A Duke in Danger (2 page)

When luncheon was over, the Duke suddenly felt as if the house was very quiet.

He was used to having people moving incessantly round him, seeing scurrying Statesmen with worried faces trekking in and out of Wellington’s Headquarters in Paris, hearing sharp commands being given at all times of the day and night, and dealing with endless complaints, requests, and reports.

There were also parties, Receptions, Assemblies, and Balls, besides the long-drawn-out meetings at which everyone seemed to talk and talk but achieve nothing.

There had, however, been interludes which were tender, exciting, interesting, and very alluring.

The Duke thought cynically that now that he was who he was, these would multiply and he could come under a very different pressure from what he had endured during the years of war.

He was of course well aware that as the young General Harling, with many medals for gallantry, women had found him attractive.

Those who had congregated in Paris either for diplomatic reasons or just in search of amusement had, where he was concerned, seldom been disappointed.

While they had had a great deal to offer him, he had had nothing to offer them, but after it became known last year that he was no longer just an officer of the
Household Cavalry but the Duke of Harlington, things had changed considerably.

Now he knew he was a genuine catch from the matrimonial point of view.

At the same time, alluring, exquisitely gowned, sophisticated married women would find it a “feather in their caps” to have him at their feet, or, to put it more bluntly, in their beds.

War heroes were of course the fashion, and every woman wished to capture for herself the hero of the hour, the Duke of Wellington, or if that was impossible then the second choice was inevitably the Duke of Harlington.

At times he found it difficult to prevent himself from smiling mockingly at the compliments he received or to suppress a cynical note in his voice when he replied to them.

It was his friend Major Gerald Chertson who had put into words what he had half-sensed for himself.

“I suppose, Ivar,” he had said, “you know that as soon as you get home you will have to get married?”

“Why the hell should I do that?” the Duke asked.

“First, because you have to produce an heir,” the Major replied. “That is obligatory on the part of a Duke! You must also prevent that exceedingly unpleasant relative of yours, Jason Harling, from eventually stepping into your shoes, as he is extremely eager to do.”

“Are you telling me that Jason Harling is heir presumptive to my title?”

“I certainly am,” Gerald Chertson replied. “At least he has been boasting of it lately, loudly and clearly all over Paris.”

“I have never thought about it, but I suppose he is!” the Duke remarked.

He remembered that Richard Harling had not been the only member of the family to fall at Waterloo. Another cousin, the son of the last Duke’s younger brother, had also died early in the battle, although it was not reported until three days later.

On the fourth Duke’s death, in 1817, the title would have been his father’s, had he been alive. Instead, it was his.

Now that Gerald spoke of it, he recalled that the title would next go to another and more distant branch of the family now represented by Jason Harling.

He was the one relative of whom the Duke was thoroughly ashamed.

He had always been extremely relieved that during hostilities he had not come into contact with Jason.

They had, however, met in Paris after the war had been won.

The Duke thought Jason had always been an odious child, and he had grown up into an even more odious man.

He had seen very little of the war, but he had managed, by scheming and ingratiating himself in a manner which most men would think beneath them, to get himself a safe and comfortable post.

He became
Aide-de-Camp
to an elderly armchair General who never left England until the French had laid down their arms.

The way Jason toadied to those in power made most men feel sick, but it ensured that he lived an extremely pleasant life.

He managed to move in the best social circles, and he never missed an opportunity to feather his own nest.

The Duke had heard rumours of his accepting bribes and of other ways in which Jason took advantage of his position, but he had told himself it was not his business and tried not to listen.

Now as head of the family he knew that he could not ignore Jason as he had in the past, and he had not realised that he was his heir should he not have a son.

Aloud he had said to his friend Gerald Chertson:

“If there is one thing that would make me look on marriage with less aversion, it would be the quenching of any hopes that Jason might have of stepping into my shoes.”

“I have heard that he has been borrowing money on the chance of it,” Gerald replied.

“I do not believe you!” the Duke exclaimed. “Who would be fool enough to advance Jason any money on the chance of my not producing an heir?”

“There are always Usurers ready to take such risks at an exorbitant rate of interest,” Gerald remarked.

“Then they must be crazy,” the Duke said angrily. “After all, I have not yet got one foot in the grave, and I am perfectly capable of having a family, and a large one!”

“Of course, it all depends on whether you live to do so.”

“What are you insinuating?”

Gerald paused before he replied:

“I heard, but paid no attention to it at the time, that after Richard’s death at Waterloo, Jason had a large wager that you would not be a survivor.”

“Well, he lost his money,” the Duke said sharply.

“I agree that you are now not likely to be killed by a French bullet, but there is always such a thing as an— accident.”

The Duke threw back his head and laughed.

“Really, Gerald, now you are trying to frighten me! Jason is far too much of a shyster to soil his hands with murder.”

“I do not suppose it would be Jason’s hands which would get dirty,” Gerald Chertson answered drily. “Do not forget there was an attempt to assassinate Wellington in February.”

“That is true. But Andre Cantillon was an assassin with a fanatical devotion to Bonaparte.”

