Chapter 14

“Wherein if music be the food of love… someone’s off key.”

Ella looked around the first cottage with satisfaction. As Mr Burrows had indicated, they’d not been in terrible repair, other than the shocking state of the roofs. The first had been re-thatched, the work completed last night, alongside some repairs to the interior. The broken window glass had been replaced and the women had got inside to get the place in a state clean enough that the walls could be repainted.

It already looked a wonderful sight to Ella, who had spent the morning sweeping and dusting, and then got down on her knees to help scrub the floors. There had been protests, naturally. Apparently, duchesses ought not to dirty their pretty hands. Ella had explained with a somewhat rueful smile that they were likely to find this duchess did a lot of things she ought not, and they’d best get used to it.

It had been a little awkward at first, with many a little in awe at finding her among them, but with a little persuasion and persistence, she had struck up conversations and got to know Oscar’s tenants. Her tenants too, now, she realised. Sharing a picnic with them had helped too. Once they’d realised she wasn’t too lofty to sit on the grass and eat bread and cheese with the rest of them, things had gone rather easier.

“Here you go, your grace. Wash some of that dust away.”

Ella looked around and gave a grateful smile as Mr Burrows held out a glass of lemonade to her.

“Oh, just what the doctor ordered,” she said, taking the glass from him. “You are kind, sir. Thank you.”

“Nonsense,” Burrows said, shaking his head. “What you’ve accomplished here in the time is nothing short of miraculous, and I’m right grateful. We all are.”

Ella flushed a little but couldn’t hide her pleasure at his words.

“Why, Mr Burrows, you make it sound as if I repaired the roof myself, which I assure you I did not. A little sweeping and cleaning is the most I can lay claim to.”

“And getting everyone here quick smart and shaking that blasted bailiff up. I heard how he tried to bullock you into waiting for his grace to give his consent, the miserable old—”

“Yes, well,” Ella hurried on before he could say any more. “Of course, he was doing his job, as one would hope he should. I’ve only been duchess for a short time and we’d not even been introduced. You can’t expect the man to jump to do my bidding without a little caution, now, can you?”

Mr Burrows made a harrumphing sound low in his throat, which indicated he didn’t agree but was too polite to contradict her.

Ella hid a smile, touched by his protective manner, and raised the lemonade to her lips. It was cool and tart and did indeed wash away the dust, from her mouth at least. Her hair was stiff with it and she could feel cobwebs on her skin. Her clothes were likewise filthy, and she didn’t dare look at the state of her nails.

“Reckon perhaps you should be getting home now,” Burrows said, an anxious note to his voice. “You’ve been here since sun up and there’s not much else you can do now.”

Ella finished her lemonade and handed him back the glass. “Yes, I suppose it must be getting late.”

“It’s well after five, your grace.”

Ella’s eyes widened. Good Lord, and she was supposed to be going to a concert tonight at the Assembly Rooms in town.

“Heavens! I shall be in the suds,” she exclaimed, and left the room at a run.

***

Berry Street was a hive of activity. Oscar had planned to renovate the empty cottages later this year and had already discussed the matter with his bailiff. That so much had happened already in his absence, made him feel a little out of sorts. He couldn’t exactly figure out why.

He was glad the work was being done, glad that Ella had felt able to take the matter in hand, yet….

Oscar sighed. He was being foolish, no doubt.

“Mr Burrows!” Oscar called out to the familiar figure, raising his hand in greeting as the fellow turned.

Mr Burrows took off his hat and strode to meet him.

“Your grace,” the fellow said politely as he ducked his head a little.

“I was so sorry to hear about the fire, Mr Burrows. Work is coming along a pace, I see, though. I hope everything is going well?”

“Oh, yes, indeed, though, if I may say so, we couldn’t have managed it without the duchess. Marvellous, she’s been, and not afraid to get her hands dirty neither. She’s been cleaning the cottages, down on her hands and knees, too, though we all told her it weren’t proper. It’s like standing in front of a summer storm, though, there’s no stopping her.”

