An Enchanted Christmas

by Barbara Metzger

  “I swear I never saw her be—” He was liable to be struck by lightning after all, for that bouncer. “That is, I do not know the child.”

  The little girl chose that moment to step closer yet to the horses and remove her bonnet. Lady Susannah gasped, or was that Gregory’s sharp intake of air? It sure as Hades was Viscount Bryson’s perfectly straight hair on that child’s head—a perfect match to his pale, almost white, blond hair, hanging down past her shoulders.

  Lady Susannah caught her breath first. Then she caught the viscount on the cheek with her swinging reticule. Jupiter, Gregory thought, reeling, she must carry a cannonball in the thing.

  “How dare you subject me to such an indignity?” she shrilled. “My father will hear of this.”

  If Earl Blakenthorpe was anywhere in London that afternoon, he’d already heard, the woman was that loud. Struck, stunned, and almost stupefied, Gregory jerked on the ribbons. The job horses broke stride. One gelding tried to rear in the traces; the other tried to go back to its stall. While Lord Bryson struggled to regain control, Lady Susannah berated his driving, his ethics, and his ancestors, it seemed. The child jumped back, but the breeze caught the bonnet she held in one hand and carried it aloft—right in front of the already unsettled horses. It was all Gregory could do to keep them from bolting, straining at the reins for all he was worth. The curricle swayed and swerved, and a wheel brushed the red-cloaked child.

  A woman screamed. Men shouted. The groom behind him cursed. My Lord, Gregory thought as he fought to halt the horses, he’d struck an infant! Here he’d been worrying over a dripping nose! He leaped out of the curricle as soon as it stopped moving. The groom ran to the horses’ heads, and Lady Susannah clambered down without waiting to be assisted. Instead of joining the viscount on his race back to the crumpled heap in the grass, Lady Susannah hurried to join a knot of friends gathered around a barouche and a phaeton some distance away.

  Without a second glace toward his disappearing companion—and disappearing hopes of settling his debts—Gregory fell to his knees beside the still figure. The moppet was breathing, thank heaven! But her eyes were closed, and she was deathly pale. He smoothed back a lock of her damnable—and damning—hair, and started to feel the girl’s head for bumps and bruises. “Come on, sweetheart,” he begged. “Wake up and tell me you are all right.”

  “I do not think she is unconscious,” a calm voice spoke from beside him. “I saw the entire incident and do not believe the wheel actually touched her. She is merely frightened, I would guess. See? She has not lost her grip on the doll.”

  The porcelain doll seemed to have taken the worst of the fall, suffering a chipped nose, a shattered arm, and a thoroughly muddied dress. If those were the extent of the damages, Gregory would consider himself blessed. He stopped feeling the infant’s birdlike bones for breaks and looked up to see a pretty young woman of about five-and-twenty bending over the child. She wore a soft gray cape and a plain black bonnet, with her brown hair in a neat coiled braid at her neck. Two little boys hovered nearby. The errant governess, Lord Bryson assumed.

  “How the devil could you—” he began only to be interrupted with her, “How could you let your daughter—”

  “She is not my daughter,” he said through gritted teeth. She was obviously not this competent-seeming governess’s charge, either, then. “I have no idea who she is.”

  The cursed female raised one dubious eyebrow as she silently studied the admittedly astounding resemblance. The brat even had a tear running down her cheek to land at the tip of her nose.

  Gregory cursed under his breath, easily reading the woman’s thoughts, that he had the morals of a maggot. “Not acknowledged, not unacknowledged. Not from the wrong side of the blanket, not mine, period, Miss…”

  “Haney. Claire Haney.” She glanced back to make sure the little boys had not strayed away.

  Gregory nodded. “I am Bryson, and I do not go around littering the countryside with my by-blows,” he said, bringing a blush to Miss Haney’s smooth cheeks. He could not tell if she believed him, and he could not understand why it seemed to matter to him. “But if I did, I would not let any offspring of mine wander the city unattended.”

  “That is all well and good, my lord, but what do you intend to do with her now?”

  “What do I…?” He intended to go home and have a brandy. Or two.

