Page 169 of Dark Tides
Johnnie had ceased to write anything, his pen suspended over the page, a blot of ink forming slowly on the nib. The minister looked blank, the magistrate was silent.
Livia turned to Rob. “I am so sorry, Roberto. But we did not know. We were young and so much in love! How should we know? The minister of your church should have told us, and baptized me, so that we might truly marry. He should have prepared me and confirmed me into his congregation in your church, as this good man has so carefully done. I would have done that for you! You know that I would have done anything for you. But he failed us, and since I was not a member of your church, since I did not understand my vows, the service was invalid. We were never married.”
The magistrate turned to Rob. “Is this true, Dr. Reekie?”
“Yes,” Rob replied hesitantly. “It’s true that we married in my church… I didn’t know…”
“If the couple are of different faiths the marriage is invalid,” the minister confirmed. “If she was not prepared for communion in our church and did not understand the vows then it is true: you were not married. All this time you were living in sin, God forgive you both. And the child…”
“Good Lord,” Lady Eliot said, truly shocked. “What has she said? Will she make her own child a bastard?”
Everyone turned to look at Matteo, who had woken and was struggling to get down from Carlotta’s arms to crawl on the floor.
“Oh, the child is mine,” Felipe spoke up.
Rob turned on him.
Sarah watched him give a little shrug as if he did not care what the admission might cost him. “The boy is mine.”
“Heavens save us!” Lady Eliot said, and gave a little stagger.
Livia shot one fierce glance at Felipe. “The child has been baptized and is the son and heir of Sir James Avery,” she stated. “Nobody else can claim him.” She stepped towards James and slid her hand into his arm. “He is our son,” she said. “Matthew Avery.”
“I doubt that Sir James wants him now,” Felipe remarked. “An Italian bastard as the heir of an English lord?”
Sir James made no answer and did not respond at all to Livia’s clutch on his arm, neither taking her hand nor shaking her off. He stood, completely still as if frozen, his eyes on the magistrate like a man awaiting sentence.
“Who witnessed your Venice wedding to Dr. Reekie, madam?” the magistrate asked her.
“I did,” Felipe volunteered conversationally. “I and a colleague of mine, a member of the stone mason’s guild.”
“Although the woman was your mistress?”
Lady Eliot closed her eyes as if she were about to faint, and then opened them again to see Felipe’s face as he answered.
“Yes,” Felipe agreed. “Would that make it invalid in your church?”
“It makes it scandalous,” the magistrate told him with distaste. “It makes it a disgrace. But not invalid. It was invalid because she was not of our religion, and she now declares that she did not understand her vows. So she was never married to Dr. Reekie, whatever you witnessed, it was not the sacrament of marriage in the Church of England. She was indeed a widow when she came to London, as she declared herself, but she was the widow of her first husband: the Signor Fiori.”
“Wearing the mourning clothes she bought for his funeral,” Felipe confirmed cheerfully. “That was a valid marriage. I witnessed that too.”
“So she was, in fact, able to marry me?” Sir James asked coldly. “Our marriage is valid in law and in the eyes of the church?”
“She was able,” the magistrate ruled, and the minister nodded.
“And she did marry me?” Sir James confirmed, his eyes like ice.
“She did,” the magistrate agreed.
“So the case of bigamy is dismissed?”
“No case to answer,” the magistrate declared.
Sir George let out a quiet oath, and Lady Eliot exhaled a trembling sigh, but no one else responded at all. Mr. Lucas tapped Johnnie’s arm to remind him to record the judgment. “This lady’s second marriage in Venice to Dr. Robert Reekie was invalid, her marriage here was properly undertaken.” He glanced down at Johnnie’s notes. “You’re a married man, Sir James, like it or not.”
White-faced, his arm gripped possessively by Livia, James Avery bowed slightly. “Thank you,” he said without any hint of gratitude.
“This is an outrage!” Lady Eliot stepped towards the desk, bristling with fury. “After what has been said about her? She is little more than a Venice whore! A criminal. A counterfeiter and fraudster! She cannot be married into the Avery family!”
