Grab yourself a cup of tea, put you feet up and read this excerpt (links to purchase are at the end, because you will want to read the rest of the book when you finish :)
March 1920
“I
say, if you’re running away from your wedding, you’re going about it quite
wrong.”
I paused with my leg out the window, satin wedding
gown hitched up above my knees. A layer of tulle floated over my face,
obscuring my view. I shoved it aside to find a tall, bespectacled young man
standing behind me. His expression was serious, but there was an unmistakable
gleam in his eyes that was distinctly at odds with his clerical garb.
“Oh! Are you the curate? I know you can’t be the
vicar. I met him last night at the rehearsal and he’s simply ancient. Looks
like Methuselah’s godfather. You’re awfully young to be a priest, aren’t you?”
I asked, narrowing my eyes at him.
“But I’m wearing a dog collar. I must be,” he
protested. “And as I said, if you’re running away, you’ve gone about it quite
stupidly.”
“I have not,” I returned hotly. “I managed to
elude both my mother and my future mother-in-law, and if you think that was
easy, I’d like to sell you a bridge in Brooklyn.”
“Brooklyn? Where on earth is that?”
I rolled my eyes heavenward. “New York. Where I
live.”
“You can’t be American. You speak properly.”
“My parents are English and I was educated
here—oh, criminy, I don’t have time for this!” I pushed my head out the window,
but to my intense irritation, he pulled me back, his large hands gently
crushing the puffed sleeves of my gown.
“You haven’t thought this through, have you? You
can get out the window easily enough, but what then? You can’t exactly hop on
the Underground dressed like that. And have you money for a cab?”
“I—” I snapped my mouth shut, thinking furiously.
“No, I haven’t. I thought I’d just get away first and worry about the rest of
it later.”
“As I said, not a very good plan. Where are you
bound, anyway?”
I said nothing. My escape plan was not so much a
plan as a desperate flight from the church as soon as I heard the organist
warming up the Mendelssohn. I was beginning to see the flaw in that thinking
thanks to the helpful curate. “Surely you don’t intend to go back to the hotel?”
he went on. “All your friends and relations will go there straight away when
they realise you’ve gone missing. And since your stepfather is Reginald
Hammond—”
I brandished my bouquet at him, flowers snapping
on their slender stems. “Don’t finish that sentence, I beg you. I know exactly
what will happen if the newspapers get hold of the story. Fine. I need a place
to lie low, and I have one, I think, but I will need a ride.” I stared him
down. “Do you have a motorcar?”
He looked startled. “Well, yes, but—”
“Excellent. You can drive me.”
“See here, Miss Hammond, I don’t usually make a
habit of helping runaway brides to abscond. After all, from what I hear Mr.
Madderley is a perfectly nice fellow. You might be making a frightful mistake,
and how would it look to the bishop if I aided and abetted—”
“Never mind!” I said irritably. I poked my head
through the window again, and this time when he retrieved me he was almost
smiling, although a slim line of worry still threaded between his brows.
“All right then, I surrender. Where are you
going?”
I pointed in the direction I thought might be
west. “To Devon.”
He raised his brows skyward. “You don’t ask for
much, do you?”
“I’ll go on my own then,” I told him, setting my
chin firmly. Exactly how, I had no idea, but I could always think of that
later.
He seemed to be wrestling with something, but a
sound at the door decided him. “Time to get on. My motorcar is parked just in
the next street. I’ll drive you to Devon.”
I gave him what I hoped was a dazzling smile. “Oh,
you are a lamb, the absolute bee’s knees!”
“No, I’m not. But we won’t quarrel about that now.
I locked the door behind me but someone’s rattling the knob, and I give them
about two minutes before they find the key. Out you go, Miss Hammond.”
Without a further word, he shoved me lightly
through the window and I landed in the shrubbery. I smothered a few choice
words as I bounced out of his way. He vaulted over the windowsill and landed on
his feet—quite athletically for a clergyman.
“That was completely uncalled-for—” I began,
furiously plucking leaves out of the veil.
He grabbed my hand and I stopped talking, as
surprised by the gesture as the warmth of his hand.
“Come along, Miss Hammond. I think I hear your
mother,” he said.
I gave a little shriek and began to run. At the
last moment, I remembered the bouquet—a heavy, spidery affair of lilies and ivy
that I detested. I flung it behind us, laughing as I ran.
