It was Christmas morning, and still Daphne had not returned. Elizabeth had not been seen since the concert, and the children had kept me busy. Max had barely spoken to me since the night of the boathouse incident. Sophia had told him that I had convinced her to go looking for Daphne. I hadn’t denied it. The last thing Sophia needed was another adult bailing out on her.
The other two children were tired, and Sophia needed to rest her ankle, so the days between the concert and Christmas had been quiet; we filled our time with making shortbread and watching Christmas movies. The Polar Express, Elf, and, of course, Home Alone. I kept my head down and committed myself to what was, in Max’s opinion, my sole responsibility.
Despite everything, there was a magical feel in the air when the children rose early on Christmas morning. I could hear rummaging in the corridor from before six in the morning, but the bed was so warm and the sky beyond the windows so dark, I waited until the noise had escalated to an unbearable point.
When I emerged from my room, a woolen cardigan pulled on over my pyjamas, Robbie was wedged between Agatha’s bed and a bookshelf, clutching at his elbow. Despite this, he was in good spirits. Even Sophia, on the other side of the bed and clearly the antagonist, was smiling.
“Shhhh!” I said. “You’ll wake your father.”
“That’s the point!” Agatha said, giggling. “If we don’t make a racket, he’ll never wake up.”
“It’s too late for that,” came a low grumble from behind the door. “I’m up.”
“Is Mum back?” Robbie asked hopefully. The giggling stopped. Sophia, in particular, looked on the verge of tears. My heart was breaking for them.
When Max emerged from behind the door, it was clear that he too was struggling with Daphne’s absence. “She’ll be away a little longer, I think,” he said, his voice strangely strangled.
“She’s not here for Christmas?” Agatha’s voice was small.
“It’s not like her. I don’t care what you say,” Sophia shouted, and ran off down the stairs, leaving the rest of us mute.
“Shall we go down, children?” Max was trying to put on a brave face, but his hands shook as he tied the cord of his dressing gown. He kissed the top of Robbie’s head and then lifted Agatha out of her bed to carry her downstairs. She burrowed her face into the spot between the shawl of the dressing gown and his shoulder. I could tell she was crying by the movement of her shoulders.
I remembered my first Christmas without my mother. My father and I attempted to celebrate alone, but the day was fraught. By the next year my stepmother had arrived, and she managed to make it special again, in her own way. I was beginning to appreciate how hard she’d worked to make that happen.
Yet here at Barnsley there was no Christmas tree, no decorations aside from the paper chain we had made and strung up around the kitchen, no smell of Christmas baking. It could just as well have been any other day. I hadn’t seen the Christmas presents since we snuck them back into the house after our furtive shopping trip; for days I had been expecting Max to ask me to wrap them. When he hadn’t, I could only assume they would either be presented in their carrier bags or wrapped in some fashion by him.
I took my time down the stairs, peering out over the landscape for snow—no sign. By the time I got to the kitchen, they were all waiting for me. Even Sophia. There was no sign of any presents. What sort of a Christmas morning was this?
Robbie, however, seemed to have pepped up slightly. “Come on! Dad said we had to wait for you.” He tugged at the door, the one that divided the kitchen from the rest of the house. Beyond that door lay the hotel.
This was unusual. The children were not allowed in the hotel part of the house, and apart from our search party the other evening, I had been very careful to ensure that this restriction be enforced.
But it seemed Christmas Day was an exception to the rule. Max helped Robbie with the door, and the children flew through. He and Agatha propped the door open for me, letting it close gently behind them once I had passed.
“Feels just like it did when I was a child,” Max said with a pantomime shiver. “Lucky you.”
No wonder my mother had escaped to Australia. I doubted I would last one night in this part of the house. I thought of the cozy kitchen just through the doors, the warm snug, the study with the open fire. Why couldn’t we stay in there?
Robbie and Sophia skidded to a halt outside a set of double doors, looking to their father for permission to enter. When he gave it, they threw the doors open and made gasps of delight despite themselves. Max increased his pace to almost a jog, pushing the wheelchair up close so that Agatha wouldn’t miss out.
It was the room I had peered into on that first morning: a large formal sitting room, framed at one end by the bay window I recognized, and at the other by an enormous fireplace, in which a roaring log fire was burning. The lamps were lit, and tea lights twinkled on all surfaces, but the real showstopper was the gigantic fir Christmas tree in the bay window, dressed from top to toe with lights and glass baubles. It was spectacular, and the mound of presents beneath it even more so. There were boxes of them, great piles of presents, far more than we had purchased. Max, or someone else, had evidently done a lot of Christmas shopping, so what was the purpose of our sudden and urgent mission only days earlier?
