“Nothing can save me. I shall kill myself! When they come to take me to the Church, they will find me dead in my bed!”
“You are not to talk like that,” Martina scolded her. “You know that it is wicked and wrong to kill yourself.
“Now listen to me. You must allow your stepfather to believe that you have accepted the inevitable.”
“But how can I? Even to think of that terrible man touching me makes me want to scream.”
She reached out her hand and touched Harriet’s lips.
“Be quiet,” she said and listen to me. “Do you remember me telling you secretly that Sir Hugh Faversham wants to marry me? I have been to see him and he has agreed to help us.”
“But how?”
“Tomorrow morning I will take you very early to Sir Hugh’s house. There in his private Chapel you will go through a marriage ceremony.
“It will not be a real marriage. You will be heavily veiled and nobody will know it is you. When you begin your vows you will give your name as mine.
“There will be no reception. You will leave his house at once and travel to his yacht and the three of us will sail away together.
“Eventually we will reveal our little deception. The marriage will be declared null and void and you will be free. Best of all we will be well away from England when the bomb goes off and your stepfather realises that he has been thwarted.”
“Oh, darling Martina, how kind you are to take so much trouble for me.”
“What I think you should do and do it quickly is to draw as much money from your bank as you can. Then you must collect what clothes you think you will need on the yacht and be ready to bring them with you when we set out tomorrow morning.”
“How can Sir Hugh be so kind? Of course he is doing it for you, but how deeply he must love you even to think of doing it. He sounds a wonderful man.”
Martina laughed and to her own ears her voice sounded a little shaky.
“Perhaps you will fall in love with him,” she said lightly, “or he with you and that will serve me right for keeping him waiting so long.”
As she said these words she was assailed by the memory of Sir Hugh’s lips on hers, with a hint of danger that had been so mysteriously exciting.
“Perhaps you’ll become jealous,” Harriet teased, “and when he next asks you will hurry to accept.”
“Never,” Martina declared decisively. “You should never allow a man to claim the upper hand – or, at least, you should never let him know that he has it.
“It is far more likely that he will find you so attractive that he’ll beg you, on his knees of course, to make your marriage legal.”
“And you would not object?” Harriet asked.
“Certainly not,” Martina said decisively.
“Oh, Martina, I am so very grateful to you and Sir Hugh for saving me from that horrible man.”
“Forget him. We are going to have an exciting time on your pretend honeymoon. You never know what might happen unexpectedly to you and of course to me.”
Harriet laughed.
“Well, one thing makes me very happy,” she said, “and that is that if I have to go on a honeymoon I want you to be with me.”
Martina smiled at Harriet.
“Think how angry any real husband would be if when he wanted to be alone with his wife, there was another woman chatting away all the time. And because she is a woman she would be trying to attract his attention.”
“That is very true, I had not thought of that,” Harriet replied. “A honeymoon should be for only two people, a man and a woman.”
“Your honeymoon will start off with two women and one man. “I am only praying that a handsome man will arrive and the pretend honeymoon will become a real one.”
“You are asking for far too much. I have come to the conclusion that I am very unlucky and nothing I touch will ever come right.”
“Nonsense,” Martina rebuked her. “You must not fall into such a gloomy way of thinking just because you have encountered a few problems.
“You are now twenty and I am twenty-one. I think we can both sit looking up at the stars and hoping that one of them will fall into our laps and we will live happily ever afterwards.”
Harriet drew in her breath.
“Do you really think that will come true?” she asked.
“Of course it will,” Martina replied. “We will be so happy because we have been forced to struggle to find what everyone wants.”
“What is that?”
“Love,” Martina answered. “Love that comes from the heart and the soul. That is the love which sooner or later you and I are going to find.”
As she spoke she bent forward and kissed Harriet on her cheek.
“Now hurry up, darling,” she said, “and pack all the things you will want. Your clothes will need to be very carefully arranged so that your veil hides your face, and the priest can say afterwards he had no idea that the bride had disguised herself.
“It was only when you drove away on your honeymoon that the bridegroom found, to his surprise, and you might add, to his horror, that he had been married to the wrong woman!”
“It is so very, very kind of him to do this. What can I say to you, Martina, except that you are the most wonderful friend anyone could ever have?”
“You must keep your thanks until we are safely away from England on Sir Hugh’s yacht. Now, instead of wasting time talking, you must start packing. Take your best clothes, the ones which make you look attractive and I will do the same. After all, we do not get married every day and when we do, we want to look exactly as a bride should look – beautiful, desirable and very, very lovable.”
“You sound so confident,” Harriet sighed wistfully. “I could never dare attempt such an adventure without you.”
“We must make the most of it,” Martina said, “and however long we live, we will make quite certain that everyone who is told our tale is astonished that we dreamed up anything so exciting.”
Harriet laughed again.
But Martina knew that her eyes were shining and she looked very different in every way from when she had arrived.
