The Bond Street Carolers by Mary Balogh

Author:Mary Balogh [Balogh, Mary]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance
Published: 2011-02-18T20:15:20+00:00

Katie was all dressed up in her red Christmas dress with white stockings and shoes and a white bow in her hair. All the ladies in the music room had smiled at her and told her—or Mama—that she looked like a princess or a doll or an angel. But Katie had sat down beside Matthew in the front row of chairs that went all about the room and had taken hold of his hand. He had not shaken her off as he sometimes did, but had clung, his own hand cold and damp. Katie had not cared for anyone but Matt at that moment. Matt was dreadfully afraid and terribly excited, but he was going to be wonderful. Katie just knew he was. She sat quietly telling him so with her hand while a lady with a limp played the pianoforte and then a great fat man sang with a deep voice and then another lady played that harp—Katie was going to play it too when she was grown up. It sounded lovelier than the pianoforte and the lady was able to play it with great sweeps of her arms that made her look very pretty.

And then it was Mart's turn. When he got up and dropped Katie's hand, she got up too and sat on Mama's lap, and the gentleman came and sat down beside them. Katie gazed at him. He was all in black and white tonight and looked marvelously splendid. She wished she could tell everyone that he was to be her papa, but she was not quite sure it was true. This morning for a few minutes she had even been afraid that they were never going to see him again. She had found herself doing something dreadfully babyish. She had sucked her thumb.

He did not look at her or at Mama. He looked at Matt—and Matt looked at him with great frightened eyes. And then the gentleman's eyes did what they had almost done for her yesterday. Except that it was definite this time and lasted a long time. His eyes smiled at Matt and he beamed at him without moving any part of his face. That was another expression Katie was going to practice. She had had no success with her eyebrows this morning. She wondered if she could smile without moving her face.

And then Matthew started to sing and Katie, who had been contemplating getting down and climbing onto the gentleman's lap, sat very still because Mama was holding her very tightly indeed. Matt was wonderful, as Katie had known he would be. He was more than wonderful, but she did not know another word. She was going to tell everyone when the concert was over that Matt was her brother.

A funny thing happened when he had finished singing about the little tiny child. Everyone clapped, as they were supposed to do, but some people started roaring—at least, it sounded like roaring—and some even jumped to their feet and started calling out that

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