THE MARQUESS OF STAUNTON HAD WOKEN AT DAWN and found himself unable to sleep again even though it had taken him a long time to get to sleep the night before. He had lain down and stared upward in the near-darkness at the familiar pattern of the canopy above his bed. He had stood at the window gazing out at moonlit darkness, his fingernails drumming on the windowsill. There had been a sheen of moonlight across the lake.
He had felt restless. His brain had teemed with jumbled memories of the day—his father’s gray complexion, Charles’s transformation from an awkward boy to a tall, self-assured young man, Claudia’s mature beauty, William’s reticence, Augusta’s formality, Marianne’s affectionate treatment of himself, his wife seated behind the tea tray at teatime, his wife making conversation with Twynham and Will at dinner, his wife playing the pianoforte very precisely and skillfully, his wife with her arm linked through the duke’s, smiling at him and forcing him into conversation.
He had smiled himself at that last memory. His grace hated to be touched. He never smiled or was smiled at. No one ever initiated conversation with him. And of course no one ever called him Father.
She was quite perfect. She was far better than the quiet mouse he had thought would do the trick. As a mouse she would merely have been despised. She would not have disturbed the atmosphere of the house. As she was, she was causing alarm and outrage. Doubtless the very, very correct Duke of Withingsby and his offspring thought her vulgar. She was not, but in their world spontaneity was synonymous with vulgarity. And she was his wife, the future duchess. The knowledge would gall them beyond bearing.
And he had understood, standing there at the window, one definite reason for his insomnia. She was in the next room, only their two dressing rooms separating them. She was his wife. The night before he had consummated their marriage and she had responded with flattering passion. He would not at all mind repeating the experience, he had realized in some surprise—he really did not think of her as desirable.
He had gone back to bed and lain awake for some time longer, remembering the smell of her hair. It was strange how a smell—or the absence of a smell—could keep one awake. And soap! He had never found even the most expensive of perfumes particularly alluring. He could remember breathing in the smell of her hair very deliberately as his body had pumped into hers, and enhancing his own sexual pleasure with the sense of smell.
There had been definite pleasure, not just physical release.
At dawn he was awake again and could not get back to sleep. The sky looked bright beyond the curtains at his windows. There was a chorus of birdsong in progress. It was an aspect of country living he had forgotten. He threw back the bedclothes impatiently. He would go for a ride, blow away some cobwebs, rid himself of the feeling of oppression the house brought to him.
But when he stepped through the front doors some minutes later, on his way to the stables, he stopped short at the top of the marble steps. On the terrace below him stood his little brown mouse, her head turned back over her shoulder to look up at him. She was up and dressed and outside at only a little past dawn?
“Good morning, my lady,” he said, amazed that he could have lain awake last night wanting this drab creature—even her eyes were shadowed by the brim of her brown bonnet.
“I could not sleep,” she said. “The birds and the sunshine were in conspiracy against me. I have been standing here undecided whether to walk to the lake or up onto the hill.”
“Try the hill,” he suggested. “A picturesque walk has been laid out there and will lead you to several panoramic views over the park and estate and surrounding countryside.”
“Then I will go that way,” she said.
He tapped his riding crop against his boots, undecided himself for a few moments. “Perhaps,” he said abruptly, “you will permit me to accompany you?”
“Of course.” She half smiled at him.
He walked beside her, his arms at his sides. She clasped hers behind her. She walked with rather long strides, he noticed, as if perhaps she was used to the countryside. But she walked gracefully too. What had life with her father been like? How long ago had her mother died? Was she dreadfully lonely? Had the father been quite unable to make provision for her, even knowing that his estate had been entailed on a male relative? Had the relative been unwilling to provide for her? Did she miss her home and the countryside and the life of a lady? Had there been love in her home? Had there been love outside it—had there been a man she had had to leave behind in order to work as a governess? He was glad when she spoke and made him aware of the direction of his thoughts. He had no wish to feel curiosity about her or to know anything about her beyond what was necessary for his purposes.
“Your father really is ill,” she said. “Have you discovered what is wrong with him and how serious it is?”
He had spoken briefly with Marianne in the drawing room last evening. “It is his heart,” he said. “He has had a few mild attacks during the past few months. The physician has warned him that another could be fatal. He has advised almost constant bed rest.”
