A Nosegay of Yellow Roses

Title: A Nosegay of Yellow Roses
Author: ExcentrykeMuse
Fandoms: The Gilded Age / Twilight Saga
Pairings: Bella/Owestry, Gladys/Hector
Word Count: 5k
Rating: PG
Warnings: arranged marriage, gambling, vampires
Author’s Note: I wanted to write a “Gilded Age” fic.  I loved Gladys’s and Buckingham’s sweet romance.  They fell in love and it was so sweet.  So I transplanted the Viscount of Owestry from my Pride & Prejudice fics to the Gilded Age.  There’s about a 70 year difference.  Owestry is related to Darcy on his father’s (the Earl of Matlock’s) side and Hector (the Duke of Buckingham) on his mother’s side.  Just suspend disbelief.  This is fanfiction.
Summary: Bella ran away from Owestry in the dead of night.  However, he followed her all the way to New York and employed Mrs. Russell to reintroduce them at Gladys and Hector’s society wedding.

A Nosegay of Yellow Roses

Bella was confused by her summons to Russell House on Fifth Avenue.  She knew George Russell by reputation and by sight.  He was not a gambling man.  She had had a flutter with the son, Larry.  However, she was not a woman of society.  Far from it.

Bella had come to New York in search of Carlisle Cullen—she had heard a rumor that he was practicing medicine in the city—and had stayed because it had proved comfortable and convenient.

It was still more than thirty years before Carlisle would be in Chicago and by then Bella would be a woman in her fifties.  By then, she assumed she would have given up hope of finding him and hopefully would have established a life.  She knew, at that point, she could never return to the twenty-first century.  At least she was in America.

Her carriage pulled up to the mansion on Fifth Avenue and Bella looked up at it in wonder.  It was decidedly impressive.  Bella had rooms in a clean part of the city, but nothing remotely this fashionable.  The door was opened for her by a footman and she was handed out.

Going up to the door, she gave her card and was shown into a large Drawing Room.  On her way, she passed an open door and she spied Larry Russell, who leaned back from where he was standing to catch a better glimpse of her.

A handsome woman in the latest fashions was waiting for her, and Bella entered.

“Ah, Miss Swan.”

“Mrs. Russell,” Bella replied, greeting her hostess.  “I was quite surprised by your invitation.”

“It took me several days to track down your address,” Mrs. Russell admitted, offering her a seat.  She looked at Bella openly.  “Yes.  You are just the right size.”

“Size?” Bella inquired.

“My daughter Gladys is marrying the Duke of Buckingham.  Surely you’ve read about it in the papers.”

Bella was confused.  “Of course I have.  All of New York has read about it.” 

The gambling dens were full of it.  Men who liked a flutter also liked to place bets.  Whether the Russell-Buckingham wedding would come off was a matter of great speculation over the past few months.

“Hector mentioned you knew his cousin, the Viscount of Owestry.”

Bella stilled.  She had known the Viscount of Owestry back in London when she was gambling there in her late teens and early twenties—before she had sailed to New York.  He had taken to a late flutter in the Little Season of 1880 when his father was demanding that he remarry.  It seemed the title needed a male heir.  Owestry had decided that if he were to marry again, he wanted to marry Bella, or he would not marry at all.

Bella had been flattered but she still hadn’t given up hope of finding Carlisle and convincing him to turn her at that point.  She had only been twenty-one, still young enough to wait for Edward, who would be turned when he was seventeen.

She was now twenty-five.  With each of her birthdays, the reality of being with Edward became more and more unrealistic.—and the realization that she had fallen in love with Owestry became more and more apparent with each passing year of being away from him.

Mrs. Russell took Bella in and was waiting for a response.

Bella hesitated.  “Is Owestry in New York?”

“For the wedding.  Hector—the Duke of Buckingham, asked me to make you a bridesmaid as a special favor.  As a bridesmaid is under the weather, I’ve found I can oblige him.”  She smiled at Bella.  “You are quite beautiful, if I may say so.  You will compliment the other bridesmaids quite well.”  She paused, waiting for Bella to speak.

