Honor's Players - By Holly Newman Page 0,18
and her wedding dress. She refused filmy muslin nightgowns in favor of a more sturdy lawn material and insisted on an ivory-colored wedding gown over a stark white which she knew, while highly flattering to Helene, would cause her to appear insipid.
She stared now at the wedding gown reflected in the mirror, unconsciously stroking the fine material. It was of ivory gauze with silk appliqué petals and leaves sewn in tiers at the hem and on the puffed upper portion of her sleeve. The bottom of the sleeve fitted snugly to her arm, fastening with ten tiny pearl buttons. The gown’s small, high bodice was plain. On her head Elizabeth wore a small brimmed hat of ivory silk plush decorated with the same silk petals and leaves as were on her dress. Attached to the brim and allowed to fall over her face to her shoulders was a sheer gauze veil edged with tambour work. Elizabeth, turning slightly so she could see the gown from all angles, was pleased with the overall effect.
The maid sent into her that morning by Lady Romella fussed about her, straightening a petal and seam while chattering of her mistress’s good fortune. “And to think, my lady, one day you’ll be a Countess!” She clucked her tongue. “Lawks a mercy, all a’Lunnon a been buzz’n about this wedd’n. It’s the affair of the season, that’s what they do say, even if it do seem a might unseemly in its haste,” the maid remarked ingeniously, hoping for some reaction from Lady Elizabeth that she could take below stairs.
Her chatter fell on deaf ears. Around and around in Elizabeth’s mind the one single unanswered question whirled. Why me? She had tried to dissuade St. Ryne, had tried to show him only her nastiest side, only to find herself tongue-tied before him, impotently raging within herself. She refused to analyze her reasons, knowing if she did so she would discover she had met the one man who mattered.
No! she thought sharply, tossing her head, which sent the maid into another bout of clucking. No man mattered! For her sanity she repeated the litany in her mind. She wondered how late she dared be before her father stormed up the stairs.
Elizabeth fervently wished Hattie were here. Her old nurse was the only person she ever laughed with, the only person to understand her and love her unreservedly.
To be unloved was agony. She had borne it from her father since her mother’s death. She could even say with conviction it didn’t bother her anymore. At nineteen she had learned to accept what she could not have though she still railed against it. She trembled at the thought of being thrust into a new life with a man she didn’t know and who couldn’t possibly love her. Her eyes misted, their gold lights turning to amber.
Her waspish tongue and rude attitude had developed as a young girl's ploy for attention from her father. At least if he ranted, railed, and punished her, he had to acknowledge her existence. Hattie had often lectured on the futility of such a strategy, but her words were to no avail. As Elizabeth grew older, her rudeness and cutting tongue became a habit and a defense. She learned to consider herself unlovable for she was the one blamed for her mother’s death.
She remembered the day well—she could scarcely forget for it was carved in her memory and often haunted her dreams. It was her fifth birthday and nature was helping the family celebrate by offering up an unusually warm spring day. The past winter had been particularly severe and for a time Lady Susan Monweithe, Elizabeth’s mother, had been extremely ill and not expected to survive. She had, nonetheless, recovered splendidly, leaving the family doctor awed and her family joyful. As the weather was sunny and mild, it was decided Elizabeth’s birthday party would be out of doors; consequently, a family picnic was planned. Her father was jolly then, tossing first her then Helene in the air. After lunch, he dozed in the shade of a large tree while their mother watched as she and Helene, a golden-haired toddler then, explored the edge of the lake. Mama had warned them not to go too close; however, with youthful impetuousness they did not heed her. While Elizabeth gathered flowers by the water’s edge, Helene squatted on an overhanging rock to watch some frogs. From her great maturity at five, Elizabeth knew it was dangerous to get so