Page 79 of One More Christmas at the Castle
I decided to make a couple of batches of soup this morning – carrot and coriander, and leek and potato – and thought we could have a little of that and a cheese toastie apiece, if I could lure Xan out of the library into the kitchen later.
He’d found another run of interesting letters and intendedmaking lots of notes, but soup isn’t something that goes well with laptops and precious paperwork.
I made the soup first, before the cleaning service invaded the kitchen, then stirred up the fruit and rum mixture in the larder: I’d be able to bake the cake in the next day or two.
Magic Mops would make up the bed in the Bluebell Room, ready for Mrs Kane’s arrival the next day, but Henry would add the finishing touches when he got back.
‘I’m going to get a bowl of flowering bulbs for Mrs Kane’s room,’ he’d announced before departing. ‘And a pot of something pretty for Mrs Powys’s boudoir, as she calls that little sitting room next to her bedroom.’
‘Nice idea,’ I’d said, thinking that that would maketwosurprises for our employer in one day, for I intended putting the outside solar lights on the fir tree as soon as I had a minute, in the hopes they’d have charged up and be twinkling brightly by the time she came home in the late afternoon.
Henry had offered to help me with the lights before he left, but I’d told him there was no need: the tree wasn’t much taller than I was and, anyway, how difficult could it be to drape a string of oversized fairy lights on the branches?
When I could hear the zooming noise of vacuum cleaners approaching, I put my outdoor things on and then collected the box of solar lights and the stepladder I’d put ready in the Garden Hall.
I’d meant to tell Xan I was going out for a short time, but when I looked into the study, he was so totally absorbed in what he was reading that it seemed a shame to disturb him – and Plum, snoring on the hearth rug, didn’t even wake up.
Burdened with the box and ladder, I trudged round to the front of the house and across the lawn, but as soon as I’d stepped off the path, I found the snow more substantial underits crispy coating than I’d thought, and once I was standing right next to the fir tree I realized it was a bit higher than I’d estimated.
It was fat and bushy, too, so I’d only be able to reach to loop the lights around it for the first couple of feet, after which I’d have to keep moving the ladder.
I untangled the long string of stars and opened the ladder, standing on the bottom rung to press it firmly through the snow.
It felt solid enough when I climbed to the top, trailing stars. I’d had to take my gloves off and the icy air was soon nipping at my face and fingers.
I fixed one end to the topmost spike of the tree and then began to wind the string around the branches, reaching round the back to pass them from hand to hand, so it must have looked as if I was hugging the tree!
It felt a long way up and a bit precarious, but after two turns I went down a step … and felt the ladder shift a little under me.
I stopped dead, but it seemed to have steadied again, and in any case, I thought, stretching out to loop the lights right round the tree one more time before I’d have to start moving the stepladder, I wouldn’t have far to fall and a soft landing, if it did topple!
But this time I must have leaned out just a littletoofar, for the ladder suddenly slid backwards, unbalancing me, and then, as I teetered at the top, lurched sideways.
The steps went one way and I plummeted downwards in the other – though I didn’t land with the soggy thump I was expecting, but instead was caught and held in a pair of strong arms.
‘My hero!’ I gasped, looking up into startled lilac-grey eyes, as Xan staggered slightly under my weight, though his grip remained firm.
I’d never been this close to him and I found myself staring into his eyes, unable to break the contact. They were strangely beautiful, like crystal, and framed in the longest of black lashes …
He blinked first – and once the connection was broken, I came to my senses with a rush of embarrassment.
‘Oh, thanks, Xan! But you can put me down now.’
He set me on my feet, then said, scowling, ‘Are youmad, teetering about on ladders in the snow on your own? You could have broken your neck! What on earth were you thinking of?’
‘I wasn’t teetering,’ I said with dignity. ‘Or at least, I wasn’t until I tried to reach round a wider bit of tree. I should have moved the ladder round instead – it was a loop too far. These solar lights are the surprise for Mrs Powys I mentioned.’
‘She’d be even more surprised to find you lying unconscious under them! Why on earth didn’t you ask me to help you?’
‘I did look into the study, but you were hard at work and I didn’t want to disturb you.’
‘You constantly disturb me,’ he said obscurely, but at least appeared not to be angry any more. ‘Plum asked to go out and then I spotted you – in the nick of time, as it happens.’
‘Where is Plum?’ I asked, but just then spotted something like a small, hairy snowplough heading in our direction.
Emerging on to the trodden-down patch by our feet, Plum sneezed and then shook himself, scattering icy crystals.
‘Hello, Plum – your master’s cross with me.’