“I’m afraid that I can’t—”

“But you can!” Mrs. Russell assured her.  “How bad can being fitted for a dress and serving as a bridesmaid in this Season’s most anticipated social event possibly be?”

Bella was looking at her gloves.  She glanced up with her large violet eyes.  “Surely, Mrs. Russell, you can see I am in mourning.”

Mrs. Russell carefully reached out and placed her hand over Bella’s.  “Hector explained it to me.  Your father died on the passing to England and you’ve been in mourning ever since.  What has it been, six, seven years?  I quite applaud your devotion to his memory.”  She slipped her hand away.  “Surely you can put it aside for one event.  No one will fault you.”  She smiled again.  “I would view it as a special favor.  With one invitation would come others, Miss Swan.”

“I daresay if Owestry is asking this favor, he would prefer to sweep me back to England despite the years that have elapsed,” Bella murmured.  She had found it rather difficult to deny Owestry anything when she was England and had had to tear herself away from him.  She had snuck onto the boat in Southampton, leaving in the middle of the night and telling no one, only posting a letter to him to explain.  Only her distant hope of Edward had kept up her resolve.

That resolve had broken over the past four years.  She was twenty-five now.  Even if she did find Carlisle Cullen, she could never be with Edward even if she were turned.

Leaning forward, Mrs. Russell admitted, “I did have that thought myself.”  She reached for a card on the side table and presented it to Bella.  “Your fitting is for eleven o’clock.”  She rose and Bella stood with her.  “I also hope you will be our guest for dinner tomorrow.  Seven o’clock prompt, Miss Swan.  The Duke of Buckingham and the Viscount Owestry will also be in attendance.  Please,” she said sternly though with a twinkle in her eye, “do not upset my numbers.”

She walked to the door.

Bella hesitated but followed.  “If I leave now, I should be able to make it,” she realized.

“My thoughts exactly,” Mrs. Russell agreed.  “I will see you tomorrow.”

Bella was shown out.

Larry Russell was waiting for her.

“How,” he inquired of her, “are you the mystery new bridesmaid?”  He was smiling at her.  “When I asked Mother to substitute a neighbor of ours, she insisted she already had someone quite special picked out.”

Bella forced herself to return to the moment.

Slipping the card up her sleeve, Bella looked up into Larry’s puppydog face.  “I am no one special,” she assured him.  “Mrs. Russell only asked me because the Duke of Buckingham requested it.”

Larry leaned in.  “And how do you know the Duke of Buckingham?”

“Never met him,” Bella told Larry, swishing past him in her fashionable mourning silks.  “We do not frequent the same dinner tables.”  She looked over her shoulder and saw that Larry was smiling to himself.  She would most likely see him at dinner.

Sweeping into her carriage, she gave the driver the address of the modiste and settled in for the ride.

When she arrived, Bella discovered that the gown was white.  She detested white.  Renee had worn white jeans and a white halter top to her wedding with Phil.  The image was seared in Bella’s mind. 

Fortunately, the dress, which was already made, was her approximate size, and only a few alterations had to be made.

“Do I have to wear a veil?  Please tell me I only have to wear flowers in my hair,” Bella asked as she walked out of the changing area, stopping dead in her tracks when she saw who was waiting for her.

The Viscount of Owestry was not a handsome man.  He was of middling height with thinning blond hair, watery eyes, and weak shoulders.  His clothes never looked like they fit because he could never fill them out properly.  However, he was undeniably attractive to Bella, who found him charming in a useless sort of way.

“I see you’ve followed me all the way to New York.”  She paused to take him in.  He’d gotten thinner over the past four years.

“I found I had to force an invitation from Buckingham when he told me he was marrying American money.  Mrs. Russell said it was difficult to find your address.”

She smirked at him.  “You know I do not move in polite society.  The gentlemen are neat and respectable, but their wives do not know me.”  She came up to him and smiled.  “I haven’t even met the bride.”

