Epithalamion, or, A Lyric Ode in Honor of a Bride and Bridegroom

To Guy

Note: Special thanks to the folks on the Life and Times board at Pemberley, especially Caroline, for providing an invaluable resource. Renewed homage as well to Dorothy L. Sayers's Busman's Honeymoon for the title of, and inspiration for, this piece.

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[Chapter Two] [Chapter Three]

Chapter One

Before Marianne Brandon opened her eyes she was conscious of soft morning light and the happy warbling of thrushes and skylarks all trying to outsing each other--and of the steady breathing of her husband in the bed beside her, of his warmth against her back. She lay for a time without moving, smiling with the memory of the night just past, considering her own thoughts and emotions in an effort to determine whether she sensed any fundamental alteration in her nature. She had left girlhood behind forever--and yet in truth girlhood had deserted her long before, so that this step, this further initiation into womanhood, had not seemed as abrupt as she had once imagined it would be. It had been, however, rather awkward and embarrassing and untidy, and quite astonishingly painful. She no longer wondered why some brides were horrified by the events of their wedding nights and dreaded the nights thereafter--those who had married with little affection or regard, who perhaps had gone to their marriage beds in ignorance, whose husbands had little inclination to take care. She could not imagine enduring such discomfort from a man for whom she felt no esteem or trust. Now even more than before she knew her own husband to be tender and considerate, knew she could have faith in his assurances, given amidst loving apologies for his clumsiness--for he had been at least as nervous as she!--that soon the painful aspect would pass and this new excitement and wonder would be unalloyed.

At last she looked upon the walls and furnishings that had heretofore gone unnoticed. She stretched, and turned--to see Christopher sitting back against the pillows in his dressing gown, gazing down upon her with a joyful but tentative smile.

"Good morning--Mrs. Brandon."

Her answering smile was shy, but only briefly; in an instant it became open and warm, for how could she be shy after such a night? "Good morning, sir." For a moment she merely contemplated him, this man with whom she had begun a new and fascinating journey. Her husband--protector, friend, lover. And then she reached for his hand, and the force with which he gripped hers, his relieved exhale of breath, told her that he had been somewhat uncertain how she would greet him. She pressed her lips against his palm to show him he need not have doubted. "Have you been sitting there very long?"

"Only a few moments. I fear I woke you--I should have sat in the chair."

"So far away? And I cannot imagine anything more dull than watching someone sleep."

"When the someone is one's bride, and when one has never before had the opportunity to watch her sleep, the sight is infinitely enchanting." He spoke very softly, as if reluctant to disturb the peace that suffused the room.

"Your bride," she said. "And you are my husband."

And then she could think of nothing else to say. What did one say when one had been--intimate--with a gentleman? She had said many things to him in the night, as he had to her, and she had fallen asleep in the sheltering circle of his arms with no thought that the light of day might bring a new embarrassment. She was very conscious of, of all things, his bare ankles between the hem of his dressing gown and his slippers.

"You're staring at me. Is my hair standing on end?"

"Am I? Forgive me-- No, your hair is but a little mussed. It is only that--I have never waked to find a gentleman in my bed!"

He smiled, eyes bright with recollection, and gently brushed her cheekbone with the backs of his fingers. Only after a few moments did it occur to him that beneath her humor might lie a more serious implication. "Perhaps--I should have slept elsewhere--" He must not expect too much intimacy of her too quickly.

"No--I did not mean to imply that it was an unpleasant surprise!"

"Then--you do not mind--you do not expect that I--" He glanced toward his dressing room and the bedroom beyond it.

"Not at all! Of course I expect to share a bed with you!"

As a result of this declaration they both became thoroughly red in the face. Brandon could think of only one response to it--to kiss his bride, which he did at length, to her delight and satisfaction. "But I would ask," she said, after some little while, "to be left alone for a few minutes just now--"

"Yes, forgive me--I should have realized--" He made himself disengage from her embrace. "But I assure you they will seem endless minutes--" The latch clicked softly behind him.

