Mary Balogh: A Secret Affair

He was thankful he had not.

And he was, dash it all, getting nervous .

What if she was having second thoughts?

What if an old duke had popped up out of a deep chair somewhere in Finchley and eloped with her?

And then there was the sound of carriage wheels-after all of the guests had surely arrived. It was only three minutes to eleven.

The carriage stopped. Of course . There was nowhere else to go along this trail except the chapel.

There was a greater hush within. Everyone had heard what he had heard.

And then the vicar appeared in the doorway and instructed the congregation to stand. And he walked down the aisle toward the altar and left the doorway clear for Delmont, Hannah’s father, and for Hannah herself.

A vision of all that was beautiful in soft pink.

His bride.

Oh, Lord. His bride .

He took half a step toward her and stopped. He was supposed to stay where he was. She was supposed to come to him .

And she did so until she stood beside him, her arm still drawn through her father’s though she was smiling at him through the froth of a pink veil that was draped over the brim of her straw bonnet.

He smiled back at her.

And why they had spent so much time discussing where they would marry and how many people they wanted as their guests he really did not know. It did not matter where they were. And for the moment it did not matter who was there to witness them exchanging vows that would bind them in law and in love for the rest of their days.

It did not matter.

“I do,” he said when the vicar had asked him what he was prepared to do in order to make Hannah his wife forever.

“I do,” she said in return.

And then he was reciting vows, prompted by the vicar, and she was reciting them in her turn. And Phillip was handing him the shiny gold band of her wedding ring and he was slipping it onto her bare ring finger. And suddenly-

Ah, suddenly it was all over, the anticipation and the excitement, the baseless fears.

They were man and wife.

And what God had joined together, no power on earth could put asunder.

“Hannah.” He lifted the veil back from her face and gazed into her eyes.

They gazed back into his own, wide and guileless and trusting.

His wife .

And suddenly he was aware of shufflings and murmurings, a child’s piping voice, a single cough. And he was aware again of where they were and who was here with them. And he was glad that family and friends were here to celebrate with them.

He felt a warm rush of pure happiness.

Hannah-his wife-smiled at him, and when he went to smile back, he realized that he was already doing it.

THERE WERE NO CARRIAGES outside the chapel. They would all walk back to Warren Hall, the bride and groom leading the way.

But not immediately.

When they had stepped outside the church, Hannah looked at her new husband, her hand slipping from his arm so that she could clasp his hand instead.

“Yes,” she said softly as if he had said something.

Her husband. Oh, he was her husband .

And they turned together, as if they had discussed it beforehand, and made their way into the churchyard. They stopped at the foot of one small and simple mound of grass. A headstone bore the five-line inscription, Jonathan Huxtable, Earl of Merton, Died November 8, 1812, Aged Sixteen Years, Rest in Peace .

They stood side by side, looking down at it, their hands clasped tightly.

“Jonathan,” Hannah said softly, “thank you for living a life so rich with love. Thank you for living on in Constantine’s heart and in your dream at Ainsley Park.”

Constantine’s clasp on her hand was almost painful.

“Jon,” he said, his voice a whisper of sound, “you would be happy today. But you were always happy. Go in peace now, brother. I have kept you too long. I always was selfish. Go in peace.”

A tear dripped from Hannah’s chin to the neckline of her wedding dress. She dried her eyes with the gloved fingers of her free hand.

“I love you, Hannah,” Constantine said almost as softly.

“I love you too,” she said.

And they turned toward their wedding guests, who were crowded about the path outside the chapel doors, talking and laughing. Children darted about, their voices raised in high-pitched chatter.

Constantine laced his fingers with Hannah’s and they walked toward their family and friends, smiling with exuberant joy.

And the air rained rose petals.

IT WAS A PERFECT AUTUMN DAY. Not perfect enough for the baby’s nurse, perhaps. But then her anxieties would have denied him any outing at all until he had attained at least his first birthday. She would have made a hothouse plant of him if she had her way-which she had on all sorts of other issues since she had experience at her job and clearly loved the baby with all her grandmotherly heart.

Hannah had found her when her former “family” had outgrown its need for her and she had applied for a position at Land’s End, though she had admitted during an interview that she dealt better with infants than with the elderly. Beggars could not be choosers, however.

The day really was perfect. The heat of summer had gone, but the chill of winter had not yet arrived. There was not a sign of a rain cloud, or any other cloud for that matter. And the wind had taken a holiday. So had yesterday’s light breeze. The sky was a riot of color. Not the sky itself, of course, which was a uniform blue, but the tree branches against it. Reds mingled with yellows and oranges and browns of all shades, as well as a few hardy greens. And very few leaves had yet fallen to the ground.

It would have been a lovely day for a ride-for a gallop across country and yet another challenge to a race. Hannah still held out hope of beating Constantine one of these days. Not that she had done much riding for several months, of course, even at a sedate walk. He would not have allowed it even if she had been inclined to take a risk. She had not been so inclined.

They rode sedately in the carriage-the closed carriage. Nurse might be overridden, but she could not be entirely defied. She had experience and they did not.

It was a journey they usually made with the dogs. A sizable and cozy corner of the stable block had been given over to dogs not long after their wedding when Constantine had the idea that the elderly at Land’s End needed more stimulus than just their own company and that of a few human visitors. And sure enough, the visits of the dogs were the highlight of their days. Sometimes Hannah and Constantine took them. More often, Cyril Williams did. He was a ten-year-old who had picked Constantine’s pocket in London when they were there briefly after Barbara’s wedding to the Reverend Newcombe, a ragged, shivering bundle of filth and rags who had lost his mother, his last remaining relative, a few months before and had descended from a life of desperation to one of animal survival.

Cyril and dogs had been made for one another. He fed them and groomed them, exercised and trained them, and loved them-and sometimes sneaked them into his room in the house while all the servants and his master and mistress became inexplicably blind and deaf. They doted upon him and followed him like shadows. They were gentle with him and for him and moped about the stables whenever he was away-under protest-at the village school.

Today it was not the dogs that were being taken to cheer the elderly.

Today it was four-month-old Matthew Huxtable, who in his parents’ admittedly biased estimation was the most beautiful child in the world. He had inherited his father’s dark hair and skin tone and his mother’s blue eyes and bright smile.