The whole third chapter. I’ll finish the first draft today or tomorrow. I’ll then do an edit, and should have it ready for beta readers by 5 December. If you would like to read the whole thing, and have time to do it in a rush (I’d need it back by 12 December), I’d love to hear from you. Just drop me a note through the contact form. It will be about 21,000 words.

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 1

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 2

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 3

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 4

Chapter three

Mama was in a flap. One of tonight’s guests had cancelled, and the table would be unbalanced. The cook had taken back the turbot, saying it was not fresh, had got into a screaming match with the fishmonger, and was now sulking. Papa had sent a message saying he and Daniel would be late. And the roses for the dining room were yellow, not pink as Mama had ordered.

Min nodded, and agreed, and nodded again. Mama would work it out. Mama always worked it out, and the dinner would be magnificent, as it always was. But Mama seemed to need the drama of solving one crisis after another.

Min, though she took her colouring and size from her mother, was far more like her peaceful father in temperament. “If you can solve it, Min,” he would say, “Then do so. If you can’t solve it, it isn’t your problem. But worrying never changes anything.”

Sure enough, by the time the first guests were announced, order had been restored and all was in readiness. Mama, with Min at her elbow, presented Papa’s apologies for his tardiness.

“A big order. He is upstairs changing for dinner. He and our nephew, Daniel, will be down shortly.”

The guest were all from trade families. Several times a week, the Bradshaw dinner table became a location for what Papa called the great game of business. Mama was an even better strategist than Papa, choosing who to invite with an eye to advantage for Bradshaw Carriages, keeping the dinner table conversation light but providing many alcoves and separate rooms for the private conversations that led to alliances for the benefit of each party.

Martin Billingham, who escorted Min into dinner once her father and cousin arrived, was the son of the man who had brought them the big order. Mama had suggested the contract might be sealed with a marriage. Mr Billingham was, Min supposed, a nice enough young man. But–whatever her mother thought should happen–Min was not going to marry him.

At dinner, most of the talk was about the French, and whether they would invade. Some of those present believed Napoleon was no longer a danger, now that he was committing troops to fight the Austrians.

Others thought it was only a matter of time until he beat the Austrians and returned to Bologne.

Min pointed out that the French naval commander, Villeneuve, had combined his fleet with the Spanish fleet, at Cadiz, and her father agreed it was a worry. “Trust Admiral Nelson to deal with them,” Daniel insisted.

“And if they don’t, we have the militia, do we not?” one of the other ladies said. This was a sore point. The volunteers that made up the militia were not paid, but they needed to be equipped, trained, and fed on training days.

Mr Billingham senior summed up the general view. “Mark you, it’s us that pays when they raise taxes. It always comes back to us, whether it’s windows or servants or sugar. One way or another, it comes back to us.” Mr Billingham held the current Post Office contract; if Bradshaw Carriages met the deadline with the current order, they’d have a lucrative partnership for the next five years.

“You need not worry, Miss Bradshaw,” the younger Mr Billingham assured her, when the men joined the ladies after dinner. “I am confident that Napoleon will not dare to invade. He knows the English will rise up to the last man to oppose the French should they land on our shores.”

“Minnie doesn’t worry, Martin,” Daniel said, taking the seat on her other side. “If the French took over Bath, Minnie would sell them chairs for all the soldiers injured in the invasion, wouldn’t you Minnie? Did you manage to get the leather you wanted?”

“They’re dyeing some for me,” she said.

“A happy customer then. Although he’s not your usual sort, Minnie.”

Mr Billingham frowned. “I cannot like you dealing with customers, Miss Bradshaw. The risk! The scandal! I am surprised your father allows it.”

Daniel laughed. “Oh Uncle thinks anything Minnie does is exceptional.” Was that a sour note? Daniel had no right to be jealous. If anything, the shoe was on the other foot. Daniel was Papa’s business heir, and was being trained to take over. Min’s childhood dream of running the carriage works would never come true. She knew as much as Daniel, but she was a woman and he was a man.

“Indeed, if I were to have the privilege of taking a jewel such as Miss Bradshaw into my home,” Mr Billington was proclaiming, speaking to Daniel rather than Min, “she would never have to lift a hand in any kind of work.”

