Happy Birthday, Mr Darcy (11 page)

But it wasn’t very hard to guess which six words Warwick had written to Katherine – not very hard to guess for a Janeite – because Warwick had chosen Captain Wentworth’s words to Anne Elliot in
Persuasion
from the most romantic letter ever written.

“I am half agony, half hope.”

Chapter 17

Half-way through the ceremony, Dame Pamela stood up and gave a reading which was, of course, the final paragraph from Jane Austen’s
Emma
and the congregation nodded and sighed with happiness as she read the words ‘the small band of true friends who witnessed the ceremony were fully answered in the perfect happiness of the union.’

Dan caught Robyn’s eye and mouthed the word ‘sorry’ across the aisle but she cast her eyes to the floor and refused to look at him. He swallowed hard.

When the moment came to exchange rings, Dan stepped forward and shared an amused look with Warwick which, luckily, nobody else saw otherwise questions would surely have been asked and, before they knew it, the registrar declared that Warwick and Katherine were husband and wife and a great cheer went up from the congregation and Warwick leaned in to kiss his bride.

‘Is that straw in your hair?’ Katherine said as they were asked to sign the register.

Warwick’s hand flew up to his head. ‘I er –’

‘How on
earth
did you get straw in your hair?’

‘I just took a quick trip to the stables,’ he said. ‘Isn’t it meant to be good luck to pat a grey horse on your wedding day?’

‘Is it?’ Katherine said. ‘It’s the first I’ve heard about it.’

The wedding party were just making their way outside for photographs when Robyn took Katherine to one side and adjusted her hair.

‘There, that’s better,’ she said with a smile. ‘You almost lost a rosebud after that kiss of Warwick’s!’

Suddenly, Katherine grabbed Robyn’s arm as she spotted a buxom woman in a brilliant emerald-green and silver dress.

‘Robyn?’

‘Yes?’

‘What’s Mrs Soames doing here?’ Katherine asked in alarm.

‘Oh,’ Robyn said, ‘I meant to warn you. I’m afraid Doris Norris invited her – she was kind of pressured into it from what I can gather.’

Katherine stared in amazement as Mrs Soames caught her eye. She was heading right towards her. There would be no avoiding her.

‘Oh, goodness!’ Katherine cursed under her breath. Of all the days to have a confrontation with Mrs Soames.

‘Ah, Dr Roberts,’ Mrs Soames began, her enormous chest heaving itself towards the startled bride, ‘there’s something I am compelled to tell you.’

‘Really, Mrs Soames? Are you sure it has to be now only I’m a little busy,’ Katherine said, making to move away but Mrs Soames stopped her, laying a fat hand on the bride’s arm.

‘Yes, I simply
must
tell you,’ she went on, ‘that you look absolutely
beautiful!
’ Mrs Soames said with just the hint of a smile warming her large face.

Katherine blinked in shock. Was that a compliment she’d just been given? By Mrs Soames? The woman who did nothing but find fault with the world and then inform ever single resident of it?

Mrs Soames nodded at the bemused Katherine and then turned to leave.

‘Did I just imagine that?’ she asked, turning to her maid of honour.

Robyn’s face broke into a huge smile. ‘Well, I never!’ she said. ‘Mr Knightley said “Surprises are foolish things” but I think that was rather wonderful!’

The little temple on the island had been dressed with pink and white roses and sky-blue ribbons and Katherine and Warwick posed for photographs.

‘You look so radiant,’ Warwick told Katherine in between shots.

‘And you look like the perfect gentleman,’ she said.

‘Better than Mr Darcy?’ he dared to ask.

‘
So
much better,’ she said, leaning up to kiss him.

‘Perfect!’ the photographer shouted.

‘I do love you, Mrs Lawton,’ he said a moment later.

‘And I love you,’ she said, smiling up at him.

‘Good. Now, let’s eat!’

The starter was white soup from the recipe taken from the cook book of Jane Austen’s good friend, Martha Lloyd. It also had the honour of featuring in Chapter 11 of
Pride and Prejudice
so it was a truly fitting dish for the wedding breakfast.

Roast beef had been chosen for the main course and a simple dessert of strawberries and cream in honour of
Emma
was received with much delight by everyone.