“No one has met the bride,” Owestry admitted, offering his arm.  “She refuses to come out of her room.”

“Really?” Bella remarked.  “I take it she is very young.”

“Very,” he agreed.  “Her father is buying Buckingham and his title.”

“How sad,” Bella agreed.  “I take it the Duke is consenting to be bought.”

Bella’s parasol was handed to her, and they stepped out onto the street. 

“Buckingham asked me my opinion on American women since I so obviously had experience with them.”  Owestry looked at her meaningfully.

Bella looked into his watery eyes in question.  They were of almost an equal height, especially with the thick two inch heels on Bella’s shoes. 

“I confided in him when I was planning to propose,” Owestry confessed, blushing a little, which made Bella smile to herself.  “I wanted his opinion as it was to be my second marriage and my first had been barely polite.”

“You know I was sorry for it,” Bella murmured, looking away in embarrassment now.  “How is Annabelle?”

“She still asks after you,” Owestry told her.  “She is now quite the young woman of eleven.”  Owestry hesitated.  She looked at him now questioningly.  “Will you allow me to escort you to luncheon?”

“I have not slept,” Bella admitted.  “I came home and Charlotte had the invitation to visit Mrs. Russell.  I decided it was better to stay up than to go to bed and then interrupt my sleep.”

“I see,” Owestry decided, clearly disappointed.  “I shall see you at dinner tomorrow, though.  And you will allow me to escort you into the wedding breakfast.”

Bella smiled despite herself.  “The Duke of Buckingham and Mrs. Russell are quite obviously matchmaking.”

“I hope you are not angry with me.”

“Not angry,” she promised him.  “I will see you tomorrow.”  Placing her hand on his chest, she waited for her footman to open her carriage door for her, and allowed Owestry to lift her in.  She was then carried away to her rooms on Seventh Avenue.

Bella was in a whirl as Charlotte prepared her for bed.  She barely noticed as she climbed in between the sheets and when she dreamed, she didn’t dream of lions and lambs, but instead of long walks along dreary English streets and stolen moments in glaciers.

She didn’t go out that night.  She wasn’t in the mood.

She spent a quiet night in and went to bed early.

Bella dreamt of lying in the meadow in the rain, but Edward wasn’t there.  She was wearing a bustle and a high collar and when the sun came out, decidedly human fingers were stroking her hair.

She woke up with a gasp.

The bell rang at eleven.

Bella was in the breakfast room, reading the New York Times. 

Charlotte came bustling in, carrying a bouquet of two dozen yellow roses. 

Looking up, Bella smiled to herself.  “He remembered then,” she commented to herself.

“If you mean the Viscount of Owestry, it would seem that he has, mum,” Charlotte agreed, bringing in the flowers and arranging them in a vase.

“I take it there was a card?”

Charlotte passed it over.

Bella looked at the signature. It seemed Mrs. Russell had shared her address.  “I shall have to have a nosegay,” Bella remarked, “or is that not the form?” she wondered.

“The Viscount will certainly appreciate it,” Charlotte remarked.  “You always said he liked it when you carried a nosegay.”

“Yes,” Bella agreed.  “He did, did he not?”  She bit her lip and turned back to the paper.  It was filled with more speculation on the Russell wedding.  She wondered where they got their information.  They obviously had an inside source.

She turned the page.

When it came time to dress for dinner, she chose an unadorned dress to better highlight the nosegay of yellow roses.  She even had Charlotte put one or two blossoms in her hair to accent the outfit and create a greater effect.  She was no longer a young lady in the fresh bloom of youth, but she wanted Owestry to notice her.  She wasn’t so self-ignorant that she didn’t realize her heart had constricted when her eyes had landed on him in the dressmaker’s.

She took the carriage to Fifth Avenue and made sure she was fashionably on time.  It wouldn’t do to be late.

When her footman handed her out of the carriage, Bella looked up at the mansion that was all alight with candles.  Electricity had been invented but was not operational in the 1880s.  She looked forward to when there were heated showers.

