"The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other's life. Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof." Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah
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XLII.
Two days later, Ashwood Place was descended upon by nearly every member of the Beresford and Denham families. It was rather fortunate that there were a number of family members who kept their formal residence in London, as that meant that there were enough rooms between them all to house everyone.
If plans for the wedding were not busy enough, they became even more out of control when Mrs Denham and Cecily began to organise together. And though the two ladies were quite the pair of friends, they had entirely different tastes when it came to festivities. Cecily enjoyed opulence, and Mrs Denham preferred subtlety.
"If I must wait an age to present at least one granddaughter into society, then I shall have ice cream served at the breakfast!" Cecily exclaimed, the proposed menu laid out in front of herself and Mrs Denham. "I might die before I get to escort a debutante, and then how would you all feel for denying me?"
Most of the family were gathered in the great drawing room in clusters, animatedly discussing the upcoming nuptials, while many were being brought up to speed on how the events had come about.
Many were still under the impression that Perrie and Joe still had fantasies about stabbing one another in the eye with a fish fork, and so the word of their engagement had been quite a shock.
"It is but three years until Lily and Jackie come of age, Mother," Adam moaned lethargically, before he threw back a finger of whiskey from the bottle that he was sharing with Perrie's uncles Jack and Alex.
"Jackie will come of age when I say she will," interjected Jack. "Three and eighty will do just swimmingly."
"I do actually heartily agree with you there, brother," Adam said, nodding.
Cecily scoffed in a most displeased tone. "The pair of you are determined to spoil my fun! I will have my ice cream, and I will have those two debuting together!" She then turned her attention back to the menu and began discussing the minute details for the wedding cake that was being rapidly prepared below stairs.
Perrie was, of course, quite the centre of attention alongside Joe, and all of her dear family were very anxious to hear the story from their own lips. The state of Joe's face, and that of his brother's, were also a topic of curiosity. Ed's business was kept entirely confidential, and Joe lied, telling everyone that he and his brother were involved in the crossfire of a drunken brawl at a London tavern and were recovering. Adam confirmed their story, and Cecily enthusiastically embellished it, adding in enough drama to render it a pantomime.
Perrie and Joe both, however, spent the next several hours recounting how their mutual disdain for each other had developed into an odd sort of friendship, before a fierce affection had grown. Despite the circumstances that had forced their betrothal, circumstances of which that had to be awkwardly and delicately explained, it made Perrie rather proud to be standing alongside Joe as a real love match.
She had witnessed love matches all her life. She had seen the happiness that had come from choice, and she had seen her parents, her aunts and her uncles, manage to find someone with whom they had the most divine affinity. A true soulmate.
For all the bad luck, the horrors and traumas, and the demons that no doubt would continue to haunt Joe's nights, they had managed to find one another.
Perries siblings and cousins had all made the journey as well, though many of the younger children were not at all interested in listening to their eldest cousin detail her rather unorthodox romance. There was one, however, who did listen to every word with a focussed, concerned expression.
It had been several hours of talking before Lily managed to seize hold of Perrie's arm while quickly pulling her to the door of the drawing room. In seconds, the two sisters were out into the empty foyer, and were moving swiftly about the house searching for somewhere private to talk. Lily pushed her sister into the library, before she shut the door behind her.
Perrie looked upon Lily's face, and she immediately sensed her sister's anxiety. There was a desperation in Lily's blue eyes as she leaned backwards against the door.
"Perrie, this is madness," she croaked.
"I know it may seem that way," Perrie agreed. "I know Joe and I do not exactly have a history of great warmth towards each other. I imagine everyone in the village at home who knew Joe and I as children will get quite a shock when they hear."
Despite being fifteen and approaching womanhood, Lily was still quite comfortably dressed as a young girl. Their father most definitely had a hand in that. Lily wore her long, dark hair down, with only a white silk ribbon fixed at the back holding her front tendrils out of her eyes. Her day dress matched and was hemmed above her ankles. It was her youthful appearance that made her anxiety all the more heartbreaking for Perrie.
