No Other Duke Will Do (Windham Brides) by Grace Burrowes (16)

“So this is where you’ve been hiding.” Charlotte peered around at the books in the tower room. “I should have known. Who has abducted you this time? Shakespeare? Donne? Byron?”

Yesterday afternoon, Haverford had abducted Elizabeth on the same chaise she’d occupied all morning. The better part of her wits and her entire heart were still unaccounted for.

“Byron will not earn a place on these shelves for at least a century. Come in, Charlotte.”

Charlotte was impatient with anything that required her to sit for long periods—books, needlepoint, cutwork, church services—though she was better read than most young women of her station, because her mind was as active as her body.

“You must be in transports,” Charlotte said, drawing her cream wool shawl closer. “I have never seen so many books as this castle houses.”

“And you haven’t seen them all. There’s a third collection kept in the cellars under lock and key, the smallest and oldest. Haverford described it to me.” As afternoon had drifted toward evening, and Elizabeth had needed a way to ease back from the intimacy of lovemaking, Haverford had offered the topic with which she was most comfortable—books. Old, old books, and even illuminated manuscripts.

He’d regaled Elizabeth with anecdotes from St. David history. The fifth duke had chosen for his duchess a woman whose settlements included a trove of ancient documents. The eighth duke had won several Shakespeare folios by prevailing in a horse race. The stories were humorous, and yet, beneath the duke’s amused tone, Elizabeth had heard bewilderment.

“Some of these look like they were shelved on the Ark,” Charlotte said, peering at a row of bound volumes tagged with white silk cords. “You should marry Haverford.”

Elizabeth agreed. She’d written to her parents intimating as much, and to blazes with Haverford’s lack of wealth. Coin did not sneak a kiss to her nape when her stays had been done up. Coin did not take the time to show her pleasure when others had thought only to take it from her. Coin did not—

“I have never seen you wear quite that expression,” Charlotte said. “I suggest holy matrimony, and you look ready to start a holy war.”

“Matrimony for a man of Haverford’s standing is complicated.” Love, however, was the simplest thing in the world. “What has held your interest these past few days while I’ve been cavorting with great literature?”

Charlotte took the seat at the desk. The roses were beginning to droop, a fitting complement to Charlotte’s demeanor.

“I’ve been naughty. I am ashamed of myself, but mostly, I am disappointed.”

Elizabeth knew that sentiment. “Haldale?” He was handsome, charming, and not worth the smudge on Charlotte’s slipper.

“Gracious days, not Haldale. Did you know he has two children? Aunt Arabella made it a point to inform me of this.”

“You did not come up here to regale me with Haldale’s indiscretions.”

Charlotte touched a fading rose, and three petals dropped to the blotter. “I challenged Sherbourne to an archery contest.”

“Is the household to gather and watch Mr. Sherbourne’s humiliation?”

“You don’t like him?”

Haverford didn’t like him, and that was enough for Elizabeth. “He invited himself to this party, Charlotte, and harbors some sort of grudge against the St. Davids. I don’t like how he looks at Lady Glenys, and he apparently longs to develop a mine in this beautiful valley.”

“We burn coal in every household we inhabit. Why hold the mines against him? Dukes own mines, up north.”

“And men, women, and children work themselves to death in those mines. You’ve heard Mama’s tirades.”

In the last century, Wales had become—literally—Britain’s gold mine. Also its copper mine, iron smelter, slate quarry, and coal mine. Mama focused on the resulting slums, the valleys rendered infertile because of the smoky skies and dirty rain. She saw the poverty that lay beneath the great wealth of the coal barons and their managers.

Haverford saw those blights too, while Sherbourne apparently focused only on the wealth to be gained.

“I did not come here to argue politics,” Charlotte said, sweeping up the fallen petals and tossing them into the dust bin. “I don’t particularly care if Sherbourne’s wealth is earned in the same manner as the Duke of Northumberland’s. We don’t own any mines, do we?”

“No, Charlotte. Did you bed Sherbourne?” Elizabeth hoped not, for Charlotte’s sake.

“I said I’d been naughty, not demented. I bested him at archery. Shot his arrows from their flights, stopped him from proving his marksmanship.”

Charlotte had perfected that trick by the time she was fourteen. “Well, yes, that was terrible of you.”

“Be serious.”

“Charlotte, did you fire an arrow through his hat, knocking it from his head before half the debutantes in Mayfair?”

“That was years ago, and the toad deserved it. He’d got a chamber maid with child and was bragging about it at the men’s punch bowl.”

Charlotte was quite the angel of justice when men failed to take responsibility for their actions, though she always claimed her retribution was merely accident, a misstep, an oversight.

“So what provoked you to besting Sherbourne?”

