The Earl's Practical Marriage

by Louise Allen

  ‘A ball gown, my lady?’ Laurel could almost hear the clink of guineas being added up in the dressmaker’s head.

  ‘Later, perhaps. And I would be most obliged for your recommendations for milliners, cordwainers and haberdashers.’

  * * *

  It was nearly two when Laurel arrived back at St James’s Square, hungry and weary, but very pleased with her morning’s work. Most of the items she had bought would be delivered that afternoon, but Binham was guarding one magnificent striped hatbox containing the bonnet to be worn at the wedding.

  As they were getting out of the carriage a young lady came down the steps of a house three doors down. She turned north towards them, her maid on her heels, and seemed to be scrutinising the numbers on the doors. It took only a moment to bring her level with Laurel and she came to a stop, her way blocked by the open carriage door, Binham disputing the carrying of the hatbox with the footman and Laurel herself.

  ‘I do beg your pardon, ma’am.’ Laurel sidestepped and, inevitably, the other woman did, too, so they were still face to face.

  But surely I know you?

  The words were almost out of her mouth before she realised that the reason the stranger seemed familiar was because she looked like Laurel, although several years younger. Dark hair, dark brown eyes, decided eyebrows, a full mouth, close to the same height. But this was not a mirror. The other woman was far more of a classical beauty than Laurel—her nose was just the right length, her brows arched more elegantly, her mouth was not quite so wide.

  ‘We are neighbours,’ she ventured, then hesitated when instead of the expected polite smile or greeting she received a stare of unmistakable suspicion. ‘Good day to you.’ Laurel turned on her heel and marched up the steps, smarting at the snub.

  There was no sign of Giles in the front hall, but he had apparently only just come in, for Downing was holding his hat and cane.

  ‘Well, really! The rudest woman has just come out of a house next door but two, Downing. Did you see her? We were blocking her path, so I apologised and smiled and said something about us being neighbours and she looked at me as though I had insulted her and cut me dead. And the ridiculous thing is, she looks just like me—it gave me quite a start. Mind you,’ she added, ‘I would not be seen in that poisonous shade of pistachio green with so many flounces. Who lives in that house, do you know?’

  ‘That must be a lady from the newly arrived foreign gentleman’s household, my lady. I believe they are Spanish. It was a most regrettable encounter, my lady. I do not like to think of anyone treating you rudely, let alone a neighbour. It does not bode well for the tone of the Square if new residents are not courteous.’

  Laurel shrugged. ‘It cannot be because she disapproves of me, because she cannot know anything about us. Probably she was piqued because my walking dress is so much more flattering to our colouring than hers is.’

  Downing made a sound that was possibly agreement. ‘His lordship is in the drawing room, my lady.’

  She opened the door and glanced inside. Giles was engrossed in a letter, sitting with one hip hitched on to the table, the rest of the post scattered beside him. She watched him for a moment, enjoying the way the sunlight from the undraped window showed off his profile and picked up the sun-bleached highlights in his hair.

  That hair, the golden colour of the southern sun that his skin still held, set off a train of thought that she did not quite understand. She was uneasy, she realised.

  Laurel stepped back into the hall, pulling the door gently closed behind her. ‘Downing, do you think you can find out exactly who is living in that house? Their nationality and, if possible, their name?’

  ‘Certainly, my lady. I have in fact just despatched Peter on just that errand.’

  ‘With what excuse? He can hardly march up to the front door and demand to know who lives there.’

  ‘He will go down the area steps and knock at the tradesman’s entrance. He is a bright lad with, if you will excuse me mentioning it, my lady, rather a way with the girls. He will find an excuse for calling and then, shall we say, charm his way inside, have no fear.’

  ‘Good. It is not that I mind that woman’s hostility, exactly, but it is disturbing. And Lord Revesby was in the Peninsula and not all the inhabitants would be exactly friendly... Many of the Spanish sided with the French, for one thing.’

  ‘And with his nuptials imminent we do not want his lordship disturbed. I quite agree, my lady.’ Downing permitted himself a faint smile.