The wedding speeches followed including a surprise one by Dame Pamela.

‘I have the most wonderful announcement!’ she said, tapping her champagne flute for everybody’s attention. ‘One of our lovely guests - Mia Castle – who helped to make Katherine’s stunning wedding dress, has just had a phone call. Her sister, Sarah, whom some of you met at our Christmas conference, has just had a baby girl.

A great cheer went up, followed by a huge round of applause.

‘And her name is Elinor Elizabeth!’ Dame Pamela continued.

Lily rolled her eyes. ‘Another Austen addict?’ she asked her brother.

‘Of course!’ Warwick said. ‘You’re quite outnumbered here. You should just swallow your pride-’ he paused, ‘
and
prejudice and join ranks!’ He laughed loudly at his own joke and Lily flushed with embarrassment and wondered if it would be rude if she left early.

It wasn’t until the dancing began that Dan finally got to speak to Robyn.

‘I’ve been trying to talk to you all day,’ he said as he led her out onto the dance floor.

‘Well, I’ve been kept busy,’ she said.

‘Of course,’ he said, holding her tiny body next to his as the music changed to a slow dance. ‘You do know that I never encouraged Mrs Hudson, don’t you?’ he said.

Robyn didn’t reply.

‘Robyn!’ he said. ‘Are you listening to me?’ They stopped dancing and stared at one another. ‘I would never
ever
do anything like that to you. You’re my whole life now. You and Cassie. I’d never put that in danger.’ He stroked a long curly strand of hair which had escaped from her hairdo and kissed her forehead so tenderly that it brought tears to Robyn’s eyes.

‘I guess I’ll have to get used to being married to a man that other women find attractive,’ she said.

‘And what about you?’ Dan said.

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘Other men are attracted to you,’ he said.

‘No, they’re not!’ she said, sounding outraged.

‘No? What about Uncle Ned?’

‘Katherine’s Uncle Ned?’ she cried.

Dan nodded. ‘I saw the way he was eyeing up your Jennifer Ehle cleavage!’

‘Dan!’ she cried, slapping his arm. Honestly, she really was going to have to stop him from watching Jane Austen adaptations.

On the other side of the dance floor, near to where Doris Norris and Roberta were executing some alarming moves, Katherine and Warwick had their arms wrapped around each other and their foreheads touching.

‘Warwick,’ she said.

‘Yes?’

She bit her lip, not quite knowing how to say what she wanted to say. ‘I’m so sorry I-’ she paused.

‘Nearly jilted me?’

‘Made you wait!’ she said. ‘I did
not
jilt you!’

‘There’s no need to apologise,’ he said.

‘But I feel awful that I put you through that.’

He sighed and stroked her cheek. ‘We all get a little nervous,’ he said. ‘I nearly didn’t show up myself.’

‘Warwick!’ she cried but his laughter made her laugh too.

Chapter 18

The happiest days of our lives always pass the quickest and so it was with Katherine and Warwick’s wedding day. After the dancing, the moment had come to throw the bridal bouquet and the guests joined the happy couple in the entrance hall of Purley where the bride and groom climbed the grand staircase together, stopping six steps up and surveying the crowd below them.

Katherine took one last breath of the scented white roses and then turned her back before launching the bouquet into the air. A great cheer went up when it was discovered who had caught it.

‘Oh!’ Doris Norris cried. ‘
Oh!
’

The honeymoon was in Lyme Regis. Katherine and Warwick had debated whether to book something wonderfully exotic like Hawaii or the Seychelles but, in the end, the two of them couldn’t think of anywhere more romantic than the bit of English coastline where their beloved Jane had been inspired to set
Persuasion
.

So, they’d booked the best room at Kay Ashton’s Wentworth House and enjoyed picnics in the Dorset and Devon countryside, fossil hunting on the Jurassic coast and a visit to Montacute House which had starred as Colonel Brandon’s home in the 1995 adaptation of
Sense and Sensibility
.

‘I want to come here for
all
my honeymoons,’ Warwick said as they walked, hand in hand, along the harbour towards the famous Cobb.

‘What?’ Katherine cried.

‘We
are
going to renew our vows every few years, aren’t we?’ he said with a naughty grin.

