Part 1 (1/2)
The Christmas Ornament.
by Carla Kelly.
It happened over tea in October, 1815, tea in London with an old friend who required few conversational preliminaries, beyond the observation that Napoleon was at long last taking a sea voyage to St. Helena, and the weather was unusually pleasant for fall.
”Excellent tarts, by the way, Lord Waverly,” Sir Waldo Hannaford said, eyeing the table again. ”Prune centers?”
”Yes, indeed, Sir Waldo,” the older man replied. ”Did'ye ever think a purgative could be so tasty?”
Sir Waldo didn't, of course. There was a time when he would have eyed the tarts with a fair amount of suspicion. But he was older now, and willing to indulge in something that might smooth out the effect of too much dinner last night at his daughter Louisa's house. He ate another, then settled himself before the fire, sharing the footstool with his older neighbor from Woodcote, Lord Waverly of Enderfield.
”Gilbert, I have something to ask you,” he began after a long moment's thought.
”Ask away, Waldo. The only thing I have ever held back from you is the location of my favorite trout stream in Scotland.”
It was a joke of long standing between the two, and they both chuckled, then settled back into the comfort they were born to. ”Gilbert, I have a daughter,” Sir Waldo announced at last.
”I believe you have three,” the marquess replied, a smile playing around his lips.
”Indeed, I have. One is married and lives here in London as you well know, and the other followed her laird to Inverness, where, incidentally, he has an excellent trout stream on his estate.”
Lord Waverly clapped his hands and then rested them on his comfortable expanse of waistcoat. ”Good for you! And there is little Olivia, if I am not mistaken.”
”Indeed there is, my friend, except that little Olivia grew up.”
Lord Waverly looked at him over his spectacles, his eyes bright. ”Did she do that, too? Children have that knack, haven't they?”
Sir Waldo nodded, pleased at his friend's good nature. ”She is eighteen this month, and preparing for a come-out.”
”Lord help us! Eighteen! I remember when Jemmy aided and abetted in pulling out two of her baby teeth. Eighteen, you say? A come-out?”
”That is the plan, except that Lady Hannaford and I are not so certain that a come-out is quite the thing for Olivia.” He leaned forward to explain himself better. ”Martha is determined that Olivia should marry within the district, because she cannot bear to see her last chick fly from the nest.” He looked down at his hands, wondering how to say this. ”I am not so certain that Olivia would be happy with what she would find here on the Marriage Mart, anyway.”
”Picky?” Lord Waverly asked.
”No. Rather too intelligent for her own good,” Sir Waldo stated, crossing his fingers that such an admission would not lower him in his neighbor's esteem.
He wasn't sure. Lord Waverly frowned and contemplated the sweets again. ”I have one of those,” he said.
”A prune tart?” Sir Waldo asked, following the direction of his host's gaze.
”No, no! A son too smart for his own good.” He scowled at the dessert tray and motioned for the footman to remove it. ”You cannot guess what he is studying now.”
Sir Waldo couldn't. He had endured a year's incarceration at Magdalen College until his father was kind enough to die and provide a ready-made excuse to return home to run the estate. He had never found scholars.h.i.+p to his taste. ”No, I cannot imagine,” he said.
”He watches people move!”
”No!”
”Yes! He sketches all their motions and tries to figure out ways for them to do their tasks more efficiently.” Lord Waverly made a face and moved closer. ”He even attends autopsies here at London Hospital to study muscles.”
”No!”
”The double firsts were bad enough, but Jemmy knows so much now that I have a hard time talking to him. He is a don at All Souls and he actually has students who write down every pearl of wisdom that issues from his overheated mind! I call it ungentlemanly, and so I tell him, but he just laughs ...” He lowered his voice. ”... and ruffles my hair. The tall take liberties,” he concluded.
A gloomy silence settled over the sitting room; a log dropped in the fireplace. ”Is he attached to a female?” Sir Waldo asked, his voice more tentative, considering his friend's obvious irritation.
”Lord, no! He is twenty-eight and I despair-positively despair- of grandchildren.”
This was obviously a sore topic with Lord Waverly, because it propelled him out of his chair to pace the room. ”Since he has a fortune in his own right from his dear mama, I cannot compel him to find a wife by threatening to hang onto his quarterly allowance.” He stopped in front of Sir Waldo, his hands out, the picture of frustration. ”And even if he had only a small stipend, he is so frugal he would make do all year, and then probably invest the residue!” He put down his hands. ”I'll wager that half our friends would wish for problems like this from the fruit of their loins.” He sighed. ”Truth to tell, there is a sweetness to his nature that always quells me when I think I will pick a fight with him. So would he be your perfect son-in-law?” Lord Waverly sat down heavily in his chair and stared into the fire.
