Fires of Delight (47 page)

“Selena, I yearn for the Highlands,” he moaned, as they drove along toward Sean’s residence. “After the wedding, I shan’t wear another cravat for the rest of my life.”

“I don’t know about that,” she retorted, “but I know that you won’t have much need of attire for a while.”

“Oh? I believe I have heard something along those lines before.”

“From whom? Marie Antoinette?”

“A lady would never ask, and a gentleman would never tell.”

“Hah! You are no gentleman.”

“And there are times, I confess with gratitude, when you are not a lady.”

Sean’s home came into view then, a stone-and-timber masterpiece beneath the towering trees of St. John’s Wood.

“You might be living there now, Selena,” said Royce, “if you’d played your cards differently.”

Selena kissed him. “I played my cards the only way I knew, and I have won,” she said.

Selena, who had been expecting a great crowd, saw with surprise that the circular drive was deserted. No one was present but an eager footman, who grasped the reins of the horses and bade the visitors to go inside. This they did, Royce banging boldly the heavy brass knocker on the door. It was opened immediately, neither by butler nor doorman, but by a young woman of exquisite beauty, whose sweet face was drawn up in tension. Selena knew her on sight.

“Davina!” she cried, opening her arms.

“Mother!”

Tears flowed freely for a long time, as well they might. The waif that Selena had rescued out of the depths of ancient India was
grown now, but in spite of the years between then and now, no love had been lost. Sean Bloodwell had kept Selena’s memory alive in this house and in Davina’s heart, and he had done well. He came from inside the residence now to take Royce’s hand and hat. “Perhaps, sir,” he said, “it would be best if the two of us were to withdraw for a short time?”

Selena held her adopted daughter, remembering the last time they’d been close in America. It was on the fateful morning that she and Royce had been attempting to flee America. Oakley’s men had captured her; Royce was disappearing over the horizon on the
Selena
, and she stood there in the Long Island surf. Then another ship, the HMS
Lucifer
, had sailed by. On board her, Selena knew, were Sean and Davina, returning to England and to glory. The ship was too far away from shore for Selena to have seen them, even if they’d been on deck, nor would they have been able to identify Selena, standing in the surf, surrounded by Oakley’s menacing redcoats. But she had raised her arm to them anyway in a farewell salute.
Think of me kindly
, she had prayed,
for I shall never forget you
. She let her hand fall. The
Lucifer
rode proudly to the wind, bearing two whom Selena loved, homing on both the future and the past.

Now, again, past and future were united in embrace. “Oh, Mother!” the girl cried, struggling to control her joyous tears. “You’re not going away again, are you? I can’t bear it if you go away again.”

“I’ll never be farther from you than Coldstream Castle,” Selena replied, putting her daughter’s head upon her shoulder and stroking her soft golden hair.

Not if I can find the right words
.

Those words did not come, and on the morning of the day that she was to appear in the House of Lords, Selena awoke from a fitful sleep into an even more disquieting distress. Her thoughts seemed to be flying all over, shooting out of her head like tracers trailing sparks.

“You have never given way before, Selena,” said Royce soothingly, bringing her a cup of tea, “and you won’t give way now. The thought of regaining Coldstream has sustained you during times far darker than these. You are only one step away from your goal.”

“
That
is what bothers me,” Selena worried. “When I was in India, ten thousand miles away, Coldstream was a dream. When I was three thousand miles away from it in America, the reality was still remote. But now I am only a few day’s travel from hearth and home. And if I fail in my petition to the lords, all is lost. The closer I get, the higher becomes the risk. I don’t even know what I am going to say!”

“Just tell them what is in your heart.”

“There are too many things in my heart; that is the problem.”

The scheduled appearance of a woman in Parliament, and a woman rumored to be beautiful at that, lent an air of episode and event to the normally ornate and stuffy chamber. With the wedding imminent, many of the lords were loath to don their wigs and robes and come here at all. What did it matter to them, after all, that a castle in far-off Scotland hung in the balance? Still, the woman in question
had
saved the prince’s bride-to-be, and they could not very well refuse to hear her out without risking the lift of royal eyebrows.

