A Christmas Secret (2 page)

“How do you do, Mr. Connaught,” she replied, smiling at him. “That is most kind of you. May I offer you a cup of tea? It's terribly cold this morning.”

“That would be most welcome,” he said with a nod. “I think it's going to be a hard Christmas—for weather, but I hope not for anything else.”

She stepped back and opened the door wider for him. He came in, glancing around as if perhaps the vicarage might have changed since he had been there last. Then he relaxed and smiled again, reassured. Did he think they would have moved things in a night?

She took his coat and showed him into the sitting room, grateful she had lit the fire early and it was pleasantly warm. She noticed how again he looked around, smiling at familiar things, the pictures, the way the furniture was arranged, the worn chairs with their colors blending.

“If you will excuse me, I shall tell my husband you are here. Then I shall bring tea.”

“Of course.” He inclined his head, rubbing his hands together. His polished boots were wet from the snow. The wind had whipped color into his face.

She went to the study first and opened the door without knocking.

“Dominic, Mr. Connaught from the manor house is in the sitting room. I'm just going to bring tea. It's very good of him to come, isn't it!”

He looked a little surprised. “Yes. And very quick.” There was a note of apprehension in his voice.

Clarice heard it and was afraid he was anxious already that she might be too frank in her opinions, too quick not only to see a better way of doing something but also to say so. It had been known to happen before.

“I suppose I should call upon his wife. She will know all the women in the village and everything about them. He didn't mention her,” she added, biting her lip and looking straight into his eyes. “But I promise I shall behave perfectly. I will find her delightful and extremely competent, I swear. Even if she is a blithering idiot with a tongue like a dose of vinegar! I really do promise.”

He stood up. “Just don't expect me to be there. I couldn't keep a straight face!” he warned, touching her cheek so lightly she barely felt it. “Don't change too much. I wouldn't care to be Archbishop of Canterbury if I had to lose the person you are in order to do it!”

“Oh, if you were Archbishop of Canterbury,” she said cheerfully, “I would probably say whatever I pleased! Everyone would be far too in awe of you to criticize me.”

He rolled his eyes and went out to meet their guest.

She went into the kitchen happily. To be loved for herself, with all her dreams and vulnerabilities, the mistakes and the virtues, was the highest prize in life, and she knew that.

When she returned with the tray of tea and biscuits, she found both men seated by the fire talking. They rose immediately. Dominic took the tray from her and set it down. They exchanged the usual pleasantries. She poured and passed Connaught his cup, then Dominic.

“Sir Peter has been telling me a little about the village,” Dominic said, catching her eye. “His family has been here for centuries.”

She felt herself blush. She had not known his title and had called him
Mister
when she had asked him in. She wondered if he was offended. Normally she would not have cared, but all this mattered so much. She was not impressed with people's ancestors, but this was not the time to say so. She composed her face into an expression of interest. “Really? How fortunate you are to have deep roots in such a lovely place.”

“Yes,” he agreed quickly. “It gives me a great sense of belonging. And like all privileges, it carries certain obligations. But I believe they are a pleasure also. I was very sad when I learned the Reverend Wynter was taking his holiday over Christmas, but now that we have you here, I am sure it will be as excellent as always. Christmas is a great time for healing rifts, forgiving mistakes, and welcoming wanderers home.”

“How very well you express it,” Dominic responded. “Is that what the Reverend Wynter has said in the past, or your own feeling?”

Sir Peter looked slightly surprised, even momentarily disconcerted. “My own. Why do you ask?”

“I thought it so well phrased, I might ask you if I could use it,” Dominic replied candidly. “I would like to say something truly appropriate in my Watch Night sermon, which has to be as short as possible, yet still to have meaning. But I cannot prepare it until I have at least a slight acquaintance with the village and the people.”

Sir Peter leaned forward a little, a very slight crease between his dark brows. “Did the Reverend Wynter not tell you at least a little about us, collectively and individually?”

