“Talk to him,” Daisy urged softly. “Tell him your fears. I’m sure Westcliff would never do anything to hurt you, dear.”

“No, never deliberately,” Lillian agreed, her smile turning brittle. She glanced at a nearby window, out at the cool black night. “It’s getting colder. I hope we’ll have snow for Christmas, don’t you?”

CHAPTER 9

Although Hannah and Natalie had tacitly decided to put their tiff of the previous evening behind them, the relations between them were still cool the next day. Therefore, Hannah was relieved not to be included when Natalie and Lady Blandford went with a group of ladies on a festive carriage ride through the countryside. Other women had elected to stay at Stony Cross Park, conversing over tea and handiwork, while a sizable contingent of gentlemen had left for the day to attend an ale festival in Alton.

Left to her own devices, Hannah explored the manor at her leisure, lingering in the art gallery to view scores of priceless paintings. She also visited the orangery, relishing the air spiced with citrus and bay. It was a wonderfully warm room, with iron grillwork vents admitting heat from stoves on a lower floor. She was on her way to the ballroom when she was approached by a small boy whom she recognized as one of the children she had read to.

The boy appeared apprehensive and uncertain, hurrying through the hallway in an erratic line. He was clutching some kind of wooden toy in his hand.

“Hello. Are you lost?” Hannah asked, squatting to bring herself to face level with him.

“No, miss.”

“What is your name?”

“Arthur, miss.”

“You don’t seem very happy, Arthur. Is there anything the matter?”

He nodded. “I was playing with something I shouldn’t, and now it’s stuck and I’ll get thrashed for it.”

“What is it?” she asked sympathetically. “Where were you playing?”

“I’ll show you.” Eagerly he seized her hand and pulled her along with him.

Hannah went willingly. “Where are we going?”

“The Christmas tree.”

“Oh, good. I was just heading there.”

Arthur led her to the ballroom, which, fortunately for both their sakes, was empty. The Christmas tree was quite large, glittering with decorations and treats on the bottom half, but still unadorned on the upper half.

“Something has stuck in the tree?” Hannah asked, perplexed.

“Yes, miss, right there.” He pointed to a branch well over their heads.

“I don’t see any…Oh, good Lord, what is that?”

Something dark and furry hung from the branch, something that resembled a nest. Or a dead rodent.

“It’s Mr. Bowman’s hair.”

Hannah’s eyes widened. “His toupee? But why…how …”

“Well,” Arthur explained reasonably, “I saw him taking a nap on the settee in the library, and his hair was dangling off him, and I thought it might be fun to play with. So I’ve been shooting it with my toy catapult, but then it went too high, up into the Christmas tree, and I can’t reach it. I was going to put it back on Mr. Bowman before he woke, I truly was!” He looked at her hopefully. “Can you get it down?”

By this time Hannah had turned away and covered her face in her hands, and she was laughing too hard to breathe. “I shouldn’t laugh,” she gasped, “oh, I shouldn’t …”

But the more she tried to stifle her amusement the worse it got, until she was forced to blot her eyes on her sleeve. When she had calmed herself a bit, she glanced at Arthur, who was frowning at her, and that nearly set her off again. With a potential thrashing in store, he didn’t find the situation nearly as amusing as she did. “I’m sorry,” she managed to say. “Poor Arthur. Poor Mr. Bowman! Yes, I’ll fetch it down, no matter what I have to do.”

The hairpiece had to be retrieved, not only for Arthur’s sake, but also to save Mr. Bowman from embarrassment.

“I already tried the ladder,” Arthur said. “But even when I got to the top, I still couldn’t reach it.”

Hannah viewed the nearby ladder appraisingly. It was an extending ladder, an A-frame made of two sets of steps with a third, extendable ladder braced between them. One would slide the middle ladder up or down to adjust the overall elevation. It had already been raised to full height.

“You’re not very big,” Arthur said doubtfully. “I don’t think you can reach it, either.”

Hannah smiled at him. “At least I can give it a try.”

Together they repositioned the ladder close to one of the seating niches in the wall. Hannah took off her shoes. Taking care not to step on the hem of her own skirts, she gamely climbed the ladder in her stocking feet, hesitating only briefly before continuing up the extension. Higher and higher, until she had reached the top of the ladder. She reached for the toupee, only to discover with chagrin that it was approximately six inches out of her reach.

“Blast,” she muttered. “It’s almost within my grasp.”

“Don’t fall, miss,” Arthur called up to her. “Maybe you should come down now.”

“I can’t give up yet.” Hannah looked from the ladder to the overhanging ledge that surmounted the wall niche. It was about a foot higher than the top rung of the ladder. “You know,” she said thoughtfully, “if I were standing on that ledge, I think I could reach Mr. Bowman’s hairpiece.” Carefully she levered herself up and crawled onto the ledge, pulling the mass of her skirts along with her.