by Mary Nichols
‘It is still too quick. We shall have to send the invitations out this week to give people time to reply. And you must have a whole new wardrobe. There will be receptions and balls, entertaining and being entertained when you arrive in Austria. You will be Viscountess Cranford and in the thick of high society.’
Kate had hardly given the matter any thought, had been thinking of the wedding as the end of everything, when it was really only a beginning, the beginning of the rest of her life, and her heart sank. She had come to the conclusion there was nothing for it but to agree; the alternative was too terrible to contemplate, not only for her and Robert, but for her father and grandmother. ‘I wish we could go somewhere and marry quietly without all this fuss,’ she said. ‘Just you and Papa for witnesses. After all, it is a second marriage for both of us.’
‘Not to be thought of,’ the dowager said. ‘Think of the Viscount’s position.’
She did think about it, all the time. Her life was going to change beyond anything she had dreamed of and sooner than she expected. If only she could have had more time, she might have been able to find a way out of her dilemma.
The old lady turned to her son. ‘I assume you are going to marry your daughter, Thomas?’
‘I can hardly marry her and give her away. I’ll see if the bishop will conduct the ceremony.’
‘And the wedding breakfast,’ her grandmother went on, her head buzzing with the excitement of it all. ‘We must think about that too.’
‘Why not have it at Morland House?’ her father suggested. ‘It has some elegant reception rooms. I am sure James and Lizzie will agree.’
‘Capital idea!’ the old lady said. ‘It will impress the Viscount and his guests no end. Let us go this afternoon and put it to them.’
‘Thank you, Grandmama,’ Kate said. ‘Are you sure it is not all too much for you?’
‘Fustian! I am not in my dotage yet. And I shall enjoy it. And we must pay a visit to Madame Lorette tomorrow. If she is going to create your wedding gown, she must have as much time as you can give her.’
Everything was going to plan, at least her grandmother’s plan. Kate herself was beginning to feel breathless and more and more afraid. This wedding was not going to be anything like the quiet ceremony she and Edward had enjoyed, but then he had been a Captain of a cavalry regiment and not a Viscount, and his regiment had been expecting to be sent abroad at any time. And they had been so much in love it did not matter.
‘And that’s another thing,’ her ladyship went on. ‘The children. You cannot look after them and get ready for your wedding at the same time. You will be worn out.’
‘I cannot turn them out, can I? I shall have to speak to Dr Redfern and give him a little notice.’ Even speaking his name made her falter. ‘The poor things have been pushed about enough in their young lives. I want to be sure they are well and happy wherever they go.’
Robert, when informed of the discussion later that afternoon, heartily approved of the idea of using Morland House, but he had little patience with her prevaricating over the children and said she must simply tell Dr Redfern to take them elsewhere, which she refused to do. It made the atmosphere between them strained for a time, but as each was anxious to please the other, it was soon mended and, over cups of tea and Cook’s honey cakes, they set about arranging a wedding. He agreed a date and a time for the nuptials and promised to give Kate a list of people he would like invited. She asked him whether his daughters—Roberta, who was ten, and Caroline, who was eight—would like to be her attendants, but he said he was not sure. ‘I shall have to ask my sister what she thinks. I do not want them upset.’
‘You think they will be upset?’ she queried, taken aback.
‘They might.’
‘Why? I am becoming part of the family, not taking you from them. I shall be their stepmama as well as your wife.’
‘That is true and I will make arrangements for you to meet them. Now it is time I was off.’ He rose to take his leave and bowed to Lady Morland and the Reverend.
Kate rose to accompany him to the front the front door. ‘You will let me know when to expect your girls,’ she said. ‘I am sure we shall deal well together. It will be an adventure for all of us, learning about a new country.’
‘They are not coming to Austria with us, Katherine.’
‘Why not?’ She was shocked.
‘They are happy and settled with my sister and have their lessons with their cousins and taking them to a strange country will certainly unsettle them, especially as we shall be busy entertaining and being entertained. It is a large part of the job.’
‘I see.’ But she did not see. ‘Later, perhaps.’
‘Yes, later they can come for a visit. And of course I shall have home leave in due course and probably in a year or two another posting, and we cannot drag them all over the world with us.’
Kate was about to say, ‘What about our own children,’ but decided against it. When it happened, there was no way she would part with them. She watched him go down the path to his phaeton and then turned back indoors, pondering on what he had said about his daughters and the way he seemed to have shifted their welfare on to his sister. Did he not like children? Not even his own? All her doubts resurfaced and overwhelmed her.
She returned to the drawing room where her grandmother had already begun on a list of things to do. ‘You will have to speak to Dr Redfern about the children now, Kate,’ she said.
‘I know.’
‘Would you like me to do it?’
‘No, I must.’
‘The sooner the better.’
‘Yes.’ If she had any thought of confiding her doubts to her grandmother, she found she could not. She must do what was expected of her.
Chapter Six
Simon called the following afternoon, suggesting an outing to Richmond Park. ‘We could combine it with nature study,’ he said, smiling and tearing at Kate’s heart.
