The Wedding

by Edith Layton

  Crispin blinked as she continued quickly, “So if it’s all the same to you, I would like to talk about getting out of this. But if you offer me money or insult me again, I’ll stay married to you! See if I don’t.”

  This was so clearly a threat that Crispin found himself beginning to believe her.

  “So what do you suggest we do?” the earl asked pleasantly.

  “Why, I don’t know,” she said in surprise. “I thought you did. I mean, you were willing to offer me money to go away, so I assumed you had a plan. I should think we could just do the same thing, only without giving me the money.”

  Both men sat still. The earl gazed at his plate with interest. Crispin looked at her in silence.

  “You didn’t mean that I should just go away, so you could marry in peace!” she said with a gasp. “How could I leave it at that? I’d never be at peace, nor would I be able to marry. I do want to marry someday. It may be fine for noblemen to commit bigamy, but I assure you, to the people I associate with, it is not. Or, at least,” she added, irresistibly honest, as usual, “to the people I hope to be associating with, it is not.”

  “It is not precisely ‘fine’ for people of our rank, either, I assure you,” the earl said with a little smile, staring at Dulcie in fascination.

  She was tousled and badly dressed, but the immaculate earl was looking beyond that. Dulcie Blessing’s odd topaz eyes gleamed with intelligence, her honey-colored hair shone in the sunlight, her complexion was smooth, her mouth sweet and full of promise. The earl was tall and bony, with an angular face that even his best friend would never call more than pleasant. Still, Wrede was acknowledged to be an excellent judge of women, and he clearly found this girl to be as interesting and diverting as his friend’s predicament was.

  “What did you expect me to do?” Dulcie asked in exasperation. “Was I supposed to simply disappear after you paid me? I’m not a papist, so I can’t go to a nunnery. Did you expect me to simply vanish off the face of the earth?” she asked. Then all the light left her face. Her hand flew to her lips and she looked at them with widened eyes, as the worst possibility came to her.

  But since her expression was as transparent as her horror was, both men knew exactly what had occurred to her the moment it did.

  “No. I wasn’t thinking of murder,” Crispin said in annoyance.

  “Yes, you were,” she breathed.

  “Last night I was thinking of stuffing you in a trash heap, but I didn’t do that, did I?” he retorted. “I don’t do everything I think of. Do you? Yes, I was furious with you, but no, I do not go around killing people who make me angry. Murder is definitely not in my plans. I suppose I did expect you to simply vanish, but if the marriage papers vanished, too, what would it matter if you really vanished or only disappeared from my life?”

  “Oh,” she said, but she was pale and very subdued, and looked at him distrustfully.

  Suddenly it was very important to Crispin that she believe him. “If I wanted to do away with you, I wouldn’t discuss it in front of Wrede, would I?” he asked.

  “He’s your friend; he’d hardly care,” she said.

  “Of course I would care! Never fear, I won’t let him murder you, my dear,” Wrede said helpfully, smiling at her so warmly she couldn’t help but give him a shy smile in return.

  “Look you, Wrede,” he said when this friend looked at him with a quizzical half smile, “we’ve no time for conversation. What are we going to do? She seems sincere about renouncing this travesty of a marriage, but her father has the marriage papers.” He turned suddenly to Dulcie. “Mistress Blessing, do you think you can make your father change his mind?”

  “Last night I’d have said no,” Dulcie said thoughtfully, “because when he gets an idea in his head he’s like a runaway horse. He won’t listen until he’s run ragged and can’t run anymore. But now a day has gone by. Perhaps I can make him see that I don’t intend to go along with his plan, no matter what. If he sees that I am in earnest, he might change his mind. He’s not a bad man, only an impulsive one. He’s kind and good, and wants what’s best for me. Perhaps I can make him see that the best thing for me would be to be free. But even if he gives up the papers, what can we do about the marriage register and the minister and”—she ducked her head shyly—“all those people last night?”

  “I can take care of the register and the minister,” Crispin said. “As for those people last night, I agree that’s unfortunate. But let that be my worry. After all, you won’t ever have to see them again.”

