Page 78 of Lady Charlotte and the Lending Library
“How could I say no?” she asked, joy in her voice. “I’m afraid that I love you too.”
* * * * *
His mother was elated. “Married! Oh heavens! I must meet the girl.”
“You know Lady Charlotte,” he replied with a frown.
“Only in passing, as a debutante,” his mother said with a shake of her head. “I do not know her as my future daughter. Diana and I will help her plan the wedding.”
Ashford informed his mother Charlotte would send an invitation to tea on the morrow. There was also an engagement dinner to plan. He left the marchioness in high spirits when he exited the townhouse in Grosvenor Square to search out Cecil and Nathaniel.
“You missed the auction at Tattersall’s,” Nathaniel said to him later that evening when he found his friends in the dining room at White’s.
The two men were enjoying port. A waiter brought a glass for Ashford.
Cecil frowned at him. “You look odd.”
“What do you mean?” he asked with a grin.
Cecil scowled. “You look... You look quite happy. It is really rather vulgar.”
He laughed in reply. “Vulgar? Cecil, you amaze me.”
“He’s in love with Lady Charlotte,” Nathaniel said with a shrug.
Cecil leaned in and studied Ashford’s face more closely. “I see it now. It does look as if he has lost all sense.”
“Your cynicism can’t bother me right now,” he replied to his friend. “I am far too content. I have asked Charlotte to marry me, and she has accepted.”
“You’re to be married?” Nathaniel clapped Ashford on the back. “You are a tight-wound one. Never thought you were that far along.”
“What did you think, Cecil?” he asked, brows raised.
The other man sighed. “I knew you would get there in the end. Some men need a woman to keep them on the straight and narrow.”
“But not you?” he asked with a twist of his lips.
“Not me.” Cecil raised his glass. “The straight path is far too dull, my friend.”
Ashford and Nathaniel both shook their heads at their friend’s quip.
“That is a horrible sentiment, even for you, Cecil,” Nathaniel said with a groan. “I wish our friend compliments on his upcoming nuptials. Lady Charlotte has been very kind to my sister, and I am eternally grateful. I think it was due to Charlotte’s influence that Alicia finally realized Lady Julia was not a true friend to her.”
“Then we should not expect you to follow me into the parson’s snare?” Ashford asked.
Nathaniel shuddered. “Not with that brash miss,” he replied.
It did not pass Ashford’s notice that he was in the same building from which he and Cecil had first set eyes on the poorly dressed urchin, one Lady Charlotte.
Cecil lifted his glass higher and said, “Congratulations, my friend. Lady Charlotte is a kind and generous woman. She will make you a splendid wife.”
He looked in awe at his friend. It might just be the spirits in his glass, but he thought Cecil might truly mean what he said.
EPILOGUE
Charlotte’s wedding gown was an elegant cream Saxe-Coburg dress. Her bridal veil, fastened with a brooch of pearls, covered her simply dressed hair of light curls parted on the forehead. Ashford was particularly handsome in his fawn-colored coat, high shirt points, elaborate neckcloth, and fashionable striped waistcoat.
They were not married at St. George’s, the church most loved by the ton, but at the parish church of Charlotte’s family: St. James’s Church in Piccadilly.
