Despite all the grumbling and complaining that ensued, it was clearly understood by everyone that the gathering of the greenery was to be the highlight of the house party so far. It felt surprisingly good, Christina thought as she made her way up to the nursery a short time later to get the children ready for the outdoors, to hear people teasing and laughing and even insulting one another in a purely lighthearted way. And to see people openly willing to enjoy themselves. The house had never been decorated for Christmas. It was a heathen custom, Gilbert had always said, unsuited to the solemnity of a Christian observance.
Sobriety might be very worthy, but it was also very dull. This year the children were going to have ahappyChristmas. She would see to that.
Fifteen minutes later Christina was back downstairs with her two daughters, all of them dressed warmly against the windy chill of a December day that promised snow at any moment. The hall was already abuzz with the merry sound of voices.
“Lady Wanstead.” Mr. Geordie Stewart strode toward them as soon as they appeared in the stairway arch, and swept off his tall beaver hat. He beamed first at Christina and then at each of the girls. “I finally have the pleasure of seeing your daughters. Will you do me the honor of presenting me?”
He bowed formally to Rachel, who curtsied gravely, and took her hand in his to raise to his lips.
“My pleasure, ma’am,” he said.
He smiled genially at Tess.
“I have two broad shoulders, just made for carrying little boys or girls,” he said to her. “My nieces and nephews often make use of them. Would you like to ride up on one when we step outside?”
“Yes, please, sir,” Tess said. “We are going to have a bonfire and chocolate down by the lake.”
“After we have helped gather greenery, Tess,” her sister reminded her. “We are going to decorate the house with it,” she explained to Mr. Stewart. “Mama bought yards of red ribbon in the village yesterday. I am excited.”
She spoke so very solemnly, Christina thought. Those words were strangely touching—I amexcited. Would Rachel ever learn to show excitement as well as to feel it? Had irreparable harm been done ... But no. Rachel would see during the coming days and for all the years to come while Christina had any influence over her that brightness and gaiety and excitement were not necessarily evil in themselves.
“Well, and so am I,” Mr. Stewart said with answering solemnity. “Very excited. There is a magic about Christmas that is always there no matter how old one grows. Last year I helped my nieces make a kissing bough—though they did most of the work and I did most of the watching, it must be admitted.”
“What is a kissing bough?” Rachel asked.
When the whole party left the house a few minutes later, to the accompaniment of much noise and laughter, Tess rode on Mr. Stewart’s shoulder while Christina walked on one side of him and Rachel on the other. And he conversed with the girls with practiced ease, avoiding the unfortunate tendency many adults had with children of being either over-hearty or condescending.
It seemed almost, Christina thought, testing the feeling rather guiltily in her mind, like being a family.
The earl, she could see, was walking at the head of the group with Jeannette Campbell’s arm drawn through his. Their heads were bent close together and they were laughing at something. They looked good together, she admitted reluctantly. There was nothing of the coquette about Miss Campbell and nothing flirtatious in the manner of either of them. But they were clearly very fond of each other.
She forced her mind and her eyes away from them.
She was going to enjoy the morning. After so many years the decision simply to enjoy had to be consciously made. She had come, she realized, to accept the notion that enjoyment and sin were synonymous terms. She felt almost as if she had been drugged for ten years and was only now beginning to withdraw to reality.
“Now, ma’am,” Viscount Luttrell said to her when they had all arrived at the lake, “you are to be my lieutenant in this mission of ours to provide the gentlemen with endless excuse to kiss the ladies over Christmas. You live here and must therefore know where all the best mistletoe is to be found.”
“I really do not, my lord,” she said, laughing.
“Then we must hunt for it together,” he told her. “And if we are not sure when we find it that what we have discovered is the real thing, then we must simply put it to the test. Mistletoe, it is said, makes the lips tingle when set to someone else’s. A poor imitation of mistletoe has the unfortunate effect of making one feel nothing at all.”
Christina merely laughed as the viscount added Frederick Cannadine and Margaret to his team.
And she laughed half an hour later when Viscount Luttrell spotted mistletoe high on the trunk of an ancient oak tree and clambered up to gather some. He was far fitter and more agile than his habitual indolent manner might lead one to suppose, she realized. He was soon safely on the ground again.
“Now,” he said, “to put the product to the test. I do hope, ma’am, that I did not expend all that energy in vain. There is only a limited supply of it. Dare we find out if this is real mistletoe?”
She smiled at him.
But his teasing manner did not extend to the way he kissed her. He did something with his lips against her own so that hers parted without any protest at all—-and he pressed his tongue deep into her mouth. Christina was breathless with shock and indignation.
“I believe, ma’am,” he said, gazing into her eyes from a mere few inches away, his own half closed, “we have discovered the real thing.”
Which were ambiguous words if ever she had heard any.
“But I feel severely hampered,” he said, “by the fact that I must keep one arm suspended above your head and by the fact that other persons are likely to hove into sight at any moment and might be shocked by the sight of anything more ardent. Perhaps I can make off with one small sprig of this mistletoe when we return to the house and suspend it in a private place known only to you and me—preferably a place with a comfortable horizontal surface beneath it.”
Could he possibly mean what she thought he meant?
