Regency Christmas Gifts

by Carla Kelly

  “I have a better idea. Maybe there is some good to come of peace, after all. We’ll send Diana back to Bath, but might you and Jem be interested in an ocean voyage?”

  She moved her leg and sat up then, alert. “Are you serious?”

  “It happens all the time, when things are peaceful. You probably won’t be the only woman on board. If I get the sailing master I want, he’ll likely bring along the missus.” He tickled her. “Never interrogate a naked man, Ianthe.”

  She kissed him soundly. As little as he knew of marriage politics that sounded like aye to him.

  The room was cold and she was letting air under the blanket, sitting up like that, so he tugged her down beside him again.

  “How long is a voyage like that?”

  “Six months, if conditions are favorable, dearest.”

  “Will there be a surgeon along?”

  “Most certainly. I have a favorite one to requisition, if he’s available.”

  “Six months back, too?”

  He realized what she was hinting. “Aye, plus time in Australia before we wear ship and return home to Torquay. Are you thinking we—or you, more specifically—could possibly require the services of a doctor?”

  “I’m not an antique, Miah,” she informed him.

  Their recent breathless exertions left no doubts in his mind. “No, you are not. Neither am I, apparently, even though Diana probably thinks I am old enough to be in a grave, pulling soil over my head.”

  “Silly child,” Ianthe said, her voice drowsy now.

  He hugged her, then tried to rise. His love clamped her leg over him again. “They’ll sleep late tomorrow.”

  Content as never before, he still could not believe his good fortune. “Ianthe, you should know better than to marry another tar.”

  He sighed as she ran her strong hands over his shoulders, then spoke into his ear. “Of course I should not marry another deepwater man. Sir, I am still a woman of the West Country and you are not the only one with salt water in your veins.”

  Nothing else she could have said would have touched him more, or aroused him so much. They made love more slowly this time, savoring their common joy in the sea and the knowledge of their mutual satisfaction with the world they were born to.

  He held her close when they finished, content not to move beyond gathering her in his grasp and smiling when she hesitated, then laid her head on his chest, her arm around his body. In a euphoria of immense satisfaction, he told himself never to think of the time he’d wasted by not contacting her much sooner. Truth to tell, there had been precious few opportunities, not with war as the main course of his life’s meal. Now we have moved to dessert, he thought, and kissed her sweaty hair.

  “Since you named him Jeremiah, I wonder you did not call him by my old nickname,” he said, “I never could have misheard that.”

  She shook her head and kissed his chest. “Would you have had me in daily tears, thinking of you even more than I did?”

  “I’m not much, Ianthe,” he assured her, flattered, but ever the realist.

  “You are everything,” she contradicted. “Hush a moment, and let me savor the bliss of complete contentment. Parts of me haven’t felt this refreshed in years!”

  He laughed softly.

  He waited until she was asleep to leave her bed. She said something drowsy to him when he kissed her bare shoulder, but did not wake when he bundled up his clothes and left the room. When he was more or less chastely clad in his nightshirt, he looked in on Ianthe again. She slept peacefully. He longed to climb in beside her again, but that could wait until Mr. Everly spliced them.

  Diana was sound asleep, too, the hatbox on the floor right beside her bed. He watched her a moment, wondering how he would fare with a fifteen-year-old who probably knew all the answers to life’s pressing questions. Time to worry about that later.

  Jem had taken the telescope to bed with him. You’re a good lad, Faulk thought. I doubt your father would mind if I called you son. I already think of you that way.

  He stood at the window in Jem’s room and spent a long moment looking out at the bay and the channel beyond. Thank you, Jim, he thought. You laid a heavy charge on me, but apparently we have all been watching out for each other.

  He had never felt so content. A realistic man, he put it down to utter release in Ianthe’s bed, where he had belonged for years, but never found until now. As he stared at the dark waters, he knew it was more than that, and even more than Christmas working its magic. He had spent many Christmases looking at dark water, and he hadn’t felt like this.

