Although Willis, Sr., was no longer the head of the family firm,he was still regarded as the head of the family and attendance at his nuptials was considered compulsory. Flocks of aunts, uncles, and cousins would soon be descending on Finch to pay homage to the paterfamilias, an event that did not fill Bill with unalloyed joy. While he got along well with most of his relatives, he actively disliked two of his aunts. He referred to them as the Harpies, but only when Will, Rob, and his father were out of earshot.
Though Aunt Honoria and Aunt Charlotte had been widowed for many years, they had, in their youth, married men from their own social milieu. They believed that Bill had let his old-money Boston Brahmin family down when he’d married a middle-class girl from Chicago. Had they been openly hostile to me, Willis, Sr., would have come down on them like a ton of bricks, so they disguised their disdain with artful expressions of “concern” for me, the unfortunate outsider.
They criticized my posture, my table manners, my dress sense, and my speech, but they did so solicitously, as if they were bringing enlightenment to a savage who’d been raised on a desert island by a troop of baboons. Willis, Sr., who could usually spot a hidden agenda from a mile off, was blind to his sisters’ shenanigans. He saw Charlotte and Honoria through rose-colored glasses, but they made my easygoing husband see red.
Bill’s aunts had never darkened our doorway in England—they rarely left Boston—and he was not looking forward to their first visit. He made his misgivings known to me as we strolled along our little lane one day, three weeks before the wedding.
It was a glorious Saturday morning in early June. After dropping the boys off at the local stables for their weekly riding lessons, Bill had decided to clear up some neglected paperwork that awaited him at his office in Finch. He didn’t usually walk to the village and I didn’t usually accompany him, but the weather was superb and we’d both felt like stretching our legs.
My mind was on other things when Bill spoke, so his words seemed to come out of nowhere, like a bolt from the blue.
“If the Harpies are rude to you,” he declared, “I’ll strangle them.”
“I should hope so,” I said lightly, but one glance at my husband’s thunderous expression told me that he was not in the mood for levity. “What brought your aunts to mind?”
“A phone call from Father,” he replied. “Honoria and Charlotte will be arriving at Fairworth House on Monday.”
“Monday?” I said, my heart sinking. “Why so soon?”
“They say they’re coming early to help Amelia with the wedding, but you and I know they’ll do nothing but nitpick and nag.” Bill laughed bitterly. “I wouldn’t put it past them to spend the next three weeks trying to talk Father out of marrying Amelia.”
“Fat chance,” I said scornfully.
“‘An artist in the family,’” said Bill, mimicking Honoria’s penetrating nasal drawl. “‘What on earth were you thinking, William? We could understand it if she dabbled. Everyone dabbles. But she sells her paintings. For money. My dear, it simply isn’t done!’”
“They wouldn’t be stupid enough to talk like that in front of your father, would they?” I asked incredulously.
“I almost wish they would,” said Bill. “It’d be a treat to watch Father kick them out of Fairworth.”
“If they spout off about Amelia, he will,” I said. “And they won’t be able to stay with us because we don’t have a guest room anymore.”
“Yet another reason to be thankful for my beautiful wife,” Bill acknowledged, “and my beautiful, beautiful daughter.”
My husband’s entire aspect changed as he gazed down at the precious passenger I was pushing along in the pram. His shoulders relaxed, his fists unclenched, and his thunderous expression gave way to one of pure adoration. Bill was in love as he had never been in love before and I felt not the slightest twinge of jealousy because I, too, was besotted.
Don’t get me wrong. We loved our sons ferociously, but our baby girl had come to us long after we’d abandoned hope of having another child. Her late arrival had secured a special place in our hearts for her. Because of her, Bill had done the unthinkable: He’d cut back on his workload in order to spend less time at the beck and call of his demanding clients and more time at home with his family. It was a choice the Harpies would never understand, but I did, and I approved of it with all my heart.
Our daughter had been christened Elizabeth Dimity, after my late mother and a dear friend, but Will and Rob had dubbed her Bess. I suspected they’d done so for the pleasure of calling her Bessy Boots, Messy Bessy, and a host of other big-brotherly nicknames, but Bess she had been from that day forward.
Bess had entered the world on a stormy, snowy night in late February—a scant fifteen weeks ago—but we felt as if we’d known her forever. She had her father’s velvety brown eyes, my rosy complexion, and a wispy crop of silky, softly curling dark-brown hair.
“She is beautiful, isn’t she?” I crooned.
“She’s incomparably beautiful,” Bill agreed, “and highly intelligent.”
“And even-tempered,” I added.
“And healthy and strong and good-humored,” Bill continued.
“And kind and patient and wise,” I went on.