Christmas Gifts Read online

  Dear Reader,

  For ten years I contributed a novella to the popular annual Signet Regency Christmas anthology, each time with four other authors. All but four of my stories have been long out of print (those four appear in UNDER THE MISTLETOE), but I know readers still enjoy them. That annual writing assignment was my favorite of the year. Give me a couple of potential lovers, a child or two, and Christmas itself, I used to say, I could weave an endless number of stories to tug at the heart strings and exude all the warmth and hope and joy associated with the season.

  Christmas becomes almost a character in my novellas. It is not the incidental backdrop for a story that might have taken place at any other time of year. Each story happens as it does because it is Christmas. A lonely gentleman, for example, listens with a pained ear to a group of carol singers until he is suddenly enthralled by the solo voice of a young boy soprano. The boy’s mother, a lonely widow, is standing there too. Or, for example, at a large house party a young child who has not spoken since the death of her mother makes a silent wish while all the other children around her are loudly expressing theirs when they are all asked what they want for Christmas. She wishes for a new mother and then sees the one she wants in one of the guests. The lady concerned and the child’s father, however, are feeling dismayed to find themselves at the same gathering, for they have met before but parted under unhappy circumstances.

  Here again in CHRISTMAS GIFTS are three novellas. I do hope you will enjoy them whether for the first or the twenty-first time and whether to set yourselves in the mood for Christmas or to accompany the festival itself--or at any other time of the year for that matter. December does not have a monopoly on happiness and love.

  May all your Christmases be blessed, and may my novellas be a part of them!

  Mary Balogh

  “The Best Christmas Ever” Copyright © 1991 by Mary Balogh

  “The Porcelain Madonna” Copyright © 1992 by Mary Balogh

  “The Surprise Party” Copyright © 1995 by Mary Balogh

  CHRISTMAS GIFTS First E-book Edition October 2015 ISBN: 978-0-9967560-4-4

  All rights reserved. No part of the ebook may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both copyright owner and Class Ebook Editions Ltd., the publisher of the ebook. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  Christmas Gifts

  Mary Balogh

  Table of Contents

  The Best Christmas Ever

  The Porcelain Madonna

  The Surprise Party

  The Best Christmas Ever

  Mary Balogh

  “I wish for an army of tin soldiers,” Peregrine Milford said very deliberately, fixing his eyes on the holly draped over the high marble mantel above the crackling fire. He made sure that his voice was loud enough to penetrate to the farthest corner and the most remote uncle and aunt in the drawing room.

  “A whole army, not just a company or regiment,” Sir Peter Milford, his father, said dryly. “Well, when one makes a wish, one might as well make it a grand one, I suppose.”

  “I wish for a porcelain doll,” Peregrine’s sister Harriet said with equal distinctness. “With golden ringlets and blue eyes.”

  “Predictable, thank heaven,” Lady Sophia Milford murmured to her husband.

  “I wish for a cricket ball and bat,” Aubrey Dermott blurted uneasily, out of turn, “although I shan’t be able to use them until summer. But I say, this is a foolish game. I am too old for this.”

  Lord Hodges, his father, seated somewhere behind the semicircle of children about the fire, laughed. “Until you are twelve, Aub, it must be done,” he said. “It is family tradition. And you are only eleven and seven months.”

  “The children of this family have always made their Christmas wishes about the fire the night before Christmas Eve,” the Countess of Crampton, Aubrey’s grandmother, said. “And by the strange miracle of the season, their wishes are almost always granted.”

  The Earl of Crampton wheezed in such a manner that it was impossible to tell if he were laughing or coughing. “And many an addled parent has had to hare into York on Christmas Eve for a spot of last-minute shopping, too,” he said.

  “My love, please,” the countess scolded, sotto voce. “The children!”

  The earl’s wheezing this time was definitely a product of amusement.

  “It is Julie’s turn,” the countess said. “What is your Christmas wish, dear?”

  Edwin Gwent, Viscount Radbrook, the only son of the earl and countess, fixed his eyes on the child indicated and frowned. She looked rather like the porcelain doll her elder sister had just wished for. She was flushed and starry-eyed with all the excitement of the approaching Christmas in her face. But Lord Radbrook did not listen to what she requested.

  What about Anna? he thought, his eyes straying to his own five-year-old daughter, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor with the other children, staring dreamily into the fire. What did she want for Christmas? And how was he to know? How was he to prevent her disappointment and disillusionment on Christmas morning when her wish did not come true?

  It was all very well for the other parents to encourage a continuance of this family custom, which had been observed for as long as he could remember. The chances were that their children had been dropping hints for long enough that they had already been able to purchase the wished-for items. And as his father had just suggested, there was always York a mere seven miles away on those occasions when a child had kept his wish a secret until the last moment.

  But what about Anna?

  “Anna?” The countess spoke in the softened tones she always reserved for this particular granddaughter. “It is time to make your wish, dear.”

  Anna turned to look up at her grandmother with the large dark eyes that would make her a beauty when she grew up, her father thought. Marianne’s eyes. Her mother’s eyes. But at the age of five the eyes seemed too large for her thin, pale face, and the dark hair, dressed in ringlets, seemed too heavy.

