"Christie,!' commented Beau at one point, "I swear, if any of us in Virginia had had the slightest inkling you were ready to embark on marriage, we'd have camped on Windreach's doorstep, day and night, hoping to gain first chance with you. Instead you fooled us all, making us believe you wanted nothing of men. And what happened? An unsuspected South Carolinian swept you away, first chance he got. No offense, sir," he offered to Garrett. "I'd be the last to criticize a quick and active man when I see one. You saw your opportunity and you took it. Ah, but what a prize you gained! Whence come another like her?"
At this he gazed dreamily at Christie and heard his wife's request that he refill her wineglass only when he repeated it for the third time. At this Garrett privately wondered why, if Philip disapproved of Beau's drinking, he allowed his son-in-law to pour the wine, rather than entrust that responsibility to the butler or discharge it himself. But Philip, he noticed, took no wine for himself at all, choosing to sip casually from a goblet of water instead.
"Tell me, Garrett," said Philip, "what is the primary crop or crops you plant at your plantation these days? Rice? Indigo?"
"We've always been heavily into tobacco, sir, but rice is beginning to come on strong, especially since we acquired some additional tidewater lands. Indigo is only minor, my father having cut back its planting severely with the advent of the trouble beginning to brew with the crown shortly before his death. We also cultivate lumber, having three mills on additional property in the upcountry. Of course, if you ask me where my heart lies among the plantations' businesses, I'd have to tell you, in horses. The development and breeding of quality thoroughbreds has always interested me greatly."
"Aha!" said Margaret. "Now I begin to see a clue as to your fascination for my niece. Christie and her horses! They're inseparable!"
"Ah, forgive me, Aunt Margaret," said Christie, "but I'm afraid I must insist on a correction. It is true, horses have always held a fascination for me, but I must reject the notion that that was the route my husband took to my heart." She looked directly at Garrett, the turquoise eyes more deeply blue now. "He, and only he, is the chief fascination of my life, and were I never to see a horse again, as long as I had him, I'd be content."
Garrett returned her gaze with one totally and fiercely loving, a look meant for her alone, and Christie knew it. They remained thus for several moments, amid the growing silence, oblivious to those around them.
Suddenly a nervous giggle shattered the air. "Why, Christie, I declare," said Melissa. "How you do run on. You'd best take care tomorrow night at the ball. If the men hear you sighing over your own husband like that, none of them will dare or care to ask you to dance!"
"But Melissa," retorted Christie, "why should I wish to dance with anyone but Garrett?"
"Lord!" exclaimed Belinda. "Because it's unheard of, that's why. Husbands and wives don't spend exclusive time together at parties. Everybody knows that. Besides, what are you going to do when he's busy dancing with the other ladies?"
"I hate to disappoint you, Belinda," said Garrett, but I am looking forward to dancing every dance with my wife. And talking with her, too. Whether it is is unheard of or well-practiced has nothing to do with it. It's what we desire that matters. And we desire spend the time with each other."
"But you do that every day!" said Melissa.
"And the days are not long enough," answered Garrett, smiling again at Christie.
Beau interjected a loud guffaw. He was well in his cups by now. "Nor the nights, either, I'll warrant!"
Garrett gave him a patient smile and then bent his gaze warmly on Christie. "Yes, Beau, that's also true. Neither are the nights."
Christie flushed only slightly as she returned her husband's look.
"Damn it!" shouted Beau. "Do you mean to tell me I'll not get a s-s-shingle dansh with Christie?"
'Calm yourself, man," said Garrett with a wink in his wife's direction. "I think we'll make an exception two for family."
"Certainly!" said Christie, clapping her hands together in enjoyment. "I'll reserve a few dances for Uncle Philip and you, and Garrett will surely dance with Aunt Margaret and the girls."
The conversation drifted along in this manner for anther hour or more, and it was with relief Christie greeted the butler's news that Lula requested her presence upstairs to feed Adam. Beau was, by this time, threatening to slide under the dining table and she felt awkward and embarrassed by it. Seeing this, Garrett offered to help Beau upstairs to his own apartments, explaining it was on the way to his and Christie's quarters and he would be joining his wife anyway. So, with thanks to their hosts for the dinner, the Randalls, with young Richardson in tow, left the dining room.
