Sword to the Heart (Bantam Series No. 13) Read online

  They did not stop to talk to anyone, although occasionally an old man having mumbled congratulations and good wishes would start on a rambling tale of His Lordship’s father or grandfather.

  It was nearly an hour before the round was completed and Lord Colwall led Natalia from the Baronial Hall back along the passages towards the Salon.

  The Reverend Adolphus had not accompanied them and Natalia could not help hoping that, if he had gone to bed, she would have a chance to speak alone with Lord Colwall.

  With a little throb of excitement she wondered if he would kiss her.

  He had not kissed her finger before the engagement ring had been placed upon it and she wanted more than anything else in the world that he should kiss her lips.

  All the way down from the North, she imagined herself being held in his arms; of being close to him; of hearing him say that he loved her and of telling him how much she loved him.

  ‘If only we can be ... alone,’ she thought, and felt herself thrill at the idea.

  She knew that he must love her deeply to have done so much for her already, and she thought now that the reason the marriage was taking place so speedily after her arrival, was that he wanted her to himself.

  She felt her heart leap at the thought. Of course, that was the explanation.

  Even though it might seem slightly inconsiderate where her father was concerned, she knew it would be a wonder beyond words to be alone with the man she married.

  She wanted to talk intimately with him; to know that she was his! She wanted to tell him all the things that she had imagined about him through the three long years when she had thought of him, and of no-one else.

  ‘I love him! I love him!’ she cried in her heart as they reached the Salon.

  Then, with an undeniable feeling of disappointment, she saw her father was waiting for them.

  He rose to his feet as they entered, and before Natalia could speak, Lord Colwall said:

  “I am persuaded that you should retire to bed and have a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow will be for both of us somewhat of a trial. I am sure you would wish to rest.”

  Natalia wished nothing of the sort, but she had not the courage to say so. Instead, obediently, she kissed her father good-night, and then turned towards Lord Colwall.

  There was a question in her eyes as she looked at him.

  ‘At least,’ she thought, ‘he might wish to kiss my cheek.’

  But he only bowed in response to her curtsey, and she moved away a little forlornly to climb the big stone staircase alone.

  She heard a sound behind her and she turned round expectantly. Herald wagging his tail ecstatically was escorting her to her bedchamber.

  Natalia was in fact more tired than she had thought.

  She fell asleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow, and when she awoke it was to see a pale sun struggling through the sides of the curtains.

  ‘I am sure it is going to be a fine day,’ she thought.

  Jumping gaily out of bed she ran across the room to pull open the heavy curtains. It was in fact the loveliest day she could have imagined!

  There had been a sharp frost during the night and the grass was white, the air crisp and the sky very clear.

  Below in the valley she could see a river winding its way through the fields that were green, and in the forests there was still the red of the beech trees and the golden yellow of the oak.

  ‘Soon it will be winter,’ Natalia thought, ‘but now it is beautiful—a perfect day for my perfect wedding.’

  It was appropriate that the world should wear a semblance of white on her wedding day. Natalia remembered with excitement the wonderful white wedding gown the Housekeeper had shown her before she went to bed.

  “Will he think I look beautiful in it?” she asked aloud.

  She was sure Lord Colwall would tell her so, and she felt herself thrill with the anticipation of what lay ahead.

  A few minutes later the maids came to call her.

  “It is a quarter before nine o’clock, Miss,” Ellen announced. “The Reverend Gentleman is having breakfast in your Sitting-Room next door. He asks when you are awake if you would join him.”

  “Is it as late as that?” Natalia exclaimed. “I am usually called at eight o’clock.”

  “I thought you would wish to sleep later this morning, Miss,” Ellen replied. “I did look in a little earlier, but you were asleep.”

  “Well, now I must hurry,” Natalia said, “especially if my father wishes to see me.”

  She paused and then asked:

  “Where is Lord Colwall having his breakfast?”

  “Downstairs, Miss,” Ellen replied, “but of course today you cannot leave your own rooms. It is very unlucky for a Bride to see her Bridegroom before she meets him in the Church.”

  Natalia laughed.

  “Are you superstitious?”

  “Yes, Miss, and so is His Lordship. He has given instructions that on no account must you appear until it is time to proceed to the Chapel.”

  Natalia gave a little sigh.

  “Oh, dear! It is such a lovely day and I would have wished to visit the garden, or perhaps to climb to the very top of the Castle to look at the view.”

  “I don’t think His Lordship would like it,” Ellen said.

  “Of course I must do as His Lordship wishes,” Natalia smiled.

  She dressed herself quickly.

  It was impossible to find a plain morning-gown amongst the elaborate creations which hung in the wardrobe, but she chose the simplest there was and then hurried into the Sitting-Room to find her father had already finished his breakfast.

  “I am sorry to be late, Papa,” she said, kissing his cheek.

  “It is of no consequence, child,” he answered. “You might be expected to be fatigued after such a long journey.”

  “I think in reality I was just day-dreaming,” Natalia answered.

  There were two footmen and a Butler to bring her innumerable dishes from which she found it difficult to make a choice.

