A Duke by Any Other Name Page 4

  The horse danced in a little circle, then propped on his back legs.

  “Settle, imp,” Rothhaven growled.

  The horse gave one halfhearted buck, then stood like a lamb.

  “Please,” Althea said, gazing up at the duke. “The cut direct is helpful, but there’s so much more…”

  He touched his hat brim. “Never, ever beg. Good day, my lady.” And then he was off down the drive, galloping as if the devil were at his heels.

  Chapter Three

  “The days grow longer,” Nathaniel said. “I enjoy these evenings at the vicarage tremendously but must turn my attentions to the estate for the nonce. Spring has arrived at last.”

  Dr. Pietr Sorenson set aside the chessboard, the scene of a pleasant if uninspired match all around.

  “And when spring arrives,” he said, “you are off to tend your herds and acres, consigning me to the dubious comforts of Leviticus. I would rather not end the winter’s play on a note of defeat. Can’t you spare me one more week?”

  Sorenson was a widower, and he’d once remarked that evenings were the time when sorrow hung most heavily.

  “This is my second one-more-week, Pietr. I cannot argue with the sun.” To emphasize the point, Nathaniel began putting his pieces away.

  “Defeat it is, then. I did not see your rook, you naughty fellow. I absolutely did not see him prowling about there at the periphery. You grow more subtle in your stratagems while I bumble about like a hog rooting through the middens.”

  Sorenson had a subtlety all his own, as any good vicar did. “You saw her ladyship’s prodigal pigs returning to the fold?” Hannibal crossing the Alps with his pachyderms would have been less of a spectacle.

  “I was out for a ramble. Hard to miss so much splendid livestock on the move.”

  In the three days Lady Althea’s swine had tarried in Nathaniel’s orchard, he’d grown accustomed to seeing them there, accustomed to their happy grunting and sighing. Pigs were in truth tidy creatures, and her ladyship’s herd was well behaved. They didn’t tear up roots or burrow under the orchard walls, and Treegum swore the orchard would be healthier for having entertained callers.

  Nathaniel tossed his queen into the box with her court. “Her ladyship apologized for her errant sows. Sent over a wheel of cheese the like of which I would pay handsomely to keep in my larders.”

  “With the dill? Delicious stuff. She’s an interesting woman.”

  Another lure. Nathaniel told himself to stand up, shake Vicar’s hand, and ride back to the Hall. The same instant he would have risen, Vicar uncorked the brandy bottle and poured them both another two fingers.

  “This is an excellent vintage,” Nathaniel said. “Shall we drink to good harvests and brilliant sermons?”

  “Why not, and to shorter evenings in which to brood and ponder away the hours. She offered to put a new roof on the vicarage, you know.”

  So much for changing the subject. “Her ladyship?”

  “Of course, her ladyship. The Wentworth family doesn’t have mere pots of filthy lucre, they have lakes and rivers of the stuff. She could put Rothhaven Hall to rights with her pin money.”

  “The Hall is sound enough. If you need a new roof, you will apply to me, sir. I thought her ladyship went south for the Season?”

  Rothhaven Hall was being allowed to deteriorate insofar as appearances were concerned. The old pile was built to last through the ages, but Nathaniel purposely neglected anything that would give the place an inviting air.

  And Sorenson well knew why.

  The vicar nosed his brandy. “Lady Althea and her sister, Lady Constance, have gone south in spring for the past several years. My curate is a cousin to her butler, though, and Strensall says Lady Althea intends to enjoy springtime in Yorkshire this year.”

  Well, damn. Nathaniel had hoped his neighbor would remove to London, where a well-rehearsed cut direct would serve her in good stead. He sipped his brandy—delightful stuff—and told himself to bring up the benefits of running pigs through orchards.

  “Polite society is brutal to her.” Nathaniel set down his drink, clearly having imbibed more than he’d realized.

  “New money and lots of it can bring out the worst in those with older pedigrees. Her ladyship is better off rusticating with us up here in Yorkshire, where we treasure our eccentrics and treat them with the respect they are due.”