Larry Russell was waiting for her when she came in when her wrap was taken.

“What are you doing here?” she asked as her nosegay when given back to her.  “I know this is your house, but shouldn’t you be in the Drawing Room?”

Larry smiled at her as if he had a secret.  “Everyone is talking about you.”

Bella somehow wasn’t surprised.

She took his offered arm and allowed him to lead her in.  “Then why aren’t you in there and listening to the gossip?” she asked.  “The Duke of Buckingham will be your brother-in-law in a matter of days.”

“Yes,” Larry agreed.  “However, will you be my cousin?  They say you’ve stolen some Earl’s heart.”

Bella forced herself not to blush.  “‘Stolen’ is such a strong word,” she argued, bringing the nosegay up to her nose to hide her expression.  “I’m sure I gave it back.”

“Did you?” Larry asked with a laugh.  He paused in front of the doors and leaned toward her.  “Does he know about your nightly pursuits?  I can keep a secret, but I need to know which secrets I’m keeping.”

“I’m sure he didn’t tell Mrs. Russell,” Bella informed him carefully, just as quietly, “but how do you think we met?”

Larry leaned back and looked into her eyes, smiling.  “You are a dark horse, Miss Swan.”

“I like to think so,” she agreed.  “Now.  You better feed me to the wolves.”

And it was a feeding to the wolves.  As soon as they entered, everyone turned toward them as if they were expecting them, and the room went immediately silent.  It was clear Bella had been the topic of conversation.

Bella glanced at Larry as if to say, “See?” before releasing his arm and approaching her hostess as was only proper.

Owestry was soon upon them, claiming her hand.  “You wore the roses,” he whispered in her ear happily.  “I’m glad you liked them.”

“Of course I like them,” she told him.  “You know they’re my favorite.”

His chest was puffed out when he brought her to a gentleman with brown hair and a mustache.  Bella could see a definite family resemblance to Owestry.  This must be the Duke of Buckingham.  As Bella understood it, the Earl of Matlock’s sister had been the late Duke’s duchess.  She lived in a dower house somewhere and didn’t seem to have come to New York for the wedding.

Buckingham kissed Bella’s gloved hand and regarded her carefully.  “I have been wishing to make your acquaintance for many years since.”

“I was unaware Owestry discussed me with his relations,” Bella told him truthfully, accepting her hand back.  “I have very humble origins.”

“Not so, Miss Swan,” Buckingham assured her, “or at least not a humble present.”

“I certainly do not live like this,” Bella assured him, referencing the Russell mansion.  “It is rumored Mr. Russell is the richest man on Wall Street.  I read about him nearly every day in the papers.”

“I understand you are not from New York yourself,” Buckingham pressed, changing the subject neatly.

Owestry was standing beside her, a solid but silent support, his very presence a comfort to her.  She could feel his fingers in the folds of her skirt.  It was as if the past four years had not passed and they were once again in England, shirking propriety and stealing intimacies with one another.

“No,” Bella agreed, glancing at Owestry.  “I’m originally from Arizona, though I spent some time with my father in Washington State, out on the frontier.  I’m afraid I did not grow up in the more civilized parts of America.”

“We do not hold it against you,” Owestry promised her, looking at her adoringly.  “The frontier spirit is what I admire about you so much.”

Bella gave him a small, tentative smile.  “I still cannot believe you followed me to New York.”

“I would have followed you sooner if I thought I could have found you,” he confessed.  “However, I never even knew where you lived in London.  It was a complete mystery to me, and I was courting you for a full ten months.”

She did blush now and once again brought the nosegay up to her face to hide it.  Regaining control, Bella admitted, “I am an unprotected woman, Owestry.  I do not give out my address to single gentlemen.”

Buckingham looked between them knowingly.  “Well, Mrs. Russell knows your address.”

“I am certain Mrs. Russell will keep it safe in her address book if I should ask it of her,” Bella teased, directing her words at Owestry.  She knew he knew where she lived, or at least the florist did.  “I have my reputation to think of.—Now, is the bride coming down?”

