Happy Birthday, Mr Darcy (5 page)

He laughed. ‘I’m getting a bit too old for sleepovers,’ he said, ‘besides, I want to spend as much time with Katherine as I can and we can’t do that with me here and her in Oxfordshire.’

Lily pursed her scarlet-lipsticked mouth at him. ‘You mean, you’re moving?’

Warwick nodded.

‘You’re selling The Old Vicarage?’

‘Yep!’

‘Oh, Warwick! When did this happen?’ she asked as if he’d just told her that he’d committed some dreadful crime.

‘We’ve decided that we want a new home together. Well, an
old
home. But a new start.’

‘But you love this house!’ Lily said.

‘But I love Katherine more,’ he said, a soppy smile on his face that he knew would wind Lily up. ‘What can I say? We can find a wonderful place in Oxfordshire and make a new home there.’

‘And why can’t she move here? Why does it have to be you who moves?’

‘Because her work’s there. I can work anywhere. It’s all been discussed and I’m happy with the decision,’ he said, his voice becoming firmer as if he was warning his sister that he wasn’t going to brook any argument.

‘She’s got you wrapped around her little finger,’ Lily said.

‘Very likely.’

‘I probably shouldn’t say this,’ Lily began and Warwick knew he was in for a tirade for, whenever Lily said
I probably shouldn’t say this
, the listener was inevitably crushed by some tale of woe, ‘but marriage is for foolish romantics who haven’t grown up yet.’

‘Then I should be absolutely fine,’ Warwick said.

‘Oh!’ Lily cried. ‘You’re so infuriating! Open the wine!’

Warwick took the bottle of wine and left the room, returning a moment later with two full crystal-cut glasses. He watched as his sister kicked off her pair of expensive looking heels and curled her legs up underneath herself on the sofa.

‘I don’t mean to sound cynical,’ Lily began, taking a modest sip of wine, ‘but have you really thought about this. I mean
really
thought about it?’

Warwick sat back down next to her and smiled. ‘Lily – I love you dearly but just because marriage didn’t work out for you-’

‘Twice!’ she interrupted.

‘Yes, twice, it doesn’t mean it’s not going to work for me. I'm truly sorry what happened with Jeff-’

‘Cheating son of a-’

‘And with Pete.’

‘Paul,’ Lily corrected.

Warwick nodded. His sister's marriage to Paul – after a whirlwind romance when she’d been working as a translator in Paris - hadn't even lasted a year and he had obviously put her off the institution of marriage for evermore. ‘It’s a great shame that you didn’t find your own happy ending-’

Lily made a funny guttural noise that was part scoff, part grunt. ‘Happy ending! There’s no such thing outside one of your novels.’

Warwick shrugged. ‘Well, I believe there is.’

‘Do you? Do you really?’ She cocked her head to one side and examined his face with intense closeness and he stared straight back at her. She managed to look both young and old at the same time as if the vulnerable little girl and the older cynic were still battling it out.

‘I do,’ he said.

‘But to give up everything – your home, your bachelorhood-’

‘I don’t feel like I’m giving anything up. I’m simply moving forward,’ he said, calmly sipping his wine.

‘Oh, I give up on you!’ Lily said at last. ‘You’ve lost your mind.’

‘No, dear sister,’ Warwick said. ‘I’ve lost my heart.’

That night, before bed, Warwick took down the old black and white photograph of his mother, Lara Lawton, that lived on the mahogany chest of drawers in his bedroom. It had been taken when she was in her twenties and she looked like a Hollywood starlet. She’d been desperate to make a career as an actress but had never graduated beyond bit parts and, when she’d had Lily and Warwick, she’d settled for the more modest role of secretary. But she’d always been a romantic and had passed those genes on to Warwick rather than his sister.

‘Believe in love and it will come your way,’ she’d told him and he’d believed her only it had taken its time. He’d known it when it had arrived, though. He’d known it with Katherine’s very first letter to him even though she’d thought she’d been writing to a woman. He’d adored her openness and her passion for the written word and they’d become the very best of friends even before they’d met.

‘You’d have loved her,’ he told the photograph of his mother, and a great weight of sadness filled his heart that she wasn’t alive to see him get married. His father had died when he’d been very young and he couldn’t really remember much about him but he felt the loss of his mother still and was quite sure that she would have loved Katherine.