  Then the servants having left the room, the Reverend Adolphus said:

  “I want to talk to you, Natalia.”

  There was a note of concern in his voice which made her glance up at him in surprise.

  “What about, Papa?”

  “I have been thinking since last night,” her father began slowly, “that you are being married at quite an unnecessary speed.”

  Natalia did not answer. She merely put down the cup she had been holding in her hand, and sat looking at her father wide-eyed.

  “Your mother and I had thought,” the Reverend Adolphus went on, “that when you arrived at the Castle, you and I would be here for perhaps a week or ten days before the marriage took place.”

  He paused to continue:

  “During that time, your mother asked me to tell you that, if you wished to change your mind, if you decided after all that Lord Colwall was not the man you thought could make you happy, then you were to accompany me on my return home.”

  “But why should Mama think,” Natalia asked after a moment’s pause, “there was any chance of my changing my mind?”

  “You met Lord Colwall only once when you were but fifteen,” her father answered. “If you marry him, Natalia, you will be his wife in the sight of God for the rest of your life. Whatever you may feel about him later, it will then be too late.”

  “Yes, I realise that, Papa.”

  “Therefore I should have wished you to have a chance of getting to know him better,” the Reverend Adolphus went on. “As your mother suggested, if you had a week together, or even longer, you would be able to exchange your viewpoints on different subjects.

  “You would begin to know a little about each other and be quite certain in your own mind he was the man you would love for the rest of your life.”

  “I am quite certain about that!” Natalia said in a low voice.

  The Reverend Adolphus rose to his feet and walked across to the wind
ow.

  “I have been wondering during the night, and I have not slept very much, if your mother and I did wrong when we agreed to His Lordship’s proposal three years ago, when he said he wished you to marry him.”

  He sighed.

  “I thought it strange at the time, and yet to your mother it was understandable seeing you were a distant relative. Then you were educated and brought up in the way which he approved. Now I am not so sure.”

  “What do you mean, you are not so sure?” Natalia enquired. There was a silence as her father did not answer.

  “Explain to me what you are trying to say, Papa,” Natalia insisted. “After all, look at what Lord Colwall has done for me. Look at what he has given me. Can there be any doubt that he loves me as I love him?”

  Again there was a silence.

  Then in a strained voice her father said:

  “I wish your mother were here. Did she talk to you, Natalia, about marriage before you left?”

  “We have talked of little else,” Natalia said with a smile. “Mama, as you well know, Papa, was very excited that I should live in the Castle she had known as a child.”

  “I did not mean that,” the Vicar said a little uncomfortably. “I mean, Natalia, did she explain to you that when a man and a woman are married they are very close and intimate with each other, and it is love which makes their marriage either a Heaven or a Hell.”

  There was a little pause and then Natalia said:

  “I think I understand what you are trying to say, Papa, and although I am somewhat ignorant on this matter I am sure that I love Lord Colwall in the way of which you are speaking. I want to belong to him! I want to be very close to him!”

  Her voice quivered a little as she spoke.

  “You are quite certain, Natalia, that you would not rather come home with me today?” her father asked, turning round from the window to look at her. “We could tell Lord Colwall that his plans are too precipitate; that you would rather wait a few months, perhaps until the Spring.”

  He looked at his daughter pleadingly.

  “Then if you are both of the same mind, he can come to Pooley Bridge and you can be married from your own home as I always intended you would be.”

  “Papa, how could we do such a thing?” Natalia cried. “His Lordship has made all the arrangements! Think of the flowers in the Chapel; the hundreds of people who are coming to the ceremony and the Medieval Feast. How could everything be cancelled at the last moment? He would never forgive me!”

  “I suppose not,” the Reverend Adolphus admitted dully, “but I am not happy about it, Natalia.”

  He walked towards his daughter and put his hands on her shoulders.

  “You are so very lovely, my dearest, so very intelligent, and so very sweet. I think it would crucify me if I thought that you were unhappy.”

  “But why should I be?” Natalia asked. “I have told you that I love Lord Colwall, that I want to be his wife, that I want to be with him now and for always.”

  A smile lit her face.

  “I have thought of him so often,” she said, “that I feel I know him just as if he had been with me these last three years. I am sure, quite sure he feels the same about me.”

  There was an expression on her father’s face she did not understand.

  He dropped his hands from her shoulders and with a heavy sigh turned towards the fire.

  “If only your mother was here,” he muttered.

  And because she did not understand she did not answer him.

  As if he felt he could say no more, the Reverend Adolphus deliberately talked of other things—describing to Natalia the Library which she had not yet seen and which he had visited before breakfast.

  He made her a list of the books he had seen there which he particularly wanted her to read.

  They talked on the many subjects which had always interested them both, and somehow the hours passed until it was time for Natalia to dress for the Marriage Ceremony.

  She went into her bed-room to find the Maids and the Housekeeper waiting for her.

  When they had dressed her in a magnificent gown of white lace which was so elegant that it could only have come from Bond Street, Natalia looked at her reflection in the mirror, she felt sure Lord Colwall would approve.

  The boat-shaped neckline of her gown was very becoming and showed the tops of her white shoulders.

