Mary Elizabeth was right, as she always was. She barely had time to smooth her curls and wash her hands in the retiring room before she was ushered in to see the Duchess of Northumberland by the great ducal butler.
She winked at the man, just to see what he might do. Billings did not blink in response, nor did he smile, but she thought she saw a gleam of amusement in his dark-brown eyes, which was more than she had bargained for. Pleased with this small inroad, she presented herself to her mother’s closest living friend and made her curtsy as gracefully as if her mother were in the room watching her. For all Mary knew, she might well be hiding behind the screen in the corner.
Mary Elizabeth did take the time to make certain that the fat duke was not lurking about. As soon as she saw that he, too, was absent, she relaxed.
The soft light filtered in from the closed French doors, and Mary found herself thinking that with fewer pillows, and a great deal less gilt, the room might even be pleasant. She did not have long to muse to herself, however, for Mrs. Prudence was on her heels, and the duchess had raised her quizzing glass to get a better view.
“You have finally arrived, I see. And none the worse for wear for the abysmal North Road,” the old lady said, still peering at Mary as if she might find the family’s lost jewels somewhere about her person.
If she had learned one thing in the last three months, it was how to be polite even when faced with the impoliteness of Southerners. Mary Elizabeth managed to smile, wishing for her own granny, who was no doubt sewing a new shawl of hunting plaid for her even as they spoke. Her granny was the one among the family who knew that, one day, Mary Elizabeth would be coming home.
“And good day to you as well, Your Worship,” Mary Elizabeth said at last. “I see that you’ve an eye for a fine-looking woman. I suspect you were a good-looking girl yourself, once upon a time.”
The blue-haired duchess dropped her quizzing glass at that bit of impertinence, and it swung down on its gold chain, only to rest against her large bosom. She stared down Mary Elizabeth in the lengthening silence, and Mary knew that it fell to her as the guest to put the moment to rights.
She heard the sound of birdsong, faint from beyond the window, and longed with a depth of feeling that surprised her to be anywhere but there. She breathed once and took herself to task. She was where she was, and she had best face it, until she could manage to be somewhere else.
Mary Elizabeth offered an olive branch. “I must thank you for opening your home to us, both here and in London. You are very kind.”
“Hardly.”
Mary Elizabeth wondered why Robbie—for it seemed that he had finally wandered indoors—didn’t speak up from his stance beside the parlor door. Robbie was a good soul, but not always willing to step up and speak with a lady when it was needed. That had always been her brother David’s job, and he was home, in the Highlands.
Mrs. Prudence, for her part, was quiet as a mouse, as she sometimes was when intimidated. Mary Elizabeth was not sure why anyone would be afraid of this old besom. No doubt, sitting alone in the midst of all that gilt, the Duchess of Northumberland was lonely, too.
When neither Mrs. Prudence nor Robbie said anything, the duchess continued. “And how did you find the town house, girl?”
“Large, Your Worship. And a bit drafty.”
Robbie had the good grace to shift on his feet, while Pru cringed and twisted her gloves between her hands. Mary Elizabeth was about to apologize for her blunt speech, in case she might have hurt the old lady’s feelings, but before she could offer another olive branch, the duchess laughed—a keen sound, like the honking of a goose.
The duchess’s voice warmed, and she patted the cushion beside her. “You remind me more and more of your mother by the minute. Sit down, girl, and tell your brother and your friend to join us.”
Once Mary Elizabeth had settled close to her, she felt the tension in her body run out like water over the burn back home. The duchess smelled of lavender, as Mary Elizabeth’s own granny did, and a bit of cinnamon.
Mary Elizabeth met Mrs. Prudence’s eyes from across the overly fancy room, and Pru managed to take a seat on the settee across from them. The ducal butler rolled the tea tray in and settled it at the duchess’s elbow. Mary watched as the duchess played mother, doling out tea and scones as if she were Christ and they all sat at the Last Supper.