Watching him, Clarice had the sudden certainty that the answer mattered to him far more than he wished them to know. There was a tension in the lines of his body, and the knuckles of his beautiful hands were white on his lap.

Dominic appeared not to have noticed. “Unfortunately I never met him,” he answered. “The request came to me through the bishop. I gather the Reverend Wynter's decision to take a holiday was made very quickly.”

“I see.” Sir Peter leaned back again and picked up his tea. “That is a trifle awkward for you. Whatever I can do I shall be more than happy to. Call upon me at any time. Perhaps you will dine with me at the hall one evening, when you are settled in?” He looked at Clarice. “I regret my hospitality will offer you no female company, since my mother has passed away, and I am not married, but I promise to show you much that is of interest if you care for history, art, or architecture. I can tell you stories of all manner of people good and evil, tragic and amusing, belonging to this village down the ages.”

She did not have to pretend interest. “I think that would be infinitely more enjoyable than any feminine gossip I can imagine,” she replied. “And I will most certainly come.”

He looked pleased, as if the prospect excited him. Obviously he was enormously proud of his heritage and loved to share it, to entertain people, fill them with laughter and a little awe as well. He looked at Dominic. “I see you have moved the chessboard. You do not play?”

Dominic glanced around. He clearly had no idea where the chessboard had been.

“You didn't?” Sir Peter said quickly. “It was already gone when you came?”

“Yes. I haven't seen one.” He looked at Clarice questioningly.

“I haven't seen it, either,” she said. “Did the Reverend Wynter play?”

A look of pain burned deep in Sir Peter's eyes; with an effort he banished it. He swallowed the last of his tea. “Yes. Yes, at one time. He had a particularly beautiful set. Not black and white so much as black and gold. The black was ebony, and the gold that extraordinary shade that yew wood sometimes achieves, almost metallic. Quite beautiful. Still …” He rose to his feet. “It hardly matters. I just noticed because it was such a feature in the room. The light caught it, you know?”

“It sounds wonderful,” Clarice responded, because the silence demanded it, but her mind was filled with the certainty that his reason for asking was nothing like as casual as he had said. There was a depth of emotion in him that could not be explained by the mere absence of an artifact of beauty. What more had it meant to him, and why did he conceal it?

She still wondered as she also rose to her feet and followed him to the door, thanking him again for his kindness in coming.

Mrs. Wellbeloved arrived after luncheon, carrying a large bag of potatoes, which she set down on the kitchen table with a grunt of relief. “You'll be needin' 'em,” she said.

“Thank you,” Clarice accepted, telling herself that Mrs. Wellbeloved meant it kindly and it would be most ungracious to tell her that she would rather have gone to the village shop and bought them herself. Three weeks was such a short time to get to know people so she could help Dominic. “Thank you,” she repeated. “That was very thoughtful. We had a visitor this morning.” She carried the potatoes into the scullery, followed hopefully by the dog, who was ever optimistic about something new to eat.

“Come down here, did he?” Mrs. Wellbeloved said, her round eyes wide with interest, wispy eyebrows high. “Well, I never.” She picked up the long-handled broom and began to sweep the floor.

Clarice returned to the kitchen, Harry still on her heels.

“He said his family has been in the village for years,” she added, tidying one of the cupboards and setting jams, pickles, savory jellies in some sort of order.

“Years!” Mrs. Wellbeloved exclaimed. “I should say centuries, more like. Since the Normans came, the way he tells it.”

“The Normans! Really?”

“Yes. Ten sixty-six, you know?” Mrs. Wellbeloved looked at her skeptically. How could she be the lady she pretended if she did not know that?

Clarice was amazed. “That's terribly impressive!”

“Oh,
he's
impressed.” Mrs. Wellbeloved bent awkwardly and picked up the modicum of dust from the floor, carefully pushing it into the dustpan. “Come over with William the Conqueror, so he said, an' bin in this village since the year twelve hundred. Everyone knows that.” She made an expression of disdain then concealed it quickly, reaching for the bucket, putting it in the low, stone sink, and turning on the tap.