“I shouldn’t have laughed,” I said mournfully. We
were in the motorcar—a chic little affair painted a startling shade of bright
blue—and the curate was weaving his way nimbly through the London traffic. He
seemed to be listening with only half an ear.
“What was that?”
“I said I shouldn’t have laughed. I mean, I feel
relieved, enormously so, if I’m honest, but then
there’s Gerald. One does feel badly about Gerald.”
“Why? Will you break his heart?”
“What an absurd question,” I said, shoving aside
the veil so I could look the curate fully in the face. “And what a rude one.” I
lapsed into near-silence, muttering to myself as I unpicked the pins that held
the veil in place. “I don’t know,” I said after a while. “I mean, Gerald is so
guarded, so English, it’s impossible to tell. He
might be gutted. But he might not. He’s just such a practical fellow—do you understand?
Sometimes I had the feeling he had simply ticked me off a list.”
“A list?” The curate dodged the little motorcar
around an idling lorry, causing a cart driver to abuse him loudly. He waved a
vague apology and motored on. For a curate, he drove with considerable flair.
“Yes. You know—the list of things all proper
English gentlemen are expected to do. Go to school, meet a suitable girl, get
married, father an heir and a spare, shoot things, die quietly.”
“Sounds rather grim when you put it like that.”
“It is grim, literally so in Gerald’s case. He has
a shooting lodge in Norfolk called Grimfield. It’s the most appalling house
I’ve ever seen, like something out of a Brontë novel. I half expected to find a
mad wife locked up in the attic or Heathcliff abusing someone in the stables.”
“Did you?”
“No, thank heaven. Nothing but furniture in the
attic and horses in the stables. Rather disappointingly prosaic, as it happens.
But the point is, men like Gerald have their lives already laid out for them in
a tidy little pattern. And I’m, well, I’m simply not tidy.” I glanced at the
interior of the motorcar. Books and discarded wellies fought for space with a
spare overcoat and crumpled bits of greaseproof paper—the remains of many
sandwich suppers, it seemed. “You’re untidy too, I’m glad to see. I always
think a little disorder means a creative mind. And I have dreams of my own, you
know.” I paused then hurried on, hoping he wouldn’t think to ask what those
dreams might be. I couldn’t explain them to him; I didn’t even understand them
myself. “I realised with Gerald, my life would always take second place. I
would be his wife, and eventually Viscountess Madderley, and then I would die.
In the meantime I would open fêtes and have his children and perhaps hold a memorable
dinner party or two, but what else? Nothing. I would have walked into that
church today as Penelope Hammond and walked out as the Honourable Mrs. Gerald
Madderley, and no one would have remembered me except as a footnote in the
chronicles of the Madderley family.”
“Quite the existential crisis,” he said lightly. I
nodded.
“Precisely. I’m very glad you understand these
things.” I looked around again. “I don’t suppose you have a cigarette lying
about anywhere? I'd very much like one.”
He gestured towards the glovebox and I helped
myself. As soon as I opened it, an avalanche of business cards, tickets,
receipts and even a prayer book fell out. I waved a slip of paper at him. “You
haven’t paid your garage bill,” I told him. “Second notice.”
He smiled and pocketed the paper. “Slipped my
mind. I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”
I shoveled the rest of the detritus back into the
glovebox, and he produced a packet of matches. I lit a cigarette and settled
back then gave a little shriek of dismay. “Heavens, where are my manners? I
forgot to ask if you wanted one.”
He shook his head. “I don’t indulge.”
I cocked my head. “But you keep them around?”
“One never knows when they’ll be in demand,” he
said. "How long have you had the habit?"
"Oh, I don't. It just seems the sort of thing
a runaway bride ought to do. I'll be notorious now, you know."
I
gave the unlit cigarette a sniff. "Heavens, that's foul. I think I shall
have to find a different vice." I dropped the cigarette back into the
packet.
He
smiled but said nothing and we lapsed into a comfortable silence.
I studied him—from the unlined, rather noble brow
to the shabby, oversized suit of clothes with the shiny knees and the
unpolished shoes. There was something improbable about him, as if in looking at
him one could add two and two and never make four. There was an occasional,
just occasional, flash from his dark eyes that put me in mind of a buccaneer.
He was broad-shouldered and athletic, but the spectacles and occupation hinted
he was bookish.
