The Five-Minute Marriage

by Joan Aiken

  “Oh, what a tale of wickedness and depravity! But how do you come to know so much about all this, Fidd?”

  “Well, ma’am,” he replied, “I take an interest in Lucy—I’ve a reason to—so I got the story out of her. You’ll have no more trouble from them, ma’am—Miss Philadelphia—my lady—I reckon they were glad enough to get away without being taken up for fraud.”

  “I should just about say so!” struck in Mr. Browty. “The designing harpies! It puts me in such a passion—to think of all the years they have been drawing off the funds that should have been at your disposal, ma’am”—addressing Mrs. Carteret.

  Then, clasping the hand of Mrs. Carteret in his, he said to Delphie,

  “I must now tell you something, Miss Delphie, that—ahem!—may surprise you a little, but, knowing me as I hope you do—knowing that I’m a plain man but an honest one, whose word is as good as his bond, who likes things straightforward—and likes all about him to be happy and comfortable—er—where was I?”

  “You were going to tell me something, Mr. Browty!” said Delphie, smiling at him with considerable affection. She had already guessed what it was.

  “Ah, that’s right, Miss Delphie! What a head on your shoulders you always have! I was about to tell you that I have asked your dear Mamma to marry me, and she has said yes! And that has made me a very happy man,” said Mr. Browty simply, “for I know she’ll love my gals, and I shall do my possible to make her happy for the rest of her life. Won’t I, my dear?”

  It was plain from Mrs. Carteret’s smile that this programme was already under way.

  Delphie ran forward and embraced them both.

  “You could not have done anything which would make me happier, sir!” she said. “I know you will get on together famously! Mamma will be forever making plans for parties, and you will be giving them!”

  “Just so!” he said, delighted. “And I hope you’ll be coming to every one of ‘em, Miss Delphie! But there’s one thing I should like to be clear about—relative to what you and I was saying the other day, Miss Delphie—”

  “Yes, Mr. Browty?” said Delphie, casting an anxious glance at two gardeners, who had come in through a back door and were conferring with Gareth in low voices. She caught the words “Moat—body—Mr. Fitzjohn—” Then Gareth gave them some directions, they saluted, and went out again.

  “Well,” said Mr. Browty, “we just heard that the young lady as was pretending to be you, Miss Delphie, has been sent packing—and a hem good thing too!—but what about that Mr. Fitzjohn? And the suit that he had a mind to bring, proving that he was the rightful lord?”

  “I do not think that would have borne investigation,” said Gareth, returning from his conference with the two men. “It seems to have been based on the fact that my grandfather did, apparently, marry Prissy Privett—Mordred was able to show me a certificate of marriage, which he had recently discovered, tucked into a Bible in the library—but the date of the wedding, regrettably, came eighteen months after the birth of Mordred’s father and six months after that of Lucy, so there would still be no question of their being legitimate.”

  “Ahem!” came the deferential voice of Fidd. “As to that, sir—!”

  Everybody turned and looked at him.

  “As to that,” said Fidd modestly, “even Lord Bollington’s marriage to Prissy Privett wouldn’t ha’ made no difference—whether the children was born in wedlock or out of it—for the marriage was what I’d call a bit of a spong-up; Prissy Privett was married already! She was married afore she ever took up with his lordship. Either of their lordships!”

  “Good gracious!” exclaimed Mrs. Carteret. “Was anyone ever so much married as that Prissy Privett?”

  “She must have had considerable appeal,” said Gareth, turning thoughtfully to gaze up at the portrait of his great-aunt by marriage, who stood leaning against a tree and laughing down at them all.

  “First she married the Fifth Viscount—and then she married the Seventh Viscount. But who was she married to first of all, then, Mr. Fidd?” inquired Delphie.

  “Why,” said Fidd calmly, “she were married to me!” He added, sighing “A proper flighty piece she were; you couldn’t hold her down, no more than thistle-blow.”

  A stunned silence filled the room for some moments, and then, glancing thoughtfully about at the company, Fidd remarked, “Would you be wishing me to serve a nuncheon, then, Miss Delphie?”

  “Yes, Fidd, thank you,” she replied. “We shall be twenty, for Mrs. Palgrave’s husband is arriving separately, and Lord Bollington has also sent for Mr. Wylye.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” said Fidd, and bowed himself from the room.

  “Well—what a thing!” declared Una, who had been silent so far. “Only imagine—bigamy!”

  “If not trigamy, my dear sister!” said Gareth.

  “What an outrageous scandal! It is a good thing it was all a long time ago.”

  “Talking of scandal,” said Lady Bablock-Hythe, who had obviously experienced some difficulty in following the involved and shocking ramifications of the Penistone family’s previous generations, but had now chosen ground she understood, “Talking of scandal, Lord Bollington, did my ears inform me correctly—can it be possible that what Fidd gave us to understand just now is actually the case—?”

  “I am afraid I do not quite follow you, ma’am?”

  “Why, that you and Miss Philadelphia Carteret spent the whole night together up on the roof—quite alone—quite unchaperoned?”

  Delphie blushed, and met Gareth’s eyes, which were full of laughter.

  He said, “Well, yes, that is certainly true, ma’am—and devilish wet and uncomfortable it was, I can assure you! Quite the most disagreeable night I can ever recall having passed.”

  “But what are you going to do about it?”

  “Well I don’t know about Delphie, ma’am—but I plan to retire very early tonight, into a mustard bath, and I shall also take a stiff dose of paregoric. And I strongly advise Delphie to do the same.”

  “That is not in the least what I mean—do not pretend to misunderstand me, sir—are you going to offer for her hand?”

  “Certainly not,” said Gareth, taking it. “What would be the point? Delphie and I have been married these six weeks past—and very wearing it has been. However, I am in hopes that matters may now begin to improve. Honeymoons, you know, madam, are inclined to be trying! Now, if you will all excuse us, my wife and I have one or two things of a domestic nature to discuss together. We shall see you again around the luncheon table.”

  And he firmly whisked Delphie into the next room, a very pretty parlor with a french window, and out through the window into a paved rose garden.

  “Why, this is charming!” said Delphie, sniffing the budding flowers. “I had no idea there was anything so pretty at Chase. Just a minute, Lord Bollington”—for he was about to take her in his arms again.

  “Well, what is it now?” he demanded impatiently, for she was digging in her reticule and produced an envelope.

  “Knowing that you have vowed not to conclude any matrimonial alliance that does not satisfy every dictate of sense, prudence, and rational—”

  He snatched the paper from her. “What is all this? It can’t be your marriage lines—you’ve already torn ‘em up. Lord Bollington? What has this to say for itself?”

  “It is just,” said Delphie, “that I thought we should not begin our married life without a proper introduction!”

  He read:

  My dear Lord Bollington ... This is to introduce to your Notise a young Connection of yours, Miss Carteret. Miss Carteret is the best, most scrupulously honest young Lady of my acquaintance ... Her Morals are Unblemish’d, her Character direct & Sinsere, her Mind of a Purity the most Unecsepshionable & Limpid...

 

 

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