Chapter 12

T rue to his word, Victor carried their novels back to her room in Leicester Square, and Jenny stood by with eyes as wide as saucers while he inspected every corner of the place. “Mm hmm,” he murmured to himself, and Isabel thought she would be embarrassed, but she was not. He simply was interested in her lodging.

He turned to Jenny herself with a sweep of his great black coat. “You have family in London?”

“Yes, sir.” The girl hunched her shoulders up toward her ears. Isabel patted her arm consolingly.

“You report to Miss Snow’s parents about her welfare?”

Jenny slunk an apologetic look toward Isabel. “Yes, sir. Jack at the Iron Cup. I see him every so often and tell him how it goes.”

“And you won’t do that anymore.”

Jenny looked wide-eyed now, staring at the full glory of Lord Hartwick. He looked fierce and firm; she had to face her decision herself.

“No, sir,” she said finally.

“Very good.” Crisp and brief as always, he added, “I find I’m in need of a housekeeper, or perhaps head maid, if you are as good at your work as you seem.”

“Oh! I know nothing of keeping a fine house like yours must be, sir.”

“No?” There was the quick flash of his rare smile. “I think I’d like a home, not a house, and I know nothing of that either, but I’m bound to give it a try. Miss Snow and I will be married very soon.”

Eyes even wider now, Jenny clapped her hands and turned to Isabel even as she said, “Yes, sir!”

“Until then I am entrusting her to your care, and Leicester Square.” Then, turning to Isabel he added, “Please. I beg you not to walk out alone.”

“I have all the books I want now.” She pointed to the heap of luxurious volumes piled upon the room’s lone chair. “I believe I can limit my walks to the Square for now, if it eases your mind.”

“It does. It will. And I shall call each day.” Looking about the spare place, Lord Hartwick thrust one gloved hand into his pocket and pulled out a shilling. “Jenny, it is urgent that I see the day’s news. Can you find one, perhaps the late edition, sold anywhere about?”

The maid dashed out, coin in hand, and Isabel turned to her Lord Hartwick. So tall and relentless and hers. “You did not say on our walk here that you needed a newspaper.”

“I didn’t. I need a moment alone with my wife.”

He swept her up in his arms so fast and so slow at the same time, his movements deliberate yet astonishing, making Isabel’s head spin even as he slowly, slowly pressed her closer and closer with both his strong arms and pulled her lips up to his so he could plunder them.

It was a long, slow, lightning-quick time later that she subsided from her toes and breathing again. “We are not yet married,” she managed to gasp.

“In my head, we were married on Christmas Eve. More fool me for not saying so. I hope not to exhaust your great store of patience on me before I learn how to live with someone who is not a tyrant.”

Her arms floated up to rest upon his before she had time to call them back, and his kisses rained down upon her eyelids, her nose, his caressing cheek resting against hers as he nibbled lower, looking for the spots on her neck that made her gasp and melt.

It must have been quite a while but it seemed no time at all before Jenny came racing and puffing up the stairs. It was easy to hear her long before she opened the door to the little room; Lord Hartwick put Isabel just a hand’s breadth away, as deliberately as he did everything, but she saw the fire in his eyes.

It matched the one deep inside her.

He showed no interest in the paper Jenny brandished, her cheeks red from running, so Isabel took it from her, giving him a repressing little shake of her head as she did.

Jenny was no fool.

Isabel couldn’t decide if she wanted to ask the maid to make tea or fetch a loaf of bread and see if they had enough time to finish what they had started.

It wasn’t enough time. She remembered that well.

Victor went on as if they had conversed the entire time about arrangements. “I have no knowledge of where one buys gowns for weddings.”

“Nor have I. Please do sit.”

He ignored the invitation, staying near her instead.

She skipped her eyes down the front page, looking for something to amuse him. “I don’t need a new gown.”

“As you please, but I’d like to provide one.” He said it mildly and not at all as if he were planning to buy her a dozen finer gowns finer. “What do you like?”

Yes, she was beginning to grasp the nuances of his brief utterances.

Certainly it wouldn’t hurt her to begin life as Lady Hartwick in something nicer. “Perhaps a lady at the bakery will know.”

“I’m not interested in the opinion of other women. I would like to know what you like.” He said it so fiercely that Jenny sidled toward the iron stove to make tea, eyes on him as if he might move suddenly. He kept musing. “Though I have no idea what ladies have in their trousseau .”

Isabel didn’t know what a trousseau was. She’d had a chest of linens she’d stitched when younger and dreaming of Mr. Bell’s cottage; they were at her parents’ house. Her sister could have them. The Hartwick family home, she faintly imagined as she studied the columns of newsprint, did not need more linens.

