A Rather Charming Invitation

by C. A. Belmond

  “Very sporting of him,” Jeremy said, pretending to consider Guy’s sacrificial offer. I lifted my tea spoon menacingly over his knuckles. Jeremy said quietly, “Yes, I’ll give Guy a call.”

  “Good,” I said. “And make sure you mean it.”

  “You are becoming a bit of a bossy-boots yourself,” Jeremy remarked.

  “Humph,” I said. “When you’re done, let me talk to Guy. I’d like to ask him if he’ll transport that lovely clock he gave us back to London, after the wedding. When we return from our honeymoon, I want to walk into the townhouse and see that beauty, right there on the mantel, waiting for us.”

  “You won’t walk,” Jeremy said gallantly. “I shall carry you over the threshold.”

  He picked up the day’s newspaper from London, which had been lying on the table untouched, as we’d both been too busy to even glance at it. “Wow,” he said, “you don’t have to worry about seeing Parker Drake behind every tree and shrub. Looks like his lucky streak is at an end.”

  He held the paper aloft, so that I could see a headline:

  MULTI-BILLIONAIRE ADVENTURER UNDER

  INVESTIGATION FOR TAX FRAUD

  “Drake appears to be in serious trouble,” Jeremy said, scanning the article rapidly. “Among other things, he has secret bank accounts in tax-dodging havens,” he reported. “Not so secret anymore. Apparently he’s been moving money all over the world. This is a big deal.” Jeremy looked up and said, “Well, he made one big mistake.”

  “Tangling with the firm of Nichols & Laidley?” I suggested.

  “True enough,” Jeremy grinned. “But I was referring to his divorce. Tina’s suing him, so he tried to pretend he had less money in his personal holdings, to shaft her on the alimony. That was stupid. He should have given her what she wanted, just to keep her quiet.”

  “What did she want?” I asked.

  “Among other things, the yacht,” Jeremy said. “She knew where to sock it to him. He cried poverty, as only a billionaire can, and this infuriated her. You know what they say: ‘Hell hath no fury . . .’”

  “Like a woman who’s had her favorite necklace bandied about in a card game,” I concluded.

  Jeremy looked up, then said thoughtfully, “You know what this means? Drake won’t be able to bid on the Lunaire gold at auction.”

  Oncle Philippe was selling some, but not all, of the coins. The experts had already assessed the Lunaire gold to be worth nearly $500,000 per coin . . . and it was expected to go even higher at auction. “It is definitely not a good time for Drake to conspicuously throw money around,” Jeremy explained. “So I guess that means the museums and his rival collectors will get the lot.”

  “You forgot Rollo,” I reminded him. “I thought it was sweet of Oncle Philippe to let Rollo have one.”

  “Yes, it was,” Jeremy chuckled. “It seems right, somehow, that there won’t be just one person hoarding all those coins. You know, I believe that’s what Drake really craved—the glory of being the guy who discovered—and was the sole owner—of the Lunaire gold.”

  I thought about Drake and his painstakingly labelled coin collection in his office at the chalet in Geneva. “I actually almost feel sorry for him,” I said, shaking my head.

  “I don’t,” Jeremy responded. “That jerk nearly ruined our relations with your relations.”

  “Drake spurred us on to find that dowry,” I reminded him. I couldn’t help seeing everything in mythological terms now, where even ogres have a valuable role to play in the hero’s adventure. “You might say it’s thanks to Drake that Philippe doesn’t have to sell off his flower fields,” I pointed out.

  “No, it’s thanks to you,” Jeremy said. “And Honorine doesn’t have to get rushed into marriage. She’s got plenty of time to fall in love now.”

  “Er, slight new development on that horizon,” I said. Jeremy raised his eyebrows. “It would seem,” I said, “that Honorine is faced with a dilemma. She has two suitors. And both are lawyers. She told me this morning.”

  “Two?” Jeremy said, puzzled.

  “One is Charles. Apparently, he’s redeemed himself—somewhat—by having been so willing to help her do all that Lunaire research. She now admits that he may have ‘potential’.”

