The Unbreakable Spell Read online

  Caroline laughed and exclaimed,

  “You are both so clever! And I am delighted, dearest Rocana, for you to have my trousseau, which has cost Mama far more money then she intended to spend!”

  There was still enough light in the sky when Patrick greeted Caroline for Rocana to see how happy they both were.

  In fact, the radiance in their faces seemed to glow like starlight.

  Caroline threw her arms around Rocana.

  “Thank you, dearest!” she cried. “This could never have happened without you and I shall be praying all through the night that everything will be all right tomorrow morning.”

  They had driven away and Rocana watched them disappear into the dusk at the end of the drive.

  She had then gone back into The Castle feeling that whatever happened to her, two people had found the ideal happiness which was like something out of a fairy story.

  She went to bed and tried to sleep because she knew it was the sensible thing to do.

  But now the real test had come!

  With Nanny going ahead to see there was nobody about, she moved from her own bedroom into Caroline’s.

  Nanny then locked the door of Rocana’s room and took away the key.

  “I’m going to tell Her Grace you’ve got a streaming cold,” she said, “and the last thing you wants is to come near Lady Caroline and for her to catch it!”

  “That’s sensible,” Rocana agreed.

  She got into Caroline’s bed and Nanny said,

  “I’ll be back in half-an-hour to bring you a cup of tea. It’s not likely Her Grace’ll be about for another hour or so, so try to get some rest.”

  It was easier said than done and Rocana lay awake feeling cold and actually shivering with fear. Because it was the only thing she could do, she prayed both to God and to her father and mother for help.

  ‘You were so happy,’ she said, ‘and I want to be happy too, but I shall never meet anybody here in The Castle just as a sewing-maid and being bullied by Aunt Sophie. Perhaps if I cannot marry for love, I might become friends with the Marquis. At least we have horses in common, if nothing else!’

  It was, however, rather poor comfort and she knew she was very apprehensive of what the Marquis would say when he found he had been deceived, if she actually went so far as having his ring on her finger.

  She was praying and going over everything in her mind when Nanny came back, bringing her a cup of tea which Rocana sat up to drink.

  Then Nanny drew back the curtains, leaving the blinds half-drawn and arranged Caroline’s wedding clothes ready for her to put on.

  As they had both anticipated, about three-quarters of an hour later, the door opened and the Duchess came into the room.

  “Not up yet?” she said sharply. “It is time you began to dress. Your future husband has been insistent that we must not be late and it would be a great mistake to start your marriage off on the wrong foot.”

  Rocana however did not reply.

  She just held a handkerchief to her eyes and the Duchess added crossly,

  “What are you crying about? You will make your face look a mess.”

  Nanny moved quickly to the Duchess’s side to say,

  “I’d like to speak to Your Grace privately.”

  It seemed as if the Duchess might refuse and then reluctantly with a backward glance at her daughter, she went towards the door and Nanny opened it for her.

  Outside in the passage Nanny said,

  “Don’t upset her, Your Grace. She’s just feeling miserable at leaving home, but she’ll be all right. I’ll get her downstairs in time.”

  “What is she behaving like this for?” the Duchess enquired.

  “Marriage is a step in the dark, Your Grace,” Nanny said, “and her Ladyship’s always been very sensitive.”

  The Duchess snorted, but, as if she realised that Nanny was talking sense, she walked towards the staircase saying,

  “Very well. Mind she is dressed in half-an-hour’s time, then bring her to my room for me to fix the tiara on her veil.”

  “I think I’d better do that, Your Grace,” Nanny said. “If she goes on crying as much as she’s crying now, we’ll have her in a state of collapse.”

  “I have never known her behave in such a ridiculous manner!” the Duchess exclaimed.

  “Leaving home with a strange man, Your Grace, is an ordeal for any young woman and her Ladyship’s little more than a child.”

  “Very well,” the Duchess conceded, “You may come and fetch the tiara now, and I will let you know when I am leaving for the Church.”

  She proceeded down the stairs like a ship in full sail and Nanny followed her.

  Rocana was not disturbed again until a footman knocked on the door to say that the Duchess was leaving for the Church and her Ladyship was to be downstairs in the hall in five minutes time.

  “I’ll see she’s not late,” Nanny announced and the footman gave her an impertinent grin.

  When Rocana was dressed in the beautiful wedding gown chosen for Caroline and Nanny had put some finishing touches to her hair, it would have been difficult to know she was not her cousin, unless somebody had been able to see her eyes.

  Because she was frightened, her eyes were purple in their depths and had a strange mystic quality about them that was not wholly English.

  Like Caroline, she too resembled the beautiful Lady Mary Brunt after whom they had both been christened. Lady Mary had married her cousin who later became the eighth Earl of Brunt and fought in the wars under Marlborough with such distinction that he was created the first Duke of Bruntwick.

  Lady Mary had gone to France with her husband and had ridden beside him on the battlefield.

  She was reputed through her intelligence and quick wits to have directed one battle so well that it was successfully won against the French before Marlborough himself came up with reinforcements.