  She turned back to gaze into the fire again while the members of her family, gathered in the drawing room at Williston Hall, maintained a polite silence.

  I wish for a new mama for Christmas, Anna thought, articulating the words very clearly in her mind. Please, a new mama. I don’t want her to be pretty, like Miss Chadwick, or always talking and stooping down to tell me how pretty and how good I am and then smiling at Papa and forgetting about me. I want someone not so pretty, and someone quiet. Someone who will love me and not try to take Papa away from me.

  “Have you made your wish, dear?” her grandmother asked, breaking the silence around her.

  Anna closed her eyes very tightly. A new mama for Christmas, please, she begged an unseen power once more, and opened her eyes and turned her head to look up into her father’s unsmiling face.

  “She has,” he said quietly, and he smiled at her. And felt his heart ache for her. He had noted the tightly closed eyes and compressed lips and knew that a very particular wish had been made.

  What was it? he asked her with his eyes. What is it that you want, Anna? A doll? A new dress? A parasol? A muff? All four were upstairs in his room, wrapped carefully and tied with bright ribbons, waiting for Christmas morning. But what if on al
l four counts he had guessed wrongly?

  “Stephanie?” the Countess of Crampton said in her more normal voice, turning her eyes on her niece Marjorie Fotheringale’s daughter. “What is your Christmas wish, dear?”

  Anna liked her cousins. She liked all her relatives, in fact. There was a wonderful feeling of security about being at Williston Hall, at her grandfather’s house, surrounded by people who belonged to her and who accepted her. She loved Christmas in particular and all the decorations and spicy smells and rich foods. She loved the way the children were allowed downstairs to mingle with the adults so often during the days of Christmas.

  And she loved the activities of Christmas—the long walks outside and the rides when there was no snow, like last year, and the sleigh rides and the skating when there was snow. Two years before, her papa had taken her up into his arms—she could remember it though she had been not quite four years old—and skated about the frozen lake with her, and she had felt as safe as could be, even though her older cousins had been shrieking and falling all over the place. Papa had not fallen even once.

  And the indoor activities—charades and blindman’s buff and carol singing while Aunt Sophia played the pianoforte, and a whole host of other things.

  There was only one thing wrong with family gatherings. Stephanie, Angela, and William had Aunt Marjorie to fuss over them and scold them and praise them and tuck them into bed at night. Peregrine, Harriet, and Julie had Aunt Sophie. Even Aubrey, who was too old to need a mama, had Aunt Patricia.

  She did not have a mama. She had had one once. In fact . . . But no. Her thoughts were always pulled to an abrupt halt at such moments. She had had a mama, but she could not remember her. She would not remember her.

  She had Papa. And she loved him totally. He was her world and her universe. She was going to stay with Papa for the rest of her life. When she was grown up, she was going to go to India with him and to America and Brazil. And to Bath too. She was going to go all over the world with Papa.

  But for some time past she had longed for a mama. Ever since last summer, in fact, when she and Papa had been at Grandpapa’s and she had watched Aunt Marjorie undress Stephanie for the night and brush out her long blond hair and laugh with her as she drew the hair into various grown-up styles with her hands. And then Aunt Marjorie, seeing Anna staring wistfully at them, had come and done the same for her before Papa had arrived to kiss her good night. And Aunt Marjorie’s hands had been slim and soft—not like Papa’s—and she had smelled of roses.

  The flames of the fire were dancing before Anna’s eyes. She had not heard Stephanie’s wish, or Angela’s or William’s, though everyone was doing a deal of laughing over William’s wish and Aunt Marjorie was saying “Mercy on us!” and looking appealingly at Uncle Humphrey.

  “We will have to hope that York is a miracle city,” Uncle Humphrey said, and bellowed with laughter while Aunt Marjorie said “Mercy on us!” again.

  Anna got to her feet and left the semicircle of children. She went to her father, who picked her up and set her on his lap, and she burrowed her head beneath his coat and against the warm slippery silk of his waistcoat.

  “Did you make your wish, Anna?” he asked her. “Can you let Papa know somehow? Will you draw me a picture?”

  But she shook her head and burrowed deeper. Wishes did not come true if one told. That was why all the children were instructed to think aloud to the fire. They were not telling anyone. They were merely thinking. That was what Grandmama always said, anyway, and Anna believed her implicitly. Her wish would not come true if she told Papa. And she wanted her wish to come true. More than anything.

  But please not Miss Chadwick, she thought. Please, someone very quiet and ordinary. Someone who smells of roses. Someone with soft, slim hands.

  Lord Radbrook lowered his head and kissed the dark ringlets clustered on his child’s head.

  What he should give her for Christmas, he thought, was a new mother. That was probably what she needed more than anything else. She had been without Marianne for well over two years—for almost half of her young life.

  Roberta Chadwick? She would be arriving on the morrow with Mr. and Mrs. Shelton, her sister and brother-in-law, and several other guests who were not close enough family to have been invited for the full week before Christmas.