  Her tiny waist was encircled by a sash exquisitely embroidered with pearls and diamonds, which fell into a long train behind her.

  There was a sparkling diamond tiara for her to wear on her head over the cobweb-fine veil of Brussels lace, which had been worn through many centuries by Colwall brides. She looked unreal—a nymph who might have risen from the lake at Ullswater or stepped out from one of the cascades which poured down the high mountains after the rains.

  Behind the veil, Natalia herself felt as if she viewed the world through a dream.

  But this was really happening! She was to be married—and to the man who was the human embodiment of the Knight, her guardian Knight who had been her protector for so long.

  ‘Thank you, God,” she whispered beneath her breath.

  The Housekeeper’s voice interrupted her.

  “I wonder, Miss, if I might ask a very great favour?”

  “But of course, Mrs. Hodges,” Natalia replied. “What is it?”

  “His Lordship’s old Nanny, Mrs. Broom, is too crippled with arthritis to come downstairs to see you, Miss. She didn’t wish me to trouble you, but it would be a real kindness if you could step up to the next floor and let her see you in your wedding gown.”

  “But of course I will,” Natalia replied instantly. “Show me the way.”

  She lifted the front of her skirts and following the Housekeeper went from her bed-room along the passage to another staircase to the floor above.

  It was quite a long way along corridors narrower than those on the first floor.

  The Housekeeper stopped, knocked at a door, and Natalia heard a voice say:

  “Come in.”

  She found herself in what in one glance she recognised as a Nursery. There was a fire burning behind the high grate, there was a rocking-horse standing in one corner. There was the inevitable nursery screen made from scraps and transfers.

  Sitting in a chair by the fire-side was a small grey-haired woman with the land and gentle face of one who has devoted her life to the care of children.

  “I have brought you Miss Graystoke, Nurse,” the Housekeeper said.

  “How kind! How very kind!”

  Nanny made a great effort to rise from her chair, but Natalia moved quickly across the room to prevent her.

  “Do not get up,” she said in a gentle voice. “I hear you have arthritis.”

  “I have indeed, Miss, and some days it is worse than others. I think, if you ask me, it is sitting here having nothing to do.”

  “I am sure it is,” Natalia agreed. “The moment I have time, I will make you one of the herbal drinks that Mama always makes for anyone who has rheumatism in the Parish. It really does help to relieve the pain.”

  “I shall be very grateful for it, Miss,” Nanny said. “Won’t you sit down?”

  The Housekeeper brought Natalia a cane chair and then withdrew from the room.

  “You were His Lordship’s nurse?” Natalia asked.

  “I have been at the Castle since I was fifteen,” Nanny replied. “At first I worked in the house as a housemaid, and then when His Lordship arrived, Her Ladyship, his mother, asked me if I would help the old Nurse who had been brought in to look after him.

  “When she retired soon after Her Ladyship died, Master Ranulf was so happy with me that I was allowed to look after him all on my own.”

  “He must have been a very sweet little boy,” Natalia said.

  “He was the most beautiful baby you ever saw!” the Nurse exclaimed. “So handsome, I thought at the time he looked like an angel, and when he grew older, there was never a happier child.<
br />
  “He may have been the only one but he never seemed lonely, and there was not a man or woman in the Castle who would not have laid down their life for him.”

  Natalia smiled.

  “I can see you loved him.”

  “I still do,” the old woman replied, “but it is different, very different these days.”

  Natalia was silent for a moment and then she asked:

  “Why is it different?”

  “He were badly treated—very badly treated, Miss. I expect His Lordship’ll tell you about it himself, although they say he’ll speak of it to no-one—no-one at all.”

  “Who treated him badly?” Natalia asked—and knew the answer even as she asked the question.

  As if she suddenly remembered it was Natalia’s wedding-day, Nanny pursed her lips together.

  “You don’t want to be talking of things that happened in the past,” she said. “All I would ask is that you make my baby happy. That’s what he needs—happiness!”

  “I shall try to make him very happy.”

  Nurse stared up at Natalia as if her old eyes were trying to penetrate the veil. “You will love him?”

  It was a question.

  “I already love him,” Natalia answered, “and I know that I will bring His Lordship happiness.”

  “That’s all I ask, God bless you, Miss. May He bless you both.” The words were said in such a heart-felt manner that Natalia felt tears prick her eyes, then realising it must be getting late, she said good-bye.

  ‘If he has been really unhappy in the past I will make it up to him,’ she told herself. ‘I will make him happy! I must!’

  Her father was waiting for her in the Sitting-Room and as she entered he looked at his watch.

  “It is time we went to the Chapel, Natalia,” he said. “I cannot believe His Lordship would be pleased if we are late.”

  There was some reserve in his tone as he spoke of his future son-in-law, as if he resented the plans that had been made and the fact that he and Natalia must carry them out.

  “No, of course, we must not be late,” Natalia agreed. “Do I look all right, Papa?”

  “You look beautiful,” her father said in all sincerity. “I would have wished above all else that I could have had the privilege of marrying you today, but I promise you one thing—I shall pray for you and, always, that God will bless you.”