“No,” Buckingham told her carefully.  “Gladys has retreated to her boudoir.”

Bella had to keep from smiling.  The idea of a lady having a boudoir just sounded so funny to her.  It sounded like something illicit were going on, though that was clearly not what was happening.  A boudoir was a fashionable lady’s retreat.

“I should like to meet her,” Bella admitted.  “I am, after all, one of her bridesmaids.  I suppose the other bridesmaids are young ladies of fashion.”

“I presume so,” Buckingham agreed.  “The names mean nothing to me.”

Bella hummed.  She returned her attention to Owestry for a second, thinking.  Then, turning back to Buckingham, she inquired, “Have any other your other relatives arrived for the wedding?”

“My sister, Lady Sarah,” he informed her.  “She’s dying to come over her, but I told her not to overwhelm you.”

“Oh?”  Bella purposefully did not look around the room.  “Is there anyone else here tonight?  The Russells, the three of us, and Lady Sarah?”

“If Gladys were here,” Buckingham remarked, “we would have even numbers.”

“Oh dear,” Bella realized, knowing enough of society to know a hostess would not want her numbers uneven.  “How unfortunate.”

“Very unfortunate,” Buckingham agreed, quite seriously.

Considering, Bella ventured, “This cannot really be called a dinner party, however, if it’s just the two families with me added in.  Nothing is really ruined.  We’re dining en famille.”

Owestry coughed into the back of his hand.  “Quite right,” he decided.  “We only need Julia and Richard.”

“We don’t need Richard,” Buckingham decided, referencing Owestry’s younger brother.  “Demmed fool doesn’t know what’s good for him, insisting he and his heirs will inherit your title when there’s a perfectly decent woman for you to marry.”  Here he bowed to Bella.  “Now that you have found her again.”

“Bella is not a woman to be conquered—” Owestry began to argue, but a butler came in and signaled to Mrs. Russell.

Dinner was served.

Owestry was naturally Bella’s dinner partner.  Mrs. Russell had arranged it all quite nicely.

“Are you financially secure?” Owestry inquired over the soup course.  “You are not hurting.  Because if you are—”

“No,” Bella insisted quietly.  “I do quite well for myself.  I always have.  You need not worry on that score.”  She dipped her spoon into the pea green soup and lifted a spoonful up to her mouth, blowing on it carefully and trying it.  Interesting.  She wouldn’t have thought it would taste like that.

“I have worried for you all these years,” Owestry confessed.  “You were always competent, but a wrong hand can always lead to a losing streak.”

“I have savings,” she insisted.  “I don’t bet what I can’t lose.—Larry Russell and I have played together.”

Owestry looked up at the son of the household, appraising him.  “He’s too much of a puppy for you.  He probably reminds you of Septi.”

Bella smiled to herself.  “He does that,” she admitted, taking another spoonful.  She did not mention that she was in a semi regular correspondence with Lord Septimus Wimsey.  She had given up her romance with Owestry, but she hadn’t given up her friendship with Septi, who had been a confidant and a true friend. He was twenty-three now and owned an estate in Kent, not yet married, but Bella had hopes for him. 

She knew Owestry had interrogated and even threatened Septi when she had first disappeared, believing he had known her whereabouts.  However, Bella had been circumspect.  She had waited a year and a half before writing Septimus, when she had hoped Owestry would have accepted she was gone.

Owestry would not marry.  She knew that.  His marriage to Sophie, his first wife, had been so miserable that he had determined to never marry again, not even to secure an heir for the title—until Bella had changed his mind.  She knew he would not settle on anyone else.  It was her or nothing, and with her disappearance, his earlier resolve to never remarry would have reasserted itself.

Of course, she had never expected him to follow her to America.  She had left no hint in her letter where she was going, even that she was leaving the country—only that she was gone and she had no intention of him ever finding her.  That he had found her at all was miraculous.  She wondered how he had done it, or if he just had taken a chance that she might be in New York.

