Fournier’s of London had been open for three weeks, three weeks in which the numbers of diners had grown nightly until they needed to take bookings and began to turn people away at the door.
Tonight, though, no bookings had been accepted and nor would casual diners be able to penetrate into the elegant interior, where polished wood, crisp white linen, shining silver, and sparkling crystal waited for the few privileged guests.
And tonight, welcoming the diners would not be the task of the maître d’hôtel who usually managed the dining room while the proprietor controlled the kitchen.
Tonight, Marcel had left his chief assistant in charge of the final preparations. Tonight, Monsieur Fournier himself would greet his patrons, and not alone. For tonight, the restaurant, normally a sanctuary for gentlemen, would be entertaining women, and not only women, but ladies. Including Cedrica, who was waiting at the door.
Had it been less than a year since she had written to her father’s noble relative in a last desperate bid to keep the bishop from locking the poor man up? How things had changed!
Here was the biggest change of all: her husband, looking splendid in a black dress coat and knee breeches. He slipped an arm around her waist and kissed the top of her head. “Are you nervous, cherie?”
“Proud, Marcel. I am looking forward to showing our investors what we have done.”
He turned with her, surveying the largest of five dining rooms with satisfaction. Here, they could host up to one hundred diners at a time, with tables that could be divided or put together to suit the convenience of the patrons, from single diners to large banquets. The smallest of the rooms accommodated eight with comfort and could be configured for smaller groups.
Tonight, they would be using one of the medium-sized rooms, for tonight, they welcomed the friends who had taken shares in the restaurant.
It had been Lord Aldridge’s idea. When Cedrica first realized that he planned to pay the dowry he had promised, she voiced her decision to split it between buying care for her father and helping Marcel pay for the restaurant, but Aldridge advised her to think again.
“The Grenfords owe your father a duty of care,” he assured her. “Invest in the restaurant by all means, but not only in the restaurant. You also need a separate income. I suggest money in the Funds for security and then some other ventures that will give a greater return. You must think of your long-term security, cousin.”
Cedrica had quizzed Marcel on his plans and then spent hours collecting figures and doing sums. “But we will need all that money if we are to open this year.”
“We could work another year,” Marcel suggested, “or open a lesser establishment.”
“Or accept investors,” Aldridge suggested. “You and Cedrica to hold the majority share, and no one else with more than…” He pursed his lips as he considered, “five percent. You would have my support. I am confident you will make me money.”
Her Grace agreed, and so did the Laceys and the Suttons and others. In no time at all, it seemed, they had the funds to make over a building to Marcel’s high standards, the rental on a comfortable home nearby, and investments in the Funds, Aldridge’s cousin’s trading company, a woolen mill in Manchester, and a canal building enterprise.
Less than two months after the end of the house party where it all started, Monsieur Marcel Fournier and Mademoiselle Cedrica Grenford were married. Twice. Once according to English practice and law and again in a small comfortable parlor off the side of the local Roman Catholic chapel.
And now Monsieur and Madame Fournier would say thank you to those who made it possible.
“It looks well,” Marcel decided. “And the dinner, the dinner, my Rica, will be the most magnificent they have ever tasted.”
Cedrica smiled. He said that every night, and every night, his guests assured him it was true.
Out in the hall, the restaurant door opened, and they could hear the portier greeting the first arrivals. In moments, it seemed, they were surrounded by cheerful friends, the men slapping Marcel on the back and congratulating him on making them all rich, the women kissing Cedrica on the cheek and gently scolding her for being too busy to meet friends for tea.
“Mama and I brought you a present,” Aldridge said. “I left it in the hall. Just one moment.” He left the room and returned a moment later with a long, flat, oblong shape wrapped in silk and tied with ribbon, which he handed to the duchess.
“We wanted to give you something useful but unusual, something that would always remind you of Hollystone Hall,” she said.
Marcel, seated beside Cedrica, lifted her hand and kissed it. “I have a wonderful souvenir of that house party, Your Grace,” he said.
The duchess smiled. “Indeed you do. To remind you of us, then, Monsieur. We consulted with Mrs. Pearce, and she suggested that this might be suitable.”
What on earth could it be? Cedrica and Marcel took one end of the parcel each and began to untie ribbons. When Marcel cleared his end of the silk and saw the box within, he began to laugh. Cedrica was still mystified until she finished unwrapping and was able to open the box and see the pearwood mold within, the one with the dolphin shapes that had caused such contention.
“Look, Marcel, at last you will be able to make your ice tower!”
Leave it to Aldridge to have the last word, as he raised his glass of wine. “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Fournier’s of London. May it, and its proprietors, be a towering success.”
***
Today’s scene is the epilogue from A Suitable Husband, a stand-alone novella that first appeared in Holly and Hopeful Hearts. In that anthology, the Bluestocking Belles wrote stories set around a house party hosted by the Duchess of Haverford.
