The Christmas Spirit (2 page)

Trudy sighed. She couldn't explain why she felt such a restlessness to travel, or why the simple dances and pranks of her fellow elves left her feeling incomplete. "I just like to wander, I suppose."

Turning to the matter at hand, she added, "But tell me more about Sir Matthew. Why did ye call me?"

"I think he'd do a might better for a wee bit o' female company." Francis gave her a wink. "I thought some o' yer antics might make him forget his troubles. I've tried all o' mine."

"What sort of troubles are they?"

"Well--" Francis settled himself in the crook of the tree and leaned comfortably against its trunk. To any person below he would have seemed but a cluster of mistletoe, with his green felt for leaves, his beard for stems, and his pearly buttons for berries. But Trudy could see him clearly. His little round eyes twinkled back at her; and the nose on his tiny face, which was uncommonly large, twitched when he spoke, putting her in mind of an exotic monkey that had once made her laugh.

"Near as I can make out," Francis began, crossing his legs at the knee, "Sir Matthew did himself in, asearchin' for the source o' the Nile. Made him a baronet, they did, after his first trip. Though why any grown man would care to know where a muddy old river springs from fair has me bamboozled."

His wrinkled brow posed her a question, which Trudy was at pains to answer.

"I can't tell ye why a man would care to know that sort of thing," she said. "With me, it's not the knowing, so much as the searching, so that when I get there all the pleasure I've promised meself slips right away, and so, I'm off again on another search.

"But is that all that ails him?" she asked. "Just a spot of fever and some beasties in his stomach?"  She was sure there must be more, even though she knew the horrors such a journey posed for someone no stronger than a human. Most Britishers who set out to find the secrets of the African rivers never returned.

"No." Francis grimaced. "It's not so much his body what ails him, though that's considerable. It's what goes on in that head of his. He must've had a fright or two along the way, bad enough to scare the soul right out of him."

"Poor mannie!" Trudy bent down again to have another peek at Matthew.

His eyes were open now, and he had straightened himself to call a manservant into the room, a great, tall man with fair skin and thick black eyebrows, dressed in the white tunic and baggy pants of a Pathan warrior. A huge, white turban circled his head making him seem that much larger, though he must have stood well over six feet with his head bare.

As big as the Pathan was, Sir Matthew managed to look strong and broad-shouldered beside him. A strange feeling constricted Trudy's chest when she saw him decline the use of his servant's arm. She had no doubt he was feeling weak, but he held himself proudly as he was escorted from the room. The Pathan held back, ready to catch Matthew if he fell. Trudy wondered what act had bound these men together, for the Pathans were an independent race, not likely to hire on as any man's servant. This she had seen on her travels, as well as the strange bonds that sometimes formed between men. There had been times when she had envied them that bond she could not understand.

But Matthew did not seem to be a candidate for envy at the moment, though the square set of his shoulders protected him equally from her pity. Any sympathy she felt had to be tempered by the respect due a man who had endured the hardships he must have experienced: hunger and heat, exhaustion and disease, the treachery of sworn friends, the predations of brigands, danger from tyrants who mistrusted any foreigner, and the assault of cruelty upon cruelty on his eyes and his mind.

Yes, Sir Matthew needed some distraction from the memories she could imagine all too well. Yet, as Trudy watched him leave the room, a vague disquiet came over her, provoked by her brother's uncommon silence.

"Why--" she said, facing Francis--"why do I detect a hint of scheming? Ye've never wanted me to reveal meself to a man before."

"But this one's helpless with his fever," Francis explained, grinning. "And besides, Sir Matthew's sworn off women, or so he says, and he don't intend to be pixie-led. Bit of a challenge, wouldn't ye say, to see if he can resist a beauty such as yerself?"

A moment's pause, and Francis's eyes lit up with mischief. "What say, sister, if I lay ye a bet that ye can't lure him into the mists before Christmas?"

"Lure him into the mists? In his condition? I thought ye felt sorry for him."

"And so I do. But ye can't think I'd let me sister near a man like him if he weren't in such sorry straits? I know all humans are fools, but that's not to say ye can fool the lot o' them."

