Sword to the Heart (Bantam Series No. 13) (6 page)

“You are here! I am so glad, so very
...
very glad to see Your Lordship again!”

CHAPTER THREE

Natalia reached Lord Colwall’s side.

She stood looking up at him; her eyes were very large and shone like stars in her small face, her fair hair seemed to gleam like a halo in the lights from the chandelier.

To Sir James Parke, watching them, Lord Colwall’s face was entirely expressionless as he said courteously:

“I am delighted your journey was not too arduous.”

As if she suddenly remembered her manners, Natalia sank down in a deep curtsey. Then as she rose she said irrepressibly:

“The Castle is magnificent! Even more magnificent than I imagined it would be. And you, My Lord
...
you are just the same as when I first saw you three years ago!”

“I was telling Lord Colwall,” the Reverend Adolphus interposed, “how much your mother regrets being unable to accompany us.”

“Yes, of course,” Natalia said quickly.

She sensed that her father was reprimanding her for not having mentioned her mother at once.

“It is indeed regrettable that my cousin should have sustained an accident at such a very inappropriate moment,” Lord Colwall remarked.

“It only happened a week before we left
...
” the Reverend Adolphus began.

Natalia’s attention was distracted by a big dog which rose from the hearth-rug to approach her tentatively. It was a mastiff and quite one of the largest dogs she had ever seen.

“He is yours?” she exclaimed to Lord Colwall. “Just the type of dog you should have!”

“I should not touch him,” Lord Colwall said quickly, but it was too late.

Natalia had knelt down on the floor beside the dog and put her arms around its neck.

“He is magnificent, like your horses,” she smiled.

The mastiff’s tail was wagging and he was submitting amicably to her caress. Lord Colwall watched them both with surprise.

“Herald does not usually take to strangers,” he said after a moment.

“That is true,” Sir James Parke agreed, speaking for the first time since Natalia had entered the room. “After all these years, Ranulf, he still never greets me with anything but a low growl!”

“Natalia has always had a way with animals,” the Reverend Adolphus remarked proudly.

He looked at the picture Natalia made with her white skirt billowing out over the hearth-rug, her bare arms around the neck of the huge mastiff, her face soft and glowing in the firelight.

There was something like a challenge in the Vicar’s voice as he said to Lord Colwall:

“I think Your Lordship will discover that Natalia can charm not only animals but also human beings.”

It appeared, however, that Lord Colwall was not listening. He moved to the side of the fire-place where there was a table on which were two leather-covered boxes.

He opened them and said in a voice of command:

“Come here, Natalia.”

She rose to her feet immediately and walked to where he stood. The mastiff, as if he did not wish to part from her, walked at her side.

“I have for you,” Lord Colwall said, “the engagement ring which has been in my family since the days of Elizabeth I. It was designed by Sir Francis Colwall for one of Her Majesty’s Ladies-in
-
Waiting, whom he married.”

He opened the box he held in his hand and Natalia saw a large ring, very different from anything she had expected. It consisted of a huge baroque pearl, set in gold and surrounded by rubies and diamonds.

“It is lovely!” she exclaimed.

“I hoped you would think so.”

Lord Colwall held the box out to her, but for a moment she hesitated.

She had expected him to put the ring on her finger, then as he did not do so, she slipped it onto the third finger of her left hand.

“It fits exactly!” she said in surprise.

“I had it altered to the measurements sent to me by your mother,” Lord Colwall explained in a matter-of-fact voice.

Natalia stared down at the huge ring which seemed far too big for her little hand.

It was very beautiful and very unusual but it evoked a memory of her childhood.

She had been about ten years of age when she had looked at her mother’s engagement ring, which consisted of one very small diamond surrounded by even smaller ones.

“The stones are not very big, Mama,” she had said with the frankness of a child.

Her mother smiled.

“It was all that your Papa could afford when we got engaged, but when he gave it to me and kissed my finger before he slipped it on, I felt that every stone was as big as a marble!”

She laughed and held Natalia close in her arms as she added:

“It is not the gift which counts, dearest, it is the love with which it is given. Always remember that!”

Lord Colwall’s voice interrupted Natalia’s thoughts.

“I have something else for you.”

He opened the other box, a much larger one. There on black velvet lay a pendant which Natalia could see was intended to be worn with the ring.

It, too, consisted of a baroque pearl—another very large one. It was suspended from the most brilliant enamel-work, also ornamented with rubies and diamonds.

As she looked closer, she saw that the enamel represented a man on horse-back, a spear in his hand, and the huge pearl was part of the body of a dragon which he was killing.

“He is a Knight!” she exclaimed incredulously.

“I believe it is intended to portray one of my ancestors,” Lord Colwall explained. “The pendant was made for Lord Colwall in 1655 when he visited Venice, and every Colwall bride since then has worn it when she first receives the engagement ring.”

“They certainly complement each other,” Sir James said. “You must show your future bride, Ranulf, the many portraits in the Castle of past Lady Colwalls wearing both these jewels.”

Lord Colwall took the pendant from its box, and Natalia saw that it was attached to a long, thin chain which glittered with diamonds.

He held it out to her and once again she wondered if he would put it around her neck, but it was in fact her father who did so.

“Thank you
...
My Lord,” she said when it finally lay on her chest, nearly reaching the little hollow between her breasts.

Lord Colwall moved from the table back to the hearth-rug.

“I think, Sir,” he said to the Reverend Adolphus, “you will be interested tomorrow to see how a Medieval Wedding Feast can still be produced in modern times.”

