It was almost time for HMS Liverpool to dock at Marseilles. From his view on the bridge John Chester watched the port grow nearer.
Captain Hallam clapped him on the shoulder.
"I am going to the shore office to find if there are any letters. Are you coming with me, or are you leaving me to find yours for you?"
John laughed.
"I'll be very surprised if there is a letter for me."
"Oh, come on now," Hallam said. "You must have pretty girls longing for you to return."
It was a reasonable question. John Chester was nearly thirty, well set-up, with dark brown curly hair and a twinkle in his eye that might easily capture a maiden's fancy.
"What about you?" he asked, skilfully side-stepping the question. "Did you leave any broken hearts behind?"
"If I did I just hope my wife never learns of them. She was expecting a child when I left and it may have been born by now."
"Congratulations. Your first?"
"No, the third. To tell the truth, we can't really afford any more."
"So you find children expensive?" John asked.
"Endlessly. Luckily my eldest daughter is very pretty, so she may marry a millionaire and save the family."
"I am sure you can find her one," John said with a grin. "Plenty of millionaires must travel in your ship, but I have always found that pretty girls are few and far between."
Hallam regarded him with good natured cynicism.
"That is probably because their careful fathers are keeping them well out of your path," he observed.
John roared with laughter and did not deny it.
"But I would be surprised if you really suffered from a shortage of female company, anywhere you go" Hallam added, not without a touch of envy. "There seems to be a lack of unmarried Englishmen, and I have been told many times that a man with a female at home is a man to be avoided."
"I should have thought out of sight, out of mind," John replied coolly. "Who's to know what you're doing on a trip round the Mediterranean, or, as I have been travelling, far away on distant oceans, where an Englishman is as rare as a glass of cool champagne?"
"At least you can get that here," said Hallam. "If you can afford it."
"That's the problem," John said. "I often can't. What little I have has been spent on travelling. It isn't comfortable to do that when you haven't much cash, but I prefer travelling uncomfortably to not travelling at all."
"Then how will you manage at home?" Hallam asked.
"By doing what I have always done, staying clear of women with marriage in their eyes."
"But every woman has marriage in her eyes," Hallam pointed out. "Unless she is married already and then she has a husband under her heel."
"Where no woman will ever have me," John declared firmly.
"Then you will be a bachelor all your days," Hallam predicted.
"Not at all. I know exactly the kind of girl I want and when the time comes I shall choose her – sweet-natured, kind, docile –"
"Women are not docile any more," said Hallam, aghast at this lack of realism. "They have advanced ideas. They want to be emancipated."
"That kind of girl would not suit me at all," John said. "What man wants a wife who is always arguing with him?"
"No man wants that, but it's what they get," added Hallam gloomily. "My friend, you have been away from England too long. You know nothing about the New Woman."
"And you do?" John asked with a grin.
"Yes, from my wife's sister, a terrifying spinster. She could have married well, but no! It's all liberation and argument. According to her, one day women will have the vote."
"Never!"
"Just as long as I'm not alive to see it. Now I must get back to my duties. We're nearly there."
As he turned away another young man who had been standing just behind them, listening to their conversation, came closer to John.
"To listen to you talk, you're a heartless devil," he observed.
"I am not heartless at all," John objected. "I am just attracted to a certain kind of lady –"
"Dolls who never speak except to say 'Oh, how wonderful you are!' and 'I'll never understand how you clever men think of such things'."
John grinned.
"It makes for very engaging company."
"For a short time," Benedict expostulated. "But for life? Think of the boredom!"
"The trouble with you is that you come from a family of educated women," John responded gravely.
"It's true that my mother and sisters are extremely learned. Don't worry, old fellow. You will never be asked to meet them. Once I have told them about your ideas they wouldn't have you in the house."
"But Ben, don't they terrify you?"
"No, I grew up with women who talk good sense, so it seems natural to me. You have been spoilt by eastern women, with nothing to do but think of a man's comfort and agree with him."
