Embrace Me (17 page)

He and September rode from the church to the house in an open landau pulled by four white horses. With them were James and Angelica. They saw a host of round tables with slender vases containing white amaryllis. The sit-down dinner was for four hundred; the tables, draped in white silk organza and piped in white satin, ranged over the parkland with the house as a backdrop.

Everyone stood around drinking champagne and toasting the happy couple. Stewards arrived dressed in what had been the family livery and escorted people to their tables. The food was catered by Raymond Blanc and the service was lavish. A band was playing Rodgers and Hart, Cole Porter and George Gershwin while the guests ate their lunch.

Coffee was just being served and the after-dinner speeches were about to begin when the faint sound of an approaching bi-plane grew louder. Then, quite suddenly, it was swooping out of the sky over the heads of the guests before shooting straight up in the air and executing a perfect barrel roll. The pilot slowed the plane down and passed once more over the wedding party to toss hundreds of white roses from the cockpit. Then dipped the wings from side to side and was gone.

September, James and Angelica waved madly at the receding plane, until it was no more than a dot on the horizon. Harry was astounded, not so much by the daredevil display as by the fact that he had at last seen Lady Olivia Cinders’s magnificent face, her blonde hair, and the smile that he would remember all his life.