Marianne's belongings had been sent the day before and had been neatly arranged by the maids in her dressing room, and after she had tended to necessities and brushed her hair and splashed some water on her face, she donned her own dressing gown and began to explore what was now her bedchamber. An unpretentious bachelor's room, it was rather sparsely furnished in well-crafted walnut and mahogany, with in addition to the bed a table and two chairs, two bedside tables, and a bookcase so amply filled that not even a pamphlet could have been squeezed into the shelves. She peeked into her husband's dressing room, reminded by the sight of razor and shaving brush, boots and breeches and shirts, and the spicy scent of Imperial water of her father's--though his had never been so tidy unless the maid had just that moment been in. In the chamber again she opened the draperies, made of a fine, dark blue brocade, and by the morning light thus admitted she could see that the wainscot had been freshly polished. Several prints of country scenes adorned the papered walls, but her eye was drawn most to a large painting nearest her side of the bed, either new or recently cleaned, of a scene which she thought must be from the Lakes--of rugged, mist-enshrouded fells jutting up from mirror-still water, and a sky dark and heavy with approaching storm.

She was just beginning to wonder what was keeping her colonel--had he tired of her already and gone for a walk? would he turn to estate business in every spare moment? but surely neither in his dressing gown!--when he returned with a large tray filled with china and utensils and steaming plates under silver covers.

She held the door wide for him. "Did you not give the servants the day off?"

"I did. But I can find my way to my own kitchen--and it is my kitchen, despite Mrs. Howell's assertions to the contrary--and even produce a meal from it when I like. A simple meal, at any rate. I offer you eggs, kippers, toast, ham, and strawberries." He set the tray on the table and removed the covers, then reached for her hand to lead her to a chair. "Do you like the painting? We'll replace it if you do not."

"I love the painting. Is it of the Lakes?"

"Yes, of Buttermere, in fact. When I saw it in a gallery in town last week I succumbed to a romantic hope that the view from our cottage will be very like that."

"You bought a painting for me?"

"For us, rather--of the place where we shall spend our first weeks as man and wife--"

She kissed the hand that held hers, and he drew her into his arms, and such was the fervor of her response that he gave her a long, questioning look and then a slow smile, and very deliberately replaced the covers over the breakfast plates.

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"I like Sergeant Masters very much--I do remember that. Such wit he displayed! I'm so glad you asked him to be your groomsman."

"He was a friend to me when I needed one more than once in years past. He has invited us to make free of his lodgings in St. Ives--though I'm not at all certain I should risk your going near him again. He was really quite taken with my choice of bride."

"He will simply have to find his own bride," Marianne retorted, "for I am firmly settled where I am. Mrs. Jennings and Sir John were truly incorrigible, did you not think?--but I have forgiven them. And did you see Fanny make John pick up the coins? She is worse than the most grasping usurer. I am so very sorry to inflict upon you such a horrible brother and sister!"

It was now about noon, the morning having passed very pleasantly, and they were walking about the grounds in the enjoyment of being quite alone, with no one observing them--even as casually as her family had observed them--to ensure that they should obey the proprieties. They had revisited their wedding and celebratory breakfast in every detail they could recall, all the while amazed that in many particulars their memories were not entirely clear. Some outrageous behaviors and comments, however, had taken firm root in both their minds.

"But you have also brought me two charming sisters and the most affectionate mother-in-law a man could wish for, and in any event your brother and his wife have never been less than polite to me."

Though she had beamed at his praise of her immediate family, now her face wore an indignant frown. "Never less than fawning over you, you mean. But perhaps you secretly like to be fawned over--"

"Only by you--"

This he said in a husky voice, and there followed one of those frequent pauses which Marianne hoped was not witnessed by any servants who might remain on the grounds.

"Perhaps your wealth will protect you from their coarseness. Their manners will be impeccable to you."

"Then you will be protected as well."

"Yes, I am no longer a poor relation, am I? They have long since forgotten that their sisters might have had dowries but for them." She tightened her hand on his arm. "But I shall never complain about their stinginess again, for it has brought me you."

Here he stopped again, and pressed her hands to his lips. "My Marianne--I hope you know how you warm my heart when you say such things."