When Garrett finally joined Christie, she was nursing their son in a comfortable chair by the windows.
"Did you ever see anyone grow so tipsy on wine?" asked Christie, after Garrett informed her he had left Beau quietly sleeping it off on his bed.
"I'm afraid it wasn't merely the wine," said Garrett. "Beau was already well on his way before dinner. I met him en route to your uncle's study. If his marriage to your cousin is so unbearable for him this early on, why the devil, I wonder, did he wed the girl? I'll avow, she's hardly the loving wife— unhappy as well, clearly—and she's worse than she was before, as I remember vaguely, from having met her at your ball."
"Oh!" exclaimed Christie, gently removing her sleeping son from her breast. "You don't know! I guess I forgot to tell you."
"Tell me, what, love?" asked Garrett, as he took the babe from her and carried him toward the nursery door.
"Why, that Uncle Philip forced the marriage once he discovered Melissa was carrying Beau's child. At least, I hope it's Beau's child," she added in a lower voice.
At the nursery door, Lula met Garrett and took the child from him, closing the door behind her after a brief exchange of good nights.
Garrett returned to Christie, pulling her out of the chair, only to sit there himself and draw her onto his lap.
"Now," he said, kissing the pulse spot at her temple, "you may continue with your conversation, madam, in a posture more to my liking.".
Dimpling, Christie snuggled in close to his chest, sighing with the pleasure his strong, warm arms always imparted when they closed around her. "If you continue thus, my lord, there will be little conversation, though perhaps much silent communication."
"Exactly what I'm about,"—smiled Garrett—"but first, you cannot leave me hanging. You say Melissa's pregnancy preceded the marriage and the child may not even be Beau's?"
"Yes, at least I'm sure of the pregnancy; and the child could be Beau's."
Then she narrated the events of the morning before she ran away from Stanhope Manor, following it with an account of her moments in the stable back at Windreach, when she had overheard Beau and Melissa's exchanges. Toward the end of that tale, she began to smile: her smile widened into a grin and became a chuckle.
"And I think you might find it interesting to hear what words I overheard my cousin use to bring Beau back to her eager little arms," said Christie, grinning impishly by now.
"I daresay I would," chuckled Garrett. "Anything which brings such mischief to your eyes is bound to arouse my curiosity."
''She called after him," said Christie as she placed her forefinger lightly in the cleft on Garrett's chin, '"Who says I'm a virgin?'"
Only a second passed before she caught the light in Garrett's eyes and began to feel the rumble of laughter deep in his chest. Then he laughed aloud, alternately hugging her close and pressing warm kisses to her lips.
"Ah, little one. Someday I shall have to find a way of thanking your silly little cousin for what she unwittingly tripped off!"
Christie was laughing, too, but soon her laughs dwindled to a smile, and then to a serious expression which Garrett immediately matched as he took her face in his hands.
"Have you painful memories of that time, Christie?" he asked, his voice low. "Or perhaps, regrets?"
Christie
's eyes deepened and became two limpid, midnight pools. Then she closed them for a moment, thinking back to that day on the Marianne. When her eyes opened again, Garrett felt his senses stunned by the measure of love he read in their depths.
"At the time, I thought I would die," she answered him. "But now I know, without it I probably would have lost you. How strangely fortune bends us to her ends! No, my darling, not even a shadow regret. Indeed, I would eagerly do it all over again, should some unkind fate tell me I must, to once again gain you. Garrett, the way I love you, there's no room for regrets!"
"Good enough, then," said Garrett. "No regrets. And plenty of silent communication?" he asked softly, lifting the hair he had been loosening from its pins and placing a kiss at the nape where the hair stopped and the creamy neck began.
His answer was slender fingers working to open his shirt.
