Chapter Eleven
The play was going to be an epic disaster.
It began with Miss Penworth declaring that her music had gone missing. Bridget scowled and stomped around until Withers located the pages, under a tea tray in the parlor. Lord Gosling’s costume dropped its feathers again, and it took Viola more than two hours to replace them. Everyone else seemed to have forgotten their lines or lost some part of their costume, and two footmen were required to track down people who had wandered off before their scenes. In addition, the Duke of Frye had arrived at last, and no one knew quite what to say to him now. Only Lady Charlotte Ascot seemed willing to speak to him, while Serena had to restrain Bridget from pushing him out into the snow. Blessedly the duchess resumed her role as hostess, both sparing Viola from the job and preventing the duchess from delivering any sort of remonstrance about Lord Winterton.
There was a sharp little pain in her chest every time she thought about Wes, and how he would depart the next morning. She’d lain in bed all night, wishing he could come to her once more and yet terrified that he would. Was it worse to see him as much as possible and lose even more of her heart to him, or to cut herself off now? She didn’t know, and ended up stealing longing glances at him across the room as she sewed feathers.
At long last the production was ready to begin. The dowager duchess sat in the audience beside her daughter-in-law and the duke, who wore a wary expression. Sophronia looked filled with eager expectation, which only deepened Viola’s sense of impending disaster. Bridget had directed Viola to sit behind the stage with a copy of the script and remind everyone of their lines before they went on. If women could join the army, she reflected, Bridget would be the most fearsome general of them all.
The script had become utterly ridiculous. Viola had Bridget’s own copy, which was covered with crossed out sections and additions in the margins. She did her best to keep up, but when Wes approached to make his entrance, dented crown in place, she faltered and busied herself with adjusting Alexandra’s ghostly draperies. He strode past her onto the stage. Just hearing his voice made her flinch, and she accidentally stabbed a pin through the draperies into her finger.
When Alexandra went on stage to issue her prophecy about the death of the king, Viola found herself face to face with Wes.
“Do you know your lines, sir?” she asked formally.
He nodded.
“Very good. I’ll go where I’m needed, then—”
“Viola!” He caught her hand before she could retreat.
“Please don’t,” she whispered in distress. It was gouging out her heart to think that he must leave tomorrow morning and she would probably never see him again.
“Just for a moment. Please.” She hesitated, undone by the urgency in his face, and he pulled her back behind the curtain at the back of the stage—which had been borrowed from the billiard room.
“The play,” she began.
Wes waved one hand as if to shove the play away. “I’ve just died by decapitation and had my entrails eaten by wolves. I’ve done my service to Lady Bridget’s play. I need to speak to you before Wessex tosses me out.”
He wanted to say good-bye. Another wave of misery rolled over her, but she managed a slight nod. She could do this. She had to.
He took a deep breath. “Marry me.”
Viola blinked.
“I came here determined to get the Desnos atlas,” Wes went on. “I wanted to retrace my father’s last journey with it, see what he saw and experience what he did. I’ve barely spent six months at a time in England since I was eighteen, and I wanted to be off as soon as I recovered the atlas.
“But you said something about travel the other day, that it was no hardship to stay home when everything dear to you was here. When Wessex told me to get out, I didn’t even think at all about my father’s atlas—all I could think of was that I didn’t want to lose you. I don’t want to go anywhere without you.”
“But…”
“I love you,” he added softly. “If you could care for me enough to give me a chance—”
A sound escaped her, half laugh, half sob. “I fell in love with you when you took me to see the stars.”
“Did you?” His face lit up. “Then I have a chance.” He pulled her into his arms, his dented crown slipping to one side. “Will you marry me, my darling Viola? Will you travel the world with me and manage my household perfectly when we’re home? Will you have a pack of children with me, who will surely vex us almost as much as Justin and Alexandra?”
“Oh, but—but…” Viola blushed. “My brother,” she said in despair.
“I should be very proud to sponsor his fees,” he said. “He can teach me how to navigate.”
She smiled, then she laughed, and then she kissed him. “Yes. Yes, Wes, yes.”
“You should always say my name that way.”
He kissed her again, long and thoroughly. There was an outburst on the other side of the curtain. Viola ignored it for once. The duke and duchess could intervene in any uproar caused by their guests.
“It sounds like Lady Serena has got over being jilted by the Duke of Frye,” Wes murmured against her hair.
Viola pressed her cheek to his chest and smiled. “I know.”
His laugh rumbled though her. “Did you really?”
She squeezed him tighter. “Since the Christmas Eve rehearsal. She’s in love with someone else. I recognize the look.”
“Do you?” He tipped up her face to kiss her. “What does it look like?”
She put her hands on the side of his face and smiled, reveling in the way he looked at her. “Like this.”