by Anne Gracie
He kept talking, listing the things needing to be done.
She wasn’t quite sure what she’d expected his response to her acceptance of his proposal to be, but it wasn’t this, as if he’d ticked off an item on a list and was moving on to the next.
He appeared quite unmoved, as if her agreement were a foregone conclusion.
Which she supposed it was. And didn’t that make her feel beggar maid to King Cophetua?
Tall, ridiculously handsome, the very figure of a romantic hero, he delivered his plans for their marriage as if he were briefing a troop of soldiers. “You are welcome, of course, to have a member of your family examine the settlements document and negotiate any alterations before it is finalized.”
“I have no family,” Emm said. She wanted to hit him. An agreement to marry should not be taken so . . . so practically.
Surely, at least there should be a kiss.
Which was ridiculous, she berated herself silently. Did she imagine Lord Ashendon had fallen in love with her after four brief meetings?
“Oh.” He considered that a moment, then continued, “I will go up to London tomorrow and obtain a special license. We shall be married in a week’s time.”
“A week’s time?” It came out almost as a squeak.
“Yes?” He looked at her as if she’d made some irrelevant interruption.
“I cannot possibly marry you in a week.”
He frowned. “Why not?”
Because it was too much of a rush, because she wasn’t ready to be married to a virtual stranger at the end of a week, because her head was still in a whirl of tangled thoughts and emotions. Because, because, because.
She was feeling more than a little agitated, so she walked to the window and looked out for a moment. The view was nothing like the one from her little attic room, but somehow it calmed her. “I will need a new dress.”
He looked at the dress she was wearing, grimaced slightly and nodded. “Very well. Buy one. Buy a dozen. Buy whatever you need. Have the bills sent to me at my aunt’s address. It won’t take a week, will it?”
“Probably not,” she conceded. If she was going to be his wife—Lady Ashendon! A countess!—she’d need more than one new dress, but she supposed she and the girls would have to buy all they needed in London. Bath had some good dressmakers, but they wouldn’t match up to the finest London could offer. And he would expect the finest.
“But I must also give Miss Mallard more notice than a week; she will have to find a replacement for me.”
“I will deal with Miss Mallard.”
“That you will not,” she said immediately, and when he gave her that look she was starting to become accustomed to, the one that suggested she was stepping out of line, she added, “Miss Mallard is entirely my business. You have no idea what I owe her, and I will not have you ordering her around.” And riding roughshod over her sensibilities.
“Ordering her around?” he echoed. “I do not order ladies around.”
He seemed so genuinely insulted that she had to stifle a laugh. “No, of course you don’t,” she agreed. He had no idea of how he appeared to others. “Nevertheless, I will be the one who speaks to Miss Mallard.”
He clearly didn’t like it, but after a moment he gave a brusque nod. “Very well, but whatever she says, the wedding will take place at the end of the week. And if she cuts up stiff about your leaving, you may refer her to me.” It sounded like a threat.
“Why, what would you do?”
“Make financial compensation for the loss of your services, of course.” The gray eyes narrowed. “What did you think I’d do?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter.” It wasn’t so much how she feared he might treat Miss Mallard, it was that she didn’t want him completely taking over her life. He was like the tide, sweeping everything and everyone before him. She needed to be a rock and hang on to the small piece of independence she had left.
She glanced out of the window again and took several deep, calming breaths. “Why must the wedding take place so quickly? You realize it will cause a great deal of talk.”
“What does that matter? It’s nobody else’s business,” he said impatiently. “As to why it must be soon, I believe I informed you that I have urgent business to attend to.”
She sighed. “Yes, your ‘important government business.’”
“Precisely. So the sooner everything is arranged, the sooner I can leave. Now, have we covered everything? Make whatever arrangements you want for the wedding—order whatever you want and have the bills sent to me. I’ve booked the abbey for next—”
“You booked the abbey? Already? You must have been very sure of my answer.” And Bath Abbey, instead of St. Swithins, where the Mallard community normally attended! It would be very grand. She supposed an earl would expect to be married in the grandest place possible.