‘I’m doing the right thing, aren’t I?’ he said to the photograph. ‘Lily’s got it all wrong, hasn’t she?’

The face of his mother stared back at him softly, gently and silently.

Chapter 8

It was Thursday afternoon – the day before Katherine and Warwick were due to meet at Purley Hall. They’d arranged to arrive at lunchtime on Friday which would give them plenty to time to make sure that everything was in place for the big day on Saturday. Dame Pamela had also invited them to dinner in the evening along with Robyn and Dan – their maid of honour and best man – although Katherine felt quite sure that she wouldn’t be able to eat a single morsel.

Being super-organised, she was just about packed. There was just one special item that had yet to be wrapped – the wedding dress. It was laid out upon her toile de jouy bedding and Katherine gazed down at it through tear-misted eyes. She had never seen anything so beautiful. Well, not since Matthew Macfadyen had strode across the dawn meadow in the 2005 adaptation of
Pride and Prejudice
. She really didn’t feel worthy of such a dress and it felt like a terrible extravagance to have something so lovely for just one day.

But that’s what being a bride is all about,
a little voice inside her said
. Every woman is entitled to one perfect day when she is the star attraction.

So why did she feel so guilty? Her life, up until now, had been so simple and so modest. Her work outfits were conservatively cut in muted colours. There was never anything that drew too much attention to herself because that wasn’t the sort of person she was. Of course, it was wonderful to get dressed up every now and again like at the Jane Austen conferences at Purley Hall. Then, a different Katherine would emerge like a resplendent butterfly, glorifying in fabulous fabrics in rich colours.

It was hard to imagine herself as a bride. Shelley had done the most marvellous job with the dress and Katherine could never have imagined it would be so beautiful but she still couldn’t quite envisage herself on the day.

Uncle Ned would be there to give her away because her father had left home when Katherine was just seven. Her mother had died a few years ago but her mother’s brother, Katherine’s Uncle Ned, was still around. He lived in York and had just retired from teaching and had been delighted to get Katherine’s call.

‘In costume, you say?’ he’d said with a laugh.

Katherine had been worried that she’d put him off but he accepted with alacrity.

Katherine would also have her best friend, Chrissie, at the wedding. Chrissie Carter was her jogging partner. One summer morning six years ago, they’d met at a stile whilst out jogging and they’d been pounding the Oxfordshire countryside together ever since. Katherine adored her friend and the two of them had enjoyed many a jog whilst setting the world to rights which usually involved complaining about the dearth of men. Well, until Katherine and Warwick had become an item.

‘Oh, you’re so lucky, Katherine!’ Chrissie had said when she’d seen the Georgian ring sparkling on her finger. ‘I’m convinced I’m going to remain an old maid.’

Katherine shook her head. ‘You know what Jane Austen said?’

‘No, but I’m
sure
you’re going to tell me.’

‘Do not be in a hurry: depend upon it, the right man will come at last.’

‘She really said that?’

‘Amongst other glorious things, yes,’ Katherine said. ‘Let me lend you some of her novels some time.’

‘Oh, no!’ Chrissie had said. ‘I’m not wading through pages and pages of dance scenes and proposals but I might borrow the Colin Firth adaptation from you again.’

Katherine smiled at the memory. She was thrilled that Chrissie was coming to the wedding. She would be a joyous presence and Katherine couldn’t wait to see what she would wear. Although her dear friend wasn’t a fellow Janeite, she had agreed to dress in Regency costume on the day and had booked one of Dame Pamela’s outfits.

Leaving the bedroom, Katherine went downstairs. Her two cats, Freddie and Fitz, were to be delivered to a neighbour that evening and were currently curled up together on top of a favourite blanket on a balloon back chair in the kitchen.

This is the last time I’ll be in my little home as a single lady
, she thought to herself. How strange that felt. When she next returned, it would be as a married woman although, in all likelihood, Warwick wouldn’t be with her. They wouldn’t be together properly as husband and wife until they’d found a new home.

Suddenly, her heart flipped at the thought of the Katherine in the future. Wife, partner, co-habiter and, catching sight of her reflection in the kitchen window, she wondered if she was really up to the job.

