The Duke's Undoing (Three Rogues and Their Ladies) (15 page)

“Mother,” Elise said, “do not do this. I will not be forced to marry the viscount under any circumstances!”

“Chessingden is a good Whig,” Sukey pronounced, “but a bit flighty in the romance department. He is the sort of man who will forever be hankering for what he does not have. One would think he was choosing a horse rather than a wife. His flattering address makes him generally pleasing, and so he is forever running his eyes over other possibilities and wondering whether he has made the best choice. I certainly would never want to be married to him, myself. I think that your daughter has made a wise decision,”

This speech, though appreciated by Elise, was ignored by Lady William. When Bates entered, she said, “Send a footman to Brook’s Club, where he should find Viscount Chessingden. Give him a message for me. He is to wait on me here without delay.”

“And if the viscount is not at his club, my lady?” Bates asked.

“Do not be impertinent, Bates. Of course he is there! Where else would he be at this time of day?”

When Bates left the room, Elise protested. “Mother, the viscount is not at all the sort of person you would wish me to marry.”

“He is wealthy, his rank is excellent, he is good
ton
. What more is there to say, Elise? He is not mad like Waterford, nor dead like Sir Joshua! It is past time you were married, and Chessingden is imminently suitable.”

Elise knew the familiar feeling that she always imagined was like a tidal wave. She was being pulled out to sea against her will. Soon she would be gathered up and then sent crashing against the shore of her mother’s ambition. It annoyed her excessively that, do what she might, she was never proof against her mother’s wishes.
But I will not marry Gregory!

“Gregory is inconstant, as Sukey says. And he is also a complete cad!” Elise insisted. “I will not marry him.”

“Explain yourself!”

Sukey intervened. “Elspeth, you must calm yourself. Elise has excellent instincts where men are concerned. All of us were fooled by Chessingden and his smooth manners. But he is a politician, after all, and very practiced in saying just what he thinks you want to hear. He will undoubtedly tell you that he wants to marry Elise; however, he has been living in Violet Archer’s pocket this last month.”

Lady William’s face purpled. “Violet? Violet Archer? How can this be? She is as plump as a pigeon. How could he possibly prefer her to my daughter?”

“Violet worships him,” Elise said. “No doubt she flatters him. She would make him a much better wife than I. And his brother is in a position in the Commons to give Gregory considerable political advantage in the Whig Party. Most of the time he is aware of these things. Violet is more forgiving of his vanity than I am.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like Sukey told you, he is inconstant. When he is engaged to me, he wants Violet. When he is with Violet, he wants me. He can take her to the opera one night and then come here the next morning claiming that he is in love with me.”

Her mother batted this objection away with a wave of her hand. “I expect you have been spending all your time writing your novels and have not been paying him the attention you should. Undoubtedly, he has turned to your closest friend for consolation.”

“That is not the case at all,” Elise said. Why did her mother always ferret out the truth of the matter? Elise had been upstairs in her guest room working on her novel the afternoon of the Gaskills’ illfated house party. She detested charades. They reminded her too much of Joshua and the tree house. But if she had been downstairs with Gregory, they would have been partners, and the fateful Romeo and Juliet charade between Gregory and Violet would never have taken place. She never would have been in doubt about her then-fiancé’s feelings for her. And she never would have had that window into Violet’s feelings for him. But there was still the other matter. “Besides that, would you wish me to marry a cad, Mother?”

“In what way is he a cad?”

Aunt Clarice reentered the room with Queen Elizabeth under her arm and sat quietly on her pink silk Georgian chair.

Elise answered, “After he had been squiring Violet around town for everyone to see, he had the effrontery to return to me and treat me in the most odious way!”

Her mother raised one dark eyebrow. “You will have to be more specific.”

“He started to unbutton my dress!”

“Elise, dear,” Lady William said, her voice suddenly like silk. “You never kissed me when you came in.”

Puzzled at this non sequiter, Elise dutifully rose and went to kiss her mother. When she leaned down over Lady William’s face, her mother administered a stinging slap to her daughter’s cheek.

Tears sprang to her eyes. Putting her hand to her face, she looked down at her mother in horror. Sukey and her aunt both gasped. Elise straightened and walked to the door of the room with dignity. She would not let her mother treat her this way. Ever again.

Her mother was triumphant. “Elise, you idiot! Come back here! Do you not see? Now the viscount must marry you!”

Elise threw open the door, walked through it, and slammed it behind her. Then, retrieving her hat and gloves from Bates, she walked out of the house. She was not about to be in the vicinity when her mother bore down on the viscount.

But where to go? Though her chin was high, tears were streaming down her face. She must be gone before Gregory arrived. Without thinking where she was going, she walked the length of the street and then turned into the mews. Perhaps she would take her gray out and go to Hyde Park for a ride. Just then, she heard the clatter of horse hooves behind her as a rider turned into the mews.

“Elise?” It was the duke’s voice. She turned around instinctively, dashing the tears from her cheeks. “What is it, darling? Whatever has happened? Did the earl return? I made sure he . . .”

“No. It wasn’t Robert. It’s my crazed mother. She has sent for Gregory in order to insist that I marry him.”

“Elise, you are two and twenty. You need not follow her orders. Show that spine of yours!”

“She is going to force him. You see . . . well, I told her I would not marry a cad. Mother asked what I meant. Gregory . . . at one time . . . was overly familiar, to say the least, and now she says that he must marry me because he has compromised me.”

The duke had dismounted and was leading his beautiful black stallion into his stall. He pulled the saddle off his horse and handed it to his groom. “Curry Jupiter for me, will you, Jem? He’s had a long hot ride to Richmond and back.”

Taking off his top hat, the duke used his handkerchief to blot his forehead and cheeks. “Just what did that bounder do?” he asked her. Replacing his hat, he offered her his arm.