“I wasn’t besting him, Bethan. I was warning him. What is wrong with a man being proud of his accomplishments? Why is it expected that a duke will stride about, full of his consequence, admired for his condescension, but a mere banker—whose wealth supports the very crown—or a brewer, whose product in another sense supports the entire populace—must be humble and obsequious?”

“And you said you did not come here to argue politics. Mr. Sherbourne is quite capable of looking out for himself.”

“No, he is not. He thinks he is, but he doesn’t know the company he’s found himself among. Why didn’t Haverford toss him down the drive, if he’s here uninvited?”

“Because Haverford is a gentleman, and Mr. Sherbourne likely finagled an invitation from Lady Glenys without her realizing it.”

Charlotte rose. “Lady Glenys should be more mindful of her words. Sherbourne thinks to marry her, I’m guessing. He wants to marry his way into the aristocracy, and that seldom works.”

Had Sherbourne turned his marital aspirations on Charlotte? “It can work,” Elizabeth said, “after two or three generations, provided the one doing the marrying has means.” Which Sherbourne did, according to Aunt Arabella. “I’ll have a word with Lady Glenys.”

“Perhaps I’ll have a word with Sherbourne.” Charlotte leafed through a stack of papers on the desk. “What are these?”

“Those are merchants’ bills for goods and services ordered for this house party. Lady Glenys asked me to see what orders could be canceled.”

Lady Glenys had done no such thing, but Elizabeth could not very well admit that Haverford had brought the bills into the room, and muttered dire oaths about each one.

“Remind me never to host a house party,” Charlotte said. “These sums are exorbitant.”

“I thought so. I mentioned the price of the pineapples and Aunt Arabella was shocked as well.”

“Aunt does not shock easily. We aren’t that large a party, nor is transporting goods here by sea that difficult. What could Lady Glenys have been thinking?”

“She was thinking to find her brother a duchess.”

Charlotte paged through a few more of the bills. “I could buy an entire orchard of pineapple trees for what she’s spending on a few dozen fruits. Write to Her Grace. If Aunt Esther doesn’t know to the penny what a house party costs, then nobody does.”

That was a sound suggestion. The Duchess of Moreland had managed dozens of house parties and balls over the years. She’d know if pineapples were particularly expensive this year, or ice sculptures all the rage.

“Do you like Sherbourne, Charlotte?”

She set the stack of bills back on the desk. “I do not, particularly, but he’s intelligent and he accepted my setdown with good grace. I respect him for that, even if I cannot abide his calculating air. I dislike Haldale and Sir Nigel—they are indolent and vain. Sherbourne is neither.”

“He’s a bit of a peacock.”

“No more than Haverford is,” Charlotte rejoined, heading for the door. “Do you fancy His Grace, Elizabeth?”

“I do.”

“Then he’d better fancy you too.”

She slipped out the door, and Elizabeth took the seat at the desk. Three opinions—Charlotte’s, Elizabeth’s, and Aunt Arabella’s—all put the house party expenses beyond the pale.

Haverford seemed well liked by his guests, and respected by his staff. His younger brother adored him, Radnor counted him a close friend, and Elizabeth had yet to see Haverford refuse his sister any request.

And yet, the entire shire and half the merchants in Swansea seemed intent on bilking the duke of his last groat.

The difficulty with being a duke—one of the many difficulties with being a duke—was that Julian rarely had to ask anybody for anything, much less ask somebody of his own station. He thus sat at the desk in his personal sitting room, trying to compose a letter to the Duke of Moreland, and failing.

Miserably. Moreland was the head of Elizabeth’s family, and Julian was simply trying to start a dialogue, to test the waters.

“My Lord Duke,” he recited to the empty foolscap. “Or do I dare greet you simply as Dear Duke of Moreland? In any case, greetings, from Haverford Castle, which is falling to pieces as I pen this epistle. I am desperate to court your niece, but I have not two coins to rub together, and my situation isn’t likely to change for at least twelve years. I can spend her settlements handily and not scratch the surface of the debts my family and my estate have run up, not that I’d touch a farthing of Miss Windham’s portion.”

Elizabeth’s settlements were hers, her security against a future as a widow.

“I am further mortified to inform you,” Julian went on, “that my sister remains unwed, in part because her dowry has grown so modest, that only a man very much in love will consider marrying her. I have reason to hope she will secure such an offer soon.”

Which made Glenys sound like the hag of the bog, rather than the dear, delightful lady that she was.

Onward. “Your Grace will have heard that my younger brother and heir is a simpleton,” Julian went on, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose. “That characterization is unfair, but not without…”

Christ. First Glennie now Griffin, betrayed by correspondence.