Christie stood before the large, gilt-framed mirror in the room Lula and her son were using and waited with an outward measure of calm as Lula finished securing the fasteners at the back of her gown. She resisted the urge to squirm, as she once would have with Almeira, if the dressing process were proceeding at a crawl and her eagerness to be done was sprinting far ahead. She had elected to dress in this chamber, allowing Garrett their own, because she wanted him to see her only when he could behold the finished product, and now, as her eyes traveled over the image he would soon behold, she giggled gleefully.
"You better have more than giggles ready when your man sees you in this," warned Lula as she secured the final hook. "Hmmph," she uttered, stepping back to catch the same view Christie was afforded by the mirror. "That Frenchwoman must be some kind of witch for sure! And we thought those New York gowns ah bought you were daring! This one's purely scandalous!"
"But Lu," said Christie as she continued to eye herself in the looking glass, "I told you why I had her make this. A woman needs all the weaponry at her disposal under such circumstances."
"Ah know, ah know," muttered Lula, "but you've got to remember, you're a respectable married lady now, and a mother. How's it going to look with all the men gaping at you?"
"As long as my husband's first among them." Christie laughed. "Here, help me fasten the clasp of the necklace. Perhaps it will serve to cover enough of what seems to be worrying you."
Once the Randall necklace was in place, and the bracelet, the two women reappraised Christie's image in the mirror and Lula let out an approving "Mmmm."
"Better?" asked Christie.
"Well, one has to admire, the weight of all those emeralds and diamonds does have a way of making even a neckline like that look respectable."
Christie nodded, knowing what she meant, and she smiled back at the image the glass presented them. The gown was concocted from endless yards of the sheerest emerald-green silk used in multiple layers over a base underfabric which was in a deeper shade of green. The effect of the two shades used together was to produce an impression of color so rich as to lose the eye in its depths. The only place where the emerald material was used in a single layer was at the sleeves, which were sheer and puffed, reaching and billowing fully, midway between shoulder and elbow. The bodice was cut so as to be tightly fitting, moderately high in the back, but scooping so low in front, as to just miss revealing the rosy crests of her nipples. After hugging her minuscule waist, the rich yardage flowed narrowly over Christie's slender hips and stomach, clinging sensuously to her curving proportions before giving way, in a gesture of graceful freedom, to a floor-length skirt that swirled and swished lightly as she moved. The foremost impression was one of sleek simplicity which provided an effective backdrop for the splendor of the jewels she wore. The wide expanse of necklace hung low enough to cover her chest, as well as her throat, ending just above the point where the swell of her breasts began; and against the apricot cream of her skin, the emeralds' colors were perfect. She wore her hair pulled sharply away from her face to the crown of her head, where its abundant mass was tied into a large, graceful knot before it continued down her back in a long, silkily curling imitation of a horse's tail. In her ears she wore a simple pair of emeralds which were among the clothing and other adornments Charles had brought to Riverlea when he had visited.
Laughing and obviously well pleased with herself, Christie did a pirouette before Lula, revealing delicate emerald satin slippers on her feet.
"Well?" she said, twisting her braceleted wrist this way and that before a many-candled sconce to catch die light. "Am I ready to meet my husband?"
"You're ready," answered Lula. "Ah just wonder if he is!"
"We'll soon find out." Christie smiled, and Lula noticed how the depth of her dimples reflected the fun she was having in all this. "Coming?"
"No," came the reply. "Ah figure ah'll be hearing mah share of it right in here. Ah just hope he doesn't wake the young-un when he bellows. It took us long enough to put him down." She glanced briefly at Adam, who was sleeping peacefully on his stomach in an aqua-blue-painted swinging cradle nearby.
Melissa had intended giving birth to a boy, and when a daughter had arrived instead, she had cast aside the prepainted cradle and ordered another, in pink.
"Well, here goes," said Christie. She knocked at the interior door. "Garrett, are you dressed?"
"For the better part of an hour," came the good-natured reply.