"I hope you know how sincerely I mean them--"

Some little while later, after they had travelled every corner of the garden and the yew arbor without really seeing any part of them, he asked if she would like to ride over the park. She assented readily, for they had ridden together only a few times and never alone. She had not visited Delaford since knowing it was to be her home, and found herself looking about with new eyes, noticing details of landscape and vegetation she had never noticed before. The horses had been pastured for the day and she expected the colonel to lure two to the fence with a handful of feed so he could halter them, but instead he led her into the stables, where the sound of their voices brought to their stall doors Odysseus, his usual mount, and an alert chestnut she did not recognize.

She went to make the animal's acquaintance. "And who is this? I'm sure I have not seen her before."

"Haven't you?"

At his tone of studied nonchalance she looked at him once and then again, and realized what he had done. "For me?"

He smiled broadly at her expression, delighted by his success. "You have her on trial from a breeder in Stinton. Perhaps I should not have bought her when we are about to go away, but I was impressed with her responsiveness and stride and didn't want to risk losing the chance at her. An afternoon's ride should tell you if she suits. Her name at present is Daisy, though I expect you'll wish to change it to something more imaginative if you keep her."

Marianne flung her arms around him and kissed him soundly. "I have married the most generous man in the world!"

She hurried into the house to change into the sapphire blue riding habit that had been a gift from Mrs. Jennings, while the colonel saddled and bridled the horses, who twitched their ears at the cheerful melody he was humming under his breath. When Marianne returned he suggested that they exit by the rear stable door, in so casual a tone that she knew there was something else he wanted her to see.

In one of the carriage alcoves sat a fine travelling chaise, shiny and black with all its fittings burnished to a high gloss. She handed him Daisy's reins and went over to admire it, opening the door and examining the plush seats and rich curtains. "And have you hired it for our whole journey?" What a pleasant indulgence it would be not to have to change carriages as well as horses at each post inn!

He regarded her with mild indignation. "I have bought it, dear lady."

"Bought it! Such extravagance--for me?"

He replied with some diffidence, but with a twinkle in his eye. "I should like to ride in it as well." She laughed, and he continued. "Travel by post is all well and good for a bachelor, but my wife will travel in style."

"Your 'wife,'" she said with a sigh. "I shall never tire of hearing those two words!"

He had said many prayers that she would not, that he had not rushed her into this irrevocable step--though when he had confessed his anxiety during his last visit to Barton she had assured him he was not doing so and had reminded him that the suggestion to marry without delay had in fact been hers--for she was less cautious than he, less scarred by experience, even now. If she had felt her own small doubts she had never let him sense them; if the old adage "Married in haste, we may repent at leisure" had ever troubled her as it did himself on her behalf, she had never let him know.

He had said many prayers of thanksgiving as well, for the new happiness he could not yet wholly trust, for the steady restoration of life and liveliness to his spirit that had begun the moment she first looked at him with friendship at Cleveland and had surged and swelled upon her acceptance of his proposal. He flattered himself that she, too, looked happy as they rode through meadows golden with buttercups and coppices lush with bluebells, through fragrant orchards of crab apple and apple and pear, she very pleased indeed with the mare and beginning to try out new names for her, and surveying their surroundings with a new and more personal interest. Sometimes when she turned to respond to his question or comment he thought he saw a trace of surprise in her smile, but always the surprise turned to warm delight and he chose to believe that she was only a little startled, as was he whenever he considered it, by these reminders of the very fact of her married state, rather than attribute the expression to any feeling of regret for having forever attached herself to him--for that was a possibility he had neither heart nor strength to contemplate.

She had not seemed the least regretful the night before, he told himself, even at a moment when some brides, he imagined, would be nearly faint with anxious mortification. She had been brave and determined, even when he himself had nearly faltered, so wretched and brutish had he felt for causing her pain. Having brought her to the bedchamber and closed the door on the outside world, he had been very mindful of his sister's unsought but sound advice--though he had hardly needed that additional inducement to make him tremble with nerves. Marianne had seemed to welcome his every touch, but so fearful had he been, nevertheless, of disgusting her, of destroying her affection before it might grow into love, that he had at last tried to spare himself further agonizing insecurity by posing a tentative question.