Great grey rain clouds filled the sky and the air was warm and muggy when Higgins entered Dame Pamela’s room early on Friday morning and opened the curtains.

‘Good morning, madam,’ he said, placing a cup of tea on her bedside table.

‘But it’s still dark,’ she said.

‘Rain has been forecast,’ Higgins said. ‘Rain followed by a stiff breeze and intermittent showers.’

Dame Pamela grimaced. ‘And tomorrow?’

‘Unsettled.’

‘Oh, dear!’

‘With a chance of sunshine.’

Dame Pamela sat up in bed, pushing her long, white hair over her shoulders. Higgins was the only person on the planet who saw Dame Pamela before she got to work with the hairbrush, make-up and diamonds. She took a sip of her tea from her bone china mug covered in pretty violets which was used every morning and then she swung her legs out of bed, her feet finding her cerise sequinned slippers.

‘Do you know, Higgins, I actually have butterflies in my stomach. Isn’t that funny? I haven’t had butterflies since I received that
Cream of the Screen
award and was kissed by Daniel Craig when he presented it to me!’

‘Indeed, madam,’ Higgins said.

‘Nothing beats a wedding, does it?’ she said, her eyes suddenly dreamy.  ‘What was that lovely line from
Mansfield Park
? “I would have everybody marry if they can do it properly”. That was it, wasn’t it?’

‘Very likely, madam,’ Higgins said.

‘And Warwick and Katherine are certainly doing it properly,’ she said, walking across to her dressing table and picking up the hairbrush. ‘I feel so honoured that they chose Purley Hall. We must have more weddings here in the future, Higgins. I can’t think of anything I’d like more. And Austen-themed weddings at that.’

‘Yes, madam,’ Higgins said.

Later that morning, once Dame Pamela had coiffed her hair and had dressed in a pale mint-coloured dress accessorised with a very modest single string of pearls, she went outside to check on the proceedings.

The white marquee stood on the lawn by the lake. The tables and chairs and all the necessary crockery would arrive later that day. There was a lot to see to but Robyn was on hand to liaise with the wedding planner and everything, it seemed, was under control.

Walking along the banks of the little river that ran through the grounds of Purley, Dame Pamela couldn’t help thinking about her own weddings of the past and the sense of anticipation and joy that filled the days before. Were Katherine and Warwick feeling like that now, she wondered? And would Dame Pamela ever have those feelings again?

She sighed, looking back at the great Georgian house whose windows winked at her in the morning light. It was hard to imagine sharing her life with somebody now but Dame Pamela believed that one should never say never and, of course, she was a die-hard romantic and that meant that life was always full of possibilities.

Chapter 9

The drive from The Old Vicarage in West Sussex to Purley Hall in Hampshire was not a long one but, when a cynical sister was sitting beside you, the miles seemed to stretch to infinity.

At Midhurst, Lily was recounting the time that she’d caught Jeff in a clinch with their neighbour.

‘He didn’t even try to deny it,’ she said, as if still surprised. ‘He just sort of shrugged as if it was to be expected.’

And, by Petersfield, she’d moved on to the misdemeanours of Paul who had emptied their joint bank account and gambled the lot at online casinos. ‘I tried to help him. I tried to understand but he didn’t want to be helped.’

‘I’m so sorry, Lily,’ Warwick said.

‘But this is what I’m trying to tell you – you can never truly know a person. I don’t think human beings are meant to live together.’

‘Oh, you can’t be serious!’ Warwick said with a laugh as he slowed to take a bend in the road.

‘I’m dead serious,’ Lily said, her mouth a thin, straight line of intense seriousness. ‘At least, I don’t think men and women should live together.’

‘What are you saying?’ Warwick asked, casting a quick glance her way. ‘You’re not-’

‘
No!
’ she cried. ‘But I’m never
ever
living with another man again.’

They drove on in silence, finally turning off the main roads and slowing down to take the winding country lanes of Hampshire.

‘I just think,’ Lily started up again, ‘that you’re absolutely mad to be going through all this when you don’t need to. In this day and age, you don’t need to get married.’

‘I know,’ Warwick said.

‘Society couldn’t care less. Marriage is outdated and old-fashioned.’

‘But you believed in it once.
Twice!
’