Min and Daniel exchanged glances. Daniel changed the subject.  “So who was the long streak? Avery, you said?”

“Viscount Avery. He has an estate a few hours from here,” Min said. She knew exactly where it was, too.

“He was buying chairs for his mother.” Daniel made a statement of it, a frown creasing his forehead. “I’m sorry, Minnie. I was distracted. I should have sent someone to escort you or asked you to wait till tomorrow.”

Mr Billingham looked indignant, his chin jutted forward and his eyes protruding more than usual. “If you suffered insult, Miss Bradshaw, I will… I will seek this viscount out and demand an apology.” He nodded as if satisfied with that solution, though the anxiety in his eyes hinted that he hoped such a move would not be necessary.

“Lord Avery was all things gentlemanly, Daniel. Thank you, Mr Billingham. I suffered no insult.”

“You must know that I would do anything for you, Miss Bradshaw.”

Best to put a stop to that conversational direction immediately. “How kind, but I am well able to depend on my father and my cousin,” she said.

Daniel turned a laugh into a cough. “I think my Mama wants me,” Min said, suppressing the urge to kick her cousin. “Excuse me, gentlemen.”

For the remainder of the evening, she managed to avoid Mr Billingham. She could not keep him from coming to the point indefinitely, but in a few more weeks she would be able to refuse him without any damage to her father’s business.

Mama came to tuck her in. “You may be 21, Minerva,” she had replied, when Min suggested that she was too old for tucking in, “but you will be my baby girl till the day I die.”

“Not Mr Billingham, my love?” she said, as she pulled the sheets up to Minerva’s chin and smoothed them out.

“No, Mama. Not Mr Billingham.”

“Don’t leave it too late, Minerva. Invalid chairs won’t keep you warm at night, and you cannot rock business ledgers in a cradle. I know what I’m talking about, baby. Papa and I–Papa was 41 and I was 38 when you were born. We had a happy marriage, but you made our lives complete.”

“That is part of the problem, Mama You and Papa show me that marriage can be a partnership, and I want that. Mr Billingham likes the way I look, but he doesn’t like me. He doesn’t know me, and he doesn’t want to know me.”

But Lord Avery does, a small voice whispered. She ignored it. Lord Avery was not for her.

#*#

Candle went to dinner with a couple of friends from army days, and they spent the evening fighting an invasion. Beckett was still in the Guard, but their host, Michaels, had sold out about the same time as Candle, and was fascinated to hear that Candle had set up and was training a local company of militia.

“If we can hold Napoleon off at sea, we’ll be okay,” Candle said. “But we’d be fools to discount the possibility of him landing. And he’ll be back when he’s finished in Austria.”

“It’s not like regular army work,” Candle explained. “Our farm boys and footmen won’t be able to stand up to Napoleon’s trained soldiers, and we won’t try. But every Englishman and every Englishwoman will be able to strike a blow when the French aren’t watching. A broken wheel here, a shot from the darkness over there, a purge in their soup somewhere else.”

Beckett winced. “That’s hitting below the belt,” he joked.

“But you are teaching them to fight,” Michaels said.

“Yes, but a different kind of fighting. A few people moving fast in and out of cover, and striking only at weak points.”

They spent hours fighting skirmishes and sneak attacks with the salt cellars and the cutlery, taking advantage of every bit of cover provided by a dinner plate or a fold in the tablecloth.

When Candle and Beckett left Michaels’ lodgings, the dawn was just lightening the sky. The shortest distance to the hotel district led through the south end of the town, where weary prostitutes were returning home from work passed day-labourers heading to the better end of town to begin theirs.

One particularly pretty girl walked towards and then past them, and Beckett turned to watch. “We could pick up a couple of girls… no, you don’t do you.”

Candle shook his head. “You go ahead, Beckett.” He hadn’t been with a purchased woman since his 16th birthday, when his father took him to a brothel as a present. That virgin boy had been first embarrassed, then delighted, then–when he read the contrast between the smile on the painted lips and the hopelessness in the kohl-lined eyes–horrified.