”I believe he would be.” Sir Waldo pulled his chair closer to his old friend. ”I want someone who will be kind to Olivia, keep her in the vicinity, and not mind if she reads books.”
”That would be James,” Lord Waverly agreed. ”Such a union might even produce grandchildren eventually.” He was silent a moment, staring into the fire, then looked at his old friend. ”He is also mortally shy. How do you propose to bring this about?”
”I'm going to ask him,” Sir Waldo said. ”You know I am not a fancy speaker. I'll put it to him straight out.”
”You're going to propose to my son?” Lord Waverly could not help smiling.
”H'mm, I suppose I am,” Sir Waldo agreed, struck by the thought. He picked up his gla.s.s. ”What would you say to an engagement by Christmas?”
Without a word, his Mend picked up his own gla.s.s, and they drank together.
It was one thing to laugh about a proposal with an old friend, Sir Waldo discovered, but quite another to actually put the suggestion into motion. Even the harvest scenery between London and Oxford failed to rouse his interest as he contemplated the next step. My older daughters would call me the rankest meddler, he thought as he stared out the window. They would point out how well they did on the Marriage Mart, and a.s.sure me and their mama that Olivia would find a man on her own.
But will she? he thought, far from the first time. Even the vicar, who was not given to either reflection or observation, noted once that Olivia ”looks at me as though I don't quite measure up.” I should never had indulged her whim for scholars.h.i.+p, Sir Waldo told himself, again not for the first time. Who would have known she would outs.h.i.+ne everyone in the family, with the possible exception of her oldest brother, Charles? She is too smart for her own good. And probably at the mercy of fortune hunters, considering her trusting disposition. That causes me worry, he thought.
G.o.d be praised that at least she was not difficult to look at, although no beauty, he knew. Still, even there, Olivia was a true original. She had the correct posture and deep-bosomed loveliness of her mother and sisters, but she was only a dab of a thing. ”I hope James Enders has not grown too much since last I saw him,” he said to his reflection in the carriage window. ”He could be intimidating to a chit like Olivia.”
He knew Olivia's hair was hopeless, red like his own, though darker, but with the added defect of curling like paper corkscrews that pop from a magician's box when the lid is removed. It wasn't a matter of taming the wild mop, but rather forcing it into submission. Olivia did not help the matter much, he reminded himself, not when she dragged it all on top of her head into a silly topknot. Well, not precisely silly, he reconsidered, smiling at the thought. I call it fetching, in a funny kind of way, even if her mama despairs. She is interesting to look at, he concluded, possibly even memorable. But a beauty? Alas, no.
He sat back, smiling at the thought of his daughter, thinking of her quick step, her outright laugh, and her absorption in books.
”It is this way, I should tell you, James Enders,” he rehea.r.s.ed in the carriage as the Oxford spires appeared on the horizon and the land began to slope toward the River Isis. ”An estate agent once told me that even the most oddly arranged house can find a buyer. It just takes the one person who happens to be the right buyer.”
Even his admitted lack of scholars.h.i.+p never quite prepared Sir Waldo for Oxford. Whatever his inward turmoil, he took the time to admire the loveliness of Magdalen Tower, smile at the architectural eccentricity of the Radcliffe Camera, and listen as Great Tom tolled the hour from The House. Olivia should be here, he mused, and then chuckled at the impossibility.
In his own year at Magdalen, he had pa.s.sed All Souls numerous times, and never without a sense of awe, knowing that it housed the brightest among them, those who were finished with undergraduate years and embarked upon more study, a thing Sir Waldo could never imagine. He addressed the porter at All Souls and asked him to locate Lord Crandall.
”Ye timed it right, sir,” the man informed him. ”We are almost at Evensong, so the tutorials are over. I'll have him here directly, if you would wish to wait in the foyer.”
Sir Waldo did not wish to wait there, not when the quad beckoned, with its trees of fall colors. Christmas is coming, he thought, looking at the late afternoon sky. I wonder what my dear wife will tell me that she wants me to surprise her with on Christmas morning? I shall have to ask her soon, he mused.
The day was cool, but the sun had warmed the stones in the quad. Flowers close to the warmth of the wall still bloomed. He heard footsteps and looked up to see Lord Crandall approaching him. He was content to stand slightly in the shadow of the corridor and watch the man come closer.
James Enders-Viscount Lord Crandall from one of the family's various honors-wore his black scholar's robe, which the wind picked up and made him seem larger than life for a moment. Sir Waldo smiled to notice that Lord Crandall's hair, dark like his own father's years ago, looked no tidier than Olivia's. Hair must be a nuisance to the brightest among us, he could only conclude. Louisa's and Mary's hair was always in place, and not even a loving father could overlook their lack of book wit.