by Joan Wolf
Those words again, I thought.
Once more Anna whispered something and the sound of her voice steadied me.
I repeated my part after Philip and then he took my hand into his and slipped a circle of plain gold upon my finger.
The familiar shock went through me at his touch.
The nasal voice informed the small gathering of people that we were now man and wife, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Philip leaned down and kissed me chastely upon my cheek.
The shock went through me again.
Philip and I signed the marriage register, then Catherine and Philip’s groomsman signed as witnesses. A few moments later, I found myself following Lady Winterdale up the great staircase to the second floor, where the wedding breakfast was to be served.
Anna crowded in beside me. “Are you married now, Georgie?” she wanted to know.
“Yes,” I said numbly. “I rather think that I am.”
Lady Winterdale, in her usual lavish fashion when she was spending her nephew’s money, had ordered a splendid wedding breakfast. There was an array of fruits and cakes and tartes, as well as more substantial dishes like ham and turkey and lobster. Champagne flowed, and the wedding cake was laid out upon a table between the two front windows, waiting for me to cut it.
I couldn’t eat a thing. I talked to Lady Jersey, or rather she talked to me, and I tried not to resent the way her curious eyes darted back and forth between me and Philip, as if she was trying to visualize the wanton acts that had brought about our unlikely union.
Lady Castlereagh, who was known for her arrogance, was surprisingly pleasant to me, talking rather didactically about the paintings she had seen the day before at the Royal Academy.
My new husband and the gentleman who had been his groomsman, a middle-aged, fair-haired man whom I had never seen before and whom Philip had introduced as Captain Thomas Greene, talked with Lord Castlereagh.
Anna ate a great deal of cake.
It was a little past noon when our guests took their departure. We had decided earlier in the week to leave right after the wedding for Winterdale Park. Neither Philip nor I had come right out and articulated our reasons for this decision, but I knew that I did not wish to spend the first night of my marriage under the same roof as Lady Winterdale, and I suspected that Philip felt the same.
The rain had ceased by the time we were ready to leave, but the sky was still heavily overcast. We were using three carriages to transport us into Surrey: the big coach was carrying all of our baggage as well as Betty and Philip’s valet; the town chaise was carrying Anna and Nanny and me; and Philip was driving the phaeton.
Nanny stared at me as the chaise pulled away from in front of Mansfield House, worry in her little raisin-dark eyes.
“You don’t need to ride with us, Miss Georgiana,” she said. “Anna will be fine with me. If you wish to ride with his lordship, then you do that. You can always come back into the chaise if it comes on to rain.”
I did not want to tell her that I had not been invited to ride with my husband, so I said merely, “I shall have plenty of opportunity to be with his lordship, Nanny, and I really do not desire to get my new pelisse wet should it begin to rain suddenly.”
The worry did not leave Nanny’s eyes. She knew very well that I did not care about getting wet.
We left London at two in the afternoon and it was after six by the time we arrived at Winterdale Park near Guildford in Surrey. I had been prepared by Catherine for what I would see, but even with the warning, my first sight of my new home was startling.
Winterdale Park looked like it should be sitting on the corner of a Venetian piazza, not in the middle of the English countryside. Catherine had told me that the present house had been built by her great-great-grandfather to replace the Elizabethan house that had formerly stood upon the site. Her ancestor had been in love with Italian architecture, she had said, and so he had imported the Venetian architect, Giacomo Leoni, to build his new house for him.
“Lord-a-mercy,” Nanny squawked as we rolled down the drive and pulled up in front of the mansion’s main entrance. The house itself was built of very red brick, but the entrance front was a central pedimented section done in stone, which stood out starkly against the red brick on either side. “This house looks foreign,” was Nanny’s disapproving comment.
“It was built by an Italian,” I told her.
Nanny scowled. She didn’t hold with Italians.
Lord Winterdale—Philip!—had given the reins of his horses to one of the footmen, who had come out of the house to greet us, and now he came to open the door of the chaise so that we could alight.
Anna got out first and looked around shyly. Winterdale Park was a much larger, much grander house than anything she had ever seen before.
“It’s so big,” she said to Philip in a very small voice.
“I know,” he returned gently. “But Catherine tells me that there is a very pretty apartment in the back of the house looking out on the gardens that you and Nanny will like very much. The gardens are very pretty as well, and you will be able to watch your donkey grazing on the lawn.”
The mention of the donkey perked her up considerably.
I thought of what he had just said—Catherine tells me there is an apartment.
He must be almost a stranger to Winterdale Park himself, I thought. He should have grown up here, he should have had the normal life that a boy of his class expected to lead. That life hadn’t happened, however. At the age of eight he had been cast out into the ugly world of gambling hells and loose women.
What kind of moral guidance had he had? I wondered. Exactly how ruthless was he capable of being? I knew that he had wanted revenge on his aunt, and he had certainly been willing to pay a huge amount of money to get it.
Yet he was kind to Anna.
I didn’t know him at all, and I had just irrevocably tied my life to his. It was a distinctly sobering thought.
