The Viscount's Yuletide Bride
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Carol Arens
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Chapter One
The letter in Isaiah Elphalet Maxwell’s hand stung like a ball of ice—or perhaps it burned as if he crushed a live flame.
He stared out of the conservatory windows watching his young half-sister play on the shore of Lake Windermere, his heart feeling as if it were being crushed between his boot heel and a stone.
Abigail leapt, twirled in the air, then presented a deep curtsy to her cat, Eloise.
How could he not smile at her antics? Even with the letter crushed in his trembling fist, how could he not?
Eight-year-old Lady Abigail Elizabeth Turner was the one bright spot in his rather bleak home. In his life, really.
She was his, by blood and by right.
Ever since that rainy night eight years ago when his butler carried a dripping, screeching bundle into the parlour followed by a harried-looking fellow who turned out to be his late stepfather’s lawyer, Isaiah’s life had not been the same.
Half-brother—yes, he was that to Abigail—but father, too. He was the one to have cared for her, loved and nurtured her all her life. In spite of the fact that he had been only twenty-two at the time, no natural father could have been more devoted.
Spinning about, he stalked towards the fireplace, flung the missive into the flames, then returned to the window.
The wind was rising, dancing through the tree tops and scattering the last of the autumn leaves across the ground.
Naturally, Abigail did not appear to mind the cool bluster in the least. She chased the brightly hued foliage about, stomping and laughing. Her tortoiseshell cat frolicked about her skirt, swatting the lace hem.
It was time to call her inside. While it was not likely that a weakened branch would crack, fall and strike her, it could not be discounted out of hand.
Experience had taught him that he could not be too watchful when it came to keeping a child safe. An unlocked door on a freezing night had taught him that lesson.
Besides, even from here he could see the nanny shivering in her coat while stomping her feet as if that might somehow warm her.
Coming out on to the terrace, he stood for a moment bearing the cold in order to gaze at the lake. Wide and long, it resembled a frigid blue ribbon cutting the land.
Isaiah looked down the gentle slope leading to the shore. He waved his arm to get his sister’s attention. Wind caught the lapels of his coat and flapped them about.
Truly, he disliked this time of year. Hopefully it would not snow any time soon. The further they went into autumn and winter without it, the better it would be for everyone.
Seeing his signal to come inside, Abigail scooped up her cat and dashed up the stone steps. Out of breath, she wrapped her slender arms about his ribs and pressed her ear against his heart.
‘Will it snow, Isaiah?’ She hopped up and down, which made the cat wriggle out of her arms and leap inside the open door of the conservatory.
Well, lack of snow would be better for most people, but clearly not his little sister.
The nanny, her shoulders hunched, hurried past, following the cat.
‘If it does, at least we will remain properly inside the manor as sensible people should,’ she muttered in passing.
It did not seem to matter that he was Viscount Scarsfeld—the ninth one, in fact—nor that his social position outranked hers. Miss Shirls spoke her mind.
On that night when Abigail had arrived the woman had been summoned from her duties in the kitchen. With a bottle of warm milk in hand, she took the screeching baby. Before the bottle was fully suckled, Miss Shirls appointed herself nursemaid. He had allowed it since he’d had no one else. As it turned out, the transition from kitchen to nursery had worked well for Miss Shirls and for him.
Miss Shirls had been devoted to his sister every day since. He supposed it was fair and just to overlook her familiarity. Status notwithstanding, the nanny did feel as though she was family.
As family went it was only he and Abigail. If Miss Shirls placed herself with them, he did not mind in the least.
‘I want to play outdoors in the snow! I shall build half a dozen snowmen and snow cats. Will you help me, Isaiah?’
He kissed the top of her head where her hat had fallen off. Her blonde curls smelled like cold, fresh air. Could one actually smell happiness? If so, he smelled that on her, too.
Making sure Abigail grew up happy was what mattered most to Isaiah. He would do whatever was needed to keep her from the loneliness he had suffered in childhood.
As long as he drew a breath she would know every day that she was cherished.
No matter that he had tossed the letter from his late stepfather’s brother into the flames, the words remained seared on his fingers, burned into his brain.
He read them over in his mind. He did not wish to, but could not seem to help it, no matter how he tried.