“I shan’t tell you, but it was beyond the pale, Your Grace.”

“It’s Peter, remember? Let’s walk a bit, shall we? It’s not like you to be all in a flutter. Was it your mother who left that palm print on your face?”

Ashamed, she nodded. “She’s sent for Gregory, and I have no doubt that she will rake him over the coals.”

They left the horse smells of the mews and began to walk toward the square. “It sounds as though he deserves it.”

“Yes, he does. But, Peter! I don’t want to marry him in the least!”

He tucked her hand in his arm, and she felt his reassurance. Elise began to relax. They began to circle Berkeley Square. The imposing grand houses with their reminders of all the balls she had attended since Joshua’s death made her nearly ill with nerves. Suddenly, she wished to be away from London, from yet another season, and out from under her mother’s expectations.

“Tell me, Elise, if you weren’t heartbroken over Chessingden, why were you so melancholy that day in Green Park?”

“I was mourning Joshua,” she said. “I told you. I was rereading your letter of condolence for perhaps the hundredth time. It really was a most comforting epistle, your . . . Peter.”

“I took pains over it, believe me. I have no idea how many drafts I wrote.”

They were silent for the time it took to walk the northwest side of the square. Then Elise said, “If I leave Gregory and my mother together, they may begin planning the wedding. I had best get back.”

“Do you need my company?”

“If she catches wind of a duke, heaven only knows what she’ll do!”

“I must confess, I like a good family brawl. Stirs the blood.”

“Just be glad you’re not marrying into mine.”

“Have you any brothers and sisters?”

“Just sisters. Four. All younger. Mother has already browbeaten two of them into marrying for money and a title.”

“Buck up. She shall not do it to you. Or me.”

Elise felt stronger, the longer they walked. The slap had temporarily reduced her to a naughty child. But now she was settling into her own grown-up self.

“You really do not mind coming with me?”

“Relax, my dear. I am not only a duke but a general. I can give as good as I get.”

When they entered the house, Elise asked Bates if Viscount Chessingden had arrived. He replied, “Yes, miss. He’s upstairs in the pink saloon with your mother.”

Taking a long, slow breath, Elise removed her hat and gloves. The duke did the same. Then she preceded him up the stairs to beard the ogre in her den. She stopped just outside the doors and listened. Gregory was saying, “I have told Elise repeatedly that I wish to marry her, that Violet is only a friend; however, she cannot marry me until she breaks her cursed engagement to Ruisdell!”

Elise rolled her eyes. “This is where we come in. Do not be concerned if I abuse you to your face. It is the only way to set you free.”

IN WHICH THE DUKE DEALS WITH LADY WILLIAM

Elise’s mother was asking, “Who the devil is Ruisdell?” when he and his affianced entered the pink saloon. Lady William looked to be a veritable crone with a large Roman nose and what was obviously a black wig dressed
a la Greque
—a style and color far too young for her ravaged face. Her legs were stretched out on the couch, invisible under a sheet. He knew at once that she was an exceedingly difficult invalid, and his heart went out to her daughter.

He executed a very slight bow.

Elise said, “Allow me to present the Duke of Ruisdell, Mama. Hello, Gregory.”

“Duke?” Lady William ceased to lean back on her pillows and sat bolt upright. “You are a duke and you are engaged to my daughter?”

“Yes, my lady,” he said with all the loftiness he could command.

Elise said, “Be seated, Your Grace. I see that tea is being served. Would you like a cup?”

“I could use it. Yes, please. Just tea.”

As she poured his tea, he could not, even under the circumstances, refrain from noticing the grace and sensuality with which she moved. Watching a
cloisonné
bracelet caress her slender, white wrist with its movement, he recalled the first time he had seen her in the soup kitchen, when he had been fascinated merely by the way she ladled soup.

“Elise! Why did you not write? You! Engaged to a duke!”

Where had Elise cultivated her grace? Certainly not at home with her mother. It must be entirely natural, hinting perhaps of . . . He caught hold of his thoughts. This was not the moment for indulging fantasies.

“The duke’s and my engagement is only an expedient,” she said. “Robert is being troublesome, and the duke wished to stand guard over me, which he has done admirably. We needed to defray gossip, for he is a guest here in Aunt Clarice’s house. So we became engaged but just until Robert is either incarcerated or put in Bedlam. Then I will cry off.”

Her mother was smiling her most gracious smile at the duke. “But, my love, in the eyes of the
ton
, your engagement is not a mere expediency! Besides I cannot imagine a man putting himself to all this trouble if he did not care for you most sincerely. I will not allow you to cry off.”

Though he was not surprised at this, poor Elise blushed painfully. Sitting up even straighter in her chair, holding her teacup rigidly in front of her, she declared, “Though the duke has become a friend, Mother, I will never marry him. If you were more acquainted with society, you would know that he is a rogue of the deepest dye. He does not desire marriage, but even if he did marry, he would not be faithful.”

Elise’s countenance was different from how he had ever seen it before. She was peering down her nose at him, her eyebrows raised. Scornful, in a word. “He is, of all things, what I despise most in our privileged class: a womanizer, a heavy gambler, and an even heavier drinker! And he doesn’t trouble to deny it.”

She had warned him, but even so, he suspected that she meant what she said. The duke displayed a helpless grin and gave a shrug. “Everything she says is true, my lady. I would make the worst of husbands. Ruisdell Palace is in Derbyshire, and I should leave my wife there and return to London, where I would take up my present life again. I am unregenerate, I’m afraid.”

“Ah, but it is said that rogues make the best husbands!” Lady William endeavored to be coquettish and succeeded only in looking as arch as a fishwife.

“Not in my case. I am a hardened rake, your Ladyship.”