* * *
Philip had sent his steward, Mr. Downs, ahead of us to Winterdale Park in order to make certain that all was in readiness for our arrival. Upon Philip’s orders we were spared the traditional lineup of servants on the front steps, but Mr. Downs met us in the front hall along with the butler, Clandon, and the housekeeper, Mrs. Frome.
I spoke civilly to the two chief servants of the house, but when I went to introduce Anna I could barely get her attention she was so busy staring at her surroundings.
The magnificent formal marble entrance hall of Winterdale Park rose through two stories, with an array of classical statues set in niches on the first-floor level. The architecture was definitely Mediterranean in spirit, with the white walls and white plasterwork ceiling, the marble floor and intricately carved marble chimneypieces over two fireplaces all contributing to an impression of light and space.
One felt that if one stepped outside, one would see the canals of Venice, not the misty green verdure of England.
Mrs. Frome, the housekeeper, spoke to me. “Would you like me to show you to your room, my lady? Or would you like a tour of the house?”
“I think we will go to our rooms first, Mrs. Frome,” I said.
“Certainly, my lady. And when would you like dinner served?”
Being called by a title was making me feel very strange, and instinctively my eyes went to Philip. “When would you like to eat, my lord?” I asked.
“Seven,” he said decisively.
I turned back to Mrs. Frome. “Seven,” I repeated.
“Very well, my lady. Now, if you will come with me, I will be happy to show you to your rooms.”
“You ladies go along with Mrs. Frome,” Philip said easily. “I want a word with Downs here first.”
Obediently, the three of us trailed off after Mrs. Frome, down the great hall, past a vast marble-floored room that looked like a grand saloon from an Italian palazzo, to the grand marble staircase that went up to the second story.
When we reache
d the bottom of the stairs, the housekeeper said, “Would you like me to take you to your own apartment first, my lady? As his lordship requested, I have put Miss Anna and Mrs. Pedigrew upstairs on the third floor.”
I said firmly, “I would like to see Miss Anna’s apartment first.”
The housekeeper’s face was inscrutable. “Certainly, my lady.”
The three of us followed her upstairs in silence. Anna looked worried, and I knew the size and magnificence of the house was intimidating her.
We reached the third floor. “The nursery faces the front of the house,” Mrs. Frome said, gesturing to her right. She turned the other way, however, and went along the passageway to her left. She stopped in front of a door toward the end of the corridor, and held it wide for us to precede her in.
The first thing I saw was a simple red brick fireplace with a white wood mantel. There was a picture of a King Charles spaniel hanging over the mantel. I looked around and saw that we were in a sitting room. The walls were painted a pale yellow and the chinz-covered furniture looked old and worn and comfortable.
Anna immediately went to look at the picture of the dog.
“There is a bedroom and a dressing room as well,” Mrs. Frome said. “Mr. Downs had me change the dressing room into a bedroom for Mrs. Pedigrew.”
She walked to the partially opened door that led off the sitting room, and I went to look in.
The bedroom was as large as the sitting room and was furnished as cozily. The apartment was at the end of the house, and the two tall bedroom windows, which were framed by plain white muslin drapes, looked out on the terrace and the garden.
The view was spectacular.
At the very moment that I looked out the window, the sun came out for the first time all day. It glinted off an ornamental lake in the middle of the park and made the grass sparkle as if a million diamonds were sprinkled among it.
Anna said from behind me, “I like these rooms, Georgie. They’re pretty.”
“They used to belong to Lady Catherine,” Mrs. Frome said.
I swung around, and for the first time I noticed the chest piled with music in the corner of the room.
“Do you think Catherine will mind if I use her rooms?” Anna asked me worriedly.
I shook my head. “It was Catherine who told Philip that you should have them,” I said.
Anna’s brow smoothed out.
I left her gazing out the windows and went to look into the room that was to be Nanny’s bedroom. It, too, was a very decent size and looked very comfortable.
Nanny and I stood together in the sitting-room doorway and regarded Anna’s back. “What do you think?” I asked in a low voice.
“I think these will suit us very well, Miss Georgiana,” Nanny answered decisively. “Anna will be away from the noise and bustle of the second floor if you and his lordship are entertaining, and when you have children, they will be right down the passageway, which she will like very much.”
These images of my future married life seemed utterly foreign to me, but I didn’t dare say that to Nanny.
“That’s true,” I managed to mutter weakly. I forced a smile. “Well, I will leave you to help Anna change her dress,” I said. “His lordship bespoke dinner for seven.”
“It’s your wedding day, Miss Georgiana,” Nanny said bluntly. “Miss Anna can eat her dinner upstairs tonight.” She looked at Mrs. Frome for confirmation.
The housekeeper’s stoic expression never changed. “I can most certainly arrange to have Miss Anna’s dinner brought upstairs,” she said.
I didn’t want Anna to eat her dinner upstairs. I didn’t want to be left alone with my husband. I didn’t have the vaguest notion of what we could talk about.
I also knew that I could hardly admit that this was the case to either Nanny or the housekeeper.
I said weakly, “If you are sure that it will be no trouble, Mrs. Frome.”
The housekeeper looked at me. Her eyes were the color of pewter and she had a large flesh-colored mole on the side of her nose. “It will be no trouble, my lady, I assure you,” she said.