  Laurel went back to the drawing room, making enough noise as she entered to make Giles look up from his letter. He tossed it on to the table and stood up.

  ‘Did you succeed with the licence, Giles?’

  ‘Yes, there was no problem with it, thankfully. There was something of an interrogation and I had to take an oath, but it seems I look respectable enough to convince a clerk in holy orders that I am who I say I am and that you are of age and willing to marry and so on and so forth. I will send one of the footmen to collect it later today—apparently the actual document is a parchment the size of a small tablecloth and encumbered with a seal and ribbons and goodness knows what else, so they do not hand them out there and then. I called on the vicar of St James’s, close by on Piccadilly, and he is willing to marry us tomorrow morning at ten, if that is not too early for you? He says we should have the church to ourselves and can provide a verger and his clerk as witnesses.’

  With a special licence they could have married at the house but, much as she wanted to avoid fuss, that seemed rather hole-and-corner to Laurel and she was glad Giles had not suggested it.

  ‘It never occurred to me that there might be a difficulty, but I suppose you have been out of the country for so long that you are not generally recognised. It is very trusting of them to hand out licences so easily with only the man there. After all, for all they know, you might be an unscrupulous fortune hunter tricking me into marriage.’

  There was a deadly little silence, then Giles said, ‘I believe my family is sufficiently well known for there to be no question of that in their minds.’

  ‘Yes, of course. An ill-chosen jest on my part,’ she said hastily. What was wrong with Giles? She had never known him to get on his dignity like that—he had positively snapped at her. Was he regretting their match, or their decision to virtually elope? Or perhaps it was simply the apprehension that anyone might feel before making such a drastic change to their lives.

  It occurred to Laurel that she, too, was making a drastic change, one even greater than Giles’s. After all, she was not used to high society and town life. Perhaps he was concerned that she would struggle to become a fitting countess, let alone, eventually, a marchioness. Strangely she felt no apprehension about it. She was well educated, reasonably intelligent, raised to be a lady—she would learn the details of her new life soon enough.

  Perhaps soothing an irritable husband was a necessary skill. And he would soon see that she could rise to whatever occasion she was confronted with, even if she had spent nine years as a rustic wallflower. That conjured up a picture of the straggling wallflowers that seeded themselves into any nook and cranny of brickwork around the garden.

  ‘What is amusing you?’ Giles had recovered himself again. He was tired and anxious that she was all right and the wedding would go well, that was all, she told herself.

  ‘Just a foolish image as I followed a train of thought. Now, let me wipe that smile from your lips by recounting the tale of my shopping expedition. As you have not told me what my allowance is to be, I have spent as I pleased, have opened accounts all over the place and have told them to send all the bills to you.’

  ‘I will inform my banker to brace himself,’ he said with a grin. ‘Now, a late luncheon is ready, I believe.’

  Laurel remembered that she was hungry and found that the cook was as capable of producing a delicious cold collation as she
was of presenting a reviving supper or a hearty breakfast. As Giles had dismissed the footmen again and they were alone she asked, ‘Should I ask to see Cook and the rest of the staff? I am not quite sure what my position is—this is your father’s house and I would not like to give offence by seeming to assume responsibilities that are not mine.’ Giles’s mother had given birth to a daughter who had died within a few days, Lady Thorncote with her. It had been many years ago, when Giles had been about five, she supposed, and Thorne Hall had its housekeeper, of course, the supremely competent Mrs Finlay. Here things had obviously run very smoothly with the cook and butler in command.

  ‘I would be glad if you would.’ Giles passed a plate of boiled ham. ‘I certainly do not want to be approving menus and as for the contents of the linen cupboard—I surrender them entirely to your capable hands. Wait until a day or two after the wedding and then talk to Cook and Downing and arrange things between you.’

