A/N - Just a little snippet that I didn't want to get drowned out by the rest of its original chapter. A sort of calm before the storm.
In the aristocratic world in which everyone seemed to live a charmed life one position was head and shoulders above all others - that of first born son. An eldest child that is also male lived the most charmed of all these charmed lives. All of them were treated with special care and some parents took it even farther than that and all but eschewed discipline all together. The three-year-old boy dressed in a pirate costume and staring out the window of the closed carriage on its way to Downton was living such a life and his parents, James and Andrea Crawley, were possibly the most indulgent parents in the whole of western civilization. He was never corrected. He always got what he wanted. The idea of 'rules' was completely foreign to him. All he knew was that if he asked for something, he got it and he always won every game he played. Patrick Seldon Crawley was his parent's little prince. Obviously, this made little Patrick a less-than-ideal playmate for other children, though the little boy didn't know that. He only knew he had few, if any friends, so hearing that there was a 'Cousin Robert' at this house had perked his interest immediately. "Do you think Cousin Robert will play pirates with me?" the child asked his mother.
"Perhaps," his mother said weakly. She didn't have the heart to tell him that his cousin was a grown man who would most likely be far more interested in that foreign woman of his to run around the house looking for a treasure trove of toys and pillaging the kitchen for sweets.
James took his son on his lap in an attempt to get him to sit still. "If you want him to play with you, it will happen. I'll make sure of it." he told the boy confidently. Patrick grinned and gave his father a big hug.
At Downton Abbey, everyone was preparing to welcome Richard's nephew James, his wife and son, and his mother, Enid Crawley. As the family slowly began to find their way into the main hall to await their guests' arrival, Rosamund pulled Cora into the drawing room. Violet wanted to prepare her for what was to come. The Countess was sitting in her favorite chair waiting for them. She gestured for the two to sit and then began. "Before my sister-in-law and her family arrive, I feel there are some things you should be made aware of, my dear," she said as Cora took a seat, "and I would encourage you both to view these visitors as a cautionary tale about proper parenting. " Violet said eyeing the two young women. "We have Barbarians descending upon us!" she announced theatrically.
"Aren't you overreacting just a touch, Mama?" Rosamund asked.
"I never overreact," Violet snipped. Rosamund and Cora shared a look of disbelief. "And I'll pretend I didn't see that," the Countess added.
"I still don't understand how a visit from one little boy can warrant a strategy session," Rosamund said rolling her eyes. "Patrick is a sweet child, really he is. He's just a bit unruly."
"Unruly? He's positively lawless!" Violet exclaimed. "He has no discipline! He runs wild!"
"He's only three!" Rosamund cried barely keeping her voice at a respectable volume.
"That's the point," Violet growled. "Do you think he'll get easier to deal with when he's five, or eight, or ten? He'll be an absolute terror. It'll be a miracle if he stays out of prison."
"Mama!" Rosamund said. "He's just a little boisterous."
Violet's eyes narrowed. "Did he or did he not urinate into your drawing room fireplace the last time they visited you and Marmaduke in London?" she asked.
"Well, yes." Rosamund admitted. "His parents had been telling him about how careful you need to be around fire and he decided to try and put it out himself."
Violet sat back in her chair looking quite smug. "I believe you've just made my point." Cora was having trouble following the argument and her mother-in-law could tell. She set about providing the family's newest member with a little background information. "My nephew, James, and his wife, Andrea, have a son, Patrick, whom they have decided must do exactly as he likes at all times. It's some odd, new fangled, bohemian, free-range parenting which involves having a child and then releasing it on the unsuspecting populous with no concept of right or wrong, or the fact that decisions have consequences. They never scold him, never punish him, never even tell him he's done something wrong…"
"Andrea told me that she makes it a point to tell Patrick how perfect he is at least five times a day," Rosamund interjected.
"And just think of how he'll do with the ladies after another fifteen years of hearing that he's perfect and being allowed to urinate into fireplaces," Violet said with raised eyebrows. "My goodness, he'll have the social graces of a baboon." She shook her head and hoped her husband would stop inviting James and his family to spend Christmas at Downton well before then. "And then there's my sister-in-law, Enid, the most acerbic, imperious, haughty creature you'll ever meet. She's a sour-faced old bat that never met a person she couldn't speak ill of," Violet said.
Rosamund gave her mother a look. "You do realize that that 'sour-faced old bat' is only a few years older that you are," she teased.
"Then she wears those years very poorly indeed," Violet said striking a particularly dignified pose. Cora saw Rosamund put her hand to her mouth to cover her grin and Cora had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. "I don't know how someone can be that disagreeable," the Countess said with a huff. She set a withering stare upon her snickering daughter. "Are you quite finished?" she hissed. The two young women did there best to pull themselves together. "Honestly now, is that any way to treat your mother, Rosamund? You know very well that I'm as gentle as a lamb." she folded her arms in her lap and glanced at her daughter-in-law. The girl was smiling at her, but was far more demure and composed than her own daughter who stifled her guffaw with an unladylike snort. Lady Grantham started to think that possibly there were the glimmers of a future countess in 'that colonial interloper' and the idea brought a smile to her face.
"Thank you, I'll be sure to be on my guard," Cora told Violet with a smile. She had noticed Lady Grantham's smile and she thought that something she had done actually might have pleased her mother-in-law.
As quickly as it had appeared, Violet's smile vanished at the sound of Cora's accent. "You'd better be. I dare say you and Robert will be under siege when the Barbarians arrive," she said hoping that Enid would be relatively gentle with Robert's American bride… or, better yet, that the miserable creature would arrive suffering from laryngitis.