“Yes,” Lydia said, speaking to Harry.
“Lydia and I are betrothed,” Harry said.
His mother got to her feet.
“Because we love each other,” Harry said. “Notbecause of the very foolish gossip concocted by a Peeping Tom of a boy and his hysterical mother. We will be getting married.”
“Oh,” his mother said, clasping her hands to her bosom and looking at Lydia with glowing eyes.
“May I?” Harry asked Lydia.
“Yes,” she said.
“Tomorrow morning,” he said. “In the church here in the village. It was to have been a very private ceremony, even though all my family is currently staying at Hinsford Manor to celebrate my birthday, also tomorrow. We did not want a family wedding without any of Lydia’s family in attendance. But we also did not want to wait. Now it can be a family wedding after all.”
“Oh,” the marchioness said again.
Lydia’s father and brothers could not seem to find even that much to say.
Harry squeezed Lydia’s shoulders almost hard enough to hurt. She raised a hand and covered one of his own.
And suddenly the prospect of tomorrow morning no longer seemed flat. Suddenly there was nothing but joy.
The village of Fairfield was already in a state of suppressed excitement the following day when word began to spread from house to house, from business to business, as news and rumor and gossip always did in any community, thatsomething was going onat the church. It was Major Harry Westcott’s birthday, and the illustrious Westcott family, not to mention the Kingsleys and other guests, had been causing a stir all week as they paid calls in the village upon the favored ones among them. Almost everyone had been invited to the ball tonight. It was many years since there had been any such entertainment at the manor.
But now, when it was still only morning, something was happening at the church. Carriage after carriage was rolling up to it, and it looked as though everyone from the manor was descending from those carriages and going inside. Which seemed odd as this wasFriday, not Sunday. Perhaps, someone suggested, the vicar was going to do a special thanksgiving service for the thirty years Major Westcott had spent on this earth—against the odds, it might be added, while he was still a military man.
Doors opened on houses that were within sight of the church and remained open. Some people strolled up to the church, as though they just happened by pure chance to be in this place at this time. Yet others came hurrying up lest they miss something and made no pretense of being anything other than curious. Soon there was an impressive crowd gathered about the church gates, though they kept a respectful distance from it so they would not block the path being followed by each new arrival.
And then Major Westcott himself arrived and descended from his carriage before waiting for his brother-in-law Mr. Gilbert Bennington to step out after him. Both men were dressed very smartly. But it was Major Westcott’s carriage upon which much of the attention was focused. For it was lavishly decorated with flowers and greenery and could only be—
“God love him,” someone said loudly before having her voice drowned out by a swell of murmurings. “Our Lord Harry is getting himself married.”
As the two men disappeared inside the church and the carriage moved off, at least temporarily, speculation was rife about the identity of the bride. There were a few very pretty young ladies staying at the manor, though there had been no indication all week that any one of them was affianced to Major Westcott.
“Lydia?”Denise Franks whispered to Hannah Corning after moving through the crowd to stand beside her friend. “Is it possible?”
“She has not said a word to me,” Hannah said. “And Harry has not said a word to Tom.”
And then they turned to watch with everyone else. Two large men, both strangers, were striding up the street toward them, looking a bit ferocious. The crowd instinctively parted to let them through, though they were not arriving by carriage, and there was no real indication that their destination was the inside of the church.
Behind them came another formidable-looking man, just as large as the other two, but a bit more portly, and older. He did not attract as much attention as the first ones, however, for as soon as the two in front began to move past the crowd, everyone had a clear view of the woman who was holding his arm.
Mrs. Tavernor!
She was simply dressed in green, with a straw bonnet that had been trimmed with fresh pink flowers—to match those that had been embroidered upon the hem of her dress. It struck a few of the observers that she had never appeared this dainty or this youthful and pretty when she had been the vicar’s wife.
When they looked more closely, a few people could remember seeing the older man before, and maybe the taller of the other two. They had been here for the Reverend Tavernor’s funeral, had they not? The older man was Mrs. Tavernor’sfather? A man of wealth and property and influence, it was said.
The group of four made its way up the church path and into the church, and the crowd, buzzing with excitement and opinion, set itself to wait.
“Oh, Denise,” Hannah said. “I am going tocry.”
“Better not, Han,” Tom said. “I have only one handkerchief with me, and I may need that myself. My best friend is getting married.”
His wife dug him fondly in the ribs with her elbow.
Twenty-four
