Page 47 of A Winter’s Romance
M r. Fortescue looked around helplessly and asked the question to which there was seemingly no answer. “Then what in God’s name are we to do?”
Elisabeth smiled at him. “Well, the Son of the God you just invoked found himself in much the same situation on Christmas Eve, or at least, his parents did, and people helped. We shall do likewise, though I won’t offer you a manger! You can stay here. You shall sleep in my room and I’ll sleep on the truckle bed in Father’s. He won’t mind. Will you, Papa?”
After the introductions, Mr. Wilberforce had returned to his reading material and had paid no attention to the discussion. Elisabeth repeated “Papa? You won’t mind, will you?”
“What? Eh? Mind what?”
“If I sleep on the truckle bed in your room. Mr. Fortescue needs my room. Wilf can sleep down here on the settle.”
“But I couldn’t…” began Mr. Fortescue, but before he could say another word, the sound of voices raised in song could be heard outside, followed by a knocking at the door .
“The carolers!” cried Elisabeth and ran to let them in.
The room was soon filled with what seemed like a crowd but was in fact only eight people, bundled up to twice their size. Only their glowing red faces were visible between a mass of scarves and tippets and a variety of caps, bonnets and singular headwear it was impossible to name. They were all singing, not especially tunefully but at the top of their voices, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Let Nothing You Dismay , which dismayed Mr. Fortescue very much indeed.
He wasn’t fond of carols. In fact, he wasn’t fond of Christmas at all. For him it had always meant long dinners with relatives he preferred to avoid, like his aunt Florence, where he had just spent a boring duty visit of twenty-four hours. And look where it had got him. The petulant expression became even more marked.
Wilf came over and murmured in his ear, “If them’s goin’ to be makin’ that God-awful noise all night, along of the bells, I think I’ll take me chances and walk to Lunnon.”
Mr. Fortescue scowled at him awfully and Wilf amended, “I’ll just get me togs an’ see to the ‘orses.” He slipped away in the direction their coats had been taken and was seen no more for quite a while.
After a rendition of The First Nowell , which is a long carol, Mr. Fortescue was hoping his suffering would soon be at an end, but he was subjected to a spirited Here We Come A-Wassailing before there was blessed silence. Into the calm Elisabeth called out gaily, “If someone will come and help, I’ll bring out the wassail and the mince pies!”
Mr. Fortescue leaped immediately to his feet. In the kitchen he found his hostess, re-clad in her apron, stirring a big pot of liquid steaming over the fire with apples bobbing on top. On the deal table behind her lay platters of mince pies.
“I’m so silly,” she said, stepping back. “I used the big pot and filled it over the fire. Now I can’t lift it. Mary usually prepares it before she leaves but I told her I’d do it. I should have remembered she uses the smaller one.”
Then, when the visitor made as if to pick up the vessel, she caught his arm, saying, “Careful! You’ll need some cloths to protect your hands. It’s very hot!” But no sooner had her hand touched his arm than she snatched it away, as if it too, were red hot. The feel of the muscles under his tweed riding coat made her heat leap. She thrust a folded cloth at him and turned away in her confusion. She picked up one of the platters of mince pies. “If you’ll follow me,” she said, trying to keep her voice normal.
They went back into the main room and placed the offerings on the dining table. Elisabeth stood next to the pot with a ladle at the ready. To Mr. Fortescue’s surprise, the carolers each pulled a tin cup from his or her pocket and went for it to be filled. When everyone had been served, they raised their cups and chanted, somewhat raggedly:
May joy and peace surround you, contentment latch your door,
And happiness be with you now, and bless you ever more!
Then they fell upon the mince pies and rapidly demolished them. After which, they once more wished their hosts a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and left, singing the wassail song .
“They are dear folk,” said Elisabeth, closing the door behind them, “but I’m always glad we’re one of the first houses they visit. They get quite inebriated and silly by the end. Then you can hear the snoring through the church service.”
“But we saw no other houses before we got here,” said Mr. Fortescue, whose upbringing had prevented him from sitting as long as the lady were standing, and who had remained standing to one side while the carolers were eating and drinking.
“Oh, they come to us first as we’re furthest away. Then by the time they’re in the village, they have no distance to go to the church. You’ll see them later.”
She seemed to assume he would be going to church with them, and for once in his life, Mr. Fortescue found he didn’t dislike the idea.
“Now,” Elisabeth continued. “Let us have some supper. It will be very simple, I’m afraid. We have our main meal in the middle of the day. But there are some mince pies left.”