Greetings, Lord Scarsfeld,
My wife and I hope all is well with you as we approach Christmas time—a holiday we have been negligent in celebrating with you and our dear niece Abigail.’
Their ‘dear niece Abigail’ whom they had never set eyes upon.
We will, however, make amends for it this year. We do appreciate that you have taken on the burden of raising her. We are forever grateful.
As if they had just due to be grateful for anything.
But now the time has come for my wife and I to lift that burden.
Abigail had never been, nor would she ever be, a burden to be lifted.
It seems only right and appropriate, since you remain unmarried and my lovely Diana has yet to bless us with a child of our own, that our niece should be raised at Penfield. I trust this is agreeable.
Please look forward to our arrival on the fifteenth of December.
With kind regards,
Penfield
Why would Penfield decide this now? In all of Abigail’s eight years they had not visited or asked for her to visit them. A rare letter was all she had received from the Earl and Countess of Penfield.
The best he could make of it was that they had given up hope of having a child of their own and had now set their sights upon his sister. Perhaps they thought London could offer advantages that a quiet life here could not.
‘You look like thunder, Isaiah.’ Abigail slashed her slim brows at him in censure. ‘It is no wonder people think you are forbidding.’
‘Who thinks it?’
‘Nearly everyone. You ought to smile upon occasion so they do not think you so imperious.’
‘Imperious?’
‘Or crusty.’
‘Crusty!’ He was only thirty years old and years away from being crusty!
‘Do you think I’m crusty?’ Please let her not.
‘I know you are not. You can be great fun when you want to be and you have the kindest soul of anyone. Although you do your best to hide it.’
‘Why would I?’
‘It is the very question I ask.’
‘You seem older than eight years.’
‘And you seem grumpier than you are.’
He did have a reputation for being glum—even surly—he had heard some whisper that sentiment. People did not seek his company unless it was necessary. Which was fine since he preferred to avoid what was to him the false merriment of social gatherings, where at every turn young ladies and their mothers vied for his attention—for his title, more to the point.
On the occasions where he had to attend a function, presenting the darker side of his nature had given him a buffer of sorts.
His distant behaviour did keep him isolated from society for the most part, but it did not overly trouble him. He was rather satisfied with the way things were. Quiet, orderly, predictable—it was how he liked his life.
‘What would you do if you were me? To make people think I’m not crusty?’
‘Smile more, of course. Perhaps laugh out loud. And put a Christmas tree in the parlour.’
A Christmas tree! He had not put up one of those since he was a child—and, no, even for Abigail he could not do it.
‘I never knew you wanted one.’
‘Everyone does, you know. Ribbons on the stairway and bows on the mantel can only bring so much Christmas cheer. As much as I enjoy the Yule log, I’m eight years old now and it is past time I had a tree.’
‘This is the first time you’ve brought up the subject.’
‘And it will not be the last. I’ve seen them in town, how lovely they are. In all the books people sing carols while gathered about them...and while eating sugar plums! What must Father Christmas think? Asking him to come into a home with no tree is rather disrespectful.’
Perhaps he ought to try to set aside his bitter resentment of Christmas trees. It was probably unreasonable to tie his crushed childhood to them. It was not a tree’s fault that his stepfather had been a beast, or that his mother had chosen him and cast off her small son.
He ought to be reasonable about it—yet he found he could not. He would give his sister anything—anything but that symbol of his deepest grief.
‘Would you rather live somewhere else, Abigail? Somewhere that can offer you more?’ Of course she was far too young to make such a choice, but given the letter from her uncle, he did need to know.
He clasped her small hand and led her into the conservatory. She clung tight to him and remained oddly silent.
Once inside he unbuttoned her coat and slid it off her.
‘Are you sending me away?’ she asked, her voice small and quavering.
‘No! Never—why would you think it?’
‘Some girls are sent away. They have to go to boarding school and learn to be proper ladies. Is it why you have not yet hired a governess to teach me?’
‘Abigail, I would never send you anywhere you do not wish to go. I promise I will not.’ Her relieved smile showed off the gap of a missing tooth. Her customary blue-eyed sparkle returned.
Isaiah’s throat tightened when the ghost of their mother skittered across her face. Their mother when she was young, before she married Palmer Turner, Fifth Earl of Penfield.