  He decided it was peace. Maybe there was a use for it, after all. He would work his gun crews on the voyage to Australia, same as he always did, but there would be no need to fire the guns in anger now. Ianthe would be with him; Jem, too. Maybe in years to come, if there was time between the sea, and children and duty, he might have time to write his memoirs.

  He smiled at the bay below. Peace had brought its own Christmas gift: choice. He looked up at the sky and gave a small salute to the God of war he had invoked many a Sunday from his quarterdeck as shepherd of his flock, and then another to the God of peace.

  He stayed at the window until his feet were cold, then tiptoed into the hall. Another choice. Hopefully, Ianthe was right, and the children would sleep late. He went to her room and back to their bed. She didn’t even squeal when he put his cold feet on her warm legs. Good woman, this.

  A Little Christmas

  Gail Ranstrom

  Chapter One

  Near Greystoke, Cumberland

  December 17, 1818

  “The vultures are gathering, my lord.” The butler, a stiff elderly man with a fine mane of silver-gray hair, said and handed him a toddy.

  “Have they all arrived, then, Potter?” Viscount Sebastian Selwick stood in the library of Windsong Hall, warming his hands by the fire. He could not seem to chafe the chill from his bones, which was only partly caused by the coolness in the air. The rest, dash it all, was caused by the task ahead.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Evans have come with their servants. I have put them in the east wing. Mr. Jonathan Arbuthnot arrived early this morning, and is in the south wing. And, most recently, Mrs. Emma Grant along with her son, Master George, also in the east wing.”

  Sebastian wondered if Potter had a reason for the room assignments. Quarreling parties that had to be separated? He wished, not for the first time, that he knew more about the family. “How many have yet to come?”

  “I believe only Miss Sophia Pettibone. I have had the servants prepare a room for her in the south wing.”

  “Ah, yes. The spinster niece.” He glanced over his shoulder to the window and the midday gloom. There must be a storm gathering. “Should we send someone along the road to see if she is stuck?”

  Potter shrugged. “Surely she will not be long. We can send someone out if she has not arrived by supper, sir.”

  Supper. Sebastian sighed. He’d have to get through luncheon first. He did not relish sitting down with a table of strangers and breaking bread. He’d much rather be toasting by the fire in his library in London, dodging the merrymakers and well-wishers.

  At least he would not have to worry about merrymaking here. All he had to do was inventory the personal effects, supervise the interment of Mr. Oliver Pettibone, read the will to the gathered heirs and return to his blissfully quiet life in London. Only one thing troubled him.

  “Why must this particular part of Mr. Pettibone’s will be carried out at Windsong Hall? Would not London have done as well?”

  “It was his last request, sir. It had always been his intention to return to England once he retired, and that is why he acquired Windsong Hall.” Potter paused to clear his throat before continuing, and Sebastian wondered if he was still grieving for his employer. “Thus, when he learned that he was, er, dying, and would never occupy Windsong Hall, he expressed his desire that his funeral and the reading of his will take place here, as soon as may be after his d
emise.”

  As much sense as that made, Sebastian still resented the inconvenience of a trip to Cumberland for the sole reason that he was the eldest son of Oliver Pettibone’s also deceased partner and had read law at Cambridge. And, perhaps, that he would feel guilty if he disrespected his own father’s memory. He sighed. “Families…”

  “They are a great deal of trouble, sir. Not for everyone, I think,” Potter agreed somberly.

  Certainly not for Sebastian, at any rate. After his father remarried a woman with three daughters, there had never again been a moment’s peace in the house. And it only worsened after his father died. He’d rather face Napoleon’s army than his stepmother and stepsisters in high dudgeon.

  He sipped his toddy, relaxing as the hot brew worked to loosen the knot that had formed in his stomach. “And the remains?” he asked Potter in a sigh.

  “They should arrive tomorrow, sir. Or the next day. The London dispatcher assured me he would act with all due haste.”