  “You cannot simply leave her lying there.”

  “Surely someone will be looking for her. We have only to wait a moment or two before they realize she is gone missing.”

  Miss Haney did not seem convinced. “I have been in the park with the boys most of the afternoon and noticed her earlier, because she was all by herself.”

  “Then she had to have come from some nearby house,” Gregory said with more confidence than he felt. He’d never seen the little girl with any nursemaid, either, but had always assumed the child was with someone. Now he realized she’d been alone, studying the riders to find a likely target: a clunch who looked enough like her to be mortified by her blackmail scheme. He angrily turned back to the child, who had not moved. “Come now, missy. Open your eyes and tell us where you live so I can see you home.”

  Her eyes stayed tightly shut, suspiciously so. Gregory frowned. “Well, then I suppose I can deliver her to the magistrate’s office, or the nearest Charley. They’ll know what to do with a lost child.”

  The youngster’s eyes opened. They were blue, of course, with a darker blue rim. Just like his.

  “Hell and damnation!” Gregory swore.

  Miss Haney drew in a breath at his language, and the child cringed. “Please, Papa,” she said.

  “I am not your father, deuce take it! Now, tell us where you live so we can be on our way.”

  The girl’s lower lip started quivering.

  “Dash it, you are not going to cry, are you?”

  She shook her head and whimpered, “No, Papa.”

  “I am not—” he started to shout, when Miss Haney laid a small, neatly gloved hand on his arm.

  “Let me, my lord,” she said. She knelt nearer the child, without worrying over her gown or her cloak, and spoke in a gentle voice. “Will you tell us your name, dearest? We only wish to help, you know. No one will turn you over to the Watch, I promise.” She glared at the viscount when he would have protested.

  “Hannah.”

  “That’s a lovely name. Does your head hurt, Hannah?”

  “No.”

  “Does anything else hurt? Are you dizzy, and that is why you cannot remember your address?”

  Hannah started to say no, but then thought better of it, and changed her head shake to a nod.

  “Gammon. Anyone can see the brat is lying. She has a vivid imagination, is all. I shall simply take her to the nearest foundling home if she will not divulge an address,” Gregory threatened.

  “An orphanage? You could not be so cruel,” Miss Haney protested.

  What other choices did he have? The viscount barely had enough blunt to buy the chit a new doll. His best chance of satisfying his creditors and saving his estate was driving off with Sir Nigel Naperson in his high-perch phaeton. Lady Susannah was laughing gaily at something the chinless clunch was saying, as if a child’s life and near death was of no account. He stared after the disappearing equipage, frowning.

  Misinterpreting his lingering glance, Miss Haney clucked her tongue like the schoolmistress Gregory took her to be. He turned back to the brown-haired young woman and asked, “Can you not take her in until her people come for her?”

  She glanced toward the two boys who were now talking to his groom, petting the horses, and then looked back at Hannah. “I am afraid that Lady Handbury, the boys’ mother…” Her voice faded off.

  If Diana, Lady Handbury, was the lads’ mother and Miss Claire Haney’s employer, Gregory pitied them all, including Handbury. Lady Handbury was a stiff-rumped, prune-faced shrew who fancied herself an arbiter of social behavior. Her long nose was so often in the a
ir, she looked like a jackass reaching for an apple. No, she would never take a waif into her home, which meant he was stuck finding a place for Hannah. The devil take it, the chit had to belong somewhere! He asked her again, none too gently, earning him a scowl from Miss Haney. Hannah raised a stubborn chin, enough for him to see she had a tiny cleft there. He quickly lowered his own clefted chin into his neckcloth. Thunderation.

  The terror Lord Bryson had suffered earlier was receding, to be replaced by anger. The whole situation was nonsensical, to say nothing of nightmarish. “How could you have done such a damn fool thing, anyway?” he practically yelled at the child, forgetting the governess’s presence. “You could have been killed.”

  “I only wanted to go home with you, Papa.”

