The Duchess Read online

  But the moment she opened the door and stepped inside, the laughter stopped. The room was full of men, all of them smoking huge cigars and reading newspapers or talking, and when they saw her, they halted. It didn’t take any great detective work to figure out that this was a “no females allowed” room. She backed out and nearly ran into the footman.

  “I believe, miss, that you want the gold drawing room.”

  She smiled at him in gratitude and followed him through three rooms. The house had been done in the Adam style and everywhere was the most exquisite detailing. The walls were covered in silk brocade, brocade so old that in places it was shattered, but it was still lovely. Several of the chairs that were placed here and there were obviously in need of repair.

  The gold drawing room was so named because it was practically covered in gold leaf. Mirrors were framed in gold leaf, all molding was picked out in gold, and the furniture dripped gold. There were eight women in the room, all of them huddled by a meager fire, all of them bent over embroidery frames. From the looks of the worn covers on the chairs, their work was needed.

  When Claire entered, the women had been talking in low voices, but they halted when they saw her. She had the distinct feeling that they had been discussing her. No one made any effort to include her in the conversation; no one seemed the least curious about her, so Claire smiled at them and walked about the room, hoping they would resume their talking. But they didn’t, and after a while she left.

  She went back to her bedroom and told Miss Rogers she had decided to take a walk and that she needed her brown walking costume and her sturdiest shoes. Miss Rogers’s shock had registered on her gray face.

  “Now what?” Claire said tiredly. “Am I not allowed to walk?”

  “Her Grace says ladies should not walk in the morning when the dew is still on the ground. You must wait until the afternoon.”

  “Well, I’m not going to wait until the afternoon. I’m going to walk now.”

  Miss Rogers sniffed, letting Claire know what she thought of this insolence. As a result Miss Rogers could not find the dress Claire wanted to wear, nor could she find the shoes. Claire ended in finding her own clothes and dressing herself.

  It was eleven-thirty in the morning before she was able to get out of the house. She stood outside the door and breathed deeply of the fresh, clean Scottish air, then began walking. Maybe it was her suppressed anger at herself, at all the people in the house, but whatever it was, she spent hours walking.

  For all that the house needed a great deal of refurbishing, the gardens were divine. There was a wild garden, so called because it was meant to simulate nature, if nature were perfect, that is. There was a small garden of topiary animals that made her laugh. There were three enclosed flower gardens, an orchard, and there were two lovely buildings where one could sit and look out over the hills in the distance.

  When she at last returned to the house at three-thirty, she was tired and hungry and happy. The outdoors and the exercise had renewed her spirits.

  When she entered her room, Miss Rogers was waiting for her with her usual sour look. “I am starved,” Claire said happily.

  “Luncheon is from one until two.”

  “Yes, I know, and I’m sorry I missed it.” To herself she wondered if luncheon was as delightful as breakfast. “Have something brought to me on a tray.”

  “Her Grace does not allow food taken to the rooms unless one is ill. It makes too much work for the staff.”

  It was on the tip of Claire’s tongue to say that servants were there to work, but she restrained herself. “Then tell the staff I’m ill and have something brought to me. I’ve been walking for miles and I’m hungry.”

  “I cannot go against Her Grace’s requests,” Miss Rogers said.

  For a moment the two women looked at each other, and Claire knew that this small, withered little woman was going to win because Claire did not want to cause problems in the household. Claire’s intuition warned her that Harry would be told if she broke the rules and he would be displeased by her breaking of them.

  “I shall get my own food,” Claire said in disgust, and stormed past the woman. At home in New York, in her parents’ house, she had often eaten in the kitchen after she’d come in from one of her long walks or from a ride in the southern part of the city.

  It took her a while to find the kitchen. Every footman or maid she asked for directions looked as though she’d said something obscene. By the time she did find the kitchens, she was thoroughly frustrated and her head was hurting from hunger.

  As soon as she reached the door that separated the staff quarters from the main house she heard laughter, and, smiling, she pushed the door open and went into the first room. The men with their sleeves rolled up, polishing the silver, stared at her in horror. The women washing the dishes gasped. By the time she reached the kitchen and saw the cook sitting on a chair reading, of all things, a newspaper, Claire was feeling as though she were a freak.

  “I’ve been walking,” she said as firmly as she could manage, “and I’d like something to eat.”

  No one seemed able to speak.

  “I am hungry,” she said in exasperation.

  It was at that moment that the butler appeared and very quietly but firmly escorted her from the kitchen.

  “Might I suggest, miss, that you remain on this side of that door,” he said as though talking to a wayward child. “If you need anything, tell Miss Rogers and she will see that you get it.” With that he left her standing alone.

  Claire wondered whether a tantrum of rage or tears would be better. She gave in to neither, but very quietly and sedately wandered into the hall and looked for some place to sit down. She couldn’t go to her own room or to the gold drawing room or to the library.

  She found a pretty little room done in blue silk and sat down heavily on a little chair. She wondered when the next meal was.

  “Harry run off with another woman?”