Trudy rolled her eyes. "And ye think it's yer job to keep me safe? Have I told ye, yer a relic from the Dark Ages, ye are? Do ye have any idea what I've been up to while I was away?"

"Ye've mentioned a thing or two before." Francis scowled. "But if I've got ye here, doin' yer bit to trick Sir Matthew, then I can keep me eyes on you as well. And if ye do lead him on a pretty chase, wisp that ye are, I'm sure ye wouldn't hurt him any worse than he is already. If I were a human, I'd a lot rather dance me way to elfland than sit by a fire, feeling me bones rot right out of me body."

"A lot you'd know what humans feel!"

"Same as yerself! Yer as soulless as me!"

It was true that she was, and, yet, Trudy resented this particular taunt. Somehow, she was sure she knew more about humans than her brother did. She never had shared the contempt for them her fellow elves held, and sometimes her wanderings had taken her perilously close to their world.

But she had never come too close. She'd avoided that ultimate encounter with men, with its attendant danger to rob her of all her magic. That had not prevented her, however, from skipping in the air in front of them, just out of reach, to lead men who'd been lost in the desert to water, or from causing a flurry of chaos in a slave caravan in the hope that some of the slaves would escape. And it would not keep her now from doing what she could to help Sir Matthew find a way out of his despair and into the mists.

Something about his stiff, retreating figure had intrigued her. She couldn't help wondering if an explorer such as he had suffered from the same sort of restlessness she had known, and if he understood what it was. All Trudy knew was that her wanderings rarely brought her any satisfaction, though she was sure that to stay at home doing nothing more than what the other elves did would only be worse.

"Ye say that Sir Matthew never goes out?" she asked Francis, musing.

"No that I've ever seen. He just sits in that chair o' his, most of the time, he does, except when he's sleeping."

Trudy frowned and tapped her chin with one finger. "Then, no wonder his memories trouble him so. He needs something new to take their place."

"That's the spirit! I knew ye'd jump at a challenge. But, I'm warnin' ye, Trudy, Sir Matthew'll be a hard nut to crack."

Trudy scoffed. "I'll have him eating out of me hand and in elfland before Christmas, sure enough. Just ye wait and see."

And that was what I did, though I should've noticed right then and there that she had something addlepated in mind. I should've known by the way she stared at Sir Matthew and the light flickered in her eyes. But I didn't, ye see, or I would've stopped her before the whole thing got out of hand, and a terrible tragedy would have been averted. But that's our Trudy for ye. She always did do things her own way, with no proper reflection beforehand.

And, as for Sir Matthew . . . Well, that's the last time I'll believe any man who claims he won't be pixie-led.

Chapter Two

Trudy stood before the front door of Sir Matthew's lodgings in Gilbert Street and, before knocking, took a moment to survey her appearance. Beneath her elven cloak was a simple white muslin gown with tiny, pink posies worked into the cloth. The pale green color of their leaves picked up the meadow-green of her eyes, and the lively pink of the flowers matched the perpetual bloom in her cheeks. She was very pleased to think she had conjured the gown all by herself. The fact that the dress was merely an illusion did nothing to dull the thrill of wearing it. She was sure she had perfectly dressed the part of a fashionable lady of the ton.

Her rapid tap with the knocker was not immediately answered, but she reminded herself that humans were excruciatingly slow in everything. While she waited, she contented herself with the keen anticipation of entering their world as one of their own. What Francis would say when he discovered her plan, she did not know, but she could almost see the blood rising into his cheeks right now. She would lure Sir Matthew into the mists well before Christmas, but first she meant to have a little adventure of her own.

The door opened slowly. The Pathan warrior she had spied through the window these past few nights filled the entryway and dwarfed her fragile self. At the sight of her beauty--much as she had done to hide its other-worldliness--his eyes grew wide beneath their pair of heavy brows, but he soon recovered his dignity.

He bowed wordlessly after his Eastern fashion and waited for her to speak.

"Is this the lodging of Sir Matthew Dunstone?" she inquired in her acquired society voice.

The Pathan inclined his head, but his eyes never left her face.

