Barbara Metzger (12 page)

“No, thank you. I purchased one when I was in London. I had no idea of your—that is, the size, or what style you—ah, Miss Gannon would prefer. The St. Ives wedding set is in the vault in Warwickshire.” Where his father would guard it from unworthy daughters-in-law like a dragon guarding its horde of gems.

He showed her a plain band, solid and respectable, like Viscount Tyverne himself. The polished gold even gleamed like the highlights of his hair. Delia sighed and went back to her lists. “We should have flowers.”

“Flowers,” he repeated. “Every wedding has at least a few blooms, doesn’t it? This time of year might make obtaining them difficult, but Winsted is used to foraging. Belinda deserves flowers for her wedding, don’t you think?”

Delia was beginning to think that, if Belinda recovered, the poor little widgeon was getting far more than any girl deserved.

* * * *

Ty felt better when he was planning the event than he did thinking of the event. It was the same as a campaign: figuring the logistics was engrossing, predicting the enemy’s actions, preparing for every eventuality from ambush to damp ammunition. Fighting the actual engagement was nearly mechanical, like an actor in a well-rehearsed role. It was in the space between, when a man had time to think, that doubts and desperation festered. Like now.

Ty had taken care of as many details as he could this afternoon, directing his minions, authorizing payments, giving orders half of which, he suspected, Miss Croft would ignore or countermand. Tomorrow, at the actual ceremony, with Winsted and Anselm at his side, he knew he would stand firm. He had never turned his back on a battle yet. This evening, however, alone in his room, Major Lord Tyverne was quaking. He kept feeling his forehead for fever. No such luck.

He was getting married, to a woman. Well, of course he was wedding a woman, Ty acknowledged, but, Jupiter, he was actually getting leg-shackled. To a female. His mind suffered a paroxysm at the notion.

Then he recalled that he was growing more at ease around the gentler sex. Not that Miss Croft was so delicate, giving him a rare trimming, despite his apology, for believing her a straw damsel at first. She was right; Ty should not have leaped to conclusions. Then she’d stuck to her guns about him not moving to the inn for the night to protect what was left of her reputation. She did not back down, not even when he used his best parade-ground command voice. And she was right again, dash it. Ty doubted if he could have mounted, much less ridden Diablo to the inn, his legs were so unsteady. Either way, he seemed to be getting used to Miss Croft’s company. He hardly chewed on his lip when conversing with her anymore, and had not broken out in a sweat once while they made plans. He’d even made her smile again, when he suggested Dover as ring bearer.

If he could overcome his misgivings about Miss Croft, Ty thought, surely he could manage to marry Belinda
...
a sickly, pregnant young female who loved another man so much she was dying of a broken heart.

Lud.

Lord Tyverne had relieved half of his anxiety by frightening Sir Clarence half to death. The baronet would not attend the wedding. Neither would he mention taking possession of the house until Belinda, the future Viscountess Tyverne, could be safely moved. Ty choked off the baronet’s complaints—and just a bit of the baronet’s breathing—before he offered to reimburse the clunch for provisions, servants’ salaries, stabling for the horse, and whatever else the nip cheese could think of. As for browbeating his cousin into accepting Lord Dallsworth, now that Miss Croft was not marrying the viscount, well, Clarence would not do that, either. Not if he wished to show his face in London, Kent, or Warwickshire, or half the counties between, to say nothing of Spain and Portugal.

Ty still had the night to get through. He tried to sleep, but his mind kept returning to the morrow, to the wedding that would be stranger than any he could have imagined. When he commanded his brain to picture other, less nerve-racking scenarios, like a firing squad, he saw only Delia, Miss Croft—naked, with her red hair loose around her shoulders. No, the major would not be getting much sleep this night. He put on his boots.

The house was quiet, for once devoid of the sounds of sorrow. Mindle and Dover were in the kitchens, he knew, helping with the cooking and polishing; Miss Croft and the other women were above, doing whatever females did to prepare for a wedding. Men prepared by going out with friends, gambling, drinking, whoring.

Ty went to the stables to share a bottle of ale with his horse.

