Chapter Eighteen

NELL’S “INNARDS” PROVED less and less like steel as the day of her wedding approached. She had long ago had the measure of Nigel’s character, and she therefore had little expectation that she would find contentment as his wife. The most she could hope for was that his interest in her companionship would dwindle with time and that he would “go his own way,” as Sybil had suggested so long ago. Perhaps Sybil had been right about married life (it was certainly true of Sybil’s own—she and Charles often passed entire days without coming face to face with each other), but Nell was not finding it to be true during the courtship. Nigel was everlastingly under foot, and his omnipresence set Nell’s insides quivering more and more as the days went by.

With Nell’s nuptials scheduled for late May and Harry’s for mid-June, the Thorne household buzzed with wedding plans. Sybil dreamed excitedly of arranging an elaborate reception for her ward, and she decided to approach Henry to discuss financing the affair. With great trepidation, she told him her plans. He responded in a tone so brusque that she would have considered it positively churlish except that he actually agreed to all her suggestions. He gave her permission to spend whatever she deemed necessary and to send the bills to him. To her, this signified that she had free reign, and she embarked on a program of spending that filled her ostentatious soul with delight.

Soon the deliveries began. Tradesmen knocked at the back door several times a day delivering cases of champagne, polished wooden boxes filled with gold plate, barrels of monogramed Worcester Royal porcelain, crystal glasses, table linens, candles by the hundreds and the candlesticks to hold them, engraved invitations, rolls of red carpet, potted palms and dozens of other articles and accoutrements Sybil considered “necessary” for the occasion.

In addition, Nell was forced to endure a number of fittings for a wedding gown and headdress worthy of a royal princess. Sybil hoped that these grandiose preparations would dispel the look of misery which (Aunt Amelia pointed out to her worriedly) lurked deep in Nell’s eyes. She and Charles had much to gain from the alliance between Nell and Nigel, and Sybil didn’t want anything to interfere again. She therefore tried to coax Nell into a bridal glow by urging her to take part in the preparations, but her attempts met with no success. In fact, they had the opposite effect. Nell’s inner quakings and tremblings were rapidly degenerating into a sick terror.

Another person who viewed the wedding preparations with disapproval was Edwina Manning. As the news spread about the size and magnificence of the reception Sybil was planning, Edwina sensed that the interest in her own reception was declining. Her mother had planned a modest celebration to follow the wedding ceremony, with only the family and one hundred carefully selected guests in attendance. Edwina’s gown was being made by the family dressmaker, not a French modiste, as Nell’s was. The wedding cake was to be only three tiers high and baked by the family’s cook instead of the six-tiered tower that Sybil had ordered for Nell, to be baked by a French chef whose icing designs were internationally renowned.

Edwina was quite aware of the gossips making whispered comparisons behind their fans, all derogatory to her, but she ignored the whispers and went about her business with the appearance of complete composure. It was only to Henry that she revealed her conviction that Lady Sybil was passing the bounds of good taste and moving into the area of vulgar ostentation. But the only response she was able to elicit from his lordship was a stony silence.

There was, however, one benificent result of Sybil’s wedding plans—the effect they had on Lady Imogen. Nigel’s mother, impressed by the grandeur of the elaborate preparations in progress, determined to forget Nell’s former transgressions and take Nigel’s affianced bride to her bosom. To indicate to society that she had changed her mind and now looked upon the match with approbation, she sent out cards to one hundred persons inviting them to a lavish dinner party in honor of her future daughter-in-law.

If Lady Imogen’s past dinner parties had been a trial to Nell, this one was far worse an ordeal. The guests had been selected from among the most pompous, insipid and irritating of London society. Every one of them seemed to her to be overweening and overdressed. They minced through the rooms with magisterial self-consciousness and spoke to her with condescending self-importance. Yet Nigel escorted her into the enormous dining room beaming with satisfaction and pride. He seemed truly to be enjoying himself. It didn’t take long for her to realize why—he was one of them!

The dinner seemed interminable. She was seated at Nigel’s right, but he spent most of the evening conversing with the bejeweled dowager on his left. The gentleman on her left was an absent-minded octogenarian whose movements were so slow and stiff that she was convinced he feared his bones would crack if he tried to turn or bend. When she spoke to him, he leaned toward her without turning his head. Sometimes, in his efforts to speak to her, he leaned so far over that she expected momentarily he would topple over into her lap.

After dinner, the guests were ushered into a large music room where seats had been placed in neat rows. Lady Imogen had engaged for the evening’s entertainment an Italian soprano whom she had secured at great expense. Although Nell was grateful for the improvement of the entertainment over the amateurishness of the last dinner party she’d attended here, the singing was not of a quality to soothe either a savage breast or Nell’s rapidly developing headache. The soprano was short, stout and shrill, and instead of singing some of the beautiful songs of her own country, she chose to entertain the guests with ballads and folk-songs of England. Her command of the language was very limited, and Nell found herself hard-pressed to keep from laughing at her rendition of “The Cuckoo Song,” (“Well-a sings-a da cuccu,” she warbled) and a little ditty Nell had never heard before about a “leetla feench.” She cast an amused glance Nigel during the “little finch” song, but his response was a quelling frown.

By the time the evening had ended, Nell’s smile had become strained and false, and her head ached with the fatigue brought on by the excess of formality which she’d had to endure. When she could at last take her leave of her hostess, Lady Imogen thrust a huge floral arrangement (one of several which had decorated the music room earlier in the evening) into her arms as a sign of her approval of Nell’s behavior during the party and offered her cheek for Nell to kiss. It was with a weary sigh of relief that Nell climbed into the carriage and deposited the enormous floral offering on her lap.