They took to their benches insouciantly, some of them still half-asleep, and not a few of them already tipsy with wedding champagne.

“I say,” rasped Lord Rittenham to his benchmate, Lord Pulvester, “is this MacPherson woman kin to old Seamus, who tried to make Scotland independent of the crown?”

“One and the same, sir.”

“What a cheeky wench, I vow. Has she no propriety whatever?”

“It is my understanding,” whispered Lord Brockett to Lord Spencer, as those two stalwarts waited for Selena to speak, “that the woman, even now, is playing whore to that cutthroat, Campbell, right here in London.”

“And ’tis not the first time, if I hear correctly,” nodded Spencer. “Many’s the man who has tended her garden.”

The two looked at each other and chortled.

The Duke of Sussex, languid and haughty as always, happened to overhear their ribaldry.

“Perhaps she might give us a flower or two for our favorable votes,” he snickered.

In the antechamber, where she waited with Royce until she
should be summoned to speak, Selena fought to control her nerves. Her hands were wet and her lips dry. Countless times in the past she had used her mind and guile to persuade others to act in her behalf, but never before had she spoken to an assemblage. She tried not to feel intimidated, tried to remember with what ease, humor, and grace her father had addressed great throngs, always finding the right words and tone, no matter if his audience was comprised of peasants or nobles.

“I
will
do it,” she murmured.

“What, darling?” asked Royce.

“Nothing.”

The sergeant-at-arms appeared at the antechamber’s doorway. “They are ready to hear you now, madame,” he said. “Come with me, please.”

Royce took her into his arms and kissed her gently on the lips. “Just let your heart speak,” he said, looking deeply into her eyes. “And remember this: even if you do not convince them, we still have each other.”

Yet I must convince them
, she thought.
Royce and Coldstream
are
my life. God, give me the words!

Taking a deep breath, she followed the sergeant-at-arms out of the antechamber and into the well of the House of Lords. There was a buzzing in her ears, which continued even as the buzz of conversation among the desultory lords subsided.

Selena stood before them, all alone.

“Hear ye! Hear ye!” called a bewigged speaker ceremoniously. “We are gathered at the request of one of our members, Lord Bloodwell”—Selena saw Sean smiling encouragement from his bench—“to entertain the petition of one Selena MacPherson.” Ah, it was wonderful to hear the MacPherson name intoned here. “So pray give your attention, my lords.”

Dead silence.

Every eye was on Selena.

Her tongue seemed frozen, her throat dry as sawdust. What had she planned to say?
My Lords, I stand before you…

Yes, yes. Say it!
Speak!
Get it out, get started…

Not so easy.

Some of the lords began to shift in their seats. A few of them grinned. What travesty was this? The wench couldn’t even open her mouth, for God’s sake!

But then, far back in Selena’s mind, she heard the wise, sympathetic voice of Davi the Dravidian, her teacher.
“Selena, have you come all this way to be defeated? You don’t believe that, not even for an instant. Trust your heart, for the words are in it. Trust your life, for it has made your heart sing and be strong. Do not
think!
Open yourself and let that which is within emerge.”

Go!

“My Lords,” Selena began, lifting her chin, “I am Selena MacPherson, and it is as a daughter of Scotland that I stand before you.”

Her voice, low and powerful, carried easily in the historic chamber. She had the attention of the assemblage. But what next?

Don’t think, just speak
.

“I stand before you as one who has been cast out, cast out by time and circumstance and fate, cast out, yes, by folly, but who amongst us has not tasted the bitterness of life?”

“Lord be praised,” whispered Lord Spencer to Lord Brockett, “the wench is a bloody orator.” He leaned forward to listen more closely.

“I would ask you,” Selena continued, “to think now upon your homes and your lives. And upon England. Yes, think upon England too, for then, if your hearts hold mercy, you may understand my need, my torment, here this day.”

“I thought she was a Scot,” wondered Lord Pulvester, harumphing to himself.

