Marriage is Murder

Abbey had behaved herself, but she caught sight of a carrot in Robert's salad that she wanted.

"Papa! Me?" she asked.

"What do you want, Sweetheart?" he smiled at her.

"Mine!" she pointed to his salad.

"You don't eat salad," he frowned.

"Peeeeze, Papa?" she asked. He raised an eyebrow at her.

"Who taught her to say please at her age?" Robert frowned.

"Ah, well, Khaat and I have been working on please," Brian said. "We'll do thank you later. Dakota isn't into it. She thinks everything she wants is just automatically hers."

"That will pass," Robert laughed. He set his salad in front of Abbey who began picking out the carrots from it and eating them. That made him laugh.

"I'll get you another salad, Robert," Angus laughed.

"Perhaps you should get her some carrots," Robert suggested. Angus simply smiled and went back to the kitchen. He came back with a fresh salad for Robert and a little bowl of carrots for Abbey. "You all should be proud of all these little ones," he said. "They're going to grow up being completely surrounded by people who love them. Instead of one or two parents, they have a huge family of endless love around them all the time. That will teach them how to keep things in perspective when they go to Hogwarts and beyond that. I don't know of anything else I would want for any child."

Jack chuckled as Abby picked out the rest of the salad and ate just the carrots Jack knew just how she felt he'd not liked certain foods but he'd told nobody at that time. John sat quiet eating his dinner he wasn't keen on salad but ate it anyway picking at his plate while Steven and Cassidy fed the smaller ones in their high chairs. Jess fed the twins while Jack fed little Andrew who loved all of his salad and his drink. Soon he'd finished and banged his spoon for more. He'd heard Abby and smiled.

" more peeses" he said and held up his plate for more to Angus.

"Thank you for asking, Andrew," Angus said. "I'll get you more right now." He got up and refilled Andrew's pasta bowl and gave it back to him.

"NooNoo!" Dakota shouted, dumping over her empty pasta bowl.

"If you want noo noos," Angus said to her gently, picking up the pasta bowl, "You need to stop yelling."

"Mine!" she scowled at him. "Noo Noo!!"

"As I said, she just thinks its all hers. And right now, the noodles are hers too" Brian said.

"Work harder, Junior," Michael said, taking a sip from his glass of red wine.

"She'll get it. She has a much wider stubborn streak than Abbey does," Robert said, watching Angus get more "noo noos" for Dakota. He gave Dakota the plate, and she began eating them eagerly with her fingers. Brian shook his head silently.

"Leave it alone. She's feeding herself. It could be worse," Kate said. "There could be tomato sauce on those. Then we'd have to take her down to the beach and toss her in to rinse her off."

"Abbey, do you want more noo noos too?" Robert asked.

"No," Abbey said proudly, always glad to be able to say no. She pointed to Robert's garlic bread.

"More bread?" he asked. She nodded. He took a piece of garlic toast and gave it to her. She liked the butter and the salt. Not so much the garlic, but it was mild enough that she liked holding the large piece of toast in her litle hand and gnawing on it.

Jack chuckled and Jess smiled as Andrew ate more pasta " well that's one he likes " she said and smiled she looked at Dakota and chuckled " yes be pleased its clean" cassidy looked at Jaylen and smiled as he took her food from the spoon when Cassidy was slow she would grab her hand and make her give her more. Steven fed James who was a bit more fussy he'd only eat it if Steven held the spoon and put it in his mouth.

" James you better learn to follow your sister and learn not to be so lazy" he said softly to him but all James did was open his mouth wide and make " ah ah!" noises.

When dinner was finished, Angus cleared the table with Kate's help. He cut the very large pies and served it, including little slivers for each of the kids. He served it with pots of fresh tea and fresh coffee.

"This is excellent," Robert told Angus. "It is entirely different with the fresh Italian lemons."

"Our family has always liked it," Angus smiled. "We don't get lemons this fresh and sweet back in England."

"What a lovely treat," Kate said, deciding on coffee with her pie. "You always know exactly the perfect pairiings. I don't know what we did before we had you."

"You cooked for us, Kate. Well, and I tried to," Brian laughed.

"You are a very good cook," Khaat defended him.

