Regency Christmas Wishes(115)

“Miss?”

Cecilia looked up to see the housekeeper in the doorway, holding a tray.

“Please come in, Mrs. Grey,” she said, managing a half smile. “We seem to be in a storm of truly awesome dimensions.”

Mrs. Grey frowned at the sitting-room door, then came to the table, where she set down the tray. “Between you and me, Miss Ambrose, I think that Sir Lysander is in for the surprise of his life, the first time she does that across the breakfast table!”

“Oh, my,” Cecilia said faintly. “That will be a cold bath over baked eggs and bacon, will it not!”

Mrs. Grey smiled at her, in perfect agreement. “I am suggesting that you not go in there until she is a little quieter.” She indicated the tray. “Lady Falstoke sometimes waves burnt feathers under her nose, and then puts cucumbers on her eyes to cut the swelling.” She frowned. “What she really needs is a spoonful of cod-liver oil, and the admonition to act her age but . . .” She hesitated.

“ . . . but Lady Falstoke is an indulgent mother,” Cecilia continued. “I will give her a few minutes more, then go in there, Mrs. Grey, and be the perfect listener.”

The look the housekeeper gave her was as doubtful as the one that Davy and Lucinda left the room with. “I could summon her uncle, except . . .”

“ . . . this is a woman’s work,” Cecilia said. “Perhaps a little sympathy is in order.”

“Can you do that? She has been less than polite to you.” Mrs. Grey’s face was beet red.

“She just doesn’t know me,” she said, and felt only the slightest twinge of conscience, considering how quick she had been ready to bolt from the place as recently as last night.

Her quietly spoken words seemed to satisfy Mrs. Grey, who nodded and left the room, but not without a backward glance of concern and sympathy as eloquent as speech. She considered Lord Trevor’s words of last night, and the kind way he looked at her. If he can manage eleven years of what must be the worst work in the world, she could surely coddle one spoiled niece into a better humor.

She waited until the raging tears had degenerated into sobs and hiccups, and then silence, before she entered the sitting room. Janet had thrown herself facedown on the sofa. A broken vase against the wall, with succession-house flowers crumbled and twisted around it, offered further testimony of the girl’s rage. Janet is one of those people who needs an audience, Cecilia thought. Well, here I am. She set the tray on a small table just out of Janet’s reach, and sat down, holding herself very still.

After several minutes, Janet opened her swollen eyes and regarded Cecilia with real suspicion. Cecilia gritted her teeth and smiled back, hoping for a good mix of sympathy and comfort.

“I want my mother,” Janet said finally. She sat up and blew her nose vigorously on a handkerchief already waterlogged. “I want her now!”

“I’m certain you do,” Cecilia replied. “A young lady needs her mother at a time like this.” She held her breath, hoping it was the right thing to say.

“But she is not here!” Janet burst out, and began to sob again. “Was there ever a more wretched person than I!”

I think an hour of horror stories in your uncle’s company might suggest to you that perhaps one or two people have suffered just a smidgeon, Cecilia thought. She sat still a moment longer, and then her heart spoke to her head. She got up from her chair, and sat down next to Janet, not knowing what she would do, but calm in the knowledge that the girl was in real agony. After another hesitation, she touched Janet’s arm. “I know I am only a poor substitute, but I will listen to you, my lady,” she said.

Janet turned her head slowly. The suspicion in her eyes began to fade. Suddenly she looked very young, and quite disappointed. She put a trembling hand to her mouth. “Oh, Miss Ambrose, he doesn’t love me anymore!” she whispered.

With a sigh more of relief than empathy, Cecilia put her arm around the girl. “My, but this is a dilemma!” she exclaimed. She gestured toward the letter crumpled in Janet’s hand. “He said that in your letter?”

“He might as well have said it!” Janet said with a sob. She smoothed open the message and handed it to Cecilia. “Read it!”

Cecilia took the letter and read of Sir Lysander’s regrets, and his fear of contracting any dread diseases.

Janet had been looking at the letter, too. “Miss Ambrose, I wrote most specifically that the measles were confined to my sister’s house in York. He seems to think that he will come here and . . . and die!”

She could not argue with Janet’s conclusion. The letter was a recitation of its writer’s fear of contagion, putrid sore throat, consumption, and other maladies both foreign and domestic. “Look here,” she said, pointing. “He writes here that he will fly to your side, the moment all danger is past.”