Wedding of the Season

by Guhrke, Laura Lee

  “Beatrix!”

  She looked down to find Julia standing on the terrace below, with a coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other, Spike at her feet.

  “Morning, Julie!” she called back with a wave.

  “Barely,” her cousin replied, laughing.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s not morning for much longer, darling. It’s nearly eleven.”

  “As late as that? Heavens, I quite overslept, didn’t I? I’ll come down straightaway.”

  “No need to hurry. Most everyone’s gone with Sir George and Lady D. on the boat. They’re sailing up to Teignmouth, having luncheon at the Red Bull, and then sailing back down. I thought I’d race up in the Mercedes, and join them for luncheon. Want to come along?”

  She hesitated, not really in a frame of mind to see Will today. “Where’s Aidan this morning?”

  “Heavens, I don’t know. What am I, his nanny?” At Beatrix’s reproving look, she sighed and made a face. “He’s on the gazebo with Paul. They’re playing chess. Can you believe it? Chess, on such a glorious day?”

  “That’s not really all that surprising, is it? They both have a passion for the game, and they are both very good.”

  “Too good. They’ll be at it all day, I expect. Perhaps even all week, and they’ll be forced to declare a draw. Come with me to Teignmouth, do. We’ll find some pretty little cove on the way back and have a bathe, all by ourselves. It will be quite like days in Cornwall last summer, remember? Such fun we had.” Suddenly her pixy face twisted and she looked away. “God, that seems like a lifetime ago,” she murmured as if to herself, and took a pull on her cigarette.

  Beatrix frowned, concerned by the sudden hint of melancholy in her cousin’s voice. She was a little worried about Julia, who seemed a bit thinner, a bit wilder, and a bit more unhappy each time they met. “D’you know,” she said after a moment, “I believe I will come with you to Teignmouth.”

  “Darling Trix! I’ll see to the car. Have a spot of breakfast and join me in the drive. And don’t forget your bathing dress,” she added as Beatrix pulled back from the window.

  “I won’t,” she called back, and gave a tug to the bellpull, summoning Lily to help her dress. Twenty minutes later, in a blue skirt and striped shirtwaist, with a white straw boater on her head, her putty-colored motoring coat thrown over one arm, and a canvas bathing bag in her other hand, she went downstairs. She handed over her motoring coat to the footman, along with the bag, which contained her goggles and scarf, her sketchbook and pencils, a towel, and her bathing attire. She instructed him to take her things out to the Mercedes, and she went into the morning room.

  Breakfast at Pixy Cove was always an informal meal. From eight o’clock until eleven, dishes of eggs, bacon, and kidneys were kept warm on the long mahogany sideboard in the morning room, and replenished as necessary, enabling guests to partake of their morning meal whenever they chose, but because she had slept so late, Beatrix found the kitchen maids clearing away the dishes as she entered the morning room. They offered to bring her a fresh, hot breakfast, but she knew she didn’t have time and settled for toast with jam and a quick cup of tea, then she went out to the gazebo to let Aidan know of her plans for the day. To her surprise, she found that although her fiancé was seated at the tea table with the chess game spread out before him, Paul was nowhere in sight. Absorbed in studying the board, Aidan did not notice her approach until she came up the steps.

  When he saw her, he smiled. “Good morning. We began to think you intended to sleep the day away.”

  For some reason, that smile seemed more open than usual, not in keeping with Aidan’s usual reserve. It made her strangely uncomfortable. “Where’s Paul?” she asked, feeling in need of something to say.

  “Having a stretch and, I expect, thinking out his next move. I rather have him pinned at the moment.”

  “You do?”

  The question caused Aidan to raise an eyebrow. “You needn’t sound so surprised, my darling,” he said, an almost teasing gleam in his hazel eyes that caught her by surprise. Aidan didn’t tease. It wasn’t like him. An image of the look in his eyes after their kiss last night came into her mind, and instead of fading away, that little ripple of uneasiness inside her grew stronger. She pushed it aside, reminding herself again that any doubts at this point were just cold feet, trying to hang on to her lightened mood.

  “Sorry,” she said, “but you and Paul usually need an entire day, at least, for one of your chess games.”