“He didn't tell me that.” Clarice felt a need to defend him, although she had no idea why.

“Well, there's a surprise then.” Mrs. Wellbeloved turned off the tap and heaved the bucket out. She looked at the floor skeptically. “Don't seem too bad.”

“It isn't,” Clarice replied. “We haven't been here a whole day yet. I really don't think you need to do it.”

“P'raps you're right. I'll just do the table then. Got to keep the table clean.” She took the scrubbing brush off its rack, along with a large box of yellow kitchen soap. “Knew his father, Sir Thomas. He was a real gentleman, poor man.”

“Why? What happened to him?”

“Went abroad, he did.” Mrs. Wellbeloved began scrubbing energetically, slopping water all over the place, wetting the entire surface of the table at once. “Foreign parts somewhere out east. Don't recall if he ever said where, exact. Fell in love and married.” She poked loose strands of hair back into their knot. “Then she died, when Sir Peter was only about five or six years old. Wonderful woman, she was, from all he says, an' very beautiful. Sir Thomas were so cut up by it he came home and never went back there, ever. Raised Peter himself, teaching them all about his family, the land, all that. Very close, but never got over her death. I s'pose Sir Peter didn't, either. He never married.”

“There's time yet,” Clarice said quickly. “He looks no more than in his forties. He'll want to keep the line going, the family, surely?”

Mrs. Wellbeloved put her weight into the scrubbing, her lips tight, soapsuds flying. She stepped sideways and nearly fell over the dog. “It's his duty,” she agreed. “But he isn't doing it, for all that. Maybe that's what it was all about.”

“What what was all about?” Clarice asked unashamedly.

“Used to come here often,” Mrs. Wellbeloved replied, wringing out a cloth with powerful, red-knuckled hands. “Twice a week, most months. Played chess with the vicar reg'lar. Loved their game, they did. Then he stopped all of a sudden, about two years ago. Never came here since, except it were business, or with other folk. Vicar never said why, but then he wouldn't. Could keep other folks' secrets better than the grave, he could.”

“You mean they quarreled?” Clarice felt a stab of disappointment. It seemed such a sad and stupid thing to do. “What quarrel could be so bad, and last so long?”

Mrs. Wellbeloved jerked upright, banging her elbow on the bucket, which was still on the table. She winced. “Well, it wouldn't be the Reverend Wynter's fault, an' that's for certain. He was the best man that ever lived in the village, whether his family went back to the manor or the workhouse! Forgive anybody anything, he would, if it were against himself. Tried over and over to make it up with Sir Peter, and Sir Peter weren't having any of it.” She grunted fiercely. “But the vicar would never say a thing were right if it weren't. Fear o' God's in him like a great light, it is. Mr. Corde's a very lucky man to be allowed to step in for him over Christmas.” She nodded several times. “Walk a few miles in the reverend's footsteps an' he'll be the better man for it, mark my words.” She savagely wiped half the table dry, lifted the bucket onto the floor, and wiped the other half, wringing the cloth out several times.

Clarice felt defensive of Dominic, but bit her tongue rather than say anything; she needed Mrs. Wellbeloved on their side. She took a deep breath. “He seems to be a very remarkable man, even for a vicar,” she said with as much humility as she could manage.

Mrs. Wellbeloved's face softened. “That he is,” she agreed more gently. “Man o' God, I say. He deserves a holiday. Go off an' do more of his paintings an' drawings, that's what he needs.” She looked Clarice up and down, and then turned away so her face was out of sight. “Obliged you could come.” She sniffed, choking off the emotion in her voice. She picked up the bucket and threw the dirty water into the sink so hard it splashed up and a good deal of it went out again on either side, waking the cat. Etta shook herself angrily and then curled up again, nose in her tail.