Softness of the Lime by Maxine Case

Author:Maxine Case [Case, Maxine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781415209110
Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
Published: 2017-05-19T22:00:00+00:00

Geert, 1792

A Cape wedding is never a simple matter. It is less so when the groom is counted as one of the most prosperous men in the Colony, young or old, and the bride is a daughter of a wealthy and connected man; a woman who could have had any man given the scarcity of estimable women of marriageable age, and yet she chose me. I had known Magdalena since her birth practically. Her father and mine had been well acquainted. Moreover, she had always been a dear friend of Johanna, being but a few years younger than my youngest sister. Had our families not been intimates, our town, though the first and largest in the Colony, was yet so small that, in the normal course of events, we’d have been acquainted soon enough, meeting either at the weekly church service, promenading in the Company’s Garden, or while attending dinner at the home of one or other of the Cape’s eminent citizens.

In all ways, Magdalena was the kind of lady that I had been fated to marry. Our mutual eligibility had made our union almost inevitable – unless Magdalena sought a groom with a smaller fortune, or I a bride with a lesser pedigree. Neither of these options was viable; Magdalena was a dutiful daughter and I would never have been able to escape my obligations to my family, nor all the responsibilities and rewards my father had bestowed upon me. Had I wanted another, or preferred a different course, there was the fact that I was no longer as eligible as might once have been supposed. Few knew of my situation, but suffice to say that, by the age of two and thirty years, I had learned about the caprices of fate. Magda was in no way disagreeable and her substantial dowry would right all my missteps of the previous years. Marriage between the two of us was a necessary affair. Even my sisters, always so possessive over their older brother, had agreed upon my choice. There was no use in concerning myself overly much in how they would have reacted were I to have taken another … less suitable … bride. No, no use at all.

I told myself that it was for my sisters’ sake that I had made my matrimonial decisions. My father had entrusted them into my care; it was a great honour and spoke of his belief in me. He knew that whatever happened I would make the right choices for my family.

Dorothea and Johanna had been such high-spirited young ladies that it surprised me how they’d both turned into such proper matrons. Perhaps marriage and responsibilities collaborated to ensure that fancy-free maidens became respectable mothers. I was certain that, all their charms and other considerations aside, their marriage prospects would have been demonstrably diminished had I allowed my heart to dictate whom I married. Yes, it was easier when I convinced myself – for no matter how short a span – that it was for them that I had postponed marriage until the time proved opportune.

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