Carla Kelly - A Regency Officer's Wedding - The Admiral's Penniless Bride / Marrying the Royal Marine

Charles looked at his new wife, the hasty bargain he made without much thought, beyond an overpowering desire to keep his sisters from meddling in his life. Shakespeare could say it so well, he told himself. You will always be young, too.

She looked at him in such an impish way that he felt the years fall away from him, too, much as from the sonneteer. ‘There, now,’ she said. ‘Doesn’t Shakespeare read better at forty-five than he did when you were ten and forced?’

She was teasing him; at the same time he was wondering if he had ever felt more in earnest. I will frighten her to death, he thought. This is a marriage of convenience. ‘You know he does!’ Charles handed back the book. ‘You and Mrs Brustein can sniffle and cry and wallow over the verses, and I doubt a better day will be spent anywhere.’

Sophie tucked the book in her reticule. He thought she might return to her side of the chaise, but she remained beside him. ‘Perhaps when we finish the sonnets, we will graduate to Byron. I will wear thick gloves, so my fingers do not scorch from the verse,’ she teased. She nudged his shoulder. ‘Thank you for buying this.’

‘Anything, my dear wife, to further our connections in the neighbourhood,’ he said. ‘After years of riotous living coming from that house we laughingly call home now, we have a lot of repair work to do.’

As the chaise stopped in front of Madame Soigne’s shop, he knew he had been saved from blurting out that he would prefer she read to him. A man can dream, he told himself, picturing his head in Sophie’s lap, while she read to him. A pity Shakespeare never wrote a sonnet about old admirals in love. No, well-seasoned admirals. I can’t recall a time when I have felt less ancient.

She hesitated in the doorway, hand on the doorknob, and looked back at him, which must have been his cue to join her and provide some husbandly support.

‘Cold feet, madam wife? I expect you to spend lots of money. In fact, I am counting on it.’

Still she hung back. ‘A few days ago, I didn’t even have any thread to sew up a hole in my stockings.’ She let go of the doorknob. ‘You know, if I go to a fabric warehouse and buy a couple of lengths of muslin, I can sew my own dresses.’

Charles put her hand back on the doorknob. ‘You don’t need to! Don’t get all Scottish on me.’ He turned the knob and gave her a little boost inside, where Madame and her minions stood. From the look of them, they had nothing on their minds except the kind of service it was becoming increasingly obvious that his wife was not accustomed to. Sophie looked ready to burst into tears.

He took her about the waist with his hooked arm, which gave him ample opportunity to tug off her bonnet with his bona fide hand and plant a kiss on her temple. ‘You can do this. Be a good girl and spend my money.’

He left her there, looking at him, her face pale. He turned to the modiste, who was eyeing Sophie with something close to disbelief. ‘She’s Scottish and doesn’t like to spend a groat. Whatever she agrees to buy, triple it.’

‘Charles!’

He liked the sound of that. He tipped his hat to her and left the shop.

When he returned, all measured for shirts and trousers and coats, Sally was waiting for him inside the shop, calmer now and drinking tea. She watched him through the window with Madame Soigne.

‘I don’t know how one man can appear so pleased when he knows I have been spending his money,’ she commented.

The modiste looked through the window, where the admiral was getting out of the post chaise. ‘How can you tell he is pleased?’ she asked, squinting. ‘He looks rather stern to me.’

‘The way his eyes get small and kind of crinkle,’ Sally said. ‘The lines around his mouth get a little deeper.’

‘If you say so,’ Madame replied dubiously. She brightened. ‘Bien, you would know, would you not? He is your husband, and you have had years and years to study him.’

Good God, Sally thought, setting down the cup with a click. I have known the man three days and she thinks we are an old married couple? This is a strange development. ‘I…I suppose I have,’ she stammered, not sure what else to say.

The door opened. She felt a curious lift as his eyes got smaller and he smiled at her. He nodded to the modiste. ‘Did she spend lots and lots of my blunt, Madame?’ he asked. ‘Mais oui! Just as you wished,’ the modiste declared, and ticked them off on her elegant long fingers. ‘Morning dresses, afternoon dresses, evening dresses—she would only allow one ball gown—a cloak, a redingote, sleeping gowns, a dressing gown…’

‘When might these garments be ready?’ He handed over a wad of notes so large that Sally couldn’t help a small gasp.

Madame tittered and accepted the king’s ransom gracefully. ‘Oh, you seamen! I will put all my seamstresses to work. Soon, Admiral, soon!’

Bright bowed. ‘Madame Soigne, if you had been Napoleon’s minister of war in the late disturbance, he would not have lost.’ He held out his hand to Sally. ‘Come, my dear. We now have to search for enough domestics to puff up our consequence in the neighbourhood. Madame Soigne, we bid you good day.’

There didn’t seem to be any point in sitting across from him, not when he held her arm and plopped her down beside him. Besides, she had a confession. ‘I had better make a clean breast of it,’ she told him, as the chaise pulled away from the curb. ‘Madame Soigne also sent for a milliner and a shoemaker.’

‘I am relieved to hear it,’ he remarked. ‘I call that efficiency.’ He must have used her wry expression as an excuse to keep his arm around her. ‘You sound like a tar on shore leave! Spend it all in one go and chance the consequences!’

‘I call it a huge expenditure,’ she lamented.

He refused to be anything but serene. ‘Sophie dear, your duty is to rid me of sisters. That is no small task and it will require ammunition. You are dealing with ruthless hunters, who will stop at nothing. I consider you a total bargain.’

She looked at his face, noticed the crinkles around his eyes. ‘You are quizzing me! I think you are shameless.’

He threw back his head and laughed. ‘You think I exaggerate?’

‘I know you do,’ she said, trying not to smile. ‘Were you this much trouble in the fleet?’

‘This and more, but I achieved results,’ he assured her. ‘I do believe I will add to your duties, as well, my dear, since you feel I have done too much by clothing you in a style to suit my consequence. You’re going to be charming the Brusteins with Shakespeare and helping slap my house into submission. Yes, you may find me something to do, while you’re at it. Can you see me sitting on my thumbs this winter?’

‘I cannot,’ she agreed. ‘I believe I will earn that wardrobe!’

He hugged her tighter, then released her. ‘Laugh like that more often, Sophie. It becomes you.’

‘I am not so certain I had much to laugh about,’ she said frankly.

‘Then maybe your fortunes have turned,’ he said, equally frank.

Maybe they have, Sally decided, after luncheon at the Drake. She knew they had, when they came to the employment registry, and there sat the same pale governess she had shared the bench with only days ago. I could still be sitting next to her, she thought, giving the woman a smile.

Her smile turned thoughtful. She took her husband by the arm, which made him look at her with an expression that made her stomach feel deliciously warm. She walked him outside, grateful they were much the same height, so there was no need to tug on his sleeve like a child.

‘Charles.’ His name still sounded so strange on her lips, but she knew he enjoyed it. ‘Charles, that lady is an out-of-work governess. She came with me on the mail coach from Bath, and see, she is still sitting here.’