"Mm."
"Each newly-married couple receives complimentary tea and a cake at the public house. That's something, isn't it?" She shook her head, smiling. "In these days, where you must pay for even the smallest luxury, and little Gretna Green just gives you tea and cake for being married. Isn't that something?" she repeated, meeting his eyes.
It started as a twitch, at one corner of his firm lips, and spread like a tiny shockwave until Mister Field smiled, which made a wild fluttering in her breast. He chuckled, crooking his elbow for her. "It really is."
She twined their arms together, cheered. "Now are you ready?"
"As I'll ever be, Miss Blake."
* * *
"What do you mean, 'not today'?" Patrick bored holes into Mrs. Gaveston, the potato-faced woman behind the public house's high counter. He should have known that two thousand pounds could never be had so easily.
"As I've told ye, sir, it's Lady Day. Our men have gone to seek work and pay the rents, and their women are along to sell wares. Or them without skills is minding the children of those what have wares to sell."
He swallowed and glanced once more at Amelia, who smiled and was placid as a still pond except for an unconcerned lift of her shoulders. "So…"
"So there's no way, and no one, and we don't make exceptions on special days, neither. No one ta' marry ya', and even if there was, ain't two spare bodies could act as witness." She treated him to a gap-toothed guffaw. "Horses and woolies don't count!"
Amelia joined in the woman's laughter, doubled over until she glimpsed his frown, and her chuckling faded into a sigh. "If we can't take a marriage certificate, I suppose we'll have to take a room."
"Two rooms!" he snapped, holding up his fingers for her and the proprietress in case there was any question of the number.
"Ohh!" Mrs. Gaveston shook her head in mock sorrow, thick lips twitching. "Oh, sir. I'm the very messenger of bad tidings for ya'." She turned down her eyes, and her lips went on twitching, but she held silent. Obviously she didn't find the tidings so ill and was pleased at making him drag the information from her.
He looked to Amelia, who shrugged her delicate soldiers, and then he sighed. "And why, pray, is that, Mrs. Gaveston?"
"One room!" Her hand slapped down and her finger stuck up. "I've one proper suite, vacated by a couple this morning. Or chased out, depending on whose folks you ask, I reckon." She laughed again, a sound he was growing to loathe. "Take it or leave it; you won't find no other accommodation."