A/N: Many thanks for the wonderful reviews of the last chapter. This chapter may have a bit too much Sybbie but I hope you'll like it. Hope everyone is staying safe.

May 1931

"Daddy do they have horses at Downton?"

Tom lowered his newspaper and peered over the top of it to his daughter sitting opposite him. She was sitting with her face turned towards the window as if captivated by the passing Yorkshire scenery. Following her, he set the newspaper down on the seat beside him and glanced out the train window at a field separated from the train track by a dirt road and then a wooden rail fence where five or six horses stood contentedly munching grass.

"They had them when I lived there but I don't know if they still do."

"Did Mummy ride a horse?"

Nodding his head "she did" Tom replied as he saw a vision of Sybil looking oh so lovely in her blue riding outfit.

"I think I'd like to ride a horse." Sybil looked at him. "Do you think Aunt Mary would let me?"

"Sweetheart we're not going to the estate."

"What's an estate and why aren't we going there?"

Tom looked away from his daughter to the passing scenery. Why weren't they going to the estate … how could he explain …. He closed his eyes. Even now he could hear Sybil's screams … how could he tell his daughter of that place where her mother died … of the grandfather he held responsible for … Taking a deep breath he turned back towards Sybbie who was waiting for his answer.

"The estate is the house where Aunt Mary and your Granny Cora live and all the grounds around it but we're meeting them at the church in the village and then we're going to Ripon and Granny Cora is going to take you to tea while Aunt Mary and I go to lunch."

"But if Aunt Mary says they have horses couldn't we go see them first?"

"We just don't have the time since we have to get back to Liverpool to catch the ferry back to home tonight."

Sybbie crossed her arms across her chest and stared at her father. "Bbbbuuuttt" she whined.

"No buts Sybil Branson" Tom stopping Sybbie cold. "I said we don't have time and that's it and if you pout till we get to Downton we'll leave after putting flowers on your mother's grave and then you'll miss going out to tea."

Now it was Sybbie who took a deep breath. "Well I just thought it would be a good idea since I've never even petted a horse or ridden one."

"It was a good idea love but sometimes we just can't carry out our ideas."

"Maybe the next time we come?" Sybbie asked hopefully.

"Maybe" Tom answered.

As he always did Tom went into the church before visiting Sybil's grave. There he and Sybbie took a few minutes to light a candle and say a prayer, a ritual which somehow Tom found comforting. Exiting the church Sybbie darted off toward the graveyard while Tom followed at a deliberately slower pace. Rounding the corner of the church he stopped, still holding his hat in his hand a light breeze rustled his hair as he stood staring at the graveyard. No matter how many times he came here or many years passed seeing Sybil's tomb was still like a punch in the gut.

"Here it is" Sybbie shouted at her father as she patted the top of Sybil's stone tomb. Looking at that block of stone he thought of how much he hated it, it was so cold, so forbidding. It was of course something that he had had no say in just like he had had no say in Sybil's treatment until it was far too late.

Sybbie ran her hand over the carved words Sybil Cora Branson 3rd daughter of the Earl of Grantham. "Daddy what's an Earl?"

"It's a title like Prince or Duke."

"So the Earl is related to the king?"

Tom chuckled. "No love. An Earl isn't as high up as that." Even if one might act so high and mighty he thought but didn't say aloud.

"I don't really understand Daddy."

"Well love I don't either. We don't have Earls or Kings in Ireland."

"We once had kings Daddy. Uncle Darragh tells me the stories."

"Aye love once upon a time Ireland had kings but that was a long long time ago."

Sybbie ran her hand again over the word Sybil. "Daddy why did you name me Sybil?"

"Because it's a beautiful name and I thought it was a good way to remember your mummy."

Sybbie looked a bit confused. "You wouldn't remember mummy if I wasn't named Sybil?"

Tom ran his hand through his hair. "No love I'd always remember your mother. It's …" how could a man that wrote for a living find himself at a loss for words. "It's a way to honor your mother." He looked at his daughter and smiled. "Your mummy would be so proud of you."

"Do you think Granny Cora will tell me some stories of when mummy was my age?"

"I'm sure she'd love to."

"Ah Sybbie and Tom you're here." Tom looked up, rather thankful for the arrival of Mary and Cora. "It's wonderful to see you both."

While Cora and Mary occupied Sybbie, Tom spent a few minutes alone at Sybil's grave. He knelt and ran his hand over the carved words Sybil Cora Branson just as Sybbie had done. As so often he did when visiting here he envisioned scenes of her and of them. In his head he saw her standing in the garage, emerging from the house dressed in her finery reading for him to drive her to Ripon, standing over the hot stove in the abbey's kitchen so proud of her first effort at baking a cake.

