“I won’t,” Agatha promised. She let her lips curve upward knowingly. “Is there... anything else you feel you should tell me? About Eliza?”
Sydney went so red it was all his mother could do not to laugh. “I don’t know what you mean,” he mumbled, and escaped soon after.
Agatha turned back to her letter with a knowing smile. Penelope would enjoy hearing about this...
Chapter Eighteen
Penelope woke at dawn two days before Christmas, even though she could have slept later: the slumbering hives didn’t need looking at for a few days yet. The day lightened from black into a dull, leaden sort of gray, where clouds hung low like surly eyebrows and the air put clammy fingers down the back of one’s neck.
Penelope prowled around the house, counting the seconds as they ticked past on the clock face.
It got so bad that Mrs. Braintree started making broad hints about illness and fever and dosing Penelope with something from her terrifying stillroom. (Mr. Scriven said her great-great-grandmother’d been a witch in the old days.) Penelope allowed herself to be gently shooed out of the kitchens and back to the parlor by one of the new maids, hired for the holidays.
But finally, after ages had passed, it was late enough that Penelope could take her handcart to the Four Swallows and meet Agatha, Sydney, Eliza, and all their luggage in the main courtyard where the stage had deposited them before continuing along the road north to Carrisford.
The young folk were looking around with skeptical eyes, and Penelope had a pang of concern that they were not seeing Melliton at its best. Hopefully the holiday would bring the kind of cold, crystalline snow Penelope loved most, the kind that silvered every edge and turned the houses and crofts and cottages into rolling, icy fairylands.
But then she looked over to see Agatha Griffin taking a deep breath, shoulders lifting and a tightness in her face smoothing into something like happiness.
Penelope’s heart warmed in helpless response. “You can put your luggage right in the cart,” she said.
Griffin grinned. “I will—but let Sydney push the thing, if you please. He needs more wearing out than you do.”
Sydney made an affronted noise but grinned and took up the task willingly enough. Eliza tossed her bag on top of Griffin’s and sent Sydney a pert look.
Penelope gave the boy directions, and the whole group began moving east toward Fern Hall. Sydney and Eliza quickly drew ahead, talking constantly the whole time. Griffin watched them thoughtfully. “Two entire weeks away from the shop. I haven’t done anything so self-indulgent since—” She bit her lip, cheeks flushing. “Never mind.”
“Don’t hold back, Griffin,” Penelope said cheerfully. “Tell me all about your hedonistic past, where you never take even a fortnight away from work.”
“Pot calling kettle, Flood. How many beehives have you visited this morning?”
“None,” Penelope returned. “I was saving them all for you.”
Griffin went even pinker. Her booted toes scuffed at a rock in the road. “Will Mr. Flood be joining us?”
Penelope’s expansive mood withered somewhat. “He and Harry are spending one more night with Michael in Wales before they come east.” She sucked in a lungful of cold, wet air. “They’ll come bearing gifts from Christopher, and Lawrence and his wife. But for tonight, it’s only us.”
Griffin made a contented noise at that. The sound burrowed into Penelope and stayed there, glowing like an ember against the chill.
If Sydney and Eliza had been unimpressed with Melliton, they were gratifyingly delighted with Fern Hall itself. Penelope had put them in two of her brothers’ rooms, filled with ancient toys and musical instruments and trunks of clothing from past eras. Sydney flipped through old primers, recognizing a few woodcuts done by Griffin’s father. Eliza gathered up as much sheet music as she could find and carted an armful down to the parlor, where Penelope indulged them by picking out old tunes and carols on the pianoforte until it was time for dinner.
Between Mrs. Braintree’s excellent table and her even more excellent spruce beer, they had a merry evening of it. Penelope returned to the pianoforte after dinner was cleared; she was horribly out of practice and struck countless wrong notes, but nobody seemed to mind. Eliza and Sydney pulled the most outrageous articles from the attic’s dress-up trunks—faded brocades and velvets, lustrous waistcoats spangled with silver thread, ghostly lace that floated like cobwebs at collar and cuffs—and performed what they insisted was a gavotte, but which Penelope was fairly sure was a dance of their own devising.
Griffin mocked them with a fierce fondness as she sat on the bench beside Penelope, turning pages, the long warm length of her pressed up against Penelope’s side.
If only they could have stayed like this forever: well-fed and warm, glowing with laughter, happy in one another’s company. Like any other celebrating family. But the dark, cold night drew close at last, and they candled their way to bed.
Penelope got at least one wish: she woke the next morning to find the world outside frosted over with a light fall of snow. Enough to make everything sparkle, but not enough to delay the afternoon coach from London, and the arrival of Captain Harry Stanhope and ship’s purser, John Flood.
They came up the road as a pair, matching one another’s rolling stride, the leather straps of their seabags slung over opposite shoulders, their hands between them brushing but not quite daring to clasp. As always, the sight of that easy connection both pleased Penelope and made her envious, in some unnameable, uncomfortable way.
Penelope waved from the window, then turned to peer anxiously at Griffin. “Last chance to escape.”
Sydney and Eliza had already gone trooping out into the woods behind Fern Hall in search of greenery—it would be a plausible enough excuse if Griffin wanted to chaperone the pair and keep them out of trouble.
The stern glance Griffin leveled at Penelope, however, was like an anchor for her seasick heart. “What kind of friend do you take me for?” she said. “I’m staying with you, as I promised.”
The printer smoothed out her skirts, rose from the sofa, and marched toward the foyer.
