Chapter 5 – How They Met- part two

It all belongs to Rowling, except what you don't recognize.

Snape was enjoying his tea.  There were crumpets, clotted cream, raspberry jam and sweetmeats, and… Potter, damn him, was doing everything in his power to get him to put some weight back on.  Was he a child to be coddled and enticed to eat?  Snape snorted and then sighed, yes.  The fact was that Potter had been going to extraordinary measures to make him feel better, including getting that awful rag of a woman to cook up something besides burnt toast.  And Snape was feeling more and more like just a querulous old man.  He wasn't as young as he used to be and his health simply was not coming back as rapidly as it used to.  He hadn't felt like getting dressed or going out.  But, he was going to change all that, right now…

"Potter!" yelled Snape.

"Right here, Milord."  Potter stepped into the room.

"Have you been spying on me?" Snape glowered.

"Of course, Lord Snape.  Wanted to make sure you didn't keel over and drown yourself in the Devonshire cream."  He walked over and took a quick finger full to taste. "Quite fresh, I went out and purchased it myself this morning."  He made a sad face.  "And you've barely touched it."

"Well, I want to get dressed.  I need to do some shopping.  Christmas is nearly upon us you know."  He tried to get up quickly from his chair and the room spun.  Suddenly Potter's arms were around him.  Damn.  Why didn't Potter just unman him and get it over with?

"I don't need you."  He pushed the younger man away and fell back into the chair.  "Get OUT!" Snape put his face in his hands.

He admitted that he just wasn't himself anymore.  He'd been having a fit of the blue devils since his illness.  He felt so nervous, so lost.  He felt… alone.  He wanted to hear Miss Granger read to him and just quietly lay in her arms.  He rubbed his knuckles into his eyes and he schooled himself not to think of it.

Snape heard voices from the hallway.

"Of course, his doctor was telling him just the other day that the air in London is bad.  He needs to go to the country to recuperate.  Problem is that the trip to his Yorkshire estate would probably kill 'im."

"Potter, who are you –" Snape stopped at the sight of Baronet Granger.  Suddenly he felt a bit silly, still in dishabille in the afternoon.  However, he was still officially recuperating.

Granger took his hat in hand. "I was just telling your man that I feared I might be coming at a bad time."

"Nonsense, please do sit down." Snape swallowed and felt his heart begin to speed.  Damn, the least little excitement and he turned as weak as a kitten. "To what do we owe the honor of your presence?  Is everyone well?"  He kept his voice even and slow, in spite of the strange feelings that were rushing through him.

Granger did not sit down. Instead, he flushed and stammered out, "The thing is, sir, not to put too fine a point on it, Hermione—"

"Hermione!" Damn.  Snape didn't mean to interrupt, but couldn't the man get on with it?  Damn him, he's a boorish cub, with the soul of a farmer.

"She's gone off her feed," said the squire, puce as a beetroot.

"I take it you are speaking of your daughter and not a filly?"

"You know I am," he growled back and for a moment he looked like one of his own bulldogs about to attack.

With anyone else of his rank, Snape would have laughed him out of the house.  It was, after all, an old ploy to get a rich suitor back:  that the girl had taken ill, gone sick with desire when the mother was really pulling the girl's corset too tight and feeding her vinegar to make her look ill.  But with the Grangers, especially Lady Margaret Granger, he knew such traps would never happen.  They had had their daughter late in life and it had been a given that Hermione did not wish to ever leave them.  No wonder Granger looked like he wanted to draw Snape's cork or call him out.

"So Hermione is not well." Snape gestured to the chair hoping that Granger would finally sit down.

"Maggie said I should come down and invite you over for Christmas.  Perhaps if she were get to know you better—"

"She will change her heart?" Snape said in a silken voice.  Granger nodded.  "Well, it is possible, she's very young."

"Most of the girls her age in our area are either married or engaged." Granger sputtered.  "But our Hermione, she was always sensible.  Wanted nothing of it."

Snape slowly got up, shooting an evil look at Potter who was ready to come over and assist him.  Now at least they were both standing. Snape strode over and stood toe to toe with the Baronet. "And am I such a bad match?" He looked Granger straight in the eye.

Granger looked down at the floor.  "It wasn't that, though you are known to have a rather dicey disposition.  We didn't think you'd want her.  Strange she is, and always has been.  All those books.  If she'd wanted a Season, we would have given her a jolly good one.  She didn't.  And then you come along and she's a different girl."  He looked like he had a bad taste in his mouth and wanted to spit.  He turned to leave.  "I'll be sending your regrets to my wife."

