The Rusticated Duchess (25 page)

“But her only son, the son of the man she had watched die, and whose conception she had left behind her marriage vows to begin with, died.” Clare’s voice was quiet, thoughtful, as he considered the devastating sequence of events that had been Johna de Rothesay’s life.

“Actually, I don’t believe she considered ‘honour’ to mean ‘faithful’. It was common practice for those of her generation to pursue liaisons outside of marriage, and my father has had the same mistress for decades. The unacceptable part of her conduct was that she did so in order to produce an heir, instead of doing so after said heir was born.”

Clare grimaced but agreed. Even in the fifteen years since he’d arranged his marriage contracts with the FitzGeralds, attitudes towards marriage had changed. As more people married for affection, companionship, passion and love in the upper classes, the importance of faithfulness had commensurately increased. When marriage had been a business arrangement—as Lennox and Lauderdale had demonstrated—faithfulness had been of little import and it was common for both spouses to seek out their own happiness after the children had been conceived and born. “And here you are, years later, still picking up the pieces,” Clare groused, despite the half-smile on his face as he spoke.

Gloria nodded.

Clare was reserved after that, and when the meal ended, he escorted her out of the cabin and up to the deck, joining Gloria and her household in the salon. She went immediately to Eynon, sinking to the floor beside him.

She blinked when Clare joined them on the floor, and her heart honestly wobbled in her chest when he lifted the infant from the floor and greeted him, smiling as the baby’s chubby fingers twisted in his cravat and pulled, tugging Clare forwards.

From there she watched in amazement as he settled Eynon on her skirts and tempted the child to pull himself up by hiding the toy and then showing it.

“Where did you learn to do that?” she blurted, blushing when Mrs Pitcher chuckled from the settee behind her.

Clare looked at her superiorly. “I may not have had younger siblings but I do have a son of my own, and I have a very long memory.”

Gloria looked away to keep from crying.

When the boy tired, Clare was the one to pick him up and cradle him for a moment, then passed him to Gloria’s trembling arms. “I’ll leave you to get him to sleep. We should have a couple of hours remaining.” Clare set his hand on Gloria’s shoulder and she looked up, her eyes captured by the seriousness in his. “Don’t leave the salon. I’ll come for you when we dock.”

Not daring to speak past the lump in her throat, Gloria nodded and watched as Clare retreated. To her surprise, he stopped and spoke with both Colman and Brody, and they left with him.

The lump turned into a piercing headache and Eynon cried, frustrated by her lack of attention.

It was going to be a long evening.

* * * *

The midnight bells were ringing when Clare finally closed the door to the private parlour on the top floor of The Waverley and faced Colman and Jenson again. He’d outlined his plan to them earlier and they’d agreed with the scheme, especially once he’d informed Jenson of his intentions to marry Gloria.

When they’d docked, he’d sent Jenson off to The Waverley, the finest hotel in town, to organise rooms. It was early March, so the establishment had plenty of space. Gloria, Eynon and the female servants were in a fine four-room suite on the top floor. Clare was across the hall in a two-room suite. Brody and Colman would take turns standing guard even though they expected no trouble that night, while the other slept in the sitting room.

Clare was already regretting not bringing along one or two of the Killard footman, to serve as manservant and courier, but it couldn’t be helped now. Brody would need help during the days, while Colman would depart early in the morning. Clare needed Colman to make arrangements for their evening accommodations over the next days and deliver Clare’s news to his staff at Norham Castle. Then he would head back to meet and join up with the travelling party.

Clare was determined not to get caught without appropriate lodgings, even if he had to rent an entire family out of their home.

“She might have had the veil but yer right, ain’t no denyin’ we’ll draw attention with all these females. No point in trying to conceal who we are,” Colman grumbled.

“We’ll stay north of the border as much as possible, but we’ll need to stop overnight in Carlisle and then we’ll have a very long day to get to Jedburgh. No doubt Sykes will check here, so we’ll have to assume he’ll discover what day we left here. While they were settling in, I arranged for two carriages and drivers, as well as horses for you and I, Jenson. Eynon and the three women will be in the first. Gloria and I will follow with most of the luggage to even out the weight. If they do catch us, chances are that they won’t be able to stop both carriages. Jenson, you’ll need to divert south to a friendly location—Meriden’s estate, or one of the Lennox properties. I assume you know where they all are.” Clare tossed Jenson a pouch of coin.