“I believe,” she said, “that your father finds it difficult to accept advice.”
“That,” he said, “would probably be the understatement of the decade.”
“Perhaps,” she said, “he would listen to you if you spoke with him. Perhaps he invited you home with the hope that you would speak, that you would lift the burdens of his position from his shoulders.”
He laughed, entirely without humor, and her head turned in his direction.
“Do you love him?” she asked quietly.
He laughed again. “That is a foolish question, my lady,” he said. “I broke off all communication with him for eight years. During those years I deliberately made myself into everything he would abhor. I lived recklessly, I involved myself in business and investments, I made a fortune independently of the land, and I became—”
“A rake.” She completed the sentence for him when he hesitated.
“I freed myself,” he said, “from him and from all this. When I returned, I came as myself, on my own terms. No, I do not love him. There is nothing to love. And I am incapable of love even if there were. You were perfectly correct yesterday when you commented on my likeness to my father.”
“Why did he ask you to come back here?” she asked.
“With the intention of asserting his dominance over me once more,” he said. “With the intention of making me into the person he had planned for me to be since birth so that I might be worthy of carrying on the traditions he has so meticulously upheld.”
“And perhaps,” she said, “so that he might see his son again before he dies.”
“Tell me, my lady,” he said, his voice testy, “do you read romantical novels? Sentimental drivel? Do you picture to yourself an affecting deathbed scene in which father and son, drenched in tears, the rest of the family sobbing quietly in the background, are finally reconciled? Finally declare their love for each other? Promise to meet in heaven? Pardon and Peace—the book might be called that. Or The Prodigal Son, though that title has already been spoken for, I believe?”
“But not in a sentimental novel,” she said. “In the Bible, my lord.”
“Ah. Touché,” he said.
She smiled softly at him and said no more. He was agitated. Her silence had deprived him of the opportunity to work off his irritation on her. They had reached the rhododendron grove and the graveled path began to climb. Soon it would turn and they would reach the little Greek folly, from which there was an uninterrupted view down over the house and the lake beyond it.
Perhaps it was time she knew the full truth behind their marriage. “His grace summoned me home in order to marry me to the bride he chose for me seventeen years ago,” he said and felt a sense of almost vicious satisfaction when her head jerked around so that she could gaze at him. “A dynastic marriage, you will understand, ma’am. The lady is the daughter of the Earl of Tillden, a nobleman of ancient lineage and vast properties, a man as high in the instep as Withingsby himself.”
Her eyes widened—he could see them clearly now even beneath the brim of her bonnet. “They are the visitors expected here this afternoon,” she said.
He smiled. “I was expected to come home and to conduct a very brief courtship of Lady Marie Lucas, to celebrate my betrothal to her at a ball planned for tomorrow evening, and to marry her before summer is out,” he said. “I was expected then to do my duty by getting my heirs and my daughters on her annually for the next twenty years or so. The Duchesses of Withingsby are chosen young, you see, so that there are sufficient fertile years ahead of them. It is a pity, after all, to waste such impeccable lineage on a mere couple or so of children, is it not?”
She had stopped walking. They stood facing each other. “And so you advertised for a governess and offered your chosen candidate marriage,” she said. “What a splendid joke.” She did not sound amused.
“I thought so,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “I still think so. The guests will arrive this afternoon, my lady, unaware that they come in vain.”
Her eyes searched his and he felt the familiar urge to take a step back. He did not do so. There was something unfamiliar in her eyes—anger? Contempt? He raised one eyebrow.
“I believe, my lord,” she said, “you were less than honest with me. I did not know I was to be used as an instrument of cruelty. I believe I might have rejected your offer had I known.”
“Cruelty?” he said.
“How old is she?” she asked.
“Seventeen,” he said.
“And she is coming here today for her betrothal,” she said. “But she will find you already married—to me. To a woman who is older than herself and by far her social inferior. Oh, yes, my lord, you are to be congratulated. It was a diabolical plot and is working very nicely indeed.”
Her quiet contempt goaded him. How dared she!
“It seems to me, my lady,” he said, “that you were ready enough to take my money and enrich yourself for a lifetime. You asked precious few questions about what would be required of you as my wife. The only question that seemed to concern you was my ability to fulfill my financial commitment to you. You forced up my price. You insisted upon an extra clause that ensured a continuation of your annual allowance in the event that I predecease you. And are you now to preach morality to me?”
