My Lady Caroline

by Jill Jones

  Alison wasn’t sure what the British protocol was concerning the display of affection toward servants, but she didn’t care. She might be the lady of the manor, but she was also unutterably grateful to this woman who had become more to her than a mere employee. “Thanks, Mrs. Beasley,” she said, bending to hug the surprised servant. “You’ve made this day very special for me.”

  With a little lump of emotion stuck in her throat, Alison left the room and made her way up the back stairs, heading for the rooms she had decided should be called the yellow suite. Not only had the three-room chamber been decorated in shades of lovely pale yellow, accented with white and peach, but they also faced east, their tall windows admitting the early daylight in sunny, yellow rays. Alison had selected the décor for the suite herself, wanting to create a special place for special people to stay, special people like Nicki Carmione, who had arrived just in time to be her maid of honor.

  She knew she ought to let Nicki sleep. She’d taken the overnight from Miami and would be tired, but she couldn’t wait to see her best friend. “Nicki!” she called, pounding on the door. “Nicki! Wake up!’ Without thinking, she opened the door, barging in on two sleepy people curled up in the large bed. Nicki sat up and rubbed her eyes.

  “It’s the brat,” she said, smiling. Her bedmate rolled over and groaned something unintelligible in a very masculine voice.

  “Oh, God. I’m sorry.” Alison flushed bright red. She hadn’t known Nicki was bringing Andreas. “Sorry,” she said again, backing out the door. But Nicki jumped out of bed and ran to Alison.

  “Never mind him. He won’t wake up for hours.” With a girlish giggle, she dragged Alison into the small sitting room, where the two friends embraced for a long time. “Now, you’ve got to tell me everything. Absolutely everything,” Nicki demanded. “I can’t believe how this whole thing turned out. Is the ghost here? Did you find Byron’s memoirs? C’mon. Tell all.”

  Alison rang for coffee and Danish pastries to be sent up to the room, and for the next hour, the two friends caught up with each other’s lives.

  Nicki had a surprise of her own as she flashed her new engagement ring in Alison’s face. When her tall Greek fiancé finally made a groggy appearance, Alison gave him a sisterly kiss and left the pair to put themselves together in time for the late afternoon ceremonies.

  Back in the Great Hall, she found Jeremy deep in conversation with Benjamin Pierce. There had been a time, not long ago, when seeing these two particular men in a close dialogue would have raised her defenses, think they were conspiring to control her life. But no more.

  At her own insistence, Benjamin was once again serving as director of the Cunningham trust. He had been appalled at Drew Hawthorne’s inept handling of one of the firm’s oldest and most valued clients, and he’d apologized profusely and sincerely to Alison for having assigned Hawthorne to her affairs.

  Jeremy had remained carefully neutral about Alison’s decisions concerning Dewhurst Manor. He’d offered advice only when asked, and then reluctantly.

  For her part, Alison had made a conscious effort to grow up. As her self-confidence grew, bolstered greatly by both Jeremy and Benjamin, she had been able to let go of the paranoia that had been eating at her since her parents’ deaths. Today, seeing Jeremy with her father’s old friend brought a bittersweet smile to her face.

  Benjamin had come to give away the bride.

  “Well, you two,” she said, taking the hand of each, “what mischief are you cooking up now?”

  Jeremy grinned at her. “Benjamin was just filling me in on Drew Hawthorne.”

  Alison made a face, then apologized. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I realize he is your son-in-law.”

  “Was.”

  “Oh?”

  Jeremy explained with a twinkle in his eye that Hawthorne had returned from his trip to England somewhat mentally unbalanced. “Seems he kept raving about having seen a ghost or something.”

  “England is full of ghosts, I understand,” Alison replied demurely.

  “Not only was he blabbering about this ghost, which he said had run him out of Dewhurst Manor, he also claimed some nonsense about finding the memoirs written by Lord Byron,” Benjamin continued, shaking his head. “He has really gone off the deep end, and Cecelia just couldn’t take any more. She’s filed for divorce, and Hawthorne spends most of his days in therapy with his shrink.” He squinted at Alison. “There’s no ghost here at Dewhurst, is there?”

  “Not anymore. Some people used to think the place was haunted, but we haven’t seen any ghosts around lately, have we, Jeremy?”

  Her husband-to-be shook his head in all seriousness. “Ghosts are just a childish notion,” he said, repeating what Alison had told him once. Reflexively, Alison glanced around, half expecting Caro to flex her ectoplasmic muscle, but the Great Hall remained peaceful.

