Once a Duchess(3)
Bessie gave the faintest of curtsies and bustled off, carrying Lily’s outerwear and the tea. Isabelle directed Lily’s abigail to take her bag to Isabelle’s own bedchamber. They would have to share a room, as they’d done when they were girls.
When the maids left, Lily started to sink onto the faded couch, but Isabelle scooped her up again in a fierce hug. “Thank you,” she whispered against her friend’s ear. They sat down and Isabelle took in her friend’s lovely ensemble. “It’s so good to see you in a cheerful color,” she said kindly. “The black never suited you.”
Lily nodded. “Believe you me, you cannot be happier to see me in a color than I am to be wearing it. What an odd thing it was, to mourn a man I scarcely knew — to be a widow before I’d even wed. I’m glad the year is over, but neither do I quite look forward to being thrust onto the marriage mart. My whole life, I never had to wonder who I’d marry; I always knew. But now my future husband is an enigma. Which makes me like every other female in England, I suppose,” she finished matter-of-factly.
Isabelle smiled sympathetically. Through the designs of all parents involved, Lily had been born with her wedding date already set. She was to marry her betrothed the first of June, 1811, when she was twenty years of age. January of that year, however, Ensign Charles Handford and the rest of the Nineteenth Lancers were sent to reinforce Wellington’s Peninsular force. Charles didn’t make it home for the summer wedding, and in November 1811, he’d been killed in battle. Isabelle knew her dear friend did not truly grieve him, but neither was she glad to have escaped the match at the cost of the groom’s life.
These dreary thoughts occupied her mind until Bessie brought the tea tray. While Isabelle poured, Lily pulled Bessie aside and murmured to her in a low voice. The maid nodded and collected Lily’s abigail. The women donned cloaks and departed through the front door.
“What was that about?” Isabelle asked wryly, hoping to put aside the somber atmosphere. “You haven’t sacked Bessie, have you? No one else worth a salt will work for such a miserable pittance. I shall never find another like her.” She passed a cup and saucer to Lily.
“I’ve sent them to the butcher.” Lily shrugged guiltily. “You know how particular I am about food. I’m a horrible guest.”
Isabelle shook her head. Again, Lily made her gifts sound like a nuisance.
“Besides,” Lily continued with the spark of the devil in her eyes, “I wanted your dear Bessie out from under our feet. I live in fear of slipping up and calling you Isabelle, instead of Jocelyn or Mrs. Smith.”
Isabelle nodded. “Fair enough.” A strand of her blond hair fell down alongside her cheek. She hooked it behind her ear. She couldn’t remember the last time her hair had been styled by a lady’s maid. “Why have you come, Lily?” She touched her friend’s arm lightly. “Not that I’m not delighted to see you, of course, but I don’t get many surprise visitors.”
Lily set her tea on the small table beside the sofa. “I’ve come to issue an invitation.”
Isabelle’s ears perked. “To what? No one’s invited me anywhere in years.”
“A wedding,” Lily answered. “My cousin, Freddy Bachman, is returned from Spain. He’s getting married in a week. I hoped you’d come as my guest. It will be my first outing in quite a long time, too.”
A wedding? Isabelle wrinkled her brow and buried her face in her teacup. A wedding was so respectable. Two people standing before God, pledging their lives to one another — surely they wouldn’t want a divorcée there. She’d be like a leper at a garden party — completely out of place, abnormal, despised.
“Isabelle?” Lily ventured.
She raised her eyes over the rim of her cup.
“Shall I pour, dear?” Lily asked. “Your cup was empty before you lifted it.”
Isabelle quickly lowered the vacant china. “Ah, so it is. Yes, please,” she said with tight gaiety. She forced a laugh. “Who on earth is married in the dead of winter?”
“My cousin, for one,” Lily said while she poured Isabelle a fresh cup. “His fiancée has been waiting these several years for his discharge from the army.”
Isabelle’s smile faltered. “She waited for him to come home from the war? For years?” Such a testament of devotion was humbling. Isabelle shook her head. “I can’t. It wouldn’t be right.”