“No card from Miss Sedgewick yet,” he said, flipping through the flat letters on the top of the stack. “Is it horrible that I almost hoped she’d still have the gall?”
“Yes,” she said, and stuck her needle right through the heart of the poor cranberry. “Yes, it is.”
“Oh, a parcel from Zeller, though,” Ambrose said, brightening as he retrieved a paper-wrapped box from the bottom of the stack.“What could it be? German soil, perhaps? How dare he leave us at Christmas?”
“He didn’t leave us,” she said, distracted as she plucked up her next victim. “He’ll be back in a few weeks’ time.”
“Abandoned at Yuletide,” Ambrose moaned, flipping the box over and tearing the paper away. “Oh, look at that. Chocolates, from the black forest.Wunderbar!”
At that last word, Bear shot up from his snoozing position at the foot of the fire and launched himself toward Ambrose, ready to partake in whatever had just been uncovered.
“No, no, Bear!” Ambrose exclaimed. “Gift! Gift!”
The word made the dog halt immediately and flop onto his side with a long, high-pitched whine.
Vix sighed and dropped the cranberry string at her side with a frown. “Oh, Bear. Poor darling keeps hearing that word all the time this month and now he doesn’t know what to trust anymore.”
“Tragic, yes,” Ambrose agreed through a mouthful of chocolate truffle. “It is poison, though, isn’t it? Chocolate?”
“For the dog?” Vix asked, blinking innocently at him until he hesitated in his chewing, at which point she grinned. “Yes, he can’t have that.”
Ambrose gave her a wary second glance before looking back at the remaining envelopes. “No, no, from my mother, absolutely not,” he droned, tossing them aside one at a time. “Invitations. Solicitations. Salutations. Congratulations. Conflagrations …”
“Ambrose,” she said flatly, pointing the needle at him.
He grinned at her. “And one from Mrs. Baxter’s.”
She froze, her needle glinting with a single, pointed shine. Her eyes went wide, and after a moment, she said, “Oh!”
He laughed, pushing all the other mail to the side, and beckoned her over, patting his own knee. “Come on, we’ll read it together.”
She nodded, a giddy little smile bubbling up on her face as she tossed the needle into the bowl of cranberries and hurried over, throwing her skirt up over his legs and dropping into his lap. “Give it here!” she begged, flexing her hands. “I want to open it!”
He laughed, relinquishing it as she examined the envelope, running her fingers over the address on the front in careful, childlike penmanship, and then turned it over to gently ease the seal apart.
“Do you think they got our gifts already?” she was asking as she opened the flap with shaking hands, so eager to get inside that she was slowing herself down. “Do you think it is going well, with the new books and clothes?”
“I’m sure we will know soon enough,” he said, wrapping his arms around her waist and dropping his chin on her shoulder, “but yes, I suspect both things have been tremendous successes.”
Vix held her breath, pulling the paper free and blinking her dark lashes several times as though dispelling the urge to well up before she could read a single word. Her hands still trembled as she spread the sheet out and their eyes fell onto the careful lines of the missive.
Dear Lady Aster,
I feel silly writing this letter. I have never sent one before. I know you get many letters every day, and they are all written by people better with a pen than I am.
But it is Christmas and Mrs. Baxter said I must write now, no matter how afraid I was to do it. I hope it is not a terrible letter and that you do not mind if it is silly.
We all wanted to thank you for the gifts you sent. For the new pillows and the chemises and the poetry books, especially. Mrs. Baxter said you might come to visit us in the spring, and that we might thank you in person. Is that true? Will you come?
I hope you will come.
Last Christmas, I was still sick after the building fell down. I lived in a tent for a while and then in a pub and then in a big room with a lot of other children. Tonight, I have my own bed with only one other girl to share a room with a fireplace and a washbasin and lots of blankets.
My life is very good now. It is very good because of you.
Please come in the spring. I should like to give you a hug. Would that be improper? It might be, but I should like to anyway.
Please do not tell Mrs. Baxter.