"I will accept your wife's kind offer."  Snape gave an oily smile.  "After all my doctor thinks it would be good for my lungs.  All I ask is no more sauerkraut juice, please?"

Granger put his hat on and again started to leave.  "Thank you."

"Don't say things you don't mean." Snape continued in a soft voice.  "You are hoping that she will take one look at my ugly mug and realize that it was just the romance of playing nursemaid that made her feel that way.  I'm putting you on notice-- if her feelings prove true, I shall ask you for her hand in marriage."

Granger's eyes looked as if they were about to pop out of his face and he clenched his fist. "When shall we expect you then?"

"The day after tomorrow." Snape quirked a smile.  "I have some shopping to do…" After Granger left, Snape locked the sitting room door in Potter's face.  He wanted privacy to think.  He wanted to gloat.  He wanted to climb up to the roof of his house and shout out to all of London, to all the sour faced matrons and their simpering little debutants, and to the fine young men all straight of teeth and nose that had scorned him and mocked him over the years, 'Yes, Miss Granger loves ME!!!!'

&&&

Neville Longbottom was arranging hothouse flowers in a vase and Lavender Brown was darning in the corner nook.  Snape noted that the Grangers were taking no chances on their daughter being left alone with him.  He didn't mind.  He was happier than he'd been in years.  He swept into the room and was welcomed by a shocked smile on his, repeat that, his Hermione's face.

"Lord Snape!  Mama told me to expect a surprise today, but you?  What are you doing here?" Her eyes were fever bright, but the warmth of her voice was unmistakable.  And he wrapped himself in that warmth.

Snape noted that the girl before him was much changed.  There were dark circles under her brown eyes and two flushed marks high on her cheekbones.  There was no sign of artifice and he could see by the boniness of her wrists that she had lost an alarming amount of weight.

"Revenge! I am merely here to take my revenge on you."  He pulled up a chair to where she sat on the chaise lounge.  "I am here to ensure that you float away on rivers of beef tea and consume enough baked eggs to choke a plow horse."  At her moue of disgust, he continued smoothly, "You have given the people you love a terrible scare.  Your parents were so worried that they went and fetched me, thinking that I had somehow cast a spell on you.  However, they were wrong."  He lowered his voice and whispered in her ear, "You were the one who enchanted me."  He looked to see how she would react and was pleased with his result.  Perhaps John Kemble at the Drury Lane Theatre had said it better, still Snape felt he'd done an admirable job with the line.

She closed her eyes, sighed and bit her bottom lip.  Snape found the movement incredibly erotic and yet at the same time charming.  Any chit in London would have been fluttering her eyelashes and pretending vapors.  Hermione's reaction was sincere.  Snape's attention was sharply drawn away by the coughing fit that Lavender suddenly threw and then to the cracking of knuckles by Mr. Longbottom.  It seemed he had crossed an invisible line and was being warned back.

Rosie Sprout, the cook, came bustling in with a platter of food and set it down on the table.  Snape noticed that the books, which seemed to follow Miss Granger wherever she went, had vanished.  Nor was the table covered by correspondence.  Normally there was no space at all available there.  He walked over and picked up a plate.  "Ah, Miss Granger, time for your baked egg."  He brought it over to her and spooned out a small amount.  Hermione stared into his black eyes as he placed the teaspoon full of egg into her mouth and she licked her lips and swallowed.  "More, Miss Granger?"  She nodded and he continued to spoon-feed her.  When they were done, he walked over and picked up a cup of posset.  He sniffed, "Ah, yes, some lovely warmed milk with brandy.  Are you ready, Miss Granger?"  He brought it over to her and held it to her mouth as the sipped.  Their eyes met and Snape damned the fact that all convention and society, not to mention her parents, forbid him to grab her and kiss her on the spot.

&&&

Shape entered the Granger's parlor, and like their daughter, it had much changed.  It was dark and gloomy, lit by firelight alone when normally it was a rather warm and enticing room.

"How is she?" asked the Baronet in a rather sullen voice.

"Longbottom carried her up to her room and she's resting.  She ate well." There was a long pause and Snape wondered about the funereal aspect that the once charming room had taken on.