"There are many many people here that classify as good cooks, my darling," Brian laughed. "Miine is just usually edible." She rolled her eyes at Brian and shook her head.

"So what are you all planning on doing this evening?" Robert asked, feeding a bite of pie to Abbey.

Jack sat back with a coffee as little Andrew at his piece with his fingers smiling as she flt it all around his face. Jack shook his head and sighed . Jess fed Catlin her piece and she wanted more. Cassidy fed Jaylen and glanced at James who reached out to pull Stevens hand to him " hay honey, James wants food" she said and Steven chuckled as he fed James till he'd had enough and picked up his cup Steven picked up his own plate and James's and walked to the kitchen picking up Cassidys on his way past.

" good meal Angus " he said and smiled " the chef does it again" he said smiling.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it. But if you have nothing planned tonight," Angus said. "My grandfather sent a gift for you, Robert, one I think we all would enjoy."

"A gift? For me?" Robert frowned. "His friendship is already priceless."

"I'll get it." Angus went upstairs to his room and he brought back a very large wooden suitcase. He handed it to Robert. Robert simply frowned. Angus laid the case on the floor beside Robert. The wood was beautiful well varnished oak that had aged to a lovely color over the years. The fittings on the case were all of fine brass. The handle was handcarved wood. Robert leaned down and gently opened the suitcase. Inside was a collection of antique wood and brass telescopes and tripods. There were extra lenses, cleaning cloths--the entire kit to take care of them, all in a specially designed case."

"This belonged to a mariner," Robert frowned.

"Yes," Angus said. "My grandfather bought it in an antique shop in Venice on his honeymoon with my grandmother. He used it often. He feels it is time to pass it on to other family members, and he chooses you. Oh, and these two..." he pointed to the smallest ones. "Those are antique Venitian kalaidescopes. He thought we might enjoy them. And, by the looks of the sky, the view tonight from the terrace should be almost unlimited. It might be fun to get them all out and spend the evening looking at the stars . There is supposed to be a meteor shower tonight. It should be beautiful."

"What do you think?" Robert looked at them all. "We could put a fire in the firepit if it gets chilly. It might be fun."

Steven smiled as he moved to inspect them " these are beautiful " he said picking up a telescope and kaleidoscope handing it to Cassidy who placed it against Jaylen's eye who giggled seeing the colors moving in front of her eyes. "well Jaylen sure likes it " Steven said smiling.

" as I do the idea of the fire pit " Jess said and smiled at Jack who picked up an telescope and set it on a tripod facing he open window.

" wow this has good range " he said and smiled at Angus " your grandfather knew good equipment " he said smiling at him as he looked threw it.

Angus set up the other tripods and telescopes and set several up outside on the terrace while Brian let the firepit. He went over and looked out one of them. "Wow. That is amazing," He said, stunned by the beauty of what he was seeing. "You're right, Steven. And you know what? This is so peaceful. I'm not sure why we didn't try out a telescope years ago."

"Well, we did," Robert laughed. "But you and Khaat were immensely bored."

"I don't remember that," Khaat said, getting up.

"Me neither," Brian said.

"You were almost nine. You both were bored stiff," Robert told them.

"Well, we're not now," Khaat said, looking through one of the smaller ones. She went over and picked up Abbey and took her to the telescope Brian was at. She held Abbey and Brian adjusted it for her and coached her to look. Abbey made a small "ooooh" as she looked through it.

"Stars" Brian told her. She looked at him, curious. Khaat pointed up to the stars above them.

"Stars," she told Abbey. Abbey looked through the telescope again, as Robert came out to join them all.

"Mine!" she said, delighted with seeing them. Robert smiled and stroked Abbey's hair.

"If I could give you one, I would," he said lovingly to her, kissing the top of Abbey's head.

Jack chuckled and helped Andrew down from his chair and watch him run out side to stand with Steven who lifted him up to look threw his scope he too made and "oow" sound and giggled at the things he saw. " that's the moon " Steven said and Andrew looked at him " momo?" he asked and Steven looked at Jack.

" that's his way of saying moon" Jack said and walked out to stand with the Jess still sat with Catlin and her kaleidoscope picking her up she carried her outside to look at the stars above but Catlin was more interested in the Kaleidoscope than the stars.