No Bride, No Wedding

CHAPTER ONE 1876-1

CHAPTER ONE 1876Calina walked into the small cottage.

Pulling off the black hat that she had worn at the funeral, she sat down at the window and put her hands over her eyes.

She had not cried at her mother’s funeral.

But now she was alone she felt that she must burst into tears even though she knew that her mother would have disapproved.

“A lady does not cry in public,” she had said to her daughter not once but many times during the years that she was growing up.

Her mother had been very particular that she must never do anything that was unladylike or vulgar.

It was understandable, Calina had always thought, considering the different world that her mother was living in now to the way it had been when she was a little girl of her age.

The funeral had been simple and straightforward as Mrs. Hart was of no particular consequence.

The Parson had gabbled through the prayers and the four bearers had just dropped the coffin into the grave and stood back for the Blessing before it was covered over.

There were a few villagers there besides Calina and she knew that they were thinking it was a blessing that the poor woman should not have gone on suffering as she had this last year.

It was the death of Calina’s father in a far off land that had made her mother no longer wish to live.

It was as if she had deliberately given away part of her health every day until finally, three days ago, Calina had gone into her bedroom to call her in the morning.

She thought at first that she was asleep and then she realised that her mother had passed away.

Calina gave a deep sigh and knelt down by the bed.

‘How could you leave me, Mama?’ she wanted to scream out. ‘How could you just go away and leave me all alone?’

But she then realised that she might have expected it, simply because her mother could not live without her father.

The love they had for each other was so intense that for the moment she felt that, ever since her father had died, he had been calling her mother from wherever he was now to urge her to come to him.

It was strange, Calina thought, that her mother had been so blissfully happy in an entirely different world to the one she had been brought up in.

‘If I put it into a book,’ she had thought more than once, ‘no one would believe it.’

It was, in fact, a fascinating story and Calina often went over it in her mind at night.

Just recently she had felt as if it was being acted out in front of her, that she was watching her mother’s life and her own on the stage.

Lady Carol Wood was the only daughter of the fifth Earl of Hurstwood, who was one of the more distinguished and respected members of The House of Lords.

The Earl considered himself of great consequence and was desperately disappointed that he did not have a son.

He was therefore most determined that his daughter should make a brilliant marriage and his son-in-law would compensate for him not having a son of his own.

Lady Carol was an exceedingly pretty girl and was growing more beautiful year by year.

“When she ‘comes out’ she will be the belle of the Season,” her father was told by almost every one of his friends who met her.

It made him even more determined than ever that Lady Carol would make an illustrious marriage.

She was born on Christmas Day and had delighted her parents as they had been married for some time before they had a child.

Her father was in the Diplomatic world.

After his appointments as the British Ambassador in various countries, he had then settled down in London and became the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

He had not married until he was getting on for forty and this was one of the reasons why he did not have a large family. As it was, three years passed before his wife gave him a daughter.

Although he wanted a son he was thrilled at the sight of her and christened her with the names of his most distinguished relatives, who were to be her Godparents.

It was a surprise when, through the death of one of his distant relatives, he became the Earl of Hurstwood.

He was totally determined from that moment that there would be a long line of his family to follow him.

Sadly his wife was not as strong as he thought her to be and after Carol’s birth he was told that she could have no more children and this was a major blow that he had not in any way expected.

But he then resolved to make the very best of it by ensuring that his daughter made a brilliant marriage.

Because it was essential that she should appreciate the position she now had, he was determined that his only child should marry a title, if possible of a higher rank than his own.

The Dukes, however, in England at that time were very few and far between and there was only one who was really eligible and free.

The Duke of Denholme was then pursued by the Earl relentlessly.

Because the Earl had superb horses and extremely good shooting, the Duke accepted gratefully the invitations which he continually received from the Earl.

At the same time he was not a particularly attractive man. Rather shorter than many men of the same age, he had a slight lisp and was not a good conversationalist.

Lady Carol, naturally, had not the slightest idea that her father’s interest in the Duke concerned herself.

Although there were always parties at their house in London and in the country, she saw little of the festivities at first because she still had a Governess.

It was only sometime later, as was conventional, that she came downstairs at certain times of the day.

It was therefore a tremendous shock to her when she was eighteen to be told that she had to make a brilliant marriage and that her father’s plans for the future had to be followed by her without any argument or dispute.