  “Your cousin is only pinned, not checkmated. He has several means of escape.” He took up her hand and pressed a kiss to her gloved fingers. “Why? Did you wish to commandeer me for some other plan today?”

  She restrained a silly impulse to pull her hand from his. “Actually, when Julie told me you were playing chess with Paul today, I decided to go to Teignmouth with her in the Mercedes.”

  He made a face. “Must you?”

  “Why do you care?” she asked lightly. “You’ll be here all day, hovering over that chessboard.”

  “I care because I care for you, and Baroness Yardley operates a motorcar with no regard for either decorum or safety.”

  “That’s not true! She’s an excellent automobilist.”

  “Excellent?” He looked skeptical. “She drives as if the devil is after her, and she encourages you to do the same. I realize she is your family, Beatrix, but that woman is a bad influence on you in every way.”

  Beatrix felt her good mood evaporating. “Bad influence? You talk as if I’ve no mind of my own.”

  “Remember Carnarvon’s crash two years ago in Germany?” Aidan asked, ignoring her comment, his mind obviously on a different track. “He nearly died because of the reckless speeds at which he drove. Thirty, forty miles an hour. The baroness drives the same way, and on these rutted roads.” His voice, much to Beatrix’s surprise, was becoming rather testy. “I fear for you every moment you are in an automobile with her. Promise me you will keep her to a more sedate rate of speed?”

  She felt a sudden flash of rebellion, and the knowledge that Aidan was only speaking out of concern for her safety did not quite quell it. Still, she did not want to ruin what looked to be a lovely day. “Darling, let’s not quarrel.”

  “Promise me, Beatrix.”

  She sighed, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “All right, all right, I promise not to let her drive too fast.” Before he could say anything more about Julia or motorcars, or anything else that might mar her good mood, she squeezed his hands and pulled away. “We’ll be having a bathe this afternoon at one of the coves along the way back. So expect our return about teatime.”

  “Don’t go too far out when you swim,” he cautioned as she turned and went down the steps. “There’s some strong undertows past the shallows, you know.”

  For heaven’s sake, you sound like my father. Stop smothering me.

  The irritable reply hovered on the tip of her tongue, but she didn’t say it. Instead, she merely waved a hand in acknowledgment as she walked away.

  The Mercedes was in the drive, its engine on. Julia was at the wheel when she came around the side of the house, and Spike was sitting behind the seats. Beatrix walked to the left side of the vehicle where her goggles and scarf were waiting for her on the passenger seat and her motoring coat was slung over the back. She had to take off her hat to don her goggles, but once those were securely in place and her boater once again secured by her hatpin, she wrapped her chiffon motoring scarf around the hat and tied its ends beneath her chin, then she slipped into the long, lightweight poplin duster and buttoned it.

  She stepped up onto the running board, then into the vehicle, giving Spike a pat on the head and settling herself on the seat beside her cousin. “Aidan made me promise I wouldn’t let you drive too fast,” she told Julia over the noise of the engine.

  “Oh, he did, did he?” Julia released the brake lever and started forward. “Forty miles an hour it is.”

&nb
sp; “Julia!”

  “Oh, all right. I shall try to be good today, but only for your sake.”

  They motored up to Teignmouth at a speed even Aidan might have approved, making it just past one o’clock when they joined the yachting party at the Red Bull Inn for luncheon. Will, however, was not among the party gathered in the main dining room of the inn.

  “How now, where’s Sunderland?” Julia asked, looking around the dining room. “In the tavern, perhaps?”

  “Sunderland didn’t come with us, Baroness,” Sir George informed her as he pulled out a chair for her at the long dining table.

  “He intended to,” Marlowe added, doing the same for Beatrix, “for he wanted to send a cable to Thebes. But at the last minute, he decided to stay behind. Writing some paper for the Archaeological Society, he said. He asked me to send his telegram for him.”

  Beatrix couldn’t help being relieved at that news, and she quite enjoyed their ploughman’s lunch of pork pie, pickled vegetables, bread, and cheese, though she did have to remonstrate with Julia about drinking ale with the meal since she was driving the motorcar, and ale tended to hamper one’s ability in that regard.

  “I’m perfectly able to handle one glass of ale,” Julia countered, sounding a bit irritated. “Don’t fuss, Trix.”