  “So, who’s the other lawyer?” Jeremy asked, amused.

  “Rupert,” I replied.

  “Rupert? Why, that little snake in the grass!” Jeremy exclaimed. He mulled this over. “I had no idea an office romance was in the making, did you?”

  I smiled wisely. “So,” I said, “when I asked her which guy she favored, she gave me one of those shrugs, and said, ‘Well, of course, I like both Charles and Rupert. It’s très difficile. I can’t quite decide’.”

  “You sound just like her,” Jeremy said.

  And at that moment, Honorine came driving up in Jeremy’s car, for she had gone to the airport to pick up my folks, who’d just arrived from the States. I heard their excited voices as they came in the front door. Minutes later, Honorine appeared at the patio doorway.

  “Your parents are here!” she exclaimed breathlessly. “Your father went straight into the kitchen, because he has a whole suitcase full of cookbooks and recipes for the wedding!”

  “I’d better go see him,” I said, but before I could rise, Honorine put her hand on my arm to detain me a moment. She sat down with us, and took a deep breath, as if bucking up her courage.

  “Something on your mind?” Jeremy inquired.

  “Chère Penny and Jeremy, I hope you will not be offended by what I have to say,” she announced worriedly.

  “What?” I asked.

  She paused, then took the plunge. “I must say—I quit!” Another pause, and then, very excited now, she blurted out, “Because, you see, I am going to perfume school.”

  “Wow!” I said. “Does that mean you passed that fragrance test?” She nodded. “Great!” I said. “Hey, maybe you’ll turn out to be a real Nose.”

  “I’m willing to bet on that one,” Jeremy commented.

  “Who knows?” Honorine said. “But anyway, I had a long talk with Papa, and I might want to participate in running the family perfume business,” she said, very correct and formally; but then she added, rather slyly, “I could still travel all around the world, looking for new scents! I may even someday start my own line for the company.”

  “Ah,” said Jeremy, and we both suppressed a smile, imagining that David would be getting quite a bit more help than he’d ever imagined. Honorine, as if reading our thoughts, giggled.

  “I’ve been doing some research of my own, just like you do,” she confided. “I believe the wave of the future is to start a high-end boutique line that specializes in being green, au naturel, herbal, organic, and made of local, heirloom ingredients with handmade, traditional methods. Papa is of course delighted, but first I will learn not only about scent, but to make a business plan for my ‘experiment’.”

  “Oh, that sounds wonderful!” I exclaimed.

  “Now, I must ask you some- zing,” she said, her brow puckered with genuine concern. “And please answer me truthfully. Will you and Jeremy be able to manage without me this winter?”

  I tried not to breathe a sigh of relief. “Honorine,” I said, “there’s one thing I’ve learned. Never fight with destiny. You must follow your star.”

  We all went into the kitchen, where my father was already on the telephone, talking rapidly in French to the chefs at the restaurant of the pretty hotel where our guests would be staying. One of these chefs was a pal from Dad’s cooking days. Dad would supervise all the food preparation, and the cake.

  “Darling!” my mother cried as I kissed her cheek, “your father has absolutely exhausted me with this wedding-feast talk, all the way over on the plane. I am in desperate need of a nice gin-and-tonic!”

  “Right away,” Jeremy promised. My father hung up, beaming, and I hugged him.

  “The chefs are sending someone over here with samples of the appetizer,” my father a
nnounced. “We must all taste them, so don’t anybody budge from this house!”

  Honorine gazed at my parents with frank fascination, and now she grinned at me, as if to say, Well, this explains you!

  My mother wandered out into the drawing room, drink in hand, and stood in front of the tapestry, which had been re-hung there, only just today. I followed her.

  “Now I understand all the fuss,” she said enigmatically to me. “It looks just like you.”

  “It scared me, at first,” I admitted.

  “Why, naturally, darling,” she said. “If it were easy, anyone could do it.”

  “Do what?” I asked. “Get married? Everyone does do it.”

  “Not the way a serious girl like you does,” she said, with that mysterious knowing attitude that mothers have.

