A/N: Thanks to all readers and reviewers, especially: eyeon.
So I've promised to have a new chapter every Saturday, but on Christmas, it just wasn't going to happen with this fic! 😉 Still, I wanted to post something… so here's a cookie from a one shot I'm working on, The Last Downton Christmas. It's kind of a prequel to We Will Always Live At Downton Abbey, the next fic in the Mysteries of Downton Abbey series. And happy holidays, everybody!
At the end of 1911, Patrick Crawley comes to stay at Downton Abbey for the holidays. He's set to become engaged to Mary, but his heart doesn't seem to be in it. Does he really care about Mary at all? Edith is determined to find out.
Christmas 1911
Edith hid behind the branches of the enormous Christmas tree, heart pounding. She had a perfect view from where she stood. Too perfect, in fact. She saw everything. Mary's lovely pale face and swanlike neck rising up from the red dress, the sparkling garnets at her throat and ears, the jeweled silver net holding up her chignon of glossy dark hair. Her dark eyes glittered beneath perfectly arched brows, the faint tinge of colour staining her cheeks. She was beautiful and challenging and charming, and for the moment at least, she was choosing to turn a fraction of that charm on her cousin.
"Do you want my heart as well?" asked Patrick. "To add to your collection?" His voice sounded more bitter than Edith would ever have believed it could.
"Goodness. You're being a bit overdramatic, don't you think? It's only a matter of two cousins kissing under the mistletoe," said Mary, turning up her face and laughing, her eyes both bright and dark.
They stood very close, their lips no more than a few inches apart, but Patrick moved no closer. He kept staring. Edith wondered if he really did have an abstracted look in his deep blue eyes, as if Mary were really not interesting enough to hold his attention, or if she herself was only imagining that lack of interest.
Mary finally did drop her gaze. "I'll say goodnight, then," she said casually, turning to leave. He did not acknowledge her. But he kept standing, perhaps looking after her, perhaps only staring blankly into space. Then he muttered some words that Edith had heard in the stables and always pretended she did not know.
Edith was holding her breath, trying desperately to be quiet, but a branch of the tree was digging into her arm. She couldn't help moving. Patrick's head turned towards her. She'd been caught, and she knew it. She stepped out from the other side of the tree, losing her balance at the last moment and almost stumbling. She didn't even see Patrick move, but somehow he was at her side, steadying her arm, his fingers individual spots of heat on her cold skin.
"Oh! I'm sorry," she said awkwardly.
"Edith, are you all right?" He did not let go of her. In a horrible, fierce way, she wished that he would. He didn't really want to touch her, only Mary, he was only showing politeness by keeping his gawky little cousin from falling flat on the floor.
"Yes. I'm fine, perfectly all right, never better," gabbled Edith. "I've got to go to bed. Or something. Excuse me, Patrick, do." Gathering up her skirt, she turned, feeling his grip break at last. How cold the air was without the warmth of his hand.
"Edith, wait—" he called after her as she all but ran from the hall in the other direction. Even as she fled she was blinking back tears, already furious at herself for the lost opportunity to be alone with Patrick. Although, of course, there never really had been a chance for her. Mary, as always, had got to him first, claimed his heart first, even though she really did not want it.
Edith retreated into a little-used back room under the stairs, meaning to stay only until she had calmed down enough to appear normal in case anyone saw her on her way back to her bedroom. But she found a full glass of champagne that a partygoer had left on a table and drained it, knowing how improper she would look if anyone saw her, and then she slumped into a chair and stared into the grate of the small cold fireplace, trying to think of nothing. She was standing in front of the mirror over the mantelpiece and redoing her chignon when a knock came at the door. She jumped, turning, and her hair fell down completely over her shoulders.
"May I come in?" asked a very familiar voice. Before she had time to say yes or no, the door opened and Patrick Crawley came in.
He gave a sigh of relief. "Edith. I'm so glad I've finally found you."
"You were looking for me?" She could hear her own voice squeak, a sound she absolutely hated.
"Of course I was," he said a bit impatiently. "I wasn't going to allow you to run off like that without—well—seeing if you were all right." He glanced at the grate. "Aren't you dreadfully cold?
"No, I'm fine." She was freezing, actually, but she hadn't realized it until that moment.
"You're not fine at all. You're trembling." He stepped closer to her.
His presence was so overwhelming that she could hardly find words. "I—yes, I suppose I'm a bit cold after all." At least he had handed her the perfect excuse, she thought.
"I'll build the fire."
"Oh, no, you really shouldn't take the trouble—"
"Too late," he said, moving the firescreen aside and kneeling in front of the grate. "I'm a dab hand at this, you know. I'll gladly play keeper of the flames. It's far too late to call up any of the housemaids."
Edith tried to protest again, but he was already busy laying a few cinders at the bottom of the grate and then a few pieces of paper over that.
"It's really awfully good of you to look for me," she said awkwardly. "But it just wasn't necessary, Patrick."
"I know. Hand me about eight pieces of that dry wood, Edith, could you?"
"Of course." She knelt at his side and began handing him the wood from a pile of firemaking materials laid to one side. She wondered if she should say anything about what had gone before. It certainly wasn't as if she wanted to. The last thing she wanted to do was to remind him that she'd seen the tense moments between himself and her sister.