‘But it is true that you are growing up quicker than your cat can dash after a mouse. I can see you getting taller by the hour. You will need someone to teach you to be a lady. There is more to it than one would guess.’
‘Someone who will live here with us?’ Once again she looked suspiciously at him. ‘A governess, or a tutor?’
‘I was thinking more of a female relative.’
‘Lady Penfield is the only one. I believe she will not leave Penfield.’
‘I must marry. It is past time that I did.’ His sister’s mouth popped into a perfectly surprised circle. ‘How would you feel about that?’
Having a wife could only go in his favour when Lord and Lady Penfield came. He must do whatever he could to dissuade the Earl and the Countess from taking Abigail. If the issue went to court, he would lose. A married earl would be given custody over a crusty unwed viscount by any judge.
‘I’d feel a lot of things about it. But you know you must make an effort to smile at a wife or she will not be happy here.’
‘What I want to know is if you will be happy.’
‘It would be rather like having a mother in a sister. Yes, I would like that. But—will you love me less when you love her, too?’
‘Nothing in this world could make me love you less. Besides, it is not required to love one’s wife. There are happy marriages founded on friendship.’
‘If you truly thought so, you would have married by now.’
Or if his mother had found a scrap of happiness in her second marriage, he might have a more hopeful outlook on the prospect.
‘Honestly, Abigail, are you really only eight years old?’
‘I’m an eight-year-old girl, which makes all the difference. Were I a boy, all I would want to do is climb things and run about making mischief. You have seen the stableman’s son?’
‘I am forever grateful to have a sister. But do I have your approval?’
‘You do, just as long as the lady approves of cats.’
It did not appear that it was going to snow while Felicia snipped branches. Given that the clouds dotting the sky were no more than wispy puffs, it was not likely to drizzle either.
To her mind it might as well be spring in the garden of Cliverton House, with birds singing and flowers budding.
It was enough to make a holly-gatherer weep.
Christmas was supposed to be crisp and lovely.
Pausing with the clipper blades poised over a branch, she did have to admit that it was crisp and lovely. At the same time she had to remind herself that it was not in the spirit of the season to be imagining spring.
At least her fingers were chilled, her nose red with the lovely nip in the air. There was even a cup of hot cocoa close at hand, spewing fragrant steam into the garden.
Perhaps it would not snow or rain, but she carried on snipping evergreen branches with a smile. After all, Christmas was coming regardless if it arrived white and frigid or green and mild.
All things considered the weather did not really matter. Christmas was the most wonderful time of the year no matter the circumstances.
Her sisters, Cornelia and Ginny, grumbled that it was far too early to celebrate it. Of course they were not the ones to be named Felicia Merry.
Names were important. It was Felicia’s belief, and her late mother’s as well, that names had meaning, they were not simply fetching titles. Mama had often pointed out that was the reason why no one named their sons Beelzebub or the daughters Jezebel.
Funny how thinking of her mother made her smile and weep all in one tender emotion.
Time and again, she had found Mama’s name theory to be true.
In Felicia’s case it certainly was. As her name suggested, she nearly always saw the bright side of things.
‘Happy times.’ Mama had been fond of telling her what her name meant, of how she and father had thought and prayed upon it before naming her.
‘Happy times’ also described Christmas and so she had no problem whatsoever beginning to celebrate this early.
Cornelia could be excused for having her mind on other things than Christmas. She had recently become engaged to a very suitable earl. No doubt Mother and Father were gazing down and feeling very proud of their eldest child.
Ginny might come outside to join her once she put down her journal and put on her spectacles.
Spectacles she did not really need for seeing clearly. Her younger sister, by one year only, was an irresistible beauty and Felicia knew she donned them in an attempt to keep the young swains at bay.
Indeed, with her sunny curls and eyes the lavender-blue shade of a harebell blossom, she was quite sought after.
A situation which did not please her sister at all. Poor Ginny was as shy and as timid as a newborn fawn.
With the solicitor meeting with Peter in the study at the moment, Ginny would not come down without wearing her big, black glasses. Like every other man, the fellow was smitten with her.
From above, Mother and Father were probably congratulating themselves on naming her Virginia to ensure that she did not fall headlong over every gentleman wanting to woo her with flattery.