"Marianne, may I assume that you understand-- Did your mother and sister explain to you--" But he could not continue, for she was staring at him in utter incomprehension. His heart sank to his toes. Dear God, would it actually be necessary for him to describe for her the--the intricacies--dear God--

But she had saved him, understanding flooding into her face so suddenly that he realized it had never occurred to her that he might wonder. "Yes, oh yes. I was not at first certain what you referred to-- Yes, they did."

For a moment he had felt quite in danger of collapsing with relief. "I cannot picture myself--explanations--the details--" He very much wished that he could recover the ability to speak in complete sentences.

And then, to his continuing astonishment, she had opened her eyes very wide and said, "Christopher--do you not know what to do? Must I explain?"

He gaped at her, speechless, and then saw that she was trying to repress a grin--and he burst into laughter all the more exuberant for its being so necessary to restore his confidence. She began to giggle as well, and he opened his arms and she came into his embrace and they clung to each other in shared mirth, but laughter very quickly succumbed to other emotion and he found it necessary to beg her pardon for forgetting himself. "I so want the experience to be pleasurable for you--one must be careful--"

She clasped both his hands and said, in a voice that would have been firm but that it quavered so, "I assure you, my husband, I am a fount of information. Please proceed."

And, amazed and delighted by her forwardness, he did.

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The afternoon passed in alternating conversation and silence, in further reminiscence and planning for the future, in consultation over which books and magazines they should take with them on their wedding trip--in short, in unceasing diversions the pleasures of which were obvious primarily to their two participants. Brandon had further cause for relief at dinner, which they took at the parsonage with almost the whole of Marianne's family, Mrs. Dashwood and Margaret having come to help Elinor ready the nursery for its expected occupant. Upon their arrival the bride's mother, elder sister, and brother all looked her over unobtrusively and seemed to judge her whole and sane and her husband therefore satisfactory, and that gentleman chose to take as a compliment the blush on Marianne's cheeks as she exchanged a significant glance with Elinor. Only young Margaret was surprised that they did not stay long after evening service and tea, and only she gave any credence to their excuse of having to make preparations for their journey.

They departed the next morning after an early breakfast at the parsonage accompanied by embraces and well-wishing. During the first few days of their journey, the clear skies, dry roads, and the expertise of their coachman with regard to the route allowed so brisk a pace, despite several diversions, that they were at risk of arriving at Buttermere, where they had taken their cottage for a month, a day or perhaps even two before they were to obtain the key from the agent. But such a pace sustained over so long a journey was, they well knew, unlikely.

They stopped first at Glastonbury, where they disagreed vehemently with Mr. Gilpin's assertion that the ruins of the Abbey were not quite worthy of being called picturesque, and laughed over an old-fashioned party actually using a Claude glass, turning away from the genuine beauties before them to gaze at their reflection in a framed, blue-tinted mirror. They reached Wells that evening, and, the next day's being Sunday, first attended services in the great cathedral and exclaimed over the many exquisite statues along its west front (which Mr. Gilpin had thought "too much ornament"), then explored the limestone caverns at Wookey Hole, eerie by lamplight with their dark and secretive underground river and lake, and walked the floor of Cheddar Gorge and picnicked at the very rim. Setting out early the following morning, they did not pause at Bath, but promised themselves a return during the winter for concerts and theatre, Brandon feeling that with Marianne at his side he could disregard even the painful memory of his frantic but vain search for news of Eliza after her disappearance from those elegant environs. At the cathedral at Gloucester, after a scenic passage through the Vale between the gentle Cotswold Hills and the primeval Forest of Dean, they sighed over the tomb of the murdered Edward II and took some rubbings with linen and wax from several of the smaller brasses. Their interests, their opinions, their reactions, were almost exactly similar; in admiration or disdain, in curiosity or indifference, every day saw the deepening of their perfect accord.

