Chapter One

“Do you think we’ll have snow for Christmas?” Suzanne asked, looking up from her book in the nursery.

“No, silly. There are no storm clouds in the sky,” her brother Thomas said. “The chances of snow by tomorrow are awfully small.” Clearly, as a boy of eleven, in his first year of boarding school, he knew much more of the world than a girl of a mere eight years.

“I know all of that,” Suzanne declared in her most exasperated voice, tossing her walnut-colored braid over one shoulder. “But one may still wonder and wish. You don’t know everything, including the future.”

She had him on that point, at least. For the moment, Thomas appeared debated into silence. Not even he, nearly a man—or so he thought, apparently—could argue that he knew the future.

From the window seat, Eleanor Hadfield, governess of the Brunson family, smiled to herself. She’d spent the last fifteen minutes in quiet reading, an activity the children were supposed to have been engaged in as well. On most days, her charges consisted of the three young Brunson girls, but now their two elder brothers were home from school for the holidays. Suzanne’s question made Eleanor gaze out the window and wonder about snow on Christmas Day as well. November and the first half of December had certainly seen several cold snaps, but no real snow yet.

Thomas appeared before the window seat, apparently done with his reading of A Pilgrim’s Progress, if he’d ever begun it, which was rather doubtful. He peered past Eleanor, searching the landscape.

“Looking for something?” she asked, leaning to the side to accommodate his unmannerly usurpation of the space.

“For someone, actually,” he said, straightening. Thomas clasped his hands behind his back in the manner he’d surely seen from both his father and grandfather. “I’m eager to see the men returning with the Yule log.”

Five-year-old Kate’s head popped up from her primer. “The Yule log is coming today?” She dropped the primer to the table and shook her chubby little fists excitedly. “Does that mean it’s almost time to eat the plum pudding? We’ve been waiting ever so long.” This last statement was spoken with the tone of a weary eighty-year-old.

Oh, how Eleanor loved these sweet children. They embraced the world and everything in it, and firmly believed that a child was every bit as important as an adult. Society rarely gave children much notice and certainly gave no stock to what they said or did. But Eleanor nurtured in them the belief that they did matter, that they could seek after and find the things they dreamed of.

The rest of the world seemed determined to crush children’s souls and dreams, to stop them from dreaming, and instead make them wake up to reality. But Eleanor refused to be complicit in teaching such worldly lessons. Better to arm a child with happiness and dreams rather than drag them into a sad “reality” at a young age.

“The Yule log,” Eleanor began, “is brought into the house and lit on Christmas Eve—”

“I know!” Suzanne said. “That is also why the maids have been decorating the house with greenery, isn’t it?”

“It is indeed,” Eleanor said. “That’s another sign of Christmas Eve.” She pointed a finger toward Suzanne. “But you shouldn’t have interrupted, my dear.”

The girl looked properly admonished as she nodded, folding her hands in her lap and crossing her ankles like a proper young lady all in the same motion. Thomas gave her a haughty look, as if pleased to hear his sister admonished by the governess. The sight sent Eleanor’s mouth twitching with a laugh she had to work at holding back. She remembered what it felt like to be laughed at by adults, and she would not do that to her charges.

She savored every day of their learning and discovery and development because at two and thirty, Eleanor knew quite well that the fates would not be sending her own children to be borne and reared. Becoming a mother would require a husband, and women who’d been given the designation of an old maid a decade hence didn’t find husbands.

She didn’t pine or worry over the simple facts. She had a life much easier than many unmarried women her age. She had much to be grateful for. Therefore, each day, she chose to thoroughly enjoy her position as governess and to teach them the things she would wish her own children would learn, if she’d ever had any.

“Tomorrow, we will indeed eat the plum pudding as part of the Christmas feast,” she said, finally answering Kate’s original question.

Gazing out the window, Thomas sighed.

“Something weighing on your mind?” Eleanor asked.

