The Young Pretender by Sheila Simonson

Author:Sheila Simonson [Simonson, Sheila]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Regency, Historical Romance, Christmas, 19th Century, Regency Romance
ISBN: 9781601741479
Publisher: Uncial Press
Published: 2012-11-16T08:00:00+00:00

7.

The next day passed without incident. Most of the snow had disappeared. The lake bed looked dreary. The sky lowered. Jean hung about the kitchen, watching the pre-Christmas baking until Cook became restive. It was not the right time to ask her for bread-baking lessons. A large parcel came from Elizabeth but not an answer to Jean's plea for advice. It was too soon. Fanny's figurines sat in their box on Jean's dresser and reproached her silently.

Being in the dower house made her homesick for Maggie, but not for Maggie, the mother of three. For Maggie her twin, her best friend, her confidante. And for her little sister, Fanny.

Jean started to write something of her mood in her journal, but she had tried to keep the daybook from becoming an organ of complaint. So she turned outward and writ what she observed. The glint of returning water in what had been the lake. Stark branches against the sky. The birds. Voices. Agnew belowstairs rumbling. Jem outside, shouting something at a passing groom. Upstairs, Georgy's voice fluted, Caro purred, Alice tweedled like a bagpipe. And Miss Bluestone? Her voice was as a clarion sounded from a distance, Jean thought, suppressing laughter at the metaphor.

A call to duty. She went downstairs at the governess's beck to help remove Elizabeth's gifts from the sturdy box they had come in. They enhanced the meagre display laid out on one of the occasional tables. No one else, it seemed, had had time to think of gift-giving either.

Jean's most startling yuletide present came, unwrapped, the next day, Christmas Eve. The first warning was Agnew's rumble downstairs. It was afternoon by then, and Jean had been writing in her journal again. She thought she heard her name below. She set her quill in the standish and made for the stairs. An altercation in the foyer? Surely not.

When she reached the landing all she could see was Agnew's thick form blocking the front door, which was open a crack. She heard a male voice she did not know.

"Did you call for me, Agnew?"

"Certainly not, my lady!" His indignation was heart-felt. Had he wanted her, he would have come upstairs, rapped on the door of her bedchamber, and awaited her pleasure--or sent one of the maids as a messenger.

"I thought I heard my name."

"This...person claims he has something for you."

She trotted down the remaining steps, agog with curiosity. Had Hugh sent her some appalling gift she would have to refuse? A diamond bracelet? An orange tree from his father's conservatory? A spotted pony?

Agnew opened the door with obvious reluctance. The "something" was a huge segment of log. The men on the porch--two grooms from the Brecon stables--had manhandled the chunk of oak to the door from the waggon waiting on the gravel of the drive. They stood there, red-faced with exertion, and grinned. The older man whipped off his cap.

"Ar, Lady Jean, Mr. Sholto's compliments. I was to say this yur is a yule log, see. 'Tis a challenge to ye.

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