  Because she was a legend in the Brunt family, every daughter born to the reigning Duke and his sons was given Mary as her first name.

  Therefore, just as Caroline’s name was prefixed with Mary, so Rocana had been christened ‘Mary Rocana’.

  This, as Patrick had already pointed out to her, would make her responses in Church easier than they might otherwise have been.

  But her eyes would undoubtedly give her away to anybody who looked closely at her and she had a very different aura from Caroline’s.

  She herself was not aware of it, but her mother had known of it and so had her father.

  “It is something she had inherited from you, my darling,” Lord Leo said to his wife, “and although it is difficult to put into words, it is the magic I have always associated with you, as well as something spiritual that other women do not have.”

  “How could any daughter of yours not be an unusual and exceptional person?” Rocana’s mother had asked tenderly.

  “Or yours,” Lord Leo replied.

  But, as she looked at her reflection in the mirror, Rocana was only hoping that with her veil over her face and if she kept her eyes downcast – neither her uncle, her aunt nor the Marquis would suspect that she was not Caroline.

  “Now don’t worry about anything,” Nanny was saying as she took her towards the door. “People sees what they expects to see, and they’re not expecting to see anybody but my baby beneath that veil.”

  “I-I hope you are – right,” Rocana remarked with just a movement of her lips.

  Nanny lifted the end of the veil that trailed behind her gown.

  As the wedding was to be a quiet one, the Duchess had decided against a train that would have required several bridesmaids or pages to carry it.

  Instead the lovely white gown trailed a little way behind her, while the ancient Brussels lace veil billowed out gracefully when it was set down on the ground.

  Nanny held it up as they went down the stairs and Rocana resisted an impulse to look about her and kept her eyes on the ground.

  The Duke was waiting for her in the hall
, looking very resplendent with the Order of the Garter across his chest and a number of decorations on his cut-away coat with its long tails.

  “Come along, come along!” he was saying sharply as Rocana descended. “We are due at the Church at nine thirty and we have less than three minutes to get there.”

  Rocana could not help thinking it would do the Marquis good to wait, but she knew it would be a mistake to say anything.

  As she reached the bottom stair, the Duke walked ahead out through the front door and down the steps to where a closed carriage was waiting.

  The horses had wreaths of white flowers on their harnesses and the coachman had a bow of white satin ribbon attached to his whip.

  The Duke got in first so that he was sitting on the far side of the carriage and Nanny made a great business of lifting in the veil.

  After she had finished, the footman laid a bouquet that had been arranged by the gardeners on the seat opposite them.

  The carriage drove off and, as Rocana sat with her head bent, the Duke said testily,

  “Nothing but rush, rush, rush! Typical of young people today! I would have liked you, Caroline, my dear, to have been married in the old-fashioned way with a proper wedding breakfast to follow the ceremony.”

  He paused before he went on,

  “But I was not consulted! Your mother arranged everything with your future husband and, if you ask me, it’s all quite unnecessary!”

  Then, as if he thought he should talk more intimately to his daughter, he said,

  “I shall miss you, Caroline. You have been a good girl. But I don’t pretend I am not pleased that you are marrying a man in such an important position and who is so well endowed with this world’s goods. At the same time Quorn is a difficult man and I daresay he will make a difficult husband!”

  The Duke drew in his breath before he continued,

  “Nevertheless, he is a gentleman, and he will do the right thing by you. If you take my advice, you will not go prying into his private affairs. All young men have to ‘sow their wild oats’ and Quorn by all accounts has produced a whole harvest of them!”

  The Duke gave a short laugh at his own joke, then thinking perhaps it was not very appropriate said,

  “Well, here we are, and just you do what he wants and no tears. No man likes a crying woman!”

  As he finished speaking, the door of the carriage opened and the footman jumped down from the box to help them alight.

  Rocana did not hurry.

  She took the bouquet the flunkey handed to her, then reached out to rest her hand on her uncle’s arm.

  They had to go a little way up the Church path to reach the porch and there were people from the village lining it.

  Rocana did not raise her eyes, but she could hear them exclaiming at how beautiful she looked and those in the front said as she passed,

  “Good luck, my Lady!”

  “God Bless you, dearie!”

  “May you be very happy!”

  She dared not look at them but just bowed her head a little to show her appreciation of their good wishes.

  Then they had reached the porch and she could hear the organ playing softly.

  The Duke stopped for a moment.

  Than as if he thought there was no point in waiting, he led her up the aisle.

  As the wedding had been arranged in such a hurry, Rocana was aware there were only those of their relations who lived in the vicinity and a few friends and neighbours in the front pews.

  She could hear the rustle they made as they turned round to watch her approach on the Duke’s arm.

  Although she did not even glance from under her eyelashes, she was aware that the Marquis was waiting for her at the Chancel steps.

  Just for a moment it flashed through her mind that she was making a terrible mistake in tying herself irrevocably to a man she did not know and of whom everybody was afraid.

  ‘I am crazy!” she thought and wondered if at the last moment she should run away.

  She had a sudden vision of herself tearing down the aisle, throwing her bouquet to the ground.