"Oh love" he said as his hand once again brushed her name. "Every day with you was a gift." He wasn't sure why he always had so much to say at her grave and it wasn't until he heard footsteps coming towards him that he thought of the time. He brushed his hand one last time over her name. "I never thought I'd be happy again but I am and I know you'd be glad about that. But know love that no matter how happy I am you'll always be in my heart."

"So you've graduated from old trucks to a fancy motor car" Tom said as he ran his hand appreciatively on shiny dark red bonnet of the Hillman.

"What else would you expect when your husband sells them" Mary countered. "Besides I could hardly expect you and Sybbie to sit in the flatbed of the truck all the way to Ripon" she laughed.

"1928 model?" Tom said as he opened the passenger door.

"My you do know your motor cars" she chuckled. Then looking at him and smiling she asked "Would you like to drive us to Ripon?"

"Really!" He looked and sounded like a little boy on Christmas morning and she laughed at how excited he was.

"That is if you remember the way to Ripon?"

"So what if we get lost a few times on the way" he replied as he sat in the driver's seat.

"Daddy we can't waste time" Sybbie piped up from the back seat and all three adults turned to look at her. Looking at Mary she added "I wanted you to show me your horses but Daddy said we didn't have the time."

Cora and Sybbie stood on the pavement in front of the tea shop and watched Tom and Mary drive off to the pub.

Cora looked down at her oldest grandchild with a mixture of love and heartache. Oh how much she looks she looks like her mother with her dark hair and bright blue eyes and that mischievous grin. "I use to bring your mother here at Christmas time when she was a little girl." She pointed to the big tree in the middle of the town square. "She loved to come here to see the Christmas lights. We'd walk around the square and admire that tree from all angles and then we come here for hot cocoa and a treat after we'd looked at all those Christmas lights."

"I bet it was beautiful" Sybbie said wistfully as she stared at the tree.

Cora smiled at Sybbie "It was. It's too hot today for hot cocoa so how about some ginger ale?"

Sybbie vigorously nodded her head. "And cakes and biscuits."

Cora laughed. "We'll have cake and biscuits after we've had some sandwiches or maybe some tarts."

"May we sit at that table" Cora asked the waitress who readily agreed although she couldn't imagine why this well dressed woman insisted on this particular table in the row of tables in front of the large windows that faced out to the square since the view was the same from all of them.

The man sitting alone at the next table intently watched Cora and Sybbie as they took their seats. He noted the little girl with her dark hair loosely held back from her face by a wide barrette, her blue and white checked dress with the matching blue sweater that highlighted her bright blue eyes, eyes that were shining with laughter and anticipation. If someone had looked closely at him they would have been surprised that it appeared as if the man had tears in his eyes.

"I think I like this kind best" Sybbie said as she picked up another salmon sandwich and put it on her plate. "Well maybe it was this one" she said as she also put a chicken salad sandwich on her plate. "But this is very good too" she said lifting an open faced shrimp sandwich and placing it on her plate "and it's very pretty too."

Before taking a bite of one of her sandwiches Sybbie looked at Cora. "Granny Cora why do you talk differently from the other people here?"

"You mean I don't sound English?" to which Sybbie nodded her head. "That's because I'm American."

"America! That's very far away. We saw a ship ready to go to America when we got to Liverpool. Daddy says it takes days to get there." She took a bite of the salmon sandwich. "I'd like to go to America. I'd like to go to that place where the water shoots up into the sky. It's a place called" she scrunched up her face as if deep in thought. "It's … Yellowstone!" she said triumphantly. "Have you been there Granny Cora?"

"I'm afraid not. That's a long way from where I grew up in Ohio."

"They also have boiling mud! And buffaloes and bears." She sighed just thinking about the place. "Wouldn't that be grand to see? We don't have any of that in Ireland."

Cora was amused at how excited Sybbie sounded. "It does sound exciting."

Sybbie nodded her head as she took another bite of sandwich. "Mum has lived in the Far East and she saw elephants and crocodiles but I don't think I'd want to see a crocodile. Mum says their very dangerous." Sybbie pointed to Cora's tea. "She lived on a tea plantation."

Hearing Sybbie talk about her 'mum' made Cora at first a bit uneasy but she couldn't begrudge Tom remarrying and she was heartened listening to Sybbie talk lovingly about her stepmother. Every child needs a mother thought Cora and she appreciated that Aoibhinn had stepped into this role for Sybbie.

