Lady of Shame (22 page)

Epilogue

T
he wedding breakfast was a small affair, only family and servants, held in Castonbury’s downstairs entrance hall, where harvest home was celebrated with the tenants. The mood was exceedingly cheerful.

A wedding from one’s own home was far more enjoyable than a nightmare dash to Scotland, Claire decided, looking about her.

While they were missing many members of the family, Phaedra was there, sitting beside Jane looking beautiful. On her other side, wearing her most magnificent turban, Aunt Wilhelmina was tucking into the dinner prepared by Jeremy. Lily sat further along with her father. She would make a lovely bride herself in a few months and her love for Giles was clear in her eyes every time their glances met. Which they did often.

André had arranged for men and women from the local inn to wait on them and so the servants were all sitting down at one end of the table. Becca looked nervous. Agnes beside Joe Coyle was whispering and giggling. Daisy had baby Crispin on her lap, while his mother conversed with William Everett beside her.

Lumsden and Smithins sat opposite each other, competing to look the most patriarchal and keeping a close watch on the other servants’ behaviour, while Mrs Stratton cozed with the new cook, a woman from the village.

‘A toast,’ the duke said from the head of the table. He staggered clumsily to his feet. Giles put out a hand to steady him.

The company rose to their feet. All except Claire and André.

‘To my dear sister, Claire, and her bridegroom, the Comte du Valière,’ Crispin said. The title had gone a long way to settling the duke’s concern about their marriage. Not that André would use it every day. ‘The happy couple.’

‘The happy couple,’ everyone chorused.

‘To my mama and Monsieur André,’ Jane said, coming in rather late, but her little voice ringing clear in the huge room. She took a sip of the champagne her uncle Duke, as she called him, must have poured for her, and screwed up her face with a shudder to much laughter. The star on the ribbon around her throat caught the light of the overhead chandelier with myriad pinpoints of fire.

Claire stared at it.

André rose to his feet, glass in hand. Claire felt so proud of him. He was just so handsome. He exuded confidence and charm and seemed somehow able to include everyone in his smile. He glanced down at her and grinned. The shadows were all gone from his eyes. Every last one.

‘Your Grace.’ He bowed, elegant and courtly as always. The duke inclined his head, his smile broad as if he, too, had forgotten some of his sorrows on this happy occasion.

‘Lords, ladies,
mesdames et messieurs
,’ he continued.
‘Et mes amis.’
Some of the servants groaned.

‘In English,’ Joe Coyle shouted, and received a repressive look from Lumsden.

‘My friends,’ André said, acknowledging the boy. ‘Thank you for attending what is the happiest day of my life. I wish all of you the same happiness
et bonne chance
.’ His grin broadened. ‘Good luck for those of you not fortunate enough to speak French.’

More groans.

He raised his glass. ‘To my wife. My dearest heart. My Claire.’ He leaned down and kissed her to the sound of cheers. Then sat down hard when she pulled on his arm. He laughed and she laughed with him.

The servants began clearing away and an orchestra began setting up at one end of the room.

‘There will be dancing?’ Daisy asked, her face lighting up.

Talk and laughter rippled up and down the table. Claire took advantage of it, leaning closer to her new husband. ‘André, is that star you gave to Jane set with real diamonds?’

‘Yes.’

‘You said you bought it in a pawn shop.’

‘I did. It was my father’s. Sold off by one of the mob who destroyed my home, no doubt. It was an act of providence that I found it at all. It was grimy and labelled as tin.’

‘Providence indeed. But it is a family heirloom, surely?’

He looked at her, his expression soft, his eyes full of love. ‘Jane is my family.’

She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. Not done, of course, really not done in the best of circles, but they were not in the best of circles, were they? They were with their family.

Cheers and the drumming of hands on the table and feet on the floor lasted as long as their kiss, which lasted a very long time.

* * * * *

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Read on to find out more about
Marguerite Kaye
and the

series…

Ann Lethbridge
has been reading
Regency novels for as long as she can remember. She always imagined herself as
Lizzie Bennet, or one of Georgette Heyer’s heroines, and would often recreate
the stories in her head with different outcomes or scenes. When she sat down to
write her own novel it was no wonder that she returned to her first love: the
Regency.

Ann grew up roaming Britain with her military father. Her
family lived in many towns and villages across the country, from the Outer
Hebrides to Hampshire. She spent memorable family holidays in the West Country
and in Dover, where her father was born. She now lives in Canada, with her
husband, two beautiful daughters and a Maltese terrier named Teaser, who spends
his days on a chair beside the computer, making sure she doesn’t slack off.

Ann visits Britain every year, to undertake research and also
to visit family members who are very understanding about her need to poke around
old buildings and visit every antiquity within a hundred miles. If you would
like to know more about Ann and her research, or to contact her, visit her
website at
www.annlethbridge.com
. She loves to hear from readers.

