Christmas Belles (7 page)

"Then what is it, Emmy?" Lucy demanded. "It
is most unlike you to tease us so."

"It is just so difficult. I don't know how to
begin." A deep blush stained Emma's cheeks. "The truth is that
Captain Trent is coming here to marry me."

Stunned silence met this announcement, the room going so
deathly quiet, Emma was driven to repeat herself as if fearing they hadn't
understood.

"The captain and I are going to be wed. Here in the
village church."

"Well!" Lucy exclaimed. "Knock me down with a
feather!"

Agnes frowned. "This does not seem logical, Emma. You
have never met Captain Trent."

"But you know I have been corresponding with him on
matters involving the estate."

Chloe remained rigid, her shock every bit as great as when
she had heard of her father's death. Her mind whirled, mostly with the image of
Captain Trent that Agnes's words had recently conjured up. Chloe had a sudden
horrific vision of Emma being dragged to the altar by some great, swarthy brute
with gold rings in his ears, a cutlass clenched between his teeth.

"Oh, Emma!" she burst out."You can't! You
mustn't."

"Of course she must." Lucy shot Chloe a look of
deep scorn. "It is a very good match. The captain is exceedingly wealthy
and of good family. Of course, there is no title, but, this is so much better
than I ever hoped for you, Emma."

"Thank you, my dear," Emma said in dull tones.

"My heartiest congratulations, Em." Lucy rustled
over to plant a kiss on Emma's cheek.

"Mine, too," Agnes said.Even at sixteen, she was
still mystified as to why one would be eager to be married. But she followed
Lucy's example and went to give Emma a hug. But it seemed to Chloe that it was
mostly to her that Emma's soft brown eyes appealed, looking for approval. An
approval Chloe couldn't give.

What was the matter with all of them—accepting Emma's
dreadful decision as though it were something to rejoice in? Lucy lost no
opportunity in racing back upstairs. She had to write her fashionable London friends,
boast that she was about to acquire a brother-in-law of wealth and distinction.
Agnes yawned and returned to her book.

But Chloe remained rooted upon the settee, unable to move.
Any misery, any calamity that came upon the family, Emma was always the
comforter. She had cradled Chloe all night long when the news of Papa had come.
But Emma made no move to either seek or give solace now. She tried to skirt
past Chloe, murmuring about something that needed her attention in the
kitchens.

Chloe could not let her escape so easily. She clutched at
her older sister's sleeve. "Oh, Emmy, why? Why are you doing this?"

"Well, as Lucy says, it is an excellent match."

"As if you care for such stuff. This isn't right. You know
it isn't. You are not in love with the captain."

"I am sure that, given time, I will learn to esteem
him."

"No, you won't. Not when you are already in love with
someone else."

Emma paled. "Chloe, please."

But Chloe continued relentlessly. "You are in love with
Mr. Henry. And he is in love with you."

"No, Chloe. You must never speak of such a thing
again."

"Why not, when it is true?"

Emma looked stricken. "Have I been so terribly obvious,
then, going about with my heart on my sleeve?"

"No, Emma, if anything, you conceal your feelings far
too well. But I can hear it in the way you say his name, the way he speaks of
you. And it was predicted, remember? That last Christmas Eve we spent with
Papa, when I read your fortune in the lead. It said you would wed a
clergyman."

"A silly children's game, Chloe."

"Perhaps it was, but being in love is not. I have been
expecting Mr. Henry to offer for you, oh, for ages."

A sad smile tipped Emma's lips. "Then you have little
understanding of his character, my dear. He is a poor man, but very proud.
While he can offer me so little and he is already burdened with the
responsibility of his mother and younger brothers, he will never ask me to be
his wife."

"Then you must wait. Surely something will happen.
Perhaps he will get a better living or a rich uncle will die and leave him a
fortune."

"We are a little too old to believe in fairy-tale
endings, Chloe."

"Perhaps so, but that is still no reason for you to
rush into marriage with a stranger."

"I fear there is, Chloe. We are all under a deep
obligation to Captain Trent. Not only did he permit us to continue living in
his house, but I strongly suspect he has done more for us. Papa was returned to
government service for only a few months. It is foolish to suppose he would
have been paid such a handsome settlement. I suspect, nay, I am certain the
captain has been supporting us with his own money."

"Oh, Emma. No!" Chloe exclaimed, much shocked.

"Yes, and even you must fully perceive how improper
that is. He is not even that close a relative. It places us quite deeply in his
debt. Since he has done me the honor of asking for my hand, it is clearly my
duty to accept him."