Sybbie proved to be quite a chatterbox and through her comments Cora learned quite a bit about her granddaughter and her life in Ireland. Yet the conversation took a surprising turn as Sybbie finished her second fairy cake.

Setting her spoon on her plate she looked down at her lap. "I wish I'd known my mummy" her voice barely above a whisper.

"You're very much like her" Cora replied as she reached out to pat Sybbie's hand.

"Tell me some stories about her" Sybbie asked to which Cora willingly and happily complied.

"I remember this place" Tom said as he and Mary entered the pub with its timbered ceiling and plush velvet seated booths.

"I hardly think these places ever change Tom." Then she chuckled as the heavy set older woman approached them as she remembered the young pretty waitress with an eye for Tom on their last visit here. "Well maybe the waitresses" she whispered to him.

"I'm surprised you let Sybbie go off with Mama" Mary said as they waited for their drinks.

Tom shrugged his shoulders. "I thought Cora would appreciate the time alone with Sybbie. She's only seen her once before and that was what five six years ago. Besides I knew if they were around us we couldn't talk so freely."

Tom noticed that Mary flinched as he said that last line and it occurred to him that she had something in particular she wanted to talk about but knowing her as well as he did he knew it would take time for her to finally open up.

They were quiet as the waitress brought their drinks and they gave her their lunch orders. Tom took a deep sip of his ale then reached into his pocket and brought out some photographs. Handing the first one over to Mary he said "This is my son Connell. He's about 6 months old in this."

"Two sons now" she said as she picked up the photograph.

They chatted of this and that, nothing of really any importance, while they ate their meals but Tom just had this feeling that something was bothering Mary. "So how's the estate doing?" he finally asked.

Mary set her fork down. "It's …" she shrugged her shoulders "sorta at a standstill right down which considering the times is fairly good I guess. Luckily we're pretty much self-sufficient and most of the money is invested in the estate, our equipment and maintenance and businesses so we haven't really been affected. But …"

She stopped as she took a sip of wine. "Yorkshire has been hit pretty hard, harder than a lot of the country, with so many of the coal mines and textile companies going bust. Which in turn has been bad for Henry's business."

She held her wine glass with both hands, one of her fingers running around the rim of the glass.

"But the motor car industry is prospering even in the midst of this depression" Tom stated.

"In London and points south but not here in the north. So much of Henry's business relied on the middle class like managers of the textile companies and with them out of work-" she once again shrugged.

"I feel so alone Tom. It's bad enough that Papa does almost nothing regarding the estate. Like today I asked him to get some papers signed and file them at the courts but he told me he was busy. Busy! What could he possibly be doing? He leaves me to run the estate all by myself and then he has the gall to criticize my plans. And now with Henry … he can't understand why I won't give him money to prop up the business until things get better but the estate just isn't in the position to do so."

"So I take it this is causing problems between the two of you."

"He's has no problems with the estate financing his lifestyle but I haven't gotten a penny out of his business."

They resorted to silence as the waitress took their empty plates and refilled their glasses, red wine for her and ale for him. "Some nights he doesn't come home and the thing of it is I don't really care anymore" she said as the waitress left.

"It's my fault really. I think I rushed into marriage again."

"Now Mary as I recall you had a number of suitors that you turned away before Henry."

"Yes but" she shook her head "I wanted to get married again. I wanted the companionship that I had with Matthew. And I see now I was ..." her hand nervously twisted a clump of her hair. "I was blinded by Henry's charm and looks. I should have been like you Tom and waited … waited for someone like Matthew."

"Mary you can't find someone just like Matthew no more than I could find someone just like Sybil." He took a sip of his ale. "It might seem that Aoibhinn is like Sybil and in some ways she is but in more ways she's quite different from Sybil."

Again he ran his hand through his hair. "Some of it may be because of age. Sybil was so young when I met her and in so many ways you girls led a very sheltered life. Aoibhinn was 28 when we met and she'd been out in the world for a long time. She's had adventures and been to places I can only dream about and that's help shaped her into the person she is today."

Tom reached out and grasped Mary's hand in his. "You're not the person you were when Matthew met you. Life has a way of changing us or at least it should. I'm not sure I'm expressing myself right or making any sense. I don't mean to imply I wouldn't love Sybil today just as I did all those years ago. I will love her till the day I die but I've found there's room in my heart for Aoibhinn too. And I love her not because she's another Sybil but because she's Aoibhinn."

"Don't spend the rest of your life miserable Mary and if that means leaving Henry then do so. Just don't then spend your time trying to find someone just like Matthew. Maybe you need someone more interested in the estate and running it with you but his ideas may be different from Matthew's and he'll bring different knowledge and experiences."

"Do you have any photographs of my mummy when she was little?"