Oscar blinked as the fellow beamed at him.

“I’m afraid I never got the chance to congratulate you on your nuptials, but I’ll do so now. You’ve done us right proud.”

He opened his mouth, wanting to say something appropriate, but Oscar found himself at a loss. The description of Ella as a summer storm there was no diverting made him smile, though; he recognised the feeling all too well.

“I… er… thank you, Mr Burrows,” he managed at last.

Ella really had taken matters in hand since his absence. A prickle of anxiety ran down his spine as he wondered what else had changed.

“Do you know where I might find her?”

“I’m afraid you’ve just missed her. Left a few minutes ago. Ran out of here like her skirts were afire, she did,” he added, laughing before he rearranged his face at Oscar’s raised eyebrows. “Er… well, she’d not noticed the time, she’s been so busy. Reckon she’s got an engagement tonight and is running to catch up. Always running, she is. Never knew a woman so full of life.”

Mr Burrows flushed and cleared his throat, clearly believing he’d overstepped the mark as Oscar stared at him, a little stunned.

“Right, well, good day to then, your grace,” the fellow muttered, before giving a hurried bow and rushing off.

Oscar sighed. He’d have to catch her before she left tonight. His mother would know where she was going. Perhaps he could accompany her?

Hopeful he’d track her down sooner rather than later, Oscar hurried back to the house.

***

It took some time to wash the dirt from her hair, and Ella could only be grateful for her shorter locks. Her nails were in a shocking state and, despite a thorough scrubbing, she felt relieved to hide them beneath her long, silk gloves.

Ella looked up as a knock sounded at her dressing room door. Nancy hurried to the door to open it and dipped a curtsey as Mintie came in, looking regal and sumptuous in a delicious confection of amber silk. Ella got to her feet, smiling at her mother-in-law.

“What a glorious dress,” she said, turning so that Nancy could fasten a necklace about her throat. “Madame Dubois really is a marvel.”

“Yes,” Mintie replied, moving to inspect the creation herself in the full-length looking glass and smiling with pleasure. “Though I take all the credit for choosing the colour. I simply had to have it.”

“It suits you very well,” Ella said, laughing as Mintie turned her attention on her.

“It may well do, but you, my dear, look utterly ravishing.”

“Thank you, Mama,” Ella replied, pretending solemnity as she sank into a low curtsey.

Mintie beamed at her and then hurried closer, taking her hands as she rose up again. There was excitement in her eyes as she lowered her voice to a confiding whisper.

“Now, listen to me, Ella. I didn’t have time to tell you earlier, for you came home in such a bustle, but I must warn you. Oscar is home.”

Ella blinked. For a moment the words hovered in the air without her having the slightest notion of what they meant.

“H-He’s home?” she stammered.

She stamped on the urge to panic and run in pointless circles, at least outwardly. It felt very much as though her heart was doing the panicking and running for her. The words thudded in her head in time with her heartbeat.

He’s home, he’s home, he’s home… oh, for heaven’s sake!

“Well, that’s nice. It will be good to see him,” she said, striving for calm although the words sounded a little squeaky.

Mintie pulled a face at her and tutted.

“Now, Ella, listen to me. He’s home and he wants to start over. He’s sorry for leaving, and for the way he’s treated you.”

“Oh.”

Ella couldn’t manage anything further than that. She was too stunned. It had been hard indeed to stop herself moping and missing him when he’d left, but she’d done it, or at least made a decent show of it. She’d gone out into society and faced the scandal head on; she’d weathered the spiteful comments that her sister had made, and she’d made her own friends. Oscar had wanted her to live her life apart from his and she had done so… and now he was back, and he wanted to try again? Which was good, wasn’t it?

Except what if he tried and still failed?

She didn’t think her heart could stand that depth of hurt and survive.

“Is that all you can say? ‘Oh?’” Mintie asked, looking a little crestfallen.

“I rather think it is, yes,” Ella said, apologetic but honest at least.

