“I should hate it!” Hermia exclaimed. “I should like to be married very quietly with nobody else there except for Papa, Mama and Peter and, because we really love each other, I want no one to snigger or be envious.”
The Marquis put his cheek against hers.
“How can you be so perfect? I know of nobody else who would say that to me.”
“It’s true,” Hermia said. “I could not bear to have anybody there hating me or being furious because you had married anybody so insignificant.”
She was thinking of Marilyn.
“Then I tell you what we will do,” the Marquis said. “We will be married secretly and nobody, except your family, shall know what we have done until we are far away on our honeymoon.”
“Do you really mean that?”
“Of course,” he replied.
“That would be the most – wonderful thing that could ever happen!” Hermia said. “And – please – can it be very soon?”
The Marquis laughed before he said,
“Tonight, tomorrow or at the very latest two days from now.”
Then, when Hermia wanted to tell him that she was sure it was impossible, she had no chance to do so.
He was kissing her again and his kisses swept her up into a Heaven of happiness where there was only love and him.
*
The Church had been decorated by her mother with every white flower that the garden possessed.
As Hermia came in through the door on Peter’s arm, she knew, although the pews were empty, that the whole building was filled with those who had once prayed there and were now wishing her happiness.
She had not seen the Marquis since she had left London two days earlier with the excuse that, because they were all in mourning, it was only right for her to return home.
“I am so disappointed, dear child,” Lady Langdon said, “but I am sure that I can persuade my brother to invite you back again as soon as the summer is over and people return to London for the winter.”
She sighed before she continued,
“It will not be as gay as it is now, but there will be balls and assemblies and I should love to chaperone you again.”
“You have been very very kind,” Hermia murmured, feeling a little ashamed that Lady Langdon should not know the truth.
But she knew that the Marquis was right in saying that, if he invited one of his relatives to his wedding, the rest would take umbrage for the rest of their lives and it was therefore best to have all or none.
“The same applies to me,” Hermia said. “I am quite sure that Uncle John and Aunt Edith will be absolutely furious and not only because they were not asked to the wedding.”
“Forget what they are feeling,” the Marquis said. “I am quite certain your cousin will find an eligible husband sooner or later because she is a very determined young woman.”
Hermia did not answer this, as she did not want to seem unkind.
She thought it would be impossible for Marilyn to find anybody as wonderful as the Marquis and, if she had lost him, she knew how miserable she would be feeling.
But it was difficult to think of anything except the happiness of knowing that she would be his wife and they would be together for ever and ever.
“You are quite certain that once you marry me you will not be – bored and – cynical again?” she asked.
“If as a witch you cannot prevent me from being bored,” he answered, “I shall not think much of your magic.”
“Now you are frightening me.”
“I love you,” he answered. “I love you so much that I feel that what we know about each other at the moment is only the tip of the iceberg and there is so much more for us both to explore and discover which will take at least a century.”
Hermia laughed, but she knew it was the truth.
“What is more,” the Marquis went on, “I have so much to teach you, my darling one, and love is a very big subject.”
The way he spoke made Hermia feel shy, but it was not the shyness she had felt before.
It was something warm and exciting that seemed to pulsate through her so that she wanted him to kiss her and go on kissing her and for them to be closer and closer to each other.
“I love you – I love – she whispered and then could say no more.
*
When she returned home and told her father and mother that she was to marry the Marquis, they were at first astounded.
Then, when they realised how much she loved him, they were happy in a way that made the Vicarage seem to vibrate with joy.
“It is what I have always prayed would happen to you my darling!” Mrs. Brooke said. “I suppose it was foolish of me not to realise that God would answer my prayers and I should never have doubted for a moment that you would find the same love that your father and I found.”
Her mother understood, Hermia thought, as nobody else could have done, how very important it was that her marriage should not be spoilt in any way and must therefore be very secret.
The day after she returned home her wedding gown arrived from London and she knew that only the Marquis could have chosen something so exquisitely beautiful, which was exactly what she would have wished to wear to marry him.
It was white and embroidered all over with tiny diamante, which looked like flowers with raindrops on them.
There was a diamond wreath for her hair fashioned in the form of wild flowers that was so beautiful that Hermia thought it must have been made with fairy hands.
When Nanny put the white veil over her face, there were tears in the old woman’s eyes.
“You don’t look real,” she said, “and that’s the truth! It’s just as if you’d come out of the garden or the woods like one of them fanciful creatures you were always talkin’ about when you were a child.”
“That is what I hope I look like,” Hermia said.
She knew strangely enough it was what the Marquis wanted too, as no other man would have done.
Peter, dressed in the clothes the Marquis had given him, was so pleased with his own appearance that Hermia thought that he hardly had time to notice her at all.
