Confessions From an Arranged Marriage (30 page)
Read Confessions From an Arranged Marriage Online
Authors: Miranda Neville
London, a few months later
T
he carriage stopped at the entrance to Westminster Hall. The Duchess of Hampton straightened the Duke's neck cloth, needlessly since his valet had turned him out perfectly as usual. Minerva wished there was something more she could do. She knew how nervous Blake was on the occasion of his maiden speech in the House of Lords.
“You will be brilliant,” she said for the ninetieth time. “Don't forget to look at your notes from time to time.”
“I won't,” Blake promised. “But if anything could dispel the rumors that I can't read it will be this. There isn't a member of either house who'd believe I could make an hour-long speech on criminal justice reform without reading it. I just hope I won't forget my words.”
“You won't. We've practiced it so often, you know it as well as Edmund Kean knows
Hamlet
. They'll see that the new Duke of Hampton is as impressive as the last.”
“I wonder what they'd all say if they knew you'd written it.”
“Most of it. You contributed some important ideas.”
“You give me too much credit. If I have anything of value to say it's due to my duchess.”
Minerva laughed. “
That
they would never believe.” She gave him a quick kiss, careful not to muss him. “Thank you, my darling.”
“What for?”
“I've always wanted to give a speech in Parliament. Through you I realize my ambition.”
“I only hope I can represent you well. Persuade a few of those fellows to change their minds.”
“If you don't, we'll keep trying, even if it takes years.”
“I'll put up with them for years, as long as I have you for even longer.” He pulled her to him for a more thorough kiss, apparently not caring if he was mussed. “I'd better go in.”
She watched him enter the building, his tall figure relaxed and confident. He exchanged a few words with the doorkeeper, then disappeared inside. The coachman drove her home to Vanderlin House to await the reaction to the speech. She wished she could be in the House to hear him, but no matter.
How could she complain about a little thing like that when she was the luckiest woman in the world?
W
hen I decided to write a book with a political setting, I looked at events in England in 1822, the year of this book. I quickly realized that politics, while engrossing for those involved, is incredibly complicated and mostly lacking in the kind of dramatic incidents that would enhance a romance without overwhelming it. The most thrilling event of 1822 seems to have been The Great Cabinet Reshuffle. Excited? Neither was I.
I'd already invented the Vanderlin family, a ducal dynasty (inspired by the Dukes of Portland) at the very center of English political life. So I decided to unhitch my tale from history. I took a single important issue, that of Parliamentary reform, and wove my tale around a simplified version of the subject. In the U.S., every ten years, congressional and state legislative seats are reapportioned according to population changes recorded by the census. Early nineteenth century England had basically gone without reapportionment for five hundred years. Thus “rotten boroughs,” with a handful of inhabitants, sent members to Parliament while big cities had none. The Great Reform Act finally passed in 1832, though the result was hardly what we'd recognize as democracy. In fact the main provisions were similar to those Blake outlined in his dinner speech.
T
he word dyslexia didn't exist in the Regency era, neither did any concept of the condition. I'd like to thank my friend Sandy Dickson, teacher and dedicated reading specialist, for her insights into the struggles of a boy born with dyslexia at a time he could expect neither help nor sympathy.
Miranda
M
IRANDA
N
EVILLE
grew up in England before moving to New York City to work in Sotheby's rare books department. After many years as a journalist and editor, she decided writing fiction was more fun. She lives in Vermont. She loves hearing from readers and may be reached through her website, www.mirandaneville.com.
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Confessions from an Arranged Marriage
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
CONFESSIONS FROM AN ARRANGED MARRIAGE
. Copyright © 2012 by Miranda Neville. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition APRIL 2012 ISBN: 9780062096494
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062023056
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