Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Mungo watched the pretty governess throw back the drink. He then watched her gag, cough, and her cheeks turn a fiery shade of red.
“Gah,” she managed to stammer. “Wh-what’s that?”
The words came out as one as she shot him a wide-eyed look.
“Gin, treacle, and mutton fat,” he said, picking up the pickled whelk and swallowing it whole without shuddering. Beside him, Gray gagged on the same thing.
“That is awful,” he spluttered.
“And because you’re weak, you can’t stomach it,” Mungo taunted him.
Mavis, he noted, was on the move already.
“Come along, Miss Downing, Theo doesn’t like coming last.” He eased her around the table and into a run.
She held a hand to her mouth as if trying to stop the drink from making a reappearance.
“I did try to warn you.”
“Shut up.”
He’d not expected those two words to come out of the prim governess’s mouth, but then, he had heard her cussing before.
“Mungo, I had hoped, considering your size and stride, you’d be faster!” Cambridge Sinclair heckled from behind the table when they reached it. He held a sugar plum.
“Why are you eating that,” Mungo demanded, “or for that matter, here? You need to go to the second to last table and be ready when we reach it.”
“Do I?” Cambridge smiled and took a large bite. “A very kind woman handed this to me, as I clearly looked hungry.”
“When aren’t you!” Charles called.
“Mavis, you and your team cannot run while drinking and eating. The rules stand that you must not leave the table until you have finished.”
Theo was glaring at the woman, who in turn smiled back at him. In her hand was a mug of something.
“Take the food, Miss Downing. I’ll drink this time, and Theo can solve the riddle,” Mungo said.
“Dear God,” she whispered, looking at the plate. There was a gelatinous something on it that wobbled.
“There will be cake at the next table,” he added, picking up the mug. “If you don’t eat that, we have to forfeit.”
“What?” Theo spun back to face them. “That will not be happening.”
“Theo, listen now,” Mrs. Varney said. “By day I stand with face of stone. At night I fill the silent home. I feast on log and coal and spark. Seek here the heart that warms the dark.”
“Hello, Mungo.”
“Tabitha.” He nodded. The woman was a predator, but in a harmless way, or so others told him. She terrified Mungo, and not many people could lay claim to that.
“Mungo told me just yesterday how he thought you were the prettiest woman he knew, Tabitha,” Gray said.
Mungo reached for him, but he’d moved to the right, putting Bram, Leo, and Mavis between them.
“Oh, Mungo, I think you are the most handsome man in Crabbett Close too,” Tabitha cooed.
“Really?” Miss Downing said, looking at him.
She wrinkled her nose, and it absolutely did not make her look sweet.
“I can think of several far more handsome men.” She then opened her mouth and swallowed whatever hell was on that plate.
“But then, I’m sure he has a winning personality,” she added, looking like she wanted to throw up now.
“No, he doesn’t,” several Nightingales called out in unison.
“That’s a hard one, Mrs. Varney,” Theo said, still trying to work out the riddle.
But Mungo kept his eyes on the woman beside him. She swallowed several times, fighting to keep the food down. Miss Downing then pressed a gloved hand to her mouth and burped.
“Oh dear, excuse me.” She looked around, horrified, as if she’d committed an unpardonable sin.
“Burping is allowed,” Mungo said.
She gave him a tight smile before looking at Theo. “The answer is hearth.”
“Brilliant, Miss Downing. Now let us be off.”
Mungo threw back his drink, this one far better than the last would have been. The alcohol burned its way nicely down his throat.
Theo took Miss Downing’s hand, and Mungo refused to acknowledge how much he wanted to reach for the other one. What was wrong with him?
“I cry foul!” Ram roared as ahead of them, his wife, Flora, who was not in his team, stuck out her foot and sent him flying.
Theo hurdled the fallen Hellion, and the governess nimbly dodged him.
“Hurry it along, you lot,” Ivy said. She was tapping her foot.
“Mama says hurry up!” Lottie shrieked, her face sticky with sugar plum juice as she ran beside them.
“Please don’t make me eat anything that wobbles,” Eliza whispered as he stopped at her side.
Mungo studied the table as Mr. Peeky, who was manning it with his granddaughter, waved a hand over the contents. Cam stood there now, eating a biscuit.
“What’s that, Cambridge?” Ivy jabbed a finger at him.
“A superb ginger biscuit, Ivy. Tabitha Varney rushed into her house and came back with it for me.”
Ignoring the grinning idiot behind the table, Mungo said, “Theo, eat the jellied eel. Miss Downing, the macaroon, and Ivy do the riddle. I will drink.” He passed the plate to Eliza. She didn’t argue with him this time.
“I never was, am always to be. No man hath ever looked on me, yet all shall feel me, slow or fast. For I am coming—last of last. What am I?” Mr. Peeky asked.
“Bloody hell, that’s a hard one too,” Charles said.
“Exceedingly,” Cambridge agreed. “But as Sinclairs are a great deal smarter than Nightingales, it will come to me.”
Mungo braced Gray as he stumbled sideways.
“Stop that woman!” Alex roared pointing at Mavis, who was already on her way to the next table.
“It’s all very odd,” he heard Miss Downing say as she swiveled on one foot, looking around at the chaos.
Mungo righted her this time as she pitched forward. Clearly she wasn’t much of a drinker. She looked up at him, cheeks flushed, eyes a little dazed, and he could do nothing to look away.
“I’m not sure I’m going to get that riddle, Mr. Peeky,” Ivy said.
The words snapped him out of whatever spell this woman had cast over him, and he released her.
“The future,” she then said, turning away from him.