“What do you think?” he had said to her when he arrived. “Your Marquis sent a phaeton and four horses to bring me home and there was also a letter!”
He drew in his breath as if he could hardly believe what he had read,
“It told me that next term I can have two horses at Oxford of my own, besides a large credit at my new brother-in-law’s tailors, which will ensure that I can look very nearly as smart as he does!”
“He is so wonderful!” Hermia sighed softly.
“I think you are wonderful too,” Peter said, “and you deserve everything you have and a lot more besides!”
The way he spoke made Hermia smile and, as she walked up the aisle on his arm and saw her father waiting in front of the altar and her mother sitting in the front pew, she thought that nobody could be blessed with a more marvellous family.
Then, as she saw the Marquis waiting for her, she felt as if he was enveloped by a dazzling celestial light.
The angels were singing overhead and the whole Church was filled with the music of love.
*
After they had cut the cake which Nanny had baked and iced for them and everybody had drunk the excellent champagne the Marquis had brought down with him from London, her father had made a very small speech.
He wished that the happiness they felt at the moment would grow and deepen every year they were together.
Then Hermia had changed into her going-away gown, which matched the colour of her eyes and had a light cloak over it, a bonnet trimmed with ribbons and flowers of the same colour.
There were very few people about in the village as they drove through it. The Marquis had been staying only two miles away and there had been no one to notice his arrival at the Church.
Only as they passed Mrs. Buries’s cottage did Hermia see Ben peeping out through one of the windows and she knew tha
t as usual he would be the first to carry the news around the village that something unusual had occurred.
But now it did not matter.
She was married, she was going away with the man she loved and the Marquis had already planned a long honeymoon, starting first with a few nights at his country house, which Hermia had never seen.
He had already told her that he wanted to show her not only all his treasures inside it but also the places he had loved as a child.
“The woods meant something to me as well,” he said, “which I have never confided to anybody except you and, of course, ordinary people would not understand.”
“Only witches, fairies and elves!” Hermia smiled.
“And devils?” he questioned.
“You are not to call yourself that again,” she answered. “Now you are back to being the archangel you were before you fell from grace and I shall be very angry if anybody calls you a devil again.”
“Except on the Racecourse,” he said, “and my darling, no man in the world could have so much luck as to have you!”
Because it was impossible for Hermia to find words to express how lucky she was, she could only press her lips against his.
*
Later that night, as Hermia lay in the great state bed where the Marquises of Deverille had slept for generations, she moved a little closer to the man beside her.
“Are you awake, my precious?” he asked.
“It is impossible to sleep when I am so happy.”
His arms held her to him as he said,
“You are quite certain I have not hurt you? You are so precious and so like a flower that I am afraid of spoiling something that is too perfect to be human.”
“I adore you,” Hermia said, “and when you loved me it was the most glorious – magical thing that ever happened – I felt as if we had wings and flew through the sky towards the – moon.”
There was a little pause before she said the last word.
Then, as she felt the Marquis was curious, she explained,
“When I was in London, I looked at the moon and felt that you were as far out of reach as it was and that I could never – never mean – anything to you, except somebody you felt you – owed a debt to.”
The Marquis turned so that he could look down at her.
The only light came from a candle that was beside the bed, but he thought that no one could look lovelier or more ethereal.
“How can I tell you what you mean to me?” he asked, “or explain that you have given me back the dreams, the ambitions and ideals that were mine when I was young?”
“That is what I want you to have,” Hermia said. “I could not bear you ever again to be bored or cynical. And, darling, because I love you, I feel I have so much to give you.”
She knew the Marquis would understand that she was talking about spiritual rather than material things and he said,
“That is what I want to receive and what we will one day give our children – an understanding of the real value of things, not the tawdry luxuries that can only be counted up in cash.”
Hermia gave a little sigh.
“And yet if we spend money in the right way we can do so much to make people happy. Papa told me last night that he has already started on the timber yard and is employing twenty-five men and hopes to be able to employ more.”
She knew that her husband smiled and she went on,
“I also have a suspicion that you and Nanny have come to some special arrangement, which is why Papa and Mama are looking so well. There are a great many delicious things in the larder that I have never seen there before!”
“You should not go poking your nose into other people’s business!” the Marquis said.
“I did not believe anybody as – important as you could be so human – so understanding, so very very – wonderful,” Hermia said with a little break in her voice, “and that is why I say you are now an archangel! And you make me love you more every moment of the day and night.”
The Marquis kissed her eyes.
“I find you not only irresistible but an enchantment that no man could escape from.”
“Do you – want to?”
“You know the answer to that,” he said, “and, my precious, how can I ever have thought I was happy before I found you?”
“You did not look happy!”
“I suspected everybody of having ulterior motives for everything they did and everything they said. Then you came along like a star that had dropped from the sky and everything changed.”