"Not with me but I do have lots of them. What if I make up an album and send it to you?"

Sybbie's eyes lit up. "Will you Granny!"

The pair were walking around the town square when Sybbie stopped in front of a book shop seemingly mesmerized by the books displayed in the front window.

"What's captured your attention?" Cora asked.

"They have all the Nancy Drew books!" an animated Sybbie gushed.

"Are those good books?" a man standing beside Sybbie asked.

Vigorously nodding her head Sybbie gushed "oh yes." She turned and looked at the man "It's about a girl that solves mysteries." Then her eyes widened "you were at the tea shop."

"I was" he replied. "I enjoyed it very much. Did you?"

"Oh yes! I love going to tea." She started to giggle "but I didn't really have tea I had ginger ale."

His eyes twinkling he said "I'll have to try that next time. You look about my granddaughter's age" to which Sybbie replied "I'm almost eleven."

"So you think one of those books would be a good gift for her?"

"Oh yes sir"

"Which one would you suggest?"

"Well I've only read The Secret of the Old Clock" Sybbie looked at the man "that's the very first one." The turning back to the window she pointed out The Hidden Staircase. "That's the second one and I read that one too but I haven't read these other ones yet but I want to read them all."

Cora and Sybbie were sitting on a bench in the town square when Tom drove the motor car up to them.

"Daddy! Daddy!" Sybbie exuberanty called out before Tom could exit from the motor car. "Look what I got!"

"Weighed down with presents are ya" he laughed as he looked at Cora.

Sybbie raised the square box tied with a pretty blue and white ribbon in the air "this is treats for us on the train ride to Liverpool."

"Didn't you get enough to eat in the tea shop?"

Sybbie blushed. "Well maybe for tonight on the ferry."

"And is that breakfast in the other bag?"

Sybbie rolled her eyes. "No silly it's-" she hand the box containing the sweets to Cora. She started to untie the string about the brown paper. "Sybbie maybe you should just tell me what it is instead of opening it" Tom said.

"It's the next two Nancy Drew books and my own copy of Hetty Her First Hundred Years so now I don't have to borrow it from Katie."

Tom looked at Cora. "You didn't have to buy her all three books"

"She didn't buy all three of them Daddy. The man bought me one of them."

"What man?" a curious Tom asked.

"He was very nice Daddy. I helped him pick out a book for his granddaughter who's my age and as a thank you he bought me a book."

Tom looked at Cora who he could swear blushed. "I didn't see the harm in it" she said. "And Sybbie was so excited about the Nancy Drew books."

"You know I've been saving my money to buy The Bungalow Mystery so since Granny bought it for me I used my money to buy a book for Rian and one for Connell."

"We'll walk to the railway station Mary."

"It's no trouble for me to drop you off there Tom."

He looked at Sybbie. "I think we can use the walk to stretch our legs a bit. I think someone probably had quite a few fairy cakes."

"I only had two Daddy" Sybbie responded but she didn't tell him about the biscuits.

Cora leaned down to hug Sybbie. "Oh I wish I could see you more often."

"You could come visit me in Ireland Granny. I have an extra bed in my room. Grandma sometimes sleeps there and sometimes I have a friend stay over."

Sybbie looked her grandmother in the eye. "I think you'd like it. We live by the beach and we could build a sand castle or hunt for shells and then go have fish and chips. It would be a lot of fun."

"Thanks for listening to me Tom."

"Of course Mary. Don't make any rash decisions. Think, maybe write down, what it is that you want in your marriage, in your life, for the estate. Decide what is obtainable and how to obtain it. Of course you can always write to me although I know it's not quite the same as being able to talk in person."

The two hugged. ""Wouldn't they be surprised how much we've leaned on each other … well maybe me leaning on your more so than the other way round" Mary whispered.

"Yes they'd be very happy that we've become friends."

"Come back next year Tom."

"I will if I can."

"I understand."

"She's such a delight" Cora enthused as Mary drove them out of Ripon.

"Well that might be the last you see of her if Tom figures out the man in the bookshop and the tea shop was Papa."

"Really Mary I don't know what you're talking about" Cora said before looking away as if the passing scenery was suddenly of such interest.

"How could you Mama?" Mary's voice was cold and angry.

"She's his granddaughter too" Cora retorted.

"I'd say he gave up that right when he threw Tom and her out of Downton."

"Oh don't be so dramatic Mary."

"That's right. Take his side like you always do."

Instead of responding Cora once again looked out the window and silence enveloped the motor car. They were halfway to Downton before either one spoke again and it was Cora. "Sometimes you need to make peace with the past Mary."