‘I have won! I have won!’ she thought to herself.
But then she checked herself.
‘No, I must be sensible. I have won only the first skirmish. The real battle to save my poor dear friend is only just beginning. But I will not be defeated. With Hugh’s help we are going to be successful.’
CHAPTER FOUR
They spent the next few hours in Harriet’s bedroom packing up her best clothes. Martina concentrated on finding material for two wedding veils which when she and Harriet wore them would make them look like each other.
“One of us is the bride and the other is the bridesmaid,” Martina explained. “It is quite common for them to dress in a similar style, so that they harmonise.”
“Even to the bridesmaid wearing a veil?” Harriet wanted to know.
“No, not exactly, but we will just look a little eccentric, nothing more.”
“But suppose the priest is suddenly suspicious and makes us take off our veils?”
“We will just have to throw a fit of modesty and collapse in giggles,” Martina improvised hastily, “but I hardly think that will happen. It simply is not done to treat a bride with suspicion. And the priest will find it difficult to see much in Sir Hugh’s gloomy Chapel.”
“I didn’t realise he had one.”
“It’s very nice,” Martina told her, “except for being rather dark. But that will be useful for our purpose.”
When they had finished packing, they pushed the boxes against the window so that the thick silk curtain hid them.
“Now,” Martina said, “it is most useful that I have always paid my own way, because I have my own horses and my own servants, who are loyal to me and not to Mr. Ingleby. I am going to send Thomas, my coachman, to the bank to draw out a large sum of money for me. Since your account is held in the same branch, he might fetch some for
you too.”
“Yes, indeed. I will write the letter now. You think of everything, Martina. I cannot tell you how grateful I am.”
“Keep your thanks until we are safely at sea,” Martina answered. “Just keep praying that nobody guesses what we are up to and then we can begin to dance and sing.”
“Are you certain we’ll get away?” Harriet asked nervously.
“Thomas will carry our luggage downstairs as soon as he can. Tomorrow morning at five o’clock we will drive away before anyone has the slightest idea we are even awake.”
She was as good as her word, slipping down to the stables, drawing Thomas aside and giving him the letters to the bank.
He was gone for two hours returning with enough money for them both to be able to pay their own expenses while they were abroad.
To Martina this was most important. She recognised how much she was imposing on Hugh already. She did not wish either herself or Harriet to be a charge on him as well.
Then she explained to Thomas what she required on the following day.
“We want to drive straight to Sir Hugh’s house with all the luggage,” she said. “As you realise, Thomas, I am putting all my trust in you.”
“You can rely on me, miss,” he replied. “I’ve known you ever since you were born and I feels as if I belongs to your family and they belongs to me.”
“Thank you very much, Thomas.”
She slipped away from the stables and up the back stairs to Harriet’s bedroom. They were both dreading the evening ahead when Mr. Ingleby might bring Mr. Muncaster to dinner, but instead he took him to dine with some friends nearby.
He gave as his reason the fact that his wife was ill, but Martina suspected that he was afraid that Harriet would throw his plans into disarray by being hostile to her unwanted suitor. As, indeed, she would.
While they were having dinner they knew that their luggage was being moved, but they did not speak about it in front of the servants. They could only hope silently that all was going well.
“I do not think,” Martina said, “that Mr. Ingleby will be very late coming home. When his friends have ‘enjoyed’ Mr. Muncaster’s company for a while they will be anxious to be rid of him. So let us retire early so as to avoid him. Also, we still have to finalise our wedding veils. I am sure your mother wore one when she married your Papa.”
“Yes, of course she did,” Harriet agreed. “I believe it was very fashionable at one time to wear long wedding veils of white lace with a headdress of flowers. Mama’s is in her bedroom.”
“Can you find it?” Martina asked.
“I’ll try,” Harriet promised. “She should be asleep by now.”
They walked to Mrs. Ingleby’s bedroom and Martina stood outside while Harriet tip-toed in. She found as she had expected that her mother was fast asleep.
Her tiaras, her wedding veil and several ornaments she had worn at the County balls were kept in a separate compartment of her wardrobe.
Harriet took everything on the shelf, even though it meant going back twice. Then they carried it all up to Martina’s bedroom.
To their delight there was enough heavy white lace for two veils.
What Harriet’s mother had worn at her first wedding was a crown of flowers of different colours sprinkled with diamante so that they shone in the light.
“It’s very pretty,” Martina commented, “but why did she need two?”
“It was so like Mama,” Harriet replied. “She thought one might get damaged or not be as becoming at the last moment as she wanted. So she insisted, so she told me, on buying two headdresses.”
She sighed.
“I don’t like taking them like this, but I know that if I could explain to Mama she would understand. She would do anything she could to help me escape this terrible marriage.”
Swiftly Martina altered the two headdresses to look almost exactly the same. The veil which was intended to cover the bride’s face until she was actually married was so large that she was able to cut it into two pieces.