Lord Hartwick was still wondering things aloud. “Of course you’ll have Lady Hartwick’s jewels, but I would like to find you an appropriate wedding gift. Your taste. Do you like emeralds?”

Isabel, eyes locked on the paper, forgot she had no idea what a lady should say.

There. Right in the center of the second page. It leaped out at Isabel and caused her to grab her betrothed’s arm in a very unladylike fashion.

“Lord Hartwick! Did you see? Mr. Carroll, a Secretary attached to the American legation, arrived from Ghent yesterday morning with the Treaty of Peace between this country and the United States, and proceeds immediately to Portsmouth to embark on board a frigate for America. Just look! Look what you’ve done!”

Finally distracted from wedding gifts, Victor crushed her to him, taking one side of the paper to share it and leaning close to peer at it with his measuring eyes. “Not really. Not really. ”

“They have! You did! Oh, you brave brilliant man!”

This time he swept her so tightly against him that she was lifted off the floor, and she felt her skirts whoosh around them as he spun her in place.

And his few words burst with emotion. “Not wasted! Not wasted after all!”

“Not a waste,” she whooped for him. “Not at all.”

He’d helped stop to a pointless war that he’d hated, helped the women and children he’d met who had made such an impression on him and all the men who deserved justice.

He overflowed with joy, more than she had ever expected him to show, that his time had not been wasted. That he had done something. That he had helped.

Had Isabel any doubts about joining her future to his they would have dissolved in that moment. He was so much more than a lord. And the best parts of him no one else would ever see or appreciate the way she did.

“Well done. Oh, well done,” she whispered as she slid against him back down to her feet, and this time when his lips found hers she tasted the triumph in them, and smiled against them wondering if she tasted the same way.

Watching maid or no, she would have her lord, and he would have her.

They approached St. Martin-in-the-fields on foot, for exploring the streets of London had become Isabel’s favorite pastime, and Victor always accompanied.

Usually Jenny followed along as the most desultory of chaperones; today she walked behind Isabel with a basket of little things a bride might require.

“What a busy little nest of streets.” Isabel was determined to stay calm, trying to ignore how her serviceable green wool dress had been exchanged for one of golden silk overlaid with drapings of lace. The lace lay row after row with points that reminded her of snowflakes. It had caught her eye and Victor’s at the same time.

The delicate double row of emeralds at her neck had really been Victor’s suggestion but Isabel’s choice. She had never felt so grand as she did choosing something worthy of a Lady Harwick. In an hour they would belong to the new one.

Isabel’s fingers, in new silk gloves, touched the green stones as she looked up at the church's grand entrance, soaring pillars tucked among the hive of surrounding little buildings.

As always, the grandeur of the place seemed lost on Victor. “I believe there are plans to build a new, wider street. I do not keep up on London affairs. Ah, Goulburn.”

“Lord Hartwick. I had almost despaired of you arriving at your own wedding. Miss Snow.” The under-secretary swept off his hat, giving Isabel a deep bow. His high-necked suit fairly burst open at the neck with ruffles; they matched the way he had brushed the hair forward on either side of his gleaming head.

It still made her heart thump with fear that she would say or do the wrong thing before someone important.

But Victor greeted his old friend with such familiarity that Isabel felt nothing could go too far wrong while he was near. “Have you met Mr. Burroughs? Here he is. I asked him to witness our wedding too.”

Waiting on the wide stone steps, the sweating bookseller had combed his hair flawlessly, his coat brushed clean, a silk cravat crisp and new at his throat.

He seemed speechless as Victor introduced him to the Under-Secretary of State.

Victor spoke for him. “Mr. Burroughs has done me and my wife invaluable service.”

“Pleased.” Mr. Goulburn proferred the man a small bow before turning back to Victor. “I’ve taken the liberty of asking a few more guests.”

Victor’s fierce frown. “I hope not.”

The man seemed to know his friend’s moods and, in a kind way, paid them little heed. Isabel had come to recognize that Victor’s frown was nearly his default expression; his face simply fell into those lines when he thought, and he thought nearly all the time.

Mr. Goulburn went on with good cheer, “A few of the Ghent men wanted to come. It was a great day, Hartwick, and you were there in spirit. I hope they paint you there, one day when they record it for posterity. You, and me with hair.”

Victor’s brilliantly joyous laugh came more often now. He clapped his friend upon the shoulder. “Very well. Lead on.”

Isabel tried to see the pillars, the grand steps, the vast glowing space inside the church the way Victor did, as a collection of shapes and light, nothing more important than that. Tried to feel as though the dark-coated collection of people inside on this January morning were simply people, not ministers of state and—gracious—likely a few lords and ladies too.

But some of them likely were lords and ladies, and Isabel had no one to invite except Jenny and some ladies from the bakery.