  Should he do what he had been steeling himself to do ever since the previous Season in town and offer for her? Should he tell Anna on Christmas Day, if he had the reply he expected, that she was to have a new mama?

  “Children?” Marjorie Fotheringale was on her feet and clapping her hands. “Time for bed. And there is no point in groaning and looking hopefully at your papa, William. If you are to be up and bright for Christmas Eve, you will need your sleep. To bed!”

  “Yes, you too, Aub,” Lord Hodges said firmly. “You will be an old man next year when you are twelve, and will doubtless be allowed to stay up all night and all the next day too if you so wish. This year you are only eleven. Off you go.”

  Lord Radbrook got to his feet, his daughter in his arms. “I shall take Anna up,” he said. “I’ll be back soon.”

  The Countess of Crampton sighed as her son followed the children from the room. “Dear little Anna,” she said. “Will she ever talk again, do you suppose?” She was addressing no one in particular.

  “One day she will, Mama,” Lady Sophia said. “But the shock is very deep-seated. She was only barely three.”

  Lady Patricia shuddered. “Dear Lord,” she said, “I hate to think of it. I still have nightmares about it. Watching her mother drown like that, trying to retrieve her ball from the river, and no one else about to save her. And the child’s screams. Mercifully I did not hear them, but Edwin described them graphically enough. Screaming for two whole days until she lost her voice.”

  Lord Hodges patted her hand. “There is no point in torturing your mind, Trish,” he said briskly. “This is Christmas. Children are resilient. Anna will talk again, mark my words, and laugh too.”

  “Roberta Chadwick would be good for her,” Lady Sophia said. “She is so very lovely and always so sunny-natured. Will Edwin ever come to the point, do you suppose?”

  “Anna would be eclipsed by Roberta,” the countess said quietly. “She would draw all of Edwin’s admiration. And remember that Anna has had him all to herself for almost three years.” She sighed again.

  “Sophia,” the earl said severely to his elder daughter, his voice rumbling out of his chest, “to the pianoforte, girl. Is this Christmas or is it a funeral? Play something lively, something we can all sing to.”

  Lady Sophia rose obediently to her feet.

  “Williston Hall at last?” Miss Hannah Beynon peered from the carriage window as the conveyance turned sharply and passed between two high and imposing stone gateposts. “And about time, too. We would both be blocks of ice, Emma, if we had much farther to go. Is the driveway long? I cannot recall. I have not been here since Peter’s wedding to Sophia. Was that eight years ago or nine?”

  “Nine,” her niece replied, turning to smile at the red-nosed figure of her aunt, huddled from chin to toes beneath a fur-lined robe. “The driveway is no longer than a mile. We will be there in no time at all. I am sure there will be a fire in every room to greet us, and doubtless plenty of hot tea as well.”

  “Christmas Eve,” Miss Beynon said with some indignation. “It is quite inhuman, Emma.”

  “Yes,” her niece agreed, “it is bitterly cold. But those clouds are going to drop a load of snow before the day is out, Aunt Hannah. We are going to have a white Christmas. That will be a rare treat.”

  “And a body will not be able to set a toe outdoors without slipping and sliding and breaking every bone in her body,” her aunt complained.

  Emma was not feeling the cold. She was feeling something far worse. Dread. Nausea. Panic. A terrible nostalgia. A bitter regret that she had not stood against her aunt and refused the kind invitation of the earl and countess, as she had done the year bef
ore. Last year it had been easier, of course. She had still been wearing black for her mother. This year there had been no such excuse. And her brother Peter had been eager for her to accept, as had her sister-in-law, Sophia.

  No, it would have been near-impossible to have refused to come. The house, large, rambling, a curious mixture of architectural styles spanning several centuries, came into sight as the carriage rounded a bend in the driveway, and Emma felt a final lurching of the stomach.

  Yes, that was what it looked like. She remembered now as if it had been yesterday. In truth, it was nine years—nine years last summer. Peter and Sophia’s wedding, when she had spent a whole month at Williston Hall with her parents. She had been eighteen at the time. Only barely eighteen. A child. And yet old enough to make the decision that would set the course for the rest of her life.

  Old enough to ruin the whole of the rest of her life.

  “Brrr!” Miss Beynon said as the carriage drew to a stop before the horseshoe steps leading up to the main floor of the mansion. “I do not want to come out from beneath this robe, Emma.”

  Emma smiled. “Just think of those fires,” she said, “and that tea.” She turned and allowed a footman to hand her down onto the cobbles. The main doors were open, she saw in a glance upward. Peter was there, and Sophia, and the earl and countess. No one else. Just the four of them. She felt enormously relieved.

  “You are the last to arrive,” the Countess of Crampton said a few minutes later, having hugged both ladies and welcomed them to Williston Hall. “And just in time, too. The snow is going to fall at any moment. Wagering is loud and lively and fortunes are about to change hands on the exact moment when we may expect the first flake. Do come upstairs, my dear Miss Beynon. You will wish to freshen up, I am sure. And tea will be ready in the drawing room as soon as you are. Do come too, Emma. How lovely to see you wearing colors again, my dear. The last time I saw you was at your poor dear mama’s funeral.”