Chapter 14

Belinda’s room looked like a bower, with sun coming through the opened curtains. Delia had brought potted palms and ferns from all over the house, and found some ivy that had stayed green. The efficient Winsted had brought early violets from a flower seller in Canterbury, and roses from someone’s succession houses. There was also a large arrangement on the dressing table that looked suspiciously like an altar piece. The bedchamber smelled like a garden now, though, instead of a sickroom.

After conferring with Lord Tyverne, Delia had decided against disturbing Belinda by moving her to the master suite sitting room or, heaven help them, the formal parlor. Trying to wrestle the unresponsive, unwieldly bulk down those narrow stairs would have been hazardous for all of them. Instead, they had dressed poor Belinda in a pretty pink robe of Delia’s, with a fall of lace added to the front so no one would notice it did not close. Delia and Aunt Eliza had added more lace to the cuffs, to cover the girl’s bloated hands and wrists. They’d washed and dried her hair, fanning it across the pillow in a golden sweep, and placed a garland of pink roses atop her head. They spread a lacy white gauze cover over her blankets, almost like a wedding veil, and scattered a few rose petals on top of it. The dog, who had been washed and dried and combed also, had a ribbon around its neck. Delia patted the little terrier to keep it from barking at all the strangers, then placed a single pink rose by her friend’s side.

Belinda could have been a sleeping princess from a fairy tale waiting for her handsome prince—except for the immense mound of her belly. Those bewitched beauties were seldom breeding. Then, too, they were rarely whiter than their sheets, nor did make-believe brides have blue-tinged lips and labored breathing.

Still, Delia thought as she took her place near the bed, Belinda was getting married. Tyverne might not be Belinda’s first choice of husband, nor was he a prince in fact or fancy—not with his serious, gruff manner and bellowing voice—but he made a handsome groom, shining from his fair curls to his gold buttons to his black leather boots. More importantly, he was a good man, stalwart and true to what he believed was right. That was far more crucial in a husband than a facile tongue or a ready smile, Delia decided, looking across the bed at the uniformed gentleman. Tyverne had substance, aside from his strength, and he would use it on Belinda’s behalf.

He would know what to do for Belinda, be it better doctors or more medicines. She would have the best care in the world, not just what a handful of old women and one youngish old maid who knew nothing of birthing could provide. The infant—and here Delia sent a prayer skyward—would never want for anything, especially not a name. There would always be rumors and gossip, but Delia recalled what Ty had said about boys calling him Archy. He protected what was his.

Someday, perhaps, Delia hoped, she could find such a mate for herself. He did not have to be so large, of course, nor so handsome or highly stationed, not even as wealthy, simply as kind and decent. And he would love Delia unconditionally, freckles, red hair, skinny bosom and all, with his heart and soul, for this was her fairy tale.

Ty was standing at the opposite side of the bed from Miss Croft, between Mindle and Winsted, with the new solicitor, Macurdle, behind him. That was good, he thought, for they could catch him when he passed out. Stephen Anselm stood at the foot of the bed, grinning despite the solemnity of the occasion, at his friend’s discomfort. Everyone else, including Winsted, assumed Ty’s ashen color and trembling hand were due to the remnants of the fever. To the devil with old friends.

And with such folderol as this. The ceremony should have been over ages ago, if not for Stephen’s babbling. The papers could have been signed, and he could have been on his way back to London, to see what new nonsense his brother Nonny was up to. If Anselm read one more verse of scripture, Ty might have to wait another day to make the journey, deuce take it.

The women seemed to be enjoying the ritual. Nanny, Aunt Eliza, and old Mags were arrayed beside Miss Croft on the other side of Belinda’s bed, with Cook and two housemaids whispering and giggling for Stephen Anselm’s attention behind them. They’d decorated the room to look like a pagan altar, and poor Miss Gannon to resemble the virgin sacrifice. Except for the infant, of course. Now they were lined up across from the males like the opposing camp, girded for battle with rose petals and Bibles, lud, did they think he would retreat at this point? He might have, except for balding Macurdle behind him, and gap-toothed Dover between him and the door, the ring on a small pillow in the urchin’s freshly scrubbed hands.

