Chapter 35
Chapter
Thirty-Five
A Wedding
Grandmother arranged the wedding in three days. I do not know why this surprised any of us.
By Thursday morning, a special license had been acquired, a clergyman had been produced, and the drawing room at Wilton Place had been turned into a garden of blue delphiniums and hydrangeas, and white roses. Mrs. Ellison had discharged her Easter debt, because the flowers were magnificent.
Claire arrived at half past ten in pale blue silk, the waist of which Grandmother's woman had sat up two nights adjusting. No veil. No attendants beyond Chrissie and me. She looked beautiful. Not bridal. There had been no time for bridal. But happy, and that was the better thing.
"You are certain?" I asked, while Chrissie worked the last button at her wrist.
Claire found me in the glass. "About marrying your brother?"
"About doing it today."
"I would have done it yesterday."
I smiled, because there was nothing in the world I wanted more for the two of them than this.
Then Steele's voice came up from the hall, low and unhurried, answering something of Grandmother's.
Grandmother had invited him. Of course she had invited him. He had spent weeks keeping Cosmos from the gallows, had turned half of Scotland Yard to the business, and had very nearly got himself killed.
He belonged here. I had simply not thought what it would be to stand in a room with him among a veritable garden.
He had come to Rosehaven House twice since the river, both times on business concerning Cosmos, both times staying afterward for tea.
Once Petunia had held him a half hour with an account of what Fox had done to one of her dolls.
He had listened as though it were the most important thing in the world.
My heart ached just thinking about it.
"Rosalynd?" Claire was watching me still. “Are you well?”
"I'm fine."
She did not believe me. Fortunately she was about to marry a Rosehaven and would have years in which to learn that we lie to one another out of affection.
Steele stood near the back of the drawing room in a morning suit, dark and immaculate, in conversation with Sir Hugo. He turned before Chrissie and I had cleared the doorway. Something in his face let go. It lasted a moment, and it was enough. He excused himself and came to me.
"Rosalynd."
"Steele."
His eyes went to my hands. I had left off my gloves; the silk caught on the scabs. The cuts were healing, but several still ran angry and red across my palms.
"Better?"
"Much."
"Good." His hand moved an inch. Perhaps two. Then it returned to his side.
Several nights ago I had stood on a wrecked launch with his arms around me and his heart going hard beneath my cheek while he held me as though someone might still come and take me away.
Now we stood in Grandmother's drawing room among the flowers and the family and all the ordinary requirements of civilized life.
Civilized life was proving far more difficult.
"You look well," he said.
"So do you."
"I have the advantage of not having been kidnapped."
"You were shot at."
"Only a little."
I smiled despite myself. His mouth moved too, almost a smile.
Then Grandmother called us to our places.
Steele offered me his arm. Such an ordinary gesture that I nearly laughed. I put my hand on his sleeve. He delivered me to my place beside Chrissie, bowed, and went to his seat.
That was all. It should have been enough. It was not.
Cosmos came in with Fox at his shoulder—chin up, ears scarlet, a boy who had refused to weep for a fortnight.
Three days out of that cell had put no weight back on my brother, but his coat had been taken in, he had been shaved properly, and happiness had done something for his face that food had not yet managed.
Claire came in. Cosmos looked at her, and everything else in the room stopped existing for him.
It was so naked I had to look away. And found Steele.
He was watching them too, and for that one moment his face was unguarded. Longing—the same as mine.
Our eyes met across the room. He did not look away. Neither did I.
The clergyman cleared his throat, and we both remembered where we were.
The ceremony was mercifully short.
Claire promised herself to Cosmos in a voice that trembled once. Cosmos did not tremble at all until the ring. Then his hand shook so badly that Claire had to take him by the wrist and steady him.
Petunia, who had carried the ring on a cushion with enormous solemnity, whispered at a volume that reached the hall. "You are supposed to put it on her finger."
"I am trying."
"You are doing it badly."
Half the room laughed. Claire laughed hardest. Grandmother did not laugh, and afterward blamed the roses for her eyes.
Cosmos got the ring where it belonged. The clergyman went on. And then, just like that, they were married.
Three days later I knocked at the door of Claire's sitting room. The countess's sitting room. That required some adjustment.
The rooms had been my mother's. After she died they were shut, then opened and aired twice a year and shut again. Grandmother had suggested I take them years ago. I refused. They belonged to the Countess of Rosehaven, and there had not been one. Now there was.
"Come in."
Claire sat on the sofa by the windows with a writing desk pulled close and tea at her elbow. She was pale, though less pale than at breakfast, when she had taken one look at the eggs and fled the room.
"How are you feeling?"
"Much better."
"You said that yesterday."
"I was lying yesterday."
I smiled. Claire had already put her mark on the room: roses on the table, two books left face down beside the sofa, a shawl abandoned over a chairback.
My mother had written her menus at that desk.
I had written my first ones at the schoolroom table, because I would not sit in her chair.
The room was Claire's now. I was glad. Mother would have approved.
"Do you have a moment for household matters?"
Her face changed. "Oh, dear."
"Nothing dreadful, I promise."
"You have brought papers."
"Only three."
"That is how dreadful things begin."
I sat on the settee opposite her and put them on the table between us. "Mrs. Bateman came to me this morning. Cook cornered me yesterday outside the stillroom, which I consider unsporting."
Claire looked alarmed.
"Nobody knows which of us is in charge."