Lily shook her head. "No, that is not at all what I meant," she rebuffed. "I knew that there was something between you. I think it was confirmed for me when I watched you instruct Joe with the bow and arrow. Perhaps I always knew it, I don't know. One does not expel so much time and energy on someone they have no regard for. But that is not what I am worried about, Perrie! This is mad!"
"What is?" challenged Perrie.
"Perrie, you are not yet eighteen!" stressed Lily. "You were supposed to debut next year. You were supposed to have time, and choice. You might have been courted by Joe for a year, maybe more! You could have still been at home with us! But this is a forced marriage, is it not? You were compromised. If you do not marry now, you are ruined. How is that right? How is that fair? Your choice, your life, your freedom, is taken away just like that."
Perrie's face softened and she immediately went to her sister, pulling Lily in for a tight hug. The moment she did, Perrie felt Lily shudder with tears. She understood her sister's worries, and she truly loved Lily for her compassion. "We do have to marry, you are right. It would be a lie to say that I wasn't nervous, or that I felt ready. I told Joe this very information the other night. I worry that I will make a terrible wife. You have heard Mrs Liscombe utter the very words. I'm not ready, I don't think. I agree, I do this I would have liked time to grow up a little more. But something else has happened, and I do think it is a blessing in disguise.
"Joe and I will have the chance to grow up together. We certainly have much to learn, and I do doubt entirely that our marriage will be free from challenges. But I know that we love each other, and I know that our regard for each other will only grow as we do.
"And if you think I will be leaving you, then you are entirely wrong. I am your sister, Lily. I am the eldest. It is my job to order you around." Perrie grinned as she pulled back to look upon Lily's face.
Lily, however, did not seem convinced, and her eyes still swum with emotion.
"The same will not happen for you," Perrie promised. "I will make sure of it. "Grandmamma desires for us all to be great debutantes, but you know Papa will never make you if you do not wish it. If you want to remain at Ashwood and never marry, you know Papa would be quite content."
"I am certain Grandmamma would die for the shame if I became a spinster," Lily murmured, a wry smile teasing her lips.
"She is dying already if she is not permitted ice cream at my wedding breakfast," Perrie snickered. "Fear not."
Lily gasped at Perrie's joke, before she wiped her eyes with her hands. "I think I should like to be married one day, a day a long way away from now," she murmured. "But I feel as though your choices have been taken from you, Perrie, and that makes me sad. You could have done so many things. I ... I should like to do things."
"And you will," emphasised Perrie. "I promise you, darling Lily, I am well, and I do not regret what will happen, however it came to fruition." She committed herself, then, to ensuring that Lily was protected. The direction that Perrie's life had taken was not what Lily desired for herself, and Perrie would make certain that her sister was able to follow her own desires.
There was always Alice. Perhaps their grandmother would have better luck with the third Beresford daughter. Perrie had quite the hunch that Lily had no desire to walk before the queen in three years' time to be declared a match for the highest bidder.
***
The day before the wedding arrived quickly. Luckily, neither Joe nor Perrie had much to concern themselves with as every detail was being attended to by Cecily. They both would indeed just need to appear at the church and be surprised like the rest of a guests.
Joe was quite curious, however, when he received an invitation, alongside Perrie and Ed, to join Adam in his study after dinner that evening. Cecily was quite against this as she was adamant that Perrie ought to go straight to bed so that she would not appear haggard.
Adam ignored her, before he led the three of them to his London study. When the door was shut, Adam began speaking. "I informed the viscount that I would not be paying a dowry upon Perrie's marriage."
Joe suddenly blinked, and he immediately felt incredibly foolish that finances had not been one of his first concerns about marrying Perrie. He had been so swept up in the depths of his unworthiness that he had not considered how he was going to support Perrie.