He looked a little self-conscious but said gruffly, “I like to be organized.”
“And if I’d refused you?”
His brows rose at that, but he merely shrugged. “I would have canceled the booking.”
Or would he have gone off to find another hasty convenient bride? No doubt Bath was full of them—he’d only have to step into the Pump Room and lift his finger. But there was no point in pursuing that line of thought. She’d agreed to marry this man, and in so many respects it was everything she’d dreamed of as a girl. Almost.
If only the man himself were a little more . . .
Oh, he was as handsome a man as ever she’d dreamed of—handsome, and strong and powerful. But he was so . . . businesslike.
There wasn’t a romantic bone in the man’s body.
Though why she should dream of romance when she was six-and-twenty and should be beyond all that . . . They were schoolgirls’ dreams. Or spinsters’. Romantic and unrealistic. Pure fantasy.
He’d made it plain—more than plain—that this was a purely practical marriage. A job, no more, no less. And she had accepted the job.
She would no longer be a poor, unregarded schoolteacher, wholly dependent on the goodwill of her employer. She was going to be a titled lady—a countess!—with a home of her own and a family to care for. And since her husband would be somewhere on the Continent, Emm would be her own mistress. It was foolish to long for romance, pointless to dream of love. Security and independence were far more important.
She glanced up at him and caught him staring at her mouth, a dark intense stare that was almost like a touch. Warmth flooded her. Nervously she moistened her lips.
He looked up and met her gaze. His eyes were hard and gray and unreadable.
All the usual duties of a wife.
She shivered. In barely a week she would be married to this man. Her body would be his, to do with as he pleased.
Without a word, he held out his hand to her. Nervelessly she offered hers. As he had the previous day he enclosed her gloved hand in both of his, his grip sure and warm and firm. “It will be all right, I promise.”
Emm had no idea why that reassurance should rattle her more than anything, but it did.
* * *
“You are what?” Miss Mallard stared at Emm from over her pince-nez. She fumbled in her desk drawer, pulled out a vial of smelling salts and set it in front of her in an ominous warning. “Is this some frightful jest, Emmaline? Married? You? At your age?”
“I’m afraid it’s true, ma’am.”
Miss Mallard picked up the smelling salts and took a deep sniff. Her head jerked; she gasped, then blew violently into a lace-edged handkerchief. Emm, well versed in this ritual, passed her a glass of water.
The headmistress drank, then glared at her through streaming eyes. “How could you, Emmaline? After all I’ve done for you. You were to become headmistress after me!” Her head sank into her hands, and she moaned brokenly, “How sharper than a serpent’s
tooth . . . Oh, asp that pierces the bosom that has nurtured you all these years.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Emm murmured. Miss Mallard always did get her quotations mixed.
Miss Mallard took a deep breath, picked up her pince-nez, jammed them back on her nose and fixed Emm with a piercing glare. “And who, might I ask, is the blackguard who thinks to steal you away from me? Don’t tell me, it’s that dreadful old widower from church—the one who sent you flowers that time—I forget his name.”
“Mr. Bell, you mean? No, it’s not—”
“No, no, the other one. Short, fat and entirely bald. He has no fortune, you know. And a wandering eye.”
“No, it’s not Mr. Atkins, either.” Miss Mallard would hate the truth even more, Emm thought.
“Then who is it?”
Emm took a deep breath. “Lord Ashendon.”
There was a sudden shocked silence broken only by the sound of a pair of silver-rimmed pince-nez hitting the desk. Miss Mallard’s eyes almost popped from their sockets. She lifted the smelling salts, looked at them vaguely, as if unsure what they were, and put them down again. “Lord Ashendon?” she repeated in a failing voice.
“Yes, ma’am.”