  Then, almost as if it was a picture in her mind, she could see The Castle waiting for her like a prison.

  Once the doors were closed on her, the light outside would be shut out for all time and she would be incarcerated as if she were a nun.

  ‘Even the Marquis is better than that!’ she thought and then was aware that she was standing at his side.

  The Parson was their local Vicar because the Duchess had not, as she would have done had the wedding been a large one, asked the Bishop to perform the ceremony.

  He began the service and somehow Rocana remembered at the right moment to have her bouquet taken from her.

  As she gave her left hand to the Marquis, she felt the strength of his fingers and knew that the vibrations coming from him were as strong and overpowering as she had known they would be if he touched her.

  ‘He is frightening – very frightening!’ was all she could think as they made the responses that would make them man and wife.

  “I, Titus Alexander Mark,” he was saying, “take thee, Mary Caroline, to my wedded wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward – ”

  Rocana could hear his voice, firm and authoritative ringing out in the quietness of the Church.

  Then the clergyman turned to her.

  Because she wanted to give the Duke no possible grounds for annulling the marriage, she was determined to speak in a voice that was hardly audible.

  “I, Mary Caroline, take thee – ” he began.

  After a perceptible pause and in a hesitating whisper Rocana echoed,

  “I – Mary – ”

  She stumbled over the next word so that it was completely incoherent and went on a little louder,

  “ – take thee – Titus Alexander Mark to my wedded – husband – ”

  Then the wedding ring was on her finger and she knew that it was done.

  She was married and, as the Parson said, no man could put them asunder.

  The Register, presumably by the Marquis’s order, so as not to waste time, was ready in the Chancel.

  As the Marquis signed the book, Rocana threw back her veil, but pulled the sides of it around her and bent her head so low that she hoped it was impossible for anyone to see her face, especially with the large diamond tiara glittering above it.

  Then she was walking down the aisle on her husband’s arm, still with bent head and eyes downcast, to the sound of The Wedding March played loudly but not very well on the organ.

  As they reached the porch, there was a shower of rose-petals and rice, and the Marquis quickened his pace a little so that Rocana found her lace veil catching on the gravel path.

  They, however, reached the carriage to find, which she had not expected, that it had been opened while they were inside the Church.

  Only as they started to drive away did she realise that this was in fact a blessing.

  Since the Church ceremony had begun, many more people had come from the village to line the drive up to The Castle and throw flowers and rice into the carriage as they passed.

  This meant there was no need of any conversation and Rocana turned away from the Marquis to wave at those waving to them, at the same time keeping her head down in case they should notice, as nobody else had, that she was not Caroline.

  When the horses then drew up outside the front door, Nanny was waiting to lift up her veil at the back and to hurry her up the steps.

  Only as she reached her bedroom did Rocana realise that she and the Marquis had not exchanged one word since they had become man and wife.

  “Was it all right?” Nanny asked as soon as the door was closed behind Rocana and she held out her hand on which glowed the golden wedding ring on her third finger.

  “Thank God!” Nanny exclaimed. “I’ve been praying no one’d guess you were not who you appeared to be.”

  “Now I have to get away without Aunt Sophie realising it,” Rocana replied.<
br />
  “I doubt if she’ll come upstairs,” Nanny said, “but hurry and I’ve lowered the lace on your bonnet.”

  Last night, when Nanny had unpacked Caroline’s going away outfit, she and Rocana found the high-brimmed bonnet was in the very latest fashion edged with a row of lace that acted almost like a veil.

  It was very attractive and, Rocana thought, very glamorous. She also knew it would help to conceal her face, especially if she kept her head bent.

  It was fortunate that neither she nor Caroline were tall. In fact they both measured only five foot five inches and in her low slippers she had been aware that, standing beside the Marquis, her head only came up to his shoulder.

  “I must arrange not to leave until the very last moment,” she said to Nanny.

  “There shouldn’t be any difficulty now since his Lordship’s in such a hurry to go,” Nanny replied.

  Rocana hoped that she was right and, as she hurriedly changed her clothes for an elegant pale blue travelling gown and cloak of the same colour, she prayed there would be no sign of the Duchess.

  Her prayers were answered because it was a footman who knocked on the door to say,

  “His Lordship’s compliments, my Lady. He’d like to be leavin’ in a few minutes.”

  Nanny replied,

  “Very well. Will you bring upstairs a glass of champagne for her Ladyship and a piece of wedding cake? She’ll not have time to join the others in the Baronial Hall.”

  Again because of the haste with which the marriage was to take place, the ballroom had not been opened as was traditional for the reception.

  In fact, Rocana was certain there were so few guests at the wedding that even the dining room would seem too large.

  She knew it was impossible anyway for her to go there and, when the champagne was brought upstairs, she sipped a little of it.

  She found it impossible to eat anything because in her nervousness she felt quite sick.

  She was, however, completely ready and Nanny, just in case the Duchess should come upstairs, had drawn the blinds again.

  “Here’s your handkerchief, dearie,” Nanny said, “and, if Her Grace does appear, I’ll tell her you’ve had another fit of crying.”