  “Mom,” I said. “This is it. If you’ve got any advice for your little bride-daughter, do it now.”

  I expected one of her vague, airy responses that she gives whenever things get too personal for her. But she turned to me, her eyes suspiciously bright, and said, “Oh, sweetheart, I always knew you’d be just fine. But, remember that how you speak to a man is as important as what you actually say. Take some breaks during the day so that you’re not overtired and cranky when you see each other. And always let him know, with your voice, that you love him. And darling, if ever something happens that seems too much to bear, to either one of you, then see that you come home to us and take some shelter. Both of you. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Your father told me to tell you this.”

  I had tears welling up in my eyes that now spilled over, down my cheeks. My mother handed me her handkerchief. “Well,” she said briskly, resuming her usual aplomb, “I’d better go and unpack, before I fall asleep standing up.”

  When Honorine found me later, I was still sniffling a bit. She looked slightly alarmed.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “Everything’s fine.”

  “It better be,” she said. “Otherwise Maman will tell me it’s all my fault.”

  At my puzzled look she said, “Oh, yes, you know, when the tapestry disappeared and everyone was yelling at you, and it nearly ruined your wedding, she said to me, ‘This is what comes of you showing up on her doorstep and making trouble for her.’ So, you see, I had to make sure you made it to the altar.”

  “Well, you were kind of like a little rabbit who led us down the rabbit hole,” I teased her.

  Honorine smiled, then showed me why she had been looking for me. “Tante Venetia sent this, so you would have ‘something blue’,” she whispered, handing me a satin-covered box. “She regrets that she cannot travel these days.”

  Inside the box was a blue silk garter, studded with pink satin hearts that had little pink and blue gems twinkling in them. “They’re sapphires,” Honorine told me. “They are quite good, but honestly, you don’t have to wear it, if you don’t want to.”

  “Are you kidding?” I said. “Pass up a magic charm for my wedding day? Not a chance.”

  Chapter Forty-six

  After weeks of stifling hot weather, Nature saw fit to send us a storm of near hurricane force. The power blew out for a couple of hours, but, mercifully, the generators kicked in. We were on a countdown of mere days before the wedding, and everyone was running about in a state of high- strung nervous excitement. Celeste arrived each morning, glaring at the sky, announcing that the weather had come from some other, ill- bred country—Spain or Russia, for instance. Each day she did her chores and then, in the afternoon, when ready to depart, she cast another baleful look at the sky, as if to warn it against further disruptions. Day after day, however, we faced more wind and rain; and one day, the airport at Nice was closed, with traffic redirected to Paris.

  “Trust in Nature, eh?” I wailed to Honorine. “You and your Rousseau!”

  “Never mind,” my father assured me. “It can’t last, and when it’s done, the air will be more pure and clean that you ever saw. It will help you keep your head when you take your vows.”

  I thought he was just trying to keep me from throwing a full-scale bridal fit, but as it turned out, Dad was right. The day before the wedding, the sky and sea were suddenly becalmed, and the air was fresh and invigorating. The sun had not yet peeped out, but I saw patches of blue breaking up the layer of cloud cover. Here’s what a newspaper reported about that day:

  TRAIN BLEU REVIVED AS AMERICAN HEIRESS WEDS ENGLISH LAWYER

  International guests climb aboard private train for pre-wedding gala

  Destination French Riviera

  THE PRE-CEREMONY FESTIVITIES for the wedding of multimillionairess Miss Penny Nichols to Mr. Jeremy Laidley commenced in London this morning, as English guests of the happy couple boarded the high-speed Eurostar train at St. Pancras Station in London. We zipped across the English Channel at a hundred eighty-six miles per hour, while enjoying a spectacular brunch hosted by the groom’s grandmother. And was the champagne flowing!

  It was Paris by midday, where another high-speed choo-choo awaited us at the Gare de Lyon, this one dubbed the “Nichols-Laidley Express”. Here the English guests were joined by the French and American friends and family of the bride and groom. All were escorted onto specially commissioned private cars, decked out with vintage accoutrements from the old Orient Express, Pullman and Train Bleu collections, which, to this reporter’s mind, were so authentic that it made one want to light up a pipe, and solve a mystery!