Her chin jerked upward and she continued to look at him, but she flushed deeply.
“I have never made any promise to Lady Marie Lucas,” he said. “I have never had the smallest intention of marrying her.”
“But it did not occur to you to write to your father explaining this,” she said, “telling him firmly that it would not do and that he must inform the Earl of Tillden of your decision. Instead you married me and brought me here to embarrass and humiliate them all.”
“Yes,” he said curtly, thoroughly irritated with the way she was making him feel guilty. He had no reason for guilt. His life was his own. He had made that clear eight years ago, and if the message had not been taken, then he was making it crystal clear now.
She opened her mouth as if to speak, but she closed it again and turned to walk on. He fell into step beside her. “Perhaps,” she said at last, “she has had a fortunate escape, poor girl. One would not wish an innocent child of seventeen on you.”
“You, of course,” he said, “are far better able to handle me.”
“I do not have to,” she said. “When may I leave? After today’s humiliation is complete?”
“No,” he said. “I will need you for a while yet.” He must stay here for a while yet. There would be no real need to do so after today. He could return to his life in town and feel assured that his family would never trouble him again. But having come back, he knew he could not go again so soon or so easily. His father was ill, probably dying. William and Charles were his brothers. Marianne and Augusta were his sisters. Having seen them again, he felt the burden of the relationships again. And one day—perhaps soon—he would be head of the family. No, something had to be settled before he left Enfield—and before he could set his wife free. He was not sure what he meant by a settlement—not at all sure.
They walked onward in silence until she noticed the folly and stopped again.
“Walk around to the front,” he told her. “There is a splendid view. There is even a seat inside the pavilion if you wish to sit for a while.”
She did as he suggested though she did not sit. She stood for a long while in front of the folly, looking down at the house and beyond it. The scene was at its best, bathed in early-morning sunshine. If they had heard a chorus of birdsong from the house, there were whole vast choirs of them at work here.
“It will all be yours,” she said after a lengthy silence. She seemed to be speaking more to herself than to him. “Yet you do not feel the need to pass it on to a son of your own.”
He turned his head sharply to look at her. She stood with a very straight back and lifted chin. Such a proud, erect posture was characteristic of her, he realized. Dressed differently, she would look like a duchess. And dressed differently, she would look beautiful. It was a jolting thought. Not that dress created beauty, of course—it merely enhanced it. But he was already familiar enough with her face to admit—reluctantly—that it possessed far more beauty than he had thought at first. She had been wearing a careful disguise of nonentity when she came to her interview on Upper Grosvenor Street. Only the eyes had almost given her away, and she had been clever enough to keep them hidden most of the time.
“You would do well to hope,” he said, his eyes sweeping over her, “that I do not change my mind.”
She looked back at him—and blushed.
“I will not change my mind,” he said despite the alarming surge of desire her words and the look of her had aroused. “What happened between us two nights ago, though pleasant enough, was a mistake. It might yet have consequences. We will have to hope not. But you may rest assured that I will never again put you in danger of conceiving.”
She did not look away from him despite the blush, which did not recede. She tipped her head to one side and prolonged the gaze. “I believe,” she said at last, “that you must have loved your mother very deeply.”
For a moment he was almost blinded by fury. He clasped his hands very tightly at his back, drew a few slow breaths, and was very thankful for the iron control he had always been able to impose upon his temper.
“My mother,” he said very quietly, “is not a topic for discussion between us, my lady. Not now, not ever. I trust you understand?”
It was a question that could be answered in only one way and with only one word, but nevertheless she appeared to be considering the question.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I believe that perhaps I do.”
“Shall we climb higher?” He indicated the continuing path with one hand. “There are some different and equally magnificent views from higher up.” He should have gone riding, he thought. He should have kept to himself.
“I think not this morning,” she said. “Your father is to show me the portrait gallery after breakfast, though I shall try not to keep him there too long. I shall try to persuade him to rest afterward.”
“You do that,” he said, pursing his lips.
“And then I am to call upon Claudia at the dower house,” she said.
