She would have been content to keep the guest list short, to have no one at her wedding, in fact, except her family and Sir Graham and Lady Carling and the Marquess of Claverbrook.
Her sisters had other ideas. Of course.
So did Lady Carling. Of course. "You must invite everyone with whom you and Lord Sheringford have even a passing acquaintance," Vanessa told her. "I do agree, Meg," Katherine said. "It is what we decided to do for /my/ wedding, you will recall, and while it was something of an ordeal at the time, I have been so very glad since. A big wedding provides wonderful memories." "But no one will /come/," Margaret protested.
Her sisters looked at each other and laughed. "Meg!" Katherine exclaimed. "/Everyone/ will come. How could they possibly resist? It will be the wedding of the Season." "With only nine days' notice?" Margaret asked doubtfully. "Even if it was tomorrow," Vanessa said. "Of course everyone will come, you silly goose." It was an opinion with which Lady Carling concurred when she called at Merton House the same day. "And even if we were to invite only family," she said, "the numbers would be quite vast, Margaret. There are your brother and sisters and Mr. Constantine Huxtable. And there are Agatha, my sister, and Wilfred, and all my nieces – there are six of them, did you know? All of them are married. And on his father's side Duncan has four uncles and their wives and two aunts and their husbands. Not that they are actually uncles and aunts, since they were my late husband's cousins, but that is what Duncan always called them. And /they/ have so many children all told that I lost count years ago. There are even grandchildren who are old enough to attend a wedding without any fear that they will dash about whooping and getting under everyone's feet. If you give me paper and pen and ink, I will write down the names and addresses of all I can remember. Most of them are in London and will certainly expect invitations. Duncan was always very close to his cousins and second cousins as a boy. Except Norman, that is. He was a dear enough boy, but he was always very good and very ready to disapprove of any brothers and cousins who were /not/ good. That did not endear him to any of them, as you may imagine. And I suppose we cannot invite him to the wedding anyway, can we? Not when he is married to poor Caroline." Margaret capitulated and invited the whole world – or so it seemed.
Certainly her hand was severely cramped by the time she had finished writing all the cards.
The whole world replied within two days, and at least nine tenths of it was coming to the wedding at St. George's on Hanover Square and to the breakfast at Merton House.
The Marquess of Claverbrook was coming too. Margaret had carried through on her promise to visit him again with Stephen and her sisters, and none of them gave him any chance to say no. Of course, he did save face by declaring that he would attend only to see with his own eyes that his rogue of a grandson really did put in an appearance at his own wedding this time.
The days passed in a blur of activity. Before Margaret knew it, her wedding day had dawned and it really was too late to change her mind even if she wanted to.
She did not.
Crispin caused her more than one restless night, it was true, but she knew that she would never marry him even if she were free to do so.
There were too many things about him that disturbed her, and the leftover dregs of an old attachment were simply not enough.
He was coming to the wedding, though she suspected it was only because Sir Humphrey and Lady Dew were still in London and he did not wish to arouse their curiosity by staying away. Lady Dew was delighted by the approaching nuptials, though she did admit to a little disappointment that her small attempt at matchmaking between Margaret and Crispin had been unsuccessful. She had finally heard of the scandal concerning Lord Sheringford, but she gave it as her opinion that if a lady was foolhardy enough to leave her husband in order to run off with another man, then she must have had a very good reason to do so. For her part, she would not hold it against the earl, especially as he now had the good sense to ally himself to Margaret.
Margaret stood barefoot at the window of her bedchamber early on the morning of her wedding, gazing up at a sky that was deep blue and cloudless – a rarity so far this summer. She was not particularly enjoying the sight, though. She was fighting panic by telling herself that it was surely what every bride faced on her wedding day.
She did not turn to look at the rumpled bed behind her. The linens would be changed after she had left for her wedding. Tonight it was to be her wedding bed. They were to leave in the morning for Warwickshire, she and Lord Sheringford, but tonight Stephen had insisted they stay at Merton House while he went to Vanessa and Elliott's.
Margaret set her forehead against the cool glass of the window and closed her eyes.
How strange it would be to be married!
And how she ached for it. And for tonight. Was that a shameful, unladylike admission? But she did not really care. She had waited long enough for this. /Too/ long. Her youth was already gone. And since it /was/ gone, and with it all her youthful dreams of romance, then it was as well to turn her mind to the future with a positive wish for it to come as soon as possible.
Today and tonight she would be a bride – and she was going to enjoy every moment. Tomorrow and for the rest of her life she would be a wife. She was going to enjoy that too. It was what she had always wanted, after all, and what she had decided over the winter that she would /be/. It really did not matter that her bridegroom was neither Crispin, whom she had loved, nor the Marquess of Allingham, with whom she had enjoyed a comfortable friendship. She had made her decision to marry the Earl of Sheringford, and somehow she would make something good out of their marriage.
There would be a child to bring up. /Again/.
She smiled fleetingly.
Even before she gave birth to any of her own.
Oh, /let/ it be the right thing she was doing, she prayed to no one in particular as she lifted her forehead away from the window and moved into her dressing room to ring for her maid. /Please/, let it be the right thing.
It was fourteen days since she had collided with the Earl of Sheringford in the doorway of the Tindell ballroom. Fourteen days since he had asked her to dance and to marry him – all in one sentence. His first words to her. /Only/ fourteen days.
Weddings by special license, Duncan discovered during the ten days preceding his marriage to Margaret Huxtable, did not differ significantly from weddings by banns except that one did not have to wait the obligatory month for those banns to be read.
They were going to be married at St. George's in Hanover Square, for the love of God. It was the scene of most /ton/ weddings during the Season, it being the parish church of most of the beau monde. It was where legend had it he had left Caroline waiting tragically and in vain at the altar for his arrival five years ago. Legend erred on the side of good theater, of course, as legend often did, but even so… How foolish of him to have imagined a mere two weeks ago that he would procure a special license, bear Miss Huxtable off to the nearest church, marry her there with only the clergyman and a witness or two for company, and then make off into Warwickshire with her to live obscurely ever after.
He could do nothing but kick his heels while his wedding crept up on him with the speed and inevitability of a tortoise.