But her ordeal had not yet ended. Nigel climbed in after her and took his place beside her simply oozing with self-satisfied complacency. “It was a splendid evening Mama gave for you, was it not?” he asked smugly.

“Didn’t you find it just the least bit stiff?” Nell asked in a mild attempt at honesty.

“Stiff? Not at all. Mama’s galas are never stiff. It is acknowledged throughout London that she is the most gracious of hostesses.”

Nell made no answer. She did not wish to be churlish, and she was quite sensible of the fact that Lady Imogen had put herself to great effort on her behalf.

“It was most condescending of Lord Pickersleigh to attend, I think,” Nigel continued proudly. “Mama says he almost never leaves his rooms these days, and she was quite overcome when he agreed to attend.”

Nell had no inkling of who Lord Pickersleigh was, and, not wishing to put Nigel to the task of describing him, she merely murmured, “Indeed?”

“And of course Mr. Leslie and the Milbankes—one doesn’t see their like at ordinary dinners, you know.”

Since Mr. Leslie had been the elderly gentleman on Nell’s left, she could not refrain from muttering, “Let us hope not!”

Nigel stiffened. “What was that?” he asked. “Are you suggesting that you were not pleased with Mama’s guests?”

“It is not my place to be pleased or displeased. Your mother has the right to ask whomever she likes to dine with her.”

“Indeed she does, but I hoped you would show a proper regard for the honor conferred upon you this evening.”

“Oh, but I do feel honored,” Nell declared irrepressibly. “Especially by Mr. Leslie. Mr. Leslie conferred upon me the honor of almost toppling into my lap!”

Nigel was not amused. “It’s well that Mama did not hear you say that. She disapproves of levity in females, and I heartily agree. As my wife, I sincerely hope, my dear, that you will refrain from indulging in your unfortunate proclivity to flippancy.”

“May I sometimes dare to giggle? It would be very softly, of course, and only in the privacy of my dressing-room.”

He glared at her and then turned away in pique. “I daresay I should be grateful,” he said grudgingly, “that you had the good sense to refrain from ridiculing Mama’s guests while you were in her house.”

“If not the good sense, at least the good manners,” Nell said placatingly.

He accepted her peace offering with relief. “Yes, you behaved very well. Mama was quite pleased with you. She told me so.”

“How good of her,” Nell said, unable to keep the edge of sarcasm from creeping into her voice.

“I think so. It is not easy for a lady in Mama’s position in society to overlook the past transgressions of a prospective daughter-in-law, especially when those transgressions have been so widely reported. I hope you appreciate the extent of her condescension.”

Nell’s fingers curled into fists. She had had quite enough condescension for one evening. “Oh?” she asked with dangerous sweetness. “Have my ‘transgressions’ been so enormous that they require such very great condescension?”

Nigel failed to notice the warning signals darting from her eyes. “Well, you can hardly expect her to approve of a girl whose been a jilt—”

“A jilt?” Nell put in softly.

Nigel, warming to this theme and eager to have Nell understand how much his mother (in her largeness of heart) had had to forgive, ignored the interruption. “—And who rode through the park in a costume which everyone described as brazen—”

“Brazen! Do go on,” she urged, her eyes glittering ominously.

“—And whose style is described by respectable matrons as positively fast—”

“A fast and brazen jilt, am I?” she asked icily. “I’m surprised that you managed to convince her to accept me into the family at all!”

“Now, don’t fly into a pucker, my dear,” Nigel said pompously, completely confident that he had made his point. “All that is in the past. I’ve assured Mama that you’ve been properly broken to the bridle at last.”

“Broken to the bridle!” Nell flared. “Like all the other horses in your stable?”

Nigel was startled. “Come now, don’t take a pet. Look, we’ve arrived at Thorne House. We can’t permit the footman to hear us wrangling. Besides, you don’t wish to turn stiff-rumped after such a fine evening, do you?”

“Stiff-rumped? Is that more of your stable talk?” she asked furiously.

Nigel realized he was blundering badly. “Hang it, Nell, it’s only a manner of speaking—”

“Well, then, in a manner of speaking, I’d like you to know that this horse is not quite broken yet! This prime bit o’ blood has some spirit still!”

The footman had lowered the step and stood waiting for Sir Nigel to open the carriage door. Beckwith, who had opened the front door of the house and was awaiting Miss Belden’s appearance with a puzzled frown, started down the front steps. “Here comes Beckwith,” Nigel said hastily. “Best to drop this for tonight. You’ll feel more the thing in the morning.”

But Nell, her eyes blazing, would not be stopped. “Oh, no! This little mare is about to break loose! One little hurdle, and she can run free.”

“Hurdle? What do you mean?”

“I mean our betrothal. I’m about to break it again!”

Nigel sneered. “You’re jesting. You made this mistake once before and regretted it. You can’t be such a fool as to do it again.”

“Can’t I? Well, perhaps this will convince you—!” And, just as Beckwith opened the carriage door, she lifted her lapful of flowers and dropped them on his head.

Nigel gasped and sputtered in astonishment. Nell patted his head soothingly. “Don’t fall into the dismals because one little horse has bolted, Sir Nigel. Even the best of trainers fails with one or two. Good-bye.”

She offered her hand to the goggled-eyed Beckwith and gracefully stepped down. Then, smiling with angelic innocence, she turned back to the stupified, openmouthed Nigel. He sat frozen amidst the hawthorn blossoms and rosebuds that clung to his hair and shoulders, and the larkspur and peony blooms that had fallen all about him. A large, wet leaf had stuck to his nose, and a sprig of lily-of-the-valley hung from behind an ear. “By the way, Nigel, please remember to thank your Mama for giving me those lovely flowers,” she said sweetly. “I’ve never enjoyed a bouquet more.”