  Other guests had begun to filter in, each with a hug for the bride and congratulations for the groom. Kate and her staff prepared an elegant buffet luncheon, but Alison could scarcely eat a bite as her anticipation grew for the afternoon’s events.

  “Excuse me,” she said at last, giving Jeremy’s hand a squeeze. “I’m going to liedown for awhile.” He gave her a loving kiss on the cheek.

  “I’m going to pretend that our wedding day starts the moment you leave this room,” he murmured. “I’ve moved my things to another room. I’ll dress there, and leave the bride to herself. After all, it’s bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the ceremony on her wedding day, didn’t you say?”

  Removing his things to another room wasn’t all Jeremy had done in her absence, Alison discovered. She opened the door to their suite to find a huge bouquet of roses and carnations standing in a tall vase near the window. She smiled and plucked the card from its holder. It read, “For Alison, the most rare and beautiful of them all. I love you, Jeremy.”

  The servants had made up the room, and on the bed lay a small box and an envelope with her name on it. She sat down on the soft comforter and picked up the envelope. Inside, she found a second envelope, curiously old-fashioned, along with a note, written in a handwriting she didn’t recognize. “Lady Caroline wishes to give this, a lock of her own lover’s hair, as a wedding gift,” she read. “She regrets she is unable to attend the ceremonies.” Alison opened the fragile envelope and dropped a curl of auburn hair onto the palm of her hand. Now where had he come up with that? She wondered, loving Jeremy all the more for his thoughtful and creative gifts.

  She lay the lock of hair upon the white bedcover and turned her attention to the small box. Carefully, she untied the simple red ribbon and lifted the lid. Inside was a smaller velvet box, which she opened gingerly. Inside that, rubies and diamonds lay in a stunning array in a necklace both exquisite and tasteful. Alison gasped. She’d seen jewels before, but these were more magnificent than anything she’d ever laid eyes on.

  “Oh, Jeremy,” she murmured as she picked up the precious treasure. She saw a small card at the bottom of the box.

  “These once belonged to Lady Georgianna, duchess of Devonshire, Lady Caroline’s aunt, who in her time was considered to be the jewel of London Society, but she could never outshine you, my love.”

  Alison brought the gemstones to her cheek and felt their polished coolness against her skin, appreciating the treasure Jeremy had selected as a wedding present. She thought about the gift she had for him. It was nothing like the rubies and diamonds she held between her fingers, but, she thought with a secret smile, it was a greater treasure by far.

  Jeremy stood next to his best man, Malcomb McTighe, watching the procession of Alison’s girlhood friends move in time to the music down the aisle to stand beside her as bridesmaids. She’d flown them in and had been excited when all but one was able to make it.

  The afternoon sky was glorious with fluffy white clouds reflecting shades of gold and pink as the sun prepared to bid farewell to Dewhurst Manor and all of its glittering guests. Chairs placed on the terrace were now o
ccupied by over a hundred guests. Music from the harpsichord where Caroline’s ghost had performed its nocturnal concert reached beyond the windows of the reception room and filtered into the garden.

  The grounds were immaculate. The landscape architect had directed Kit and his crew of gardeners who had worked double time to restore the gardens to their very British splendor. There was still much to be done to bring them to the state Alison had in mind, but the symmetry and color of the newly planted flowers and shrubs were impressive.

  The harpsichord commanded his attention suddenly, as the musician began The Wedding March. Jeremy’s eyes were riveted on the vision in white who now emerged from the arched arbor on the arm of Benjamin Pierce. He felt his throat tighten and his heart expand as she walked toward him, her eyes shining large and golden upon him. Her dress was old-fashioned in its style, with a high waist and a modest yet revealing décolletage, much like the empire gown he’d seen on the ghost. The silken fabric was encrusted with tiny seed pearls that shimmered in the last rays of the sun, and the necklace he’d left on the bed for her was a perfect complement at her throat. My God, he thought, I never saw anyone more beautiful.

  Jeremy took her arm, and together they turned to the minister who was to perform the ceremony. He felt her shaking slightly, and he covered her hand with his, reassuring her, loving her. Yes, he vowed, he would love her, honor her, cherish her, as long as he lived.

  Maybe even longer, he thought considering the ghost.

  When it was her turn, Alison repeated her vows, but when asked if she would love, honor, and cherish Jeremy for the rest of her days, she hesitated. She turned to him, lifted her eyes and gave him a curious smile.