Fortunately, his father had lost interest in him again, and he’d remained nearly an innocent until his disappointment over Miss Bradshaw had sent him seeking experience. He spared a smile for the bored lusty widow who had educated him in London. She was still a good friend; remarried now, and he was glad of it. She deserved happiness.

Her successors had likewise been widows who enjoyed a discrete liaison with someone who treated them with respect and was happy to squire them to social events. He had not had such a liaison in six months; not since he sold out when his father died and his mother was injured. Was that the reason for his lustful response to Miss Bradshaw? He didn’t think so. He was all but certain he would respond to her if he’d just been intimate with an army of widows, end to end. And he was completely certain an army of naked widows wouldn’t have half the effect on him that Miss Bradshaw’s delectable posterior in a pair of workman’s overalls had achieved.

He continued on, smiling at his own besotted imaginings. He could see glimpses of the Abbey, and the buildings behind it that blocked his view of the river. Across the river, Miss Bradshaw would be sleeping. He passed a flower shop that was just opening its doors to offload a cartload of flowers, still in buckets and fresh from the fields. Flowers. Why not?

He was whistling when he exited the flower shop. A wash, a quick nap, a shave, and he’d be as good as new. And in four more hours, when he called to collect the Merlin chair, he would see her again.

#*#

Lord Avery was precise to his time, arriving on the dot of 11 o’clock. Min and the worker Daniel had spared to her had the chair packed around with blankets and wrapped in a canvas against the weather.

“My mother asked me to thank you for the flowers.” He must have bought every bloom in the shop. They were delivered to her mother; a polite fiction that she appreciated. Min was both appalled at his extravagance and flattered by his attention. “They are lovely, but I told you not to court me,” she scolded, when the worker was out of earshot.

“To be precise,” he said, “you told me that the Kitteridges were right. This being completely beyond the bounds of possibility, I decided you must be having a momentary lapse of reason, quite out of character, and it would be kindest to ignore you.”

“Lord Avery!” She didn’t know what else to say. She wanted to laugh, but that would just encourage him.

“You will note, however, that the flowers were not addressed to you, but to the lovely Mrs Bradford,” he reminded her.

“You have not met my mother.”

“True. But I’m sure I would conceive a hopeless passion for her if I did. If I had not already given my heart to her daughter.”

“Lord Avery!”

“You could call me Candle if you like,” he said.

“I could not.”

“You’re right,” he admitted. “It’s a silly name. They gave it to me at school, you know. Because I’m tall and thin and have a flame on top. Call me Randall. That’s my name, you know.”

She did know. She had looked him up in Debrett’s at the circulating library. She wasn’t going to tell him that.

“I will call you Lord Avery,” she said, firmly.

“Really? Think about it. You’re an efficient woman. Wouldn’t Randall be quicker and easier to say?”

“Or Ran,” she said, the words slipping out before she could stop them. Sometimes, in her day dreams, she had called him Ran.

He was delighted. “Yes. Please call me Ran. That would be very efficient.”

“And very inappropriate,” she said.

She could tell he was going to argue some more, but the worker called out to say he’d secured the chair on the back of Lord Avery’s high perch phaeton, and Daniel arrived.

Daniel wasted no time. “You sent my aunt a lot of flowers, Lord Avery.”

“I did, Mr Whitlow. I wished to show my appreciation for her daughter’s help, and my delight that we have met again.”

“Is that right? You didn’t say that you’d met Lord Avery before, Minnie”

“It was three years ago, Daniel.”

Daniel turned his suspicious eyes back on Lord Avery.

#*#

The bull had a very proprietary air. Cousinly? But it wasn’t unknown for cousins to marry. Surely Miss Bradshaw would have told him if she had an understanding with the pugnacious Mr Whitlow?

Certainly, Candle wasn’t going to have another chance for a private word with Miss Bradshaw. His teasing was having the desired effect before the bull butted in. Ran, indeed. He like it. Ran and Min Avery. He liked it very much. And not least because the way it slipped out showed she’d been thinking about him.

“When should I return for the other chair,” he asked. “In 12 days?”

“Yes. I’ll have it ready by the 6th of November. Shall we say the 7th to be safe?”

As he prepared to climb into the phaeton, the bull crowded in on him, ostensibly to make a hand to give him a leg up. “Be very careful, Lord Avery,” he muttered. “My cousin has relatives who will protect her honour.”