She had not wanted her father, mother, or sister there; she planned to inform them of the wedding by note. Next week. Perhaps the week after. There was no rush.

They had not wanted her in their lives; she did not want them in hers.

Then Isabel saw someone with her feet in both worlds. Lady Arnold, the widow who lived on a southern corner of the square and the bakery’s patron, oversaw many of the comings and goings on Leicester Square. Isabel had seen her, perhaps spoken to her twice. It was beyond kind of her to come; Isabel couldn’t even be sure how she knew.

The lady clasped Isabel’s hands in hers as Victor accepted salutations from some of his colleagues.

“The most important wedding is in your heart,” she whispered, as if they were friends, as Isabel let Jenny take off her walking coat.

Then her ladyship pressed a small posy of mistletoe and two rare yellow tulips into Isabel’s hand.

Isabel felt her shaking heart settle.

In a dress fine enough to suit any Lady Hartwick, Isabel walked step by step with Victor down the aisle to the waiting archdeacon of London, whose fine robes— oh my— brushed the floor, but who also had kind eyes and a gentle silver fringe of hair.

The archdeacon smiled at Isabel as she approached, as if he expected her, as if she belonged there, with Jenny and Lady Arnold standing beside her and Mr. Goulburn and Mr. Burroughs next to Victor Adell, Earl of Hartwick.

Her husband.

The preliminaries of the ceremony washed over Isabel unheard, occupied as she was with her unaccustomed finery, people’s kindness, the grandness of the otherwise empty church, and most of all the firmness of Victor’s solid arm under her hand.

Victor spoke often of the legalities of the ceremony. He’d purchased a common license, arranged for the church of the parish in which she lived, cemented every detail as if he expected their marriage to be challenged in court. If it were, the challenge would lose.

She had not expected the awe-inspiring sweetness of this moment, or the clearing of the archdeacon’s throat as he paused.

When she looked at the grand clergyman, framed by the carved plaster ceilings of the elaborate church, she thought she saw him blushing a little.

He turned his book to a loose, inserted page. “In younger days I was foolish enough to pen a few verses, and I promise that I do not include them in marriage ceremonies as a rule. In this case, his lordship made a request.”

Then he read in his fine voice:

“Oh fairest beam of heavenly light

That lead’st the starry train of night;

Calm silence smooths thy tranquil way,

And pensive Sorrow loves thy ray.

And when you reign, the shadowy train

Of fairy footsteps mark the plan;

And dimly, by thy beams serene,

The ghosts of lovers oft are seen.

You wished to say something, Lord Hartwick?”

Victor cleared his throat too, as if making space for words.

He turned and looked down at Isabel, never more fierce than now in his fierce love.

“I wanted to borrow words that would convey that you are my daylight and my night. I have no poet’s skill, yet now I can imagine how past lovers felt because they must have loved like we do. I hope many other lovers yet to live can be as happy as I am, as happy as I hope to make you.”

She had not imagined how he could make her heart melt.

The way Isabel looked up at him—adoring, sweet, so very glad to be here with him—was all Victor needed. The way she spoke when they were alone, through each walk and during stolen evening kisses, of the things she’d seen, the things she thought, filled places in him he hadn’t known were empty.

All he wanted was to listen to her talk to him for the rest of their lives.

He had not expected her to speak aloud, shy as she was except when something was unjust.

But she did have words, and they surprised him.

“You taught me to dream of a better life. Dreams aren’t selfish. I understand that now. Dreams are all that separate hopeless lives from hopeful ones. If I can help you spread any of the hope—the joy —you’ve taught me to feel, it will be a life well spent. I thank you, Lord Hartwick, for all the gifts you’ve already given, and for all the gifts to come.”

And with that, his fellow lawmen from Ghent gave a little cheer. Rowdy they were not, yet they felt moved to express the solidarity of their emotion.

Overcome by unfamiliar feelings of recognition, support, and most of all joy, Victor ever afterward remembered first and foremost the things she said and the feeling of sliding the cool gold ring on her finger.

That and her sigh of relief once they crossed the threshold again, shouted good wishes behind them fading in the morning light.

His carriage stood closest to the door, crowding the street, Mr. Bottle holding the reins.

Someone had decorated the Hartwick carriage with yew branches, more mistletoe, and red ribbons.

Victor nodded at the driver, who tipped his hat and bowed a little with an easy, “Lord Hartwick. Lady Hartwick.”

The last vestiges of Victor’s tension faded away.

He’d spent so much time in Leicester Square this last week, getting to know his bride and ensure her safety, he had left the Hartwick house to stew in its own juices, as it were.