Previous novels by this author:

THE RAKE’S INHERITED COURTESAN**
WICKED RAKE, DEFIANT
MISTRESS
CAPTURED FOR THE CAPTAIN’S PLEASURE
THE GAMEKEEPER’S
LADY*
MORE THAN A MISTRESS*
LADY ROSABELLA’S RUSE**
THE LAIRD’S
FORBIDDEN LADY

And in Harlequin® Historical
Undone!
eBooks:

THE RAKE’S INTIMATE ENCOUNTER
THE LAIRD AND THE WANTON
WIDOW
ONE NIGHT AS A COURTESAN
UNMASKING LADY
INNOCENT
DELICIOUSLY DEBAUCHED BY THE RAKE
A RAKE FOR CHRISTMAS

And in Harlequin® Historical eBooks:

PRINCESS CHARLOTTE’S CHOICE

*linked by character
**linked by character

Author Q&A

Apart from your own, which other heroine did you empathise with the most? And which hero did you find the most intriguing?

All of the heroines are fascinating in their own way, but I think Phaedra is one of my favourites. I like that she is such a tomboy. I must also say I have a bit of a crush on Giles. He is such a great brother and he not only has his own troubles, he is stuck with a great many he did not expect as a second son. He is very kind to my heroine.

What is your heroine’s favourite childhood memory of Castonbury Park?

Claire spent much of her time alone at Castonbury. Her own siblings were grown up while she was still in the schoolroom, so she loved it when Giles, Harry and the rest of the Duke’s family came to visit Claire’s father—their grandfather. They were all about the same age and she really enjoyed rattling around the grounds with them.

Which Montague do you think Mrs Stratton the housekeeper let get away with the most?

Edward—he was the youngest and a great favourite with the whole family.

Which stately home inspired Castonbury Park and why?

Kedleston Hall was our inspiration for the house. Some of the authors had visited the house and so were able to give the rest of us insight into the architecture and layout. Its unusual design gave us lots to work with, both with the upstairs and the downstairs members of the family.

Where did you get the inspiration for Claire and André?

I had just taken a class about Regency cooking through the Beau Monde, a group of authors who write and study the regency era, and was aware of the influx of French chefs into England around this time —particularly Carême, who was employed first by Napoleon and then by the Prince Regent. And what woman wouldn’t fall for a tall, dark Frenchman who can cook? I also thought it would give an interesting dynamic to write about such a unique upstairs downstairs-relationship.

Claire took me a bit by surprise. I knew a heroine with a daughter would make for an interesting journey for André, but I did not expect her to be sister to the Duke. She just walked up that drive holding Jane’s hand as I started writing the story and told me who she was and why she was coming back.

What are you researching for your forthcoming novel?

I am digging around in Cornwall—literally going underground. I visited a Cornish tin mine and it gave me some ideas. Tin mining and smelting was at its height in Cornwall during the Regency and, since my heroine is a teacher, she is very worried about the children who work in such dangerous places, as well as the owner of a mysterious house who seems bent on making her life difficult.

What would you most like to have been doing in Regency times?

Oh, that is a hard question to answer. I think I would want to be married to a fabulously loving husband, who would encourage me to do exactly what I wanted to do. Which is just how I am now. I am happy to say there were many writers in this era, from the bluestocking Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley through to Maria Edgeworth and Ann Radcliffe, and of course Jane Austen. These women were all well read, and all brought a voice to the women of their time. I would like to think I could join them in my own way.

AUTHOR NOTE

When the idea for Castonbury Park was first proposed, with
its upstairs-downstairs theme, I was excited by the prospect of a romance which
crossed what were, in those days, significant boundaries. Employer and servant.
The concept seemed exceedingly timely, given the recent wedding of Prince
William to a mere miss—Kate Middleton. But for a writer there were challenges to
face.

Marriage in the Regency was a different proposition from what
it is today. Once married it was difficult for a woman to break free unless she
was prepared to give up her children and any form of financial support from her
husband. While a widow might appear to have far more freedom, she’d still have a
family, whose opinion would count for a good deal, and her child’s future to
consider.

And for the most part it was expected that familial duty
would take precedence. Women were often used like chess pieces in a game of
power among the nobility. Connections were as important among the great houses
as they were among royalty, who married for the sake of strategic alliances.
Marrying someone of a lower social order did not bring a significant gain to the
family in the form of status or fortune and was definitely frowned upon.

A woman who stepped out of line faced being ostracised by her
family as well as her peers and she probably wouldn’t find a very warm welcome
among her husband’s circle either, since there was much distrust among the
commoners for those who considered themselves noble.

Yet it did happen. One famous example was the Duchess of
Leinster, one of the Lennox sisters, who married her children’s tutor after her
husband’s death. Nowadays a tutor might not be considered quite as low down the
social scale as a chef, but it was a scandal at the time.

Writing about Claire, Jane and André allowed me to explore
the dynamic of love balanced against these ideas of familial duty and family
honour.

The story also allowed me to explore the idea of a man faced
with taking on a ready-made family—something we take for granted today, but
which was much less common then. There was no such thing as adoption in the
Regency, since bloodlines were all-important.

It should be noted that romantic love had by this time become
recognised as something desirable for a couple who intended to marry. They were
just expected to fall in love with the right sort of person.

When they do not, it makes it all the more interesting for
the writer and the reader!