Mary Elizabeth found herself liking the old woman more and more the longer they sat with her. Perhaps it was the blue sheen of her hair, which made the faded-blonde locks look more interesting than merely gray. Perhaps it was the way the lady faced the world head-on and stared it down, as Mary herself did. That was most likely a trait that the lady had possessed long before she had married to become the most powerful duchess in the North.
“Your mother was a bit of a scamp, as you are, miss. She was a lady of the house of Blythe, a noble family that traces its antecedents back to William the Conqueror.”
Try as she might, Mary could not let that bit of preening pass. “Aye,” she said. “And we are kin of the Bruce on my father’s side. But go on, Your Worship.”
The old lady did not take her to task for interrupting, but smiled at her and patted her hand. “You are a fine specimen of womanhood, young Mary Elizabeth. The House of Blythe and the scions of old Scotland have crossed well, no doubt about it. We need fresh blood in the nobility from time to time. God knows, the days of besieging a castle and carrying off the women to wed are gone.”
“More’s the pity,” Mary Elizabeth said.
Mrs. Prudence choked on her tea, but the duchess continued on her merry way. “Indeed. I often think that I could use a good Highlander threatening the property and carrying me away.”
Mary blinked, and the old lady sighed.
“But those days are behind me.”
“They are behind us all,” Mrs. Prudence offered, by way of civilizing the conversation. Mary Elizabeth watched with faint amusement as her little governess faced down the duchess like a lioness in her den.
“Perhaps not all of us,” the Duchess of Northumberland said, with a pointed look at Robbie, who was in that instant robbing the tea tray of its last scone and butter.
Mary Elizabeth leaned back against her cushions and smiled as she watched a dark blush rise in Mrs. Prudence’s cheeks.
Confident that her last sally had found its mark, the duchess turned back to Mary Elizabeth.
“Your mother, it seems, had a taste for Highlanders. She flirted with every man who crossed her path, as any woman worth her salt did in those days, but it was your father who got her alone on a hunt. He cut her off from the rest of the party, and the two of them did not ride back to the house until well after sundown.”
Mary Elizabeth’s ears perked up at this. The thought that her parents had ever been remotely wild made her feel less alone in the world, and made her like them more. She tried to imagine her da—her favorite fishing friend and boon companion—keeping a lady out past dark, and she simply could not get her brain to bend that far. The duchess spoke on.
“Well, she was ruined, of course. No other man would have her, save for some nabob they pulled out of the West Indies. But your mother did not give a fig for that, nor for what anyone thought. For she did not just dally with her Highlander, but rode away with him the very next day, only to marry him in the back of beyond three days later.”
As taken as she was with the duchess’s story, Mary Elizabeth could not let that comment pass. “Beggin’ your pardon, Your Worship, but that place at the back of beyond is my home. I won’t hear a word against it.”
The old lady sniffed, lifting her quizzing glass to take in the contours of Mary’s face. “Outspoken, aren’t you, girl?”
“That I am, ma’am.”
There was a long moment that spun out between them, when Mary Elizabeth thought she saw behind the duchess’s facade to the real woman within. There was a softening behind the blue of the lady’s eyes and the trace of a smile, as if she looked on Mary Elizabeth, with her fishing, her hunting, and her knives, and liked what she saw. Mary wished to God her own mother might see her as she was and love her for it.
She looked close at her new friend, and the dark blue of the duchess’s eyes showed a hint of her soul. It was faint and far away, like the glimmering of a candle in a shuttered room, but Mary was certain that she saw it.
It seemed that the duchess knew she had been found out, or that her soul at least had been glimpsed from afar, for her spine straightened as if she were on horseback and her tone was acerbic when she spoke. Mary Elizabeth found that she liked her even more for that show of pride. They were more than a little alike, for all this woman’s pretensions of grandeur.
“And you have no interest in rank, I see.”