Mintie sighed. “But how are you going to treat him? Are you going to welcome him home with open arms, or are you going to treat him with disdain? Are you angry with him, will you have cross words for him? You’ve every right to, only… oh, not in public, I beg you.”

Ella raised a hand to silence her. “Mintie, I… I hardly know, but I promise you I would show no anger or make a spectacle of our marriage in public.”

“Are you sure?” The dowager stared at her, a worried little frown at her brow.

“Well, of—” Ella went to reassure her, the words on her tongue before she could think them through, and all at once she wasn’t sure.

She simply didn’t know what she felt, not any longer. Oscar had hurt and disappointed her and his shining armour, which had dazzled her not so long ago, was tarnished now. She knew she was far from blameless in this affair, but things could have been different.

“I will try to behave in a way to make you proud, Mintie. You have my word.”

It was the best she could do. Too many emotions were battering her heart and, just now, she had no idea which would win out.

Mintie smiled and nodded. “Of course. I know that, and it was horrid of me to press you so. It’s none of my business, I know it isn’t, but I do so wish to see the two of you happy.”

Ella leaned over and kissed her cheek, touched by the sincerity of her words.

“I know that, and I’m sure Oscar does too. We must just try to take things a day at a time though.”

“Yes, you’re right,” the dowager said, sighing. “I’m just so impatient. I want grandbabies to cuddle! Oh, to see this stuffy old house full of children.”

“Mintie!” Ella exclaimed, as Mintie gave an irrepressible laugh and went to the door. “Come down as soon as you are ready, darling. He’s waiting to greet you.”

Ella ran to the mirror and checked her reflection. She’d been thrilled with the dress: a sprigged, gossamer satin of ethereal blue, it was as light as air and clung to her slight figure. Pearls and diamonds shone at her throat and ears, and two beautiful clips nestled in her short dark curls.

“You look like a duchess,” whispered a voice beside her, and Ella turned to find Nancy smiling at her.

She embraced her maid, holding her tight for a moment. “Thank you, Nancy. That was just what I needed to hear.”

Ella tugged at her long gloves, ensuring they were even, smoothed down the silky folds of her gown, and took a deep breath. She doubted that the dress would change anything, other than perhaps how she felt about herself.

Her confidence had grown in Oscar’s absence. Being thrown headlong into society in such a manner had been daunting, but one thing had made a difference. She was no longer held in Pearl’s shadow. Oh, sometimes she was at the same events, and her dazzling sister still dazzled, and still murmured her vitriolic words.

Yet the two of them did not enter a room together, they were not greeted in the same moment, and the feeling of always being the duller, less interesting sister had dissipated with her absence. People sought Ella out now and yes, often that was because of her title rather than any genuine desire to get to know her, but not always.

Whatever other people thought of her, there was one thing she was determined to prove to her husband. She was not a child. That was one accusation she refused to allow him to reproach her with. Not anymore. No, she would show him how sophisticated his wife could be.

So, Ella held her head high and moved down the stairs with all the outward confidence she had learned to emulate over the past weeks, even if her heart was still rushing around in a daze.

***

Oscar gave up pacing the library and reached for the brandy decanter. Just one to soothe his nerves. How he would be greeted was a question he’d tried to wrangle from his mother on learning that she’d told Ella he was here. The woman had been surprisingly tight-lipped, however, and had protested that she didn’t know.

He couldn’t tell if that was the simple truth or his mother deciding he deserved torturing a little more. Either way, his guts were in a knot and, until he’d seen how things lay between him and his wife, he didn’t anticipate that knot loosening any time soon.

One thing he did see in the near future was an interminable evening listening to some well-endowed female warbling at the top of her lungs. It was not a recipe for intimate conversation. He could hardly beg off, though. Not when he’d come to try to make things right. So, the least he could do was attend with good grace, even though he was frustrated at the very thought. Perhaps he’d be able to get a word or two with Ella alone, though, either before or after the concert.

Oscar downed the brandy in one large swallow and decided to pace the hall for a while instead. At least it would give him a change of scenery.

