He hated Mama.
He hated her for doing this to Cora. Again.
The same shots had been fired before, and he supposed he and Cora both knew that at some point during the Christmas Eve dinner conversation they'd hear about their—or according to Mama—Cora's evident failure to conceive an heir. The whole blasted holiday was about the birth of a baby boy after all.
And yet knowing the enemy's offensive strategy did little to assuage the instant searing, and subsequent, excruciating ache caused by the assaults.
Robert gazed at the reflection of the fire's flames licking and slapping the sides of his nearly empty whiskey glass and replayed in his mind Cora's curt, tear-laden words to him.
"You didn't fight for me, Robert. You had the chance, and you didn't."
He had protested, of course. He'd sighed, and placed a comforting hand on the back of her shoulder. But she pulled away, continued up the staircase, and left him standing there, smoldering in his own loathing for his inability to relieve her pain.
No, he didn't fight for her.
Perhaps out of defeat or resignation, or perhaps out of sheer emotional exhaustion, he did not—could not—do battle. Not today.
He didn't dare tell Mama that Cora had been with child roughly six months before.
He didn't dare tell her that their hopes had been so short-lived.
That those hopes came crumbling down on the 24th of September.
What good would it do, anyway?
To Mama, Cora would only appear more incapable, even more unsuitable for the role of Countess.
And though her compassion occasionally surfaced, Mama was never known to be particularly sympathetic.
And so he remained silent, and prayed for Cora's fortitude—as well as his own.
But like every time before, it wasn't quite enough.
After draining his glass Robert was desperate for another distraction, so he picked up the burgundy-colored book resting on the side table.
It was once a favorite tradition of his to read A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens each year, but recent estate business had kept him away from the solitary intimacy of the library.
He sighed, flipped to the ribbon-marked page, and tried to concentrate on the words before him.
But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round—apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that—as a good time; a kind, forgiving, chartable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and no another race of creature bound on other journeys.
The sound of the door clicking shut pulled him from his temporary reprieve. He didn't have to look up from the page to know it was Mama. He could distinguish her footsteps anywhere: heavy for her delicate frame, swift, and always firmly in rhythm.
He could hear her pouring herself a glass of whiskey behind him with her usual precision, but oh, her presence alone was enough to make the muscle fibers between his shoulder blades tighten. With each tedious moment he felt another layer of fibers constrict, compact, and compress onto the growing knot of tension, as if building a defense against the inevitable assailments that would fly from her direction.
He desperately studied the fading print on the page to block her presence from his already seething mind. He urged his eyes through the motions, hoping that, if anything, the methodic movement might calm him.
Left to right, left to right.
For God's sake, get it together, man!
Left to right, left to right.
Left to right, left to—
–Oh, to hell with it all!
Violet was behind him now, leering down over his shoulder. After glancing at the page for a few moments, she remarked plainly, "Ah, yes, Dickens. Why use a few words when you can spout several hundred to describe the buttering of bread?"
Robert cringed.
Her fiery whiskey breath grazed the hairs of his neck, shocking them erect and disturbing the bundled mass of stress and anxiety in his shoulders and neck. He slapped the book shut and clenched his jaw, forcefully pressing his tongue against the back of his teeth.
He was far too cross. He knew he shouldn't speak. He mustn't. He mustn't free his tongue.
But the tension that had been building since the moment they sat down to dinner was too much.
"You would know, Mama." He hissed almost inaudibly.
"I beg your pardon, Robert?"
He twisted his torso and peered up at her through narrowed eyes from his place on the couch.
"You certainly never appear to be at a loss for words, Mama. Particularly when it comes to criticizing Cora."
Violet straightened, lifted her chin, and pressed her lips into a determined line.
"It's been nearly a year, Robert. I was simply pointing out the fact that she–"
"You think us unaware?!" he barked before she could finish. He stood now, book still in hand, but blazing as fiercely and suddenly as the fire just after the log had fallen.
"You think we don't realize the severity of our situation?! You think we aren't devastated each month!? You think we want it to be like this?! You think we aren't trying?!"
Violet pursed her lips, and then opened her mouth to respond, but Robert was quicker.
"For God's sake, Mama, it's Christmas!"
Remembering the book still tight in his grip, he raised it for her to see. He shook it for emphasis as he continued his tirade, knowing fully well that she was familiar with the timeless tale.
"The one time of the year when you're supposed to soften your heart and not patronize or criticize others. The one time to show goodwill! And you insist on reminding Cora of how inadequate you believe her to be. Enough, Mama—we've had quite enough! I must go. I cannot bear to be in your presence anymore this evening. Goodnight."
He wasn't sure where he was going. A raging tempest of a blizzard was blowing outside, but he didn't care at this point. He needed to get out. He needed to breathe.
As he turned to storm out of the room, Robert hurled the book at the couch with such great force that it rebounded off the cushion and clattered violently to the floor.
And for the first time in a long, long time, the Countess of Grantham was left speechless.