He nodded curtly. Let her do that too. Let her make friends with Claudia and with Will and with the whole lot of them if she could. She might find it harder than she imagined. Let her make friends with Tillden and with Lady Marie this afternoon. He should be feeling more than ever triumphant this morning. But she had succeeded in making him feel thoroughly out of sorts.
“Allow me to escort you back to the house for breakfast, then,” he said. Though he doubted anyone else would be up even yet.
“Perhaps,” she said, “you would care to accompany me? To the dower house, I mean. You did not have much opportunity to talk with your brother yesterday. And I suppose you have not yet met your nephews.”
“My heirs after William?” he said. “No, I have not. Unfortunately I have other plans for this morning.”
She circled around the folly ahead of him and they set off down the slope. They walked in silence, not touching.
But he spoke again as they approached the house—reluctantly, not at all sure he wanted to do what he was about to say he would do.
“Perhaps my other business of this morning can be postponed,” he said. “Perhaps I will accompany you to the dower house.” That was where they lived, he had discovered last evening, William and Claudia and their two sons. “After all we have been married for only two days and are deep in love and will not wish to be separated unnecessarily.” His tone sounded grudging even to his own ears.
“And William is your brother,” she said, smiling at him.
Yes. And William was his brother. And there were some ghosts to lay to rest, as he had realized yesterday.
PERHAPS THE DUKE of Withingsby lacked the ability to love, Charity thought, though she was by no means convinced of it—she did not really believe that it was possible to be human and incapable of love. But certainly he was capable of a pride bordering on love.
He had been at breakfast when she and her husband had returned from their early-morning walk and had entered the breakfast parlor together. He had stood and made her a courtly bow, at the same time sweeping her brown walking dress and her simple chignon—she had not summoned her maid when she had risen early—with haughty eyes.
Immediately after breakfast he had brought her to the portrait gallery, which stretched along the whole width of the house, and had proceeded to show her the family portraits and to describe their subjects and, in certain cases, the artists who had painted them. He displayed a pride and a degree of warmth she had not seen in him before.
“The people Van Dyck painted,” she said, stepping closer to one canvas displaying a family grouping, “all look alike. It is not just the pointed beards and curled mustaches and the ringlets that were fashionable at the time. It has something to do with the shape of the face and the eyes—and the sloping shoulders. His paintings are easily distinguishable anywhere.”
“And yet,” he said, “I believe you will agree, ma’am, that the Duke of Withingsby depicted here bears a remarkable resemblance to your husband.”
He did. She smiled at the likeness. “And to you too, Father,” she said. “But then I think I have never seen a father and son who so resemble each other.” And who so love and so hate each other, she thought. She did not believe she was wrong.
“That terrier,” he said, pointing with his cane to a little dog held in the arms of a satin-clad, ringleted boy, “is reputed to have saved his young master’s life when the boy fell into a stream and struck his head. The dog barked ceaselessly until help arrived.”
“The boy who is holding him?” she asked, stepping closer still to examine both the child and the dog.
“The duke’s heir,” he said. “My ancestor.”
“Oh.” She turned and smiled full at him. “So you owe your life too to that little dog.”
“And you owe your husband to it, ma’am,” he said, raising haughty eyebrows.
“Yes.” She felt herself blushing for some unknown reason. But she knew the reason even as she realized that her father-in-law was noting and misinterpreting her flushed cheeks. She blushed because she was deceiving him, because even though she really was married to his son, she was not truly his wife. She did not want to deceive. It would have been far better if her husband had come alone to Enfield Park to confront his grace, to assert his determination to live his life his way and to choose his own bride in his own time.
He moved along to the next painting and the next until they stood at last before the most recent. She gazed at it mutely, as did his grace.
He looked a good deal younger in the portrait. With his very dark hair and healthy coloring, he looked more than ever like his son. The Marquess of Staunton—proud, youthful, handsome—stood at his shoulder. The other young man must be Lord William, though he looked different in more than just age from the man she had met the day before. He looked—sunny and carefree. Marianne had not changed a great deal. The solemn child must be Charles. No one had smiled for the painter, though William seemed to smile from within.
“She must have been beautiful,” Charity said. She referred to the duchess, who sat beside her husband, looking full at the beholder. Though the least striking in looks of any of them, she seemed, strangely enough, to be the focal point of the portrait, drawing the eyes more than the child did, or than the haughty duke himself, more than her proud eldest son. The painter, Charity thought, had been fascinated by her. There was a look of faded beauty about her, though it was probable that the artist had downplayed the faded part. But he had not erased the look of sadness in her eyes.