This was not a war. The women were not his enemy. Belinda was merely a foolish female who needed his help, a young girl who might have found herself in such extremities, even if George Croft had lived and come home. Finally, Ty told himself, a man’s heart did not stop beating when he stepped into parson’s mousetrap. That would have defeated the purpose of the whole endeavor.

He was not going to collapse, and he was not going to cast up his accounts—he hoped. To redirect his thoughts while Anselm droned on—the viscount would have a few words of his own, later, in regard to his friend’s wordiness—with Nanny’s prayers echoing in an undertone, Ty looked at Miss Croft.

She was pleasant to look at this morning, more so than usual. Her face had a little more color, although she still looked weary, as well she should, having accomplished so much in such a short time. Delia was wearing a lavender dress of half mourning for the occasion, a black ribbon threaded through the trim at the neckline and at the short sleeves. The color did not become her, Ty thought, not with her hair, but it was better than the moldy black she’d had on previously. She must have considered the colors to be clashing also, for she’d placed a lace cap over most of her red curls. If Ty had the dressing of her—or the undressing, God forgive him for the thought—the cap would be the first thing to go. He decided that she would look good in green to match her eyes, or amber, like the flecks that danced in them when she was angry or agitated, which seemed most of the time in his company. Today she was gazing at him with approval, perhaps even respect, for a change. No, he could not disgrace himself now, not in the face of her rare approbation. He would even manage to speak the marriage cows—the vows!—without stumbling.

Soon enough, that time came. Now, Ty thought, instead of going as slow as a snail, his old friend Anselm was speeding the thing along. Thunderation, Ty should have had the local vicar do the deed after all.

When directed, the viscount placed his gold ring in the palm of Belinda’s ice-cold hand, trying without success to fold her swollen fingers around it. Holding it there with his own, almost as cold and uncooperative hand, he started to repeat after Anselm: “I, Archimedes—” He paused to glare at the maid who giggled again, and at Anselm, to remind him of a few black eyes and bloodied noses. “With this ring I, Archimedes Arthur Forrest St. Ives ...”

He got through it, leaving out only one of his many given names.

Delia spoke for the bride: “Belinda Helen Gannon.”

Aunt Eliza wept a little harder to hear Belinda’s name, not her niece’s.

But now the solicitor behind Ty began to shuffle his feet and clear his throat. The man had not been happy with the situation. He understood the necessity—Lud knew, he had daughters. But the details were what bothered him. He was a lawyer, after all.

“No one is going to contest the wedding,” Ty had insisted.

“When I draw up a contract,” Macurdle had replied, “no one bothers to try. That is why you chose to employ my services, is it not?”

The Reverend Mr. Anselm had found the best solicitor he could, thinking it would be just like Ty’s father to try to set aside a marriage he had not sanctioned. No matter that the church approved, or the courts recognized the legality, the earl could look for a reason to have this union annulled. Refusing to consider that Miss Gannon might not survive, Ty’s old friend was worried about any future children this couple he was joining together might produce. If he were able to prove the ceremony flawed, the earl could have the marriage declared null and void, which would make all of Tyverne’s offspring illegitimate, not just this troublesome one. None of them would thus be able to succeed to the title. In effect, Stivern could disinherit Ty after all for not bending to his will.

The special license obviated the necessity for permission of a parent or guardian, Macurdle agreed. But he had been concerned with the matter of volition. “Otherwise, my lord, unscrupulous fortune hunters could kidnap heiresses to wed
nolo-volo,
will she or won’t she, by means of a special license.”

Macurdle tried to consult with Belinda himself, so he could swear she was entering into this binding contract of marriage of her own free will. Either she did not hear him, or she did not have the strength to answer. Or she simply did not care. Belinda was no longer making those sorrowful exhalations, which Ty and Delia tried to convince themselves meant she was not in pain. Unfortunately, she was making no sounds at all.

“Usually in cases such as this, a trustee speaks for the one who is incompetent to know his or her rights. That surrogate must ensure that the incapacitated subject’s welfare is being duly considered.” Macurdle looked around.

“I can speak for Belinda,” Delia said. “She came to live with me when her father disowned her, so that should prove she trusts me.”