JoAnn Wendt (5 page)

“There is talk,” she confided happily, “that his first wives are not dead but alive, and sold into an African seraglio!” When he made no response, she demanded, “What do you think of
that,
McNeil?”

He eyed her solemnly.

“An excellent solution for unmanageable wives. I shall recommend it to your husband, the baron, when next we meet.”

She slapped at him with her comb, but would not be put off track. She leaped back to her gossip, unsheathing kitten claws upon the current duchess.

“I should like to believe Flavia cuckolded old Spindle Shanks,” she went on, wetting one finger with her tongue and repairing a disarrayed curl. “But, alas, Flavia lives like a nun. No one can be found to say a word against her.” She sighed in disappointment.

McNeil said dryly, “How uncooperative of the duchess.”

Annette gave him a quick sharp look, then giggled.

“McNeil, there is nothing so dull as a faithful wife.”

“Is that the opinion of your husband, Baroness?”

He found himself on the receiving end of a flung comb.

It was Garth McNeil’s first party at a ducal estate and he was amused to note that in tone it didn’t differ from a public ball in Williamsburg, Virginia, which one might attend for the price of a three-shilling ticket.

As in Williamsburg, each element sought its level. Avid horsemen gathered in groups, talking horses while their wives fussed at them to dance. Gamblers sought the gaming rooms while
their
vexed wives took pains not to appear vexed. The politically minded flowed to the smoking rooms. The young unmarried people danced every dance in the brightly lit ballrooms. The elderly claimed comfortable settees on the fringes of the dancing, their cheeks growing pink with wine and misty-eyed reminiscence.

“Come, McNeil,” Annette said, firmly taking his arm. “We must find old Spindle Shanks and present you.”

He moved with her through the glittering, expensively dressed assembly.

“And how will you present me?” he asked in amused curiosity. “As your dear and long-lost cousin?”

Discreetly, she stabbed him in the rib with her fan as her rustling skirts guided him on. “Stop it. I shall introduce you as shipmaster of the
Caroline,
prime shipper of Vachon china-ware, as business associate and close friend of my husband.”

His mouth twisted in a wry smile as they drifted through the music and gaiety, heading for the east ballroom.

“Ah, yes.
My close friend, the baron.” He paused. “But tell me, Baroness, what does my close friend the baron look like? Tall or short? Thin? Fat as a cow?”

She shot him a black look.

“McNeil, do behave tonight.”

“Say please.”

Temper flared in her eyes. Then she giggled.

“Please.”

He bowed.

“I shall be the personification of good manners, Lady Annette.”

* * * *

McNeil was annoyed at the instant surge of dislike he felt for the duke of Tewksbury. He did not usually find himself condemning a man at a glance. America-born, he always granted benefit of a doubt. Still, he felt his hackles rise as he and the duke exchanged the expected amenities in the ballroom. He loathed everything about the man: the peacock strut, the arrogance, the glint of hardness flickering in the cold eyes.

His hostility growing by the moment, McNeil clenched his jaw and spoke as little as possible. Annette chattered on brightly, oblivious to the polite contempt in the duke’s smile.

“The baron regrets he cannot attend tonight, sir,” she bubbled on in high spirits. “Business detains him on the Continent. Where is Her Grace? Shall we have the honor of seeing your son, the marquis?”

The duke warmed slightly in pride.

“I have ordered the nurses to awaken him and bring him down.” He paused. “However, Her Grace has seen fit to contradict me.” Displeasure moved across his features, hardening his mouth. “Her Grace has gone to fetch him herself. She insists he be wakened gently. She coddles him,” he said with distaste.

Annette burst into good-natured laughter.

“But he is only a baby, sir!”

He gave her a chilling look.

“He is the marquis of Bladensburg and the future duke of Tewksbury. He cannot begin to learn his duties too early.”

McNeil’s stomach turned. With a bow that barely qualified as polite, he excused himself. He needed air. There was a taint to the duke that sickened him.

Ignoring the flirtatious glances and fluttering fans that ushered him through the crowd, he made his way out and headed for the gaming room.

* * * *

Flavia chewed her lip as she hurried along the corridor, her son heavy and wiggling happily in her arms. She was worried. She knew she’d displeased the duke. And in front of guests. She hadn’t meant to speak up. But her heart had rebelled at the thought of the nurses roughly rousing Robert from his sleep. The nurses toadied to the duke. They would’ve wrenched Robert awake with the greatest speed: rough hands, loud voices, bright candlelight. At least she’d spared Robert that. She’d wakened him softly, with coos and kisses.

