Simply Unforgettable by Mary Balogh Page B

you would have put the snow to?” he asked her. “It was hardly worth longing for, was it?”
    â€œWell, you see,” she said, setting one elbow on the table and resting her chin in her hand, against all the rules of etiquette, “my great-aunts would not have enjoyed engaging in a snowball fight and one can hardly fight with oneself. I probably would have built a snowman. When it snowed two winters ago, Miss Martin canceled afternoon classes and we took the girls out into the meadows beyond the school and had a snowman-building contest. It was great fun.”
    â€œDid you win?” he asked.
    â€œI ought to have,” she said, picking up her knife and fork again. “My snowman was far and away the best. But the teachers were declared ineligible for prizes. It was grossly unfair. I almost resigned on the spot. But when I threatened to do so, I was rolled in the snow by a dozen or more girls, and Miss Martin studiously looked the other way and made no attempt to exert her authority and come to my rescue.”
    It sounded, he thought, like a happy school. He could not somehow imagine rolling any of his own former teachers in the snow, especially with the headmaster looking on.
    Miss Frances Allard was certainly not the bad-tempered, prunish woman he had taken her for yesterday. And he must admit that if their positions had been reversed, he would have been in an even more cantankerous mood than he had been anyway and would have been entertaining gruesome dreams of boiling someone in oil too. Not that either he or Peters would tolerate someone’s overtaking them on any road under any circumstances, of course.
    â€œTeachers are not ineligible for this morning’s prizes,” he said.
    â€œOh?” She looked at him with raised eyebrows.
    â€œOut beside the inn,” he said, pointing in the direction of the side facing away from the village. “As soon as I have helped you do the dishes. One problem, though. Do you have proper boots?”
    â€œYes, of course I do,” she said. “Would I have longed for snow for Christmas if I did not? Am I being challenged to a snowman-building contest? You will lose.”
    â€œWe will see,” he said. “What did you put in these potatoes to make them so delicious?”
    â€œMy own secret combination of herbs,” she said.
    He finished his meal and gathered the dishes together to wash while she set about mixing a fresh batch of bread—it could rise while she was outside winning the competition, she told him.
    Fresh bread! His mouth watered even though his stomach was full.
    He even—horror of horrors!—
dried
the dishes.
    If it had not snowed, he would now be on the final leg of his journey. He could have been home by this afternoon—to the quiet, familiar peace of Cleve Abbey and the prospect of an early return to London and its myriad pleasures—though only until the Season began, by Jove. But here he was instead, planning to alleviate the boredom of a useless day by building a snowman.
    Except that he was no longer bored—had not been since he rose from his bed actually.
    He tried to remember the last time he had built a snowman or otherwise frolicked in the snow, and failed.

4

    He was making the mistake, Frances noticed with a furtive glance in his direction, of building his snowman too tall and thin—an error often made by novices. It looked much larger than hers, but he was going to have problems with the head. Even if he could lift a suitable one that high, it would not remain in place but would roll off and ruin all his efforts. She would be the undisputed winner.
    Her snowman, on the other hand, was solid and squat. He was broader than he was tall. He was—
    â€œToo fat to pass through any door,” Mr. Marshall commented, diverted from his own efforts for a moment, “even if he were to turn sideways. Too fat to find a bed wide enough or sturdy enough to sleep on. Too fat