A/N: Oh, lovely readers and reviewers, thank you ever so much. I am sorry for the delay. I have worked on seemingly every chapter of this story, except this one and the one after, the ones I actually needed to write. Thus I am a bit behind, and you might get Andith Christmas a little after real Christmas, apologies in advance.

There were times in Edith's life when she believed she'd been happy. Dancing with her father, balanced precariously atop his feet, at her parent's tenth wedding anniversary party. Chosen for the honour above both Mary and Sybil. At fifteen a poem she'd written was published in a national anthology. Looking back, it was terrible; all about global warming and tragedy and the earth's abundant bounty under attack. The stuff of teenage emotional excess, but, at the time, it was the best thing she'd ever written and her name was in a book. Her acceptance letter from Newnham had rendered her speechless one moment and dancing around the kitchen putting on an excellent rendition of Eye of the Tiger the next. There was the blissful summer between the end of tripos and the results of tripos. Life was sun, champagne and punting whilst musing on every conceivable topic.

As she moved away from her teenage years and into adulthood those moments of joy and contentment started to become more difficult to find. The nagging suspicion she wasn't meant to be an historian became ever more prominent. Self-doubt was her constant companion. She remembered a sense of happiness on handing in her MA dissertation and during the first few weeks of her relationship with Michael Gregson, so high was she on the idea that he would want to date her. But that was it. She experienced much of her life, particularly her adult life, in a haze of grey indifference.

Now, everything was in colour. Curled up in the corner of the archive, reading a lambing pamphlet from 1872, knowing that Anthony would arrive to pick her up at the end of the day. This was happiness.

It transformed her work too. In the past she'd had to pull every word, on every topic like blood from a stone with a blunt syringe. Each essay, article, chapter was fueled by masses of tea and simmering anxiety about what the consequences might be if she didn't at least write something. The achievement was to have something done, the contents were never satisfactory, it had been too much of a mental trauma to even reach the stage of finished. Productivity arose only from negativity.

Now the words flooded out. Off the back of the incredible assortment of documents she'd read whilst at the archives, she'd written two complete articles and had ideas for eight more.

Then there were Pearson's diaries. Once one was found and they knew what they were looking for, she and Mrs Hughes found a whole box of them. The early thoughts of a girl full of ambition, frustration and passion even before she was sixteen. Pearson obsessed over the antics of the Suffragettes, catalogued the news of the movement for the vote. She was asked to leave school on six separate occasions for expressing her thoughts too vocally on the subject. Then there was the war. That consumed her too, all the injustices of it – her Father lost his life and her grief bled onto the pages through her pen - but there were triumphs, her Mother's achievement running the local school and the community pulling together through the turmoil. There was the occasional mention of the Strallan family and Locksley – 'the big house on the hill', as Pearson had labelled it, a little socialist, Edith suspected, even aged twelve. She'd ask Anthony about the names mentioned or the places or events and he'd shrug his shoulders. It had been her experience at Cambridge that the families of the most historic individuals were usually the worst historians of them. She'd been at College with the great-granddaughter of Nancy Astor, who was surprised to learn she'd had a run in (or two) with Churchill. Anthony found inventive ways to alleviate her annoyance at his lack of knowledge; in his arms she quickly forgot.

Edith inhaled Pearson's every word, greedy for them. She knew this girl. And she was desperate to find the rest of the diaries, to know the woman she would become, to know what consequences she'd had to shoulder. It was every historian's dream to discover an untapped resource and a voracious diarist was foremost amongst the possibilities.

How could she not be happy? She was in love. And she was doing what she loved, successfully, she felt, for the first time in her life.

"I'm sorry to interrupted again my dear."

Edith stuck a thumb in the page she'd reached, "No need to be sorry, what's the problem?"

