Alex and Eliza: A Love Story(84)
As the noonday sun glanced off the snow on that cold December 14, and the parlor began to fill up with first cousins, distant relatives and friends, a Bach sonata for flute and harpsichord signaled the wedding was about to get underway. The southeast parlor, being the grandest in the house, was chosen, wherein were gathered Angelica and John Church, and Peggy and Stephen Van Rensselaer, and Philip Junior and the younger Schuyler siblings, along with the requisite Schuyler, Van Cortlandt, and Van Rensselaer kin.
Anticipating the bride’s entrance, all conversation came to an abrupt halt as guests took their places on either side of the great hall. The family sat in several tiers of chairs, exquisitely yet soberly dressed, except for Angelica, who could not resist a crimson gown.
Waiting in the vestibule for General Schuyler to walk their daughter into the room, Catherine Schuyler crossed her shawl over her large belly and began to rock herself. Not lost on her was the irony of the bride coming down the aisle on the arm of her father: the quaint concept that a woman is under the primary care of her father until she is given over to the keeping of another man. Well, her first daughter Angelica’s ship had already sailed on that passage, so Mrs. Schuyler intended to relish every moment of this, her second daughter’s most elaborate affair.
Although, in hindsight, as practical Eliza had reminded her mother after the wedding costs began to mount up, perhaps Angelica had done the financially strapped Schuylers a considerable favor.
BUT ENOUGH ABOUT her mother, for as much as this was Mrs. Schuyler’s triumph, it was Eliza’s day. And on this very special day Eliza remained true to herself to the last.
Entering the grand foyer to strains of Bach and heads tilting with oohs and ahhs, she represented the picture of modesty and grace in a simple dress of ivory, fitted but without a corset, with thick petticoats to give it shape but nothing so cumbersome or affected as a bustle or train. A thin silver diadem circled her hair, from which hung the palest veil, set with freshwater pearls. Aunt Gertrude’s borrowed cameo provided the finishing touch.
Altogether, the first glimpse of his bride—which should have come as no surprise to Alex, standing there looking so lean and handsome himself—nearly brought him to his knees.
Of course, a young groom always tries to look his best, but Alex was particularly dashing in his blue-and-buff uniform with the gold epaulets and the green ribbon of an aide-de-camp. He had known all along exactly what he would wear—the same stiff number he’d chosen to sit for his portrait by Charles Willson Peale shortly after he joined General Washington’s staff. The yellow buttons gleamed on his uniform, and breeches were as brilliantly white as the legs of a hawk. A single curled lock of his ginger hair had escaped the ribbon that held it back and fell rakishly beside his eyes.
But behind that confident fa?ade, even on what should have been the happiest day of his life, there was a sadness he could not name. In contrast to his bride’s enormous tribe, there was no one there to represent his own, despite his best entreaties. Yes, he had sent a written invitation to his estranged brother in St. Nevis to come meet his black-eyed beauty, and he had pressed hard for his father to come to America from the Grenadines, but neither of them had written him back. Indeed, no one from his remaining family would ever meet any of the Schuylers. For Alex to be enveloped into one of New York State’s blue-ribbon families helped put to bed a lifetime of doubts and depression about his own dubious birthright.
Eliza fretted for her fiancé, but he seemed resolute. “You are the only family I need,” he’d told her.
And now the moment had arrived.
The minister began the ceremony with the traditional question for Eliza’s parents. “Do you, General and Mrs. Schuyler, give your blessing to these two, and promise them your continued love and support?”
“We do,” said the Schuylers, “—with God’s help.” An amen chorus from their huge clan echoed their pledge.
Then the minister turned to Alex. There was no one beside him. “And who stands up for you, sir?”
There was an awkward silence as the guests looked around the room for the bridegroom’s supporters. Finally, an unpretentious voice announced itself from the edge of the room.
“I do, sir.” Stephen Van Rensselaer slipped through the guests and stepped up right behind Alex. Peggy’s hand went to her throat, her eyes brimming with love for a man whose words always seemed to come at the perfectly timed moment. The familiar words of the Dutch Reformed marriage ceremony stumbled slowly out of Stephen’s mouth. “I give my blessing and promise my continued love and support . . .”
“As do I!” Lieutenant Colonel James McHenry, Alex’s fellow aide-de-camp, cut smartly through the guests to take up his post beside Stephen.
“And I, as well,” said John Church, his voice booming from the other side of the hall.
The minister raised his eyebrows, patiently waiting for the coda to their pledge.
“—with God’s help!” said the three in perfect unison.
“Well done,” whispered Angelica to her very own new husband. Even she couldn’t help but be moved.
The minister covered the bridal couple’s clasped hands with his own and called for the exchange of the vows. In deference to his future in-laws, Alex had gone along with the conventional vows of the Schuylers’ church. But when it came to writing his personal vows, the scrivener in him came to the fore.