I realized that I was not sounding very much like a countess and I stuck my chin in the air. “Very well. Then perhaps you will show me to my own rooms,” I said.
“Certainly, my lady,” the housekeeper said. She moved toward the door.
“I’m going now, darling,” I called to Anna. “They are going to bring you your dinner up here, and I will see you in the morning.”
She swung around, her face puckered, her mouth open, ready to protest, but before she could say a word, a small King Charles spaniel came racing in the door, yipping hysterically.
“Snowball!” Anna cried, dropping to her knees and holding out her arms. The dog leaped into them.
I looked at the young footman who was standing in the doorway. “His lordship told me to bring him up,” he said to me.
I smiled. “Thank you. What is your name?”
“Alfred, my lady.”
“Thank you, Alfred.”
Nanny said to me in a low voice, “Go now, Miss Georgiana, while she is distracted by the dog.”
I nodded and went quietly out the door with the housekeeper.
We did not return to the main staircase but instead went down a small set of stairs that was just outside of Anna’s apartment. I had thought that the earl’s apartments would be on the second floor with the other bedrooms, like they were at home, but Mrs. Frome took me all the way down to the first floor instead.
The earl’s apartments were at the back of the house, facing the gardens like Anna’s, although they were far bigger and more sumptuous than hers. There was one bedroom, with a four-poster bed and matching chairs that Mrs. Frome told me proudly had been made for the earl who lived during the reign of King James. Three tall windows draped with green-and-gold silk looked out upon the magnificent view. Above the white-marble fireplace hung a landscape of a Venetian canal.
Two doors opened off the bedroom.
“This is the door to your dressing room,” Mrs. Frome told me, moving toward the door on the left wall. “The other door leads to his lordship’s.”
Reluctantly, I followed her into the room that for over twenty years had been the domain of Lady Winterdale. I hadn’t at all minded putting Anna into Catherine’s rooms, but I found that I did mind following in the place of Philip’s aunt.
Betty was waiting for me, and her familiar face helped to cheer me up. I talked to her in an artificially animated way all the time that she helped me to change my clothes.
Talking helped me to keep from dwelling on the fact that this house apparently had only one bedroom for the master and the mistress, not two.
The dressing room had a cheval glass, which I glanced into briefly before I went out into the passageway. I was relieved to see that my inner turmoil did not appear to show on my face.
Nervously, I smoothed down my golden-silk evening dress and prepared to face my husband over the dining-room table.
A footman was waiting outside my apartment to escort me to the drawing room. He told me that a number of the rooms on the ground floor had been put aside for the use of the family, and that dinner was to be served in the place he called the morning room. I was ineffably relieved to hear that I was going to be spared the feeling that I was dining in an Italian palace.
Philip was waiting for me in a small anteroom which was decorated with three gilded mirrors and one yellow-silk sofa and two chairs. He did not smile when he saw me.
“Is Anna joining us?” he asked.
“No. Nanny said that it would be better if she ate her dinner upstairs tonight.”
His eyebrows lifted slightly. Then he said, “The morning room is next door.” He came over to me and formally offered me his arm. I rested my hand on it with extreme tentativeness and together we walked into a room that was fully as large as our formal dining room at home in Weldon Hall.
Philip held my chair for me and I took my seat at one end of the p
olished mahogany table. In the light of the chandelier, Philip’s neckcloth looked as white as snow, his eyes as blue as sapphires, his hair as dark as midnight.
There was a lump in my chest that felt as big as a fist.
The soup came in and was put in front of me. I was terribly conscious of the footmen standing at the sideboard.
We can’t sit through this entire meal in silence, I thought desperately. I have to say something.
I couldn’t think of a thing.
In a perfectly ordinary voice, Philip said, “How on earth did that dog come to be given the name of Snowball?”
I was so surprised by the question, and so relieved by its normality, that I actually managed a little laugh. By the time I had finished recounting the story of Snowball, the lump had subsided from my chest, and I had managed to eat my soup.
After dinner was over, I left Philip to drink his port in correct, masculine solitude. Instead of returning to the small anteroom next to the morning room, however, I was conducted by Mrs. Frome to a room she referred to as the green drawing room. This was a large and magnificent room on the family side of the first floor. The walls of the green drawing room were appropriately hung with green silk and an immense Turkish rug covered its polished wood floor. It had French doors that led out onto a terrace that overlooked one of the flower gardens. The scent of roses came once more to my nostrils.
In spite of all this aforementioned splendor, however, what struck the eye the moment one entered the room were two elegant fragile figures of cranes with gilded feathers that were perched on a satinwood table in the middle of the room. When I commented upon them, Mrs. Frome informed me that they were Chinese pieces imported by the late earl’s father.
“They’re beautiful,” I said reverently.
I actually saw a slight smile on her face as she nodded in agreement. “Would you like me to have some tea brought to you, my lady?” she asked.
“No, thank you, Mrs. Frome.” I looked around the room once more. It was filled with lovely pieces of furniture, and several more Chinese figures of birds rested on the mantelpiece, but there was no musical instrument.