  “We will.”

  We? What was that all about? Jeremy wondered. Had her title gone to her head? Was she using the “royal we”? He couldn’t imagine his bleeding heart liberal behaving in such a manner. The moment passed, however, and he forgot about it until much, much later, when the party was over and the guests had found their way through the maze to their bedrooms, and Jeremy and Alison lay together on a bed in the Dorchester in London, where they were to spend their first night as husband and wife.

  “By the way,” she whispered after they had made love for the second time, “thank you for the presents.”

  “Presents?” he murmured. “I only gave you one. The necklace. But I’m glad you like it. It looked stunning on you, by the way.”

  He felt Alison move closer and drape an arm around him. “But there was another present on the bed. Don’t you remember the lock of Byron’s hair?”

  Jeremy sat up on one elbow. “Lock of hair? I didn’t leave a lock of hair on the bed. I…uh…put that in the safe in the library.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Jeremy felt his face grow warm. How could he explain that most inexplicable incident? Even Alison might find it hard to believe that the ghost apparently had taken the lock he’d found in the book in the library, only to return it later, dressed to kill in that diaphanous gown. He decided not to go into detail. “I found a lock of hair in a copy of Childe Harold in the library that was inscribed to Caroline from Lord Byron,” he explained. “I…pinched a few strands to give to Malcomb to run a DNA test on. I thought the hair might be Caroline’s because it was in an envelope addressed to Lord Chillingcote. Turned out it was Byron’s. But I swear, I put the rest of the lock in the safe in the library.”

  “And I swear you have larceny in your soul,” Alison laughed, punching him lightly. “Then you didn’t put that envelope on the bed this afternoon?”

  “No. You don’t suppose…?”

  “I thought she…it…was gone.”

  “Hmmm.”

  They lay in thoughtful silence for a long while, then Jeremy remembered her odd answer to their wedding vows.

  “What did you mean when you answered the minister, ‘we will’ rather than ‘I will’?”

  “Because there was more than one of us answering the question,” she murmured.

  Jeremy was puzzled. “I don’t understand.”

  “You don’t happen to have any dill pickles around here, do you?”

  Epilogue

  The old man stood at the crest of the hill, looking across the newly-groomed landscape of Dewhurst Manor. Beside him, a large dog scratched its ear. The night was illuminated by a full moon which had risen large and golden to shine down upon the guests who had attended the wedding of the Lord and Lady of Dewhurst and who now slept in the many rooms of the old manor house.

  Ashley T. Stone smiled. He’d been pleased to be invited, and he’d enjoyed the wedding, watching if from this distant vantage point. He’d never much liked formal affairs, but he’d been there, in his own way. Alison was such a lovely young woman. Looked so much like Lady Caroline, it was a little uncanny, he thought.

  He wondered where Caroline’s ghost was now. Since the night of the amazing fireworks, when he’d seen what he’d thought was an exploding star and had learned later from Alison that it was the ghost’s dramatic exit, the glow had been extinguished from Dewhurst. Ashley T. Stone figured that the spectacular pyrotechnics had been the final performance of the winsome but volatile specter.

  “Come on, boy, it’s late,” he said to the dog. “Let’s go home.” He started to leave, but stopped when he saw what he thought was a flicker of light in the tower of Dewhurst. He squinted. Must be mistaken, he thought, knowing that the newlyweds had left already on their honeymoon. But he saw it again, and then realized that a golden aura was slowly illuminating the ancient structure.

  He chuckled. “I didn’t think you’d stay away long.”

  Bibliography

  The volume of material that has been written about Lord Byron is enormous, as was the volume of his own correspondence and poetical work. For the purposes of this story, I have used the following books for accounts of Byron’s conversations, letters, poetry and comments of those who knew him:

  The Complete Poetical Works of Lord Byron, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1933.

  The Uninhibited Byron, Bernard Grebanier, Crown Publishers, New York, 1970.

  Caro, The Fatal Passion, Henry Blyth, Coward, McCann, & Geohegan, New York, 1973.

  The Prince of Pleasure and His Regency, J.B. Priestley, Harper and Row, New York, 1969.

  The Essential Byron, Paul Muldoon, Ed., Galahad Books, New York, 1992.

  His Very Self and Voice, Collected Conversations of Lord Byron, Ernest J. Lovell, Jr., Ed., Macmillian, New York, 1954.

  Byron, A Critical Edition of the Major Works, Jerome J. McGann, Ed., Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 1986.

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