Pausing, she glanced at Owestry.  “How did you know to have Mrs. Russell look for me?”

“I thought you were in Paris at first,” he admitted carefully.  “I looked for you there.”

“Then?”

“I knew you would never go to Italy,” he told her next.  “You always said you hated it there.  You professed you never liked Spain or Switzerland.  I tried Marseille.  That is a popular holiday spot.  I sent agents to Bonn and Baden Baden.  Then my mind to the United States.  It occurred to me you might have come home.”  He shrugged.  “I didn’t know where to start.  New York seemed as good a place as anywhere.”

She shook her head.  “Lucky Mrs. Russell found me—for you.”

Owestry put down his spoon and turned to her.  “Are you going to disappear again?”

“Do I need to?” she asked just as seriously.

The nosegay of yellow roses was set next to her plate.

A servant came between them and took her bowl away and the moment was broken.  Bella glanced up at the table and saw that Buckingham was speaking with Mrs. Russell.  Lady Sarah seemed to be saying something to the table.  Bella and Owestry seemed to be in their own private world.

“I still love you, you know,” Owestry now admitted, now that the servant was gone.  “I know you loved me once.”

“My circumstances have changed,” Bella murmured.  Edward was no longer a possibility she could dream about.  Her life in the twenty-first century was now well and truly gone.  If she even found Carlisle it wouldn’t matter.  She was too old.

“Have they?” Owestry asked carefully.

A servant approached and served Bella the next course.

She looked at it.  It seemed to be a small piece of meat with some sort of sauce drizzled on it.  She supposed this was how the rich lived.  She would have to get used to it if—when she married Owestry.  She doubted an Earl would let his Countess cook dinner.

How she missed pizza dinners in front of the TV with Charlie.  She had hated them at the time, but now she was nostalgic for them.

Bella looked up at Owestry.  His watery eyes looked so hopefully.

“If you should ask me again—”

“Will you sail back with us on the boat on Sunday?” Owestry breathed.  “We can be married on the ship by the Captain.”

Bella laughed a little to herself.  “I have a ladies’ maid,” she warned.

“How perfectly lovely,” he complimented.  “She can stay in your cabin after the marriage and simply come and dress you for dinner when it is time.”  He reached out and carefully placed his hand over hers on the table, which was terribly risqué for the 1880s.  “Well, m’dear?”

“Well,” she agreed. “That’s settled then.”

Three days later, Bella was dressed in white and waiting in Russell House.  She had blue flowers in her hair and had a veil, which she had set aside.  She thought it was absolutely horrible, but traditions must be observed, and she would soon be a bride herself. 

She and Charlotte had agreed to pack this dress for their departure the next day and she would wear it at her own wedding aboard ship.

Larry Russell had sent her a note early that morning, asking her to stop by before the wedding, and now she was waiting in the Drawing Room.

“Ah,” Larry greeted, coming in.  “There you are, Miss Swan.”

“Why am I here?”

“Gladys won’t come down.”

Bella blinked.  She was confused.  “Shouldn’t one of her friends be here?”

“I would ask Marian,” Larry agreed, “but you are in a unique situation.”  He came up to her and took her in carefully.  “You are engaged to Hector’s cousin, the Viscount of Owestry.  You have agreed to the life Gladys is entering—and you’re in love with Lord Owestry.  Mother said you ran away from him and he followed you all the way here.  It’s the perfect love story.”

Bella grimaced.  “I do not imagine myself as a heroine.”

“Please,” Larry asked.  “Try.”

Bella wasn’t in exactly a position to refuse.  She was a bridesmaid after all and Buckingham was her fiancé’s cousin.  Owestry had explained the financial difficulties the dukedom was in.  Most titles were in financial difficulties.  The Earldom of Matlock was lucky in the fact that it was financially solvent and Owestry could marry where he pleased.

She was shown up to the second floor and, after knocking on the door, Bella entered a lovely bedroom.  A young girl in a dressing gone was sitting on a loveseat, looking completely lost.  Her big brown eyes looked up and Bella smiled at her.