  “I am not your papa, and you cannot go home with me. Now, get up off the cold ground before you take a chill and lay that in my dish, too.” He did not wait for Hannah to stand, but scooped her up. He was astonished at how light she felt. Why, his greatcoat weighed more. She put one arm around his neck and softly patted his cheek where the bruise from Lady Susannah’s reticule was still bright red. To Gregory, her touch felt like a butterfly’s wing on his skin, and he decided it was simpler to hold Hannah at eye level than to keep bending down to talk to the plaguey chit. He turned to Miss Haney, hoping she might have a suggestion to offer.

  Claire looked from one to the other, not knowing what to believe. Here was a remarkably attractive gentleman behaving like a bee-stung badger, while tenderly cradling a remarkably similar child. Everyone knew Viscount Bryson’s pockets were to let, and he was dangling after Lady Susannah Fitzjohn and her dowry. A love child could not further his cause in that quarter. Yet he had sworn Hannah was not his, and he was reputed to be an honorable man. Poor, yes, and seeking to make an advantageous marriage, but honorable. She shook her head.

  Gregory could see the indecision in Miss Haney’s pretty green eyes. She was a respectable female, past dewy-eyed innocence, but no woman of the world who would be unfazed by licentious behavior. If she did not believe him, no one would. He looked down at the tiny mirror image in his arms. “Hannah, have you a last name?”

  Hannah nodded. “Marvell.”

  “Marvell…Marvell. Lud, your mother isn’t Ann Marvell, is she?”

  Hannah nodded again.

  “Marvelous Marvell? Why, she used to be the highest paid”—he recalled the proper governess—“ah, entertainer in London.”

  “Then you did know Hannah’s mother, my lord?” Ice dripped from Miss Haney’s voice.

  “Gads, no. I could never have afforded— That is, before my time. I would have been at university during the Marvell’s reign. But my brother, my deceased brother, just might have known her.” And it would have been just like feckless Gordon to keep an expensive mistress while the roof of their house rotted. Which made Hannah Gregory’s niece, and his responsibility for sure.

  “Where is your mother now, Hannah?” he asked, relieved that all he had to do was restore the moppet to the demi-mondaine. “I am sure she must be frantic with worrying over you.”

  “Oh, no. She has gone to Russia. To the court.”

  Oh, Lord. “Your mother is visiting the tsar?”

  Hannah did not know about any tsar. “She is gone to Russia to be the court’s Ann.”

  Miss Haney coughed.

  “I, ah, see. Then who is caring for you until your mother returns?”

  Obviously, if anyone cared about her, ever, Hannah would not be in the park on her own, but Gregory had to ask, praying for an aunt or a cousin or a former colleague. Lud, his niece being raised by a retired bird of paradise? The viscount’s blood ran cold at the thought. No, he was simply cold. Hannah must be, too, in her lighter cape. He opened his greatcoat and wrapped it around her, still in his arms.

  Hannah snuggled closer, making sure the doll was well covered, too. “She is not coming back. Miss Chiswell said so.”

  Oh.

  Chapter Three

  While Viscount Bryson waited outside the door of the Chiswell London Academy for Girls, he was wishing he’d brought an extra handkerchief. Hannah had cried and begged the whole way here from the park, weeping onto his collar and down his shirtfront, turning him and his only handkerchief into a dirty, sodden mass. To think that he’d been worrying over staining his breeches, kneeling on the damp ground to propose to Lady Susannah. Instead his name was being dragged through the mud. His neckcloth was ruined, along with his reputation. Worst of all, his heart was close to breaking.

  What else could he do but return the runaway to her school? Lud knew he could not afford to hire her governesses and nursery maids. A hair ribbon and a clean handkerchief were the best he could manage with his current situation. In another month he would lose the family estate unless he could find the wherewithal to pay the creditors he’d inherited along with the title and property. Gregory’s father had gambled on ’Change and ended with nothing but worthless stocks. His older brother had wagered on fast horses, and ended with a broken neck. Gregory had just gambled on marrying an earl’s daughter—and lost. Now he was in worse straits than before, with the bank sure to discover that his golden goose had flown the coop. Word of the debacle in the park would already be flying from club to coffeehouse to servants’ quarters. The bankers would not wait much longer before installing their own manager at Belle Towers, a land agent who would squeeze every last shilling from the already impoverished tenants. Viscount Bryson would have to seek employment—though Zeus knew he was unskilled for any position—or join the army.