There were other contradictions as well, I
observed. Being a curate clearly didn’t pay well, but the car was mint. Perhaps
he came from family money, I surmised. Or perhaps he had a secret gambling
habit. I gave him a piercing look. “You don’t smoke. Do you have other vices?
Secret sins? I adore secrets.”
Another fellow might have taken offence but he
merely laughed. “None worth talking about. Besides, we were discussing you.
Tell me,” he said, smoothly negotiating a roundabout and shooting the motorcar
out onto the road towards Devon, “What prompted this examination of your
feelings? It couldn’t be just the thought of marrying him. You’ve had months to
accustom yourself to the notion of being the future Viscountess Madderley. Why
bolt now?”
I hesitated, feeling my cheeks grow warm. “Well, I
might as well tell you. You are a priest, after all. It would be nice to talk
about it, and since you’re bound by the confessional, it would be perfectly
safe to tell you because if you ever tell anyone you’ll be damned forever.”
His lips twitched as if he were suppressing a
smile. “That isn’t exactly how it works, you know.”
I flapped a hand. “Close enough. I always had
doubts about Gerald, if I’m honest. Ever since he asked me to dance at the
Crichlows’ Christmas ball during the little season. He was just so staid, as if
someone had washed him in starch rather than his
clothes. But there were flashes of something more. Wit or kindness or
gentleness, I suppose. Things I thought I could bring out in him.” I darted the
curate a glance. “I see now how impossibly stupid that was. You can’t change a
man. Not unless he wants changing, and what man wants changing? The closer the
wedding got, the more nervous I became and I couldn’t imagine why I wasn’t
entirely over the moon about marrying Gerald. And then my aunt sent me a book
that made everything so clear.”
“What book?”
“Mrs. Stopes’ book, Married
Love.”
“Oh, God.” He swerved and neatly corrected, but
not before I gave him a searching look.
“I’ve shocked you.” Most people had heard of the
book, but few had read it. It had been extensively banned for its forthright
language and extremely modern—some would say indecent—ideas.
He hurried to reassure me. “No, no. Your aunt
shocked me. I wouldn’t imagine most ladies would send an affianced bride such a
book.”
“My aunt isn’t most ladies,” I said darkly. “She’s
my father’s sister, and they’re all eccentric. They’re famous for it, and
because they’re aristocrats, no one seems to mind. Of course, Mother nearly had
an apoplexy when she found the book, but I’d already read it by that point, and
I knew what I had to do.”
“And what was that?”
“I had to seduce Gerald.”
This time the curate clipped the edge of a kerb,
bouncing us hard before he recovered himself and steered the motorcar back onto
the road.
“I shocked you again,” I said sadly.
“Not in the slightest,” he assured me, his voice
slightly strangled. He cleared his throat, adopting a distinctly paternal tone
in spite of his youth. “Go on, child.”
“Well, it was rather more difficult to arrange
than I’d expected. No one seems to want to leave you alone when you’re
betrothed, which is rather silly because whatever you get up to can’t be all
that bad because you’re with the person you’re going to be getting up to it
with once you’re married, and it’s all right then. And isn’t it peculiar that
just because a priest says a few words over your head, the thing that was
sinful and wrong is suddenly perfectly all right? No offence to present
company.”
“None taken. It does indeed give one pause for
thought. You were saying?”
“Oh, the arrangements. Well, I couldn’t manage it
until a fortnight ago. By that time I was fairly seething
with impatience. I’m sorry—did you say something?”
“Not at all. It was the mental image of you
seething with impatience. It was rather distracting.”
“Oh, I am sorry. Should we postpone this
discussion for another time? When you’re not driving perhaps?”
“No, indeed. I promise you this is the most
interesting discussion I’ve had in a very long while.”
“And you’re still not shocked?” I asked him. I was
feeling a bit anxious on that point. I had a habit of engaging in what Mother
called Inappropriate Conversation. The trouble was, I never realised I was
doing it until after the fact. I was always far too busy enjoying myself.
“Not in the slightest. Continue—you were
seething.”
“Yes, I was in an absolute fever, I was so
anxious. We were invited to the Madderleys’ main estate in Kent—a sort of
‘getting to know you’ affair between the Madderleys and the Hammonds. It was
very gracious of Gerald’s mother to suggest it, although now that I think about
it, it wasn’t so much about the families getting to know one another as about
the viscount and my stepfather discussing the drains and the roofs and how far
my dowry would go to repairing it all.”
