“And all in the d-darkest bowels of the wild country,” Flavian said. “I expected savages to j-jump out at me from behind every r-rock as I traveled here, Ben, intent upon slitting my throat.”
“It is more likely,” Ben said, “that they would want to kidnap you so that they could sing to you, Flave. You should hear the miners’ choir where I work. It would be enough to make you weep sentimental tears.”
“S-spare me,” Flavian said faintly.
Hugo had a tankard of ale in his hand. “We must not keep Ben from his beauty sleep tonight of all nights,” he said, “and we will not try to get him foxed. But we will drink a toast to you, Benedict. That all your life your heart will dance as your person did in that alcove before Christmas.”
“Oh, the devil!” Flavian said, getting to his feet and holding aloft his glass of port. “Marriage is t-turning Hugo embarrassingly poetic. But he has the r-rights of it, Benedict, my boy. M-may you be happy. It is all we have ever w-wanted for one another.”
“To you, Benedict,” Imogen said, lifting her glass of wine. “And to Samantha.”
“To your happiness, Ben,” Ralph said, “and Mrs. McKay’s.”
“To you, brother,” Calvin said. “I always admired you greatly. You knew what you wanted and you went after it and did superbly well. It almost killed me when you were so badly hurt so soon after Wallace was killed. But then I learned to admire you more than I ever had. And I still do even if youdocause me worry when you won’t come home and let me look after you and when you insist upon walking and evendancing, for the love of God. To you, brother—all the happiness in the world and to Samantha too.”
Ben, smiling at him, felt rather as if he were seeing his brother for the first time.
“And may you always ride your wheels as fast as we can run, Benedict,” the duke said.
They all drank, and Ben laughed.
“If you do not want to see me turn into a watering pot,” he said, “and if you do not want to find the doors of Cartref locked against you, you had better leave. I will see you all in the morning.”
“One word of advice, Ben,” Hugo said as they were taking their leave. “Get your valet to tie your neckcloth looser than usual tomorrow. There is something about being at the front of the church when you are a bridegroom waiting for your bride to arrive that makes the neck expand.”
“And he is not lying, Ben,” Calvin told him.
Samantha’s half brother arrived the day before her wedding. She had already moved into the big house and greeted him there on his arrival. They shook hands and conversed politely. She asked about her sister-in-law and nephews and nieces. He asked her about her home and her connections in the village. He shook hands with Ben and conversed politely with him.
But it was all done in company with others. Samantha was touched that he had come so far and at the worst time of the year for her sake. But he seemed more like a stranger she had once known than someone who was close to her. She hoped he would not regret coming. But she supposed he would not. He had come out of a sense of duty to their father, not out of any fondness for her.
Ah, life was difficult sometimes.
It was not until the following morning that she finally saw him alone.
She was dressed for her wedding. She had chosen a simply styled dress of warm white velvet with a gold chain and locket about her neck and gold earrings. A small gold-colored bonnet hugged her head. Her heavy cloak, which was flung over the back of a chair in her dressing room, was also of white velvet with gold frogged fasteners at the front and fur lining.
She had considered various bright colors but had rejected them all in favor of white. She wanted simplicity. She wanted just herself on display to her bridegroom, not the brightness of her clothes.
“Ooh,” Gladys said when she had fitted the bonnet carefully over Samantha’s curls and tied the ribbons in a bow to one side of her chin, “you were right and I was wrong, Mrs. McKay. White is your color.Everycolor is your color. But you look perfect today. The major is going to eat you up, he is, when he sees you. Not that he’d better do it, mind, not when—”
But her monologue was interrupted by a knock on the dressing room door and she went to see who was there.
“Thank you, Gladys,” Samantha said. “That will be all.”
She smiled at John. She had thought everyone had left for the church by now.
“You look very fine,” he said, his eyes moving over her. He was frowning. “I have always thought of you, you know, as your mother’s daughter. I would never think of you as my father’s too. But you were—you are. You look like your mother, of course—well, a bit like her, anyway. I was always thankful about that, for I am like my father. I can see it when I look in a glass. But you do too. Not in obvious ways. Just sometimes in a turn of the head or a fleeting expression—not anything I can put my finger on exactly. But you are his daughter. Not that I ever doubted it. I just ignored it.”
“John.” She stepped forward and extended her right hand. “You have come all this way and I am touched. I know it was hard for you when our father married my mother.”
“You are my sister,” he said. “I had to come and tell you that, Samantha. Not that you did not know it, but…Well, everyone needs family, and I know you have always been denied half of yours and didn’t know about the other half until recently. I am glad you have discovered that half. Bevan seems a decent sort as well as being as rich as Croesus.”
“John,” she said hesitantly, hoping she was not about to introduce a discordant note into their meeting, “why did you keep his letters from me and all of Mr. Rhys’s except the one you sent soon after Papa’s death? Why did I not know about the money my aunt left me or all the gifts my grandfather sent?”
He frowned. “I knew nothing of any gifts or money,” he told her. “I do know that when our father was dying he had me find two bundles of letters and burn them while he watched. He told me your mother had not wanted you to have anything to do with her Welsh relatives, that they had treated her badly and must not be allowed to bother you. He wanted to honor her wishes, especially as you had made such an advantageous marriage. All I ever had was letters asking what you wanted to do about the cottage. Father had said it was just a run-down building, not worth anything. I sent the one letter on to you after answering it myself—I thought perhaps you ought to see it so that you could send an answer of your own if you wanted. You did not write back, and your husband was in a bad way, and I didn’t bother you with the other few letters that came. But they did not mention any money, Samantha—only the cottage. I had no idea it was the house it is.”
“Me neither,” she said, smiling at him. “As it has turned out, John, it is a good thing I knew nothing, but discovered the truth only when it would mean most to me.”