  Sorenson winked and saluted with his glass. He was a man approaching mid-life but had the sort of vigor that would see him into an active old age. Like many in the area, he was blond, blue-eyed, and rangy, and his sense of humor was never far from the surface.

  “Her ladyship plays chess,” Nathaniel said. “Also cribbage and backgammon. You might consider calling upon her from time to time. Take your curate and he can visit with his cousin while you enjoy a game with her ladyship.”

  Sorenson began putting the white army away. “And how does the Dread Duke know such interesting details about a woman who can’t be bothered to make small talk? I’ve tried charming her in the churchyard more times than I can count, and while she’s never quite rude, she never engages in friendly chatter.”

  She doesn’t know how. “Does she attend the assemblies?”

  “Maybe one or two a few years ago. Not lately.”

  Because she had no escort, very likely. What was wrong with her family that they all but banished her to the moors and dales?

  “Perhaps you ought to invite her, Sorenson. You’re the vicar, the professional good Samaritan.”

  “Oh, right. Then I’d be seen singling out an unattached lady for special attention. The pastoral committee would soon be taking wagers on my marital status. In theory, I could offer for such a woman, being nominally a gentleman, but the match would be considered a mésalliance, and besides, Lady Althea isn’t at all drawn to me. Why don’t you court her?”

  The question was offered half jokingly, so Nathaniel dredged up a smile. “Take a wife? A dread duke rather loses his cachet if he’s been snabbled by a duchess, don’t you think? If ever I give up my freedom, I’ll need far more inducement than a wheel of cheese.”

  Sorenson paused in his tidying up, the white army still half on the field.

  “Is it freedom to limit Your Grace’s company to the retainers who’ve known you since boyhood? Is it freedom to seldom leave the grounds of your estate by day, and always at a dead gallop? Is it freedom to deny yourself an occasional jaunt down to London, where you might speak for Yorkshire in the Lords? How long has it been since you’ve seen your mother?”

  Nathaniel could put Sorenson in his place with a single look—acknowledge, disdain, dismiss—but the effort of posturing as an unapproachable duke was simply too great at such a late hour and for so little purpose.

  “Her Grace and I correspond regularly, and the Hall was not a happy abode for her. And for your information…”

  I paid a call on Lady Althea and enjoyed her company tremendously. If anything made Nathaniel want to jaunt down to London, it was the notion that her ladyship rode into battle alone, year after year, against a legion of petty bullies. How would any prospective husband get to see the wit and determination in her if she remained a target for polite society’s poison arrows?

  “For my information?” Sorenson prodded.

  “Lady Althea is lonely,” Nathaniel said, rising. “When you decline to call upon her, you slight your duty to a member of the flock. She wasn’t raised here, she has no friends in the neighborhood, and her family apparently neglects her. You can spare her an hour over a cribbage board, Pietr. She’ll stuff you with excellent fare and probably trounce you to boot.”

  Sorenson rose as well, his drink in his hand. “I do so benefit from being on the receiving end of a sermon from time to time, and you aren’t wrong. You have a flair for a scold.”

  Lady Althea was a prodigy at delivering scolds, did she but know it. “The next time Squire Annen and his lady invite you to dine, suggest they invite her ladyship. You know how to introduce the newcomers, and yet you’ve been remiss with Lady Althea.”

  “Now you’re my social conscience, Rothhaven?”

  Now Nathaniel was angry. Contrary to his reputation, his temper seldom bothered him. He played a part—the growling, arrogant master of the Hall—and he did so for good reasons. He was careful never to confuse the role with the real man.

  But on Lady Althea’s behalf, he was angry, and that was reassuring. “Some people choose solitude. Others are banished to it. Lady Althea has done nothing to deserve banishment.”

  Sorenson took a leisurely sip of his drink. He wielded agreeableness with the same skill Nathaniel applied to ill humor and hauteur, and the vicar was a shrewd man.

  “What did you do to deserve banishment, Rothhaven? A man who truly sought solitude wouldn’t put up with my chess, much less make a weekly pilgrimage across the fields for it.”