"What's wrong with that?" John asked with an air of innocence.
"Oh, to blazes with you!" exclaimed Benedict. "I don't believe that you are as bad as you pretend."
"Maybe not," said John with a grin. "But almost!"
He led the way off the bridge and down to the deck, where he leaned against the ship's rail with easy grace, watching the harbour growing nearer.
Benedict Kenly, his friend who had accompanied him on part of his travels, thought that John was ungrateful as well as heartless.
He seemed oblivious to the advantages conferred by his long, lithe figure and handsome face, thought Benedict, who was sadly conscious of his own lack of height. His face was round and cherubic. Some girls were attracted by his kind heart, but they did not fall in love with him, he reflected sadly.
But John Chester, who could have his pick of pretty females, cared only for his freedom.
"Heartless," Benedict repeated.
"Let me tell you something, Ben," said John, "A man has to be a little heartless if he means to stay free of entanglements."
"Your life is full of entanglements," Benedict observed with perfect truth.
"Flirtations. I am talking about serious entanglements, the kind that lead to domesticity, like that poor devil, Captain Hallam."
"But you are going to be a Duke," Benedict noted. "You cannot stay unmarried all your life. What about your heir?"
John's eyes, as they turned on him, were so aghast that Benedict could not contain a laugh.
"What an appalling thought!" John exclaimed. "My uncle is not yet sixty. He might still marry and have an heir of his own, thus sparing me the draughty castle and the dreary inheritance."
They joined Hallam in going ashore and headed for the office where the letters of those who were travelling awaited collection.
John knew that there would be nothing for him, but it was as well to check before he and Benedict went to sample Marseilles hospitality.
But to his astonishment the man behind the desk said,
"There's been one waiting here for the last six weeks, sir."
It was not a letter, but a telegram that he handed to John. It bore his name and the name of the ship.
"It must be urgent," observed Benedict.
"I don't see how it can be. Heavens, I hope it's not that girl I dined with on my last night ashore."
"Did you behave like a gentleman?"
"Of course I did. Well, one kiss." Benedict frowned and John added defensively, "She was very pretty."
He opened the telegram and became very still as he read,
"Mr. John Chester, aboard HMS Liverpool. It is with regret that we inform you that your uncle, the Duke of Chesterton, died yesterday.
It is important that you should return immediately.
James Wentworth."
John read it over twice before he could believe it. He felt he had been hit by a bombshell.
As his uncle, who had never married, was now dead, John would become the Duke, inheriting not only the title, but also the house he occupied, which had been in the family for eight hundred years.
His whole life had been turned upside down and for a moment he could not think clearly.
"Is it bad news, old man?" Benedict asked sympathetically.
"The worst," replied John, very pale. "Come on, I need a drink, urgently."
He swept his friend out of the office and into the nearest tavern and ordered a bottle of brandy in a terse voice that made the landlord scuttle. Only when he had managed to take the first drink could he recover himself enough to toss the telegram across the table at Benedict.
Benedict read it and exclaimed,
"How sad. Were you close to him, John?"
"My uncle? No, we were never on cordial terms. And now it seems I am not to be reprieved after all. I will inherit a title that I do not want and a draughty great castle that's in a very bad state of repair."
He drained his brandy in one gulp, trying to come to terms with the calamity that had fallen on him.
"A title is useless without the money to keep it up," he added. "My uncle spent his money very strangely. He became religious in his old age and filled his home with poor people who had nowhere else to go."
"I don't call that strange," commented Benedict. "I call it noble."
"You come from a family of clergy," John pointed out. "It's understandable that you sympathise, but my uncle's family never did.
"Why any man wished to spend his time helping those who were too stupid to help themselves, I cannot understand. They not only gave him a great deal of trouble and when they died he paid for their burial. Then he had to contend with their weeping relatives who did nothing for them while they were alive."
"That's a very hard thing you are saying."