Duty. Chloe winced. That was one of those disagreeable words
that always applied to something vastly unpleasant. It did not at all fit
Chloe's romantic conception of what a bride's attitude toward her intended
should be.

Yet Chloe saw the uselessness of further argument. Gentle
Emma might be, but she could wax stubborn as well, especially when she was
thoroughly convinced she was doing the right thing.

She would marry this captain in stoic fashion, be a good and
faithful wife. Over the years, she would forbid herself to even think of Mr.
Henry. But those moments would come, Chloe knew, when Emma would be unable to
help it, and then her heart would break in silence.

Long after Emma had left her, Chloe sat alone in the parlor,
feeling very bleak. The burden of that final responsibility Papa had laid upon
her suddenly seemed very heavy, weighting down her heart.

"Keep faith when there seems little reason to do so,
believe that even the impossible can often be very possible. Be the Keeper of
Dreams, Chloe.".

"How am I supposed to do that, Papa?" Chloe
lamented. "When my sisters persist in dreaming of the wrong things."

There was Agnes, who seemed doomed to become a hermit, going
blind over her books and Lucy, becoming so hard, almost mercenary. Yet Chloe
could not spare a thought for them right now. Emma was the one in most
immediate danger. But how was one to rescue a sister when she refused to
cooperate?

"You can't fling away your happiness in this fashion,
Emma. I won't permit it." Yet even as Chloe formed this resolve, her heart
misgave her.  She would be putting herself into opposition against this
unknown captain, who was fast assuming the dimensions of a Blackbeard in her
mind.

Well, she didn't care. Let him rattle his saber and bellow
at her all he liked. If she had to move both heaven and earth to do so, she
would find some way to prevent Emma's marriage to Captain William Trent.

Chapter Three

The winding drive came to an abrupt halt, and Windhaven
Manor loomed out of the early-morning mist. With the fog so thick, it was as
though one minute the house wasn't there and the next it was, in all its ramshackle
splendor.

Leaning forward, Trent peered out the window of the carriage
for the first glimpse of his inheritance. He stifled a soft groan. It was worse
than anything he could have imagined. He knew that most great houses were the
work of many generations, but he had never seen one that was such a positive
horror of Georgian and Gothic revival. Far from the additions blending
harmoniously, Windhaven simply looked as if one mad architect couldn't make up
his mind.

The bailiff he had hired had warned Trent. In all his
reports, Mr. Martin had found the house quite impossible. Of course, Trent
meant to subject the place to a thorough inspection of his own, but he doubted
he would waste much time or money on Windhaven. Very likely he would close up
the house and seek to provide his new bride with some more suitable dwelling,
perhaps closer to the port of London. Emma's sisters could continue to reside
with her there until each of the girls had been married off in turn.

As the coach lurched to a halt before the front steps
leading past the colonnade, Trent did not wait for the postilion to come to his
aid. Tucking his cockaded hat beneath his arm, he shoved open the door and
leapt down to the gravel path.

As he did so, the hilt of his dress sword tangled in his
cloak. Trent straightened it, feeling more than a little foolish. He had given
in to Doughty's cajolery and worn his uniform after all, although the Lord
alone knew why. Perhaps because, although he was loath to admit it, he was
experiencing just a hint of nervousness about meeting his bride. He was not
attempting the role of a peacock, but surely it could do no harm to present
himself in his best light, as an officer and a gentleman.

While Trent stretched his legs, a little cramped from all
those hours stuffed into the coach, Doughty climbed down from the box where he
had been riding with the coachman. One would have thought that by this time a
groom or some sort of servant would have come scurrying forward to help with
the horses, but there was no sign of anyone.

"Shall I start hauling down the baggage, Cap'n?"
the steward asked.

"Belay that a moment, Mr. Doughty." Frowning,
Trent stared up at the house, mantled in its early-morning stillness. An
unnatural silence seemed to hang over the place, but that might be owing to the
mist. Fog had a way of lending an aura of unreality to things,

"I don't see any sign of Mr. Lathrop, sir,"
Doughty said, attempting the hopeless task of peering back down the drive.
"Do you suppose we lost 'im?"

"Possibly, but Mr. Lathrop is more resourceful than he
seems. I am sure he will catch up to us." All the same, Trent spared a
glance in that direction himself. An excellent horseman, Charles had scorned
making the journey closeted in the coach. An indifferent rider himself, Trent
had not even been tempted to join him, especially not in this cold, damp
weather.

Although certain his friend was all right, if Charles did
not appear soon, Trent would have to go look for him. For the present, he
turned back to his immediate problem, his astonishing lack of any kind of
reception. Granted, he had pressed on a little hard, arriving a day earlier
than expected. Still, his appearance should not take the household that much by
surprise.