Aware of the two stern nurses trailing behind, exchanging frowns of disapproval, she faltered as she approached the ballroom. Her heart was heavy with dread. Would the duke have forgiven her peccadillo? Or would he hold it against her, meting out some future punishment? She remembered a past springtime when she’d unknowingly infuriated him by romping with a kitchen puppy through a garden plot of bright yellow daffodils. The duke did not speak of the incident. However, the next day all dogs were banished from Tewksbury.

Kissing the baby’s soft cheek, she drew a deep breath for courage and stepped into the ballroom. She forced a serene smile to her trembling lips as the sea of guests parted for her with appropriate admiring cries for the baby. Approaching the duke with a poise she didn’t feel, Flavia searched His Grace’s face for some signal of mood. His lips smiled, but his eyes were flint.

She looked away in panic.
Dear heaven, he’s furious with me! What will he do?

Immediately, silk-gowned and jeweled women flocked forward, cooing, clucking, petting the baby, uttering little cries of compliment that were meant for the duke’s ears.

“But he is
precious,
sir,” the Baroness Annette Vachon bubbled to the duke after warmly greeting Flavia. “See how he clings to his little mother. Aren’t they sweet together?”

Flavia’s hope for clemency sank. Annette Vachon meant well, but she couldn’t have said anything more damaging. In fear, Flavia glanced at the duke. He continued to smile, but the flinty eyes were coated with frost.

“Maternal attachment interferes with the process of education,” he said testily.

The baroness laughed, and Flavia’s hope sank further.

“Nonsense, sir!
Babies need their mothers.”

The duke stiffened. “It has never been so for the dukes of Tewksbury. We are reared without maternal coddling. It prepares us for our station in life.”

He smiled at Annette and then at Flavia, but Flavia trembled at the thought of what might lurk behind the smile.

“I shall return Robert to the nursery,” she offered quickly.

The duke checked her with a frown. “Allow the nurses to do it, my dear.” He signaled to the nurses who’d trailed after her. As a stout humorless nurse reached for Robert, he shrieked, clinging to Flavia’s neck. She feared to comfort him with soft patting. Under the duke’s forbidding eye, she could not. Helpless, she let the stout woman wrench him from her arms. Robert wailed. The wails cut a path through the sympathizing guests and faded into the corridor. Flavia stole a look at the duke. Clearly he was displeased with his son’s performance.

“You see, sir?” Annette Vachon pressed tactlessly. “A baby needs his mother.”

“He needs discipline,” the duke snapped. “And he shall have it. Tomorrow he goes to my estate in Germany. To Bladensburg. There he shall be reared by nurses and tutors who do
not
coddle.”

Without thinking, Flavia cried out, “No! Not yet! I know that Tewksbury heirs must spend their boyhood at Bladensburg, but Robert is still a baby, sir. He’s—”

Controlled anger glittered in the duke’s eyes, cutting her off.

“You disagree with my decision, my dear?” he asked pleasantly.

Guests murmured, drifting away. Flavia stared about blankly, seeking support that was nonexistent. Even Annette Vachon had turned from the subject and was flirting with a French count. The orchestra swung into the rousing German march that the duke liked, and she forced her numb gaze to her husband.

“Please, sir? Don’t send the baby away—don’t.”

His face was implacable. The music grew louder, its rhythmic cadence square and thumping.

Coldly, the duke said, “It is time for us to lead the grand march, my dear. Will you grant me the honor of taking my arm?”

Dazed, Flavia complied. Like a puppet responding to its puppeteer, she moved with him to the head of the ballroom where the march would begin. Stunned and heartsick, she hid her feelings behind the duchess of Tewksbury’s cool, serene smile.

The party was endless. Finally, Flavia found an opportunity and fled into the darkness of the garden to be alone. Her heart was bursting. She desperately needed to weep. Needed to release the heart-deep sobs that had been choking her during the past hours of obligatory dancing.

