Page 39 of The Secret Christmas Library
The noise was ridiculous, and just seemed to get louder, as they both sprang apart as if doing something they shouldn’t.
Mirren felt her cheeks flame, as Bonnie burst through the servants’ staircase doors, followed closely by Esme and Theo, all of them shouting.
Bonnie was laying down a tray full of cold cuts, cheese and fresh bread, with chutney and pickled onions for them to make a hearty ploughman’s supper.
‘I told them,’ she said to Jamie, her face pink and quivering. She stopped for a moment, looking at both of them, as if she could smell something in the air between them. Mirren frankly wouldn’t put it past them: she already thought it entirely possible that Bonnie was part witch.
Esme and Theo were yelling incoherently, and, Mirren ascertained quite quickly, were absolutely roaring drunk.
They must have achieved this with some speed.
Although she wasn’t wearing her watch. Time didn’t seem to stick to its normal passage here; it wobbled in and out.
She couldn’t tell how long she and Jamie had been lying on the rug, talking of this and that.
It could have been hours, or minutes. She looked over to him.
His sandy brown hair had fallen in his eyes, and the little frown line was back.
She wanted to use her fingers to smooth it out, to calm him down. Then move her hand lower . . .
‘What the hell?’ he was saying.
‘They’ve been all through the kitchen,’ said Bonnie, looking irritated for the first time. ‘Stuck their fingers in the Christmas pudding. They drank the cooking brandy! Now how am I going to set it on fire?’
‘You were going to set it on fire?’ Mirren was genuinely excited. ‘I love Christmas pudding.’
‘It was terrible,’ slurred Esme. ‘Or great – not sure.’
‘Not as great as the sloe gin,’ said Theo. His hair was awry, his chin unshaven, and his eyes weren’t quite focused.
‘You drank the sloe gin?’ said Jamie. ‘That’s been there for donkey’s years.’
‘It gets stronger every year,’ said Esme.
‘That’s why nobody drinks it!’ said Jamie. ‘It’s rocket fuel.’
‘GOOD!’ said Esme emphatically. ‘That’s what this place needs. A FUCKING ROCKET. Explode the bloody lot.’
Theo started tucking into the bread and cheese without even taking a plate. Bonnie folded her arms in a way that spoke volumes.
‘Sorry,’ said Jamie. ‘I really am.’
And he looked at her gently in a way that Mirren wished he were using on her.
‘Just . . . keep them out of my kitchen,’ said Bonnie crossly.
‘Oh, Bonnie Bonita, we are so, soooo sorry,’ said Theo, prostrating himself, his mouth full. ‘When you are so wonderful . . . you are wonderful, you know. So wonderful.’
‘Yeah, alright,’ said Bonnie.
‘Almost makes me take my focus off my girlfriend,’ said Theo, his eyes sliding all over the place as he awkwardly segued across the room, all of him jerking about clumsily except for his glass of dark brown liquid, which remained miraculously upright.
‘Your what?’ said Esme, suddenly not sounding quite so drunk. But Theo was, to Mirren’s horror, already standing right in front of her.
‘I miss you, my angel,’ he said, half-crooning, to Mirren, blasting some boozy breath on her face. ‘Please come back to me.’
‘Wait – I didn’t realise he was your . . . I thought you said . . . ’
Jamie’s face was suddenly a mixture of upset and confusion, which, if Mirren hadn’t been so utterly horrified, might have answered a few of her questions.
‘No!’ said Mirren.
‘Course you are,’ said Theo. Then, in a mock whisper to Jamie, ‘She LOVES it.’
‘I don’t love anything!’ said Mirren, desperately. ‘Oh, my God!’
‘Course you do,’ said Theo. ‘You were giving me the come-on LAST NIGHT!’
The room fell silent, as Mirren boiled with fury.
It had only been flirting. And she had had no idea that she would suddenly feel quite differently about her employer; she hadn’t even noticed it creeping up on her.
She had thought she would get her own back on Theo and, okay, had been feeling a bit lonely, but . . . well, that was yesterday!
Nobody would give her a chance to explain and she couldn’t anyway without it sounding worse.
Jamie was looking genuinely horrified, Theo was wildly swinging around, shouting, ‘Someone put that music on! It’s too quiet in here and I want to dance with my baby!
’ and Esme was looking miserable and slightly more sober.
‘Actually,’ said Jamie suddenly, ‘I’m not that fussed about supper. I think I’ll just go to bed.’
‘Me too,’ said Mirren. ‘Theo, you’re a disgrace.’
‘No, no, you stay,’ said Jamie, sounding tired.
‘YEAH, STAY!’ said Theo, grabbing her with one hand and some more bread with the other.
Esme was fumbling with the record player.
‘I’ll dance,’ she announced boldly, and, as if things weren’t already bad enough, as the old music came on – in a ghastly way, the needle speeding up on the record – she started to perform what was clearly supposed to be a very sexy dance, while Theo grabbed one arm, then held on to Mirren with another.
The speeded-up waltz sounded gruesome but neither of them seemed to care.
‘Get off me!’ Mirren said crossly, pushing him away, and running to the door. But Jamie had vanished into the gloom, and the spell was broken.