While on the road the hours and the miles were taken up with posing riddles and singing favorite songs, and most often with reading to each other from the books and tracts in the box on the opposite seat--their current subjects being the latest of Mr. Wilberforce's polemics and Sir Thomas More's thought-provoking Utopia. Occasionally--for even among the newly married conversation might lag for five minutes at a time--they silently perused recent issues of Gentleman's Magazine and The Lady's Monthly Museum that they had not had time even to glance at while preparing for their wedding, but always an item would strike one or the other as worthy of sharing and thus an entirely new subject would occupy the succeeding half-hour. Marianne looked over the music she had brought--for the colonel had made certain to secure a house that offered her a pianoforte--and wished she had included more Beethoven, while Brandon read through accumulated correspondence. The bride discovered the protective feeling that can be inspired by watching a husband sleep, as well as the amusement of his chagrin, when the jolting of the carriage woke him, at having been caught in less than constant attention to her. She, too, was known to doze, and woke more than once to his kisses.

"Christopher! The curtains are open--we shall scandalize the countryside from here to Buttermere!"

The greatest portion of her alarm was feigned, and his smile showed that he knew it, but saying, "Allow me to safeguard your reputation, madam," he reacted decisively and drew the panels closed, thus exciting her admiration of his competence.

"Where else should we travel," he asked, pulling her against him to cradle her from some of the bumps of the road, "now that we have got a fine new chaise?"

"Oh, everywhere! To Scotland and Wales and the fen country and the Cotswolds and the Peaks--we must explore everywhere that is picturesque--and we simply must go to visit John and Fanny in style. And perhaps even to Ireland, which everybody says is very beautiful. And the Greek Isles and the Alps and the Black Forest--everywhere! How I wish I had Elinor's talent for sketching. Her pictures from our family's stay in Canterbury bring back such wonderful memories."

"Would you ever like to go to India? I have quite a few friends still posted there."

"India! It is so far. But with you as my guide--perhaps someday--" He had described for her many of the thrilling sights and strange customs he had witnessed in that hot and dangerous land--like the magnificent Taj Mahal, that glorious monument to love (on which Elinor's only comment had been, "Why did the shah not build something his wife could enjoy while she was alive?"), and the awful practice of suttee, a widow's burning herself on her husband's funeral pyre, which extreme behavior even Marianne could not condone. He of all her acquaintance had truly had adventures. How could she ever have thought him dull! "Shall you dress in a turban and teach me to ride an elephant?"

He laughed. "If you like." A comprehending look came into his eyes. "By your proud expression I deduce that you are taking Sarah's instructions to heart."

"I promised her to be the best wife I can possibly be, and she did tell me to make you laugh often. She has known you all your life--she must be my guide."

"Only be yourself, and you will be the best possible wife for me."

"Dearest Christopher--"

"Have I told you that I have taken a vow to steal kisses from you in wooded ravines--like this--and this--?"

"Mmm-- Have you? I think you will not find it necessary to steal them-- We must query the agent closely on which walks present the best opportunity--for I don't suppose the guidebooks include such information--"

"A criminal lapse--"

On the fourth day they stopped in the late morning in the market town of Tewkesbury for the coachman to see to a squeaking wheel. Strolling along the bustling street arm in arm, admiring the many half-timbered medieval buildings and making a few small purchases--lace and riband for Marianne and a watch fob for the colonel--they felt very satisfied with themselves and their new situation. While they partook of muffins and tea at the ancient Black Bear, Brandon told Marianne of some of Delaford's tenants with whom she would soon become acquainted, and she shared with him the plans she and Edward and Elinor had already formulated for the expansion of the parish school.

She was learning that one says to a gentleman with whom one has become intimate just what one has always said, with the pleasant addition of more earnest flirtation and an awareness and expectation of what private moments might bring. After some little self-consciousness each morning--which her husband seemed to share--she was soon feeling as comfortable with him as she had ever felt, with the exception of, in response to his touch or even his glance, slight lurches of her stomach or flutterings and warmth in her secret places--reminders that their association was not what it had been, that it never would be again. Her body was learning to accommodate him just as her heart had done, and each night she made room for him in their bed with greater familiarity and eagerness, in the anticipation not only of pleasant physical sensation but also, and with surprise, the sense of a growing spiritual bond.

Upon gaining their room that evening at the Peacock in Halmiston, after a day on which the carriage curtains had been most often closed, they modestly resisted the temptation to test at once the utility and comfort of the bed, though they did require rather longer to dress for dinner than was strictly necessary. The colonel could not but be relieved--a frequent state of mind in recent days, he reflected wryly--that his bride had forgiven him the initial discomfort of her marital duties and in fact seemed as ready as he to share the pleasures of the body as well as the mind. He had never lain with someone less knowledgeable than himself in such matters, and he found it both exciting and humbling that Marianne had so completely trusted him with the innocence of her body even after experience had shattered the innocence of her heart.