This was something that could indeed send him into a pit of despair if he was not careful. He had been shadowing the duke to become his brother's steward one day. Ed had not yet inherited. Even Ed, at this point, was living on the kindness of the duke. There was no income from their father's estate to enjoy. Whatever money the estate generated was no doubt gambled away by their father. Would the estate be worth anything by the time Ed inherited?
"Let me finish, Joe." Adam seemed to read Joe's mind, and he stared at him knowingly with a firm brow. "I informed the viscount I would not provide a dowry, but that is not the case. I will entrust to you twenty-five thousand pounds upon your marriage tomorrow."
Joe's mouth went completely dry. Beside him, Joe heard his brother choke on his own tongue.
"An additional five thousand will be put into trust for your heirs upon ... upon my daughter's death." The bequest was practical, but to even fathom it greatly affected the duke.
"Papa," uttered Perrie softly.
Adam cleared his throat. "Something which will happen long after I am dead and buried," he murmured. He then turned around and went to his desk, before he collected some papers. He brought them back over to their party and coughed again to regain his composure. "I want you to use the dowry to establish yourself and your family, Joe. I have spent a considerable amount of time with you, and I know you to be a hard worker and a fast learner. You are honourable, and I would not have done all that I did for any less of a man. Our wedding gift, your mother and I, is this. A gift for you both, a gift, really, for all three of you." Adam held out the papers to Joe, and Joe accepted them with rather shaky hands.
It took a long moment for his vision to focus so that he could see what he was looking at.
"Are those our names? All three of us?" Ed exclaimed, reading over Joe's shoulder.
Perrie, in turn, yanked Joe's arm down to her height so that she could read over them as well.
The papers were in fact a deed. They were a deed to an acreage of land. Joe, Perrie, and Ed's names were all listed upon the deed as owners.
"It is arable land," Adam informed them. "Highly fertile, and it produces excellent yields. I want you to invest in this land. Work it, manage it, as you have learned. Make it your own estate.
"There is also a house on the land which is your own. Althorpe Cottage. It is a little dated, but I don't doubt your grandmother will be on hand to help you decorate. You will be but a fifteen-minute carriage ride from Ashwood's gates. I timed it."
"Papa!" exclaimed Perrie, before she launched at her father, wrapping her arms around his waist.
"Perhaps we can make this what will be the new Evesham estate one day," Ed enthused. "You both will be the viscount and viscountess one day, after all."
"What?" Joe frowned, still quite in shock as to what he held in his hands.
"You will be my heir, Joe. I will not marry," Ed declared. He wrapped his arm around Joe's shoulder and squeezed him. "This is what you deserve, brother."
"It is what you all deserve," Adam interjected. "I have total faith in all three of you. You have shown yourselves to be quite a dynamic team when you are not trying to kill one another."
What could have been a moment of extraordinary self-doubt became one of excitement. And it was such because of the people around him, and how they made Joe feel. Joe was still so used to the thunder cloud that his father brought over him, that the sunshine of Perrie and her family could still be surprising.
But the sun always followed the rain. Joe would always remember that in moments of darkness. The sun would always return and outlast.
He looked upon Perrie, whose smile took up most of her beautiful face. She was the sun. She was his sun.
After spending a further hour in the study discussing plans for the land, Adam decided that it was late, and that all of them ought to retire. Before he dismissed Joe and Ed, he cleared his throat rather awkwardly and said, "Now, Perrie. Please go to your mother. She wishes to speak to you before you go to bed."
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Hope you enjoyed it!!
Happy 7/7 - SPEAK NOW TV DAY!! I listened through the whole thing and loved every second of course. I then spent a long time making more friendship bracelets for the tour which is my current hyper fixation hobby hahaha
Anyway, I'm off to bed as I've got to be up to go to the hair dressers tomorrow. I'm a fake blonde, shhh.
Nighty night! Vote and comment xxx