He left the people he'd been talking to and approached her. "I've been looking everywhere for you. Is Livvy ready?"
“She'll be ready in time. I'm just getting the girls to help her dress.”
Layla and Eden were in high spirits and even Kitty seemed to have pulled herself together. "People are arriving. I want you out of sight so you can make a grand entrance," Jane said. "Let's go to Livvy's room and all help her get her gown and veil on.”
They hurried through the main room and upstairs. Jane took a seat by the door while the younger women fussed with Livvy's petticoats, a fancy garter, and the dress. As Eden started working on the long row of tiny buttons up the back, there was a light tap on the door. Mr. Willis had brought up an iced silver bucket with a bottle of champagne and a tray of elegant glasses.
“My gift to the bride and bridesmaids," he said.
They all thanked him effusively. "No more than a sip or we'll all be too drunk to get down the stairs without tripping," Eden said with a laugh. Then, realizing this might have been tactless considering how Mrs. Crossthwait had met her end, she started apologizing.
Jane took charge and cut her off. "There's no time for any of you to get tipsy," she said. "It's only ten minutes until showtime. Livvy, you look spectacular. And the rest of you are beautiful." She opened the door and said, "Whispering only now.”
There was a short stretch of wall between Livvy's room and the head of the stairs where they could line up without being seen from the room below. "Layla first, then Eden, then Kitty, remember. Here comes your father, Livvy.”
The husband and wife musicians were seated far enough back from the top of the stairs to be out of the way, but close enough for their music to drift down the stairway. Jane got the bridesmaids, Livvy, and her father lined up, took a deep breath, and nodded to the couple.
They stood up and began to play the flute and violin quietly. As the volume of chat and shuffling about in the room below diminished, the music got louder. After a moment, Jane peeked around the corner. The guests were in place. Marguerite and Iva sat to one side of the front row of chairs, Iva in a floor-length silvery dress and Marguerite in a matching style but in maroon. They should have traded either wigs or dresses, Jane thought. Mrs. Hessling was sitting on the other side of the aisle in dreadfully violent turquoise polyester with quite a large matching hat and purse. She was fidgeting with the purse, obviously trying to figure out whether she should hang onto it or set it on the floor. Uncle Joe, wearing the fairly decent clothes he'd worn to the rehearsal dinner, was standing against a wall at the back of the room, looking around at the other guests with a scowl. As Jane watched, Dwayne, Errol, and the minister came out of the side room where Shelley had been holding them until the right moment.
“Okay," Jane whispered as she turned to face the upstairs contingent. "Layla, you first. Try to stay centered on the staircase.”
Layla, lovely in her pink slip dress with the fringed scarf draped skillfully over one shapely shoulder, stepped out, head held high, and started slowly and gracefully down the stairs.
Jane watched for a moment, counting to ten, and turned to Eden. "You're next.”
Livvy was whispering furiously to her father. "I can't do it, Daddy. I know you're disappointed, but—"
“Livvy, get a grip on yourself," he said quietly, but very sharply.
“No. I don't want to marry Dwayne. I don't want to marry anyone.”
Jane nearly fainted. She'd already launched the first bridesmaid and it was time to fire up the next one and the bride had changed her mind!
There hadn't been anything in the wedding planning books about this!
Eden had turned to them as well. "Good for you, Livvy. Good for you!"
“Butt out, Eden," Jack Thatcher said. "You've always been a troublemaker."
“Daddy—"
“Livvy, it's too late. The wedding has started.”
The musicians, fascinated and appalled by the argument, missed a few notes. Jane glared at them and they obediently looked away and went back to playing properly.
“But Daddy—"
“No, Livvy. I'm not going to let you humiliate all of the family this way.”
Kitty made a funny gasping noise. Her face was awash in tears. Jane lunged into Livvy's room and grabbed a box of tissues, handing a wad of them to Kitty.
