A Yuletide Treasure by Cynthia Bailey Pratt Page B

leaves an old maid. Tuppence is lucky.”
    She dropped the last charm into the dark brown batter. The semisolid mass accepted it with the sound of a kiss. Mrs. Lamsard picked up a wooden spoon. “Three times you stir, sunwise, and you makes your wishes,” she said.
    Camilla met the woman’s eyes and raised her eyebrows, mouthing, “Sunwise?” With a thick forefinger, Mrs. Lamsard drew a circle showing her the way to go.
    Camilla knew just enough not to say her wishes aloud. The memory of childhood games played with her sister came back. One must never ever tell a wish, for that breaks the spell, spilling all the luck out of it so that it will never ever come true.
    She had no intention of making a wish. She didn’t believe in wishes or dreams. Such things were for children and not always for them. Yet as she pushed the thick wooden spoon through the batter, knowing this was an ancient action carried out through the centuries, she found herself wishing that she might always have the warmth of friends, the nearness of family, and ... Her gaze lifted for one turn of the spoon, seeking out Sir Philip. Impulsively, she wished for a love that would banish her loneliness, outlast her youth, that would grow warmer and deeper with the passing of the years.
    Was that too great a wish for a Christmas pudding? Perhaps she should wish for a packet of needles or a skein of wool, two things she was sure to receive this Christmas as at every Christmas. But she decided as she gave the last stir to be bold, to be, perhaps, foolish and to wish for love.
     

Chapter Seven
     
    After Camilla, the doctor stirred the pudding. He looked like a pagan god making preparation for a sacrifice, noble, remote, exalted. Tinarose couldn’t take her gaze from his face. For Camilla, who knew he was thinking about slippers, some of the fascination of his remarkable good looks faded.
    After the guests came the master of the house. Though he smiled as he took up the wooden spoon, polished like glass from countless Christmas stirrings, when he began his turn, he kept his eyes downward, as if concentrating seriously on his wishes, Camilla wondered what such a man as Sir Philip could desire. He seemed to have everything, a fine home, a close family, status in his community. Perhaps he thought of his late brother. It would explain the pensive expression he wore throughout the superstitious ceremony.
    As Lady LaCorte stirred, she kept her left hand flat against her side, as if transferring some of her wishes to her unborn infant. Her daughter looked shyly at the doctor as she took the spoon in her hand. The smaller girls giggled as they passed the spoon from biggest to littlest, then ran laughing back to the governess’s skirts. And so it went, among the servants, from old Merridew down to a frightened-looking dairymaid, her fingers red from cold.
    Camilla found Sir Philip beside her as the festival ended. “This is where we ‘gentry’ withdraw and leave them to continue. There’ll be cider drunk with cornmeal sprinkled on it and some singing.”
    “This is a long-standing custom in this house, I take it?”
    “Very long. But even older is the custom that when the master leaves, the festivity begins. Once, I could stay quiet in the corner and no one would take notice of me. I was just ‘young Mister Philip’ then. Now, for all my sins, I am master here and, thus, unwelcome.”
    He raised his hands, and a silence fell, silence with an undercurrent of laughter and whisperings. “Thank you, Mrs. Lamsard. I’m certain that this year’s pudding will be a resounding success.” A ragged cheer went up at this. “However, I do make one request. As you all know, everyone should stir the Christmas pudding so that all the household will have good fortune. We have a guest in this house who cannot come down to make her wishes. Therefore, if Mrs. Duke agrees, I ask that the pudding bowl be carried up to Mrs. Mallow’s bedside so that she might have her