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Play, music; and you brides and bridegrooms all,

With measure heap'd in joy, to th' measures fall.

Mr. Terry was willing, but the bishop had “whistled off” somewhere as Gordon put it, so that he could not give his approval until half of the fortnight was past. Sarah was only a little sorry at the delay, for it thrilled her heart to see her intended husband knit himself into the very fabric of the family.

Though he lodged at Perryfield, he was with them from morning to evening, if they themselves were not at Perryfield.

Moreover, it seemed all Iffley was as eager to welcome him back as they had been eager to discuss him and pass judgment upon his hasty departure months and months earlier.

After church he was invited to a half-dozen dinners and suppers and card parties, but the baron had got to both Mrs. Dere and Mrs. Terry beforehand, and both women joined forces to insist there was not time for more than a large dinner party at Perryfield and a musical evening at the rectory, to which all those issuing individual invitations to Langworthy were invited and with which they must be satisfied.

“If he and Mrs. Sebastian are to be married in a week’s time,” Mrs. Terry proclaimed in the churchyard, “they must be left alone to prepare. And if they have been deprived of the sight of each other the last eighteen months, I assure you we are all of us de trop. ”

“I am the talk of the town once more,” Horace said to Sarah the morning after the Perryfield dinner. They had donned wool cloaks and braved the light frost for a walk before breakfast. “It quite swells my self-regard.”

Rubbing her cheek against his shoulder, she chuckled. “You had better get used to it, because if you are only to appear in Iffley every year or two, your appearance will always make a stir. And we will always have to fight to snatch what minutes we can.”

“We have our allies,” he returned. “We can ask Mrs. Dere to organize a review at the beginning of every visit, in which I am paraded before the village to shake hands and exchange greetings. I will then regale them with my three best stories, told in Irving’s most roundabout manner, losing and recovering the thread several times and venturing into side alleys of no particular interest. After which I will begin to repeat myself.

When I catch the first yawn or glance at his watch, I will abruptly conclude, and everyone will go home satisfied and hoping not to see me again for a long while. ”

“Better yet,” she laughed, swinging his arm, “In your absence I will call on everyone regularly and insist on reading to them portions of your letters—the dull bits—so that they do not want to attend Mrs. Dere’s review in the first place and will try to beg off.”

“The dull bits!” he protested, giving her a little pinch. “I’ll show you dull bits!” Throwing a glance all around and finding them unobserved, he made good on his promise.

“Have I indeed bored you in my letters, my love?” he asked some minutes later.

“No! Don’t leave anything out, Horace,” she urged him.

“Not even the wind conditions which Frances makes fun of. Unless—perhaps you have yawned over my letters yourself? Would you prefer to read less about the harvest or what Bash said or did or what the latest thing was to put Mrs. Dere in a huff…?”

“Don’t stint a single word,” he said with conviction.

“If you knew how blue one can get, so far from home and surrounded always by everlasting men! Why, even Harry can’t be got rid of, if he knows I have received a letter.

Not until I’ve read him every last passage—except for the ones about how you adore me, you understand.

(Frightfully long, those parts. I blush like a schoolgirl throughout.) It’s been kind of you and Mrs. Barstow to read his letters to Mrs. Barbary, but I’m afraid nothing can be done about how little she gives you to say in response. ”

“Poor Harry! For his sake Frances and I will drag ourselves more often to the Barbarys, and I will try to be especially observant so I may give him news of his siblings. Is he…doing well?”

“So well I suspect he will become a pirate, if given the opportunity. I told him as much, and he replied that if he did, he would share the loot with me, as a wedding present.”

Sarah shook her head, smiling. “How kind and generous everyone is being! Harry—at least in his criminal imagination—my family, the baron…Horace, you don’t feel rushed into this, do you? We were going to wait, but now, this very Sunday before you must go again you will be—”

“‘Cabin’d, cribb’d and confined’?” he finished for her, pulling her close again.

“I wish I could be, if it were with you, Sarah. As tightly as I am holding you now. Tell me you’re happy about it, too, darling, even if you must hitch yourself to someone who will abandon you again next week, for who-knows how long, and who may, unless Fortune smiles upon me, leave you poorer than he found you. ”

“Yes. I tell you now, yes. And so I will tell you again on Sunday when Mr. Terry asks.”

It did not rain on their wedding day, though it did the night before and the night following.

The bride wore her dark blue gown because it was her husband’s favorite, and though he was sorry not to be allowed to wear his dress uniform off duty, no one who saw the dashing young lieutenant thought anything wanting in his appearance.

All Iffley was there, it seemed, joined by the Weatherills from Oxford and the Egertons from St. Lawrence.

Mr. Horatio Langworthy the uncle sent terse felicitations and an invitation that Sarah might visit him in Portsmouth, which she shuddered at but politely deferred.

The baron’s wedding gift to the couple was a lavish breakfast at Perryfield and the engagement of a room for two nights at the Star in Oxford.

“But I have additional plans, my dear,” he informed Sarah before handing her in to his coach.

Beaming, he leaned to whisper in her ear and was rewarded by her eyes growing round with amazement.

“But don’t tell Mrs. Barstow,” he said. “I mean to surprise her with the news at Stir-up Sunday.”

“Not a word,” she promised. “But may I tell Horace?”

“Of course you may! What God hath joined let no man put asunder, you know.” Chuckling.

“What was that about?” asked her husband, when they were bundled in the Perryfield coach, hot bricks at their feet and a blanket across them. But then, “No—wait. Tell me in a minute. I have more pressing business.”

They were nearly to the Pettypont Bridge before Sarah pushed him away, laughing, so she might remedy her appearance. “Look, Horace,” she said, pointing from the window. “Is this where you kissed Mary Pence?”

“Wicked wife,” he scolded.

“Wicked husband, more like.”

“Too late for regrets now, Mrs. Langworthy. The deed is done, and I am yours.”

“So you are,” she sighed, settling back into the circle of his arm.

“And if I had heeded Sebastian Barstow’s counsel sooner, my bestowed bride, we might have had two months together, instead of two nights.”

“No,” she replied thoughtfully, “it had to be this way. Neither of our hearts was ready when we first met. And we will have the rest of our lives, Horace, whatever happens.”

“So we shall. Look here, Sarah, I have a wedding gift for you.”

“A wedding gift!” She sat up and squeezed his hand.

“That reminds me. You kissed it out of my head. Lord Dere told me he is going to build an addition to Iffley Cottage! There isn’t room for much, but he wants to knock out a wall and enlarge the little parlor, making space for another bedroom on the first floor.

I know you haven’t been upstairs, but when it is done, you and I will have my little room and the larger one adjoining for ourselves. Isn’t it splendid?”

“Splendid,” he agreed. “A splendid gift from a splendid fellow. And you must write in great detail about the renovations, so I may experience the noise and dust and fuss vicariously. Now for my gift. It is no home, but I hope you will like it.” He thrust a little velvet pouch into her hands.

Biting her lower lip, she opened the bag and shook into her palms a pair of teardrop earrings made from opaque, peach-colored stone.

“Oh, Horace.” Her throat was tight.

“Do you like them? I thought you could wear them with your cameo. Did I ever tell you I was with Sebastian when he bought that cameo for you? He was trying to decide between two designs. He said blue would match your eyes, but the blush color would match your face and your spirit. I said I liked the peach myself, and so I do.”

Dashing away a tear, she replaced the earrings in their pouch and carried it to her lips. “I love them. And I will love my cameo all the more, knowing it was from both of you.”

Kissing him again, she placed her hand in his, and the coach rattled along the High Street, carrying them into their new life.

The End