  Drat! He was stuck at Windsong until Mr. Pettibone’s remains arrived. There was nothing yet to bury in the frozen cemetery overlooking the valley, and the will could not be read until afterward. At least he could use the interim to perform the sorting of Pettibone’s personal belongings.

  The luncheon bell rang and he finished his toddy in one large gulp, fortifying himself. The time had come to deal with the task at hand—the gathering of the family. He squared his shoulders and headed for the dining room.

  God save him from families.

  After introductions, they were seated and the soup, an excellent chicken bisque, was served. Stilted at first, the conversation soon turned to the only absent guest.

  “It does not surprise me, my lord, that she has not arrived in a timely fashion. Why, I shall be surprised if she arrives at all,” Mrs. Marjory Evans proclaimed over her bowl.

  Unpredictable, Sebastian gathered.

  “An unconventional gel,” her husband, Thomas, agreed. “Never biddable—she jilted a duke, you know—and disaster follows her everywhere.”

  Scandalous, too?

  Mr. Arbuthnot, a handsome blade from London who seemed to be annoyed by nearly everything, sniffed as if he smelled something vaguely unpleasant. “Really, Thomas? I hardly think you’d be impartial. The duke was not the only suitor she refused if I recall.”

  “Are you implying I was Thomas’s second choice, Jonathan?” Mrs. Evans asked with an arched eyebrow.

  “I am implying, Marjory, that Thomas is perhaps not Sophia’s most impartial critic. As for her jilts, I seem to recall some twaddle about her not wishing to be ‘controlled.’ Sophia would not be a spinster if she did not want it so.”

  Sebastian clenched his jaw, steeling himself for another week or two of bickering. Since the family could not be relied upon for an impartial description, he tried to recall what he’d been told about Miss Sophia Pettibone.

  The sole surviving child of Oliver Pettibone’s older brother, Miss Sophia had been taken to live with her mother’s side of the family when she was quite young. Later, there had been some scandal in London—likely the jilt Mr. Evans had just mentioned. He’d heard the words headstrong, odd and exotic. Put them together with unbiddable, unpunctual, scandalous and disastrous and he couldn’t imagine such a creature. She was bound to be trouble, that much was certain, and he couldn’t abide troublesome women. He wondered if the groomsmen he’d sent out had found her yet.

  “I was just making the point that we cannot expect anything ordinary from her,” Mrs. Evans said under her breath. “I warrant that she will be without a chaperone when she arrives.”

  “You shall see, my lord, and I do not envy you having to deal with her,” the usually shy Mrs. Emma Grant added.

  “Hmm,” was his only reply as he stood and dropped his napkin on his chair. With a slight bow in the ladies’ direction, he left the room. If the woman was going to be that much trouble, perhaps he ought to help the groomsmen look for her. Nothing would happen to the chit while he was responsible for events at Windsong Hall.

  Sophia Pettibone scrubbed her gloved hand across the frosted coach window as she tried to peer out at the countryside. Her excitement was growing. How lovely it would be to see her father’s side of the family again. Yes, this would undoubtedly be an opportunity to build a relationship with them. They so rarely saw each other that they were not exactly what she would call “close,” but she had longed to feel that way. To belong to something larger than herself. She sighed and put her melancholy thoughts away.

  “I have heard the lake district is the loveliest landscape in all the empire,” she told her maid. “I brought my paints along. At the very least, I shall do some sketches to complete later.”

  “Aye, miss. I warrant there’ll be plenty o’ spare time, but what could you find to paint with the leaves gone and everything so cold and bleak?”

  “Bleak? Do you not see beauty in the winter sky? The patterns of frost and the pristine blanket of falling snow? I am fascinated by the way the bare branches of trees etch a silhouette against the gray.” Sophia caught the hand strap attached to the inside wall to steady herself when the coach rocked as it hit a rut. “Goodness! Hold tight, Janie! I hope the rest of our trip will not be so rough.”

  “We must be nearly there, miss. The groom at the last inn said ‘twould only be a few hours. We have already missed lunch, I fear.”

