“Frank,” whispered Mary, who was with them.
“Then I will call you Frank, if you will allow me. The use of Christian names is, I think, pleasant and hardly common enough among us. I almost forget my own boy’s name because the practice has grown up of calling him by a title.”
“I am going to call him Abraham,” said Isabel.
“Abraham is a good name, only I do not think he got it from his godfathers and godmothers.”
“Who can call a man Plantagenet? I should as soon think of calling my father-in-law Cœur de Lion.”
“So he is,” said Mary. Whereupon the Duke kissed the two girls and went his way, — showing that by this time he had adopted the one and the proposed husband of the other into his heart.
The day before the Duke started for London to be present at the grand marriage he sent for Frank. “I suppose,” said he, “that you would wish that some time should be fixed for your own marriage.” To this the accepted suitor of course assented. “But before we can do that something must be settled about — money.” Tregear when he heard this became hot all over, and felt that he could not restrain his blushes. Such must be the feeling of a man when he finds himself compelled to own to a girl’s father that he intends to live upon her money and not upon his own. “I do not like to be troublesome,” continued the Duke, “or to ask questions which might seem to be impertinent.”
“Oh no! Of course I feel my position. I can only say that it was not because your daughter might probably have money that I first sought her love.”
“It shall be so received. And now — But perhaps it will be best that you should arrange all this with my man of business. Mr. Moreton shall be instructed. Mr. Moreton lives near my place in Barsetshire, but is now in London. If you will call on him he shall tell you what I would suggest. I hope you will find that your affairs will be comfortable. And now as to the time.”
Isabel’s wedding was declared by the newspapers to have been one of the most brilliant remembered in the metropolis. There were six bridesmaids, of whom of course Mary was one, — and of whom poor Lady Mabel Grex was equally of course not another. Poor Lady Mabel was at this time with Miss Cassewary at Grex, paying what she believed would be a last visit to the old family home. Among the others were two American girls, brought into that august society for the sake of courtesy rather than of personal love. And there were two other Palliser girls and a Scotch McCloskie cousin. The breakfast was of course given by Mr. Boncassen at his house in Brook Street, where the bridal presents were displayed. And not only were they displayed; but a list of them, with an approximating statement as to their value, appeared in one or two of the next day’s newspapers; — as to which terrible sin against good taste neither was Mr. or Mrs. Boncassen guilty. But in these days, in which such splendid things were done on so very splendid a scale, a young lady cannot herself lay out her friends’ gifts so as to be properly seen by her friends. Some well-skilled, well-paid hand is needed even for that, and hence comes this public information on affairs which should surely be private. In our grandmothers’ time the happy bride’s happy mother herself compounded the cake; — or at any rate the trusted housekeeper. But we all know that terrible tower of silver which now stands niddle-noddling with its appendages of flags and spears on the modern wedding breakfast-table. It will come to pass with some of us soon that we must deny ourselves the pleasure of having young friends, because their marriage presents are so costly.
Poor Mrs. Boncassen had not perhaps a happy time with her august guests on that morning; but when she retired to give Isabel her last kiss in privacy she did feel proud to think that her daughter would some day be an English Duchess.
CHAPTER LXXX
The Second Wedding
November is not altogether an hymeneal month, but it was not till November that Lady Mary Palliser became the wife of Frank Tregear. It was postponed a little, perhaps, in order that the Silverbridges, — as they were now called, — might be present. The Silverbridges, who were now quite Darby and Joan, had gone to the States when the Session had been brought to a close early in August, and had remained there nearly three months. Isabel had taken infinite pleasure in showing her English husband to her American friends, and the American friends had no doubt taken a pride in seeing so glorious a British husband in the hands of an American wife. Everything was new to Silverbridge, and he was happy in his new possession. She too enjoyed it infinitely, and so it happened that they had been unwilling to curtail their sojourn. But in November they had to return, because Mary had declared that her marriage should be postponed till it could be graced by the presence of her elder brother.
The marriage of Silverbridge had been August. There had been a manifest intention that it should be so. Nobody knew with whom this originated. Mrs. Boncassen had probably been told that it ought to be so, and Mr. Boncassen had been willing to pay the bill. External forces had perhaps operated. The Duke had simply been passive and obedient. There had however been a general feeling that the bride of the heir of the house of Omnium should be produced to the world amidst a blare of trumpets and a glare of torches. So it had been. But both the Duke and Mary were determined that this other wedding should be different. It was to take place at Matching, and none would be present but they who were staying in the house, or who lived around, — such as tenants and dependants. Four clergymen united their forces to tie Isabel to her husband, one of whom was a bishop, one a canon, and the two others royal chaplains; but there was only to be the Vicar of the parish at Matching. And indeed there were no guests in the house except the two bridesmaids and Mr. and Mrs. Finn. As to Mrs. Finn, Mary had made a request, and then the Duke had suggested that the husband should be asked to accompany his wife.