He’d barely made it to the centre of the grand entrance hall when movement at the top of the stairs caught his eye, and then his breath.

Good heavens.

Was that… his wife?

He realised in that moment that all his thoughts of Ella over the past weeks had recalled her mud-splattered, and with her hair all ragged from where she’d sheared it off. Why, he didn’t know, except that the sight had been engraved on his memory.

The woman before him looked as if she’d never so much as dirty the hem of her dress and would expect him to throw down his coat for her to step upon.

Her hair had grown out a little, soft curls surrounding her petite face in a cloud of gleaming mahogany locks. Diamonds glinted among her dark curls, at her ears and against her slender throat. They were matched only by the sparkle in her wide, grey eyes.

“Rothborn, this is an unexpected pleasure. You should have told us you were coming. We would have been better prepared to greet you.”

Rothborn.

Not Oscar, but his title.

An uneasy feeling bloomed in his chest, but he moved forward to greet her, hardly able to take in the sight before him. What on earth had she done to herself since he’d left? She looked….

“Goodness, Ella, you do look….”

Beautiful, glorious, astonishing….

“…different.”

Oscar cursed himself. Excellent, Rothborn. That’s the way to sweep her off her feet with your urbane charm. Well done.

One elegantly arched eyebrow raised, just a little.

Wait, what happened to the thick beetle brows she used to glower at him with?

“You look different too, Oscar,” she replied, and though she smiled there was an undercurrent to the words that he couldn’t quite decipher.

“I’ve been spending a lot of time at the gym,” he offered, wondering if she’d noticed that he was a little broader in the shoulder, perhaps, or that his coat was tighter than it ought to be.

“Ah,” she said, her voice soft, a secretive look in her eyes he couldn’t read. “That must be it.”

They fell silent as Wilkes and the footmen arrived bearing cloaks and hats, and his mother joined them.

“Is Bertie with you, Oscar?” Ella asked.

“He came back with me, but I dropped him off at your father’s. He said he’d come over tomorrow.”

She nodded her acceptance of this information, and Oscar escorted them out to the waiting carriage.

A skin-prickling air of tension accompanied the journey to the Assembly Rooms, at least for Oscar. There was still a little of the day showing in the sky, though the moon was also visible. The light in the carriage might have been growing dim, but Oscar could still make out Ella’s features well enough.

The scandal sheets had been right. She did rival her sister now. Oscar experienced a strange sensation which shivered over him and told him that she not only rivalled Pearl but surpassed her.

Pearl’s beauty came from the perfection of her features. The bluest of thickly-lashed eyes, a complexion of the sweetest English rose, and a figure that could steal a man’s breath from across the room.

Ella’s beauty was hard to pin down, like snatching at quicksilver and finding it slipping through your fingers. You thought perhaps it was one thing, only for your attention to be caught by something else.

The heart-shaped face he’d always thought elfin and mischievous was still both those things yet now carried with elegance and poise. Then there was that sparkle in her grey eyes, the slightly devilish look of amusement that promised she’d surprise you. Her hair was lustrous, and though her short locks were unusual, the temptation to run one’s fingers through them was tantalising.

He’d never taken much notice of her figure, if he was honest. Yet she’d had his full attention when she’d walked down the stairs towards him, hips swaying. She was such a little thing, he’d had no idea of the slender curves she’d been hiding. Not the full breasted, womanly shape that Pearl boasted, no, but….

His mouth seemed suddenly dry.

Ella Rothborn—his wife—was no child, and now he realised just how much of a fool he’d been.

This conclusion changed none on entering the Assembly Rooms at Newmarket.

If Oscar experienced a swell of pride at entering the elegant building with his wife upon his arm, it was short-lived. Before he could think of a reason to keep her glued to his side, she had been wrangled from his grasp and bustled off on a tide of chattering people.

Her friends, he noted, comprised many of his own friends. He was greeted with a few cheery calls of “Ho, Rothborn, you here?” and, “Ah, the wanderer returns.” None of which made him feel a whit better as they all scurried off in his wife’s wake.