“Tomorrow?” the Reverend Adolphus ejaculated in astonishment.

Lord Colwall did not reply.

“Are you telling me that Natalia is being married tomorrow?”

Lord Colwall raised his eyebrows:

“It appears to surprise you!”

“I had no idea the ceremony was to take place so soon!” the Reverend Adolphus exclaimed. “After all, we might have been delayed.”

“I was not afraid of that!” Lord Colwall answered. “My arrangements are made with the greatest precision, and I would have been extremely incensed with my coachman if you had not arrived today at exactly the time I expected you!”

The Reverend Adolphus looked at Natalia.

“My daughter might have been expected to be tired after the long journey,” he said. “I should have thought a few days’ rest would have been an obvious consideration.”

“But I am not tired, Papa,” Natalia protested.

She felt uncomfortable at the note of criticism in her father’s voice.

“I felt certain, in view of the quite small number of miles you have had to travel during the last three days,” Lord Colwall said slowly, “that you would not be in the least exhausted, and I have in fact made all the arrangements for our wedding to take place tomorrow.”

“I am quite happy to agree to anything Your Lordship has planned,” Natalia said.

Because she felt there was still a feeling of obvious disapproval emanating from her father, she quickly tried to change the subject: “Your horses are so splendid that you were quite justified in trusting them to bring us here at exactly the time you had planned.”

She looked up at him with a smile on her face and added:

“Of all the wonderful gifts you have given me
...
and I have so much to thank you for
...
the best of them all was, of course, Crusader!”

Lord Colwall looked puzzled.

“Crusader?” he queried.

“My horse
...
the one you sent me. I have ridden him every day, and I was going to ask you later if he could be brought here to the Castle. I cannot bear to be without him.”

“But of course,” Lord Colwall agreed. “That is very easily arranged. When your father returns tomorrow he can carry my instructions to the groom to bring Crusader home.”

“Oh, thank you! Thank you!” Natalia cried. “I knew you would understand how much Crusader has meant to me all these years.” She did not see the look at first of incredulity and then of anger on her father’s face.

The Reverend Adolphus could hardly believe that, having travelled all the way from Cumberland to attend his daughter’s wedding, he was to be sent back like an unwanted servant as soon as the marriage had taken place.

Then with a Christian-like forbearance he realised that it would be embarrassing for Natalia if he were to protest.

As if Sir James realised what was passing through his mind, he tactfully drew the Vicar on one side to show him a collection of exceptionally fine snuff-boxes which stood on a table at one side of the room.

For a moment they were out of ear-shot of Natalia and Lord Colwall, who remained at the fire-side.

“As I have already said, My Lord,” Natalia remarked, “I do not know how to begin to thank you for everything you have given me! My trousseau is so beautiful ... I cannot really believe it is mine.”

“Your trousseau is a replica of the one provided for the daughter of the first Lord Colwall when, in the reign of Charles II, she married the Duke of Wessex,” Lord Colwall replied. “I found a complete list in our records and I ordered exactly the same number of garments for you.”

He paused and added:

“I knew that as far as good taste is concerned I could trust Madame Madeleine.”

His words dulled a little the look of gratitude on Natalia’s face. She had thought that he had chosen himself—and with care—the elaborate gowns which were hanging in the wardrobe upstairs; the ermine-lined, exquisite garments which had been sent to the Vicarage.

Then she gave a metaphorical shake of her shoulders.

How foolish she had been to think His Lordship would actually select her gowns. After all, tradition was part of his life. How could it be anything else when he lived in a Castle like this? When he bore a name which was part of the history of England?

She forced a smile to her lips.

“I am so very grateful.”

“There is no need for you to be,” he replied. “As my wife you must of course uphold the dignity of your position.”

She glanced at him quickly, then before she could speak the Butler announced from the door that dinner was ready.

Lord Colwall offered Natalia his arm, and as they walked through the marble Hall and down the wide corridor, she realised it was the first time she had touched him.

She felt her fingers tremble on his arm at the thought.

‘How proudly he holds himself,’ she thought admiringly.

As they passed the suits of armour which lined the corridor, she knew exactly how he would look dressed in one of them with a great plumed helmet on his head.

The Dining-Room had a high, Gothic-arched roof, but the cold austerity was relieved by the carvings on the stone capitals.

There was a whole log burning in the great fire-place and the walls were hung with portraits of the previous owners of the Castle.

The high-backed chairs were covered in tapestry which Natalia learned later had been worked by industrious Chatelaines over the centuries.

The table was massed with gold ornaments and lighted candelabra, and as Natalia seated herself on the right of Lord Colwall she felt small and a little insignificant in a room that could comfortably seat a very large number of people.

As if Lord Colwall read her thoughts he remarked:

“Tomorrow we shall hold our Marriage Feast here and will entertain over two hundred guests.”

‘It sounds frightening,” Natalia said. “I had always thought that I should be married in our tiny Church at Pooley Bridge by Papa.”

“The Bishop of Hereford will officiate,” Lord Colwall told her. “Your father will not be required to take part in the service.” There was a little silence and then, as if Sir James once again sensed the resentment arising in the Reverend Adolphus, he said: “Have you seen the newspapers today? I read in
The Times
that at Fordingbridge in Hampshire a mob under the leadership of a man who called himself Captain, broke up a factory which manufactures threshing machines.”

“Do you think that the Captain in question is the mysterious Mr. Swing?” the Reverend Adolphus asked, diverted for a moment from Natalia’s wedding.