"Dash it all, Benedict, don't look at me like that. I don't mean to sound callous but I have had a bad shock, and I don't know which way to turn."
"Of course," said his friend loyally, "you are saying things you don't mean."
"Yes, well, don't get sentimental about me. I don't have a soft heart. All I can see at the moment is that I have been landed in a nasty position. Goodbye my freedom, goodbye my way of life!"
"But of course you will wish to do your duty to your family now," Benedict began to say and was silenced by a look from John.
He thought his friend looked shockingly pale, like a man in a nightmare. Which was exactly how it felt to John.
John had seen little of his uncle in recent years. He had always found other appointments to keep when his family thought it their duty to visit the Duke. He had no wish to suffer the boredom and discomfort he found at the castle.
Yet now it was his.
And he had no idea of what to do with it. Or how to solve any of the multitude of problems that were about to descend on him.
"I had planned to stop off at Marseilles for a while," he mused, "and maybe take another ship home. But now –"
"But now we must rejoin the ship," said Benedict at once.
"There is no need to spoil your trip, Ben."
"Of course I am coming with you. I will have to spend a few days with my family near Portsmouth, but then I am coming on to you. Do you think I would desert a friend when he's in trouble?"
John flashed him a grateful glance, downed another brandy and they headed back to the ship.
That night they began the journey to Portsmouth. John leaned against the railing, looking out at the choppy sea.
"My father once said Uncle Rupert was as mad as a hatter," he told Benedict.
"Because he helped the poor and oppressed?"
"Because he put them before his own family. When he inherited the title there was a reasonable amount of family money and a home which most sensible people would rejoice at owning. It had pictures, furniture, a library, in fact everything a man could want. He spent it all on his lost sheep.
"There were endless family squabbles and it was one of the reasons I felt the need to travel. I could just afford one journey, but I used it to make some money, so that I could give something to my mother and sisters and have a little over to pay for the next journey. That way I managed to explore much of the Orient, while still doing my duty to them."
"What were the other reasons you wanted to travel?" Benedict asked.
John thought for a moment.
"I was looking for something," he said.
"But what?"
"I am not sure – just, something different. Something outside my own experience that would make sense of the world. I have always lived in hope and now I shall never find it. All hope is gone."
"Perhaps it isn't to be found abroad?" Benedict suggested.
"I certainly haven't found it in the places I have visited," John agreed. "Perhaps it doesn't exist."
"Of course it does," Benedict said earnestly. "It exists for everyone. But maybe you cannot just go out and find it. Perhaps you have to be ready to recognise it when it finds you."
"Now you are getting mystical," John reproved him.
"And you're getting tipsy, old fellow," Benedict said kindly.
"It's enough to make any man drink himself to death," John said morosely. "And whatever it is, I won't find it now, not in England, a country I hoped I had left behind."
He thought for a moment.
"Do you realise," he said at last, "that there is actually no need for me to go home? I might never have called at Marseilles. I could turn round and go back on the next ship."
"No, you couldn't possibly do that," Benedict said. "You are the head of the family and it is your responsibility, however much you hate it."
"I suppose you're right," John sighed. "But every word feels like chains on me. Well, there's no hope for it. Let's go to bed."
*
It was evening when they docked at Portsmouth and there was nobody on the quay to meet either of them, since nobody knew when they would be returning.
"Come to the castle and suffer with me," John pleaded.
"How can any man resist such an invitation?" Benedict exclaimed. "I will join you as soon as I have seen my family."
At last it was time to disembark. As John walked to the gangway he found a porter was already there with his luggage.
"I suppose you will want a carriage," the man said to him.
"Can you find me one with two horses?" John replied. "I live in the County of Hampshire, near the village of Little Kingsford, so it will be a long journey."
"I'll do my best," said the porter and went off.
When John disembarked a few minutes later he was pleased to see that his luggage was being loaded into a two horse carriage.
"Goodbye old fellow," he said to Benedict. "Join me as soon as you can."