I stopped to finish unpinning the veil and pulled
it free, tearing the lace a little in my haste. I shoved my hands through my
hair, ruffling up my curls and giving a profound sigh. “Oh, that’s better! Pity
about the veil. That’s Belgian lace, you know. Made by nuns, although why nuns
should want to make bridal veils is beyond me. Anyway, the gentlemen were
discussing the money my dowry would bring to the estate, and the ladies were
going on about the children we were going to have and what would be expected of
me as the future viscountess. Do you know Gerald’s mother even hired my lady’s
maid? Masterman, frightful creature. I’m terrified of her—she’s so efficient
and correct. Anyway, I suddenly realised that was going to be the rest of my
life—doing what was perfectly proper at all times and bearing just the right
number of children—and I was so bored with it all I nearly threw myself in
front of a train like Anna Karenina just to be done with it. I couldn’t imagine
actually living in that draughty great pile of stone, eating off the same china
the Madderleys have been using since the time of Queen Anne. But I thought it
would all be bearable if Gerald and I were compatible in the Art of Love.”
“The Art of Love?”
“That’s what Mrs. Stopes called it in Married Love. She says that no matter what differences a
couple might have in religion or politics or social customs, if they are
compatible in the Art of Love, all may be adjusted.”
“I see.” He sounded strangled again.
“So, one night after everyone had retired, I crept
to Gerald’s room and insisted we discover if we were mutually compatible.”
“And were you?
“No,” I said flatly. “I thought it was my fault at
first. But I chose the date so carefully to make sure my sex-tide would be at
its highest.”
“Your sex-tide?”
“Yes. Really, you ought to know these things if
you mean to counsel your parishioners. The achievement of perfect marital
harmony only comes with an understanding of the sex-tides—the ebb and flow of a
person’s desires and inclinations for physical pleasure.”
He cleared his throat lavishly. “Oh, the
sex-tides. Of course.”
“In any event, Gerald and I were most definitely
not compatible.” I paused then plunged on. “To begin with, he wouldn’t even
take off his pyjamas when we were engaged in the Act of Love.”
The curate’s lips twitched into a small smile.
“Now that shocks me.”
“Doesn’t it? What sort of man wants a barrier of
cloth between himself and the skin of his beloved? I have read the Song of Solomon, you know. It’s a very informative piece of
literature and it was quite explicit with all the talk of breasts like twin
fawns and eating of the secret honeycomb and honey. I presume you’ve read the Song of Solomon? It is in the Bible, after all.”
“It is,” he agreed. “Quite the most interesting
book, if you ask me.” Again there was a flash of something wicked as he shot me
a quick look. “So, was your betrothed a young god with legs like pillars of
marble and a body like polished ivory?”
I pulled a face. “He was not. That was a very
great disappointment, let me tell you. And then it was over with so quickly—I
mean, I scarcely had time to get accustomed to the strangeness of it because,
let’s be frank, there is something so frightfully silly about doing that, although you probably don’t know yourself, being a
member of the clergy and all. But before I could quite get a handle on things,
it was finished.”
“Finished?” he said, his hands tight on the
steering wheel.
“Finished. At least, Gerald was,” I added sulkily.
“He gave a great shudder and made an odd sort of squeaking sound.”
“Squeaking sound?”
“Yes.” I tipped my head, thinking. “Like a rabbit
that’s just seen a fox. And then he rolled over and went to sleep just like
that.”
“Philistine,” he pronounced.
“Then you do understand! How important the
physical side of marriage is, I mean. Particularly with a husband like Gerald.
One would need a satisfactory time in the bedroom to make up for—” I clapped a
hand to my mouth. He smiled then, indulgently, and I dropped my hand, but I
still felt abashed. “Oh, that was unkind. Gerald has many sterling attributes.
Sterling,” I assured him.
“Sterling is what one
wants out of one’s silver. Not a husband,” he said mildly.
I sighed in contentment. “You are good at this.
You understand. And you haven’t made me feel guilty over the sin of it,
although you mustn’t tell anyone, but I don’t really believe in sin at all. I
know that’s a wicked thing to say, but I think all God really expects is a
little common sense and kindness out of us. Surely He’s too busy to keep a
tally of all our misdeeds. That would make Him nothing more than a sort of
junior clerk with a very important sense of Himself, wouldn’t it?”
“I suppose.”
