“I thought when I was last here that if I was ever going to marry I would bring the woman I love here.”
His voice deepened as he carried on,
“Because this is the country of love, I felt so deeply moved by everything I saw and love seemed to be in the very air itself.”
Devinia was about to speak when he said,
“That is why I know, if we are married here today, our love will be blessed by the Goddess of Love and by God Himself and it will last for ever.”
He spoke in a serious tone which Devinia had not heard before, but felt deeply moved by his words.
Because she could not think of how to express her feelings, she bent and kissed his hand which he had on his knee.
“I love you! I love you!” she said. “I just know that every minute of every day and every year we are together, I will love you more and more.”
The Duke put his arm round her and pulled her close to him.
For a moment, as what she had just said seemed to be ringing on the air, they were silent.
When she saw the Church, Devinia knew at once why it had meant so much to the Duke.
It was very old and beautiful.
It had maybe been built by the same craftsmen who had built the Temples for the Gods.
There were endless flowers round the outside of it.
When she then entered it, she felt at once a strange sensation which was different from anything she had ever known before.
The Church was relatively small, but the altar was exceedingly beautiful and the Cross and the six candles on it were of shining gold.
There was an old Priest walking down the aisle.
When he saw the Duke, he stopped and the pleasure in his eyes was very obvious.
It was the Duke who spoke first.
“I promised you, Father, I would come back,” he said, “and here I am. I hope you have not forgotten me.”
“But naturally I have not forgotten you,” the Priest replied. “I have often thought of you and prayed that you would found what you were seeking.”
“Only you, Father, knew just what I was seeking,” the Duke replied. “But I have found her when I was certain that my searching was impossible and now I want you to marry us tomorrow morning.”
“I can imagine nothing I want to do more than to marry you,” the old Priest said. “But I have a very large funeral tomorrow morning and so it would be better if you were married today.”
The Duke turned and gazed at Devinia.
“Why not?” he asked.
For a moment she did not reply and then she said almost in a whisper,
“Please, I do so want – to wear the Wedding dress we have just bought.”
The Duke looked at the Priest.
“I am sure, Father, that your wife would allow her to change in your house which I know is only next door.”
“Of course,” he replied. “She would be delighted as she too has often spoken about you and wondered if ‘that handsome boy’ as she called you, had ever got married.”
“The answer was ‘no’ until this moment,” the Duke answered, “and that is just why, Father, I have brought my future wife here, the moment my yacht came into Port.”
“If that is where you are,” the Priest replied, “then there is no reason for you to go back. Your fiancée can change in my house and my wife will be pleased to help.”
He smiled before he added,
“I must find my two sons who will take part in your Wedding, who can help me prepare the Church.”
The Duke merely nodded and the Priest went on,
“It is now, I think, getting on for five o’clock. If you are married at six o’clock, which is usually the time we close the Church, there will be no visitors and you two young people will have the place to yourselves.”
“That is what I want,” the Duke replied. “I have always been afraid of being forced into a large Wedding. I can imagine that nothing could be more perfect than if you marry Devinia and me here alone.”
Devinia thought that, if he had ended his sentence, he would have said ‘except for the Gods’.
But she understood how deeply he felt about this lovely little Church and she slipped her hand into his and said,
“This is what I want too and it is something that we will always remember.”
“Of course, we will,” the Duke agreed.
“You know the way to my house,” the Priest said, “and now I will get busy and make the Church look as beautiful for you as is possible.”
“You know, Father, that I don’t need to express my gratitude,” the Duke told him, “but you are aware how truly grateful I am.”
Then, taking Devinia by the arm, he led her out of the little Church and along the path outside to where, set in a garden, was a small but enchanting house.
A maid let them in and after they were shown into an attractive sitting room, the Priest’s wife came in.
She had aged a great deal, the Duke thought, since he had last seen her and her hair was completely white, but she still had the English look of a Lady of Quality.
When she held out both hands to him, he took them in his and kissed them one after another.
“You have not forgotten me?” he asked.
“Of course not,” she answered. “I often wondered how you were getting on and if you had ever married. As you told my husband it was something you would not do until you were older.”
“It was a vow I made because I felt that no woman could in any way be as attractive as the glorious Goddesses of Greece,” the Duke replied. “But now I have found what I was seeking and your husband is marrying us in an hour.”
The Priest’s wife gave a cry of delight.
“What we are asking you is if Devinia could change into her Wedding dress here, as I now understand that your husband has a funeral tomorrow morning, which was when we asked to be married.”
“So, you are to be married tonight!” she exclaimed. “Oh, that is much better! There are always holidaymakers poking their noses in and tonight you can have the Church all to yourself.”
“That is exactly what we want,” the Duke agreed. “And I am hoping that the Wedding dress will fit Devinia.”
“If it does not I will sew it on her!”
She took Devinia into a pretty bedroom and helped her change into the Wedding dress from the shop window.
It looked, she thought, even more enchanting on her than it had in the shop window and what was more the saleswoman was right, it fitted her exactly.
The veil covered her hair and fell down over her face.
“What you must have,” the Priest’s wife said, “is a halo of flowers. Your hair is so lovely but it will, of course, be hidden until you throw back the veil after the ring has been put on your finger.”
Devinia was only too willing to let her arrange her hair as she wished.
She then disappeared into the garden to come back with a large number of small white roses for the garland of flowers for Devinia’s hair.
She said, however, she could not bear to hide the beauty of her hair underneath the veil so Devinia gave her permission to cut the veil in half so that it fell on either side of her face.
