The Map of Chaos (Trilogía Victoriana #3)(81)
“He can give it to you when he gets here!” her aunt interrupted. “It’s far too damp out here. You’ll catch your death! I can’t imagine what would happen if you fell ill weeks before your wedding. It would be a complete disaster! What would I say to your wretched parents, who will arrive any day now? After their shock at your unusual engagement and your subsequent refusal to have the wedding in New York, not to mention the recriminations I have had to endure because of it all . . .”
“Come, now, Auntie, nobody who knows me—and I assure you my parents know me very well—could possibly hold you responsible for my actions.”
“Well, they do! And your mother, my beloved sister-in-law, has made it her business to tell me as much in all her delightful letters, in that subtle, insinuating way of hers. I’m sure they think I didn’t protect you enough when, two years ago, they placed you in my care so that you could enjoy a nice, safe holiday on the old continent. But how could I have suspected such contempt for the rules of etiquette in a young lady of your upbringing? Anyway, for better or for worse,” she went on with the resigned tone of a martyr, “you will be Mrs. Gilmore in a few weeks’ time and will no longer be my responsibility. But there is one last thing I will say, dear niece: notwithstanding my horror at the idea of a distinguished Harlow marrying an adventurer of uncertain origin, who made his fortune as a common merchant, I confess that after living with you for two years I can’t imagine any other man who would put up with you.”
“And I, dear Auntie, couldn’t agree with you more. In fact, before I met Monty, I had decided not to get married at all, for I doubted any man was capable of making me happy.”
The old lady sighed.
“Happiness is utterly overrated, my dear girl, and obviously it isn’t something that should be entrusted to incompetent men. A woman has to find her own happiness and as far as possible avoid involving her husband in the search.”
“Is that why you never married, Auntie?” Emma asked softly. “So that no man would ever spoil your happiness?”
“I didn’t marry because I didn’t want to! But if I had, I wouldn’t have chosen an amiable buffoon for a husband. Breeding and money are the two most important things in a man, for they frame a woman’s beauty and intelligence. A frame can embellish a painting, but if the frame is vulgar, then the painting is better without one. Anyway, at least it reassures me that with your future husband’s fortune and your dowry you won’t be short of money. But tell me, are you planning on spoiling everything by catching pneumonia? Would you like me to meet your parents off the boat bearing the tragic news that they have crossed the ocean to bid you farewell on your deathbed?”
Emma rolled her eyes.
“Don’t be so dramatic, Auntie. I assure you a bit of cold air isn’t going to leave me on any deathbed, and besides,” Emma said, smiling inwardly, “I have sufficient reason to suspect that my future life with Monty will be anything but conventional. We share such an intense fear of boredom that I am sure neither of us will die in a mere bed. I daresay we shall meet our end in the jaws of a plesiosaurus at the center of the Earth, or fighting off a Martian invasion . . .”
“Young lady!” the old woman exclaimed. “Don’t make fun of Death. Everyone knows Death has no sense of humor.”
“Let me remind you that you started it.” Emma grinned, softening her tone as she noticed the old lady’s pallor. “But don’t worry, Auntie. I’ve never felt better. Besides, I’m all wrapped up. And I’m sure Monty will arrive any moment . . . ,” she added, scanning the driveway without much conviction.
After sensing her niece’s doubts with the eagerness of a bloodhound, Lady Harlow returned to the subject of what she considered to be Montgomery Gilmore’s faults—starting, of course, with his apparent fondness for being late. Emma knew the old lady’s refrain by heart, after hearing it endlessly repeated for two years, and I have to confess, dear reader, that she agreed with every word: her fiancé possessed each of those exasperating, unfortunate, wearisome faults, and several others that her aunt had overlooked. But taken together they created a whole that was so stimulating and dynamic that anyone who came into contact with it had no choice but to be crushed or to reinvent herself. Two years ago, Montgomery Gilmore had entered her life like a train passing through a glass station, leaving her little choice but to climb aboard or spend the rest of her life on a platform smashed to smithereens. And Emma had jumped aboard without a second thought. Just as she had jumped aboard the hot-air balloon, where, to Monty’s horror, she had laughed so much she had almost made the basket capsize. She would even climb on the back of an orange-plumed heron and fly to the stars if he asked her.
With a sense of joy, Emma realized that the more she listened to her aunt’s diatribe, the less annoyed she felt about her fiancé’s lateness. After all, he was bound to appear sooner or later. She had no doubt about that. She knew she could count on him the way she had never been able to count on anyone. And nothing else mattered to her. Monty would arrive inventing the most hilarious excuse, tying himself up in such knots with his apologies that instead of justifying himself, he would condemn himself hopelessly, and she would have no choice but to burst out laughing. Emma gave her aunt a sidelong, almost affectionate glance. She surprised herself thinking she would miss her, a little, and the old lady would doubtless miss her, too, when she left her all alone again, when she went to settle in her new house after the wedding. She promised herself that, amid all her happiness, she wouldn’t forget her aunt and resolved to visit her as often as her duties as a newlywed would allow. A newlywed . . . the idea gave her butterflies in her stomach, a feeling that spread through the rest of her body.