“Well, of course he did, idiot,” said her fond twin.
“Then that settles the matter,” Matilda said. “Thank you, Avery. Though I would have done it anyway, you know, even if there had been no such statute.”
“Quite so,” he said.
And so here she was now, dressed in pale blue and silver, wearing a frivolous hat at a jaunty angle on her head, knowing—though Charles did not—that Gil and Abigail and Katy had arrived late yesterday afternoon at Viola and Marcel’s London home, and knowing too that no man awaited her downstairs to offer her a steady male arm to help her totter her way along the nave of St. George’s to meet her bridegroom.
Her bridegroom! Her heart leaped within her bosom and performed a couple of headstands and a number of tumble tosses before leaving her simply breathless. Surely he would have changed his mind at the last moment and would not be there awaiting her when she arrived.
What utter nonsense and drivel!
Her bridegroom! Charles. Ah. At last. At long, long last.
And if she stood here, one glove on and one off, still in the hand of her maid, and entertained more of such idiotic thoughts, it wasshewho would not be turning up on time. Not that brides were expected to be on time. But she was not just any bride. She was Matilda Westcott. And Matilda had gone through life being punctual, on the theory that it was bad mannered to be late and waste other people’s time when they might be using it to better effect elsewhere.
She was not going to start being late with her own wedding. She was not going to be early either. That would be embarrassing. She would be on time. To the minute.
And it was time to leave.
“Thank you,” she said, taking her glove from her maid and pulling it on as she drew a few deep breaths.
Her wedding day!
Perhaps she would perform a few twirls on her way along the nave. Nowthatwould make for a memorable wedding.
How dreadfully the mind babbled when one was nervous.
And she was very, very nervous.
Oh, Charles!
She straightened her shoulders, stepped out of her dressing room, and made her way downstairs and outdoors to the awaiting carriage.
Ten
Charles was resigned to his fate as he awaited the arrival of his bride at St. George’s. Behind him the pews had filled with family and the very crème de la crème of aristocratic society. At least, he assumed they had filled. He did not turn his head to look. But he could hear the rustling of silks and satins, the muted conversations, the cleared throats.
Given the choice, he would still opt for a quiet wedding. He was also still glad Matilda was to have her grand wedding at last. He sat in the front pew, wondering how her life would have proceeded if her father had not refused his suit quite so adamantly or if she had not refused to discuss the matter with him afterward. Or if he had had the gumption to fight for what he wanted instead of turning peevishly away to nurse his bruised heart by becoming one of England’s most notorious rakes and hellions. Would they have married? Would his children be hers too—but different children, of course? But children of her own—and his. Would she have been happy? Would he? Her life would certainly have been different. Would his?
They were pointless thoughts, of course. Ifs were always pointless when applied to the past. If the past had been different, then so would the present be. He would not now be sitting here on full display before theton, awaiting the arrival of his bride. She would not be living through her wedding day now, today.
He was glad it was now. He felt suddenly happy even as a twinge of anxiety nudged at him lest she be going through one of her many doubting moments and would simply not come.
Impossible! Of course she would come.
“Nervous?” Adrian murmured from beside him. His son was his best man.
“Of course,” Charles murmured back. “Today is the start of a wholly new life.”
But before anxiety could take hold of him, he heard a stirring from the back of the church and guessed that it heralded the arrival of Matilda, who was apparently coming alone. Her mother had arrived earlier with Mrs. Monteith, her sister, and Miss Boniface, her paragon of a companion who also, according to Matilda, sniffed. They had come earlier than originally planned in order to take up residence with the dowager countess and console her for the loss of her eldest daughter to marriage.
The clergyman, fully robed, appeared from somewhere and Charles rose with the rest of the congregation and the great pipe organ began to play. Charles turned to look along the nave. And sure enough, she came alone, a straight-backed woman of middle years, proceeding with slow—but not too slow—dignity along the aisle, her eyes fixed forward until they found and held upon him. She was dressed decently, elegantly, almost severely in pale blue—as he might have expected had he given the matter thought—with an absurdly pretty straw hat tipped forward over her forehead and with her silver-gloved hands clasped before her. Her face was pale, her mouth in a prim line until she was a few steps away from him. Then, unseen by all except the closest of the congregation, she smiled at him with all the sunshine of a summer’s day behind her eyes.
He saw in that smile the vivid girl she had been. And he saw in the quiet poise of her demeanor the woman she had become.
He saw Matilda. His love. Always and ever his love.
She set her hand in his, giving herself to him because, as she had explained, she did not need any man to do it for her, no matter how closely related to her that man was or how well meaning. She let her fingers curl about his own in a firm grip.