“I promise you,” he said, keeping his own voice low, “I will guard her honour with my life.”

The bull looked at him long and hard, then nodded. “Fair enough.” And he gave Candle a heave, propelling him up into the phaeton.

Candle leaned down to take the reins from the worker.

“Good day, Mr Whitlow. Your humble servant, Miss Bradshaw. I will see you in a fortnight.”

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 6

The story continues. The disclaimer continues to apply: it’s still raw–uncopy edited, unproofread, and unfinished. I’m up to 15,500 words, and figure another 5,000 will bring me to the end.

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 1

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 2

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 3

Genevieve Norton, known at school at Kitty Cat, rounded her blue, blue eyes into her innocent look. Min had seen her practicing that look and a dozen others in front of a mirror. “Why, if it isn’t little Miss Bradshaw. Fancy seeing you here.”

“I live in Bath,” Min said.

“Oh, I know that.” Lady Norton slid her eyes sideways to Lord Avery, inviting him to join in the fun. “I meant here in a tea shop. With a man. On your own. Oh but perhaps I am mistaken. Perhaps the rules are different for those who are not ladies.” And she lowered her voice to not quite whisper to Lord Avery, “She is a tradeswoman you know. Carriages or some such.”

He smiled warmly at Min. “As it happens, Lady Norton, you have interrupted a business meeting. Miss Bradshaw is designing an invalid chair for my mother. I know you will excuse us if we continue.”

“Know what kind of business I’d like to discuss with Miss Bradshanks.” Mr Kitteridge said, waggling his eyebrows at her.

Lord Avery’s nostrils flared. She had heard the expression, but she’d never seen it happen. But his voice was quiet and controlled when he said, “Kitteridge, Perhaps you and your sister had better leave now.”

Lady Norton fluttered her eyelashes at him again. Practiced expression number 8, or was it 9? “Lord Avery, you must call while you are in Bath. Perhaps tomorrow afternoon?”

“Thank you, Lady Norton. However, I expect to be leaving Bath in the morning.” He was taking the Merlin chair home and then coming back, but no need to tell them that.

Kitteridge, his eyes on Min, opened his mouth and then thought better of whatever inappropriate remark he was about to make. He said good day, instead. “Come on, Vivi. Best be on our way. Things to do tonight, you know.”

Lady Norton laughed, a tinkling little sound of amusement, also practiced. “Such a busy place Bath is this month, Lord Avery. Tell me, are you staying at the Royal?”

“I am not,” Lord Avery said.

“Come on, Vivi. Your servant, Avery. Miss Bradshanks.”

Lord Avery took his seat again, and picked up the cup she’d poured for him.

“Do you suppose he gets your name wrong on purpose?” he asked? “Or is it general stupidity?”

The twinkle in his eyes put the nasty couple back into perspective. Now she was an adult, their petty insults had no power to hurt her. She didn’t move in their circles, and they weren’t respected in hers. Anxiety, indignation: both receded under Lord Avery’s calm amusement.

“A little of both, I believe,” she replied.

“What a poisonous pair,” he said. “Did she make your school days as unpleasant as he made mine? You know, when you disappeared from the house party, she told me that you had just been playing at liking me for the amusement of your friends. Her exact words, if I remember, were ‘after all, Captain Avery, you are not exactly the answer to a young girl’s prayers, are you?’ I shouldn’t have believed her, should I?”

Good heavens. She shook her head, her mind racing. Those past few hours at the house party had been too painful to remember, but now she was reliving the conversation that had sent her running to her room, to wait, wide-awake, till morning dawned and she could leave.

“Why did you leave?” Lord Avery asked.

“I heard… I thought I heard you discussing me with Mr Kitteridge. But I did not realise till just now. I heard his voice, but I never heard yours. Kitty Cat–Lady Norton–had told me you were just after my money, but she always sees the worst in everyone… And then… Do you remember that I tore my hem and went to have it sewn up?”

“I remember. It was the last time I saw you.” His eyes were sombre.