  “Yes,” Wrede said, “the viscount can simply explain that it was all a jest—to tease a certain lady. Don’t look so dismayed, child, our set does enjoy such jests.”

  It was so true that Crispin winced.

  “Very well,” Dulcie said, rising from the table. “I’ll just go home and find Father.”

  “You don’t have to go so far. He’s here,” Crispin said, “I persuaded him to stay the night. I didn’t want him running into Harry Meech and his friends in the dark.”

  “Bad enough to see them in the light,” Dulcie agreed nervously.

  “Don’t worry about anything,” Crispin said. “I’ll cover your debts. It isn’t fair that you should be jailed for my mistake. Then I’ll see if I can find you and your father a home far from London and Harry Meech’s crew. I’ll get the register from poor old Dr. Featherstone and have him write down what we said, not what he imagined. That’s only fair, too. Then I’ll find him safer harbor than the Fleet. Now you go talk to your father, and we’ll have the whole thing settled before long. You’ll be staying here until I can find you lodging elsewhere,” Crispin added.

  “I must go to my father,” Dulcie said again.

  “Ask Stroud to have a footman take you to his room,” Crispin said. He followed her into the hall, and watched her as she went up the long stairway.

  “I thought you would be intent on getting your own lady back,” the earl commented from his side.

  “I am,” Crispin said absently, still staring after Dulcie. “But this little thing—she’s so young and inexperienced. She has no money, no connections, and no friends of any influence at all.”

  “Indeed,” the earl said dryly. He seemed vastly amused.

  As they stood in the hallway waiting for Dulcie and her father to return, they heard the door knocker sound. Stroud opened the door, and Crispin heard a familiar voice. His butler turned to look at him. Crispin froze, then silently nodded his head, as the earl whistled low. The front door was opened wide to admit visitors, come to congratulate him on his wedding.

  It was raining, so the two sedan chairs outside were carried directly into the hall so that their lady passengers wouldn’t get wet as they got out of them. Crispin had only enough wits left to signal Stroud to pay the sedan men, as the two ladies stepped from their chairs. But he had eyes for only one of them.

  She removed her cloak to reveal a magnificent gown of brocaded yellow silk with a tight bodice and wide skirt. It was much too elegant for a morning call, but he had never seen her look lovelier. Lady Charlotte’s hair was dressed high, as it had been the night before, and was still fully powdered. Only now there were artificial butterflies in the elaborate curls instead of the fresh flowers she’d worn to the ball. Charlotte stared at him and then, without a word, came into his arms. He held her close, before he remembered he had no right to hold her at all.

  “Crispin,” she said when he released her, and she stepped back to stare up into his face, her eyes bright with emotion, “I didn’t sleep at all last night. I didn’t know if I should come this morning. Auntie, here, said I should not. But here I am. I had to speak with you. At first I never wanted to see you again. Then I thought I must, if only to say that it was a cruel jest. A cruel, cruel jest. One that I doubtless deserved. But you? Dear boy, no matter how I suffered, you will pay the higher price. To be married to such as that—because of me. To think that you shackled yourself to that creature only to spite me!” she said in wonder. “
It’s an honor, I suppose, but one I could have done without.”

  “Are you congratulating Crispin or yourself?” the earl asked sweetly.

  “Oh, Wrede,” she said as sweetly, “I should have expected to see you here. After all, what else have you to do?”

  “I would not have missed this for anything,” Wrede assured her so merrily that her smile grew cold and she looked to Crispin again.

  “My dear,” she sighed, gazing at Crispin from behind the fan that she’d produced, “it was a coup, I’ll admit. And for that I do congratulate you. You quite astonished my enemies, and you startled me. To marry so soon to show that my rejection meant nothing to you! What a retaliation—it was stunning! Everyone’s talking about it. But to trade one night of blissful revenge for a lifetime of unhappiness? A high price for such a little triumph, surely. I’m not at all sure that even Prendergast will be so modern as to allow me to meet with a man who has married so far beneath himself.” Her voice held great sympathy, but her eyes blazed. The fan fluttered wildly as she went on, “Rumor has it that she’s a commoner with neither money nor reputation to sweeten the pot!”