“You’re one of my bridesmaids,” Gladys realized.  “I have no idea who you are.”

“No one’s told you about me?” Bella wondered.  “I’m Bella Swan.”

A look of realization crossed Gladys’s face.  “You’re marrying Hector’s cousin.  Larry told me.”

“I am,” she agreed, carefully coming in and taking a seat.  “It’s the only way Mrs. Russell got me to wear white.  I quite detest the color.”

“You do?” Gladys wondered.

“I’ve been in mourning for over five years,” Bella admitted.  “My father died on the crossing to England.  It’s easier just to always wear black.”  She shrugged.

Gladys turned to more fully face her.  “You must come out of mourning now that you’re marrying Lord Owestry.”

“I suppose I will,” Bella agreed, “but less about me.  You’re supposedly getting married today.”

Gladys sighed.  “I never thought today would actually come.”

“I was so scared of marrying Owestry I boarded a ship for America and didn’t tell anyone.”

Gladys’s eyes widened.

“No one told you that part?”

Gladys shook her head.

Bella looked down at her hands and glanced back up.  “But you’re not in love with Buckingham.  Not like I am in love with Owestry.”

“No,” Gladys agreed.  “My mother wants me to marry him.”

“He seems very nice,” Bella murmured.  “He was very supportive of Owestry finding me.  He asked for Owestry’s opinion on Americans.”  She shrugged.  “I suppose you have me to blame for Buckingham’s interest in marrying an American heiress.”

Gladys reached out and touched the back of Bella’s hand.  “Owestry must truly love you.”

Bella smiled to herself.  “We love each other.—Englishmen are very quiet in their regard.  I have spoken to Buckingham about you.  He respects you and your opinions.  This is not an unequal marriage.  You are also both walking in with your eyes open.”

“My mother wants me to be a Duchess.  I never sought it.”

“I can well believe that of Mrs. Russell,” Bella agreed.  “However, you will not be friendless.  I will be there.  Another American.  Another girl who has been living in New York.  Owestry also has Buckingham’s ear.  We will both be in London for the Season.  I have several acquaintances that I will introduce you to.  I promise you that you’ll love Lord Septimus Wimsey, the youngest son of the Duke of Denver.”

“You already have it all set up,” Gladys realized.

“All set up for you,” Bella told her. 

Gladys was clearly thinking.

“You will have friends,” Bella coaxed her, “not just Buckingham.  I have a whole set all ready for you.”  Granted, they were all members of White’s and gamblers or the sisters of gamblers, but they were eminently respectable.

Bella hoped the offer of comradery and friendship would entice Gladys.  She couldn’t offer love, but she could offer friendship and social acceptance.

“And,” Bella continued, “Owestry and I are marrying on the ship.  We’re having the captain perform the honors.  You can be my bridesmaid.”  She gave Gladys a private smile.

There was a knock on the door.

Mr. Russell appeared.  He looked between the two of them.

“Father,” Gladys told him, a little hopefully, “Bella already has friends in London and has promised to introduce me, all our own age.  I won’t be a fish out of water.”

“Wonderful, darling.  I see your mother knew what she was about, making Miss Swan a bridesmaid.”  He came more fully into the room.  “Perhaps we should send Miss Swan to the church and you should get ready?”  Mr. Russell looked carefully at Bella.

Bella looked over at Gladys.  “I will be right there waiting for you,” Bella promised.  “I promise to introduce you to Owestry at the wedding breakfast.”

“Lord Owestry is standing up with Larry,” Mr. Russell put in.  “You might catch sight of him in the church.”  His eyes twinkled.

Gladys reached out and hugged Bella.  Bella hugged her back, not caring about crinkling her dress.

With that, she stood and nodded to Mr. Russell, closing the door behind her.

She paused for a moment before going downstairs to another girl’s wedding.  It would soon be her turn, and she found she couldn’t be sorry.

The End.