It was very pretty. The church itself is pretty, standing in the park, close to the ruins of the old Priory, not above three hundred yards from the house. And they all walked, taking the broad pathway through the ruins, going under that figure of Sir Guy which Silverbridge had pointed out to Isabel when they had been whispering there together. The Duke led the way with his girl upon his arm. The two bridesmaids followed. Then Silverbridge and his wife, with Phineas and his wife. Gerald and the bridegroom accompanied them, belonging as it were to the same party! It was very rustic; — almost improper! “This is altogether wrong, you know,” said Gerald. “You should appear coming from some other part of the world, as if you were almost unexpected. You ought not to have been in the house at all, and certainly should have gone under some disguise.”
There had been rich presents too on this occasion, but they were shown to none except to Mrs. Finn and the bridesmaids, — and perhaps to the favoured servants in the house. At any rate there was nothing said of them in the newspapers. One present there was, — given not to the bride but to the bridegroom, — which he showed to no one except to her. This came to him only on the morning of his marriage, and the envelope containing it bore the postmark of Sedbergh. He knew the handwriting well before he opened the parcel. It contained a small signet-ring with his crest, and with it there were but a few words written on a scrap of paper. “I pray that you may be happy. This was to have been given to you long ago, but I kept it back because of that decision.” He showed the ring to Mary and told her it had come from Lady Mabel; — but the scrap of paper no one saw but himself.
Perhaps the matter most remarkable in the wedding was the hilarity of the Duke. One who did not know him well might have said that he was a man with few cares, and who now took special joy in the happiness of his children, — who was thoroughly contented to see them marry after their own hearts. And yet, as he stood there on the altar-steps giving his daughter to that new son and looking first at his girl, and then at his married son, he was reminding himself of all that he had suffered.
After the breakfast, — which was by no means a grand repast and at which the cake did not look so like an ill-soldered silver castle as that other construction had done, — the happy couple were sent away in a modest chariot
to the railway station, and not above half-a-dozen slippers were thrown after them. There were enough for luck, — or perhaps there might have been luck even without them, for the wife thoroughly respected her husband, as did the husband his wife. Mrs. Finn, when she was alone with Phineas, said a word or two about Frank Tregear. “When she first told me of her engagement I did not think it possible that she should marry him. But after he had been with me I felt sure that he would succeed.”
“Well, sir,” said Silverbridge to the Duke when they were out together in the park that afternoon, “what do you think about him?”
“I think he is a manly young man.”
“He is certainly that. And then he knows things and understands them. It was never a surprise to me that Mary should have been so fond of him.”
“I do not know that one ought to be surprised at anything. Perhaps what surprised me most was that he should have looked so high. There seemed to be so little to justify it. But now I will accept that as courage which I before regarded as arrogance.”
Table of Contents
CAN YOU FORGIVE HER?
PHINEAS FINN
THE EUSTACE DIAMONDS
PHINEAS REDUX
THE PRIME MINISTER
THE DUKE’S CHILDREN
Mr Vavasor and His Daughter
Lady Macleod
John Grey, the Worthy Man
George Vavasor, the Wild Man
The Balcony at Basle
The Bridge over the Rhine
Aunt Greenow
Mr Cheesacre
The Rivals
Nethercoats
John Grey Goes to London
Mr George Vavasor at Home
Mr Grimes Gets His Odd Money
Alice Vavasor Becomes Troubled
Paramount Crescent
The Roebury Club
Edgehill
Alice Vavasor’s Great Relations
Tribute from Oileymead
Which Shall It Be?
Alice Is Taught to Grow Upwards, Towards the Light
Dandy and Flirt
Dinner at Matching Priory
Three Politicians
In Which Much of the History of the Pallisers Is Told
Lady Midlothian
The Priory Ruins
Alice Leaves the Priory
Burgo Fitzgerald
Containing a Love Letter
Among the Fells
Containing an Answer to the Love Letter
Monkshade
Mr Vavasor Speaks to His Daughter
Passion versus Prudence
John Grey Goes a Second Time to London
Mr Tombe’s Advice
The Inn at Shap
Mr Cheesacre’s Hospitality
Mrs Greenow’s Little Dinner in the Close
A Noble Lord Dies
Parliament Meets
Mrs Marsham
The Election for the Chelsea Districts
The Palliser Novels Page 468