Free Anne Perry's Christmas Mysteries: Two Holiday Novels by Anne Perry Page B

it would, with the greatest pleasure.
    After enjoying it, in spite of the circumstances and the thoughts that occupied her mind, she rose and washed. She dressed in the housekeeper’s other black gown, again with the chambermaid’s assistance, and found she rather enjoyed talking to her. Then she made her way downstairs.
    She met Agnes in the hall. She was wearing outdoor clothes and apparently about to leave.
    “Good morning, Mrs. Ellison,” she said hastily. “I do hope you slept well? Such a distressing time for you. I hope you were comfortable? And warm enough?”
    “I have never been more comfortable,” Grandmama replied with honesty. “You are most generous. I do not believe I stirred all night. Are you about to go out?”
    “Yes. I have a few jars of jams and chutneys to take to various friends. Nearby villages, you know? I am afraid the weather does not look promising.”
    Grandmama had another burst of illumination, of double worth. She could catch Agnes alone, unguarded by Bedelia, and if the weather did not oblige by snowing them in, she could affect to have caught a slight chill to prevent her returning to St. Mary in the Marsh tomorrow, or worse, this afternoon.
    “May I come with you?” she asked eagerly. “I am not here beyond this brief Christmas period, and I would so love to see a little of the outside. It is quite unlike London. So much wider…and cleaner. The city always seems grubby when the snow has been trodden, and everything is stained with smoke from so many chimney fires.”
    “But of course!” Agnes said with pleasure. “It would be most agreeable to have your company. But it will be cold. You must wear your cape, and I will have another traveling rug brought for you.”
    Grandmama thanked her sincerely, and ten minutes later they were sitting side by side in the pony trap, with Agnes holding the reins. It was, as Agnes had warned, extremely cold. The wind had the kiss of ice on it. Clouds streamed in from the seaward side and the marsh grasses bent and rippled as if passed over by an unseen hand.
    The trap was well sprung and the pony inexplicably enthusiastic, but it was still not the most comfortable ride. They left the village of Snave and moved quite quickly in what Grandmama presumed to be a westerly direction, and slightly south. It was all a matter of judging the wind and the smell of the sea. Agnes began by companionably telling her something about the village of Snargate and its inhabitants, and then explaining that from Snargate they would continue to Appledore. Then if there were time, to the Isle of Oxney as well, which of course was not an island at all, simply a rise from the flat land of the coast. However, if there were floods, then it would live up to its name.
    Grandmama thought that possibly the history of these ancient villages might be quite interesting, but at present it was the history of the Barrington sisters that demanded her entire attention. She must direct Agnes to it, and not waste precious time, of which there was far too little as it was.
    “You speak of the land so knowledgeably,” she began with flattery. It always worked. “Your family has its roots here? You belong here?” People always wanted to belong. No one wished to be a stranger, as Maude must have been all her adult life.
    “Oh, yes,” Agnes said warmly. “My great-great-grandfather inherited the house and added to it a hundred and fifty years ago. It is Bedelia’s of course. We had no brothers, unfortunately. And then it will be Randolph’s. But then it would have been his anyway, because I have no sons either.” She turned her face forward so Grandmama could see no more than a fleeting moment of her expression, and the moisture in her eyes could have been from the east wind. It was certainly cold enough.
    “You are fortunate to have sisters,” Grandmama told her. “I grew up with only brothers, and they were a great deal older than I. Too much so to be my