Amanda McCabe (15 page)

Epilogue

If it be true that good wine needs no bush,

’tis true that a good play needs no epilogue.

—
As You Like It

“‘Come little conduct, come, unsavory guide, Thou desperate pilot, now at once on the dashing rocks thy seasick weary bark! Here’s to my love. O true apothecary! Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.’”

Ned gulped from his bottle of poison and fell across Daphne, who lay on her bier.

“Is
Romeo and Juliet
really an appropriate play for a wedding celebration?” Marcus whispered to Julia. “It seems rather, well, gloomy.”

Julia brushed her lace veil off the shoulder of her white satin gown and whispered back, “Sh! It is very nearly the end. And
Romeo and Juliet
is quite appropriate for any romantic occasion. Since we are leaving for Egypt tomorrow, and probably won’t be back for a long while, they wanted to do something special for us.”

She patted his arm and turned her attention back to the stage set up in the drawing room. Daphne was stirring on her bier now while Ned still twitched.

Julia smiled behind her handkerchief. Somehow, she could not cease smiling, even in the face of the great tragedy onstage.

It had been a most perfect day, indeed. The sun made an appearance, despite the fact that it had rained all the week before, and St. Anne’s was filled to the rafters with guests. Lady Edgemere wore a new bonnet of green-and-pink feathers and roses; Mary and Agnes and Daphne looked exquisite in their bridesmaids gowns of blue silk; and Abelard proudly gave the bride away.

Julia did not even cry when Mr. Whitig pronounced the benediction over them. She was far too busy smiling.

But now she tried to look suitably serious as Daphne snatched up Ned’s dagger and cried out, “‘O happy dagger! This is thy sheath. There rust and let me die.’”

Then she stabbed herself and fell dramatically across Ned’s body.

The audience leaped to their feet, applauding and cheering as the actors came back to life to make their bows.

“Is that the end?” Marcus asked Julia.

“There is usually an epilogue, but Abelard told me they would stop with the deaths. Much more affecting, you know,” answered Julia. “So, yes, that is the end.”

“Good. Because I have something very special planned for today, myself.”

“You do?” Julia said, full of eager anticipation. “What is it? Not more diamonds?” She touched the delicate web of diamonds and pearls that hung at her throat, Marcus’s wedding gift to her.

“You’ll just have to see for yourself. Come with me, Lady Ellston, my darling wife.”

Julia took his outstretched hand and let him lead her out of the drawing room. All the guests followed, eager for Mrs. Gilbert’s sumptuous wedding breakfast that was laid out in the dining room.

They all stopped, confused, when Marcus led them not to the feast but into the foyer.

“Marcus! Where are you going?” Julia whispered, every bit as puzzled as the guests when her new husband led her up the stairs. “It is much too early for . . . for
that
!”

Marcus looked back at her and laughed. “My dear, as much as I may wish it otherwise, I know that it is too early for
that
. This is my gift to you.”

“Gift! You have already given me too much.”

“But this one is the finest of all.” They reached the top of the staircase, and Marcus released her hand to hop up on the polished banister. “My gift to you, Julia, is one glorious flight down the banister.”

Julia choked on a surprised laugh. “Are you saying? . . .”

“Yes.” Marcus patted the length of wood behind him. “Would you care to accompany me?”

Julia looked down the gleaming stretch of the banister into the upturned faces of all their guests. Mary and Daphne had obviously guessed what was going on and nodded their heads in encouragement.

“Everyone is watching,” she murmured.

“That is the best part.”

Julia looked back to her husband, to his eager face, and saw what this meant to him. It was not just a childish antic; it was a new freedom, a new beginning.

She grinned at him and unpinned her lace veil from her hair. “You are absolutely right, my dear. Lead on.”

Then she hopped up on the banister behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and went flying into the future.

Keep reading for a special excerpt from another Regency Romance

by Amanda McCabe

SCANDAL IN VENICE

Available now from InterMix

England, 1814

He was dead.

Really, deeply, profoundly dead.

And she had killed him. Lady Elizabeth Everdean nudged cautiously at the prone body of her affianced bridegroom with the toe of her slipper, moving one massive, flaccid arm all of two inches. He did not appear to be moving at all, and the stream of crimson that flowed from the back of his bald head was a very bad sign indeed. Still, she wasn’t absolutely certain. It seemed entirely impossible that someone who had caused such violence, such terror only an instant before should suddenly be so . . . still. Choking back a terrified sob, she clutched her torn chemise around her naked breasts and knelt beside him. Slowly, slowly she leaned forward, half afraid the closed eyes would suddenly fly open and the cold hands would reach for her again. She stretched out one finger and touched the pulse point on his wrinkled neck.

Nothing. Not a movement, not a breath. The ancient Duke of Leonard would never, could never, hurt her again. Not in this world. Elizabeth almost murmured a prayer of thanksgiving, before she realized that she was now in serious trouble. She stumbled to her feet and fell back onto the rumpled bed, shaking with sobs. Right next to the murder weapon itself. With a small shriek, she shoved the bloodstained chamberpot onto the floor and buried her head in a pillow.