I pushed these thoughts aside and took a moment to enjoy the children’s reactions to the spectacle. Even for an adult it was magical, Max had taken so much trouble to make Christmas special. My idea of Max was shifting before me, his character so fluid I could barely grasp it.
Hanging back, enjoying the warmth of the room but feeling superfluous, I wondered if there was a way I could back away without anyone noticing. The table was set for breakfast, and by my counting there was a place for me, but my presence felt conspicuous. I deliberately kept to the shadows while the children explored the piles of presents and unpacked stockings filled with chocolates, trinkets, and clementines.
“There’s a present under there for you,” Max said, catching me midstep as I edged farther and farther away. “More than one, I think.”
“Oh. I have some things for the children. I’ll go and get them,” I replied, thinking I would take as long as possible, perhaps even run myself a bath and leave them to it.
“I think there’s enough here for now. Come. Sit. Here, next to Aggie.” It was the first time I had heard Max use the pet name. He shuffled her over, closer to him. Having no real reason to retreat, I gave in. I watched as the children opened their presents, tucking the small pile accumulating for me down one side of the sofa, so I could open them later in the privacy of my room.
The children were in raptures, tearing away the wrapping from their gifts. Among them I recognised the things we had chosen on our shopping trip and saw that they were well received, if unnecessary in the deluge. Who had organized this for Max? In the shops with me he’d been uncomfortable and seemed to have little idea about his children’s desires, and yet gift after gift was being unwrapped to shrieks of delight. There was no sign of Mrs. Mins, and yet I detected her hand; only she in this household possessed the twin skills of subterfuge and efficiency. I suspected that Elizabeth’s comments at the concert were the reason she was missing her moment of glory.
Max gave nothing away, and of course I could not ask him, for the generous array before us was the work of Father Christmas. Who, though, had decorated the tree and adorned the room? What was the point of having such elaborate decorations and only revealing them on Christmas morning? Max brought me some coffee, and I sipped it tentatively, convincing myself I liked the taste as much as the smell. “It’s been a tradition here since I was a boy,” he explained, seeing my confusion. “The Christmas tree is not revealed until the day of Christmas. It’s not unusual, actually—it’s the way it was always done, once upon a time.”
“Stuck in the past as usual,” I remarked, meaning it as a joke but finding that the words sounded bitter on my lips. It was anger, I suppose, at his ability to so completely excise my mother from these memories. As if she had never even existed. Was he planning to do the same with Daphne? I wouldn’t let him.
“Only with the things that matter.” Max watched me carefully. I sipped my coffee again and turned towards the children.
“It’s beautiful,” I said, and it was true. The room, grand and imposing as it was, felt warm and welcoming, and so different from the day I had peeked through the window. The tree was one thing, but it was the excitement radiating from the children that made it special. The only thing missing was their mother.
As if he’d read my mind, Max said, “Daphne always loved it in here at Christmas.” The decorations and the lights and the fire in the hearth had made the room come alive, but I felt Daphne’s absence keenly. I couldn’t imagine how the children were feeling.
“Loved?” I asked, the words bitter on my tongue, but Max had turned away.
“Open your presents!” I felt a tug on my sleeve, and it was Robbie.
“Go on, you’ve got a great pile.” He was right; the stack next to me was threatening to tumble.
“Go on.” Max nodded towards the gifts. Agatha and Sophie stopped what they were doing to watch. There were three parcels, varying in size from large to book-shaped. I opened the largest first, a hangover from childhood I suppose, and discovered another box within, nestled in which was a pair of glossy red boots.
“Gumboots!” I exclaimed.
“Wellies,” Agatha corrected me from her spot on the sofa. “What did you call them?”
“Gumboots.”
“That’s what Mum calls them too.”
“That’s right, she does too.” Max looked mildly shaken. He fluctuated between speaking openly about his wife and bristling at the mention of her. It was as if it was simultaneously too difficult to talk about her and too difficult not to: I found it hard to determine any pattern in his behaviour.
“They’re lovely. Perfect for the weather here. I’ll be able to take you guys for long walks, now I have the right boots.” Everyone went quiet, and I realised my mistake. Not looking at Agatha, I quickly added, “I love the red.”
“We’ll always be able to see where you are,” Max said quietly, the slight threat in his voice at odds with his festive demeanour. He met my eye as I reached for the next present.