  That all sounded reassuringly unfussy. Everything seemed to be going so smoothly and yet Laurel felt uneasy, on edge. It could be pre-marriage nerves, she supposed. Stepmama had delivered another awkward and confusing little lecture about One’s Marital Duties, which had nearly reduced Laurel to unseemly giggles. If she had been completely innocent she would have been both alarmed and perplexed by the murmured phrases and rather alarming imagery, but as it was she was looking forward to the experience with only a few qualms, so it could not be that affecting her mood.

  ‘Giles.’ She spoke so abruptly that he put down the forkful of ham that had been halfway to his mouth.

  ‘Laurel?’

  ‘You are quite, quite certain that you want to marry me, aren’t you? Because it is not too late to change your mind. No one except Stepmama and your father and the servants know I am here.’

  ‘Of course I want to marry you. I want nothing more than to marry you.’ He spoke without hesitation. ‘Is something wrong? Are you changing your mind?’

  ‘No. Not at all. It is simply that I cannot quite understand why you want to marry me.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  Giles looked at her directly, his eyes very blue, that blazing blue she had learned to associate with extremes of emotion when he was young. ‘Believe me, Laurel, it is the sum total of my ambition to marry you and only you. I will do my utmost to make you a good husband, I swear it.’

  It shook her, the intensity of that declaration. There was almost something desperate about it. Was his conscience troubling him because of their long-ago misunderstanding? Was he afraid that she had recoiled from marriage as a result and he was now on a mission to save her from spinsterhood?

  ‘I believe you,’ Laurel said, as serious as he. ‘I will try to stop fretting—I suppose it is having my life turned so comprehensively upside down that is making me unsettled.’

  * * *

  After luncheon Giles retired into the study, pleading a mountain of paperwork and correspondence and no secretary to assist him. Laurel set her foot on the bottom step to climb the stairs to her room and see how Binham was getting on with the newly delivered purchases and her outfit for the wedding.

  ‘My lady?’ Downing appeared from the baize door at the back of the hallway. ‘Peter has returned from our neighbours’ house.’

  ‘Has he discovered who they are?’

  ‘A noble Portuguese family apparently. The English maid Peter was talking to was a little confused by their foreignness and certainly has taken against their own servants, which I suppose is inevitable. The head of the household is supporting the Portuguese Minister Plenipotentiary in some matters of trade negotiations, it seems.’

  ‘The duty on port, I suppose,’ Laurel mused. It was a coincidence that no sooner had Giles returned to London from Portugal than natives of the country had set up home virtually next door, but with the war over at last it must be inevitable that matters of trade would need discussing and Portugal was, she recalled, England’s oldest ally. ‘Thank you, Downing. The young lady must simply be very short-tempered and resented us blocking her path.’

  She must remember to tell Giles about this. He might enjoy having someone to reminisce with about life in Lisbon.

  * * *

  ‘The sun is shining. Shall we walk to our wedding?’ Giles, who had breakfasted in his rooms, met Laurel in the hallway at half past nine. ‘It is only a short distance to the church and I must say I would enjoy showing off my lady looking so beautiful. That is a delicious bonnet, but the face beneath it is even more so.’

  ‘You are a flatterer, sir.’ But she allowed him to kiss her hand and then her cheek. ‘And you are looking very fine yourself.’ Dryden had trimmed Giles’s hair and he was turned out in biscuit-coloured pantaloons, glossy Hessian boots, immaculate white linen, a dark claret waistcoat subtly embroidered with gold and all set off with a swallowtail coat in midnight-blue superfine. His buttonhole sported a rosebud the exact colour of her own gown, doubtless the result of consultations between Binham and Dryden. ‘I would like to walk very much.’

  Giles clapped a tall hat on his head, pulled on his gloves and took a leather portfolio from Downing. ‘The licence itself. Shall we go?’

  St James’s Square was still quiet as they crossed Charles Street, turned along the northern edge and then turned right up York Street. The church was immediately before them at the top of the short slope, sitting at the junction with Jermyn Street. Beyond its grey stone walls would be the bustle of Piccadilly, but all was tranquil here, except for deliveries and shop staff sweeping front steps.