  He’d expected anger, but Charlotte’s spiteful attack took Crispin by surprise—until he realized it was typical of Charlotte. Although he’d regretted having to cause her unhappiness, he had honestly never expected her to dissolve into tears. Crying wasn’t her style, and Charlotte’s style was what he admired most about her. She was as bright and hard as a diamond, and he’d thought himself just the man to appreciate such a gem. Trust Charlotte to give back as good as she got. She might bleed to death from a broken heart, but no one would know it but her pillow. She had a tongue that could cleave like a dagger. No wonder she was society’s darling. He would never have been bored with her.

  He smiled. “Things may not be what they seem,” he said.

  Hope sprang to her eyes. “Really?” she asked, her fan slowing to a pulse beat. “A jest within a jest? I see. If so, dear Crispin, how vexed our friends will be with you. They like to watch someone being deceived, but they detest being deceived themselves. I wonder if they’ll forgive you for such a joke. I wonder if I will,” she mused.

  “I didn’t say it was a joke,” Crispin said, suddenly serious. “I only said things may not be what they seem. Charlotte,” he said, his handsome face grave. “I can’t say more now. I have no right to ask this of you either, but I will anyway. Please wait at least a little while.”

  She studied his face, and then with a great sigh of pleasure, she returned to his embrace. He would set things right. She would make him pay for this one day, she supposed, because she was not accustomed to being treated badly, but not now. Not until this danger of losing him had passed.

  He held her tight, bending to rest his cheek against hers. But it was like resting his head against a stuccoed wall. Her stiffly pomaded and powdered hair scratched his cheek. It had looked exquisite last night, but now it felt like a hard shell atop her head. When he felt Charlotte stiffen and then saw her staring beyond his shoulder with wide eyes, he was glad of a chance to step away from her.

  Until he saw what she’d been staring at.

  Dulcie Blessing stood on the stairway, white-faced and frightened.

  “My lord,” she said, and paused, looking at Charlotte.

  “Oh, you must not hesitate to speak in front of me,” Charlotte said quickly, her gaze traveling up and down Dulcie’s slender form, noting her cheap, wrinkled gown and her simply dressed hair. “We met last night, but allow me to reintroduce myself. I’m one of Crispin’s dearest friends. So dear to him, in fact, that I was going to marry him. Why, the only secret he had from me, it seems, was you. Isn’t that so, Crispin my dear?” she asked, her voice sweet but her eyes hard as they slewed to Crispin.

  Dulcie spoke before Crispin could. “My lord,” she said again, “my father is gone. Vanished. He left only this.” A paper trembled in her hand as she held it out to Crispin.

  Before Crispin’s hopes could rise, he saw that it wasn’t the marriage paper, but only a note.

  “He left a message for you. And one for me. He says—he says he’s not coming back,” Dulcie whispered, unbelieving, “for my sake. And he’s taken the papers with him to protect them—from you and me and Harry, forever.”

  CHAPTER 7

  “Charlotte was almost as hard to get rid of as Harry Meech and company,” Crispin muttered as he propped his lean frame against the wall near the front door and began to read the letter in his hand.

  He couldn’t wait to see what Philip Blessing had written in his letter and didn’t notice the footmen’s stares. After he’d read the note twice, he put out one hand to Dulcie.

  “Let me read yours,” he commanded. And then looked up from his letter, his eyes hard, when he didn’t find another letter in his hand.

  Dulcie’s chin went up. “No,” she said boldly. But he noticed that her defiant chin was trembling.

  “I want to read that letter,” he said.

  She shook her head, backed up, and put her letter behind her back. She looked so like a child that he found it hard not to laugh, exasperated as he was.

  “It’s private,” she said warily.

  “You’re my wife, aren’t you?” he asked. “Isn’t that what this is all about? So until you’re no longer my wife, you have to act like you are. And a wife has no private property, remember? Her husband is her lord, master, and receiver of her letters. Now—the letter, if you please!”