Because the Earl had to make quite certain that the Duke did what was required of him, he made himself not only a close friend, but an extremely generous one, which the Duke found very pleasant indeed.

The Earl not only provided him with horses to ride in London so that he did not have to send to the country for his own but he also gave extravagant parties for him.

These enabled the Duke to meet amusing people, who he would not otherwise have met.

Because he had lived in the country when he was young and seldom came to London, he introduced him to a number of most attractive actresses as well as some of the ‘soiled doves’ who were notorious in St. James’s.

In fact the Duke became so dependent on the Earl that he would not have thought of going to London unless he could stay with him in his luxurious house in Berkeley Square.

He made no plans to open the house in Islington where his father and mother had stayed a few times when they left the country to attend the Opening of Parliament or some other State occasion.

Finally, when Lady Carol was nearly nineteen and had been acclaimed a beautiful and enchanting debutante, the Earl spoke to the Duke and told him where his duty lay.

“Carol will make you a perfect wife,” he said, “and I know, as you enjoy being here with me so much, we will have a great deal to interest us both in making your house in Derbyshire more attractive than it is at the moment and finding a new house for you either in Berkeley Square or Park Lane.”

He paused before he added,

“And I consider the one that your father and mother occupied in Islington to be dull and not worthy of your exalted position.”

The Duke agreed with everything as he always did with the Earl.

Obediently he proposed marriage to Lady Carol at a ball that they both attended, which was described by the newspapers as the ‘ball of the Season’.

Lady Carol was astonished.

She had no idea of her father’s scheming plans that had started almost as soon as she was born.

She had accepted the Duke being frequently in the house as if he was a rather dull and inevitable member of the family.

But she had never in her wildest dreams thought of marrying him.

She was considerably surprised that he had wished in any way to be associated with her and she had already had several proposals of marriage that her father had pooh-poohed as soon as he heard of them.

He told her that the men were not worthy of her and they were of no particular Social standing.

She had found that the men her father entertained either for his own pleasure or before they went off to a ball to be rather dull and in most cases far too old for her.

So by the time she ‘came out’ her mother had been dead for some time and it was her father who arranged everything.

So she had little idea of what she was missing and other girls of her age had a far more amusing and exciting time than she did.

Because she was so pretty Lady Carol never lacked a partner at a dance.

But, as her father had told her, she was now to be the hostess as her mother was no longer there.

She therefore had to be polite in accepting those who had dined with them before she danced with anyone else.

Of course they paid her fulsome compliments and she had accepted them. In the same way she accepted the flowers they sent her the next morning when they thanked her and her father for a very delightful dinner.

She did not, unlike most girls of her age, worry much about marriage. It was something that she felt would happen to her at some time or another.

But it would be with someone who made her heart beat quicker. Someone who would make her thrill with excitement when he proposed marriage.

She could not think that this would happen with any of the men she had met so far.

When her father, who always examined her closely at the end of every party, asked what had happened, she was pleased, although she did expect it, when he told her decidedly and without provocation that the man who had offered her his heart and his name was of no consequence.

In future he was to be struck off their guest list as undesirable.

It was therefore just like a blow from the sky itself when her father told her that she was to accept the Duke’s proposal and they would be married in a month’s time.

“But, Papa, I don’t want to marry him,” Lady Carol said firmly.

“Nonsense! Nonsense!” her father snapped. “He will make you an excellent husband. I grant you his house in Derbyshire is very dull, but I can afford to decorate it as a part of your Wedding present just as Arthur wants me to alter his stables, which, as I have often pointed out, are out of date and not worthy of the horses I have given him.”

There was a note in her father’s voice which told Lady Carol that it was useless to argue with him.

She had tried it ever since she had been a child, but she had always been overruled and forced to do what her father wanted, however much it might differ from what she wanted for herself.

It was impossible to explain to her father that, when she thought of marriage, she thought of someone tall and handsome.

Like a heroine in a novel he would make her heart turn a somersault when he looked at her and they would instinctively know that they had been brought together by Fate.

And, as far as she and he were concerned, there was no one else in the world but each other.

“I know you are fond of the Duke, Papa,” she said, “but I don’t love him. When I do marry, I want to marry a man I love.”

“Of course you will love Arthur,” her father said sharply. “Love comes after marriage not before and he will make you a really excellent husband. You will not be frightened that he is running after other women.”

He smiled at her before he went on,

“He will arrange parties in a way that he has never done before either in the country or in London.”