'It will be an expensive trip,' he thought as he turned towards the carriage, 'but it will be more comfortable than going by train, which usually means waiting for hours and changing several times before I finally reach the nearest station to my home.'
Suddenly he heard a voice just behind him.
"Please, please will you take me with you? I am travelling to the same part of the County as you are and no other carriage here at the moment will take me."
The voice was strong, eager and pleasant.
As John turned round in surprise he saw standing behind him a very pretty girl. She was well-dressed and was carrying a case which he would have thought would have been too heavy for her. She looked at him in a pleading way and he thought it almost impossible to refuse her request.
"Are you really going to Little Kingsford?" he asked. "It will take over two hours from here."
"I know that," she replied. "the coachmen I have asked say it is too late to take their horses so far and I don't want to stay here tonight."
"It will be a bit of a crush," John said, "but of course I will give you a lift if that is where you are going."
"I am indeed going to Little Kingsford," she answered. "I heard the man from the ship saying that was where you were going and I would be so very grateful if I can travel with you."
John smiled.
"Of course we can manage it," he said. He called the coachman and indicated for the girl's luggage to be put in with his own.
But she kept hold of her case as they began to walk and John politely tried to take it from her.
"No, thank you," she replied brightly. "I can carry it myself."
"It looks heavy."
"Oh, but I am very strong," she said cheerfully.
They reached the carriage just as all the other luggage was aboard. Without hesitation she lifted her bag and tossed it in. Then she reached into her purse and handed a shilling to the servant who had taken the rest.
"I think you should have left that to me," John murmured.
"You can tip him as well," she answered. "I don't suppose he will mind."
John hastily added his own tip and they climbed into the carriage together. As they moved off, John looked at the girl beside him. She was certainly very pretty. Her fair hair under a white straw hat was most becoming.
It was just a pity, he thought, that she spoiled her charming effect by showing so much mannish independence.
"Were you on board the ship on which I travelled?" he asked.
"No," the girl replied. "I have been staying with friends nearby, but I had to leave very suddenly."
"Not a family tragedy, I hope?"
"Oh, no. My friend has a brother who – well, he started to get a little silly about me. I could not make him take no for an answer, so I slipped away. Of course that meant I could not make proper travel arrangements, so I am going home anyhow. Then your ship came in and I heard someone saying it had come from France."
"That's right," John replied. "We called in at Marseilles, but actually I have come from the Far East. And since we are both going to Little Kingsford, I suppose we will be neighbours."
"I am going to Kingsford School as I believe they are short of teachers."
John looked at her in surprise.
"Are you a teacher?" he asked. "Somehow you don't look like a school marm."
"I am not one yet," the girl told him. "But I have had an excellent education and I want to use it. Otherwise I will just sit about and be the daughter at home and do nothing."
"Why do nothing?" John wanted to know.
"Because that's what daughters at home do. Or they sit on charity committees, but Mama's in charge of them all so that doesn't leave me much to do. She simply will not let go of the reins and it's very exasperating when I want to be doing things."
"What sort of things?" John asked cautiously.
"Useful things. You cannot imagine how I long to be useful. I find it an intolerable waste of life to do the same chores day after day, paying visits, buying new clothes, reading ladies' periodicals."
John concealed his thought that this was an entirely proper occupation for a young female, but said diplomatically,
"That must be very boring. But I think you will find a school dull too."
"Well, I have read all the books in the library and I cannot think of anything to do except be a teacher. After all, what is life without serious activity?"
"Serious activity?" echoed John, looking at her doubtfully.
It occurred to him that, although undoubtedly pretty, she was less charming than he had first thought. Young ladies, in his view, did not speak about 'serious activity'. And if they did, a sensible man avoided them.
"But surely a woman finds her serious activity in marriage," he remarked. "And raising children is a serious activity. I dare say you will marry soon."
"No thank you," she replied as though declining a slice of bread. "The married state does not suit me."