  If he could not care for his own dependents, Viscount Bryson could certainly not support an unknown infant. Besides, Hannah needed a woman’s care, a female’s education. She needed a home with people who knew how to raise a child, who could give her respectability along with affection.

  The archwife at the academy would not have known affection if it bit her on the arse. Miss Chiswell was a dry old stick, who kept a stick near to hand. Gregory did not wish to think about the uses for such an implement. This was an establishment for little ladies, by Jupiter, not hell-born boys.

  He put Hannah down once they were shown into Miss Chiswell’s office, but the girl clung to his leg. The headmistress came around from behind her desk when they entered, but all she said was “Well, well, well.”

  “Not well at all,” Gregory replied. “I found one of your charges playing truant.”

  Miss Chiswell ignored his words, studying the unkempt gentleman and his butter stamp instead. She quickly noted the lack of shine to his boots, the slightly ragged edge of his coat sleeve, the length of his untrimmed hair. There was no money to be had here, so she did not bother with polite insincerity. “I see the brat landed on her feet after all.”

  “No, she landed in the dirt.” Gregory handed Hannah the doll she’d insisted be carried, too, hoping she’d then release his leg. “Why was she not under your supervision? How could you permit a mere babe to be out on her own?”

  Miss Chiswell’s nostrils flared so, she looked like a hound on the scent of a fox. “You are a fine one to ask, sirrah. Why was she not under your protection all these years?”

  Because her mother had never been under his protection, Gregory wanted to shout, but he knew this tight-lipped matron would never believe anything but the evidence of her own eyes. “I never knew of her existence until this afternoon. My deceased brother might have. I have no way of knowing. She is a sweet little thing but she is not mine, so I am returning Hannah to you.” He started to pry Hannah’s fingers off his legs. A barnacle would have been easier to dislodge.

  “Not so fast. Her tuition has not been paid.”

  What was left of Gregory’s poor heart sank, and his light purse grew poorer. He’d have to pay the witch’s fees, of course, which meant he was that much further behind on the mortgage payments. What was the difference? He had no chance of meeting the new year’s deadline. He nodded.

  “No, Papa,” Hannah cried. “Do not leave me here!”<
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  “For the last time, poppet, I am not your father, and you have to—”

  “No! They take the money and never use it on us. Miss Chiswell buys herself jewelry that she puts on when no one is looking and—”

  “That will be enough, Hannah,” the headmistress said, reaching for Hannah’s arm and dragging her away from Lord Bryson.

  “—and Mr. Chiswell visits Sukey Johnson every week, and everyone knows she is a—”

  Miss Chiswell slapped Hannah so hard the child would have fallen, except that Gregory caught her, and folded her back against his chest, doll and all.

  “I have reconsidered,” he told the woman on his way out. “Hannah will not be staying here after all. I would not leave my dog in this place, under your care.”

  “Do you have a dog, Papa? Can I play with him? What’s his name?”

  Gregory was so angry that he walked seven blocks with Hannah in his arms jabbering away before he recalled the curricle and groom he’d left waiting. “We can send him back for your belongings.”

  Hannah tried to brush the dirt off her doll’s skirt so the embroidered hearts showed. “I already have Valentina, and that’s all I own.”

  Gregory cursed under his breath. The chit did not have a change of clothes? A nightgown? A hairbrush of her own? He could not decide whom he wished to strangle most: Miss Chiswell, Ann Marvell, or his own dearly—but less dear by the moment—departed brother.

  As he lifted Hannah into the curricle, he noticed the scarlet mark of the Chiswell bitch’s hand on the child’s cheek. “Does that hurt, sweetheart? We’ll put a cold cloth on it as soon as we reach my flat.”

  “Oh, no, Papa,” she said, reaching out to touch his own cheek where he’d have a black-and-blue bruise by morning. “Now we just match better.”