A tap sounded on the door.

Only Glenys or Radnor would disturb Julian in his personal sitting room. “Come in.”

Hugh St. David admitted himself and stood on the threshold. “Your Grace wanted to see me.”

No, Julian had not wanted to see Hugh, or any of the other guests crowding around his buffets like street urchins at a Christmas dinner. He rose, nonetheless, hand extended.

“Hugh, please have a seat. We haven’t had a chance to catch up.” Julian gestured not to the chair flanking the desk, but to the sofa.

Hugh had been the older cousin who’d taught Julian how to cast a fishing line, how to smoke, and how to tie his first cravat. When Julian had inherited the title, the cousinly mentoring had faded. When Hugh had taken Delphine to wife, the relationship had become perfunctory.

Why did I let that happen? And worse, Has Hugh banished himself to the cliffs and beaches to avoid not his wife, but his host?

“Good of you to invite us,” Hugh said, looking anywhere but at Julian. “The castle’s always a pleasure to behold.”

“The castle’s falling apart.”

Hugh was family, he’d been visiting the castle for all of his two-score years, and he fancied himself a scientist. He’d see changes in the family seat others ignored, while he’d completely miss his wife’s growing restlessness.

“Castles do that. They fall apart,” Hugh said, flashing a rare smile, “but truly subduing them takes a lot. As long as we’re being honest, you might want to keep that Windstruther puppy away from Lady Glenys.”

Julian poured two portions of brandy from the decanter on the sideboard, and passed one to Hugh. “Any particular reason I should look askance at Windstruther as opposed to every other bachelor?”

“A fellow from the Geological Society says any vowels Sir Nigel owes tend to be misplaced for months at time, and he’s a hothead. Averages two duels per season and lives for the day when we’re at war with France again.”

“Good to know.” Sir Nigel was subsisting on a quarterly allowance, then, and minding neither his budget nor his words.

“Should have told you sooner,” Hugh said, taking a sip of his drink. “Saved you some bother.”

Julian took an armchair and wished Elizabeth were with them. She’d know how to broach the topic of a straying wife without embarrassing anybody.

“Is Delphine a bother?”

“She’s a terror.” Hugh’s words blended admiration and woe. “My terror, though. Has she been pestering you?”

Blessed St. David. “One hopes she’d know better.”

Hugh rose, drink in hand. “She had a theory, you see. She thought I was your heir, and because I’m a healthy specimen, I was to outlive you. We were to have a few sons, while you remained a bachelor. Devonshire’s not married. Quimbey held out until recently. Dukes don’t always marry when they have heirs to tend to the succession.”

Julian sipped his drink rather than mutter profanities. “She was to become the next Duchess of Haverford?”

“And be treated with the deference owed one of her soon-to-be lofty station.” Hugh finished his brandy and set his glass down a bit too hard on the sideboard. “Instead she got the boring life of obscure gentry, a husband who dreams of dead ferns, and not a son to be seen.”

Hugh would make a good duke. He was sensible, for all his geological passions, and he loved the land.

“Should I be concerned for Griffin’s safety?”

“You have to ask that,” Hugh said, “because the lad’s vulnerable, but everybody loves our Griffin. Delphine’s problem is her choice of spouse. I no more want your title than I want you bringing coal mines into this shire. If that damned Sherbourne had his way, half the neighborhood would be torn up.”

“It’s petty of me,” Julian said, “but to hear somebody honestly malign Mr. Sherbourne is a relief. He might yet marry Glenys, though, so consider keeping your opinions of him to yourself.”

Hugh poured himself another half-portion of brandy. “He’s the most disliked man in the shire, Haverford. Those who don’t owe him will barely acknowledge him, though they’re few enough in number. He has every merchant in his pocket, and talks of nothing but how their custom would improve if only we brought a mine or two into the valley.”

Just as brandy both soothed and burned, Hugh’s words were part solution, part problem. “I’m in debt to him,” Julian said. “I hadn’t realized others suffered the same indignity.”

“Your father, God bless him, was not the most sensible sort.”

A charitable characterization. The dukedom had lost financial ground during Grandpapa’s day, while Papa had all but shoved the family finances over a precipice formed of books and unthinkable self-indulgence.

“My father could not resist the lure of a bound tome, and there was a canal scheme.…”

“And Sherbourne’s papa was likely the chief swindler,” Hugh said. “I’m sorry. I’ve a bit put by, if that will help. My land is good, and I take care of it. Delphie’s imprudent in some ways, but she doesn’t overspend her pin money.”

The words were on the tip of Julian’s tongue: I’m touched at your generosity, but won’t need to impose to that degree.…A ducal proclamation, and a falsehood. The empty sheet of foolscap lay on Julian’s desk, a reproach and a sign of hope.