  I did do a bit of sleuthing, and discovered that all the exquisite silverware, delicate linen tablecloths, fringed lamps, and period artwork were, in fact, donated by the guests themselves, in lieu of wedding presents. What a great idea! All such furnishings will be donated to Women 4Water, the bride’s favorite charity. Will the bride set a trend among the socially conscious well-heeled? Quite possibly, since the president of Women4Water has reported that the charity’s phone and e-mail lines have been jammed with offers of donations, from more folks who wish to participate in this excellent international drive to restore clean drinking water to all the world’s children, and to promote healthy seas for the planet.

  Now, I don’t have to tell you which direction this new incarnation of the old train bleu was pointed—south, south, South of France. As the train pulled away from Paris, the party was already in full swing. Guests were fêted with fine sauvignon blanc wine and a sumptuous luncheon of roast quail on a bed of delicate herb-infused rice, with hearts of palm. Mmmm!

  And, oh that scenery! A casual look out the window revealed a panorama of changing vistas across the lush and verdant French countryside, with its ancient castles, rolling farms, stunning forests, breathtaking mountains, and the gorges and rivers that the train traversed on magnificent viaducts spanning the sky . . . Ah, a feast for all the senses.

  And, the band played on! Somewhere south of Lyon, the singing began, with an impromptu Cole Porter duet by American guests “Erik and Tim”. Not to be outdone, this was answered with a Noel Coward ditty by the groom’s mother’s English beau—one Guy Ansley. Spontaneous applause ensued for all performers. After that, it was fun, fun, fun to the strains of music spanning the entire twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

  Arriving in Cannes at 6:45 P.M., the last wedding guests boarded the train, these being the French family of the bride . . . Fourteen minutes later, the train pulled into the station at Antibes, where guests were brought to a luxury boutique hotel on the gorgeous Côte d’Azur, for a supper under the stars, poolside.

  Tomorrow, the nuptials take place at noon, at the private Riviera villa of the happy couple. But keep an eye out for the young bride and groom, because, word is that they will be sneaking off for the honeymoon aboard their vintage yacht known as “Penelope’s Dream”, which will bear them away to . . . where? Glamorous “parts unknown”. . .

  I put the clipping in my wedding scrapbook. By all accounts, this dispatch from the bridal train was fairly accurate, for many of our guests later confided to Jeremy and me that the party atmosphere on the gussie
d-up train was elegant and irresistible, and that even the haughty Margery joined in the singing and dancing. I kept a pair of dinner plates from the event. They say, Nichols-Laidley Express on them, with the letters shaped to resemble a cute little train, roaring down the track along the coastline.

  Chapter Forty-seven

  Penny Nichols

  and

  Jeremy Laidley

  request the pleasure of your company

  on their wedding day . . .

  The morning dawned sunny and crystal clear, as if someone had taken a chamois cloth and polished the sea and sky, specially for us. I woke early, with the soft sunlight streaming into the room, gently nudging me to rise; yet Jeremy, apparently, had awakened even ahead of me. He was not in the room when I first stirred, but soon there was a knock at the door. When I opened it, he entered with a formal attitude, carrying a breakfast tray.

  “Hi,” Jeremy whispered, setting the tray on the bed. “Nobody else is up yet. Just us. I made breakfast,” he said, lifting a cover off a plate. “Now, your father told me that you love scrambled eggs. He also says that ‘Anybody can cook gourmet, but only a real chef can scramble an egg’. We shall see.”

  Jeremy scooped up a little on a fork, and carried it to my lips. I tasted it, as he waited.

  “Mmmm . . . Parfait,” I said softly. He opened a bottle of chilled champagne he’d stolen from the cellar. Then he poured it into two little glasses, and sat beside me, and we drank a toast to the day.

  For a while, we just sat there, leaning against the pillows, gazing out the open window, watching the sun rising, listening to the birds singing about the day.