Isabel had visited the house with him twice to arrange their chambers, tell the cook her tastes, and once, with Jenny falling asleep on a chaise in a corner, to read Mrs. Burney’s latest novel together late into the night.

All he had requested for today was to order the wedding breakfast, knowing Mrs. Reed would manage it.

Now the decorations felt welcoming, as if the entire house might welcome home its lord and new lady.

It warmed him as he settled into the seat next to his wife.

Perhaps he had overestimated others’ hostility. Trained as he had been to see viciousness everywhere, he had perhaps not noticed how many people did not subscribe to it.

His father and the odious Mrs. Hopp had loomed so large in his life he had perhaps failed to notice that others did not agree. Peculiar, he thought as he settled in beside Isabel’s warmth and braced his arm behind her so she would not be jostled too badly by the movement of the carriage. One or two evil people caused so much havoc, and their removal so much peace.

Like Napoleon, he thought, reminded of the emperor banished to his little island. Perhaps evil people ought to know their place.

Regardless, his wife and their future was much more interesting.

He squeezed Isabel’s hand now. “For all our wanderings this week we have not walked as far as the Hartwick house. I still cannot imagine you walking such a distance yourself.”

“I only did it once,” she confided. “A carriage driver took me there, the first time; I only walked home.”

“Is that so? What carriage?”

“A hackney. The one that took you.”

“The same one?”

“The very same. I recognized his face. You would too if you saw him; he had those red cheeks, and a red hat.”

Victor could not recall seeing any such gentleman. “How much did he charge you?”

“He wouldn’t let me pay at all. He assumed you were my husband, said you would pay when we reached home. I fretted about it the whole way, then once we reached your house he only said I should be home on Christmas Eve and drove away.”

“And so you were.”

“It wasn’t my home then. ”

“It was waiting to be.” Which was the simple truth. For though at the time he had only been Earl of Hartwick for three days, he had been waiting for that house to be a home all his life, and what that required was Isabel. It always had, and it always would. “ I was waiting to be. Never has a pantomime turned real so quickly as my pretense to be your husband in that bookshop.”

“The hackney driver thought you were my husband because I let you kiss me.” She leaned into his shoulder. He loved the sensation.

“Perhaps he thought me your husband because of the way you followed me to the carriage,” teased Victor back.

Teasing was not a skill that came easily to him, but he was learning. It took trust.

“I think he just wanted to help me. He knew I needed help.”

“I needed it too.” Settling back into the seat, Victor cushioned his wife’s journey by pulling her closer with his arm, supporting her with his body, his strength. He ate more these days, knowing his right to whatever food suited him, and being far, far less hungry in his soul. “What a bear I was that day.”

“You had already done something great. You just didn’t know it yet. Imagine, they signed the treaty that very Christmas Eve, and you didn’t know. Signed by the King the day before New Year’s eve, and you had to read about it in the paper.” Isabel looked indignant, his favorite judge. “One of those gentlemen might have written you a note.”

There was nothing so pleasant as her righteousness on his behalf. Victor shrugged, enjoying how it pressed her softness into him. “Perhaps they did. There is a prodigious amount of correspondence upon my desk at home.”

“And you paid it no attention?”

“I was busy walking up and down Piccadilly looking for my wife.” He reached over to play with the fingers of her far hand. “And how do you like your ring?”

Just as he knew she would, Isabel drew off the ring to examine it closely from all angles, as she did everything.

He saw the moment she spotted the engraving in the weak January light. Saw her read the words he’d had put there.

Justice and smiles Christmas Eve, 1814

She nodded. When she looked up at him again, he thought he saw a tear at the corner of one eye.

He kissed it away.

“I have a gift for you too.” Drawing up the little basket Jenny had thrust into her hands after she settled in the carriage, she drew out something the size of a letter. He unwrapped it from its length of linen.

It was a stitching sampler, simple and beautiful, like her. On a stretched, framed scrap of green wool—no doubt a remainder of the dress she had worn the day they met—she had embroidered white Christmas roses and three words.

Kindness and honesty

He felt his mouth pursing and twisting, trying to discover a new shape to express all this joy.

“Is it too simple?” She leaned into him to study it in his hands, which he enjoyed for multiple reasons. “Ought it to have the Hartwick crest on it, or...?”

“It is perfect. One cannot improve perfection.”

Taking him at his word, Isabel nodded and subsided, then, before he could miss her warmth and softness, wrapped her arms around his arm and pulled it close.

As the houses thinned, Victor began planning how to shorten the time between giving up this pleasant position in the carriage with his wife pressed close, and taking up a similar one in their house.

At least Isabel looked as sorry as he felt when their carriage finally rolled to a stop.

Then her face changed as he handed her out at the base of the ancient steps, which were lined with all the Hartwick servants on both sides, all the way up to the door.