‘You mean, you’d go through all that
again?
’ Katherine said, a frown of disbelief etched on her forehead.

They stopped walking and Warwick turned to face her. ‘For you, I’d go through
any
thing!’ he said and, taking her face in his hands and kissing her passionately, she truly believed that he would.

***

Acknowledgements

Once again, I’d like to thank all my dear readers who have stayed with the adventures of the Austen Addicts. I love hearing from you all and I really hope you enjoyed this latest story. And thank you to my dear husband, Roy, for putting up with yet more Jane Austen research!

Three Graces sample

If you’ve enjoyed the Austen Addicts series, you might also like Victoria’s novel,
Three Graces
. Read on for an extract:

Prologue

Deep in the English countryside, at least three train rides away from London, lies the forgotten county of Cuthland.  It’s not the first choice of tourists but those who discover it revisit it until they know every perfect mile.

It’s a county of winding roads, gently sloping hills and river valleys.  Beech woods sprawl luxuriously, rivers flow calmly, and the brilliant purple moors spread to the very heavens.

In the heart of this landscape lies Amberley Court.  For most of the year, it’s hidden by a dense emerald veil of trees but, during the winter months, you can catch a glimpse of it from the road.  It looks something like a honeycomb with its warm golden stone but it’s anything but symmetrical.  Added to down the centuries with a wing here and a turret there, it is a wonderfully higgledy-piggledy sort of house.  No two towers are the same height and no two windows are the same shape.  If one was comparing it to a human face, one would, perhaps, think of a Picasso and yet it has all the grace of a Gainsborough.

Inside, it is a perfect jamboree of Medieval, Tudor, Jacobean and Georgian with fourteenth century alcoves and sixteenth century fireplaces.  Mahogany vies with walnut, and rosewood with satinwood.  There are Chippendales and Hepplewhites, Sheratons and Gillows.  There are cellarets and chaise longues, davenports and dressers.  There are tapestries to take your breath away, galleries that will make you gasp and ceilings that will have you reeling.

There are …

Hang on …

You’re not interested in all that, are you?  You don’t want me to tell you the strange story about the dining room doors or how long the ornate plaster work in the Long Gallery took.  You have no desire to know how much the sixth duke paid for a bust of himself or how long the enfilade is.  You want to know if it’s haunted, don’t you?  That’s why everyone visits these old houses.  They’re not interested in the furnishings.  They don’t want to know dates.  They all have but one question to ask the tour guides and room stewards.

Is the house haunted?

Georgiana?  Do you care to answer this question?

No? 

Are you
sure? 
This could be your big moment.

Not yet?

Oh.  All right then.

Chapter 1

‘I’m not at all sure about this,’ Carys said to Louise, looking up at the grand country house as they finally reached the top of the driveway.  Three storeys high, with windows the size of swimming pools, it was the biggest house they’d ever seen.

‘Oh, come on!  How often do we get to go to a bash like this?’ Louise giggled, running her other hand through her hair and opening up a tiny gold compact in order to check her lipstick.

‘Where shall I park?’ Carys asked, noticing that all the cars were Jaguars, BMWs and Range Rovers.

‘Yours will fit in there, won’t it?’

‘Mine would fit in to the boot of any of these,’ Carys said, eyeing up the enormous cars with immaculate paintwork gleaming in the evening sunlight.  She was incredibly fond of the old Marlva she’d inherited from her uncle but she couldn’t help feeling it was a little out of place at Roseberry Hall.  Although Marlva cars were the county of Cuthland’s most celebrated industry, Carys wished she could boast the latest model, the sleek Marlva Panache, instead of her rotund 1960s Marvla Prima.

‘I’ll reverse in, I think,’ Carys said.  She had a habit of talking through every manoeuvre she made.  ‘Straight over here,’ she’d announce as they approached a roundabout.  ‘Left turn after the hospital,’ she’d inform whoever was in the passenger seat as she drove into town to work.

‘What was that?’ Carys suddenly asked as she heard a bump.

Louise looked out of the back window.  ‘Some sort of wall, I think.’

‘Oh, God!’  Carys inched the car forward slowly, hoping she wouldn’t hear the sound of old brickwork collapsing

‘Don’t worry.  It’s probably already seen out the Civil War; it can survive you.’