While tears were a luxury any Tewksbury kitchen maid could afford, the duchess of Tewksbury could ill afford them. Even in the supposed privacy of her apartment, there was always a servant about, eager to ingratiate herself with the head steward by reporting on her mistress. Tears, laughter, a cross word or even a happy shout—all were reported and eventually reached the duke’s ear, and the duke would lecture her on the theme of dignified self-control.

Blinded by tears, she fled, her slippers crunching the mollusk-shell path. The garden was empty. A chill damp breeze had begun to blow off the river, chasing in even the most ardent lovers. There was no moon, but Flavia needed none. She knew every inch of the garden. It was her only refuge at Tewksbury. She knew everything about it, even knew where wild rabbits hid from the gardener’s cudgel. Slipping from the white shell path, she left the formal part of the garden and found the dirt trail that cut through a thicket of small trees and wound along the riverbank. She ran. When she reached her private place by the river where trees shielded her from view of greenhouse and tool sheds, she sank into the inky darkness and sobbed. Her cries were wild and raw, her few sobbed words incoherent. She wept as she’d never wept before.

When her emotions were spent, she knelt there, numb and exhausted, beyond caring that the damp grass was spoiling her gown. She bowed her head. Bowed it to the inevitable.

Robert will go...the duke will have his way...

She felt empty. Only gradually did she become aware that life still went on all around her. She could hear distant violins. The river lapped soothingly at the shore. A hint of the sea came to her in the damp-smelling river breeze. She breathed deeply and caught the startling aroma of tobacco.

Turning quickly, she saw the red glowing tip of a cigar. A man sat smoking, deep in the shadows. She prickled, then squelched the fear as an unworthy one. If the man meant her harm, he’d have done her harm by now. She’d been weeping a long time.

“Forgive me,” she said timidly. “I thought this place deserted.”

The cigar glowed to brightness, then faded. Smoke lingered in the air for an instant, then wafted off in the breeze. Flavia found the smell oddly comforting. At last the man spoke.

“Don’t apologize. Every heart has its hell.”

The words were terse but not unkind. The accent Yankee. So he is America-born, Flavia thought sadly. There were many at the ball. Flavia had met several and danced with two. It was all the rage for highborn ladies to dally with handsome colonials, bringing them to parties in lieu of an absent husband. Gossips said Annette Vachon brought a colonial tonight, but Flavia hadn’t seen him.

The colonial didn’t intrude by speaking again. She was grateful. A less sensitive man would’ve attempted to offer comfort. Her gown rustled as she rose to leave.

“Do you desire escort?”

His voice. His voice! Don’t
imagine things, Flavia. Don’t break your heart more than it is already breaking.

“No, thank you, sir. I know Tewksbury as well as I know the back of my hand. I’m the—” Her voice fell away, and she found herself wondering at her impulse to confide in this stranger. “I am Flavia Bochambeau, the duchess of Tewksbury,” she finished without heart.

She would’ve had to be deaf to miss the harsh intake of breath that came from the darkness.

“Then I understand,” he snapped, and she sensed he truly did. She was aware that the duke’s cruel decision about Robert had been pounced upon by gossips. The tale had gone flying. No doubt it had been served up with the iced lobster in supper rooms, dealt out along with cards at gaming tables, and passed from fluttering fan to fluttering fan in the two ballrooms. No one could fail to know.

“Thank you,” she whispered sincerely.

For response, he moodily slung his cigar at the Thames. She watched it go. It was a tiny comet, trailing angry fire, then vanishing into a black watery void.

She knew she must weave her way back to the violin music. She mustn’t linger and further anger the duke. Yet she was loath to leave. The quiet colonial exuded a strength, a comfort. God knows, she thought, I am badly in need of such.

“Your voice,” he said, his shoes scraping stone as he rose. “It reminds me of—no. No.”

Her heart was suddenly a pendulum, swinging between hope and dread.

“Sir? Your voice, too... it...”

Just as he moved toward her, the moon forced its way through the dark, rain-laden clouds. The moon peeled back the clouds, layer by layer, and then sprang out, huge and white. Light flooded the riverbank.

“You!” he cried out.

“You...” she breathed.

He took three wild steps toward her, then froze as though he feared a closer look.

“Is it you?” he demanded. “Is it?”

Flavia swayed, her mind reeling. Safety lay in denial. Safety for herself and Robert.
Run! Run back to Tewksbury!
But her feet would not obey her mind. Instead they obeyed her heart, and she found herself flying into his arms.