"Go knock on the door, Mr. Doughty," Trent
commanded. "At least the butler must be up and stirring."

"Aye, aye, sir." Doughty bounded up the steps and
beat an impatient tattoo with the brass door knocker. When moments passed and
that drew no response, the steward used his brawny fist, hammering hard enough
to set the portal atremble.

His efforts were greeted with nothing but that unrelenting
silence. When the burly man raised his fist again, Trent called, "Hold,
Mr. Doughty. This is of no avail. You have already pounded loud enough to wake
the dead."

It was an unfortunate choice of words, for Doughty's eyes
waxed large and round. "Aye, Cap'n, that's just what I was thinkin'
meself. This be some sort o' ghost house."

"Don't be absurd," Trent said. That was all he
needed, Doughty suffering from one of his attacks of superstition run rampant.

"D'ye want me to try peekin' in some o' the
windows?" Doughty clearly made this offer with all the valor he could
muster, but he swallowed deeply.

"Of course not," Trent said. "Go around back
of the house and see if you can roust out a groom or stableboy. I shall go try
one of the other doors."

"Aye, Cap'n." Doughty looked none too happy about
it, but he shuffled off to obey.

Trent stalked back along the drive, gravel crunching beneath
his boots. The noise sounded unnaturally loud, as noises were wont to do in
fog. He spied a path winding around the side of the house and took it, thinking
it might lead to a garden entrance or perhaps the kitchen door.

The path was thick with overgrown shrubberies, badly in want
of a trimming. The sight of nature run wild only added to the house's air of
desertion, of being lost to the enchantment of time.

Trent was not often given to harboring fancies, but he began
to feel as if he had strayed into some strange dream in which he had only
imagined Sir Phineas Waverly, his four daughters, and the betrothal to Miss
Emma. Perhaps the mists would close and the house would disappear in a minute.

Trent brought himself up short, disgusted with himself for
entertaining such foolish thoughts. At the next turn in the path, he would
chance upon someone, some logical explanation for why no one had come forth to
greet him.

Yet what happened next seemed to defy all logic. One of the
bushes at the corner of the house was seized with a violent fit of shaking.
Then a laugh carried to Trent's ears.  It was low, musical, and almost
haunting. Trent started in spite of himself. He called out in his best
quarterdeck roar, "Is someone hiding over there? Show yourself at
once."

He would not have been surprised if he had received no
answer, given the strangeness of everything else about this place. But the next
second, a girl emerged onto the path. Although she was garbed in a long, green
coat, Trent could tell that she was as slender and graceful as a sylph. Her
hood was flung back, revealing masses of golden brown hair, tumbling in waves
about a delicate face with an ivory complexion blushed with rose.

Because she came upon him as she did, so suddenly out of the
mist, Trent was reminded of those legends his sailors wove on dark, lonely
nights at watch. Legends of a nymph riding the ocean's foam, a lady of the sea,
calling with her siren song, her arms outstretched. Trent himself had never
been visited by such an apparition. Until now.

The girl halted a few feet away from him on the path and
dropped a curtsy. "Good day to you, sir," she said simply.

It took Trent a moment to realize he was staring, frozen as
though some spell had been cast upon him. He snapped himself out of it with a
brisk shake.

"Good day, Miss…" He paused, subjecting the girl
to a quick assessment, deciding that whoever she was, she could not be his Miss
Emma. "Are you one of the daughters of this house?"

Before the girl could reply, a second figure darted out from
nowhere. Erupting from behind the girl's skirts was a moppet of a child, a
coarse woolen cap crushing her flyaway baby curls. She was bundled up in a
thick coat that made her look round enough to roll.

Yet the urchin managed to launch herself at Trent and fling
her arms about his knees. He stiffened, considerably taken aback. His
experience with small children was limited, but he followed one invariable
formula. Admire their well-scrubbed appearance, give them a stern smile, and
pat them on the head.

But he had never had one leeched to his leg before.
Moreover, besides appearing grubby, with blueberry stains about her mouth, this
babe looked fierce enough to take off his hand should he attempt to touch her.

"Kotcha, kotcha, kotcha," she called out in a
singsong of triumph. "Bean'tu n'elf kin?"

Trent felt very much as though he had wandered into a
strange land whose inhabitants spoke some Lilliputian language he could not
comprehend.

"I am afraid I don't quite understand," he said.

The girl in the green coat broke into a trill of laughter.
Her remarkable light blue eyes sparkled like sunshine on the water.
"Peggety wants to know if you are the king of the elves," she said,
amazingly able to translate the moppet's speech.