“I came back to the alcove where you were waiting, and I heard Mr Kitteridge say, ‘Avery, old chap, you have to admit, if you must marry the shop, it comes in quite a tasty package.’ I could not move. I just stood there. I heard someone reply, very low. I couldn’t make out the voice or the words, but Mr Kitteridge said, ‘That’s right, Avery. No need to take her into society once you’ve got your hands on her lovely money.'” She blushed, remembering the rest of his sentence, which she wasn’t going to repeat. ‘Keep her at home and enjoy all her other lovely assets where the smell of the shop won’t bother the neighbours. I wouldn’t mind getting an heir and a spare on that one, I can tell you.’

#*#

“Damn his lying, cheating eyes,” Candle said, forgetting for a moment that he was in the presence of a lady. “I beg your pardon, Miss Bradshaw. Will you believe I wasn’t there? When you left for the retiring room, I went to get us some punch. I stopped to talk to some people. I was watching the door, but someone…” he stopped, his eyes unfocused for a moment as he looked back into his memories. “Lady Norton bumped into me and spilled the punch. I had my eyes off the door for several minutes.”

Miss Bradshaw nodded. “She was in the retiring room. She spent 10 minutes telling me how improvident you were, and how unworthy I was, and on, and on–all in that sweet ‘I am only trying to help’ voice of hers. She left just before I did.”

“They planned it. They were in it together.”

Miss Bradshaw had clearly come to the same conclusion. Slowly and deliberately, she repeated, “Damn their lying, cheating eyes.”

Candle gave a bark of laughter, then turned suddenly serious. “We have wasted a bit of time, haven’t we? May we start again, Miss Bradshaw? I was courting you, you know. I’d like to court you again, if I may.”

Miss Bradshaw shook her head, sadly. “We come from different worlds, you and I. The Kitteridges were right about that.”

“It didn’t matter back then.”

“I was 17 back then. I believed Cinderella could marry the prince. I did not think about what her life would be like the next morning, raised to scrub out the kitchen and surrounded by people who despised kitchen maids.”

Candle would have argued, but the maid arrived with the umbrellas. Miss Bradshaw thanked him for the tea.

“Polly and I will be fine from here, Lord Avery. It is only just around the corner.”

Candle insisted, though, on escorting them both to her father’s fine terraced house on Henrietta Street.

She gave him her hand in parting, and one of those warm smiles that melted him from the centre. “I am so glad to know what really happened at the house party, Lord Avery. All these years, I have believed I was mistaken in you. I am happy to know that I was not.”

He raised her hand, so tiny and delicate in his, but wiry and strong and capable. “Please know that my admiration was, and is, genuine, Miss Bradshaw.” He kissed the air above the back of her hand, fighting the temptation to press his lips to her glove–or to strip the glove off and lay his kiss in her palm.

He doused the thought. All unbidden, it had left her sweet palm to travel up her arm and beyond, and he had to remain respectful if it killed him. Any sign that he regarded her as less than a lady would, he was sure, condemn him take her decision on his proposed courtship as final. And that, he had no intention of doing.

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 5

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 1

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 2

Min changed into an afternoon dress, while Lord Avery waited for her in the office downstairs. He hadn’t blinked at the price she asked for the two chairs, writing a bank draft for the first chair, and promising payment on delivery for the other. Rumour had it he’d inherited a fortune from an uncle. Perhaps, for once, rumour spoke true.

As she buttoned her pelisse and tied her bonnet strings, she thought wistfully about the far more fashionable clothes that she had at home. How silly. Lord Avery was a client like any other, and she would no more dress up for him than she would for… she cast about for the person she wanted least to impress. Daniel. She would no more dress up for Lord Avery than for Daniel.

They walked down Cornwall St into Walcot Street, Polly Stample keeping a pace behind.”

“How did you come to be making chairs, Miss Bradshaw?” Lord Avery asked. He couldn’t really be interested, but she would tell him, since he asked.

“I began when my mother broke her hip, Lord Avery. She was not entirely happy with the chair made by one of my father’s workmen, and I designed some improvements. It has grown from there.”

“An unusual hobby for a woman,” he commented.

A hobby, indeed. Every man Min knew, from her father down, insisted on seeing her work as a hobby. Never mind that invalid chairs were one of their most profitable lines. And she managed it all, from designing the chairs to keeping the accounts.