Thinking of the protracted lunch he’d consumed earlier in the day, their visitor could only be glad of the idea of something simpler. But first he said, “We have not yet settled where we are to stay the night. I find the idea of turning you out of your bed unacceptable. If you are truly kind enough to offer us shelter, I can sleep down here.”
“On the settle?” she laughed. “We’d have to fold you in half! No, Mr. Fortescue, I shall be perfectly comfortable in the truckle bed. I’ve slept there before, when father has one of his bad nights. Wilf can stay down here. Where is he, by the way?”
“Seeing to the horses. He prefers their company to that of most people. Now the carolers have gone, he’ll be back. ”
Sure enough, footsteps were heard in the kitchen, and Wilf’s diminutive figure reappeared.
“There’s a barn be’ind the ‘ouse,” he said. “I brung the ‘orses in there out o’ the cold. There was a bit o’ ‘ay in there too. I give it to them. ‘Ope that’s okay, Miss.”
“Yes, of course, I should have thought of it myself,” said Elisabeth. “We used to have a pony and trap but… well, we had to get rid of it.”
“If we are to sit at table,” said Mr. Fortescue, “I should like to wash my hands and change out of my riding attire, if I may.”
“Of course! How silly of me not to have thought of that! Come this way.” Elisabeth lit a candle on a small table next to the stairs and waited for him to follow.
The visitor took his bag from the corner where he had stowed it and climbed the narrow stairs to a landing, ducking his head as he reached the top.
“This house is really not built for someone your size,” laughed Miss Wilberforce. “You are sure to bang your head at some point. I think you should wear a cap. I could loan you one of Papa’s!”
“Wearing a cap indoors would make me much more uncomfortable than a bang on the head,” he responded. “Anyway, perhaps it would knock some sense into me.”
“Do you lack sense?”
“Since I rode us over ice without slowing down and ended up in a ditch with a broken wheel,” he answered ruefully, “I should say the answer is yes.”
“But then you would have missed the carolers, which I could tell you so enjoyed!”
He laughed. “Was it that obvious?” Then he said seriously, “But I would have missed meeting you, Miss Wilberforce, and that would most certainly have been a pity.”
She raised her eyes to his. “Yes, it would,” she said quietly. Then, shaking her head slightly, she added in a different tone, “We have so few visitors. It’s nice to see someone different. Here we are.”
She opened the door to a bedchamber, went in and put the candle on a table. “I’ll send Wilf up with some hot water,” she said briskly, and left him.
The visitor’s initial reaction when entering his hostess’s bedroom was to breathe in deeply. It smelled delightfully of her. He saw her nightgown hanging on the back of the door and had an urge, which he instantly quelled, to bury his head in it. Wilf arrived with a ewer of hot water that he poured into a basin on a washstand behind a screen in the corner of the room. Mr. Fortescue rapidly performed his ablutions and then opened his bag. That’s when he remembered he’d packed in a hurry, anxious to be gone from his aunt’s. Normally he would have had his valet with him, but the man had developed a putrid sore throat the day before he left home. He was going to be gone for only one night, and had thought he could manage without him. He’d changed into his riding apparel, and had all but thrown the clothes he’d been wearing that afternoon into his bag. Consequently, his only coat and waistcoat were creased. Luckily, his valet had given him an extra shirt and several neckcloths, knowing his master routinely went through two or three to get the folds just as he wanted. He dressed in the clean shirt and crumpled outer clothing, then did the best he could with his neckcloth and his hair in the small mirror over the washstand. But going down to supper, he was very dissatisfied with his appearance.
Miss Wilberforce’s feelings were quite different. As he descended the stairs, she first saw shining Hessians with jaunty tassels. Above them came slim, buff-colored pantaloons. A superfine, swallow-tailed coat in a deep navy blue was gradually revealed, then a grey pin-striped waistcoat. She didn’t notice the creases. Last came glimpses of a spotless shirt with a moderately high collar, a neckcloth wrapped round it in complicated folds. When his neck and head came into view, his hair combed into a perfection of artistic disarray, Elisabeth almost caught her breath. In his riding apparel with his hair uncombed, he had been an attractive man. Now he looked very handsome indeed: an illustration for the best-dressed man about town.
She knew this because amongst the papers that arrived periodically from London, Elisabeth sometimes received copies of the Mode Illustrée . Although she was by no means a follower of fashion and laughed over the creations more than she pined for them, she had no difficulty in recognizing the very modish style of their visitor’s dress. How he had been able to achieve such perfection in that small mirror she could not imagine. She herself usually glanced in it only enough to make sure her curls were not entirely wayward. Now, looking down at her serviceable gown, she wished had thought to change for dinner, too. She and her father had given up the habit of doing so, since in the country they didn’t dine so much as sup in the evening.