by Archer, Kate
Lord Penderton rubbed his chin. “So you say, there was a struggle in the garden, Sir John was there, planning to make off with Kitty, then the dandy Grayson proposes marriage?”
“Just so.”
“It cannot be right, though,” Lord Penderton said. “He is too stupid for Kitty. Remember? The book?”
“He is not stupid at all,” the baroness said. “He is different from Kitty. He has the soul of a poet and he reminds me of Frederick, without all the rule-making about what women should and should not know.”
“You mean, his feelings are easily hurt? God, I’ve tried to explain to Frederick backwards and forwards he must not take things so personally! Miss Crimpleton made one comment on his brown coat and he hasn’t worn it since.”
“What I mean, my dear husband, is Lord Grayson lives in his feelings as Frederick does. They are both romantics, they breathe poetry, and this will do for Kitty very well. When she has buried her nose in a book of dry facts too long, he will take her hand and pull her into the sunshine and fresh air.”
“Ah,” Lord Penderton said, considering. “Just as you pull me to the dining table.”
“Precisely.”
*
Kitty spent the weeks before her marriage assuring all and sundry that she was indeed betrothed to Lord Grayson. It seemed nobody could quite believe he had engaged himself.
Poor Penny was particularly turned upside down about it. It was she who had introduced Kitty to Sir John and she who had warned Kitty against Lord Grayson.
She wrote—How could I have been so wrong? Though, my dear Kitty, as I write that line it occurs to me that I should have known all along that I was wrong. I made such a muck-up of my own circumstance that I should have presumed myself the absolute worst matchmaker in the world. Now, I will have to like Lord Grayson, though I have been so used to condemning him. Though I suppose he has finally redeemed himself and so I must credit him with that. All I can say, my dear friend, is that if you are happy, then so am I.
Penny may have credited Lord Grayson with redeeming himself, but Lord Dalton certainly did not. Dalton was so enraged at the news that Lord Grayson thought it wise to decamp to Crackwilder’s apartment lest his friend do a violence to him. Mrs. Radish-Radeesh was convinced to give over a room and Grayson and LaRue spent an uncomfortable week together in it before the duke, his father, was convinced to release him some funds.
Much to society’s surprise, Miss Dell and Lord Grayson were indeed wed. They took a wedding trip to Sweden, and there Lord Grayson called upon some of his vague connections. One of those was Baron von Fersen, who was charmed by Kitty, though he remained annoyed with Grayson. He was somewhat mollified after hearing the story of Veritas. But not entirely.
In the end, they came home after a month, glad to leave all thought of Veritas behind. They settled in their new London house, their bedchamber a clear depiction of them both. Velvet and cushions and a tall bookshelf for Kitty. An enormous looking glass and one of the bookshelves given over to poetry and plays for Grayson. Even Miss Austen was given her own space on the shelf and Kitty secretly became enamored of Pride and Prejudice.
Kitty spent her mornings in bed, surrounded by her preferred books. As the day grew late, Lord Grayson would make his entrance as sharply composed as ever. He would pick out her dress, as Kitty herself could not be bothered with such things, and he would even direct poor Martha as she did her mistress’ hair.
Lady Grayson became something of a leader of fashion, though she did not spare much thought over it. Whatever her lord thought would suit she was happy to wear. Many a young girl recently come to town would daringly approach Lady Grayson for advice on this bonnet or that silk, only to find themselves floundering in a conversation about hemi-parasitic plants.
Lady Grayson pursued her endless thirst for knowledge, though the Royal Society never did admit women in her lifetime. Mr. Crackwilder was a great help in her pursuits, as he was promptly hired as Lady Grayson’s librarian. Mr. Lackington and Mrs. Herschel remained constant in their exchange of letters.