“It is a business, not a hobby,” she told Lord Avery.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, then visibly thought better of it.

“Go on,” she said.

He didn’t pretend not to know what she meant. “I don’t wish to make you cross,” he told her. “I value my skin.”

“I will try to resist tossing you into the Avon.”

He laughed out loud. “You would need to trip me, Miss Bradshaw. I’m rather too large for you to lift.”

“Are you changing the subject, Lord Avery?”

He spread his hands in surrender. “I was just going to say that business is rather an unusual hobby for a lady,” he said. “I meant it as a joke, but I decided it wasn’t very funny. Truly, Miss Bradshaw, after the last six months, I have nothing but admiration for anyone who can run a business.”

He sounded sincere. He looked sincere. He couldn’t possibly be sincere. Min knew what the gentry thought of trade. She’d heard it often enough while she was at school. “Mini, darling, whatever is that smell? Have you not washed today? Oh, but I forgot. You cannot wash off the shop, can you darling?”

But Lord Avery was continuing. “I was raised to run the family estate, of course. But I inherited from my uncle six months ago. He ran a huge business, and now I’m trying to learn how to do it. So far, I’ve been lucky in my managers, but Mother says I need to know the impact of every decision made in my name, and how everything works.”

Min nodded. “That is what my father, says, too. My mother says the same applies to running a house. You have to know how to do everything in order to know everything is being done well. This is Pursell’s.”

Lord Avery opened the door to the showroom.

At first the sales assistant was keen to serve him, but he said, “I am just here to escort Miss Bradshaw.”

Min pulled out an off-cut of the velvet they were matching, and leafed through the sample book until she found a match. They didn’t have that colour in stock, but she was assured they could have it dyed and ready for her within a week. Min reviewed her schedule. If Lady Avery was happy to trial the chair for three weeks instead of a month, they could still make the Christmas deadline.

“I wish to select the skins,” she told the sales assistant.

In the storeroom, she inhaled a deep lungful of the smell of fresh leather, then laughed when she realised Lord Avery was doing the same.

“It reminds me of the saddle room at Avery Hall when I was little,” he said. “What about you?”

“My father’s harness shop. When I was little, my mother was in charge of it, and I spent a lot of time there. My mother was a Conti.”

“Conti? Your mother is related to Gavriel Conti?” Lord Avery whistled. “I am sorry, Miss Bradshaw. That was most impolite of me. But Conti Saddlery is a legend. I have a Gavriel Conti saddle, and I wouldn’t part with it for the world.”

“Gavriel Conti was my grandfather,” she had found the stack of skins she wanted and the sales assistant was pulling them out so that she could inspect them.

The sales assistant’s superior attitude had changed to reverence when he realised that he was serving the granddaughter of the great Conti. He must be new. She seldom bought skins herself, usually picking what she wanted from the manufactory’s stores, but she’d been coming here with her parents since she was a babe in arms.

He and Lord Avery were exchanging stories about Conti harnesses and saddles that had come unscathed through trials that would have shredded lesser leatherwork.

He was not what Min had expected. For a brief week, she had convinced herself that he was not like other offspring of the nobility–that he saw past her modest birth and liked her as a person. Then, for three years, she believed he was just like all the others; an idler who thought his noble birth entitled him to a life of ease and plenty, and who looked down on those whose labours made his leisure possible. Now, he confounded her.

If he wasn’t after her money–and if the fortune he had inherited was a tenth of what people said, he didn’t need her money–why had he come seeking her? She discounted the story that he’d told; it was, after all, highly unlikely the Master of the Pump Rooms would send him to her.

She would have to watch him carefully, and guard her heart.

Chapter two

Miss Bradshaw chose the skins she wanted and arranged for them to be dyed and delivered. Out in the street, it was raining again. Candle unfurled his umbrella. He was so much taller than her, that if he held it over both of them, she would be soaked in every gust of wind. When he tried to hold it just over her, though, she objected.

“My bonnet will keep me dry, Lord Avery. I must not take you out of your way.”

“I promised to escort you, Miss Bradshaw. Surely you will allow me to keep my promise? Do you return to your workshop?”

“I am for home on Henrietta Street. Polly and I will be fine.”