Eden took Jane's arm. "I'm going down now. The guests are starting to get alarmed and Jack will win anyway.”
She stepped out onto the stairway and started down the steps. Jane pulled on Kitty's sleeve, took another handful of tissues and quickly blotted her face, and said, "If you don't smile as you go down those steps, I'll hunt you down later and slap you senseless. Do you understand me?”
Kitty nodded and composed her face into a rather horrible grimace.
Jane didn't even have to watch Kitty's descent to know how awkward it was. She could hear the clunk of her feet over the music which was relentlessly going on. She turned to Livvy and Jack.
The hissing match was over. Livvy had one hand resting lightly on her father's arm and was holding her tulip bouquet in the other hand. Her face was as cold, white, and composed as marble. Jane waited, staring at them with horrified fascination, and when the sound of Kitty's heavy steps stopped, she touched Livvy's arm. It was clammy.
“Are you sure?" Jane asked.
Before Jack could say anything, Livvy nodded and father and daughter stepped forward.
Jane couldn't bear to even watch them descend the staircase. It was too much like watching someone go to the gallows. She went back to Livvy's room and collapsed in the chair by the window.
“Poor, poor Livvy," she whispered.
The musicians reached the end of their piece and fell silent.
Nineteen ·;·.
If Livvy refused to say her vows or ran screaming out of the lodge when the minister said, "Do you, Livvy…" there would be nothing Jane could do. Nor did she want to be seen peeking around the wall again, so she just sat there staring out the window, as clever and nimble as an amoeba, until the musicians began to play again. That meant it was over. For better or worse. If Jane's plans had been followed, Livvy and Dwayne had kissed to seal the bargain, then come around their flower "frame" and exited the lodge down the little center aisle between the chairs. In a moment, they'd be outside in the lovely April sunshine, being congratulated as the guests poured out behind them to deliver hugs, kisses, and good wishes.
Livvy was going to need lots of good wishes. Jane bestirred herself. There was a lot to do now and very little time. As she came down the stairs, she saw that the table people were already scurrying around like a school of very organized fish to fold up the chairs and stack them in preparation for putting up the long buffet table.
Larkspur was standing by, practically dancing with impatience and holding a big flower arrangement. At least Jane assumed it was Larkspur. All she could see were his legs behind the vase, flowers, and foliage.
Likewise, Mr. Willis was hovering at the kitchen door with an enormous silver chafing dish and his local assistant was weighed down with a stack of dinner plates.
Shelley was doing her best to dislodge the few guests who hadn't yet moved outside. "I'm tempted to jerk their chairs out from under them," she said as she passed Jane. "Ladies, would you like to come outside now?" she cooed sweetly to a pair of the trophy wives who were comparing their jewelry.
As soon as the last of them were driven outdoors, chaos broke out.
The long tables were slammed into place in the center of the room, tablecloths snapped and billowed and before they were even all in place, Mr. Willis and Larkspur were fighting for space on the long white expanse. Mr. Willis thought the beef Stroganoff should have pride of place in the very center of the table with appetizers and salads on one side and bread and desserts on the other. Larkspur felt strongly, and was not loath to express the view as if it were gospel, that the enormous vase of tulips, ferns, and agapanthusmust be the center highlight with smaller arrangements in the spots Mr. Willis had marked out for the plates, silverware, and napkins at the far end.
“Centerpiece flowers in the center," Jane snapped. "Small arrangements between the plates and appetizers and another between the bread and desserts and stop squabbling! Larkspur, the drinks table is almost ready. You work on that and then fit things around what Mr. Willis sets out."
“No flowers near the glasses," Mr. Willis shrieked. "They'll drop petals and bugs in the glassware."
“My flowers do not have bugs!"
“Flowers in the middle, glasses around them. Flower petals in champagne look pretty," Jane declared.
“You're getting this bossy stuff down," Shelley said from behind her. "What was the big delay between Layla's entrance and Eden's? People were beginning to mutter among themselves."