There was a long silence. “Lord Ashendon, brother to the Rutherford girls?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“The man who was here the other day? I spoke to him. Tall, handsome, rich—that Lord Ashendon? He’s asked you to marry him?”
Emm nodded. “Yes, ma’am, and he wants the wedding to be next Tuesday. I’m afraid it’s very short notice, but Lord Ashendon is adamant.”
There was another long silence. Then, “For next Tuesday?” She gave Emm a sharp look. “You’re not in the family wa— No, of course not. There hasn’t been time. I take it you knew him from before.”
“No, ma’am. I never set eyes on him before last week.”
Miss Mallard blinked. “Good heavens!” She considered it for a moment, then said in a bracing voice, “Well, whatever his lordship’s reason for such a rush, he shall not find us wanting! Short notice indeed, but we shall prevail, I am determined. We’ll fire you off in style, my dear. I’ll speak to the vicar about the ceremony—”
“It’s not to be at St. Swithins. His lordship has booked the abbey.”
“The abbey?” Miss Mallard’s eyes gleamed. “Oh, excellent.” She pulled out a pad of paper and started to make a list. “New dresses for both of us, of course. Cancel your classes for today—for the rest of the week, in fact. Thwaites, Johnstone and Clegg can fill in for you. You and I will go at once to Madame Floria’s and order new dresses for the occasion. You cannot possibly marry Lord Ashendon in that old rag!”
Emm blinked. She hadn’t thought it was quite that shabby.
Miss Mallard scribbled on her notepad, muttering furiously. “Invitations must be sent out! Heavens! Tuesday next! We shall never get everything done. And flowers—at this time of the year they will have to be heavy on the greenery.”
She made another note. “The menu for the wedding breakfast—something elegant and delicious. Is it the right season for quails? I must consult Cook.”
Bemused, Emm said, “Ma’am? Are you perhaps, thinking of organizing the wedding? Because there’s really no need—”
Miss Mallard glanced up. “No need? What a foolish question, child. Of course there is.”
“But it’s to be a small, quiet wedding only.”
“Nonsense! You don’t think I’m going to let an opportunity like this pass, do you? Not only do the pupils of the Mallard Seminary marry well—we have three duchesses, two marchionesses, five countesses, six viscountesses and the rest”—she dismissed the lower titles with a wave—“even our teachers can marry earls!”
* * *
The days that followed disappeared in a whirl of activity. First came the visit to Madame Floria the dressmaker, who, once she heard whom Emm was to marry—and at the abbey, where no doubt the bishop would wed them—gladly and ruthlessly set aside her current orders and vowed she would have a most beautiful dress ready in time.
Emm then proceeded to disgust both Miss Mallard and Madame Floria by preferring a simple dress in sage green wool to their choice of silver tissue and lace.
“I don’t want anything fussy. It’s to be a quiet, practical wedding,” she told them. “Besides, I would rather be warm.”
“Nonsense, Emmaline. You’re to be a countess. His lordship might be impetuous in his haste to marry you, but you have a position to think of. You would not wish his lordship to be embarrassed by a drab bride, now would you? Of course not, so begin as you mean to go on.” Miss Mallard was determined Emm would make a splash, the dressmaker too.
In the end, they settled on a dress of cream silk, trimmed with lace and pearls simply cut, with puffed sleeves and topped—in a sop to what Miss Mallard called Emm’s ridiculous insistence on warmth; brides who were to become countesses apparently didn’t need to be warm—with a long-sleeved spencer in cream silk velvet, delicately ruched, with a high collar, and buttoned down the front with pearl buttons. And when Madame Floria produced a lovely cream shawl of silk and cashmere, it was pronounced to be perfect.
It was the most expensive clothing Emm had ever owned, and the most beautiful, and since all her other clothes were extremely plain, not to mention rather worn in places, Emm decided to take Lord Ashendon at his word and ordered a dress in the sage green wool as well and a warm pelisse in claret velvet. She had no idea where they were going after the wedding—to London, or to his family seat, wherever that was, or somewhere else, but green wool was far more practical for traveling than cream velvet.
