17. Stop The Wedding, I Want To Get Off

"Miss Sheffield," Niles asked softly. "Are you awake?"

"Come in," came the voice on the other side of the door.

Jocelyn Sheffield was not only still awake – at eleven p. m., no less – but still dressed, sitting on her bed with her knees drawn up and a glass of wine in one hand. She blinked up at him with eyes red from crying. This was not how a woman should look on the night before her wedding.

"If this is about the catering," she said, trying to smile, "I have complete confidence - "

"This is not about the catering." He closed the door behind him and advanced a few steps, until he stood by the foot of her bed. "Though it is about your wedding. May I sit down?"

"Of – of course." She put down her glass on the nightstand and gestured nervously, the Duke's diamond noticeably absent on her hand.

"Our families have known each other for a long time, haven't they?"

"Oh, since the Middle Ages at least," she giggled. "Why? What's the matter?

"More to the point, Miss Sheffield, you know me."

"Of course I do."

"You know that I rarely hesitate to speak my mind, especially when the welfare of my employer – or anyone connected to him – is concerned. They call me 'nosy', 'impertinent', 'interfering', but I only interfere for their own good. And on that note, Miss Sheffield, I feel it is my duty to ask you: are you absolutely certain that the Duke of Salisbury will make you happy?"

Jocelyn's face, which had been flushing deeper and deeper all the while as he spoke, finally crumpled up like a used tissue. Her mouth trembled; tears came sliding down her cheeks. She might have been six years old again, crying because her brothers had locked her out of their tree house. Niles sat down on the bed and gathered her into his arms, just as he had done then.

"You're right," she whispered against his shoulder. "That was not an appropriate question."

"Is it Lester?"

"How did you know?" She pulled away, shook her golden head, and smiled tearfully. "Never mind. Of course you know. Oh, Niles, do you think if I had any hope, I'd still be doing this?" She shot a glare at her wedding dress, which was hanging on the open closet door. "Don't you think, if – if he cared anything about me – he would have said something by now?"

Niles' glance fell on her nightstand, where a vase of peach-colored roses stood next to a video cassette of the film Sabrina. It was his turn to shake his head. Jocelyn, sweet as she was, appeared to have inherited the family tendency to miss what was right before their noses.

"With all due respect, Miss, I don't think you understand," he replied. "You don't know what it's like for a man in his position. Declaring himself is a risk he can't afford to take. If you were to reject him – "

"But I wouldn't!"

"It would either make every drive a misery, or force him to give up his job. And if you accepted him, it would be even more complicated – can you imagine Mrs. Sheffield's reaction to having a chauffeur as a son-in-law?"

Jocelyn winced.

"Not to mention the fact that he has nothing to offer you - "

"I don't need him to offer me anything," she retorted, blushing again. "I'm already rich enough. All I want … but it's impossible, Niles. You know it is."

"I know nothing of the sort."

He took one of the roses from the vase and handed it to her.

"Who do you think found these for your wedding bouquet? Who was it who could tell Miss Fine everything she needed to know – your favorite food, your favorite songs? Who carried you in his arms when you sprained your ankle the other day? Certainly not the Duke."

Jocelyn bowed her head over the rose, holding it in an attitude of prayer.

"You should see the way your chauffeur checks and double-checks the engine, just to make sure that car is in top condition when you step into it. And when you drive out together, he brakes for the full three seconds at every red light – nobody does that in England, let alone in New York! Don't you see? For men like us, the only way is to be subtle. We don't dare to show our feelings except through the work we do … "

Niles looked down at his hands, rough from years of chemicals. How many tea trays had they carried back and forth from Maxwell's office, loaded with shortbread cookies or cucumber sandwiches because he knew whose favorites they were? How often had he cleaned the green sofa where CC Babcock sat, or waxed the floor she walked on? How many times had she watched him working with a sneer on her elegant face?

"So you see," he wound up, forcing his thoughts back to Jocelyn and Lester. "If you'd only speak to him, it may all come out right. It's not too late."

Jocelyn sighed and leaned back against the headboard, her eyes half closed.

"I'll think about it," she says. "Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to get some sleep."

Her voice was flat and automatic, the voice of someone who will say anything to extract herself from an unwanted conversation. Niles wondered if she had any intention of 'thinking about it', or if the dazzling suitability of her match to the Duke of Salisbury would prove impossible to resist. His respect for his childhood playmate lowered by several degrees. Sensing this, she refused to meet his eyes.

"Thank you for your advice, Niles," she said, her aristocratic voice pronouncing every word with crystal clarity. "Good night."

"Good night, Miss."

He nodded, turned on his heel, and was already halfway out the door when she called him back.

"Niles?"

"Yes?

"You're not in love with someone, are you?" she asked, a little girl again, watching him with her arms wrapped around her knees. "Someone from a higher class than yours?"

"Really, Miss Sheffield. Would I do a thing like that?"

She laughed.

Thanking his stars for her inherited lack of perception, he bowed himself out.