“I know that,” Gerald Chertson replied. “At the same time—and I am not trying to frighten you—Jason Harling has a fanatical devotion to himself and his future.”

“I refuse to worry about anything so absurd,” the Duke said loftily.

However, as he walked from the Dining-Room
towards the Library after an excellent meal, something struck him.

Together with his satisfaction with the house and everything which now had changed his life to a bed of roses from one which at times had been on very hard ground, he felt that Jason Harling was undoubtedly longing for his future to be assured.

“I suppose I shall have to marry,” he told himself.

It was a depressing thought, and his mind wandered to the beautiful Lady Isobel Dalton.

She had made it quite clear when he left Paris that as she would be in London next week, she expected to see a great deal of him.

The daughter of a Duke and widow of an elderly Baronet who had died of a heart-attack from over-eating and over-drinking, Lady Isobel was a very gay widow.

She had been one of the many women in Paris—French, English, and Russian—who had been eager to console the war warriors after their long years in the wilderness.

At every party they had glowed like lights in the darkness, and the Duke had found that Isobel’s arms encircled his neck almost too eagerly, while her lips invited his even before he had any desire to kiss them.

However, it would have been impossible not to become aroused by the fiery delights which Lady Isobel offered him, and by the flattery with which she made him feel he was the only man in the world.

“I love you! I want you!” she had said a thousand times. “I loved you the moment we met, and now, dearest, you are in a position I never dreamt would be yours. I love you because you will behave exactly as a Duke should.”

He was well aware that she pressed herself both physically and determinedly closer and closer to him, and when he had stayed with her after dinner the night before he left Paris, she had made her intentions very clear.

“
As soon as you have everything in order, I will join you,” she had said softly. “We will entertain and make our parties the smartest, the most fashionable, and the most influential in the whole of London.”

She had given a little sigh before she said:

“The Prince Regent is getting very old, and the
Beau Monde
needs a new leader, and who would look more handsome and more dashing or authoritative than you?”

She paused, expecting the Duke to say that no-one was more beautiful than she was.

But he realised that he was being pushed into declaring himself, and he had not yet made up his mind whether he wished to marry anyone, let alone Lady Isobel.

When he thought about it, he knew it would be a marriage which would please his many Harling relations and be acclaimed as “sensible” by the Social World at large.

Although Isobel could excite and arouse him as few women had been able to do, something which he called his “intuition” told him she was not really the type of woman with whom he desired to spend the rest of his life.

He had learnt in the Army that women were for pleasure and should not encroach too closely on the man’s world of living, fighting, and dying for his country.

Lady Isobel was very different from the attractive young Portuguese women who offered themselves to the tired men who needed some respite after the hard fighting in the Peninsular War.

She was different, too, from the attractive, cheerful little French
cocottes
who could make a man laugh, however tired he might be, and even find it a joke that they had picked his pocket just before he left.

But women were women, and while a man must sometimes relax from the hard realities of war, marriage was a very different thing!

As he had travelled back over Northern France and had an uncomfortable crossing on a tempestuous
Channel, the Duke, when he was not thinking of his new possessions, found himself thinking of Isobel.

She was beautiful and confessed her love for him very convincingly.

Yet, there was something stronger than that thought, which he could not understand, and which held him back from asking the question that she was longing to hear.

“I must be with you, Ivar,” she had said a thousand times. “I cannot live without you, and I know you would be lost and lonely without me.”

It had been easier to cover her lips with his and kiss her than to argue.

The Duke had known when he left Isobel that she was closing up, before coming to London, the house in which she had been living in Paris.

It was part of a deliberate plan, because she was determined with a steel-like will which lay somewhere in that soft, seductive body, that she would become the Duchess of Harlington.

Thinking of her made the Duke feel restless.

He walked to the fireplace and dragged violently at the elegant needlework bell-pull.

He imagined the wire running down the corridor until the iron bell was jerked backwards and forwards in the passage outside the pantry-door, where it was impossible for Bateson and the footmen not to hear it.

He did not have to wait long before the door opened and Bateson, rather breathless, appeared.

“I have changed my mind,” the Duke said. “I have decided I will visit the Castle today. It should not take me more than two hours to drive there.”

He saw a look of consternation on Bateson’s face.

“Has Your Grace informed Lady Alvina of Your Grace’s intention?”

“I meant to stay here,” the Duke said, “at least until the end of the week, but I will see the Castle and return either tomorrow or the day after.”

“I think it’d be wise for Your Grace to warn Her Ladyship of your arrival.”

The Duke smiled.

“I expect I shall be comfortable enough, and after such a good luncheon I will not be very hungry for dinner. Congratulate the Cook, Bateson, after you have ordered the Phaeton and the new team of horses which I understand are already in the stables.”

As he had no intention of arriving in England without excellent horses, he had asked Gerald, when he left Paris a week earlier, to go to Berkeley Square and see what horses were waiting for him.

“If they are not up to scratch,” he had said, “buy me a team worth driving.”

As he and Gerald shared a taste in horses, as in other things, he knew he would not be disappointed, and when twenty minutes later he was told that the Phaeton was at the door, he saw that his friend had done him proud.