‘‘Damn you to the furthest reaches of Hades, Peter!’’ she choked out, consigning her stepbrother to flames of torment with a furious swipe of her fist. ‘‘This is all your doing. Yours . . . and mine.’’

She peered at the unmoving body of her ‘‘betrothed’’ through the tangled curtain of her black hair. And to think, when Peter had told her he had arranged a marriage for her she had been happy.

Happy! As darkly comical as that seemed now, she had seen marriage as a way to leave Peter’s household, a way to escape from the cold stranger he had become since his return from the Peninsula, a way to escape from their quarrels and icy silences—so different from the laughter of her childhood. She had dreamed of a handsome young gallant, who would take her to London where she could become the portrait painter to the ton, the Toast of the Town.

Ha! Had there ever been a more naïve chit than she had been? Those dreams had died a hard death when she had come downstairs for their dinner party that very night and seen the duke waiting for her, ancient and portly and drooling. She would have run away right then and there, barricaded herself in her room, if Peter’s iron grip on her satin-covered arm had not prevented her. She had had no choice but to bow her head and allow the duke to take her hand in his scaly palm. She had thought she knew the worst life had to offer when she sat beside him at dinner, watching him down champagne and lobster patties as if they were nearing extinction. What very little she knew. What had happened after she retired, and the duke paid her a little ‘‘call,’’ had been inestimably worse. It had been, in fact, like a painting she had once seen of the Last Judgment. Elizabeth now knew what those poor, doomed souls, flayed alive and shrieking, had felt when they were thrown to torment. Those snakelike hands had shoved her to the bed, the bed her mother and stepfather had once shared, and reached for her hem.

‘‘You are mine now,’’ he had panted in her face, his breath hot and reeking of garlic. ‘‘Your brother thinks he has the better of me, but he can think again, my pretty little whore.’’ And he had latched his teeth onto her earlobe. Elizabeth screamed then, screamed in mindless terror. Not even his slaps could silence her—she did not even feel them. As he turned to reach for a discarded petticoat to shove into her mouth, her desperate fingers had groped across the slippery sheets for something, anything, she could use in her own defense. She had only one thought now, desperate as a wounded animal, that she would surely die if this terrible assault went on. Then she felt the cool, heavy porcelain of the chamberpot. Thankfully, it was an empty chamberpot. She had not meant to actually kill him. Just stop him from touching her. Her own loud sobs, and a timid knocking at the door, jolted her into the present. ‘‘Lady Elizabeth!’’ Daisy, Elizabeth’s young maid, pecked at the door again. ‘‘Was that you screaming, Lady Elizabeth?’’

They knew! They knew what she had done, that she was a murderess, and now she would be dragged off and hanged, and Peter would laugh. All because of a pig like the duke. She was only eighteen—she did not want to die! Life was so very unfair. Daisy knocked at the door again, louder. ‘‘Lady Elizabeth, please! Is something amiss?’’ They did not know! Of course they did not. Not at the moment, anyway. Taking a deep, steadying breath, she called, ‘‘I am quite all right, Daisy.’’

‘‘Truly, my lady?’’ Daisy’s voice was uncertain. ‘‘Truly. I . . . I had a bad dream, that is all.’’ Elizabeth shut her eyes tightly. If only that were true. ‘‘You . . . you may go. I will ring for you in the morning.’’

‘‘Yes, my lady.’’ Elizabeth listened as Daisy’s footsteps faded, then she ran across the room, tripping over her tattered hem, to where her armoire stood open. She scattered ball gowns, tea frocks, parasols, slippers, and bonnets onto the floor carelessly, pushing a change of clothes into a valise along with her mother’s jewel case and a packet of letters from an old schoolfriend, the famous artist Georgina Beaumont. Georgie was in Italy now, far away from England, and she had always urged Elizabeth to join her. Elizabeth felt that now would be an auspicious time to accept that offer. On top of the clothes, she placed a carefully wrapped bundle of sketchbooks, pencils, and pigments.

‘‘I have to leave,’’ she whispered as she wriggled out of the ruined chemise. ‘‘There is no other way.’’ As she turned to snatch up clean undergarments, she caught a glimpse of herself in the gilt-framed mirror above her dressing table. Purple bruises darkened her pale shoulders and small breasts; blood had caked at the corner of her mouth. She was suddenly disgusted, nauseous, at such vivid proof of what had happened this horrible night. She grabbed up the lethal chamberpot and deposited the meager contents of her stomach. When the illness had passed, Elizabeth knelt there on the floor, naked and trembling, unable to cry or think or do anything. She swore, then and there, that no man would have such power over her again. Her father, her stepfather, her brother, the duke—all the men in her life had caused her naught but sorrow. From then on, she would not be Lady Elizabeth, pampered daughter and helpless pawn. She was simply Elizabeth, and she would be fine on her own.

***

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Amanda McCabe
’s books have been nominated for many awards, including the RITA Award, the
Romantic Times
Reviewer’s Choice Award, the Daphne DuMaurier Award, the National Readers Choice Award, and the Holt Medallion.

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