  A flower seller was setting up her stall just before the entrance to the church, a small boy at her side struggling to fit bunches of foliage into buckets of water. ‘I knew I had forgotten something.’ Giles stopped and consulted the woman.

  They waited while she made up a neat nosegay of pink roses, ferns and a frothy white flower that was new to Laurel. She tied it with trailing white ribbons, obviously used to making up bouquets for brides, and handed it to Laurel with a beaming smile. ‘Blessings on you, ma’am, and your handsome gentleman!’

  Giles paid and Laurel took his arm again as they mounted the few steps into the wide stone corridor that ran along the west end of the church, linking the Jermyn Street and Piccadilly entrances. The cool and quiet of the interior, the familiar church smell of damp and snuffed candles and dust that she had always thought of as the odour of sanctity, transported her from the outside world and into the reality of what she was about to do.

  I am marrying Giles. After all these years, after so much pain. I will make this work, we will be happy and he will never regret marrying me, she vowed as Giles pushed open the doors into the nave and they walked side by side down the aisle to the waiting vicar.

  The service ran its course, the words so familiar from the many weddings she had attended and her study of her prayer book the night before. Then the vicar asked, ‘Who gives this woman to be married to this man?’

  Silence. Neither of them had thought of that, she realised. ‘I do,’ Laurel said. ‘I give myself.’ Beside her she heard Giles expel a long breath—relief, or shock at her presumption? Then she saw he was smiling and that so was the vicar. It was a good omen, she thought fleetingly before her attention was drawn back into the exchange of vows.

  ‘For better or worse...’

  I am not going to regret this marriage and neither will he.

  ‘For richer for poorer...’

  Beside her she felt Giles stiffen and wondered for a fleeting, uneasy moment if the settlements had been very unequal, then forgot in a wave of emotion as the ring slid on to her finger.

  Laurel had not been certain who would witness the ceremony. A dour verger, perhaps, or the sexton—who would also be, ominously, the gravedigger. But no sooner had the words ‘I now pronounce you man and wife’ been uttered than several figures came forward, eager, it seemed, to sign the register.

  There
was the verger, cheerful, bald and skinny in his dusty black cassock and there was the flower seller, who must have left the boy in charge of the stand while she came in to watch the wedding.

  Goodness knows what a pickle he is making of bouquets, Laurel thought.

  Hard on her heels were a pair of respectable elderly ladies who must have come into the church to say their morning prayers and who were telling the verger how very excited they were to have been present at such a romantic wedding and finally there was the sexton, his cassock apparently hastily donned, for his old boots were showing beneath it and it was hitched up at the side to reveal his working breeches.

  ‘Only two witnesses are required,’ the vicar began.

  ‘Oh, I think we must have all of them, don’t you, my dear?’ Giles took her hand and squeezed it. ‘After all, it is not every day that the heir to a marquessate is married to his childhood sweetheart, is it?’ he added, giving their audience exactly the thrill he had intended.

  At which point the two sentimental ladies began to weep and the flower seller came forward and added a silver ribbon to the rosebud in Giles’s buttonhole and the sexton produced a large red-and-white-spotted handkerchief and blew his nose with great vigour.

  The verger unscrewed the large brass knob on the end of the long verge he carried as his badge of office, revealing that it was actually a beaker. He tipped up the staff and filled the vessel with a dark brown liquid. ‘Best French brandy to drink the health of the happy couple,’ he announced.

  ‘Not in church, Brooks!’ The vicar shepherded them all into the vestry. ‘How many times must I tell you, Willie?’ But he took his own sip when the beaker was passed to him and the two ladies mopped their tears and made a confused and rambling toast and the hollow stave produced enough brandy for the happy couple to drink as well, once they had signed the register and the others were jostling to take their turns with the scratchy steel pen.

  ‘I think I am a trifle tipsy,’ Laurel whispered, holding firmly to Giles’s arm. ‘I am not used to spirits at the best of times and I hardly ate any breakfast.’