"It's been a lovely Christmas," she said instead, feeling a fool.
"Yes, it has. A few of those pieces of coal, if you don't mind—use one of the cloths to keep your hands clean."
She handed him the coal, piece by piece. He laid them carefully on the grate, leaving hollow spaces between them.
"Why do you push the coal so far back on the grate, Patrick?" she asked, because it was something to say.
"So that the smoke would go up the chimney and not into the room," he said. "Another couple of pieces, if you would?"
She handed him the coal, glad of the cloth between their hands so that there was no chance their skin could touch. She wasn't sure she could hold her hard-won composure together through that. "How do you know so much about making a fire?"
He gave her a rather sardonic grin, crinkling the corners of his skin around his eyes. "All the housemaids but one left last winter because they couldn't get on with Mrs. Grundy, and we were forced to shift for ourselves for weeks on end."
"Oh, I see," said Edith more awkwardly than ever, remembering the horrid housekeeper at James Crawley's manor house. Mrs. Grundy constantly reminded his side of the family that she could leave at any time, especially if her pay didn't improve, which was not something that Patrick's father could manage. As if I needed any reminder that Patrick hasn't got any money coming to him, so he's got to marry Mary!
"Now the matches, if you please," said Patrick. She handed him a long match, and he struck it into flame. "And if I've done this correctly, which I think I have managed to do… here we are!" He fired the paper from below, and the paper and wood burst into flame. Edith watched the daggers of dancing orange lick up through the center and take hold.
"Now isn't that nice?" he asked from behind her.
"Mm-hm." The warmth began to stream through the room, and Edith relaxed, letting out a breath she hadn't even realized she'd been holding. Patrick had somehow moved so that he was sitting directly behind her, and she was completely aware of the feel of his warm, solid body, only a few inches from her own. If she let herself fall back just the slightest bit, she would lie in his arms. Which was utterly impossible, of course, so she wouldn't do it.
"Do you know," he said, "I rather wish there could have been dancing tonight."
"Why? So you could dance with Mary?" she snapped. As soon as she heard the words come out of her mouth, she would have given anything to take them back.
"No," he said. "So I could waltz with you, Edith."
She sat very still, barely daring to breathe. He had actually said those words. She had heard them. Unless I've fallen asleep, and I'm dreaming…
Patrick stood up and offered her his hand, looking down at her with unreadable eyes. The invitation was clear.
Edith had certainly danced before, although not often. Her first season had been this year, delayed so as not to take attention away from Mary, and she had attended several balls and smaller dances. She had actually been rather good at graceful movement and following a partner. But she had never really had a dance partner whom she wanted. She did want Patrick, and if this were her only chance, then she would take it. She grasped his hand and allowed him to pull her to her feet.
"I wish there were a gramophone here," she said.
"I don't think we'll need one," he replied. "Just imagine the music, Edith. Can you?"
She nodded, thinking that she could imagine anything now, when Patrick was standing so close to her, when his midnight blue eyes were focused only on her. If they weren't cousins, of course, then she couldn't be alone with him. It would be a scandal for her to spend a moment alone with a man who wasn't her relative. Or would it? This was a different time from her mother's childhood, or her grandmother's. The two of them weren't bound by quite the same Victorian rules. Thirty years earlier, even twenty, it would have been a disgrace, perhaps a scandal if they were caught by the wrong person. Now, things had changed, surely?
"The beautiful blue Danube," Patrick said. Then one of his arms went round her waist, the other clasping her hand, and he began to whirl her round, leading her in the steps, and there was nothing but him and her in all the world. Edith was dimly aware in some corner of her mind that what they were doing was hazardous, that they teetered perilously close to the edge of some uncrossable line, but she didn't care. Radiant, soaring happiness filled her entire body, making her lighter than air.
"Your hair is so lovely, Edith," he said after some uncountable length of time.
"It's all come down," she said.
He broke the rhythm of the dance to reach down and touch a red-gold curl on her shoulder. "I wish you could wear it like this all the time."
Edith could only nod in reply.
One of his hands smoothed her hair back from her face, and he looked at her wordlessly. She drank in the sight of him, his handsome sculpted features, the lines of cheekbone and jaw and chin; his straight dark brows above midnight blue eyes, his wavy, glossy brown hair. She felt that she could never get enough of looking at him, and in this moment, suspended in time, apart from everything outside this room, she was not going to stop.
"Beautiful Edith," he whispered. His face was coming closer to hers, ever closer. She tipped her head back and closed her eyes.
The door banged open. Edith started in surprise. Her grandmother looked back at her from the doorway.
"Ah, there you are," said Lady Violet Crawley, nodding to them both. "How fortunate it is that I've finally managed to find both of you. Your room's been prepared, Patrick, of course. And Edith, I should rather like to have a word with you."
Everything was a blur of embarrassment after that. Patrick gave her a stricken look, but he left the room, and she heard him heading upstairs.
"Grandmama—I—" Edith began, as soon as they were alone.
"Hush, my dear," said Lady Violet, her eyes sad. For all that her grandmother had said she wanted to speak to her, she seemed to have nothing more to say.