Christie opened the door and floated in. She saw Garrett lounging easily in the wing chair near the fireplace, and she smiled at the handsome appearance he made. It was the first time she had seen him without the high, black boots he usually wore; that preference, he'd once explained, probably was linked to a habit formed while in the military. This evening he wore a fine pair of gold-buckled shoes with white hose which matched in snowiness his breeches and silk shirt whose jabot rendered his tanned face darker than usual. His waistcoat was also white, but heavily embroidered with gold thread; his jacket was a deep forest green.
Christie's appraisal of her husband was quickly arrested by what she saw in his face. As he stared at his wife, the casual smile it had borne soon vanished and she saw him blanch as he watched her make a curtsy. But he said not a word. Instead, he rose from his seat and came forward to meet her where she stood.-Stopping a couple of feet in front of her, he let his eyes travel leisurely from the shining knot at the crown of her head to the floor beneath her feet.
"Madam," he breathed, "you are a wonder!"
Christie broke into a delighted smile. "You're not upset, then?"
"Of course, I'm upset." He grinned. "I wouldn't be a man if I weren't. But you warned me fairly of what I might expect, and why. Not that it really prepared me for what I see." He chuckled. "And I'm beginning to have second thoughts about letting you dance with Beau or even your uncle. There's a great temptation hang a large sign about this lovely neck," he said huskily as he touched her creamy throat, "inscribed with the words, 'private property.'"
A familiar tingle swept through Christie's body as he touched her and she caught the burning glow in his emerald eyes. Swallowing hard, she smiled up at him. "I think we're overdue downstairs, my love," she murmured.
Garrett took a deep, ragged breath. "So we are, but you can rest assured my thoughts will be on little else this evening, save the time when we'll be due to return back up the stairs." Then he took her hand and led her to the ballroom.
The ball was already in progress when they arrived, taking their time as they descended the grand staircase so they might review at leisure those already assembled below, and since some of these were recognized by Garrett, he pointed certain individuals out to Christie.
"That would be William Laughton Smith, the state's representative to the first congress," he whispered. "I can only guess that the lady he dances with is his wife."
"Who's that swarthy-looking gentleman who stares at us?" asked Christie.
"My love," said Garrett, smiling down at her, "if you haven't yet noticed, the whole damned room is looking this way, and I hardly fancy it's me they're staring at! L
et's see, swarthy—hell, it's the Swamp Fox himself! Francis Marion, my old commander! Damn, but it's good to see that familiar face!" he added, glancing ever so briefly, and a trifle nervously, Christie thought, at a flaming redhead near the base of the staircase. "But if I know old Marion, it's definitely not me he's staring at! He always had an eye for beauty!"
They had reached the ballroom floor now, and the flame-haired beauty turned to them, but her eyes focused on Garrett.
"Garrett! I had no idea you'd be here! I haven't seen you at a ball in ages!"
She had green eyes—not an emerald green, like Garrett's, Christie noted, but closer to a pea green— and they were flecked with tiny chips of gold as she bent them coolly now on the woman on Garrett's arm. Garrett bowed slightly.
"How are you, Vanessa?" Christie thought she detected a slight strain in his voice.
The redhead replied in a drawl so thickly honeyed it made Christie bristle. "Just wonderful, now that I've found you here, darling. And I'll be in even finer spirits once I've discovered why you've neglected poor me all these months."
Garrett cleared his throat and gave Christie's arm a squeeze; and when he spoke, Christie noticed the strain had disappeared. "Vanessa, I'd like you to meet my wife, Christie Randall." He flashed Christie a brilliant smile, his white teeth heart-stompingly dazzling in his tanned face. "Christie, Miss Vanessa Poinsett."
"Your wife!" hissed Vanessa. The beautiful face twisted into an ugly scowl she made no attempt to disguise. "How—how long have you been married?"
"Almost a year," said Christie pertly, although she knew the question had been directed at Garrett. Indeed, Vanessa had yet to address her at all. But she had small chance to contemplate this further, as suddenly there seemed to be a crowd of people rushing to meet them, and most of these were men. Then she saw Philip breaking through the assemblage as he greeted them.
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