"Certainly not!" Trent told the child gruffly.

"Bean'tu kin o'ferries, 'en?" Peggety demanded,
equally as gruff.

"Be not you the king of the fairies, then?" the
girl repeated.

"No!" Trent bent down to pry the child away, but
Peggety had already released him with a look of disgust.

"C'mon, Klooey," she said, tugging at the older
girl. "No ferries 'ere. 'Et's go back inner kittchin n'eat s'more
pie."

With that, the child ambled off down the path, vanishing
round the corner of the house Trent almost reached out, fearing the girl would
disappear as well.

But she lingered to apologize. "I am sorry if Peggety
startled you, sir. We have been searching in the bushes for fairies all morning
without success, and she has grown impatient."

Trent frowned. "Do you think that a proper game to play
with the child, encouraging her to believe such nonsense?"

"Why not? We might actually turn up an elf or
two."

"Of course you won't."

"But we could."

Trent raked the girl with an impatient stare. He realized
she must be older than he had first imagined. Her lack of inches had deceived
him, but the hinting of her curves did not. She must be eighteen, at the least.

"Aren't you a little old," he said sternly,
"to be thinking such things as fairies really do exist?"

"Aren't you a little young to be so sure that they
don't?"

This absurd conversation was getting him nowhere. The young
woman confounded him further by saying pleasantly, "You are a stranger to
these parts, sir. Are you lost?"

"I didn't think so," he muttered. "But now I
am not so sure. Is this Windhaven Manor?"

"Yes, certainly it is." She studied him
thoughtfully, for the first time appearing to notice the cockaded hat tucked
under his arm. Trent's cloak had shifted open enough to reveal the shaft of his
sword and the gleam of his gold buttons.

The young lady went pale, her eyes widening in dismay.

"Oh, by my saints!" she whispered.
"Blackbeard!"

"I beg your pardon?"

"N-nothing," she stammered. Friendly enough only a
moment ago, she now took a wary step backward. "Could you possibly be
Captain Trent?"

"I could—that is, I am. And you are?"

"Chloe."

This soft response conveyed nothing to Trent until he
searched his memory. "Oh, you must be Miss Waverly's youngest
sister."

"Next to the youngest," she said. She started to
offer her hand, withdrew it and curtsied again instead. "Welcome to
Windhaven, Captain."

"Thank you, Miss Chloe. Though I cannot say it has
proved to be much of a welcome so far. Do you realize that no one came to
answer the front door when I knocked?"

"That is not surprising. Emma and Polly are likely in
the kitchen with Old Meg. That's way at the back of the house. Lucy is still
abed, and Agnes, when she is reading, would never bother herself about the
door. And as for me, I was—"

"Beating the bushes for fairies with Peggety. Yes, I
know "

She finally had the grace to blush.

Trent continued, "I wasn't aware there were any
children upon the estate."

"There aren't. Peggety belongs to Sukey Green, who
worked as a housemaid here until she married a sailor from Littledon. That's
our village and near enough that Sukey still visits us. Our cook, Old Meg,
makes the best possets, and Sukey is quite heavy with child and-- "Chloe
paused, looking a little self-conscious. "Er- that is Lucy says that I
should say Mrs. Green is 'in an interesting condition.' "

"Well, ah, yes. Ahem." Trent gave a deep cough. He
was accustomed to hearing seamen swear with fluency and crack the most lewd of
jests, but he felt embarrassed to be discussing women "in interesting
conditions." He made haste to turn the subject.

"I did find it strange when we knocked so hard and got
no response. I thought we might at least have raised your butler."

The most enchanting dimple quivered in Chloe's cheek.
"That would have been quite a feat, sir. Poor Giddings has been dead these
many years, and we have never had another manservant. We always leave the front
door unlatched during the day. Everyone hereabouts knows that."

"What! Leave the door unlatched so any mendicant might
wander in! And what about thieves?"

"We have no thieves in this district. Besides, we have
nothing to steal."

Trent's disapproval must have been obvious, for she tossed
her head slightly. "We trust our neighbors enough to leave the door
unlocked. That is just our way here, Captain." She seemed to be defying
him to change the custom, which Trent had every intention of doing.

He decided that he had been quite wrong to entertain any
notion of Miss Chloe resembling a sea sprite. No nymph would ever be possessed
of such a stubborn chin. But Trent was not seeking any confrontation at the
moment.

He let the matter of the door pass, saying, "I did not
mean to sound critical, Miss Chloe. I fear I am a little tired from my journey,
and I would like to pay my respects to your sister."

"Which one? Oh, you must mean Emma." She looked a
little glum as she reached this conclusion.