Cecy learned many things during her first year of marriage—how to run a large household, how to plan a menu, how to host a dinner party. She learned about pregnancy and childbirth and about being a mother, and everything she learned, she wrote down. The journal had a name now—The Book of Wifely Knowledge: For Phoebe—and when their second child was born, Cecy copied its contents into a matching journal—The Book of Wifely Knowledge: For Emma. Everything from wedding nights to managing servants to raising children. She added some recipes, too, things she had learned to make in the still-room: lavender water and essence of rose, bramble wine and elderflower cordial.

When Benjamin was born, Gareth started a journal for him. Cecy saw him working on it from time to time, but she didn’t try to read it, any more than Gareth tried to read the journals she was writing for their daughters. But she knew one thing that was in it, because he’d asked her for it: the recipe for what was arguably the best mulled wine in the county.

They were drinking that mulled wine now. A fire burned in the grate and the shutters were closed against the winter night and the drawing room was cozy. Cecy sipped her wine, sweet and spicy, tasting of cinnamon and cloves, ginger and orange zest. She glanced across at Mattie and Edward Kane. This was one of her favorite times of the year: Christmas, when Mattie and Edward came to stay for a month, and Mulberry Hall filled with adults and children and laughter.

“Shall we stage home theatricals this year?” Mattie said. “I think the older children would enjoy it.”

“They’d love it!” Cecy said.

“One of Perrault’s tales,” Gareth suggested. “Puss in Boots? Sleeping Beauty?”

“Little Red Riding Hood,” Edward said. “I’ll be the wolf.” He bared his teeth, and he did look savage, with those scars across his face—and then he grinned, and he was no longer in the least bit frightening.

Cecy fetched a copy of Perrault’s tales and they listened as Mattie read first Little Red Riding Hood and then Puss in Boots aloud. How familiar this was: a dark winter’s evening, Mattie’s voice rising and falling as she read. If she closed her eyes Cecy could almost imagine herself back at Creed Hall.

Except that Mattie had read sermons at Creed Hall, not children’s tales, and the drawing room had been chilly, not cozy, and Mattie had had to stand while she read, and there had never, ever been mulled wine or laughter.

Cecy looked across at Mattie curled up on the sofa, and at Edward sprawled alongside her. He was smiling as he listened to his wife, his eyes heavy-lidded, almost closed, and that reminded her of Creed Hall, too: Edward falling asleep whenever Mattie read the evening sermon.

Five years ago, almost to the day, that she and Mattie had first met him.

And five years almost to the day that they’d met Gareth.

Cecy took her husband’s hand in both of hers and rested her head on Gareth’s shoulder, and perhaps it wasn’t entirely proper to nestle close to one’s husband if one had guests, but Mattie and Edward were family.

By the time Mattie had finished reading Puss in Boots the longcase clock in the entrance hall was striking half past eleven.

Mattie smothered a yawn and said, “Lord, is it that late already? Time for bed.”

“Definitely.” Edward yawned, too, and climbed to his feet and held out a hand to her. The hand with only three fingers on it.

Mattie took it. Together they headed for the door.

Cecy uncurled and climbed to her feet, too.

Gareth stood, but he didn’t head for the door; he turned to the escritoire, opened it, and rummaged for a sheet of paper.

“What is it?” Cecy asked.

“Something I want to remember to tell Benjamin.”

Benjamin was only six months old, but she understood what Gareth meant: a note to go in Benjamin’s journal.

Gareth flicked open the inkpot, picked up a quill, and scrawled a short sentence. Then he glanced at her and smiled and held the paper out so that she could read it.

Surround yourself with people who make you happy.

His gaze held hers for a long moment, and then he put the paper on the escritoire again and wrote another sentence, even shorter.

Cecy stepped closer to read it.

I love you, Cecy, he’d written.

She picked up the quill and dipped it in ink, and wrote: I love you, too. You make me very happy. Then she smiled at her husband and took his hand and led him up the stairs to bed.