Page 36 of Twelve Drummers Drumming

Jemima’s head snapped up.

In her father’s hand was a small piece of parchment folded over and over many times. It had been sealed with red wax, and as her father turned it around in his fingers, she could see a large, neat hand had written her name on the front.

Miss Jemima Fitzroy

“A letter for Jemima?” Arabella, seated opposite her, accidentally let a large dob of preserve fall from her roll. “From whom?”

“I cannot tell,” mused her papa. “I certainly do not recognize the hand.”

Jemima smiled weakly. “I am sure if I was given leave to open it, I could answer all your questions!”

Sophia laughed, but Arabella’s serious face did not shift.

“I was not aware that you were in correspondence with anyone,” she said gravely. “Is it Joy? Or Audrey—I know you last saw her at her wedding, perhaps it is a note from her.”

Jemima had no reason to suspect the note had been sent to her by Hugh, no way at all for her to tell from the handwriting if it were he who had penned it.

Yet who else could possibly be writing to her?

She could not take her eyes from it as her father turned it over and over in his hands. “I think I should perhaps open it, you know,” he said finally in a deliberate voice.

Gasps were heard up and down the table, but Jemima was only aware of her own voice. “Papa, please! I am one and twenty years old, I am no child who needs protecting!”

“But you are my daughter,” he reminded her with a serious look on his face, “and under my protection. Who knows what salacious gossip this letter may contain?”

Jemima could feel her heart thumping painfully against her chest. On the mere chance it could possibly be from Hugh, it was imperative she was able to open it alone, with the eyes of no one on either it or her. To think her father could be the first to gaze upon the page on which Hugh had written…

“Really, Arthur,” cut in Selina in a calm but forceful tone, “Jemima is quite right. She is not a babe in arms any longer, and I see no harm from a mere letter.”

For the first time that Jemima could remember, she shot a grateful look down the table at her stepmother. Selina returned her look with a bemused smile, then looked down at the apple sitting on her plate, waiting to be eaten.

“Hmm.” Arthur did not sound convinced, but after a few more seconds of deliberation, he offered Jemima her letter.

She tried not to sound too pompous when she said, “Thank you¸Papa.”

It was somewhat difficult, and what was even worse was that after such a fuss, all eyes in the room were now on her.

“Are you not going to open it?” Sophia asked, curiously.

Arabella nodded. “After such a long wait to gain ownership of it, are you not wild to see what it says?”

Jemima smiled. “Not yet. Not here, at any rate.”

“Well, I’ve got other things to attend to,” said Caroline quietly.

“And I’ll come with you,” said her mother. “After all, you cannot be expected to plan an entire wedding by yourself, can you?”

Soon, the only two left were Jemima and her father.

“I was up this early and realized we had not spoken properly in a while, Jemima,” said her father genially. “I often find that the earlier I awake in the morning, the more that I achieve in the day. I would not wish to be slovenly and then complain I never had time for anything, like young Sophia.”

Jemima smiled. It was not her wish to avoid her father—far from it, it was almost a miracle she had him alone—but at the same time, she had no wish to lie to him. A falsehood was the only response to questions pertaining to her plans for that day, and she would be obliged to give it if he asked.

“So,” her father said happily, “where have you been off to, Jemima my dear? Do not think it has gone unnoticed, your scurrying about here and there—or I should say there and there, as here is not a place you seem to be frequenting in these last weeks.”

Although she knew eventually the question would come, Jemima hesitated. She had not considered the reply she was to give. How could she even attempt to explain her walks with Hugh, her conversations with him, her understanding of him in new and exciting ways…

“Well?”

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