Free A Yuletide Treasure by Cynthia Bailey Pratt Page A

she needs now is a mite of sleep, and that she’ll have or my name’s not Portia Duke.”
    “Is it?” Camilla asked, finding it hard to believe. But no one was responsible for their name, only what it stood for. “How pretty,” she added quickly.
    “M’father was fond of a word of poetry in the evenings, poor man.”
    “ ‘The quality of mercy is not strained,’ ” Camilla began.
    “That’s right.” Mrs. Duke seemed puzzled that anyone besides her father should know it. “Mortal fond of poems and such like. Don’t know where he took a taste for such stuff, him being no better than a coachman.” She sniffed. “No sense to it, mostly.”
    ‘Your father must have been a remarkable man.”
    “He was a good provider. My mother says you can’t expect more from a man than that.”
    “My mother says the same thing,” Camilla noted. Of course, Mrs. Twainsbury masked her meaning rather more than Mrs. Duke’s mother. She talked about the duty a girl owed to her family not to marry beneath herself. Though the daughter of a general might equal the second son of an earl, Camilla had always wondered secretly if her mother had felt herself to have married up or down on the social scale.
    Mrs. Duke seemed suddenly to remember that she disliked Camilla. All the same, she grudgingly promised to offer her good wishes to Nanny Mallow, should she awaken. Then she slipped back into the sickroom and shut the door quietly but firmly.
    At almost the same instant, Camilla heard a door open on the floor above. She frankly listened, hoping for some clue to her reception at the Manor.
    Though she had not expected to be received with open arms and a military band playing “See the Conquering Hero,” the cool unfriendliness of the inhabitants, even if tempered by charity, was starting to make her doubt herself. Was her breath somehow offensive? Did she remind them all of some acquaintance better forgot?
    A quite young and rather loud voice sounded from above. “But I don’t see why you should be allowed to eat with the grown-ups while we have to take our tea up here.”
    “It’s not fair,” another voice chimed in, younger, yet somehow deeper. ‘You’ve got your cameo on. We’re not even allowed to look at ours.”
    “That’s because you’re children,” Tinarose said. Camilla could imagine the young girl’s nose tilted in the air. “A lady like me needs a little touch of jewelry to set me apart from the governesses and companions.” Her sisters greeted this attempt at pretension with hoots of laughter, then a scream as a sudden swift thud of a charge took place. Lighter feet skipped away over Camilla’s head.
    Camilla dipped two fingers into the high lace collar that scratched so abominably at her neck. She caught hold of and dragged out her gold locket on a thin chain. With a wry smile, she laid it to repose on her bosom. It had been made on the Continent and was said to be quite fine. She, at least, would not be relegated to the status of governess or lady’s companion, two fates which she prayed she need never attempt.
    She waited patiently on the landing until Tinarose stopped chasing after her sisters. When Tinarose caught sight of her as she came down a level, her steps grew slower and more deliberate on the uncarpeted stairs to the third floor.
    “Are you lost?” she asked, the tone friendly.
    “I don’t know the way to the dining room.”
    “Oh, my uncle isn’t there.”
    “I wasn’t looking for him. Your mother said I might join the family for dinner if I didn’t feel like taking a tray in my room. I would like company, so here I am.”
    “You saw Mother?”
    “Yes. She lent me a few things for the night.”
    Tinarose nodded as if Camilla had confirmed something for her. “I thought I recognized the dress.”
    “It’s very pretty. I’m very grateful to her.”
    “Mother doesn’t like it. Of course, she couldn’t wear it anyway. Not now.”
    “I was sorry to hear of your father’s