Diamonds are for Marriage: The Australian's Society Bride

“It’s true, isn’t it?” Robbie appealed to her. “Why are you trying to find fault with Boyd in this? He’s my saviour. I thought you loved him. You told me you were getting married.” He took hold of her arm. “Hell, I didn’t have anything to do with this sudden decision, did I?”

“Of course you didn’t.” Leona stopped that idea in its tracks. “It’s just that I see Boyd as invincible.”

“We all die, Leo,” Robbie said gently.

She shivered in the golden heat. “Don’t talk about dying!” For Boyd to die would destroy her. “It’s just I’ve spent so many years—”

“Putting up a front with Boyd?” Robbie suggested. “In some ways I think you find loving him the way you do terrifying,” he added very perceptively.

“Isn’t love terrifying?” she asked. “Love also sets one up for loss. The bliss of my childhood was shattered by the loss of my mother. Dad turned into another person. I think he forced himself to remarry. You know, the couples thing.”

“He could have done better than Mother,” said Delia’s only child, betraying the full extent of his emotional dislocation.

“Did Boyd say anything to you about—” she stumbled over the word “—us?”

“He said you’d agreed he’d make the announcement after he’d spoken to his father.”

“Who won’t be at all happy,” Leona repeated, showing her anxiety. The last thing she wanted to do was cause big trouble. For one thing, it might rebound on her own father, who held a high position in the firm. Rupert was not a man to be crossed.

Sharp-eyed Robbie inspected his stepsister’s lovely distressed face. “Why, Leo, sweetie, Boyd won’t give a damn about that. I keep telling you. He loves you. You’re the only woman in the world for him. Hell, I just hope I can find a woman I can love like Boyd loves you. Don’t you know how lucky you are?”

“Did he say he loved me?” Leona asked, so very uncertain of Boyd’s true motives.

“Leo, he doesn’t have to,” Robbie said. “When have you ever put into words your true feelings for Boyd? You’ve spent your time throwing dust in his eyes. I’d say Boyd has acted admirably. He’s given you an opportunity to grow up, stand on your own two feet, carve out a career. He’s very proud of you. We all are. Who cares about old Rupe? To be honest, I don’t think Boyd cares a lot about him either. Well, he is his father, but I have the feeling Boyd has never forgiven Rupe for the hard time he gave his mother. I do remember Aunt Alexa as being the loveliest lady and so kind to me. Then old Rupe ups and marries that gold-digger, Jinty. How he could after losing a woman like Alexa, I’ll never know.”

Leona didn’t know either. “For someone who is only twenty, you’re very perceptive, Robbie,” she said.

“That’s true.” He took the compliment for a statement of fact. “How did beautiful Alexa marry that wicked man? It couldn’t have been the money. Alexa’s family is old money, establishment.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, Rupert is still a handsome, virile man,” Leona said wryly. “If Jinty left him tomorrow—”

“That will never happen,” Robbie assured her.” Being Mrs Rupert Blanchard counts for everything in Jinty’s world. I bet she’s cursing the day Oz cut away from the Queen’s Honours system. She could have been Lady Blanchard. Now, wouldn’t that be something?”

“Actually, there is a Lady Blanchard,” Leona said, referring to the English side of the family. “But my point is that Rupert could have his pick of goodness knows how many women. Some as young as me.”

“Then it’s really a form of prostitution, isn’t it?” Robbie opined. “Selling yourself for money.”

Leona swallowed. “Well, I suppose that’s one way to put it.”

“It could never be you.” Robbie turned to her with his flashing white smile. “You and Boyd are not like them. You’re marrying for love. Hell, I feel like dancing!” He jumped up and held out his hand. “Come on. Let’s go back to the house. I’m starving.”

The three polo fields received constant year round attention from Rupert’s groundsmen to keep the surfaces in fine playing condition. With the more than welcome spring rains, Polo One, with perhaps the most spectacular setting, surrounded by rolling hills and magnificent shady trees was looking in great shape. A crowd of spectators from near and far was seated on rugs, collapsible chairs, bonnets, boots of cars, cushions and so on, right around the field. Those who weren’t early enough to find the choicest spots beneath the trees made sure they brought big beach umbrellas to ward off the brilliant sun.

Each team was made up of four players, wearing a different coloured jersey, bearing the number of the position they were playing. Robbie, who had made a lightning recovery, was wearing a green Number 1 jersey, which meant he was the most offensive player. Peter Blanchard was Number 4, primarily responsible for defending his team’s goal. Peter’s cousin, James, was at Number 2. James was more experienced than either Robbie or Peter. Boyd, as team captain, wore a deep red jersey that for some reason made his eyes look bluer than ever. Boyd, with an impressive armoury of strokes, was the highest rated player so he had the pivotal position of Number 3.

Leona, pre-match, moved freely about the gathering, greeting and being greeted by the familiar polo crowd. All four men on the Blanchard team looked stunningly handsome in their gear, a thought she was not alone in having; the tight-fitting white trousers, coloured jerseys, high boots, knee guards and helmets gave them the glamour of men in uniform. The opposing team looked pretty dashing too. To make it even better for the young female spectators, six of the eight players were bachelors.