One for herself and one for Harriet.
“So you are going to be a bride as well as me?” Harriet asked.
“We have to make it difficult for the priest to realise what is happening,” Martina answered. “It will be dark first thing in the morning with only a faint light coming from the candles on the altar.
“The Bishop, when he finally comes to hear about the wedding, will discover that the marriage service was so muddled that therefore neither you nor I are actually married to Sir Hugh.”
Harriet stared at her. Then she gave a cry.
“Oh, darling!” she exclaimed. “How did you think of anything so clever? Then of course we will both be free.”
“We have to be very careful however not to let the priest suspect the muddle that is going on,” Martina suggested. “Otherwise he will insist that the ceremony takes place again. Luckily, I think he is a very old man, who probably has poor eyesight.”
“But surely we require my stepfather to believe in the marriage?”
“Of course – for a while. Just long enough to be rid of Muncaster. The Bishop can declare it annulled later.”
“But will either of us actually be married to Sir Hugh?”
Martina considered this possibility.
“I suppose we will both be half married to him,” she mused, “but as the law says that is impossible, both marriages will be invalid.”
“Oh, Martina, you’re so brilliant. Can we really carry it off?”
“We can if we get a good night’s sleep,” Martina replied firmly.
They were tucked up in bed nearly two hours before Mr. Ingleby returned. Harriet heard him talking to one of the servants waiting for him.
She fell asleep with her fingers crossed.
*
It was Harriet who woke first in the early dawn.
She awakened Martina and they talked to each other in whispers while they dressed in the pretty gowns they had chosen to wear for the wedding.
They carried in their hands the veils and headdresses they had arranged so skilfully the previous night.
When finally they crept silently downstairs and out through the back door, they found the carriage waiting for them with their luggage piled on the back.
They climbed in quietly, whispered to the coachman and he set off. It was a very bright morning and the sun was rising in the sky.
Martina knew that as Harriet looked back at the house which had been her home ever since she was born, she was saying goodbye to her mother whom she had always loved.
She had left a letter to say she was going away but would send her news when she could.
Then as they crossed the boundary of the estate, Harriet gave a cry of happiness.
“We’ve got away,” she said excitedly.
“There is still a lot to do before you are really free,” Martina told her. “You must not count your chickens before they are hatched!”
“I will do anything you want me to do.”
“Just remember to keep the veil over your face and if you have to speak you must try to answer in a voice unlike yours.”
After a moment Martina added reflectively,
“After all, Hugh is being very kind in helping us, but he does not want to find himself married at the end of this strange ceremony.”
“I think he wouldn’t mind if he found himself married to you,” Harriet remarked slyly.
“But that would leave you free to marry Brendan Muncaster,” Martina pointed out.
Harriet gave a cry of horror.
“Anything but that. I only mean that for you and him it might be the perfect match.”
“Hmm!”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said Hmm!”
“What does that mean?”
Martina sighed.
“It means I may have started something I do not know how to finish.”
They drove on in silence.
As they reached the large an
d impressive house which belonged to Sir Hugh, Harriet slipped her hand into Martina’s saying,
“It is all so frightening, please help me not to make any fatal mistakes.”
“Just follow me,” Martina encouraged her. “Remember everything depends on confusing the priest.”
A servant was waiting just inside Sir Hugh’s front door, ready to guide them to a small ante-room next to the Chapel.
There Martina and Harriet quickly changed into the wedding gowns they had brought with them.
Martina arranged one of the veils on Harriet’s head and Harriet arranged the other one on hers.
There were flowers and diamante decorating the top of their heads, while it was difficult through their veils to see their faces.
Sir Hugh met them at the door of the Chapel.
“Are you still set on going through with this, Martina?” he addressed one of the veils.
“I am Martina,” said the other veil. “That’s Harriet.
“I beg your pardon. Are you really sure you want to go through with this wedding?”
“Of course,” Martina replied indignantly. “Oh, please don’t tell me you’ve changed your mind.”
“I think this is a mad, ill-judged affair that is headed for disaster,” he retorted bluntly. “But no, I have not changed my mind. I am going ahead only because, if I didn’t, you would think up something even more outrageous and I might not be around to save you from disaster. Now, Miss Shepton, let us proceed.”
He drew Harriet’s arm through his and opened the door leading into the Chapel.
Inside there were bouquets of spring flowers with candles on the altar. The whole Chapel looked very attractive, but as there was no light except from the candles, it was difficult to see anything very clearly.
Both clad in white, both glittering with diamante, the two girls entered the Chapel itself to find the priest waiting at the altar.
Hugh led Harriet up to him with Martina following behind.
It was as the service began that Martina became aware of how Hugh had been very astute in his choice of priest. The man was at least eighty years old and although he wore glasses he still seemed very myopic.
As the two girls moved side by side, it was obvious that he was not certain, as they both looked exactly the same, who was the bride.
Journey to Happiness Page 5