Grimly, the man took it even while he objected. “You’ll need my pistol if we’re to ward off four of them, or more.”

Clare’s eyes flashed. He was worried, but couldn’t wait to search out reliable outriders. “Your charge is the safety of that baby, and believing Eynon is safe is the best thing for Gloria. If she’s constantly anxious about you, she’ll not be able to focus when it’s most necessary. After we outfit you tomorrow night in Carlisle, you’ll wear gentleman’s attire. We shouldn’t have any trouble until at least then. With the proper clothes, a shave and a wash, you’ll pass as one of your uncle’s sons. When we were your age, he could have been your twin.”

Colman was reading a list of stopping places, but looked up then, missing the shocked look on Jenson’s face behind him. “Carlisle’s not that much past Wigton. You could get farther tomorrow.”

“Not if I’m to see to you and call on the bishop in the early evening,” Clare said shortly. Both men looked confused for a moment, but then Jenson recovered and nodded.

“Don’t need a special licence, at least in Scotland.”

“We’ll have to cross the border into England eventually and there’s no way to guarantee we can cross back. I’d rather have as many choices as possible, and to be frank, I’m not thinking there are many places between Carlisle and Jedburgh where we’ll find decent lodging.”

It was Colman who finally asked the question that had been bothering Clare all along. “And when ye get to Ladykirk? Ye still have Sykes on yer tail, and he will show up eventually—or worse than ’im. What then?”

Clare’s face was grim. “Then we’ll have a wedding”

Colman took the first watch in the corridor outside the door to the larger suite across the hall. Brody disappeared, and Clare sat at the desk in the corner of the room. He penned more dispatches to the family solicitors in London, to his son and to his father, regarding his impending change in status. He wrote an updated note to Lennox regarding their experience in Douglas and their current plans to part ways with Brody and Eynon if required. He wrote brief memos to each of his stewards at all of the dukedom’s estates altering his schedule. Lastly, he penned and sealed—but did not frank or post—a carefully worded announcement. Clare stared at the words, memorised them, then folded that paper and placed it carefully in his oilskin travelling bag.

Brody Jenson returned to the sitting room as he was dousing the lamp. Clare paused and looked him over carefully. He’d seen Jenson’s surprise at his earlier words, and realised he needed to clarify what he knew and what he suspected, especially when Jenson looked at him warily. His voice tired, Clare nevertheless spoke, knowing he had to do so at this first opportunity for a private communication.

“Once upon a time, years ago, His Grace, the Duke of Lennox, had a schoolmate with whom he became inseparable. When this friend was in town, he lodged at Lennox House, instead of in rooms of his own or at his parents’ domicile. He travelled with His Grace to spend the summer in Wales with his sons.”

Jenson froze, his face drawn, but Clare went on quietly. “Lennox was—is—powerful enough that openly questioning him would have cut one off socially and cut political ties with one’s entire family. Most didn’t care. Lennox had two sons, and if he wasn’t causing an outright scandal there was little reason for concern on that score. Moreover, his friend—Lord Robert Twicken—was only a fourth son of the Duke of Richmond. Twicken was wealthy but had no purpose other than to keep company with Lennox. So they went on, until Lennox and Twicken fell in lust, or maybe even in love, with the same woman.”

“Not my mother,” Jenson said automatically.

“No, this would only have been twenty-one years ago. To all outward indications, the trio managed very well for years. The lady had a child, which was presumed to be her husband’s, and then a second child, also thought to be her husband’s, but in truth each of them had fathered one. First Twicken, then Lennox. But something changed. Eventually Twicken decided to pursue his luck in France against Napoleon as a cavalry officer. Whether it was simple patriotism or a desperate escape I don’t like to guess.”