“You are too pretty, my dear, to hide your face and I know that the Duke will want to look at you while you make your vows and so will my husband. He has never liked veils which hide from him what he wants to see.”
“What is that?” Devinia asked her.
“He wants to see that what you say is the truth that comes from your soul and that you love the man you are marrying so that it shows in your eyes.”
“You are so right, that is what you should show,” Devinia said, “and I love the Duke with all my heart and soul.”
The Priest’s wife kissed her.
“That is what I want you to say. I thought when I first met him he was a very clever and unusual man who loved Greece. As he said, it gave him something he had always sought but believed he would never find.”
Devinia thought that it was what she wanted herself but she was too shy to say so.
It was five minutes to six, when the Duke who was waiting for them downstairs, told them the time.
“We must go to the Church,” he urged.
Devinia came down from the bedroom where she had changed.
The Duke took one look at her and thought it would be impossible for any woman to look so lovely.
“Even the Goddesses will pay their homage to you tonight,” he said very softly so that only she could hear.
“So do I look as you want me to look?” Devinia whispered.
“As I hope and prayed my wife would look when I found her,” the Duke replied. “Now I have found her I can only tell you that you are perfect in every way. Not only with your amazing beauty but because you have given me your heart.”
“It is yours, completely and absolutely yours,” she answered.
They walked a short way to the Church and, as they drew nearer, they heard the organ playing.
“The two boys have been helping their father,” the Duke said, “to arrange the Church and one of them always plays the organ when there is a Service.”
When they went through the Church door, Devinia gave a gasp.
In their absence someone, and Devinia thought that it must be the sons of the Priest, had put flowers in every window and in the centre of them was a lit candle.
There were also flowers all over the altar.
As the six candles were lit the whole place seemed to vibrate with beauty and the strange feeling of Holiness which she had known when she first entered.
Wearing his Vestments, the Priest was waiting for them and, as they walked slowly up the aisle towards him, the organ was playing softly.
The Service was short but the way the Priest read it made it seem just as if an Archangel himself was marrying them.
When they made their vows, Devinia was sure that her mother was looking down at her and she was happy and content that she had found a man who loved her as much as she loved him.
‘I love him! I love him!’ Devinia thought to herself when she knelt to pray.
Then, as the Priest blessed them, she was sure that she and Ivan were receiving the Blessing of all the angels of Heaven.
As well they were being blessed by the Gods and Goddesses of Greece who had lived and brought the secret of love to the world.
When the Service was over, Devinia and the Duke climbed into their carriage and drove away.
“It was a wonderful, wonderful Service,” Devinia said. “I did not have time to thank the Priest.”
“But I did,” the Duke answered. “I gave him a large sum of money which I knew he would give to the Church. I gave a present for his wife and his children too, which he will enjoy as much as they will.”
Devinia moved nearer to him.
“You are marvellous,” she sighed. “You think of everything.”
“I think of you,” he said and took Devinia’s hand in his.
They were silent.
And it seemed as if the Holiness of the Service had carried them into another world.
A world where there was only love and it was quite impossible to think or feel anything else but love.
The moon and the stars were coming out when they reached the yacht.
It was because of the Duke’s orders, Devinia learnt later, that there was no one waiting for them.
The Duke drew Devinia into the Saloon where their dinner was laid out for them and there was champagne in a gold ice-cooler.
In the centre of the table was a cake iced in white with their initials engraved on it and encircled with white roses.
There were flowers everywhere on the whole yacht making a kaleidoscope of intense colour.
“It is all so lovely!” Devinia exclaimed. “How did you manage to arrange all this to make me so happy?”
“I sent a messenger to the yacht while you were dressing yourself in your Wedding gown and the Captain has followed my instructions as I knew he would.”
“Did you tell him that we were being married?” she asked.“I told him we would be married when we returned and that we wished to see no one,” the duke replied. “The crew are drinking our health in champagne.”
“I must thank the chef tomorrow for what he has produced for us in such a short time,” Devinia told him.The Duke nodded his agreement.“How can you be so wonderful as to think of everything that makes me so happy?” Devinia asked.
“I love you,” the Duke answered. “And we will spend our honeymoon here in Greece where the Gods have brought love to the world that will last for millions of years.”
“I love you with all my heart and my soul, Ivan, but I am so afraid that it is not enough for you.”
“It is all I want,” the Duke replied. “I know that our love will go on increasing day by day and year by year.”
“We must be sure – of that,” Devinia whispered.
Then the Duke was kissing her.
Kissing her lips gently at first and then wildly and demandingly and passionately as if he was afraid of losing her again.
When the Duke finally made her his, she knew that they had both found a Heaven of Love that would always be theirs.
‘I love you! I love you!” Devinia sighed softly.
She felt, as the Duke pulled her ever closer to him, that she had never been happier.
“I love you so very much, my darling Devinia,” he breathed. “You are mine now and for ever.”
The flowers whispered the same message and the stars shining through the porthole said it too.
“I love you! I love you!”
The love they had found together on this earth came from God, was part of God and was theirs for Eternity and even beyond.
Where to buy other titles in this series
The Barbara Cartland Pink collection is available for download at the following online bookshops :-
www.barnesandnoble.com - epub format for the Nook eReader
www.whsmith.co.uk - epub format for the Smiths/Kobo eReader
www.firstyfish.com - epub format
ebookstore.sony.com - epub format for Sony eReaders
www.amazon.co.uk - For UK Kindle users
www.amazon.com - For international Kindle users
itunes.apple.com - for Apple iOS users
www.barbaracartland.com- Printed paperbacks
160 Love Finds the Duke at Last Page 14