Chapter Thirty-Four

1911

‘You!’ Viola said. ‘It was you driving the carriage!’

Laurie nodded. ‘It was. May I?’ He held his hand out and prayed desperately that she would take it, and that he wouldn’t be left standing here like the last snowman of the season, quietly drooping and disappearing into the soggy earth.

Suddenly she smiled and he felt his heart lift. An unusual sensation, admittedly — but he swore that at that very moment, it genuinely happened.

‘You may,’ she said,

He was done for. Finally, utterly and completely head over heels in love with this annoying, beautiful, sparky American girl.

He helped her out of the carriage and then guided her through an archway towards the centre of the garden. He was pleased to see that the lanterns and candles he and Fabian had brought out earlier were lit up and shining, and sent a silent prayer of thanks to his partner in crime. He absolutely couldn’t have done it without him.

* * *

Viola, her hand safe and warm in Laurie’s, allowed herself to be gently guided through the garden. She looked around her in wonderment, seeing the leaves and shrubs gilded with frost; holly and ivy were wound around everything, and, above them, was a bright, shining moon. The snow clouds had passed over and it was enchanting.

‘“The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow, gave a lustre of midday to objects below,”’ she whispered, quoting the poem Pearl’s children had enjoyed earlier.

‘I couldn’t have said it better myself,’ said Laurie. She realised he had taken hold of her other hand as well and they were standing close, so very close to one another.

And there it was, the scent she would recognise anywhere. Woodsmoke and tobacco and leather . . . How did it now make her go weak at the knees?

‘I’m sorry for the subterfuge,’ he continued. ‘It’s not the first time I’ve crept around under your nose, though.’

‘Oh?’

‘The tearoom at Bodmin. You were there with Pearl and my sisters. When I found out they were going into the town, I went as well — but about half an hour after they did. I took Jester. Raced across the moor. And then I deliberately walked past the tearoom, just to see if I could see you.’

Jester, for of course it was he who had drawn the carriage, whinnied as if to remind everyone of his part in the charade. Laurie cast a glance in his direction and grinned.

Viola laughed as well. ‘I thought it was you! I saw you!’

‘ Not my proudest moment.’ Laurie smiled. ‘I’m not given to general lurking. But this — the grand gesture thing.’ He shrugged, suddenly looking embarrassed. ‘It’s completely new to me. I generally pride myself on my use of words and saying the right thing and all that, but when I’m with you, I can’t actually string a decent sentence together without saying absolutely the wrong thing. So a grand gesture of sorts was the only way I could think of to get you alone, away from all our families, and to do this . . .’

And then, as the moon broke fully through and cast its magical light down on them, he leaned in and she closed her eyes and reached up towards him, responding . . . and then he kissed her, so very gently, that at first she thought it was a snowflake brushing her lips. She shivered and he pulled her closer, then he kissed her again and she realised it was no snowflake.

Finally, they drew apart, and she opened her eyes and looked into his.

‘I think,’ he said slowly, ‘I’ve maybe wanted to do that since the first day I saw you.’

‘When I was sitting in a puddle?’

‘Exactly then.’

She smiled. ‘Maybe I’ve been wanting to do the same. I’m glad we called a truce.’

‘Me too.’

‘But can I just ask one thing?’

‘What’s that?’

She ran her fingers up and down his arms and then placed her own arms around his waist. ‘Why just the shirt?’

He grinned and it made her heart stutter. It was an expression she felt he only shared with the people who mattered to him most — this was the Laurie he kept hidden from most of the world.

‘Ah. That.’ He pulled her closer and laid his forehead against hers for a second, then moved ever so slightly back so he was looking directly in her eyes again. ‘At Halloween. When you fell down the stairs and you said you didn’t want me to be a romantic hero.’ Again, that smile. He reached his hand up and moved a strand of her hair out of her face and behind her ears. ‘In my experience, if my sisters had reacted like that and said no, quite so vehemently, and went quite so red, it might have meant something different. So, I figured ,’ he emphasised the Americanism and that made her smile again, ‘that you might actually want the gallant behaviour and the grand gestures, and a romantic hero or two wouldn’t go amiss.’ He looked up at the sky ruefully. ‘This wasn’t my first plan. Had it not snowed, then you would have been delivered here, probably by Fabian, and I was intending to ride a horse across the estate and sweep you up on it. Possibly declaiming some poetry while I did it, possibly not.’

Viola laughed. ‘Hence the shirt sleeves.’

‘Hence the shirt sleeves. The only way I can look romantic and Byronic. I’m as bad as Medora and that damned dress of hers. And, yes, that was why I had to finally don the overcoat, the scarf and the hat — and become your heroic driver instead.’

‘Medora’s dress is beautiful ,’ said Viola. ‘And your shirt sleeves are just wunnerful .’ That made his smile even wider. ‘But it’s damned cold! Here — let’s put the coat and scarf back on you!’

But Laurie shook his head. ‘Not just yet. Let me be Byronic and heroic just a few minutes more, because, listen . . .’ He looked towards the direction of the village, and, sure enough, there was the faint chime of bells striking midnight . . .

‘Merry Christmas, Viola Arthur,’ Laurie whispered.

‘Merry Christmas, Laurie Teague,’ Viola whispered back. ‘I actually do love you as a romantic hero. Maybe I could kinda be persuaded to love the real Laurie just a little bit too.’

‘Then let me try to persuade you on that one, Miss Arthur. It would be my absolute pleasure.’

And then they kissed again and those first few moments of Christmas 1911 were, they agreed many, many years later, the beginning of the most “wunnerful” Christmas morning they’d ever had . . . and absolute proof that secret Christmas wishes did indeed work.