Though her exclusion from the society was an irritation for a time, Kitty finally hit upon an idea. She created her own society of learned women who met weekly during the season and wrote to each other in the summer. As Mrs. Herschel was an esteemed member, it was not too long before members of the Royal Society began petitioning to attend the various presentations put on by the ladies. That led to the “great trading of papers” in which gentlemen and ladies could communicate freely on their discoveries and conclusions. Mankind’s knowledge of how flies walked on walls was all the better for it.
Lord Grayson, to his credit, never lost his enthusiasm for listening to his wife as she explained some obscure fact, or pondered a new conclusion, or recapped the latest meeting of the Society of Women Intellectuals. He understood her perfectly well, though how long he retained any of this information might be a question for debate.
It mattered not, as it was not every day that their conversation centered on astronomy or botany or history or geology. There were many other days when Lord and Lady Grayson lounged before a cozy fire as the lord read to her from Shakespeare, Wordsworth, and Byron.
It was, in the end, as they liked it.
When children came, Kitty found herself perplexed over why they wept over some minor disappointment. She looked to her husband and he was always able to explain why a broken doll, or a marzipan dropped in the street, or a bedtime come too soon, was akin to the world ending.
Whenever the childhood drama reached a fever pitch, Lord Grayson would order that all the usual activities of the house were to stop instantly so that they might grieve the devastation properly. It might entail holding a somber funeral for a dead parakeet, or awarding a broken toy soldier a medal for bravery, or composing a poem that precisely captured the anguish over lost marbles, or a passionate speech condemning the sun for setting too soon.
That these impromptu events caused no end of late dinners and missed appointments mattered little, as Lord Grayson was late to everything anyway. LaRue went on just as temperamental as ever, and even more temperamental when the lord came back upstairs, having just ruined the folds of his cloth during a romp with his children. The children, themselves, were vastly entertained by the valet’s loud condemnations in French and often competed on who might playact the closest imitation. When they were not making fun of the lord’s valet, they entertained themselves with their parents’ interests. Should an eyelash fall, it would be carefully collected and examined under the microscope. Should the rain come down in buckets, a play might be put on to glory in the moods of Mother Nature.
Lord and Lady Grayson were, in the end, of equal intelligence and different interests. Lady Grayson might contemplate the architecture of the house, but it was Lord Grayson who was the beating heart of it.
That he made his wife’s heart beat faster was all the better.
The End.
About the Author
By the time I was eleven, my Irish Nana and I had formed a book club of sorts. On a timetable only known to herself, Nana would grab her blackthorn walking stick and steam down to the local Woolworth’s. There, she would buy the latest Barbara Cartland romance, hurry home to read it accompanied by viciously strong wine, (Wild Irish Rose, if you’re wondering) and then pass the book on to me. Though I was not particularly interested in real boys yet, I was very interested in the gentlemen in those stories—daring, bold, and often enraging and unaccountable. After my Barbara Cartland phase, I went on to Georgette Heyer, Jane Austen and so many other gifted authors blessed with the ability to bring the Georgian and Regency eras to life.
I would like nothing more than to time travel back to the Regency (and time travel back to my twenties as long as we’re going somewhere) to take my chances at a ball. Who would take the first? Who would escort me into supper? What sort of meaningful looks would be exchanged? I would hope, having made the trip, to encounter a gentleman who would give me a very hard time. He ought to be vexatio
us in the extreme, and worth every vexation, to make the journey worthwhile.
I most likely won’t be able to work out the time travel gambit, so I will content myself with writing stories of adventure and romance in my beloved time period. There are lives to be created, marvelous gowns to wear, jewels to don, instant attractions that inevitably come with a difficulty, and hearts to break before putting them back together again. In traditional Regency fashion, my stories are clean—the action happens in a drawing room, rather than a bedroom.
As I muse over what will happen next to my H and h, and wish I were there with them, I will occasionally remind myself that it’s also nice to have a microwave, Netflix, cheese popcorn, and steaming hot showers.
Come see me on Facebook! @KateArcherAuthor