And there was some wisdom in beginning as she meant to go on. She might feel like the beggar maid to his King Cophetua, but she’d be damned if she would dress like it.
On that thought she ordered another two dresses, and a pelisse in dark green with silver braiding à la hussar.
To the order she added chemises, petticoats and various other undergarments, as well as stockings and four nightgowns, two in cotton lawn and two in thick flannel. Her own nightgowns were well worn, mended and patched in places and not something she wished anyone to see, not even a maid, let alone her husband.
These she insisted on paying for herself. It was bad enough expecting Lord Ashendon to pay for her wedding dress, but just the thought of him perusing a bill for her undergarments caused her cheeks to heat.
Then there were shoes to purchase—and here Emm fell for a pair of cream kid slippers, not in the slightest bit practical but so sweet and pretty, and a dashing pair of red leather ankle boots.
After years of hoarding every penny, it was frighteningly easy to fall into a frenzy of shopping, but Emm did her best to control herself. When you were marrying a man for reasons unrelated to love, you didn’t want to begin the marriage by going on a spending spree with his money.
The days flew past. There were invitations to write, fittings at Madame Floria’s, consultations with Cook and local suppliers over the wedding breakfast menu and most nerve-racking of all, a visit to Lady Dorothea and the girls who would become her sisters-in-law and niece by marriage.
She’d assumed Lord Ashendon would be there to introduce her as his affianced bride, but he hadn’t yet returned from London.
Emm had had some idea that they might resent her marrying him—she knew perfectly well the world would judge it a most unequal match, and while she’d always gotten on well with Lady Dorothea and the girls, having a pleasant acquaintanceship with a schoolteacher was one thing; welcoming that same schoolteacher into your family was quite another. And having a nobody suddenly outranking you . . . well, she couldn’t blame them for resenting her.
But as it happened, the Rutherford ladies welcomed Emm warmly, only the girl called George hanging back, which was not surprising, since they’d never met. It didn’t take long for Emm to
realize that a good part of Rose and Lily’s delight was rooted in their determination to be bridesmaids, and she immediately invited all three girls to attend her at her wedding.
Rose and Lily accepted with joy. George demurred, but her youthful aunts insisted that she would soon get used to dresses and of course she would be a bridesmaid. Emm blinked at the references to not being used to dresses but supposed it would become clearer as she became better acquainted with the girl.
The girls immediately fell to discussing what they would wear and in what colors—apparently their late brother had forbidden the wearing of mourning black: the best thing he’d ever done for them, according to Lily. The only thing he’d ever done for them, Rose said.
Lady Dorothea smiled benignly on the girls and helped Emm compose a list of people on the groom’s side who needed to be invited. There weren’t many relatives, she assured Emm, and the short notice as well as the distance would ensure that few guests would attend.
“But don’t worry, Ashendon will give a ball to introduce you to everyone when you go to London,” she assured Emm.
Emm had her doubts. It seemed Lord Ashendon hadn’t informed his aunt of his plans to marry Emm and head off to the Continent post-haste. But if he hadn’t told Lady Dorothea, she wasn’t going to do it for him.
Back at Miss Mallard’s, the news had spread through the school like wildfire, and the girls’ excitement became almost a frenzy when Miss Mallard announced that the entire school would attend the wedding.
Everywhere Emm went she saw clusters of girls, whispering and giggling with, as often as not, Lavinia Fortescue-Brown at the center of each group. On further inquiry she learned that Lavinia was claiming she’d introduced the happy couple. Heaven knew what other tales she was telling—the girl had a very fertile imagination.
But when she summoned Lavinia and demanded to know what she had been telling the others, Lavinia’s answer floored her. “Your advice about not encouraging men, that they want what they can’t have, and being cool to them will only make them more eager—well, I didn’t really believe you at the time, but it was so right, wasn’t it, Miss Westwood? And you’re the proof!”