“Well. I’m pleased you are the governess, as clearly you are a great deal smarter than all of us,” Bram said.
Mungo did not like the look in his friend’s eyes as he studied first Miss Downing and then him.
“Amen!” the Nightingales roared.
“Devilishly clever, but logical, now that you’ve given us the answer, Miss Downing,” Cambridge said, smiling. “Lovely to meet you. Quite the job Charles told me you’ve taken on, taming this lot.”
Mungo threw back Mr. Peeky’s spiced rum, the best drink of the games, and then nudged his team on to the next, now with Cam keeping pace with them, still eating.
The winds swirled, and laughter rang out around Crabbett Close.
He might appear as if he thought this was a chore, but he understood the benefits of the games as much as the others.
Unity and a place to have fun, when beyond this street, there was often hardship.
Not here, however. The residents in this street looked out for one another, and the Pavlov fortune had helped with that, as it had helped many charities, from orphanages to the families of fallen soldiers.
“This is the last table, Miss Downing, and you are doing very well!” Anna cried. She was running beside them, holding Lottie’s hand.
Looking over his shoulder, Mungo noted Gray advancing. He gave Leo a look, and he stepped left as Mungo stepped right. The detective ran into them with a loud “Oomph.” Leo and Mungo ran on.
The Douglas table was a treat for the residents because it held the legendary treacle cake.
“I’m Mrs. Douglas, and this is Mr. Douglas. Welcome to our table.”
“This could be the last time we eat treacle cake,” Theo said, pouncing on the delicious treat at the same time as Cam.
“You can’t both eat it!” Mungo roared.
Cam crammed it into his mouth. Theo sighed and replaced his piece on the plate.
“I’ll leave the recipe with Bud,” Mrs. Douglas said.
“I don’t think Cam should come anymore. He’s not very good at teamwork,” Ivy said.
“Large family. I’ve had to learn to fight for every crumb,” Cam said with his mouth full.
“I’ve just today learned that you are leaving,” Mungo said to the Douglases as he reached for the mug, but Eliza beat him to it. “You’ll get a sore head,” he cautioned her.
“I don’t need your advice,” she snapped back.
“It’s the truth. I’ll miss you all, but we also miss our grandchildren,” Mr. Douglas said. “You’ll be comfortable in our home, Mungo.”
“Pardon?”
“It’s the perfect place for you. Your own home, but close to those you love.”
“I, ah, I don’t think—”
“Brilliant idea,” Bram said, clapping him on the back. “You don’t have to move in, but if you own it, you can when you’re ready.”
“You want me to move out?” It hurt him to think his friend did.
“You know better than that. I want you to always be close to us. You are part of this family, but I sometimes think you’d like your own place, Mungo.”
“God’s truth, purchasing my own house was one of the best days of my life,” Cambridge said. He held a wedge of treacle cake in each hand now. “And I love my family.”
“You’re all on the same street,” Charles mocked him. “And your brother-in-law purchased it.”
“My point is, independence is a wonderful thing,” Cam added.
Mungo turned to look at the Douglas house. Not huge, but two stories, and comfortable. This he knew, as he’d entered it many times. He’d never thought to have his own home, but here, in Crabbett Close? He had to admit the idea was tempting.
“Give it some thought,” Mr. Douglas said. “There is no hurry.”
“Winner is Mavis and her team!” Mr. Greedy declared.
Miss Downing burped again. “Oh dear, excuse me.”
“Quite all right,” Cam said, doing the same.
The games slowly wound down, though the noise hardly did. Mungo moved away from the governess, as he was far too aware of her. The tables were being cleared, but no one was quite ready to return indoors. Children raced about, full of sugar.
Ram declared that his wife had cheated. Flora, equally loudly, pretended innocence. Cambridge sampled leftovers with the dedication of a man fulfilling a sacred duty. Ivy and Bram tried—and failed—to herd the younger ones toward the house.
Mungo stood slightly apart, arms crossed, watching the chaos as he contemplated the thought of purchasing the Douglas house. His eyes, however, kept drifting to Miss Downing.
She stood with Tabitha and Mrs. Greedy, slightly away from any Nightingales, as if she knew it wasn’t her place to be any closer to those who employed her. Her bonnet was askew, her cheeks were a pleasant rosy hue… and she was swaying.
Mungo frowned.
She caught his eye over the heads of the children and offered a polite, ladylike smile that tried very hard to hide the fact that she had consumed several questionable drinks and was feeling the effects. She was also shivering.
He stalked toward her, unwinding his scarf.
Miss Downing froze. “What are you doing? Oh—I couldn’t possibly—”
“Go back to the house,” he said after he’d wound the long length of gray wool around her neck. The words came out gruff. “This is no—”
“Place for a governess. Of course, excuse me.”
She’d gone before he could stop her, misunderstanding what he’d been about to say.
“I like her,” Bram said, coming to where Mungo stood watching Miss Downing flee.
“But is she good at her job? That question is all that matters.”
“Fred, Matilda, and Anna like her, so perhaps you could be nicer.”
“I could, but it’s unlikely,” Mungo said. “About the Douglas house, Bram.”
His friend just smiled and said, “It is not my decision to make, my friend.” He then walked away to where his family all stood, now wrapped in blankets.
They were Mungo’s family too.
His eyes went back to the Douglas house. Could he purchase it? Live in it? He’d never wanted to own a property, and that was likely because in a small corner of his mind he’d thought he’d return to Scotland.
He thought about Fenella then. She was his kin, and he would miss her, while knowing also that his family were exactly where he’d left them and that he was not strong enough to take the first step toward fixing what had been broken between them all those years ago.