At least Mother and Father need fear nothing of the kind where Felicia was concerned. She was neither pretty nor petite. She quite towered over her sisters. To her knowledge she had never turned a man’s head. There were occasional suitors, but they were half-hearted wooers, being more interested in what Father’s title had to offer them than in her. For most of them it took no more than half an hour of being looked down upon—or having to gaze up at her—to send them searching for a more fetching lady.
An overly tall, red-haired and green-eyed woman was no one’s first choice.
After three Seasons with no offer of marriage, she was quite firmly on the shelf. In another year she would become positively dusty.
Which was not a horrid thing. No, not really.
Surely a woman could lead a satisfactory life without a husband to dictate how merry she could feel, especially at Christmas? Living at Cliverton House with her sisters and her cousin, Peter, who was now Cliverton in Father’s stead, was a satisfactory existence.
She tried not to think of how this would all change once her sisters married and once her cousin took a wife—and, really, at thirty years old it was time he did. Everything was bound to change then. It was mortifying to see herself being dependent upon her cousin and his future wife’s good will for every little thing.
‘Lady Cliverton, I would like a new bonnet, if it is not too much trouble,’ she mumbled, imaging she might one day say such a thing.
Still, for the moment she was the unattached cousin of Viscount Cliverton and she was, for the greater part, free to act as she pleased.
For instance, when she decided to decorate the parlour on the first day of December no one forbade it. While it was true that they considered her actions a wee bit eager, no one prevented her from draping holly over the fireplace mantel and red ribbons on the banister.
A husband might stay her hand, douse her joy. Not all men were enthusiastic about celebrating Christmas. She was better off unwed than being bound to a cheerless man.
Was she not?
As it was now, she was free to trim greenery with no grumpy fellow to cast a frown.
She could sing carols while she did it.
‘“I saw three ships come sailing in, on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day. I saw three ships come sailing in on Christmas Day in the morning.”’
It did feel glorious to sing. There were few things she loved more.
She went up on her toes to snip a branch that her sisters would not be able to reach. They would be forced to summon a gardener to do it. Even Peter would have to stretch on his toes to manage.
‘“And what was in those ships all three, On Christmas Day on Christmas Day—”’
‘Screeching cats.’ Peter’s voice, so unexpected, nearly made her drop the shears.
‘Take this,’ she said and handed him the branch she had just cut.
Her cousin often made jest of her singing voice. It was difficult to take offence since she knew he stated the obvious with affection.
Sadly, in spite of the fact that she adored singing, she could not carry a tune.
‘You do realise that by Christmas Day these will be dried out?’
‘In the event, I will simply cut more.’
Peter might be her cousin, but he felt more like a brother. After the death of Felicia’s aunt and uncle, he had come to live at Cliverton House so they had been raised together.
Father had made no secret of the fact that he was delighted to have his heir presumptive under his roof. Felicia always felt that Mother and Father had loved their nephew with the same affection they bore their own children.
Love was the abiding spirit at Cliverton. Even more so with Christmas so close at hand. Why, already she imagined the house scented with evergreen branches.
‘It is a nice morning, Felicia. Will you sit in the sunshine with me for a moment?’
For all that he called this a nice morning, his expression appeared drawn.
‘It is lovely, even though it is not my first choice for weather this time of year.’
Peter cleared his throat, tugged at his cravat while she sat down beside him on the garden bench. He looked rather as though he was sitting on a drawing pin.
‘Choice is a thing we do not always have, wouldn’t you agree?’
Why was his mouth drawn tight? It did not appear that he was about to break into a smile at the pleasure of spending a few moments with her.
‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘There are times when we must muddle through, regardless of circumstances.’
‘I hope this is something you believe and not a mere platitude.’
‘I’m beginning to feel that I hope I believe it, too.’ She suspected this was not simply an idle conversation on a pleasant day.
A movement on the steps caught her attention—Ginny standing on the porch, wringing her hands in front of her and looking like spoiled milk.
Clearly Felicia needed to hurry with the Christmas decorating. Something was going to need muddling through. A bit of cheer would only help.
‘Yes, well you might. Felicia, the solicitor has brought—news.’
‘Are we to assume it is not good news?’
One only needed to look at Ginny, her glasses clenched in her fist, to know it was true.
‘You had best tell me what the problem is before I imagine the worst.’ As clearly Ginny had already done.
‘Viscount Scarsfeld is requesting a bride.’