“Oh, poor Ella,” his mother laughed, shaking her head. “The poor girl never gets a moment’s peace anymore. She’s wanted everywhere, invited to every fashionable party. You must be so proud of her. Everyone wants to know her, Oscar, and if we attend a ball? My word, but the girl is danced off her feet. She’s all the rage, I swear. I knew she would be, once the scandal died down. She’s so funny and full of life.”

These apparently ingenious words made him narrow his eyes at his mother, but she seemed to find someone she simply had to speak to across the room and rushed off, leaving him alone. To be fair, her words were borne out as he looked over to find Ella surrounded by people. She was laughing, her face alight with amusement, and with a pang of remorse Oscar remembered a time, such a short time ago, when she had laughed that merrily for him. He’d barely had to open his mouth to make her roar with laughter at the feeblest of jokes. Could he still do that? He didn’t feel the least bit certain.

Oscar pushed his way through the throng, relieved to note there were still many people who clamoured to speak with him, at the same time as wishing them to Hades and out of his path. Ella was moving further away, arm-in-arm with a young woman he didn’t recognise.

He was thwarted once more as an elderly man who had been a friend of his father’s closed in on him and Oscar was forced to stand and make polite conversation for a few minutes. By the time he’d broken free, Ella was nowhere in sight.

Cursing, he made his way through the throng, only to swear with more vehemence as he discovered his wife at last, talking to bloody Ranleigh.

The duke towered over her, though he had ducked his head to whisper in her ear. Whatever he’d said made her burst out laughing as the duke stared down at her, something that looked dangerously like affection in his eyes. Damn the bastard. How dare he look at Ella like that?

Furious now, though as much with himself as with Ranleigh, Oscar closed the distance between them.

“Rothborn?” Ranleigh said, something that might have been surprise in his tone. “I hadn’t heard you’d come home?”

Well, I have, damn you, Oscar muttered inwardly, fighting the desire to gnash his teeth. Instead, he gave Ranleigh a pleasant smile and lifted Ella’s hand, placing it firmly on his arm.

“Just today, Ranleigh,” he replied, keeping the words as placid as he could.

The electric atmosphere crackled around them. Everyone knew the rumours—that Ranleigh had been pursuing his wife in his absence—and they were all desperate to see how this would play out.

If Ella objected to his rather possessive claiming of her hand, she said nothing, though she levelled a rather curious glance in his direction, which he tried hard to ignore.

Before any less prudent words could be spoken by either party, the call went around to take their places, and Oscar led Ella into the room given aside for the concert.

The Assembly Rooms were beautiful, all pink walls and crisp white plaster moulding. Vast chandeliers glittered and illuminated the elegant building, which was one of the finest of its kind in the country, only outdone by larger towns such as Bath. The ballroom had been set aside for tonight’s concert, and chairs filled the space with an aisle down the middle.

Oscar settled Ella in her chair, irritated to find that Ranleigh sat on her other side.

Don’t rise to it, he warned himself.

The fastest way to bring an argument with Ella would be to criticise her choice of friends, particularly after the last time they’d been together. That Ranleigh had been the source of that row did not escape him, nor did his stupidity in warning Ella off, and then disappearing himself. If he’d been intent on throwing her into the man’s arms, he could not have done better.

“What are we listening to tonight?” he asked Ella, desperate to begin some kind of conversation with her.

“Haydn,” she replied.

Well, that answered that question. At least he didn’t groan out loud, though he was tempted.

“It’s dreadfully warm in here,” he tried, smiling as he took the program she passed his way and fanning himself with it.

“Angelica Giodarmo, the famous soprano, is singing tonight. That’s why it’s so packed. If you were anyone less than a duke I’d doubt they’d have let you in at all.”

He slid a glance in her direction but could find no edge to the words. Any further attempts to talk to her were over, however, as the musicians took up their positions.

With a sigh, Oscar settled back in his chair and resigned himself to an interminable evening.