Hetty had been shocked, dazed, and had sat like a frightened mouse all the way back; she was herself only now recovering from that earthquake revelation.
Shy Mr Partington, the Kydd school headmaster, saw her and fell into step. “Miss Cecilia? Do the gossips have it true, that you are to be-”
“I am to be married shortly, that is right in the particulars.”
She kept it at that and bade him a good day at her door.
“Well?” prompted her mother, before she had even taken off her bonnet. “Were they nice, a-tall? Did you-”
Cecilia bit her lip. This was not going to be easy.
“Mama, I’ve something to tell you-and Papa too. It’s very important: shall we go into the parlour?”
“Oh, dear, I hope this won’t take long. I’ve a rabbit pie as I’m …” She saw something in her daughter’s face and without another word hurried off to find her husband.
“Why, Cec-what’s to do?” Kydd wanted to know.
“Not now, Thomas. There’s … I have to speak to them both.”
“Oh, well-”
“Not with you, Tom. This is serious.”
Her mother returned, leading her father. Cecilia followed them in and, with an apologetic smile, left Kydd outside to wait.
Ten minutes later his parents came out-and they were as white as a sheet, passing him silently without noticing he was there.
“Cec-what’s this mean, for God’s sake?” he blurted.
“Thomas, I think we should take a walk in the garden.”
They returned slowly, Kydd shaking his head in disbelief.
“Dear Tom. If you’re surprised, think how I felt. In the morning I’m Cecilia Kydd and in the evening I’m … well, I’m to be a countess.”
“Where’s he now, sis?”
“At the Angel until we send for him.”
“Well, we’d better do that now. There’s a gallows lot to hoist in.”
The maid was told to fetch Mr Renzi while Kydd gazed in awe at his younger sister.
“Have you set a date yet?”
“Nicholas needs to have a consort by his side when he takes his place as an earl, he says. And so it will be an early wedding.”
“This year? Or six months only, you shameless devils?”
“Tom, we thought this week.”
“Whaaaat?” he gasped. “You can’t just-”
“He’s a noble lord now, Thomas. He will have leave from the Archbishop of Canterbury himself to wed by special licence.”
Kydd sat down suddenly, lost for words.
Emily bobbed at the door. “Miss, it’s Mr Renzi here.”
“Oh, do show him in, please.”
Scrambling to his feet, Kydd saw his friend of years come in, his countenance serious.
“You’ve heard the tidings.”
“I have, you wicked dog. Frightening the womenfolk like that, you villain!”
But Cecilia had noticed her brother’s tense watchfulness, his unease. “Thomas!” she scolded. “And that’s no way to speak to the Earl of Farndon.”
“Oh? Then how am I … What’s his tally now, can I ask?”
“This is the Right Honourable the Lord Farndon of Eskdale Hall in Wiltshire. He’s to be addressed as ‘my lord’ or ‘your lordship’ and never on your life ‘you villain,’ Tom.”
“Then it’s ‘your lordship,’ if it serves,” Kydd said, in an odd voice, and gave an exaggerated bow, but when he looked again Renzi’s grave expression had not altered.
“This is harder than ever you will know, dear friend,” he said, in a low voice. “I see before me the sea hero I respect and admire above all men, and society demands he bends the knee to me. I would be gratified beyond measure should you hold to ‘Nicholas,’ dear fellow-or even ‘wicked dog’ would answer.”
They clasped hands.
Kydd turned to his sister. “Now, how about you, Cec? What do I hail you as?”
“Why, I’m sure the Countess of Farndon would be content with ‘my lady’ or ‘your ladyship’ but never in this world ‘sis,’ good Sir Thomas.”
“As it shall be, Your Worship. Now if we’re to be squared away and all a-taunto for a right true wedding in this week, we’d better bend on more sail. Where do we start, Cec?”
It was quickly settled that the cosy familiarity of St Mary’s Church would be best suited for the Kydds, and Renzi hastened to make clear that it would suffice also on his side. Its small capacity dictated a family wedding only with a strict limit on guests. This brought a measure of relief in other arrangements, particularly when it was learned that the groom’s family would certainly be invited to Hatchlands, the county seat of Lord Onslow, a distant relative, who might be depended upon in the matter of carriages.
Kydd assumed charge, sending Cecilia off to fit for a bridal gown and reassuring his parents that they could remain indoors quietly while he took care of all the arrangements.
The delighted tailors of Guildford went to double tides, Kydd and Renzi both to be as resplendent as it was possible to be, and after judicious choices the needles flew.
Canon Chaddlewood of St Mary’s allowed he was more than happy to conduct a marriage: who were the blessed couple? When told of the quality of the celebrants and congregation he nearly swooned, and on learning of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s intercessionary licence, he shrank in fright. It took all of a threat to lose the honour to rival Holy Trinity to move him to accept, with the offer of an organist from Hatchlands and a choir from the school.
The wedding was therefore set for Friday next at ten.
Kydd had his own preparations to make. Orders under his name were sent on the Portsmouth stage to the officer-of-the-day of L’Aurore. It desired him to send a party of trusties by return for special service, their rig to be their best as for captain’s inspection.
He then instructed Boatswain Perrott of the school to transform his assembly hall into a temporary mess-deck, and left the gleeful peg-legged sailor teaching his eager boys how to rig header tricing knittles for hammocks.
It was all shaping up in a most satisfying way.
“So you’re not nervous at all, old horse?” Kydd said lightly, helping Renzi with his snowy cravat.
“Only that this may in fact all be a vain imagining to vanish at any moment with a loud pop. Thomas, days ago I was a lowly secretary-however honourable the post,” he hastened to add. “And now the world may see me as the espoused of the loveliest creature in existence.”
“Hold still, Nicholas. How can I get a decent tie if you move?”
“Dear fellow,” Renzi said softly. “You’ve said that before.”
“What? And I never did!”
“I’m desolated to contradict my best man, but do you not recall in Artemis frigate we were most certainly tie-mates?”
Kydd stopped. The memories flooded back of a young man with a cherished deep-sea mariner’s long pigtail being combed and plaited by his friend, the favour to be returned afterwards.
“Aye, I do, Nicholas.” A stab of feeling came as he realised that not only were those times so distant in the past, but the continued friendship, which saw them that morning performing exactly the same favours for each other, was now about to be concluded.
“I … I’m going to miss you in L’Aurore, m’ friend,” he said quietly. “It won’t be the same without I have a learned cove scratching away for me somewhere.”
“You may believe that I too shall miss … deeply … the freedoms and sights of the sea life.”
He paused, then brightened. “Yet there is perhaps a final service I can do my good captain. It crosses my mind that, should you continue to require a confidential secretary, may I recommend for your consideration a young man of shining qualities whose discretion I can vouch for personally?”
“Oh? Who then is this splendid fellow?”
“An under-secretary on the estate, Dillon the name. He has notions of one day travelling the world, as I have done, and it seems to me that were you to oblige him in this manner then his loyalty would be unbounded.”
“Life in a man-o’-war is not for the faint-hearted, Nicholas.”