“I want you always to feel like that,” Hermia murmured. “But supposing I had – lost you?”
The horror she had felt when she found him lying on the floor of the witch’s cottage and the memory of his cousin descending from the roof to kill him swept over her.
Instinctively she put out her arms to draw him closer to her as if she would protect him against any danger, any evil.
As if he read her thoughts, he said,
“I am safe now and, with your love to encircle me, nothing can hurt me. It is love, my precious, that is the magic spell that holds us both enthralled from now until Eternity.”
“And I love you, my wonderful, kind, marvellous husband,” Hermia said, “until there are no words to tell you how much you mean to me.”
“I don’t need words.”
His lips held hers captive and, as she felt his hand touching the softness of her body and his heart beating against hers, she knew the fire was rising in him and felt flames flickering within herself.
Then, as he carried her up into the sky, they were inside the moon, coveted by the stars and there was only love – the love that would hold them spellbound until the end of time.
OTHER BOOKS IN THIS SERIES
The Barbara Cartland Eternal Collection is the unique opportunity to collect as ebooks all five hundred of the timeless beautiful romantic novels written by the world’s most celebrated and enduring romantic author.
Named the Eternal Collection because Barbara’s inspiring stories of pure love, just the same as love itself, the books will be published on the internet at the rate of four titles per month until all five hundred are available.
The Eternal Collection, classic pure romance available worldwide for all time .
Elizabethan Lover
The Little Pretender
A Ghost in Monte Carlo
A Duel of Hearts
The Saint and the Sinner
The Penniless Peer
The Proud Princess
The Dare-Devil Duke
Diona and a Dalmatian
A Shaft of Sunlight
Lies for Love
Love and Lucia
Love and the Loathsome Leopard
Beauty or Brains
The Temptation of Torilla
The Goddess and the Gaiety Girl
Fragrant Flower
Look Listen and Love
The Duke and the Preacher’s Daughter
A Kiss for the King
The Mysterious Maid-servant
Lucky Logan Finds Love
The Wings of Ecstacy
Mission to Monte Carlo
Revenge of the Heart
The Unbreakable Spell
Never Laugh at Love
Bride to a Brigand
Lucifer and the Angel
Journey to a Star
Solita and the Spies
The Chieftain Without a Heart
No Escape from Love
Dollars for the duke
Pure and Untouched
Secrets
Fire in the Blood
Love, Lies and Marriage
The Ghost who Fell in Love
Hungry for Love
The Wild Cry of Love
The Blue-eyed Witch
The Punishment of a Vixen
The Secret of the Glen
Bride to the King
For All Eternity
King in Love
A Marriage made in Heaven
Who can deny Love?
Riding to the Moon
Wish for Love
Dancing on a Rainbow
Gypsy Magic
Love in the Clouds
Count the Stars
White Lilac
Too Precious to Lose
The Devil Defeated
An Angel Runs Away
The Duchess Disappeared
The Pretty Horse-breakers
The Prisoner of Love
Ola and the Sea Wolf
The Castle made for Love
A Heart is Stolen
The Love Pirate
As Eagles Fly
The Magic of Love
Love Leaves at Midnight
A Witch’s Spell
THE LATE DAME BARBARA CARTLAND
Barbara Cartland, who sadly died in May 2000 at the grand age of ninety eight, remains one of the world’s most famous romantic novelists. With worldwide sales of over one billion, her outstanding 723 books have been translated into thirty six different languages, to be enjoyed by readers of romance globally.
Writing her first book ‘Jigsaw’ at the age of 21, Barbara became an immediate bestseller. Building upon this initial success, she wrote continuously throughout her life, producing bestsellers for an astonishing 76 years. In addition to Barbara Cartland’s legion of fans in the UK and across Europe, her books have always been immensely popular in the USA. In 1976 she achieved the unprecedented feat of having books at numbers 1 & 2 in the prestigious B. Dalton Bookseller bestsellers list.
Although she is often referred to as the ‘Queen of Romance’, Barbara Cartland also wrote several historical biographies, six autobiographies and numerous theatrical plays as well as books on life, love, health and cookery. Becoming one of Britain’s most popular media personalities and dressed in her trademark pink, Barbara spoke on radio and television about social and political issues, as well as making many public appearances.
In 1991 she became a Dame of the Order of the British Empire for her contribution to literature and her work for humanitarian and charitable causes.
Known for her glamour, style, and vitality Barbara Cartland became a legend in her own lifetime. Best remembered for her wonderful romantic novels and loved by millions of readers worldwide, her books remain treasured for their heroic heroes, plucky heroines and traditional values. But above all, it was Barbara Cartland’s overriding belief in the positive power of love to help, heal and improve the quality of life for everyone that made her truly unique.
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