“My love,” he said against her lips. “Mylove.”
“Peter,” she said.
And they kissed again before he placed her hand very formally on his arm and led her back in the direction of the ballroom.
The music had stopped.
Everyone was already at supper.
Her betrothal was about to be announced. Herbetrothal.
26
The wedding of Susanna Osbourne to Viscount Whitleaf was solemnizedat the church near Alvesley Park in Wiltshire on a perfect day in August.
Alvesley had been chosen from among a number of contending places—for a number of reasons. Although Susanna’s grandparents had been eager to host the event in Gloucestershire, even they admitted that their homes and the village inn could not possibly accommodate all the distinguished guests who would be invited and that the assembly rooms above the inn would be a shabby location for the wedding breakfast even if they had been large enough.
Sidley was a serious contender, but how could Susanna’s fellow teachers travel so far when there were charity girls to look after? And the viscount would not hear of marrying his ladywithouther friends in attendance.
For a while only Bath seemed a viable option—and one that was perfectly acceptable to both the bride and the groom—until Lauren, Viscountess Ravensberg, and the Duchess of Bewcastle again took it upon themselves to organize wedding celebrations. Though actually it was Eleanor Thompson who set the plans in motion when she informed her sister in her weekly letter of the predicament concerning the charity girls and commented upon the vast size of Lindsey Hall.
No one ever knew—or asked—how the duchess persuaded the very toplofty Duke of Bewcastle to take in twelve schoolgirls for a whole week surrounding the wedding of one of their teachers, but she did, and his grace was even seen to smile upon her during the wedding itself, a rare enough public display of affection.
Alvesley it was, then, and guests came from every corner of England, it seemed, and even from Scotland and Wales—the viscount’s sister and her husband from the former, Mr. and Mrs. Sydnam Butler with David and their four-month-old daughter from the latter. The viscountess came from London, where she had enjoyed a gratifyingly successful Season, having drawn the admiring attentions of two distinguished widowers. She came despite the fact that she had not seen Lauren, her niece, since the latter was a baby. The viscount’s sisters and their families came, as did some of his friends, most notably Theo Markham and John Raycroft with his new bride.
Susanna’s grandparents came with two of her aunts and their husbands, whom she had met during a visit at Easter. And all her closest friends were there—Claudia Martin, Anne Butler with Mr. Butler, and the Countess of Edgecombe with her husband, newly returned from a singing engagement in Paris. Eleanor Thompson was there and Lila Walton and Cecile Pierre, the French and music teacher, and even Mr. Huckerby had made the journey from Bath. And of course, the twelve charity pupils attended the wedding too, supervised by Miss Thompson and Miss Walton, though they were so thoroughly awed by the occasion and the company that no supervision was really necessary. Even Agnes Ryde was mute and wide-eyed.
It was a wedding worth waiting for, as the bride and groom agreed after the event. But, ah, the wait had been tedious in the extreme.
On three separate occasions between Christmas and August the viscount had traveled to Bath. On two of those occasions he had stayed for a week, on the third for ten days. And yet he had found his sojourns there almost more frustrating than the long spells when he wasnotthere, since Susanna flatly refused to neglect any of her duties—or would certainly have done so if he had ever asked. During those weeks he had come to understand that a teacher’s work was more a way of life than a job. There was almost literally no spare time, even for a languishing fiancé.
Apart from the dreariness and frustrations of the wait, though, they had been happy months for Peter, who felt that all his dreams had suddenly come true and would come to full fruition once he had a wife by his side at Sidley—not that a wife had been part of the original dream. Once shewasthere, he doubted that he would ever want to step beyond the bounds of Sidley and its neighborhood—his home, his circle of contentment and happiness.
Susannadidhave regrets about the life she would leave behind on her marriage. The school had been home and haven to her as a girl. It was where her bewildered, badly bruised heart had healed. It had been home and workplace during her young adulthood. She loved teaching, she loved the girls, she loved her fellow teachers, especially Claudia, who had been both sister and mother as well as friend to her for many years.
But all women must leave behind their homes and their families when they married. And in her case it was, she believed with growing conviction as the months passed, a worthy exchange. She could never have been truly happy as an unmarried woman, with no man, no children, no home of her very own. Nottrulyhappy. And she loved Peter far more deeply than she could have imagined loving any man. Perhaps it was because she liked him and admired him as much as she loved him.
And there was no school near Sidley, she had discovered. It was a lack she meant to rectify, and though Peter had merely laughed when she had mentioned it during one of his visits to Bath, it had been an affectionate, indulgent laugh, and there had been love and admiration in his eyes.
She had dreaded the end of school in July, telling herself with each passing event that it was thelastin which she would be involved. At the same time, she had thought the end of term wouldnevercome.
She was to have aweddingin August.
She was to marryPeter.
She was to spend the rest of her life with him, for as long as they both lived.
But August came, as it inevitably does each year.
And with it came the wedding day, a perfect blue-skied sunshiny day.
Peter was sitting at the front of the church, John Raycroft beside him, aware that the pews behind them were filling with guests, though he did not turn his head to look.
He felt, in fact, as though it would be impossible to turn his head if he tried. Surely for once in an otherwise exemplary career, his valet had knotted his neckcloth very much too tightly, though the man had almost wept over its perfection after standing back to examine his handiwork an hour or so ago.
He ought not to have come so early, he thought, as his stomach started to feel like a churning cauldron.
What if she simply did not come?