“When I was still a young girl, my father fell upon bad times. I am not here to debate whether he erred, for it is not my right to judge him. He was good to me and kind to his subjects and acted according to the knowledge God had granted him. Because of his actions, he was dispossessed and later murdered. I love him still, no matter how men may gauge him, and I love my home as well.

“Who among you,” she continued, “has not in some way, at some time, felt alone? Even in the comfort of your great halls, has there not been a moment at which life seemed to fall down upon you, in all its random complexity? I was abducted to India, and there I was very alone until befriended by Lord Bloodwell, who sits in honor among you. I was alone in America too, until I chanced to meet kindred spirits with whom my heart beat as one. Right or wrong in the eyes of the world, yet I was true to my heart as God had given me to know it.

“Yet always I have thought of home, of Coldstream Castle, and of this green, mighty isle of which it is, and ever shall be, a part. We, all of us, have that feeling inside us. We, all of us, would do most anything to find the path back to hearth and peace.

“If you can understand that, then you understand me as well.

“I wish you all safe havens, and sweet journeys thereto.”

She stopped and looked around. Every eye was upon her, but she could not read, in the rapt faces of the lords, any reaction to what she had said. The chamber was completely silent.

I have failed
, she thought.

The sergeant-at-arms led her out without comment.

“Oh, Royce!” Selena cried, throwing herself into his embrace. “It is all over. They listened, but they did not hear.”

“I wouldn’t be too certain of that. You were magnificent. I almost had tears in my eyes.”

“Almost?”

“As you know, I am not easily given to tears. Neither, I think, are the lords.”

Sean Bloodwell entered then, and kissed Selena on the cheek, taking her hands in his own. “It was beautiful, Selena,” he said.

“But the lords did not react!”

“How could they? They could do nothing in the spell of your words.”

“What is going to happen now?” she asked, a trifle anxiously.

“Well, they will take your plea under advisement, and make a decision in due course.”

“In due course? You mean I must wait?”

“Selena, many of these men have not, in twenty years time, decided anything more complicated than which horse to ride on a hunt. But their word will be passed in due time, and I believe it will be to your liking.”

“You only
believe
it?”

“All right, it will almost certainly be in your favor.”

“Almost?”

Sean smiled. “Selena, all I am trying to tell you is that you did splendidly, and everyone who heard you knows it. These matters take time. You must, for once in your life, be patient.”

“I shall go mad being patient.”

“Well, then do something distracting to try to put the matter
out of your mind. Why not join Davina and me for the wedding festivities? We will be in the line of march from the palace to Westminster.” He turned to Royce. “You are welcome too, of course.”

“You honor me, sir,” said Royce, bowing. “And may I add that you are possessed of more courtesy and grace than I have found in any man?”

Yes
, thought Selena. What Royce said was true. But would the rest of the lords prove to have even a portion of Lord Bloodwell’s gifts?

Selena stood beside Royce and watched as Princess Francesca came out of the palace and walked, attended by the ladies of the court, to the carriage in which she would take her final ride as a maiden. She looked radiant, glowing, transported already by the wonder awaiting her. Trumpets heralded her appearance. She was a flower, a shining, white rose, and the ladies around her were as flowers too. The early morning had been gray, damp, foggy, but now the sun pierced through clouds. Always a good omen.

A sign of sanguine portent also were the tens of thousands of cheering citizens who flocked the route of the nuptial procession. Some of them had waited all night for a choice spot along the thoroughfare from which to glimpse the bride. Their numbers and their unrestrained enthusiasm meant that the princess would be accepted in England, in contrast to the animosity that her aunt had engendered amongst the people of France.

Adding to Francesca’s luster was the news, which had been widely bruited, of her spectacular escape from France, and many cheers were directed toward the open coach in which Royce and Selena rode with the popular Lord Bloodwell and his daughter. They were hailed all along the way, and when the procession slowed at corners, men, women, and children jam-packed in front of pubs and shops lifted glasses of ale or gin to toast the saviors of the princess.

“Is it not passing fine,” smiled Sean to Selena and her man, “to be a king and ride in triumph through Byzantium?”