In a cordoned off area beneath the deep shade of the trees were the polo ponies … A great polo pony was essential to a fine player’s performance and proficiency. The Blanchard team was superbly mounted. There were twenty-four ponies in all, mostly mares, that had to be made available during a match, due to the extreme demands put on a pony during the six period chukkas. Four minute breaks were taken to enable the players to change ponies.

Polo, one of the fastest, roughest, most dangerous games in the world of sport, was thus a rich man’s game. The upkeep of the teams of ponies alone was sufficient to keep it that way.

Leona was nervous. Nervous and excited too. She loved the game—the speed and athleticism of horse and rider, the strategies the brilliant pivotal players, like Boyd, came up with to clinch a game. But she had two men in her life to worry about. Boyd and Robbie. Dangerous collisions could and did happen even with the “right of way” rule. Robbie, though a fine player, was known on occasion to be downright reckless. Boyd, an even better rider, the far more experienced, subtle and considered player, was nonetheless given to spectacular displays especially on his number one polo pony, the beautiful mare, Andromeda, in play today. Robbie’s opposite number was a player Leona had watched many times before. Without question an experienced player with a big range of shots, he wasn’t above a bit of barging, hooking and blocking his opposite number to slow him down. Mostly it worked. So there was a duel on there. Even Boyd, who relied on thought, action and fantastic speed as opposed to dirty tactics, which actually made him the superior opponent, when the chips were down played his team to win.

Leona was wearing white—always good in the heat—a pinstriped fine cotton shirt with matching crisp white trousers, an eye-catching navy and white leather belt looped through the waistband. To complete the look she had brushed her hair high off her forehead, then caught it into an updated French pleat. She looked, as she always did, very chic. It was, after all, part of her job and so far as the family was concerned that was the way they wanted and expected to see her. Rupert had already complimented her on her appearance and kissed her on both cheeks. Obviously his son and heir hadn’t got around to having that heart-to-heart talk. Well, she had told Boyd she wanted to be well clear of Brooklands when that happened.

Jinty had had the good sense to keep a still tongue in her head, not wanting to fall out with the Heir. Tonya, though, as always, had a jibe to share. “Don’t you find white a problem?” she smirked, inspecting Leona from head to toe, immensely jealous and agitated by the way Leona’s slender figure and glowing head was soaking up all the sunlight.

“I’m not going to dig the garden beds, Tonya,” was Leona’s reply, her tone pleasant. Keeping one’s cool in the face of Tonya’s contrived insults and barbs only served to irritate Tonya the more. Tonya herself was looking bone thin but very stylish in a deceptively simple shift dress, its colour almost a match with Boyd’s red jersey.

Robbie, then Peter, came up to Leona, expecting and getting good luck and best wishes for a win. Peter put his arm tightly around her in some sort of claim, before his kiss landed on the side of her mouth, despite her best attempt to dodge it.

Nevertheless she knew the clinch would set off a chain of gossip. She remembered how one elderly member of the family had had a girl pregnant from a single kiss she’d caught one of the cousins exchanging with his then girlfriend. “Such things do happen!” was the dire warning.

“That boy’s in love with you,” Geraldine now told her, shaking her arm as if to put her on the alert.

“What a lot of rot, Gerri!” Leona tried to answer carelessly.

“Not rot, my dear,” Geraldine corrected her firmly. “Just be sure to tell him you’re spoken for.”

Spoken for? Leona felt the hot wave of colour stain her cheeks. “Are you going to tell me how you heard that?” Boyd was very close to his aunt. He must have told her.

“I’ve heard nothing. So far,” Geraldine maintained, adjusting the brim of her straw hat to a snappier angle. “I have eyes.”

Leona fell into the deckchair beside her, urgently taking Geraldine’s hand. “So what exactly is it you think you’ve seen? And with whom?”

Geraldine patted the small fine-boned hand that held hers. Then her shrewd grey eyes went past Leona’s lovely, imploring face. “He’s coming over right now. Don’t look so worried, child. I’ve had my suspicions for quite a while.”

“Oh, my goodness!” Leona jumped up, stopping only to whisper in Geraldine’s ear, “Gerri, I swear I’m frightened of you.”

“Don’t be frightened, child,” Geraldine looked up with a reassuring smile. “Everything will be fine.”

All it would need was a miracle.

“Flower Face, still running away?” Boyd swiftly caught up with her as she dodged through the trees, catching hold of her hand.

“I have to, Boyd. I’m feeling absolutely stretched.” Indeed she was. She rounded to stare up into his sapphire eyes, gemlike against his bronzed skin.

“You want us to have a nice quiet game?” he asked with such a beguiling half smile.

“Damn it! The game’s only half of it,” she said spiritedly. “I am nervous for you and Robbie. I couldn’t bear it if either of you were injured.”

“For heaven’s sake, I thought all your thoughts were with Peter!” he scoffed. “Where does he get off, hugging you like that? I was gratified to see you turn your head away. He was most certainly aiming for an off-to-the-wars type kiss.”

“Well, he didn’t get it!” Leona said in a tart voice. “Have you said anything at all to Gerri about … about … us?”

“One would have to get up very early in the morning to take Gerri by surprise,” Boyd said. “Gerri’s a mind-reader. Why, has she said something?”

Leona bit her lip. “She said everything will be fine.”