  Claire looked up to see her little sister standing in the doorway.

  “Why aren’t you having lessons?”

  “I gave her a headache. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing that about half a pound of roast beef wouldn’t cure.”

  “That’s easily solved. I’ll get you a sandwich.”

  Claire wasn’t fooled by the brat’s offer to help. “You can’t. They won’t allow you in the kitchen.”

  Brat just smiled, then smiled more broadly when Claire’s stomach growled loudly.

  “How much?” Claire asked. She knew all too well that Brat would never consider doing something for someone without payment.

  “Tell Mother I’m too old for lessons.”

  Claire just looked at her.

  “I want my ears pierced and you can give me your pearl and diamond earrings.”

  Claire continued to look at her sister.

  “All right, then. Twenty bucks.”

  “I don’t have any money with me.”

  Brat smiled. “I know where you have it hidden. I’ll have you a meal in no time.”

  Within minutes, Brat was back with a fat roast beef sandwich slathered with a mild horseradish sauce, a bowlful of sliced tomatoes, and a large glass of milk. All this was carried on a big silver tray by a very handsome young footman.

  “Put it there,” Brat said to the man.

  “But Her Grace doesn’t allow eating in this room,” the man said with a bit of fear in his voice.

  “She does now,” Brat said and winked at the man. He turned and left them.

  “However did you manage this?” Claire asked, her mouth full. “There are so many rules.”

  Brat looked astonished. “You don’t have to obey rules.”

  After that Claire tried her best to learn all the rules before she broke them. Her brat of a sister might be able to break the rules and get away with it, but she wasn’t trying to make a good impression. In fact, Brat’s philosophy of life seemed to be that people should try to impress her, not
the other way around.

  For tea Claire wore what Miss Rogers suggested and she was in the gold drawing room promptly and she sat where she was told to sit. The women around her spoke in hushed tones about people she didn’t know; they didn’t so much as acknowledge Claire’s presence. Claire sat with her hands on her lap and her eyes downcast. Once she looked across the table to see the plain-faced woman of the morning smiling at her, and Claire smiled back.

  Claire changed dresses again for dinner. At this meal it seemed that people were allowed to talk—but the talk consisted only of dogs and horses, neither of which interested Claire, so again she was silent.

  After dinner the men and women separated and went to different drawing rooms, and from there they went to bed.

  Only by accident did she see Harry before she went to bed. He was yawning and looked as though he were already half asleep.

  “Don’t the men and women ever get together?” she asked between his yawns.

  He grinned at her in a way that made her take a step backward. “They make babies, if that’s what you mean.”

  “No, I mean, don’t the men and women talk to one another? At home—”

  “Darling, this isn’t America. You’re in Scotland now, and things are different.” He gave a great yawn.

  “Did you buy your horses?”

  “Mmmmm.” He gave another yawn. “I must get to bed. See you in the morning, darling.”

  “At breakfast?” she said, but Harry didn’t notice the sarcasm in her voice.

  “Yes, at breakfast. Good night.”

  Chapter Four

  Claire looked at the watch pinned to her breast and stamped her foot in annoyance. She had done it again. For the second time in four days she had missed luncheon. It was now only ten minutes after one o’clock, but she knew from experience that she wouldn’t be seated after the duke was. She had tried to talk to Harry, to ask him why his mother made all the rules when he was the important one in the family, but Harry’d only said, “That’s the way it is. That’s the way things have always been.”

  Now she knew she had two choices: she could go back to her room hungry or she could find her sister and pay her twenty-five dollars to fetch her a sandwich. (The brat’s fees had gone up.)

  But Claire didn’t want to do either of those things. She would try to train herself to do without luncheon, and tea if necessary, to get some time to do what she wanted to do. Of course it might help if she had any idea what she wanted to do. She had spent three days exploring the center section of the house, looking at the pictures, mentally figuring out what needed repair and how much it was going to cost after she and Harry were married. She had spent another two days walking about the gardens. She so desperately wanted to get into the library that one night she had slipped downstairs with the intention of sneaking into the room when no one was there. But there was an old man in the room even at that hour. Claire gave a little gasp and fled back up the stairs.

  Now, hungry from her long walk and knowing it was going to be hours before her next meal, and, too, knowing how the other women gave her disapproving looks when she ravenously gobbled down sandwiches and cakes at tea, she kicked at the outside wall of the house. When that didn’t help, she sat down on a little bench, her head in her hands, and for the thousandth time felt like giving way to tears.

  But it was while she had her head down that she saw what looked like an opening in the bushes. Her curiosity overriding her hunger, she got up to examine the space. There was indeed a path through the greenery that surrounded the west wing of the house. She made her way through the shrubbery. Within a few feet she came to a door that was completely hidden by the bushes. She had tried every door both inside and out to this wing and had found all of them to be locked, but she knew before she touched this door that it would be unlocked. It was not only unlocked but the hinges had been recently oiled; the door opened easily.