While the older ones got themselves ready, she helped Joe into his boots, worrying all the time about breaking the news of her impending marriage and telling him the children would have to be moved again. She felt guilty about it and realised it had perhaps been unkind to take them in the first place, but, oh, how they had wrenched her soft heart and she wanted to make them happy. The wrench would be even greater now she had come to know them and love them. Doctor Redfern had warned her about that but she had thought herself strong enough to resist it. She was not strong at all or she would have had the courage to reject Robert. But how could she? If it were only her own happiness she had to consider, she would have braved the condemnation and followed her heart, but every reason she had for going on with the wedding was as valid now as it ever had been. And Dr Redfern, this gentle, caring man, would have to be told.
Once they had left the coach in a convenient spot, the children ran off to pick wild flowers; Kate had said she would help them name them afterwards. Watching them, she was glad it was not the sort of day out that the haut monde habitually enjoyed and they were unlikely to be seen by anyone who knew her, like Captain Feltwell, who had not confined himself to baiting her, if what her cousin James had told her was true.
She and her grandmother had gone to Morland House to tell her cousins about the betrothal and ask if they would allow their home to be used for the wedding breakfast and if their eldest daughter Charlotte could be one of her bridal attendants, to which Lizzie had agreed wholeheartedly. ‘I have no doubt it will be the wedding of the year,’ she said. She was a tall slim woman, not known for her beauty, but she had a pleasant, open countenance and was adored by her husband and four children.
‘Don’t tell her that,’ her grandmother had put in with a chuckle. ‘She is already in a ferment over it. Wants a quiet wedding, would you believe?’
‘Not possible,’ Lizzie had said. ‘Given the standing of the groom in Society.’
‘So I told her.’
While they were chatting, James had arrived back from Tattersalls
where he had been looking over some horses. After being told the news, offering his felicitations and endorsing his wife’s agreement over the wedding breakfast, he had added, ‘What’s this I hear about Kate and a mob of slum children invading the Holles Street?’
‘Where did you hear that?’ Kate wanted to know.
‘At Tattersalls. I met Feltwell there. He said he’d seen you cavorting in the park with them. Man with you too.’
‘That was Dr Redfern.’ Kate had gone on to explain about the doctor and the charity and how she had taken in four of the children.
‘That’s all very well,’ James had said. ‘I admire your kind heart, but it won’t do to be talked about, you know. Doctor Redfern is already known as an eccentric and there is that business over his broken engagement. Did his reputation no good at all and mud sticks, you know.’
‘If people cannot find anything else to gossip about, then they must lead very impoverished lives,’ she retorted.
‘Does the Viscount know of the children?’
‘Of course. In any case, they are only with us for a week or two, just until Dr Redfern can find permanent homes for them.’
‘I say no more, then, but I must warn you, Kate, Feltwell is a notorious gabblegrinder, so please watch your step.’
She was wondering for the hundredth time what Captain Feltwell could possibly have against her, when Simon’s voice broke her reverie. ‘You are quiet, Kate,’ he murmured. ‘Are you not enjoying yourself?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘I was thinking…’
‘About what?’
‘Oh, nothing, this and that.’
When they arrived home she sent the children up to the nursery to play with some of the toys she had had as a child, while she spoke to Simon over cups of tea in the drawing room. Lady Morland, knowing what they would be talking about, had found an excuse to leave them.
‘Out with it,’ he said with a smile, after they had been sitting in silence for a whole minute.
‘Out with what?’
‘Whatever is on your mind. You have been in a brown study the whole afternoon. Is there something wrong?’
‘Not wrong exactly.’ She paused and then burst out, ‘Oh, I can’t bear it. I have done more harm than good having the children here.’
‘How can you say so? That is nonsense.’
‘No. You see, I am to be married sooner than I expected and will be leaving here, so I am afraid I must ask you to make other arrangements for the children. You do not know how sorry I am, not only to lose the children, but to lose your good opinion of me.’ It all came out in a breathless rush.
‘Married?’ He was so startled he only just managed to save his tea from spilling. ‘I did not know you were even contemplating it.’
‘The Viscount wanted to delay the announcement until he returned from Paris and could tell his daughters first.’
‘Viscount Cranford?’ He felt angry, betrayed, as if she had deliberately deceived him. Why had it never come out in the course of conversation that she was engaged to be married, unless she had been deliberately withholding the information from him? Why could she not have told him when they were dancing with the children and talking about the ball? Or when they talked about her having children of her own?
He would never have let her have the children if he had known. He certainly would not have taken them to Hyde Park, or to Hampstead Heath, or Richmond Park. Why had he not obeyed his own rules to hold himself aloof? Why had he not stuck to his vow to hold back from all women? He had allowed her to pierce his defences, to make him think she was different enough to make him forget Isobel and wonder if there might be a future for them together. He should have known, the minute he set eyes on Cranford, what was in the wind. But he hadn’t. What a blind fool he had been! It was a monumental effort of will to speak calmly. ‘May I offer my felicitations.’
