Page 57 of The Secret Christmas Library
‘Um, maybe,’ said Theo, not sounding quite so triumphant. ‘But, you know – faster!’
‘Exactly!’ said Mirren. ‘We know the title of the book we’re looking for.’
Jamie turned sharply.
‘In a houseful of books completely out of order . . . thatbloodyold man.’
They snowshoed back to the house in silence, their breath visible in front of them. Jamie’s gaze was distracted from the ground ahead only once, when a great hare bounded across the grass, beautiful, larger than Mirren would have thought possible. She had never seen a hare in the wild before. His face softened. Hers did too.
‘What’s the book about?’ she asked Esme, crunching along next to her.
Unexpectedly, rather than being sarcastic, Esme, her cheeks pink from the cold, was thoughtful. ‘Oh, it’s so sad. It’s a big weepy love story and she loves him so much but they’re so poor and the village is so gossipy and, her love can’t keep him sensible, and . . . it’s really beautiful.’
Mirren thought about it. ‘And it’s set . . . ’
‘After the First World War. Up near here,’ said Esme. ‘It must have been a very familiar story to him.’
‘A love story?’
‘I suppose,’ said Esme. ‘I never think of my grandfather as having a romantic life beyond my grandmother, who he wasn’t verynice to at all. After she left, he was a confirmed bachelor, back when that didn’t immediately mean “gay” – one of those men who’s more interested in collecting and puzzles and old railway timetables than socialising. Neurospicy, I suspect we’d call him these days. Back then, we just called him an irascible old bugger.’
She smiled.
‘Not for want of trying by the good middle-class divorcees of the parish,’ she laughed in memory. ‘Rushing about in their best BHS, with the most God-awful home-made shepherd’s pies.’
‘That sounds very snobby.’
‘Oh, no!’ said Esme drily. ‘You’re going to have to report me to theGuardian.’
She stalked onwards, her long legs making her look elegant even in the ridiculous snowshoes. Mirren didn’t bother trying to keep up.
‘I wish we could have called up all the covers,’ said Theo, as they sat around steaming mugs of tea and toasted sandwiches. The Aga was powering through, and its warmth was the most wonderful thing Mirren had ever felt. It was almost worth it, she thought, being constantly freezing and getting soaked through, for the joy of coming into the cosy kitchen. Maybe that was why people climbed mountains: for the sheer joy of stopping climbing mountains. That made a lot more sense.
‘I saw that the cover was kind of green,’ said Theo. ‘But I’m not sure that helps too much. Did you see the spine?’
Mirren shook her head. ‘Nope.’
‘Great,’ said Theo. ‘It was a very tiny picture as well.’
‘How many editions do you think there’ve been?’ Mirren asked.
‘Over the years? Loads,’ said Theo.
‘It’s never off the school syllabus,’ said Esme. ‘Generations of girls have grown up sobbing.’
‘Did you sob?’ asked Mirren of Jamie, who shrugged.
‘That means yes,’ said Esme. ‘You should have seen him as a boy. Whenever they had to put a Roger down, he sobbed for weeks.’
‘I did not!’ said Jamie. ‘Shut up.’ He glanced around nonetheless to check that Roger the sheepdog was still at his heels, which he was.
‘You shut up!’
Mirren and Theo shared a look, that Jamie caught and immediately stopped himself. Mirren knew from her own family, particularly her relationship with her mum, how hard it was to break your old family dynamics sometimes.
‘So it could look like anything?’
‘I don’t thinkanything, exactly,’ said Theo. ‘It’s sad, and old, so it won’t have dogs on the front. We could each pick a corridor?’