During the plain but hearty meal he was in such a state of distraction, captive of a potent combination of desire and astonishment, that he was certain she must sense it as if his mind had touched hers across the table. But her own self-possession and cheerful conversation were unaffected, and he realized that in fact she was unaware of his thoughts--and that she would quite likely not understand them if she were. Though she knew what it was to lose her heart's desire she did not know what it was to attain it. She could not understand his elation in drifting into slumber each night beside the very companion for whom he had yearned so long and waking each morning enveloped in her warmth--in sensing the first hesitant conjoining of her soul with his own. He had rather expected that he would soon become accustomed to this change in his circumstances, but he had vastly underestimated the capacity for emotion of his own rejuvenated heart, for, on the contrary, as the moments and hours of their new life accumulated the alteration seemed to him even more wondrous and profound. At times he almost could not conceal from her the full intensity of his love, but he must, for she must never feel constrained to show him more affection than she could honestly feel. To love her too much might well be to lose her.

After dinner they walked through the homely village in the gathering dusk, and came upon a small assembly room from whose open windows and doors spilled light and music and a fever pitch of laughter that could be explained only by the liberal flow of strong liquid refreshment. A gentleman in evening clothes was just hopping up the steps past a gaggle of children spying through the door; he paused on the landing when he caught sight of them.

"What's kept you? You've missed all the fun! Charlie and Bess drove away hours ago. No trouble on the road, I hope?" And then, peering at them with vision perhaps not entirely clear as they stepped into a square of light, "Oh, I do beg your pardon--I thought you must be the Petersons--you do resemble them in these shadows. Who are you, then?"

Marianne was rather put off by the blunt manner that originated, perhaps, in both country habit and drink, but the colonel smoothly introduced himself and his wife and explained that they were stopping at the inn. The man offered his hand.

"My name's Norwood--you passed my lands on the south road as you came in. My eldest, Charles, has finally made up his mind to take a wife--he's five-and-twenty, you know, well past time--and we've all waited so long that there was nothing for it but to invite the whole village to the breakfast, which we started about ten o'clock this morning."

Marianne exchanged a look of amazement with her husband, whose own eyes were already alight with humor at the notion that a man more than ten years his junior might be considered dilatory in his pursuit of matrimony. "This is yet the breakfast, sir?" she asked, suspecting that Sir John Middleton, were he present, would have met his match.

Their companion shouted with laughter. "I told Charlie that if I've spent all his inheritance it's his own bloody fault! Do come in and have some cake and ale. No, I insist--do come in--it's the least I can offer after accosting you this way, and besides, all of Halmiston is invited and here you are in Halmiston--"

Brandon queried with a look and Marianne assented with a lively smile, and they were soon assaulted by noise and bustle and a flurry of introductions to no fewer than fifty people whose names they immediately forgot. If all of Halmiston was not present a cross-section certainly was, and the wives and daughters of finely dressed merchants and gentleman-farmers danced readily with blacksmiths and laborers while their husbands and sons danced with dairy maids and dressmakers. Squire Norwood's lady wife was a jolly woman who made love with every man in the room whether young or old, and immediately claimed Brandon as a partner, while Marianne found herself swept onto the well-scuffed floor by a sweating plowman and an elegant schoolmaster who for this one evening had declared themselves bosom friends. Within five minutes it was somehow discovered that the late arrivals were also newly wed, and they instantly became secondary guests of honor, plied with as much food and drink as they could safely consume after a plentiful meal.

"We shall remember this 'breakfast,' I think," the colonel called out to his wife as he crossed behind her, and she could only laugh in reply as she was spun away. By the fourth or fifth set, however, she had secured him as a partner, and, all etiquette obviously having been forsaken for the evening, refused to give him up for the remainder of the two hours they stayed. It was their own nuptials, and the delirious joy of the night, all over again, and the moon had set before they slept.

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Continue to Chapter Two

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