“Not exactly.” He shrugged and sighed again. “I just wonder how many more years it will be before I can go along to fetch the Yule log.”

“It’s hard to be seen as too young,” Eleanor said, rising and placing an arm about his shoulders. In my case, I’m seen as too old, she thought. But again, she’d made peace with the reality. She wanted to help Thomas make peace with being too young, a struggle for her because he wouldn’t remain too young. All too soon, he’d be fully grown.

“Father won’t let me go on the fox hunt either.”

“He will soon, I’m sure of it.”

“I hope you’re right.” Thomas sat on the window seat and stared out the window again.

She patted his shoulder and crossed the room to Suzanne and Kate as the door opened to reveal the eldest of the Brunson children, Andrew.

“It’s here!” he announced.

At once, Eleanor and the children, including three-year-old Emma, looked to the window.

“You won’t see them out there,” Andrew said, sauntering into the room as if he felt that he, like his younger brother, had long-since outgrown the nursery. “They’ve brought the log into the ballroom, and they’re about to light it. I’ve been sent to fetch the children.”

He turned about and left with the air of one having completed a mission in a foreign land. Eleanor chuckled at the thought; he’d spent many a day in this very nursery, and not all that long ago either.

She clapped and announced the need to tidy the nursery before they could go down to participate in the festivities. As she put a few books back on their shelf, she thought of Andrew’s superior manner. If he needed to be taken down a peg or two, she could certainly remind him that he had not yet been deemed old enough for the fox hunt this year either. But she’d wait to have that discussion with him in private.

She recalled all too well the feeling of being called to task before her elders, usually at the hand of the late Mr. Brunson, the uncle who’d taken her in when she was orphaned. He gave her a roof over her head, yes, but he’d never treated her as anything but an interloper. Fortunately, his son, the current Mr. Brunson, did not take after his father, which was precisely why Eleanor agreed to return to Willowsmeade as governess.

Most of the year, the boys were at school, but when they came home for holidays, their mother tended to come down with various ailments of a nervous nature, often complaining of the noise and chaos.

At such times, Eleanor cared for the boys as well as the girls. It was the least she could do for their father, who, though Eleanor thought of and referred to him as Mr. Brunson now, had as her cousin once been almost a brother, who, when she’d come to live here after her parents died of cholera, both teased and fiercely protected her as if she were his sister. When she’d been but eight—the same as Suzanne now—he was known to her simply as Henry.

In truth, she still had days when hearing “Mr. Brunson” recalled to her mind the severe, selfish man who’d reluctantly taken in his orphaned niece. He’d treated her harshly, as if she were the one who’d lost a fortune rather than her father, who’d speculated his wealth away. She had to remind herself that now, the name referred to the father of these children, her dear cousin Henry, who’d offered her a position at Willowsmeade when she refused to be taken in on charity.

After her one failed Season, the elder Mr. Brunson had—reluctantly—paid for some schooling that enabled her to find employment. He’d done so entirely thanks to Henry, who’d argued in the only manner his father cared about: that without an education, Eleanor would be a drain on his household. Not so if she could support herself. A modest education for her would be a sound investment for Willowsmeade.

Thank the stars for Henry’s interference. He’d secured for her the education that had allowed her to live in some comfort as a governess in two other households, until Henry brought her back after his father’s death. If not for Henry, she might have ended up on the streets, starving, sick . . . perhaps dead.

She had dreams of her own—to be independent, to live on her own one day—and she saved every penny she could to that end. Henry insisted that so long as he breathed, she would have a home at Willowsmeade, that she could live in the dowager cottage on the estate if she so chose. Perhaps she would move into the cottage years hence, when she’d grown too old to manage rambunctious children—perhaps after being governess to Andrew’s children—but for now, she would earn her keep through honest work.