  Beatrix let the matter drop, and though Julia did drink her glass of ale, she didn’t order a second one. Beatrix was glad of it, for she was enjoying her day, and she didn’t want to quarrel with Julia any more than she’d wanted to quarrel with Aidan.

  They parted company with the yachting party around two o’clock and started back along the road toward Pixy Cove. It was a lovely drive, even though she had to remind Julia several times to slow down on the way back. When they were less than a mile from the house, Julia pulled the motorcar to the grassy spot on the side of the road that overlooked the cliffs, patches of beach, and inlets below. “Where should we swim?”

  “Phoebe’s Cove?” Beatrix suggested, pointing to a spot just ahead. “It’s right down there.”

  “We always swim at Phoebe’s Cove. What about Pelican Point?” Julia suggested, twisting in her seat to point behind her.

  “Very well, but if we bathe at Pelican Point, we can’t go out very far. The waves are strong there, and I promised Aidan—”

  “That tears it!” Julia cried. She yanked back the brake lever and turned in the seat to face Beatrix. “What on earth is wrong with you?”

  Beatrix stared at her cousin, stunned by this unexpected attack. “Wrong with me?”

  “ ‘Don’t drive too fast, Julie,’ ” she mocked. “ ‘Don’t drink too much, Julie.’ ‘We can’t swim out too far. I promised Aidan.’ ” She paused and pressed her lips together with a sound of derision, then she went on, “Honestly, you’re starting to sound just like your father!”

  Beatrix shook her head, taken aback, not only by her cousin’s tirade, but also by the fact that Julia’s words were similar to her own thoughts that morning and compelled her to argue the point. “You ask what’s wrong with me, but this . . . this sudden, unprovoked attack upon me and my fiancé and my father, too, compels me to ask what’s wrong with you!”

  “Unprovoked? I think the past few days have given me plenty of provocation. I hadn’t intended to come to Pixy Cove this year. Do you want to know why?” She didn’t allow Beatrix time to hazard a guess. “Because Trathen was coming, that’s why.”

  Beatrix was baffled. “But why should Aidan’s presence bother you? You know him. You introduced me to him last year. Good grief,” she cried, struck by a sudden thought. “You’re not . . . jealous, are you?”

  “God, no!” Julia stared back at her, appalled, clearly thinking she was off her onion for suggesting such a thing. “I hardly know the man. I’ve only seen him twice before in my life. And besides, I’m married, remember?”

  “That doesn’t seem to stop you from having affairs.” Beatrix tried to say it without letting her disapproval of Julia’s goings-on creep into her voice, but of course she didn’t succeed.

  “When you’ve been married a decade, you’ll have earned the right to lecture others about their dismal marriages,” Julia muttered. “Until then, I’d appreciate it if you’d keep mum on the topic.”

  “I know you’re unhappy with Yardley—”

  “Unhappy?” Julia gave a shout of laughter, but it was clear she wasn’t amused. “Yes, you could say that.”

  “I’m sorry, Julia, that you’re unhappy, but it’s unfair to take out any anger you might feel about it on me. I’ve done nothing to deserve it.”

  “No? Then stop lecturing me about how I drive, what I drink, and where I swim! And stop being such a killjoy. Damn it, Trix, I didn’t drag you off to Cornwall and teach you to drive a motorcar and do the can-can and blow smoke rings and swim in the nude so that you could become this dull matronly sort who disapproves of everything and everyone!”

  “That’s unfair!” Beatrix felt her own temper flaring. “The only thing I’m disapproving of is what you’ve become! Being saucy and provoking and playing music people hate—”

  “You mean Aidan hates it!”

  “Yes, that’s precisely what I mean! You’ve been rude to him ever since you arrived, abominably rude.”

  “Why shouldn’t I be rude? I feel him judging me every moment I’ve been here with a disapproving eye, and I don’t like it!”

  “How can you blame him for disapproving? Or me for worrying? Look at you. Dark circles under your eyes, thin as a rail, smoking too much, drinking too much. And let’s not even talk about the shenanigans you’ve engaged in! Honestly, Julie! Doing the fandango at Maxim’s? Auntie Eugenia nearly fainted when she heard about that. What were you thinking of, disgracing the family that way?”