Mrs Hughes sat on the floor across the other side of the room in the middle of a big puddle of grey skirts, a large leather book open beside her. The pen in her mouth waggled frantically as she spoke, "If I cannot find a date on a document –"

"Nothing in that pile pre-dates 1850 or post-dates 1900, just write 'date unknown' and reference those years." Mrs Hughes had decided to try and catalogue the contents of the archive. Edith had a suspicion that she was simply lonely, the library being so quiet once the schools broke up for the holidays and no one waiting at home.

"Ah – thank you."

They worked for a few more hours in a companionable silence, punctuated by Edith's need to share some fascinating fact or figure and Mrs Hughes's confusion about the material she was trying to manage. As the end of the day approached she started to stack the catalogued documents in neat piles. She caught her toe in the hem of her skirt and petticoat and fell to the floor with a thud and an exclamation. Out of the corner of her eye Edith saw the tumble of a cloud of grey fabric and the swish of flying papers.

"Mrs Hughes! Mrs Hughes!"

The librarian lay flat on the floor, staring at the ceiling, somehow looking both pained and cross.

"Bugger."

"Are you all right?"

"The pride's certainly damaged. The rest of me, I'm not too sure. Give me a hand would you dear?"

Together they worked her upper torso into a sitting position, and she leant back against the staircase, closing her eyes a moment. Frowning, she looked down at her feet, "My right ankle, it's –"

The first blooms of an ugly bruise were already showing. "Can you move it?" Edith asked. A slight shift. "Can you stand on it?"

Mrs Hughes attempted to straighten the foot so that she might flatten it out and try to walk, but sucked in a breath of air with a grimace, "Not a chance."

"Wait here." Mrs Hughes gave her an arch look in response. "You know what I mean! I'll get Thomas. He'll be able to carry you up the stairs."

"I'm sure he'll be delighted to assist."

Outside she found Anthony leaning against the car. In the furor downstairs she'd forgotten it was nearly home time and that they'd see one another again. He gave her his dimple and her heart skipped in reply. Would she ever stop feeling giddy on seeing him? Intellectually, she knew she probably would, but at that moment she couldn't imagine it.

He leant down and kissed her on the cheek, shy, still, of too much affection in public, "Evening. Where's your coat? And bag for that matter?"

The sight of him had made her forget her task, "Oh, I'm not ready yet, Mrs Hughes has taken a fall and she can't - "

"What?!"

At that moment she noticed Mr Carson at the back of the car, unloading a few things from the boot.

"What's happened to Elsie?" He barked the question, demanding answers, and quick.

"Steady on Charlie." Anthony said.

Edith explained, "It's nothing to worry about, she just fell and -"

Then he was off, through the door of the library, calling his wife's name. Edith and Anthony stared at the space he left.

"Oh God, she's not going to be happy. I was supposed to get Thomas. What is Charlie doing down here any way?"

Anthony went to the boot and shut it, piling Carson's things up beside the rear wheel, "He drove me. How do you think I get here every night?"

"Of course."

"And then I suspect he lurks by the pub and watches Mrs Hughes lock up and walk home."

Wrinkling her nose, Edith replied, "I can't decide if that's creepy or romantic."

"Making sure the woman you love navigates home safely in the darkness?" He tucked his arm around her waist and she did the same, fitting her thumb into his belt loop, "Romantic, I think."

It was apparent at the top of the archive stairs that Edith's prediction had been right: Mrs Hughes was not happy. Her voice was raised, going at a mile a minute and her accent had turned very, very Scottish.

"Dinnae touch me Charlie Carson!" She shouted.

"Elsie. Elsie." He placated, or attempted to, and failed.

"I dinnae need your help!"

Carson said to them, "Being angry brings out the Glaswegian in her."

"Dinnae talk about me like I'm not here."

He sighed, "I'm sorry, love. Let me help."

"I'm not your love. And, no."

"Yes you are. Now don't be stubborn. You can't walk." He went to put his arms around her shoulders but she pushed them away.

She folded her arms and held her chin out, appearing for all the world as the very picture of stubborn, "I can. I just need a minute."

"Your ankle is twice its normal size. Last month up in the barn –"

She raised a hand to his mouth, "If you're about to compare me to a sheep, I suggest you rethink."