  Sorenson had never come this close to overtly judging Nathaniel’s choices before. “I won’t be making that pilgrimage again until autumn,” Nathaniel said. “And to answer your question, I have been banished as punishment for the great transgression of having been born, as you well know. I’ll bid you good night and see myself out.”

  He collected Loki from the little stable and carriage house at the back of the vicarage grounds. Loki tried shying at a few moonshadows on the way home, though his heart wasn’t in the mischief.

  “You needn’t cheer me up,” Nathaniel murmured. “We can enjoy a pretty spring night for once if we please to.”

  The horse apparently agreed. Thus it was that as the path curved past Lady Althea’s park, Loki sauntered along at a tired trot, while Nathaniel pretended to ignore the single illuminated window on the corner of Lynley Vale’s second floor.

  “Who coul
d that be?” Constance paused in the rearrangement of her shawls long enough to cock an ear toward the park. “Sounds like a lone horseman.”

  “The Dread Duke going home from his weekly call upon the vicarage,” Althea replied. The hoofbeats echoed across the darkened park in a slow, even pattern. Perhaps His Grace was in a contemplative mood. “More brandy?”

  “No, thank you. I must moderate my consumption in anticipation of the ordeal ahead.” Constance tossed back the last of her drink and set the glass on the table. Althea and her sister were enjoying their nightcap on the balcony off Althea’s sitting room, swaddled in shawls against the evening chill.

  “Why go to London at all?” Althea asked, leaning her head back against the cushions. “Why subject yourself yet again to ridicule, gossip, and slander?”

  “I subject myself to our nieces. Twitting Quinn by spoiling his daughters is the most fun I’ve had since learning to ride astride. Besides, Yorkshire is pretty, but it’s desolate.”

  And London—where few unmarried ladies worth the name had ever ridden en cavalier, much less learned to enjoy good brandy—was something even worse than desolate. Constance also painted with oils, another transgression against London’s version of propriety.

  How in perdition did she stand the place? “I’m considering traveling to Italy,” Althea said.

  “I thought people traveled the Mediterranean in winter.”

  “When have I ever done what’s expected of me?” Althea set her drink aside, the lassitude fine spirits could impart having become too much of a temptation lately.

  “A medicinal tot now and then is hardly scandalous, Thea. If you do go to Italy, bring me back some daring art, would you?”

  “Of course, dearest.” Though that assumed Althea would be coming back soon.

  They fell silent, and the hoofbeats came closer, still muffled by the evening dewfall. Althea had sent the wine and cheese to Rothhaven Hall, also the tablet recipe, but she didn’t expect His Grace would call again. With a man like that, a decision was a decision, and he’d said no quite firmly.

  “Do you ever consider taking a husband?” Althea asked.

  “I do not. Our mother took a husband. Look how that turned out.”

  “Quinn became a husband. I’d say that’s turning out rather well.” For Quinn, Jane, and their offspring.

  Constance took up Althea’s glass. “Quinn became a husband to Jane. They were extraordinarily lucky to find each other. If you’re looking for a fellow, the wilds of Yorkshire aren’t likely to offer much of a selection.”

  “The wilds of London offered no choice at all. I can’t go back there.”

  “That sounds dire, Thea. Do you mean you cannot go back there ever?”

  “Not to socialize. Do you recall the Honorable Mr. Pettibone Framley?”

  “Pretty-boy, to his familiars. He makes quite an impression. The blond Byron is another one of his sobriquets. Tell me you weren’t foolish.”

  The chill was deepening, though the stars were spectacular. “I was foolish. He was charming. I let him steal a few kisses, and within a week, Stephen told me that in the clubs, I’d become the Strumpet of Birdsong Lane.”

  Constance muttered an epithet unbecoming of a lady or a gentleman. “Quinn could ruin him for you, though Stephen ought not to have been bearing tales. Our baby brother exercises questionable judgment sometimes.”

  “Jane could ruin Framley for me, but what’s the point? I’d be the Strumpet of Birdsong Lane if I’d permitted him no liberties at all. The year before, I was accused of trying to steal Miss Faraday’s fiancé. The year before that, Appolonius Warton stepped on my hem and landed me on my backside before half the world. Jane could do nothing about any of it, because to stir the pot is to spread the stench.”