Lady Granger broke the tension that had begun to build. "Hermione was always happy here."

She sounded very different.  Not the strong, self-assured woman he had known during his stay.  Enough, thought Snape.  I'm tired of being treated like the villain in some Drury Lane entertainment, not caring that he had just stolen some choice lines from said establishment.

"Lady Granger, I never attempted to alienate your daughter's affections.  Though I do have tender feelings toward her, I never revealed them."

With that she gave a small cry.  "I am very sorry if you are under the impression that we blame you.  It was entirely my fault."  Snape heard her husband reproachfully murmur his wife's name.  She continued, "Hermione, having always been a level headed girl, well, I made the mistake of thinking she could handle the responsibility of your care without becoming emotionally involved.  I was wrong."

Snape still didn't understand.  "How can you be so sure that she just hasn't fallen ill of her own accord?"

Lady Granger got up and walked over to a bureau in the corner of the room.  She removed a key from her chatelaine and opened a drawer.  She took out several sheaves of paper and handed them to Snape.

He sat down near the fire and proceeded to read.  After a few minutes he looked up.  "It looks like notes for a novel of some sort.  The lead character does bear a passing resemblance to me."  He quelled the urge to chuckle, as he had never in his life been described in such glowing terms as in the little snippet he'd read.  "The dialogue is quite good.  Hermione did write this?"

"She started it a few days after you arrived.  But after you left, she put away all her books, parchments, ink and quills.  She refused to read the letters, which were arriving for her daily.  Lavender found those papers you are holding in the dustbin. Hermione's been doing nothing but staring out the window."  Lady Granger took back the papers and locked them up again.  "The day before I sent for you, a Mr. Charles Lamb showed up on our doorstep, accompanied by a Mr. Alastor Moody, publisher of the Examiner.  They were concerned that our daughter had not gotten back to them and had come all the way from London to check on her wellbeing.  Can you imagine that?"

She sat down by the fire.  "Our daughter has built up a rather impressive ring of correspondents.  After those two left, I made it my business to open each and every letter she had received.  Poets, Playwrights, Anarchists!  She's a friend to them all," she sighed.  "We don't mind, but I believe you should very carefully reconsider your involvement with Hermione.  She is unlike other girls.  Do you really think you can be happy with her?  Do you think she could be happy with you?"

Snape uncrossed his long, elegant legs and leaned forward. "It is my belief that perhaps it is because she is different that we are so admirably suited.  I have met bluestockings and they are invariably, silly, know-it-all poseurs.  The fact that Miss Granger chooses to hide her light under a bushel indicates she still has a sensible head on her shoulders no matter what the contents of that head may be.  Her living in London could be to her advantage; instead of writing, perhaps she could have an afternoon salon to meet with her coterie.  At worst, I should at least have intelligent company to discuss Kean's latest performance."  Snape's upper lip curled into a classic sneer.

Both the Grangers' gasped at Lord Snape's liberalism.  They had no idea any man, least of all this disdainful nobleman, would be so tolerant of their daughter's peccadilloes.  They looked at each other and Maggie gave an imperceptible nod.  "Very well, Lord Snape," said the Baronet, "you have our permission to court Hermione."

&&&

Hermione thought they must make a very odd scene.  Here she was walking along the hedgerows with Lord Snape.  There had been a thaw and the air, though brisk, was mild enough for the two recent invalids to take a walk.  She stepped quickly to keep up with him and really wished that they might slow down a bit.  However, their chaperones were also walking apace, and Snape was trying to keep a distance ahead of them.  Finally Hermione had had enough.  She stopped and turned around.

"Really, Neville, Lavender, and you too, Harry.  Can't his Lordship and I have any privacy?  I understand you need to be there, but can't you just back it up a little?"  Her breath was steaming into the air and her lovely little arms had folded against her chest in a very stubborn stance.

Snape stared in astonishment at the woman he was courting.  In his entire time here, she'd never said 'boo' to anyone.  The others also seemed quite chagrinned.

"Well, Neville, Lavender, I'll slow down if you two do," said Harry reasonably.

Lavender simpered at Harry, "Well, if you insist." Longbottom kicked meanly at a stone. 

"It's not like there are pirates hiding in Romney Marsh ready to drag Miss Granger away," Snape added, attempting to imitate Harry's reasonable demeanor and sounding snide instead.

"No," drawled Longbottom, "it's the smugglers you've got to watch out for."