"Would you tell him, please, that he has a visitor?"

The Pathan hesitated only a second before surprising her. "Sir Matthew does not receive," he said, with a regretful bow. "He is unwell." And with that briefest of statements, he closed the door.

Trudy stared in disbelief at the flat, painted surface. She had never been refused to her face before. She wondered briefly if the problem was with the dress, if she had somehow failed to give the appearance of a respectable caller.

But as she looked down again, she could only nod approvingly. She liked the way the skirt subtly sparkled with the scattering of fairy dust she had added for trim. The innovation was her own, not strictly in the pattern books, but she did not think it enough of a departure to make a man take offense. Gentlemen were notoriously ignorant where female fashions were concerned, and besides, she wasn't quite prepared to give up all her advantages. An elf maid must attend to her attractions, same as any girl.

Having worked out her frustration in this idle musing, she returned to the problem at hand. She had intended to meet Sir Matthew entirely upon his own human terms; but if those failed, she was quite prepared to use magic, just as long as whatever trick she pulled could easily be explained. The big Pathan would be a formidable obstacle to any other girl, but he was as nothing to her.

Wrapping herself completely in her elven cloak, she knocked again, letting her taps fall more heavily on the door to disguise their origin.

This time, when the Pathan opened the door, she saw his blank stare of confusion. His brows snapped together darkly as he walked right past her and out into the street to peer this way and that. Assured that she was completely invisible to him, Trudy tiptoed daintily through the door, relieved to find that he had not been born on a Sunday. Those born on a Sunday had a remarkable gift for seeing elves, but since he obviously had not, her task would be all the easier.

She waited until he had reentered, scratching the back of his head below his turban, then followed him up the stairs to a door near the landing. Judging by its position in the house, she had no doubt it was the door to Sir Matthew's library.

As the Pathan knocked and entered, her heart gave a leap of anticipation.

"Ahmad, who was at the door?"

Out in the corridor, Trudy heard Matthew speak for the first time and was astonished by the depth of his voice. She had not expected a seriously ill man to produce such a resonant tone, but Matthew's words filled the air with a low vibrancy, betraying none of the weakness his illness implied.

"It was a lady, Matthew saab," the Pathan answered. "She asked to see you."

"A lady? For me?" A hint of anxiety entered his voice.

Trudy tensed to learn its meaning, but all Matthew said next was, "Did she leave her card?"

"No, saab--" Ahmad's questioning tone revealed that he must have been more disconcerted by her presence than he had shown--"I am afraid I did not think to ask her."

"No matter. It was not--"

"No, saab." The Pathan's voice softened but a notch. "It was not the mem'saab."

The silence that followed his statement made Trudy squirm with a rare uneasiness. Though she couldn't see Matthew, she somehow sensed his embarrassment.

But all he said when he did resume speaking as lightly as before was, "I cannot imagine that it would be, but neither can I think of any other lady who might call. Must have been an error."

"Yes, undoubtedly, saab."

Trudy waited for some time after Ahmad had withdrawn before lifting her hand to the knob. Matthew's acceptance of her story would depend very much upon her timing.

"Sir Matthew?" She pushed the door open with a falsely timid knock, making sure not to speak so early as to have her entrance denied.

As she advanced into the room, he looked up startled, and instantly his brows snapped together over a lean, haggard face. Then, as her beauty, fully released, struck him with its powerful force, his lips parted and all time seemed to suspend.

Trudy had meant to use these moments of enchantment to satisfy her own curiosity. But her study became not so much a conscious design as a mirror of Matthew's wonder.

She had seen many men before. She had observed them all her life in countless situations, but none had struck her with the sheer force of character that Matthew did. He was free of his ague today. She had purposely waited until his last bout of malaria had passed, knowing she would not be received if he were genuinely ill.

Now, she wondered how even that dreaded disease, which affected all humans who traveled in the tropics, could keep such a strong man pinned to his chair. Determination seemed to reside in the long cut of Matthew's jaw. Mental energy issued from his deep, dark eyes, betraying the lightning quickness of a profound intellect. Even dazed as he was by her magic, he seemed to see right through to her very core.