  “They go after you,” Constance said. “You threaten them and they close ranks. I’m harmless by design, because I have learned from your example. I sit with the wallflowers, dress as plainly as I can, and never flirt, so they ignore me.”

  Althea suspected Constance’s determined plainness had other motivations, though now was not the time to investigate them.

  “All I wanted,” Althea said, “was to make a few friends, to have a gallant or two.” Rothhaven had been right: Comporting oneself like a puppy left on the back stoop, begging to be taken inside to a place by the hearth, had been the greatest foolishness of all. Never beg. Even if once upon a time begging had been your only means of surviving.

  “What do you want now, Thea?”

  I want a family, people of my own to love and argue with. “My bed, I suppose. I’ll be awake to see you off in the morning, and I will look in on Thorndike Manor from time to time while you’re gone. Your people know they can call on me if anything should arise?”

  “Nothing has arisen in the vicinity of Thorndike since Prince Rupert lost the Battle of Marsten Moor. Are you certain you don’t want to come to London with me? Quinn and Jane will wonder at your absence.”

  “I have never liked London. Quinn dragged us south because his banking business required him to set up a household there, but my memories of London are tedious.”

  Constance rose, her shawls wrapped about her like so many furs. “And your memories of Lynley Vale are so much better?”

  “I’ve met His Grace of Rothhaven, Con. My sows went a-viking and paid a call upon his orchard. He was so incensed he left his property in broad daylight to scold me. He nearly called me out.”

  “And does he have a squint and crooked nose?”

  He has a lovely smile and kind eyes. “He’s personable when he’s not in a temper. I invited him back for a game of chess if he’s ever so inclined.”

  Constance bent down and hugged Althea about the shoulders. “I looked him up in Debrett’s. He’s the nearest lofty peer to either of our properties, and I was surprised that he hasn’t married. An older brother died before succeeding to the title, and I couldn’t find any cousins. My housekeeper, who knows everything about everybody, doesn’t think the current duke has an heir. All very odd.”

  She straightened and drained the last of Althea’s drink. “Your sows have to be the most valuable pigs in all of Yorkshire. Have they ever escaped before?”

  “They didn’t escape. I was curious about Rothhaven and did what was necessary to inspire him to pay a call. I doubt he’ll call again.” And that was disappointing. Very disappointing.

  “His loss,” Constance said. “I’ll make your excuses to Quinn and Jane, but don’t be surprised if they dispatch Stephen to look in on you.”

  “Forewarned and all that.” Stephen was a good brother. He’d ride over Althea’s tenancies with her, flirt with the squires’ daughters, and threaten to install another lift in some corner of Lynley Vale that had managed splendidly without a lift for three hundred years.

  Then he’d be on his way, and neither meddle nor bear tales.

  “Are you coming in?” Constance said. “The night grows downright nippy.”

  “Soon. Pleasant dreams.”

  “Why doesn’t a personable, relatively young, unmarried duke have a duchess, Althea? Why does he tear about the shire on horseback at odd hours as if the excisemen are after him? That cannot be a happy existence.”

  “No, it cannot, but that is what he has chosen, and his neighbors respect his choice.”

  Constance retreated indoors and the silence deepened, save for the sound of hoofbeats fading in the darkness.

  “The time has come to separate the irises.” Robbie made that announcement as if it portended marching armies and deposed kings.

  “I thought separating irises was an autumn activity,” Nathaniel replied, spooning overcooked eggs onto a plate.

  “Early spring works too. It is still early spring, isn’t it?”

  A man who seldom went out of doors in the winter months had little sense of the advancing season. “We’re weeks away from our last frost, so yes, I’d say early spring yet reigns. More eggs?”

  “Please.”

  Nathaniel exchanged plates with Robbie and took a smaller serving for himself. While Nathaniel would never, ever resent having Robbie home, conversation with his brother could be something of a burden.

  What topic would I suggest to Lady Althea if she wanted to foster pleasant talk over a meal?