‘Thank you.’ She sensed his anger, though not the reason for it, assuming it was only the fate of the children that concerned him. ‘But you do not have to take the children away immediately. I can keep them until you find somewhere else for them. In truth, I would like to have them for a little longer.’
‘But surely you will be busy? I believe a wedding takes a prodigious amount of organising.’ He said it lightly to relieve the tension, but inside he was in turmoil. He wanted to yell at her, take her by the shoulders and shake her, tell her that Cranford was not the man for her. Make her see. But that would only compound his idiocy.
‘Not too busy that I cannot look after them as I have been doing for a little longer,’ she said. ‘And I do not want to uproot them again before I need to. They have settled in so well.’
He cooled his anger. He had no right to be angry with her; she did not know what had been in his mind, and he thanked God for that. If he had spoken, what an idiot he would have made of himself. A second humiliation was more than he could have tolerated. ‘When is the wedding to be?’ he asked, once more in control of himself.
‘The last Saturday in July, the twenty-sixth. I hope you will be able to attend.’
‘Thank you,’ he said, though he told himself he would find some pressing engagement not to go; he could not bear to see her married to Viscount Cranford. He was convinced the man was wrong for her. What he could not understand is why she could not see it for herself. ‘How did you meet the Viscount?’
‘He was my late husband’s senior officer and was with him when he died at the Battle of Vittoria. He was slightly injured himself and came home to recuperate and came to see me to offer his condolences. He was a great help and comfort to me and after he returned to the Peninsula we kept up a correspondence.’
‘And you fell in love with him.’
‘I do not think it was as sudden as that. We are a widow and widower and you would not expect the giddiness of youth. We developed a fondness for each other.’ That was all it was, she admitted to herself, and even that was fading as she became more and more disillusioned.
He was not sure if it was the answer he expected or wanted. It did not make him feel any more sure that this was a match made in heaven. And she was far from old; he put her at twenty-five, no more, young enough to display a little giddiness, especially as she was obviously a demonstrative woman who did not hide her feelings. And that was another thing; she had never hinted she did not welcome his attention. There was that dance on the terrace at Lady Eleanor’s ball; something had happened between them then, momentous enough for him to dwell on it again and again. And there had been other occasions when they had been close, when he had allowed himself to hope.
‘I wish you happy,’ he said. ‘And do not worry about the children. I will take them off your hands in good time.’
‘There is no rush. I can manage a little longer. Joan is a great help and my grandmother has taken over most of the arrangements for the wedding. She is as excited as a child over it.’
‘But you are not?’
‘Of course I am,’ she said quickly.
He stood up. ‘I will let you know what arrangements I have made.’ His voice was cool, his tone abrupt. ‘Are you going to tell the children, or shall I?’
‘I will tell them. If it were not for moving to the British Embassy in Austria immediately after the wedding, I would ask my husband if we could keep them.’
He knew that was out of the question; the stiff-necked Viscount Cranford would never countenance such a thing and she must know that.
After he had left, Kate made an especially nice tea for her charges and sat with them while they ate it. All but Annie had been half-starved when they came to her and were beginning to fill out. Had she condemned them to going back where they came from, to hunger and poverty, dirt and rags? It was breaking her heart to think she had. And Dr Redfern was hurt and angry. She could hardly blame him, but she was hurting too and the reason for it was not hard to find.
Michael and Sarah accepted the news with a shrug of their shoulders. They had been shunted about between the Home and fos
ter families for years and had learned to take the good along with the bad. She worried about what sort of adults they would make with a background like that. Joe, of course, did not understand and only Annie cried at the thought of going back to the Hartingdon Home. Kate hoped the child’s mother would be fit enough for her to go to her own home before that became necessary.
After the others had run off to prepare for bed, Kate took Annie on to her lap to console her. ‘Your mama will soon be better and then you can go home again. Think of your stay with me as a little holiday.’
‘I don’t want you to go away.’
‘But I must. You understood when I explained about going on a ship and living abroad, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, but must you?’
Kate pondered this. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But what do you say to being one of the attendants at my wedding?’
‘What’s that?’
By the time Kate had explained, the child was much more cheerful, but Kate wondered what the Viscount would say. She had made the suggestion on the spur of the moment, without thinking, and she could not and would not retract. And surely she could have whom she pleased to attend her on her wedding day?
She had gone downstairs for dinner and afterwards helped her grandmother to write out invitations, wishing the list was not quite so long and wondering how many would accept, given the short notice.
It was while they were doing this she told Lady Morland about her promise to Annie, which appalled the old lady. ‘Oh, Kate, you foolish, foolish child,’ she said. ‘Whatever made you do it?’
‘She was upset at having to go back to the Home and I felt I had let her down. It was meant to be a sort of recompense…’
‘She is highly unsuitable, you must know that. Do you want to quarrel with your husband before you even get him to the altar?’
‘The choice of attendants is mine, Grandmother, and Annie is a sweet girl and knows how to behave. She is thrilled at the prospect and I will not go back on my word.’