Candle turned, and handed the maid his umbrella. One of them might as well be dry.

“Then we will brave the weather together, Miss Bradshaw.” He offered her his arm.

They hurried down Northgate Street and turned towards the bridge. Miss Bradshaw leant into him as she jumped over the puddles he strode past. The magic was still working; she still made him feel strong and capable.

Three years ago, fresh out of university and new to the Guard, he’d been nervous in company, expecting the teasing he’d endured at school to follow him into society. And it did.

But Miss Bradshaw had talked to him about books, and gardens, and animals. She’d listened as he explained his plans for a military career. She’d leant on his arm on walks and waved admiringly as he showed off his one skill, outriding all the other male guests.

Tiny though she was, she never made him feel over tall and clumsy. Indeed, she had confided that she was always nervous in crowds, but not when he was there to protect her. Was it all a tease?

On an impulse, he pulled her into the doorway of Crofts Tea Room, at the entrance to the bridge.

“Miss Polly,” he said to the maid. “Your mistress and I will take shelter in here while you hurry home and fetch another couple of umbrellas.”

The maid turned uncertain eyes to Miss Bradshaw. Would she agree? Candle held his breath.

“Run along, Polly. We will wait in the Tea Room.”

He opened the door for her as the maid hurried off, almost invisible under the big umbrella.

Following close behind her, he almost collided with her back when she stopped suddenly. He was close enough to feel the tension radiating from her, and the effort she made to relax, and continue into the little tea shop.

A servant hurried up. Candle absently asked for a table for two and for tea to be served. Most of his attention was on the couple already seated at the far side of the shop. Guy Kitteridge was one of those who had made his life miserable at Eton and later at Oxford. Kitteridge was with his sister Genevieve, Lady Norton, a slender blonde with a waspish tongue.

They were absorbed in their conversation, and with luck wouldn’t notice Candle and Miss Bradshaw. He waved Miss Bradshaw ahead and followed her and the waiter to a small table near the window that looked out onto the street across the bridge.

Interesting that Miss Bradshaw reacted as she did. Lady Norton had been a great friend of hers three years ago. Although, come to think of it, he hadn’t seen any signs of closeness between them during the house party. It was only after Miss Bradshaw left that Miss Kitteridge, as she was then, told him that they’d been at school together.

Miss Bradshaw had seated herself so that all the brother and sister would see was her back. Candle angled his chair so that he, too, would be hard to recognise.

Lady Norton was the one who told him why Miss Bradshaw left so precipitously. Wasn’t that interesting? Candle beamed. Miss Bradshaw raised her eyebrows. No. He would not explain to her why he was suddenly happy. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps one day.

The servant brought a laden tray. Two cups, a teapot, milk and sugar, a three-tier cake plate filled with delicate sandwiches on the lowest tier, iced cakes on the middle tier, and candied fruit and flowers on the top.

As Miss Bradshaw poured the tea, he tested his new theory. “Mr Kitteridge and Lady Norton are over there in the corner,” he said. Yes. That was a slight grimace, quickly controlled. But it was definitely a grimace.

“No doubt you wish to greet your friend,” was all she said. But the warmth that had begun to creep back into her voice during their afternoon was markedly absent.

“He’s no friend of mine,” Candle assured her.

“You have had a falling out?” She handed him his cup, prepared just the way he had liked it three years earlier.

“We never had a falling in,” Candle said. He was watching the pair from the corner of his eye. They’d seen him–it was hard to be inconspicuous when you were well over 6ft tall and had red hair.

“Don’t look now,” he told Miss Bradshaw, “but they’re coming over.”

“Lord Avery? It is Lord Avery. I told Guy it was you.” Lady Norton was fluttering her eyelashes at him. She must have heard about his inheritance. Three years ago, she had barely acknowledged his existence, except that one time at the end of the house party, and even then she had let him see her contempt. Even when she’d made eyes at him a few months later, she’d made it clear she was stooping to do so.

The contempt was well veiled today, at least in his direction. She didn’t acknowledge Miss Bradshaw’s existence at all.

Well, he could fix that. “You remember Miss Bradshaw, of course,” Candle said.

Candle’s Christmas Chair excerpt 4