“She was the most celebrated beauty of her time,” the duke said stiffly.
Was that why he had married her? For her beauty? Had he also loved her? She had borne him thirteen children. But that fact proved neither love nor lack of love. She was Anthony’s mother, Charity thought. The woman about whom he still felt so deeply that he had turned to ice this morning when she had suggested to him that he must have loved her.
“She was the eldest daughter of a duke,” his grace continued. “She was raised from the cradle to be my bride. She did her duty until the day of her death.”
Giving birth to Augusta. Charity felt chilled. Had he loved her? More to the point, perhaps—had she loved him? She had done her duty …
I am the daughter of a gentleman, she wanted to say. I was raised to be a lady. I too know my duty and will perform it to the day of my death. But it was not really true, was it? She had married just two days ago and had made all sorts of promises that would never be kept. She had made a mockery of marriage—for the sake of money. Her husband had been very right about that this morning, when she had been outraged to discover just why he had married her in such haste and brought her here. She felt a pang of guilt and was surprised that she should feel so defensive, so eager to justify herself to this stern man who never smiled and who appeared to have inspired no love in his children.
“Father,” she said, taking his arm, “you have been on your feet for long enough. I am truly grateful that you have brought me here and shared your family—Anthony’s family—with me. But let me take you somewhere where you may rest. Tell me where.”
“I suppose,” his grace said, “Staunton did not even offer to clothe you in suitable fashion for your change in station.”
He had silenced her for a moment. She was horribly aware of her drab walking dress, from which she should have changed for breakfast and certainly for this visit to the gallery. But she had so little else into which to change. She did not release his arm. “We married in haste, Father,” she said. “Anthony wanted to come here without delay. He was anxious about your health. There was no time for shopping. I do not mind. Clothes are unimportant.”
“On the contrary,” he said, “appearance is of the utmost importance—especially for a woman of your present rank. You are the Marchioness of Staunton, ma’am. And of course he married you in haste. I wonder if you know why he married you. Are you naive enough to imagine that you are beloved, ma’am, merely because of melting looks and kisses on the hand and the conjugal activity that doubtless occurred in your bedchamber last night? If you harbor dreams of love and happily-ever-afters, you will without a doubt be severely hurt.”
She swallowed. “I believe, Father,” she said as gently yet as firmly as she could, “it is for Anthony and me to work out the course of our marriage and the degree of love it will contain.”
“Then you are a fool,” he said. “There is no we in a marriage such as yours. Only Staunton. You are a wife, a possession, ma’am, of sufficiently lowly rank to enable him to demonstrate to me how much he scorns me and all I stand for. He will get children on you so that he may flaunt to me and to the world the inferiority of their mother’s connections.”
This, Charity thought, still clinging to his arm, almost dizzy with hurt, was how she was earning her money. For Phil. For Penny. For the children. She would not lose sight of the purpose of it all. How glad she was now that she had had the foresight to declare herself an only child.
“Do you feel scorned, Father?” she asked. “Are you hurt by Anthony’s marriage to me?”
He did not answer her for several silent moments. “If I am, ma’am,” he said at last, “Staunton will never have the satisfaction of knowing it. You will see that I am not without resources of my own. Most games are intended for more than one player. And most games are truly interesting only when the participants play with equal skill and enthusiasm. Yes, my dear ma’am, I am feeling fatigued. You may help me downstairs to my library and then ring for refreshments for me. You may read the morning papers to me while I rest my head and close my eyes. You are promised to Lady William for later this morning? I will spare you after an hour, then, but not before that. My son came home to me yesterday, bringing me also a daughter-in-law. It behooves me to become acquainted with her. It would not surprise me to discover that I will grow markedly fond of her.”
His voice was chilly, his eyes more so. But it did not take a genius, Charity thought, to guess what game it was his grace had decided to play. She had known from the start, of course, that she was to be a pawn. She had just not known the extent of her involvement in that role. But it seemed that every hour brought her a fuller understanding of what she had got herself into.
She supposed she deserved every moment of discomfort that had already happened and that was still to come.