The paper was thick like parchment and heavily embossed with gold patterns; my hands were shaking, and my fingers fumbled at the silk ribbon, unable to loosen the knot.
“Here, let me.” Max reached into his pocket and revealed a small folding knife with a bottle opener and a screwdriver, the type you might see in a hardware store. He put his hand on top of mine where I held the parcel, and it was warm. Applying a gentle pressure to my hand, he flicked at the ribbon, and it fell to the ground.
There was tissue paper inside, and then a waxed cotton jacket, a shorter version of the one I had seen on Mr. Mins down at the cove, lined with soft tartan cotton. I brought it out of the wrapping and held it up; I could tell by looking it would be the perfect size. It was not something I would wear in normal life, but that life seemed to be on hold, and this jacket was better suited to my new life here at Barnsley. My light down jacket had been no match for the relentless drizzle and cold winds. I was touched that Max had noticed—touched and a little worried.
I was contemplating opening my third present from Max when the door opened, and Mrs. Mins arrived. Her presence, combined with Daphne’s absence, made me feel uneasy.
Mrs. Mins seemed uneasy as well, a contrast to her usual unruffled behaviour. “Merry Christmas, Summers!” she called out, jolly and festive. She was wearing yet another clinging wrap dress, this time in red velvet. Her cheeks were flushed, and although she was fully made up, her eyes were tired. She looked as if she had been up for some time. I thought guiltily of the way I had lounged in bed until the last possible moment.
“Merry Christmas, Mrs. Mins,” the children replied, showing no inclination to get up and greet her.
Mrs. Mins disappeared out the door and returned pushing a trolley laden with silver-topped servers. She lifted them onto the sideboard one by one, resting them on special stands and placing matching serving spoons in front of each one. Once they were all in order, she came over to the sofas and kissed each of the children in turn. Agatha and Robbie smiled at her, but Sophia turned away slightly, the kiss landing somewhere closer to her hairline, a telltale smudge of red lipstick at her temple.
Giving Max a great eyeful of her cleavage, Mrs. Mins bent down to kiss him on the cheek. He remembered his manners at that moment and jumped up, grabbing her hand and almost butting her in the head before gathering himself and kissing her on both cheeks. “Merry Christmas, Meryl. Thank you for everything.”
“It’s nothing,” she said, still hanging on to his hand, though every inch of the room we were in indicated a great deal of effort. “The goose is in the oven, and I’ve left instructions for when to pull it out. The vegetables are in the warmer—I know you like them soft—and the sauces are in the pantry. I’ve got breakfast here for you. Sue is coming in later to clear up, so you don’t have to worry about that.”
Great. Sue. The eavesdropping waitress from the pub. I made a mental note to make myself as scarce as I could later on in the day.
“Thanks, Meryl. You’ve thought of everything.”
“Are you sure about the pudding, Max?”
“Yes, quite. The children would prefer ice cream anyway.”
“I never liked pudding,” I said, hoping to relieve the tension in the room. It was true: the rich boozy fruity sponge was my least favourite thing as a child, and I only ate it so I could move on to my chocolate coins.
“Is there anything you don’t have a strong opinion about?” Max asked.
“I think I’ve been quite reserved in my opinions so far.”
Max snorted. I felt Sophia’s eyes on me. Cautious.
“Right, well, breakfast is ready,” Mrs. Mins said. “There’s scrambled eggs, smoked salmon, croissants, and pancakes for the children.”
At the word pancakes, I made an involuntary but audible sound of excitement. What had gotten into me? After years of avoiding refined sugar, I was becoming obsessed. It seemed there was no end to my cravings for food devoid of any nutritional value. “And for Miranda,” Max said, raising his eyebrows at me.
Mrs. Mins looked at both of us in turn and then, lacking either the ability or the desire to decipher what was going on, turned and left the room. Max smiled at me, and made a gesture imploring me to serve myself. “Come on, kids. Leave those things be for a minute.”
One by one they dragged themselves away from the presents, Sophie helping Agatha into her wheelchair and pushing her towards the table. Robbie stood up last, a small camera perched on his head.
“Robbie, what’s that?” I asked. Max moved up beside me.
“It’s a camera,” he started to explain, “and it films whatever I see. So right now, it’s filming you. And now”—he spun around—“it’s filming Dad.”
“Turn that off, Robbie,” Max said. “I can’t believe Father Christmas sometimes.” And he winked at me over Robbie’s head, not bothering whether the camera caught the moment or not.