“Glenys and Radnor are circling each other like two cats in a barnyard,” Julian said.

“And kittens have been known to come from a lot of hissing and caterwauling,” Hugh replied. “Radnor has coveted my timber for years. If twenty acres of mature oak will aid the course of true love, I’m happy to donate it to the settlements.”

A queer feeling came over Julian, equal parts humility, gratitude, and relief. Twenty acres of mature oak was a significant asset, and one that would appreciate for generations without costing a penny. Over the past two centuries, the British Navy had requisitioned nearly every sizeable oak tree in some shires, though pockets of Wales had escaped that plundering.

Those trees were worth a great deal now.

“I will accept that offer, Hugh, with more thanks than you can know, but I suspect the course of true love, or at least marital concord, might also be aided by a trip to Paris for you and Delphine.”

Hugh sank into the chair behind Julian’s desk. “We were not a love match, and I know you mean well, but…Delphie’s mostly bored. She’ll settle down in another few years.”

Hugh had apparently been telling himself that twaddle since the wedding. “So take her somewhere she can entertain herself with the company of the man she married,” Julian said. “She thinks you love your fossils more than you care for her.”

“What?”

“She’s humiliated when you leave at first light, day after day, in search of the perfect rock. She misbehaves to get your attention, to prove to herself that you matter as little to her as she matters to you.”

When another man might have called Julian out for meddling, Hugh looked intrigued. “I take myself off for hours each day so she needn’t limit her diversions on my account. At home, we can go for days at a time without saying more to each other than, ‘Pass the salt,’ or, ‘Wasn’t that a dreadful sermon?’ Delphie doesn’t need or expect me to hover.”

“Hovering is different from waiting until after breakfast to go on your rambles. You might cosset her a bit, where others will take notice.”

Hugh studied his drink as if the glass held tea leaves instead of brandy. “Cosset? She’s my wife, not some blushing virgin twiddling her bonnet ribbons in the churchyard.”

Sympathy for Delphine St. David was a novel and welcome sentiment. “Offer to escort her to breakfast, Hugh. Invite her to come along on your next hike, pack a picnic, bring a book to read to her, and don’t look at a single fossil.”

“These surrounds don’t offer any good fossils,” Hugh said. “I always bring a book, there being no library to equal yours, and after enjoying a pint or two in the village, I find a quiet place to read and nap, if you must know the truth.”

Elizabeth had known the truth. “Partner Delphine at whist and flirt with her across the table. Steal a kiss on one of the unused stairways. Bring her a rose some night, and tell her the chimney in your room is stopped up, so you’ll need to share her bed.”

“My chimney.…You know, Delphie said something this morning, about her room having a draft. Do you suppose she was casting a lure?”

Bless Elizabeth Windham. “If she is, you’d best catch it. Griffin won’t marry, I’m without a duchess, and you’re a man in your prime. The weight of the succession, at present, rests on your shoulders, Hugh.”

Hugh rose and tugged down his waistcoat. “I’ve considered reminding Delphie of that.”

“When you do remind her, have a bouquet of roses in your hand.”

“Roses and ferns are a lovely combination,” Hugh replied, marching for the door.

“And Paris in autumn is beautiful.”

“One step at a time, Haverford. One step at a time.”

Hugh left, and Julian sent up a prayer for marital concord. For now, the weight of the succession truly did rest on Hugh’s shoulders. Delphine’s frolics might well have landed a cuckoo in the St. David nest, which was probably half of her motivation for frolicking in the first place.

“At least that problem shows some promise of a solution.”

Julian took his drink to his desk, and sharpened a quill pen already sporting a perfect point.

Lady Pembroke had pronounced half of polite society in dun territory half the time. The law of the land prohibited a peer from being jailed for debt, probably because the entire aristocracy would otherwise find itself, in one generation or another, behind bars.

Julian scrawled a few sentences and sealed and franked the missive before self-doubt stayed his hand. To act on impulse was contrary to his nature, but in this case, inaction was intolerable. He gave the letter to a footman in the corridor, along with directions to send the missive to Moreland by express.

Despite the expense.

After Julian had spent another hour at his desk dealing with ledgers and political epistles, the same footman brought in the afternoon post.

“My thanks, Elfryd,” Julian said. “If you’d get word to Hayes that I’d like to see him in the estate office on the hour, I’d appreciate it.” Hayes being the butler Julian had inherited from his father.

“Of course, sir.” Elfryd withdrew, leaving Julian with a pile of correspondence that very likely contained more bills.

One epistle was sealed with a ducal crest. Julian started there, prepared for a harangue by letter on some parliamentary matter.