Jenson’s voice was hollow, a little gruff. “His Grace—Richmond—wanted at least one of the brothers to go, to save face for the family. Lord Robert was the only unmarried one, ten years ago. I was lucky enough to accompany him as his batman and to be there, at the end. All he really wanted was to get home to England, to Lennox House. He was totally unsuited for that life.”

Clare had felt the weight of family responsibility all his life, but his heart ached, then.

“Jenson, you’re the grandson of a duke. You’ve been adequately educated, taught to speak. You have no business being dressed as a servant, not even if the boy is your nephew, and you’re the spitting image of your uncles’ sons, or will be as soon as you’ve a decent haircut and tailored clothing. Twicken and Lennox should both have done better by you, but Lennox still lives by the old rules of Georgian England where such things were hidden and denied.”

“I think my father would have, if he’d come back to England, alive,” Jenson admitted reluctantly. “But I’ve always known Lennox could turn me away.”

Clare nodded in the dim room. “As long as you live a good, upstanding life, you have a place in Gloria and Eynon’s life. I’ll personally make certain of it.”

Jenson was silent for a long while, but then he nodded. “Thank you, my lord.”

“Goodnight, then,” Clare murmured, and turned away.

His mind whirled with the thought of Gloria across the corridor, despite her refusal and his determination not to force or pressure her into intimacy. He’d deliberately put every member of her household between his bed and hers. She needed to rest and he still needed to sort out her emotional and desperate resistance to marriage, not to mention her surprisingly intense response to the notion of childbearing.

As much as he wanted her in his bed, he also wanted her company. The bed was lonely and cold, despite the fire in the hearth, so he turned and thought back over their conversations in the last two days.

The words chased him into an uneasy sleep, and into a whirlwind of unhappy dreams.

Gloria was there, of course. She was always in his dreams when she was not beside him at night. She was beautifully nude and wonderfully carefree, standing before him without shame. But she wasn’t happy. She screamed at him, the words whipped away by the wind, her tears painting sparkles across her cheeks where the sun reflected on her face. Then later, still without clothes, her eyes red from tears. She threw a glass of wine past his head and it splattered against a painting. He turned and saw it was a painting of herself and Eynon, and the red wine stained her oil-painted bosom as though her heart bled.

Clare awoke later, horrified by the last images of his dream. It seemed as though he could not dream of the woman wearing clothes. She’d been blessedly naked but frighteningly still, a pistol in her hands. At first it was pointed away, aimed towards Sykes with three little terrier dogs following at his heels. But then she’d changed positions, her arms had contracted, and the pistol had lifted towards her flushed, plump lips as March had done—

“No!” Clare sat up, even as the word left his mouth. His hands shook, and he clenched them into fists, breathing deeply as he gained control.

A glance at his watch showed the hour was early, but he dared not lie back down. Sykes and his companions would leave Douglas this morning and discover Clare’s duplicity by mid-afternoon. They could be back on Manx by late this evening by sailing into Peel and riding across the island, but then they’d have to bribe the wharfmaster to find
Beannacht
’s destination, or head to Blackpool to discover that Clare had not headed there. They could get no farther than The Waverley Hotel by tomorrow evening, and the chase would be on. He supposed they could ride all night and be arriving in Carlisle even as Clare’s own party left, but it would take some time to search—

He had to stop thinking about all the possibilities. They could not plan for them all. Chances were that the four would try to sail directly to Blackpool from Strangford. Only once they realised Clare had never arrived in his home port would they return to Douglas to beg, bribe and steal whatever information they could about his actual destination—or they’d assume he’d head for the safety of Norham Castle and set out overland to follow. Either way, Clare ought to have a few more days to convince Gloria that marriage to him was her best and only option.

It was still dark when Clare, already dressed and having eaten, slapped Colman’s saddlebag closed and watched him mount and disappear into the dim grey mist towards Carlisle. Clare would stand an hour’s watch in the corridor while Jenson prepared their belongings and freshened up.

Gloria was inside the suite door, already awake. He could hear her crooning to the baby, and Clare shifted uncomfortably, then paced back and forth before the closed panels. The need to comfort her—to kiss her—was growing. How long would he hold out before he abandoned the horse and took a place inside Gloria’s carriage?