Mary Elizabeth did not back down. No matter how the woman beside her fought not to be known, Mary knew how lonely such a life was. Having glimpsed the real woman, she would not now pretend that she had not. If she and the old lady were to be friends—and she had just decided that they were—she could not stand on ceremony, or let the duchess continue to hide. “No, Your Worship. A man is only as good as his two hands and his brain make him.”
There was a gleam behind the woman’s quizzing glass, a sheen that made Mary Elizabeth think of tears. “And you would say the same of a woman?”
Mary Elizabeth did not flinch. “Yes, ma’am.”
The duchess blinked, and the shutter came down over her soul again. But Mary Elizabeth knew it was still there. The lady had shielded her heart, but Mary Elizabeth would take care and not bruise it.
“Well, you’ve got enough fire and vinegar in you to make two of your mother, and no mistake,” the duchess said by way of dismissal of all that had passed between them behind their chatter. “I’m glad I summoned you here. You’re just what the place needs to liven it up a bit. The country is deadly dull.”
Mary relaxed and bantered with the lady as she knew no one else was brave or foolish enough to do. “I disagree, Your Worship. You’ve got the sea right by you, which makes for good fishing if you’ve the nerve to sail out on it.”
“I haven’t,” the duchess said. “And neither will you. If you drown yourself off my beach, your mother will have my head on a platter.”
Mary Elizabeth frowned but knew that she would not let such a stricture deter her. “I am disappointed, ma’am. I had hoped to go sailing.”
“My son might take you,” the duchess said. “He’s a fair sailor, when he’ll put his books down long enough.”
Mary Elizabeth smelled the trap then and knew better than to spring it. This lady, soul sister though she might be, had plans for Mary—plans that Mary would be quick to botch. Mary Elizabeth would marry a fat, old duke on the day Scotland and all its people fell into the sea. But she feigned ignorance, as if she were a fool.
“Would that be your son the duke, ma’am?”
“None other,” the old lady groused, looking peevish. “I’ve not got another one.”
“Well,” Mary Elizabeth said, feeling that it was only sporting to let the old besom know her own position, so that there would be no question of confusion and no disappointment later, “your son has nothing to fear from me, Your Worship. He might take me for a sail and come back safe as houses.”
The old lady looked shrewd, her eyes narrowing. “Safe, is he? And why might that be?”
“Well, even if he kept me out until dark, he’d still be safe. For I’d never marry him, you see. I’m not the marrying kind.”
The duchess stopped pretending and laid her cards on the table. Mary Elizabeth felt a surge of respect for her.
“Your mother wants you married, girl. A duke would be just the thing.”
Mary Elizabeth frowned like thunder. She took a breath and tried to sound civil. “My ma and I disagree on this point, Your Worship.”
“On marrying a duke?”
“On me marrying at all, ma’am.”
The old lady laughed out loud at that, as if Mary Elizabeth might be brought around to her way of thinking. “Well, my son is destined to wed. No doubt he’ll be glad that there’s one girl at this house party who’s not trying to catch him.”
Mary Elizabeth smiled at the old lady then, and knew that, just as she had not given an inch on the subject, neither had the duchess. Mary had studied enough of strategy, however, to know the value of a clean retreat. She turned her eyes to the French doors that led out into the garden.
“Might I explore a bit, Your Worship? I’ve been trapped in a carriage for five days. I’d like to stretch my legs.”
“By all means, dismiss the duchess before you and wander away.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
Mary Elizabeth smiled, knowing the lady had to keep up the pretense of annoyance but that she understood her. It was refreshing to be understood by someone, after a lifetime of making friends with people who never gleaned a bit of her soul. Catherine loved her, and so did Mrs. Prudence, but they did not understand her, and most likely never would.
Before she fell into a taking and began to droop about the mouth and whine, Mary Elizabeth escaped that room and all its thwarted expectations, leaving the French doors standing open behind her.
When she stepped into the fresh, clean air of that garden, following the birdsong, she also heard the sound of the sea and went off in search of it. She had not gone far when she stumbled across an uprooted rosebush and the man who had dug it up.