  “There you go again. God forbid I should disgrace the family. What’s happened to you, Trix? Do I have to drag you off to Cornwall again to put some sense back in your head?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m talking about you. It all started when Will went away to Egypt, and you didn’t go with him. In fact, you never went anywhere. You never did anything. It was as if his leaving had sucked all the joy of life out of you. Your father approved of the change, I daresay, for it kept you right under his thumb where he could cosset you and protect you and keep you from leaving him. And you just let it happen . . . let your soul wither away, while you did good works and needlepoint like a dutiful daughter. You were a tragedy in the making.”

  Beatrix was unable to believe what she was hearing. “I was a tragedy? That’s what you’re saying?”

  “You were becoming one. When your father died, I thought surely you would come out of the . . . the cocoon he’d spent most of your life wrapping you in, but no. When I arrived in Devonshire, I found you draped in black crepe, and everything worse than ever. You were like some sort of cross between Queen Victoria and a Catholic nun.”

  “My father had just died!”

  “When you said you weren’t going to Pixy Cove with the rest of us last year, I knew something had to be done. I kidnapped you, if you remember, in the Daimler and took you to Cornwall. I knew I was no replacement for Will and my little cottage at Gwithian isn’t Pixy Cove, but I had to do something. And we had a jolly time, too, didn’t we? It was so merry, just like the old days here, and you started to be happy again. When you and I went to the St. Ives Ball and I introduced you to Trathen, I could see he admired you, and I saw that you liked him, and I thought you’d finally started to get on with life. I thought you’d begun to think of the future, not the past.”

  “So I was! And I am! I became engaged, didn’t I? If that’s not thinking of the future, I don’t know what would be!”

  “I was glad when you became engaged to Trathen. When you wrote to me at Biarritz last Christmas and told me the news, I was happy for you, for both of you. But then, in your next letter, you said you and Trathen were touring your estates for your honeymoon, and I couldn’t believe i
t. You, who pores over Baedekers and longs to see Florence, going on an estate tour? How ghastly!”

  Beatrix drew a deep breath and tried to get hold of her temper long enough to explain. “I wanted to go to Florence, but we can’t. You see, Aidan is sitting in the House of Lords, and—”

  “Not that his inclination to tootle around his own properties and call it a honeymoon surprises me,” Julia went on as if Beatrix hadn’t spoken. “After being in that man’s company for the past three days, I don’t believe there’s a romantic bone in that man’s body.”

  “You have no right to criticize my fiancé in this manner. You’re only doing it because he disapproves of your conduct. And I can’t say he’s unjustified. You’ve become fodder for scandal sheets all over Europe!”

  Julia, obviously on a tear, continued to ignore her. “And to think I defended your engagement to Will just the other day, when I’m beginning to think it’s the biggest mistake you’ve ever made—”

  “What? You talked about Aidan and me with Will?” Beatrix was becoming more outraged with every moment.

  “I did! On the very afternoon I arrived, he tackled me on the subject. He asked me if you were in love with Trathen.”

  “He did?” She was stunned that Will would even ask such a question, and she badly wanted to know what Julia had replied. She shouldn’t ask, she knew. Instead, she should dress Julia down for displaying such a lack of discretion and gossiping with Will about her, but her curiosity proved stronger than her outrage. “What did you tell him? I hope you assured him I was very happy.”

  “Ah, but that’s not what he asked me.” Julia shot her a triumphant glance that made her feel suddenly uncomfortable. “He asked me if you were in love with Trathen. I said I didn’t know.”

  “What?” Beatrix groaned.

  “Well, it isn’t as if you and Aidan go about cooing like doves and sneaking off for passionate kisses in the garden every night!”

  “I am making a sensible marriage. I am marrying a good man.”

  “I’m not disputing that. But you don’t really want to marry him.” Something sparked in Julia’s eyes, something cold and dark that made Beatrix shiver, despite the bright sunshine. “I married Yardley because my parents assured me it was the right thing to do. I knew it wasn’t, and I did it anyway. Don’t make my mistake. Listen to your heart, Trix, not your head.” She stopped and took a deep breath. “When you wrote and told me you were engaged, I thought you’d gotten over Will. But you haven’t.”