  “I don’t please,” she said, “and that’s just another reason I don’t want to be married to you.”

  “Nor I to you. But if you want to change things, you’ll have to let me know what’s going on, won’t you?” he asked, irritatingly aware of the fact that Wrede was still lounging nearby, grinning.

  “Well, I suppose,” she said hesitantly, handing it over to him.

  A moment later he looked up, with an expression of disgust. “It’s practically identical to mine,” he said. “Full of apologies and telling me nothing I need to know. All I know is that your father has vanished, the way I asked you to do.”

  He slid the letters into one of his wide pockets and stalked off to speak with Stroud. The butler and the footmen held a hurried conference. One ran off to the kitchens, and when he returned they consulted some more. Crispin nodded and dismissed them.

  “At dawn,” Crispin reported, “your father left this house wrapped in a cloak, quiet as a mouse. Or a rat. A scullery maid saw him creep out though the kitchens. He was said to have been ‘ever so nice,’” Crispin told Dulcie and the earl mockingly, before he stalked off to his study. They followed. When they got into the room, Crispin was standing with his head down, his arms braced on his desk.

  “Any idea where he went?” he asked the air.

  “No. He could be anywhere,” Dulcie said sadly. “We traveled all our lives. He has friends—well, people he knows—everywhere in England.”

  “Could you be a little more specific?” Crispin asked through gritted teeth.

  “London, of course. But Kent and Sussex and Hampshire too. Oh, and we spent some time in Leeds and in Dover, Chester, Bath, and York. And once we went to Scotland. I don’t think we ever went to Wales though,” she said, considering it.

  “Did you tell him you wanted to stay?” Crispin asked, straightening and glaring at her.

  “Oh, certainly,” she said sarcastically. “Last night I lay on the floor and whispered it under the door. When could I have?”

  “I don’t know,” he said quietly. “You tell me.”

  “I would tell you if I could,” she cried. “He left me, not you. He’s my father, not yours. I want to find him even more than you do. But you don’t believe that,” she spat. “Oh, no. To you I’m vile and terrible, and something to stare at like a…rat, as you say. Well, I’ll trouble you no more,” she said, and without another word she turned and ran upstairs. But both men heard her crying as she went.

  “Don’t say it,” Crispin said wearily, pu
tting up one hand. “I was very hard on her. Agreed. But she and her father nave been hard on me. What you forget is that women can weep at the drop of a handkerchief, so their tears mean nothing. What does mean something is that she bears my name, damn her.”

  “She seemed very upset,” the earl commented.

  “So she seemed,” Crispin agreed. “But what does that mean? I wish I knew. Will she leave? I doubt it, Wrede. Where would she go?”

  *

  That was exactly what Dulcie herself was wondering. But go I shall, she thought defiantly, as she glanced around the sumptuous room where she had spent the night. Nothing of her was in the room but her body. And that, she vowed, wouldn’t be there for long.

  It was one thing to be locked in a room after a harrowing night, but it was broad daylight now. Her father had gone from this terrible place. She hoped it was because he really did think it was the best thing for her. It wasn’t, but it would be easier to bear if she could convince herself that he’d really thought it was. She’d be better off elsewhere. But where?

  For a start, she thought, dashing her hand across her eyes to dry them, she’d need her things, such as they were. Her clothes and her books… She didn’t have that many belongings, she realized sadly. She’d always had to travel light, and had collected few mementos. Only those things that would fit in one carpetbag and her pockets. But, she reminded herself sternly, those few things at least were hers.

  She would go get them. She would wait an hour or two, until the viscount and his friend forgot about her and then quietly slip away. Her room overlooked the front of the house, and she stayed at the window, waiting for darkness, or enough courage to leave, whichever came first. When she saw the viscount and the earl go outside and saunter down the street together, she knew her moment had come, whether she was ready or not. Her cape had been brought up from downstairs sometime during breakfast, and it was the sole garment hanging in her wardrobe. No wonder the servants had looked at her so strangely. She threw it over her shoulders. There was a thin rain falling, and her cloak was threadbare, but that didn’t matter. Nothing mattered, except being able to leave.