“Oh, I know you can’t agree with me. You make your
career on sin, just as much as anybody who sells liquor or naughty photographs.
Sin is your bread and butter.”
“You have a unique way of looking at the world,
Miss Hammond.”
“I think it’s because I’ve been so much on my
own,” I told him after a moment. “I’ve had a lot of time to think things over.”
“Why have you been so much on your own?” he asked.
His voice was gentler than it had been, and the air of perpetual amusement had
been replaced by something kinder, and it seemed as if he were genuinely
interested. It was a novel situation for me. Most people who wanted to talk to
me did so because of my stepfather’s money.
“Oh, didn’t you know? Apparently it was a bit of a
scandal at the time. It was in all the newspapers and of course they raked it
all up again when I became engaged to Gerald. My parents divorced, and Mother
took me to America when she left my father. I was an infant at the time, and
apparently he let her take me because he knew it would utterly break her heart
to leave me behind. He stayed in England and she went off to America We’re
practically strangers, Father and I. He’s always been a bit of a sore spot to
Mother, even though she did quite well out of it all. She married Mr.
Hammond—Reginald. He’s a lovely man, but rather too interested in golf.”
“Lots of gentlemen play,” he remarked. His hands
were relaxed again, and he opened the car up a little, guiding it expertly as
we fairly flew down the road.
“Oh, Reginald doesn’t just play. He builds golf
courses. Designing them amuses him, and after he made his millions in copper,
he decided to travel around the world, building golf courses. Places like
Florida, the Bahamas. He’s quite mad about the game—he even named his yacht the
Gutta-Percha, even though no one uses gutta-percha balls anymore.”
He shook his head as if to clear it and I gave him
a sympathetic look. “Do you need me to read maps or something? It must be
fatiguing to drive all this way.”
“The conversation is keeping me entirely alert,”
he promised.
“Oh, good. Where was I?”
“Reginald Hammond doesn’t have gutta-percha
balls,” he replied solemnly. If he had been one of my half-brothers, I would
have suspected him of making an indelicate joke, but his face was perfectly
solemn.
“No one does,” I assured him. “Anyway, he’s a
lovely man but he isn’t really my father. And when the twins came along, and
then the boys, well, they had their own family, didn’t they? It was nothing to
do with me.” I fell silent a moment then pressed on, adopting a firmly cheerful
tone. “Still, it hasn’t been so bad. I thoroughly enjoyed coming back here to
go to school, and I have found my father.”
“You’ve seen him?” he asked quickly.
“No. But I made some inquiries, and I know where
he is. He’s a painter,” I told him. I was rather proud of the little bit of
detection I had done to track him down. “We wrote letters for a while, but he
travelled extensively—looking for subjects to paint, I suppose. He gave me a
London address in Half Moon Street to send the letters, but he didn’t actually
live there. You know, it’s quite sad, but I always felt so guilty when his
letters came. Mother would take to her bed with a bottle of reviving tonic
every time she saw his handwriting in the post. I didn’t dare ask to invite him
to the wedding. She would have shrieked the house down, and it did seem rather
beastly to Reginald since he was paying for it. Still, it is peculiar to have
an entire family I haven’t met. Some of them kept in touch—my Aunt Portia, for
one. She sent me the copy of Married Love. When I
came to England for the little season, I asked her where Father was. She
promised not to tell him I’d asked, but she sent me his address. He has a house
in Devon. He likes the light there, something about it being good for his
work.”
“I see.”
“It’s very kind of you to drive me,” I said,
suddenly feeling rather shy with this stranger to whom I had revealed entirely
too much. “Oh!” I sat up very straight. “I don’t even know your name.”
“Sebastian. My name is Sebastian Cantrip.”
“Cantrip? That’s an odd name,” I told him.
“No odder than Penelope.”
I laughed. “It’s Greek, I think. My mother’s
choice. She thought it sounded very elegant and educated. But my father called
me Poppy.”
Sebastian slanted me a look. “It suits you
better.”
“I think so, but when I was presented as a
debutante, Mother insisted on calling me Penelope Hammond. Hammond isn’t my
legal name, you know. It gave me quite a start to see the name on the
invitations to the wedding. Mr. and Mrs. Reginald Hammond cordially invite you
to the wedding of their daughter, Penelope Hammond. But I’m not Penelope
Hammond, not really.” I lifted my chin towards the road rising before us. “I’m
Poppy March.”
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