"You have tried it?"
"No, but I have seen enough of it to know that no sensible woman would have anything to do with it."
Thoroughly taken aback, John stared at her. Young ladies were not supposed to talk like this.
"Then it's lucky for us poor devils that there aren't too many sensible women in the world," he said, trying to turn it into a joke.
"But there are some sensible women in the world," she objected. "Plenty of them, in fact."
"Then how does it happen that they get married?"
"Because the world offers them no other choice," she said. "Otherwise –"
Sensing a speech threatening him John said hastily,
"Suppose we tell each other our names?"
"I am Gina Wilton," the girl answered, offering him her hand to shake.
He took it and found his fingers almost crushed by a determined grip. He only just managed not to wince.
"And you live in Little Kingsford?"
"That's right, in the shadow of the castle."
John gave her a curious look.
"Why do you mention the castle?" he asked.
"Because the thought of it has always filled my life. I have always been able to see it from my bedroom window, the great tower rearing up against the sky. And it's a real castle too. So many places that call themselves castles are really just houses and they were only built a couple of hundred years ago.
"But Chesterton Castle was built when castles were fortresses and it has real turrets and battlements so that you can fire arrows at the enemy, and a real moat."
"Well, it isn't really a moat any more," John said. "It was filled in years ago, but you can see where it once was."
"I used to make up such stories about the castle when I was a little girl. I was a Knight in shining armour, riding forth to slay the dragon and protect the weak."
"Women were not allowed to be Knights," John said firmly.
"I was in disguise," she replied, just as firmly. "I rode the country on my trusty steed, Maximus, protecting the weak."
John privately thought that the weak would probably run for cover at the sight of this terrifying girl, but he was too much of a gentleman to say so.
"Weren't you ever the damsel in distress?" he asked.
"Pooh, who wants to do that?"
"I thought not."
"Women led terrible lives," she complained, "stuck at home all day, waiting for the men to come home from their adventures. I would rather be out there actually having the adventures. Wouldn't you?"
"Well, I do enjoy travelling," he admitted.
"Oh, yes, you said you had been to the Far East, I remember. Will you tell me all about it?"
"No," he said flatly.
"Oh! Why not?"
"Because you never let me get a word in edgeways."
"I am so sorry. I am afraid I am always doing that."
"I can imagine. I would hate to be a dragon facing you. You would talk the poor creature to death!"
She chuckled and it had a strangely pleasant sound.
"So, while I have got you quiet for a brief moment," John resumed, "allow me to introduce myself."
"Oh, yes, I didn't you give the chance to do that, did I?"
"I am surprised you noticed. You might like to know that we are going to be neighbours, because my destination is the castle."
Gina gave an exclamation.
"How exciting! Oh, please, I long to see inside it after seeing only the outside for so long. Do you think you could possibly arrange it?"
"It might be managed," John agreed.
"You could actually persuade the Duke to agree?"
"He might be open to reason."
"Really? Do you know him? The new one, I mean. John Chester. Of course I know that the old Duke died and John Chester has disappeared. There are all sorts of stories flying around about him."
"Really?" John queried. "And just what stories are they?"
"People say that he is mad and his relatives have to hide him away to avoid a scandal."
"Indeed."
"Some people say he vanished years ago and nobody knows where he is, so they are going to hire an actor to pretend to be him. Fancy that!"
"Yes, fancy. Do go on, Miss Wilton. I cannot wait to hear the rest."
"Well, the other story is that he is a criminal in some foreign prison and they are trying to get him out, but the authorities won't release him because he is so deep in villainy."
"Well, I like that one best so far. I would rather be steeped in villainy than mad."
The effect of this pronouncement was all he had hoped. Miss Wilton stared at him, her jaw dropping.
"You mean – you – ?"
"You never did allow me to speak for long enough to introduce myself. Allow me to do so now, Miss Wilton. John Chester, Duke of Chesterton. At your service."