He cleared his throat and pursed his lips, but couldn't help himself, "A cow, but it's relevant –"

"Charlie!" She rested her head in her hands.

Edith stole a glance at Anthony and immediately wished she hadn't. He had his hand over his mouth and his shoulders rocked up and down. The blue in his eyes, shone with tears. On catching her eye, he snorted and let out an audible titter. A titter! Her six foot plus, blonde haired, blue eyed, Adonis tittered and she could hardly believe it, but it made her love him a little bit more. His giggles were catching and she started to laugh too. It was a farce, this scene. The angry Scots lady and her English knight in muddied arran wool.

"Elsie if you'll just listen to me!"

"You're infuriating! Infuriating! An insufferable know it all –" She paused, and seem to drag a word up from her stomach, "Bawbag!"

Puzzled, Edith couldn't help but interject, "What's a bawbag?"

Anthony laughed again and tried to smother it with a cough. He whispered in a voice laced with amusement, "I'll tell you later."

"And you!" Mrs Hughes turned her ire on Edith, pointing, "You were supposed to get Thomas, not him." She repositioned the pointing finger to jab it at her husband's chest.

"I'm sorry, events overtook me!"

"Thomas couldn't help you anyway Elsie. Spindly, pale boy." As he said this, he hooked one arm under her knees and the other about her torso, ignoring her continuing protestations. With a comedic groan that set Anthony and Edith giggling into their hands once again, he lifted his wife up. He looked down at her, "That lad couldn't manage you Elsie."

"Are you saying I'm fat?"

"Oh, quiet, you know I think you're perfect." As he whisked her past them, he winked and said, "I like a woman with a bit of flesh on her bones." It was obvious he was delighted to once again have his wife in his arms, regardless of the manner in which it had come about.

"Bawbag." Mrs Hughes said again, but without any venom. It was impossible not to notice that as they went up the stairs her head came to rest lightly upon her husband's shoulder.

Edith turned back to Anthony and jabbed her head at the sight in front of them, mouthing "Look!" With her eyes wide and her smile broad to act as the punctuation.

Through the descending mist and the inky black early evening Mr Carson carried his wife towards her home, slow but steady steps. Edith was certain he wouldn't drop her.

"Do you think they'll get back together?" Edith asked.

Anthony shook his head, "I think it's unlikely that a trip, fall and gallant, if somewhat ungainly, rescue will fix whatever forced them apart."

"We could help them along a bit?"

"What do you mean?"

"Hang on." She sprinted over to the couple, who were still bickering about what help Mr Carson should and should not offer.

"I meant to ask earlier - Mrs Hughes, and you too Mr Carson, do you want to come to Christmas lunch at Locksley? Anna's cooking enough food for a small army."

Mrs Hughes frowned and Carson smiled, "We'd be delighted."

"What do you mean by 'we', Charles Carson?"

"I mean you and I, Elsie Hughes. Christmas is in four days; you won't be back on your feet by then. You won't be driving up to Glasgow for dinner with your crotchety sister, so we might as well have it here."

"You don't make my decisions Mr Carson. I –"

The argument, Edith sensed, was likely to continue, so she jogged back to the car. Anthony stood dutifully by the driver's door, watching her return and opening it so she could clamber inside.

"I invited them to Christmas lunch."

"Playing matchmaker?"

"They're meant to be, I think, I'm just trying to push them along."

Anthony narrowed his eyes, "You didn't trip her up did you?"

She laughed, "Nowhere near the scene of the accident, Officer, I promise."

"Well, I have to tell you, the use of the term bawbag does not bode all that well for your hopes of reconciliation."

"What does it mean?"

"Annoying person."

Edith considered a moment and shook her head, "that's not so bad."

With a raised finger - discouraging her early declaration - Anthony added, "And also: scrotum."

He glanced across at her and she caught his eye. She saw his bottom lip moving again, the shake of his shoulders and the tears gathering. With no one to judge them they dissolved like schoolchildren into peels of laughter.