Hermione stifled a giggle.  Everyone knew that, Dymchurch, the nearest town to them, had its primary source of revenue from the free traders.  Well, perhaps not everyone.  She looked over at Snape.  He held out his arm and she took it.  She looked back at the servants and winked.  They walked and this time the trio behind them held back.  Eventually they came to the end of the hedgerows.

"If we turn left here, you can just make out the spires of the village church in the distance."  Hermione enjoyed being out in the air again after not feeling well for so long.

"You never cease to surprise me, Miss Granger.  I was beginning to think you were a mouse."  He wrapped his fingers in hers relishing the freedom to finally hold her hand.

"I suppose I'm just feeling better."  She looked up at him, still marveling that he had come back for her.  She felt his hands around hers and she wondered for the hundredth time if she were dreaming.  This was everything she'd ever wanted and she felt giddy with joy.

"Tell me about your writing." Snape looked at her and was a bit surprised to see her frown.

"What do you mean-- my letter writing?" Hermione suddenly felt very nervous.

Severus gave her a curious look and decided to drop it. "Yes, exactly."

"I have a lot of friends and we write to each other," she said rather too earnestly.

"That's it?"  Severus told himself again to drop it. He squeezed her hand reassuringly.

"Yes." She squeezed back.

They continued on in companionable silence.  Severus now knowing for the first time that Miss Granger was capable of being less than open with him, and Hermione now aware that secrets might be harder to keep if one were married.

&&&

"And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the Holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the countenance divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land."

The hymn ended and they all sat down.  Normally Snape didn't like Christmas Midnight Mass, but here in this small, country church, he felt quite at home.  He enjoyed being with the Grangers in their pew and singing with his beloved by his side.  Definitely, it felt good having her there and being slightly more accepted by the family.  They sat and listened to a not overly long reading by Dr. Syn, the parson there at Dymchurch, and they headed home before one AM.

Snape had arranged with the Grangers that he'd be allowed to be alone with her.  Finally, there would be no Longbottom or Lavender gawking at them.              Snape felt nervous, knowing the next few minutes would determine his future happiness.  Hermione sat, and there was a look of surprise on her face that their guards had disappeared.

"Lord Snape?"

"Please call me, Severus." He forced himself to breath deeply in spite of his racing heart.

Hermione looked up at him.  "Very well, Severus.  Would you like to sit?"  The way he looked at her suddenly made her nervous.

Snape paced the floor of the parlor twice before deciding to take the bull by its horns.  He knelt on the floor by her chair and looked directly into her eyes.  "Miss Granger—"

"Well, if I'm to call you Severus, shouldn't you call me Hermione?" Her eyes sparkled with mischief.

"I'd rather call you angel, or dear heart, or… sweetest wife." Snape wanted to be confident, but he'd never proposed before.  He continued to verbally stumble, forgetting his carefully planned words.

Hermione gently laughed and put her hand on his cheek.  "I knew it.  Are you asking me to…?"

"To marry me, if you don't interrupt.  Hermione, may I have your-hand-in-marriage?"  Nerves caused him lose his normal aplomb and he rushed it all out together at the end.

She nodded twice, staring at him speechlessly.  He brought out a fabric pouch and with trembling hand opened it.  He placed the emerald and diamond ring on her left hand ring finger.  "I cannot express the joy—" and got no further because she'd fainted dead away.  He caught her just before she could hit the floor. "Oh, damn," he said as he stared at her.  He picked her up and headed to the door.  Just across the way in the sitting room her parents were waiting.

"Lady Granger, she's fainted."  Snape stood on the thin edge between total frustration and panic.

"Take her up to her room.  I'll get some smelling salts."  Snape rushed up the stairs with Hermione's father at his back.

It was the first time he'd ever seen her room.  He was astonished by it's simplicity.  He'd expected a lady's boudoir, and instead it contained a simple dark wood bed with a plain white counterpane, clothing chest, wardrobe, a writing table and chair all in the same dark wood.  No frills and with nothing fancy, it could have been a chamber in a nunnery.

 "Did she say yes?" asked her father peering in from the hallway.

"She did.  I think the ring overwhelmed her." Snape stroked a curl of hair out of his betrothed's face, keenly aware of her father's disapproval the entire time.

Granger entered the room and looked at the ring. "I'd say you're right.  I'd faint too if someone gave me that.  It's way too large."