  Before Sophia could answer, the coach lurched and began to slip sideways. “Heavens!” She raised her voice and shouted to the driver. “What has happened, sir? Have we broken a wheel?” And just then, as slowly and easily as you please, the coach tipped over on its side.

  Sophia reached for Janie and pulled her against her chest to cushion the girl’s fall. They landed with bruising force against the door. Sophia prayed that the window would not break and cut them. Her knee had jammed into the door latch and a sharp pain shot through her leg. She and Janie scrambled to right themselves and held on to each other in the dim light afforded by the single frosted window above them. Janie was moaning and shaking, and Sophia prayed she would not give in to hysteria.

  Suddenly there was more shouting than could be accounted for by her driver and footman, but the sound was muffled by snow and the position of the coach. “Miss? Miss! Is everyone all right?” her driver called.

  “We’re whole, sir!” she called. “Can you pull us out?”

  The coach rocked as someone stepped up on the axle and a moment later the door above them was thrown open. The silhouette of a man’s head and shoulders appeared above them—black against the gray sky and not their driver from the size of him.

  He reached down with a gloved hand for her, but she slapped at the insistent reach and nudged her nearly hysterical maid. “Take Janie first, please.”

  The man hoisted the plump maid without the slightest difficulty and they disappeared, no doubt to examine Janie for injuries. She held her breath as the coach slid sideways again and she pressed her lips together to keep from crying out. Oh, pray the coach was not perched on the edge of a cliff!

  “Hold the axle!” an unfamiliar voice called.

  The coach creaked as he climbed again and appeared through the window. “Now you, miss.”

  She stripped her gloves so she could clasp better and reached up to him. When his hand closed around her wrist, she gripped his wrist in return and he hoisted her upward, too, without hesitation. There was strength and confidence in that hold, and she knew he would not falter.

  Before she could see him clearly, he swung her down to the waiting arms of her driver, who caught her with a slight stagger. “Are you well, Miss Pettibone? You look…overset.”

  “Overturned would be more apt, Mr. York. But I am well enough. How is Janie?”

  “Here, miss,” the maid called from the road. “I am whole.”

  Relieved, Sophia exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “Thank heavens! You may put me down now, Mr. York.”

  The driver placed her o
n her feet, but a sharp pain shot through her right knee. She grimaced and seized Mr. York’s arm to steady herself. “Just a bruise,” she assured him. “Give me a moment to adjust and I shall be quite fine.”

  “Are ye sure, miss?”

  “I—"

  “Will not put weight on it until it has been seen to.”

  Sophia turned to the pleasantly masculine voice that had finished her sentence and recognized the silhouette of the man who had pulled her from the coach. Oh, my! He really was quite handsome. The wind had mussed his dark hair and a sweep of it had fallen across his brow to frame the most interesting eyes she had ever encountered—somewhere between gray and green. He had a strong chin with the shadow of a cleft. He smelled of fresh linen and wool with a hint of shaving soap—a very pleasant scent that caused something to tingle deep inside her. His mouth, though, was pursed in concern as he bent over her.

  Before she could respond, he swept her up and began carrying her to a coach a few yards away. Little alarm bells went off in her mind. The man was handsome, yes, but how could she possibly know his intentions?

  She wiggled, trying to get down. “Sir, put me down.” “I do not think so, Miss Pettibone. We must get you to Windsong Hall with all due haste.”

  Windsong Hall? “Are you one of the guests, sir?”

  “I am the executor of your late uncle’s estate.”

  Sophia had received a letter from a Viscount Selwick with instructions to come at once to Windsong Hall for the reading of the will. This, then, must be the unknown viscount, but that did not help her with her dilemma in the least.

  “Lord Selwick? Really, you needn’t carry me, and I must wait with Janie and the coach.”

  “I have already assured myself that Janie is sound. If I have learned anything from my stepsisters, it is to ignore demurs. Save your breath, Miss Pettibone.”

  She raised her eyebrows at his tone. “My reticule—”