"Oh."
That was the difficulty precisely.
"You are the Countess of Rosehaven now. Mrs. Bateman needs to know whether household matters go to you or go on coming to me. Cook has the same question. There are accounts to approve, menus, servants' wages, repairs, orders—"
Claire held up a hand. I stopped. She swallowed, and her color went faintly green.
"You are ill!"
"No. You said menus."
I bit my lip.
"Do not laugh."
"I wouldn't dream of it."
"You are laughing."
"Only internally."
"That still counts."
I moved the papers a few inches farther from her. "We can discuss something else."
"No." She took a careful sip of tea. "We should settle it." She considered the papers as though they might attack. "Would you mind terribly going on with it? For now," she added quickly. "Only for now."
"Claire, they are yours by right. I don't wish to impose."
"You are not imposing. I intend to take them. Truly. But I should like to grow accustomed to being Cosmos's wife before I grow accustomed to being mistress of his house." Her hand drifted, without her knowing it, toward her stomach. "And just now—"
"You are growing a Rosehaven."
"I am attempting to. At present it appears determined to kill me by means of breakfast."
"Then yes. Of course I'll continue. When we go to Yorkshire we can begin turning things over. Slowly. Mrs. Bateman will teach you what I can't."
Relief flooded her face. "Thank you."
"It isn't a hardship. I've done it for years."
"I know." Something in the way she said it brought my head up.
Claire reached across and took my hand. "There is something else you have done for years."
"What?"
"Raised the children. You could begin handing that to me as well."
I pulled my hand back. "No."
"Rosalynd—"
"I wouldn't."
"You could."
"I couldn't."
"Why not?"
Because they were mine. I did not say it, because it was not true and because it was. They were my brother and sisters. Somewhere along the way the distinction had stopped mattering.
Claire left the sofa and sat down beside me, where she took both my hands in hers. It was so exactly what I had done to her that I nearly smiled.
"My dear," she said, "I saw how Steele looked at you at the wedding."
My heart gave one hard beat. "Claire."
"He is in love with you."
I turned to the window.
"And you are in love with him."
"That is hardly the point."
"I think it is very much the point." I tried to take my hands back. She held on. "Don't you think it is time you married?"
I stared at her.
"Not necessarily tomorrow."
"How reassuring."
"But soon."
"Claire—"
"You can trust their future to me."
That stopped me. She squeezed my hands.
"You can. I love Cosmos. I love all of you. I cannot take your place, and I would never try. But you do not have to carry everyone forever." She went on before I could answer. "Not all of them, of course. Petunia will remain yours."
I laughed despite myself. "Petunia belongs to herself."
"Yes. But you are the only mother she has ever known.”
That silenced me.
"Holly and Ivy, though—certainly. Fox goes back to school, and Cosmos can steer him there. Laurel is perfectly happy so long as somebody keeps her in books."
"Which is becoming expensive."
"I shall speak to Cosmos about the book allowance."
"Laurel will adore you."
"And Chrissie requires a beautiful gown, a ball, and a swarm of admirers."
"Preferably all three at once."
"Precisely. By next season I expect she'll be married." Then her expression softened. "You need to look to your own future, Rosalynd."
I looked down at our joined hands. For years there had always been a reason not to.
A household to run. A child to comfort. Twins to manage.
Fox to worry over. Laurel to coax out of a book.
Chrissie to prevent from doing something appalling.
And Cosmos—who now had a wife who loved him dearly and would keep him the rest of his days.
And now Claire sat in my mother's room and told me I was allowed to go. The thought should have felt like freedom. It frightened me instead.
"Even if I entertained the idea," I said, "there is one rather substantial difficulty."
"Which is?"
"The gentleman generally has to propose."
Claire's mouth twitched. "Yes. That is the usual arrangement."
"Steele has shown no inclination to do so."
"I would not be so certain."
"I would."
"Why?"
I hesitated. It was his story, not mine. But Claire was my friend, and now my sister. "His first wife died in childbirth. You know that much."
Her amusement went out.
"He loved her dearly. And he believes he killed her by giving her his child."
"Oh, Rosalynd."
"So you see. He will not marry again.”
Claire was quiet a moment. "I think he would.”
"You don't know him as I do."
"No. But I know how a man looks at a woman he loves."
I shook my head. “He doesn’t want children, Claire. And I do.”
"He wants a push in the right direction."
That made me laugh. "You make him sound like a recalcitrant horse."
"Men are remarkably similar."
"Claire!"
"Cosmos wanted pushing, you know. He was being sensible and honorable."
I laughed harder. "Of course he was."
"Painfully so."
"I suppose you deployed your womanly wiles."
Claire's smile turned wicked. "Oh. I did rather more than that."
I stared at her. She let go of my hands and reached for her tea with infuriating composure.
"What did you do?"
"When matters are settled between you and Steele, come to me and I shall explain."
"There will be nothing to settle."
"Rosalynd."
"I mean it. I wouldn't."
"You could."
"I couldn't."
"You could change his mind." Claire held my gaze. "All you need do is be brave."
Out in the corridor a floorboard gave—the loose one by the linen press, which had announced every one of my siblings since they could walk. I turned toward the door. Then the small, quick sound of somebody scurrying away.
"What was that?"
Claire tilted her head. "I didn't hear anything."
Nothing now. The corridor had gone quiet in the way corridors do when they are being quiet on purpose.
I watched the door another moment, then let it go.