At last Eleanor declared the nursery tidy enough for them to venture down to the ballroom, but she insisted they line up first and listen to her reminders about behaving properly in the company of adults. When she had their promise of good behavior, she led the way through the door and along the corridor. Little Emma lagged behind, so Eleanor scooped her up and carried the girl on her hip.

Thomas didn’t trail behind as he’d done several years ago, when she first joined the household. Instead, he walked nearly abreast to Eleanor—one more sign, she supposed, that he viewed himself as her equal.

Or my superior, she thought realistically. Despite the fact that I am old enough to be his mother.

“I can hardly wait for the plum pudding tomorrow,” he said. “Why does it have to be at the end of the Christmas feast?”

“I had no idea you were so partial to plum pudding,” Eleanor said as she smoothed back a bit of Emma’s hair from her face.

“Oh, it’s not the pudding itself I’m partial to,” Thomas said.

Eleanor could sense he was deliberately leading the conversation, but where to, she did not know, and she hadn’t any idea whether the destination was a trap he was hoping to horrify her with or something entirely innocent. “If it’s not the plum pudding you anticipate, what is it, then?”

The boy’s step came up short right before they descended the staircase. Eleanor turned to him, curious yet dreading what he was about to say. “I cannot wait until it’s brought into the room on fire.” He nearly whispered the final two words, but he said them leaning close, his eyes wide with excitement.

Of course the boy’s favorite part of Christmastide was a flaming dessert. She should have guessed. He grinned and raised his brows, waiting for her response.

“I can see why you would find that thrilling,” she said, striving for the same tone she’d use when discussing a matter of grave importance. Biting back chuckles around the boys was becoming harder and harder. At this rate, she’d be laughing outright well before they returned to school.

Thomas nodded, wearing a silly grin, which contained a few gaps as well as too-large teeth that weren’t fully grown in. “I’m going to ask Papa if Julian can light it this year. I’m sure he’d drench it with more brandy than Papa does, so the flame would be bigger—maybe higher than my head!”

With that, Thomas trotted ahead down the stairs, leaving Eleanor and the girls standing atop the first step, staring after him.

Julian.

The name rang in her mind over and over like the bells on a church, only it didn’t stop at twelve times. She’d heard his name spoken only now and again, and not at all of late. Whether Henry spoke of Julian often when she wasn’t in his company, she didn’t know. As for herself, Eleanor never mentioned him and hadn’t since he left Willowsmeade for war and she left for her one Season in London.

There had been a time when she’d thought Julian Stephens would always be part of her life. He’d been part of her heart from the day she’d crossed the threshold at Willowsmeade as a young girl. Just as Henry had been her playmate, so had Julian, the gardener’s son, even though he was two years older than Henry.

Julian used to say that she was above his station, and that when he returned from the navy, she’d be a duchess or some such. He was wrong. The few times she’d heard Henry—rather, Mr. Brunson—talking of Julian had told her that he’d risen through the naval ranks quickly and even had his own ship. He was Captain Stephens now, while she was still an orphan with no dowry and a father who’d squandered their name. The one thing she’d had that could attract a man—her youth—was long-since lost.

Perhaps Thomas is mistaken, and Julian is not coming for the holiday. Somehow, her feet regained the capacity of movement, and she led the girls down the stairs. She took each step slowly in hopes of not making her heart race any faster than it already was.

The only Christmas guests she’d heard mention of were the Edgleys, who’d arrived in time for Advent, more than a fortnight ago. Guests did not generally arrive as late as Christmas Eve. Surely Mr. Brunson would have mentioned the possibility to the servants, and if she’d missed the announcement, it wouldn’t have been for long, as the older servants who’d known Julian since boyhood would have been abuzz with the news.

Eleanor took a deep breath, easing her racing pulse. She had no reason to think that the boy who’d once said he’d return to her after he’d made something of himself was actually here.

That is, she had no reason to think so until they approached the ballroom door, and laughter poured into the corridor.

Including the one laugh Eleanor Hadfield would never, ever forget.

Julian had come to Willowsmeade.