Snape looked at his future father-in-law.  "Are you suggesting it is in bad taste?"  'Pon rep, it was like some nightmare with both the Grangers challenging him over and over. 

"Well, up in London I suppose it's all the crack.  Of course, people will be expecting that sort of thing," said Granger sidestepping the issue.  "I suppose you want a big fancy London wedding as well."

"If money is a problem, I will handle it," he waved his hand in the air dismissively.

"NO.  Money's not a problem.  It's just that you don't understand our Hermione.  She isn't like that," Granger replied.  Snape thought he saw actual tears gathering in the older man's eyes.

"And that is why I am marrying her.  Heavens, if there ever was a refreshing change from the London barracudas that I have to swim with every season."

"Well, just don't go changing your mind." And the Baronet sadly walked from the room just as Lady Granger arrived with the salts. 

"She's coming round. You shouldn't be here in her room." Lady Granger had been ignoring Snape's presence while waving the cut glass bottle of restorative under Hermione's nose.  But now the mother wanted Snape to leave.

"Please let me stay.  We didn't have much of a chance to talk."  He said in his most ingratiating tone of voice. 

"Hermione, dear, you fainted.  Do you wish to speak to Lord Snape?"  Snape noted that, yet again, the Grangers would give anything to their daughter that she asked for.  For a split second he wondered if this would make a girl headstrong and then dismissed the thought as ridiculous.  Headstrong? Not his sensible, sweet Hermione!

She looked at him, "Yes, Mama, I'd like a moment alone with him."  Her eyes were shining and not from fever.

Her mother looked miserable, and said, "I'll just be outside the door."

"Did you mean it?  You want me to marry you?" Hermione asked with a look of wonder.

Snape kissed the back of her hand.  And then, with some daring, he turned her hand over and kissed the palm and then her wrist.  "Yes.  Can there be any doubt?" She in turned stroked his face.

He leaned over her and placed a kiss on her forehead.  He swallowed, knowing that he wanted so much more, but that he would wait.  "Tomorrow, we can discuss all the details.  But rest now.  I suppose it was too much of a shock."  He stroked her hair.

"Severus, kiss me on the lips." She pleaded.

He looked at her and slowly smiled.  He licked his lips once and leaned over and gently brushed his lips over hers, "Sleep well, my love."

He got up and left.  Lady Granger came in and sat on the foot of Hermione's bed.  "Is this what you want?"  Hermione hugged her and whispered in her ear, "Oh, yes, Mama.  It is."  Tears came down both their cheeks.

&&&

Less than three months later, they were married and, two hours after the wedding ceremony, Snape was told that Hermione had been having an affair.  And like a stupid, jealous old fool, he believed the lie.

A/N:  A very special thank you to: Liesl, Mp, Queenie and Yuffiie

Further notes: the hymn sung at Midnight Mass is from a poem by William Blake circa 1804.  The music that we recognize for it was composed by Charles Parry in 1918 for a Woman's Right to Vote Campaign and obviously is a century later than the version that our heroes sung.  Instead, I believe it was Dr. Syn, the parson of Dymchurch who did his own musical adaptation of Blake's poem. There was a wonderful rendition of the hymn on the Brain Salad Surgery album by Emerson, Lake and Palmer, 1973.

Dr. Syn was a character created in 1915 by Russell Thorndike.  Thorndike wrote several books on the character as well as wrote and performed in a stage play (1923) about him.  The most famous version of the story is Disney's 1963 movie called "Dr. Syn alias The Scarecrow", which was based on a book written by William Buchanan in 1956 (who took Thorndike's character because there was no American copyright protecting Thorndike's creation).  I thought I'd just throw Dr. Christopher Syn in because the time and place were appropriate.  And the incredibly sexy Patrick McGoohan played him in the Disney version.

BTW, Dymchurch is a real place as is Romney Marsh.

The real life publishers of the Examiner were Leigh Hunt and his brother John Hunt.  But at the time of this story they were in prison for libeling the Regent.  So I figured Mad Eye Moody might have helped them out.

Very little cant Glossary:

Fit of the Blue Devils = Depression

Draw Someone's Cork = Punch in the nose and cause to bleed

Posset = A spice drink of hot sweetened milk curdled with wine or ale

Charles Lamb = Real life Essayist and Children's book author

Free-trader = Smuggler

All the Crack = Very fashionable