  She stepped into the darkened interior and felt as though she’d stepped back in time. Before her rose a high, two-story stone room that she knew without being told was part of a castle. There were rotten tapestries hanging from the walls, and at one end was a fireplace meant to roast whole head of cattle. Scattered about the room were broken chairs and benches and tables. There was a heap of what looked to be armor and weapons in one corner.

  As her eyes adjusted, she walked about the cold room, cold as only stone that hadn’t been heated for a century or so could be, and looked at the objects. She ran into several cobwebs, but they didn’t bother her since she was much more interested in what she was seeing.

  Leading out of the big room were two sets of spiral stone stairs, and she started up one of them. The stones were worn away from thousands of feet traveling up and down the stairs; they were slippery with damp and cold.

  On the second floor she explored several rooms. Some of them still contained bits of furniture. She picked up a heavy sword from the floor and carried it to the light of the single window in the room. Several panes of the old semitransparent glass were gone, and there were bats in the room. She examined the sword carefully and once again she heard the bagpipes in her head. What she had experienced so far at Bramley was completely removed from what she had imagined Scotland to be like, but, here, holding this sword, she began to feel some of what she had expected.

  Still carrying the sword, she went up another floor and walked into a large room. Light streamed into the room, and as she looked at the tattered shreds of fabric hanging from the walls, she could imagine what this room had once been—and what it could be again.

  She hugged her arms about her, rubbing them against the cold, and whirled about. “After I’m married I shall restore this place,” she said aloud. “I shall make these apartments ours and they shall be as glorious as they once were. I shall hang tartan cloth on the walls. I’ll have the tapestries repaired. I’ll—”

  She didn’t say any more because she stepped on a rotten board and the floor gave way under her, the sword flying across the room. She screamed as she went down, but she had sense enough to throw her arms out wide so she didn’t go all the way through and fall to the stones of the floor below. She yelled once for help but then stopped. Who was going to hear her through several feet of stone walls? Who was going to find her? No one seemed to care when she didn’t show up for meals. Would it be days before she was missed?

  “Well, well.”

  She looked up to see the man she’d met before, the man who called himself Trevelyan, standing in the doorway. Immediately, all the emotions she’d felt when she first met him came back to her. She didn’t like the way he was standing, leaning against the doorway in an insolent way; she didn’t like the expression on his scarred face, a face that seemed to be younger than she’d remembered.

  “I heard something down here, but I thought it was rats. Looks as though it’s just one big rat.”

  “Do you think you could possibly make nasty comments later and help me out of this now?” And when I get out, I shall use the sword on you, she thought.

  “You look like you’re doing all right. Remember, I’m a decrepit old man. I might have a heart attack if I helped you. Maybe I’d better get your big strong duke.”

  She was trying to find something to grab on to so she could pull herself up, but there was nothing. “Harry has gone to buy horses.”

  “Does that rather a lot, doesn’t he?”

  “He’s going to race them.” She stopped floundering and looked up at him. “This is becoming painful. Could you please help me?”

  Trevelyan took a few steps toward her, bent, put his hands under her arms, and easily lifted her out of the hole. For a moment she stood very, very near him, not touching him, but close enough to feel his breath on her face. When he looked down at her, her heart began to pound. Anger was what was causing the pounding, she thought, but the pounding didn’t feel exactly like anger. He gave her a little smile, as though he had found out something that he’d wanted to know, then turned and walked awa
y.

  Claire began dusting herself off. “Thank you so much. I was becoming concerned that anyone would ever find me and that I’d—”

  She stopped, since she was talking to an empty room. He was no longer in the room. She went to the doorway and looked down the stone stairs but saw no sign of the man. She looked up and saw just a bit of motion as he climbed the stairs.

  Good, she thought. She didn’t want to be around him. His cynicism, his entire attitude toward life, was something she didn’t want to be near.

  But then she remembered talking to him on the day they first met. It would be nice to talk to someone. Actually, it would be heavenly to talk to someone.

  She straightened her shoulders, lifted her skirts, then followed him up the stairs.

  At the top of the stairs she entered a room that was small compared to the one below, but still it was a nice-sized room and she could see that all of the best furniture from the old castle had been put here. There was a tapestry along one wall, and against another wall was a more modern settee that was upholstered in torn yellow silk. There were several big chairs with carvings of bearded men on them. In the center of the room, oddly enough, were eleven small tables, a chair at each one, each table covered with stacks of paper, notebooks, fountain pens, and bottles of ink.

  Claire forgot how cold she was, how much she detested the man whose room this was, and started toward the nearest table.

  “Leave that alone!” Trevelyan commanded from behind her.

  Guiltily, she turned toward him. He was standing in the doorway with a cup and saucer in his hands, sipping at something steaming. Claire’s hunger pangs and cold returned. On one wall was a fireplace with a small fire burning. She left the table and went to stand with her back to the fireplace. Perhaps he’d offer her something to eat. She tried to remove the look of defiance she knew she was wearing and smiled at him.

  He gave her a raised-eyebrow look, as though he knew just what she was thinking, went to the nearest table, sat down and began writing. “I don’t remember issuing invitations, so you may leave.”