The Duchess Read online

  But thirty minutes later it was nearly full light and they had reached the west wing of the house. Claire thought of the long day before her. There wouldn’t even be a possibility of seeing Harry. She could always find her mother and spend the afternoon with her. Or she could introduce herself to the other people in the household and…And what? Talk of dogs and horses?

  She stood by the door that led into the west wing and looked at her watch.

  “Miss breakfast again?” Trevelyan asked, his hand on the door.

  “No. I still have plenty of time to dress yet.” She made no motion to move toward the front door of the house.

  “They still have that no talking rule at breakfast?”

  “Yes,” Claire said glumly, thinking of the long, boring meal awaiting her.

  Trevelyan sighed. “All right then, come upstairs and we’ll see what Oman can cook for us.”

  Claire’s smile was radiant. She forgot all about her intention of never seeing this man again. Now all she could think of was his cozy room and his books and the fire and the delicious food.

  They entered the old part of the house and had reached the sitting room when Oman came from the bedroom and said something in another language to Trevelyan.

  Trevelyan turned to Claire and said in a low voice, “Harry’s in there.” He nodded toward the bedroom.

  Claire smiled as she took a step toward the bedroom, but Trevelyan caught her arm.

  “This might be personal,” he whispered.

  “I—” Claire began, but Trevelyan put his hand over her mouth.

  “He may not be alone,” Trevelyan said in a mysterious way.

  Claire opened her eyes wide in disbelief, and Trevelyan removed his hand. He opened a big medieval chest behind her. “In here until I find out what he wants.”

  “I will not—” she began, but then Trevelyan picked her up by her arms, dropped her into the chest on top of some things that in other circumstances she’d have liked to examine, shut the lid, and sat on it, just as Harry entered the room.

  “Where the devil have you been?” Harry asked. “I’ve been waiting here for half an hour. And whose voice was that I heard? It sounded like a woman’s.”

  “It must have been your imagination. To what do I owe the honor of your visit?”

  “MacTarvit’s at it again.”

  “How many this time?”

  “Six.”

  “And your mother’s on a rampage? I doubt that she can bear to part with six cows.”

  “She wants me to put him off the land.”

  Trevelyan was silent for a moment. “And you thought I might do your dirty work for you.”

  “Vellie, you were always so good at talking. I thought you might talk to the old man.”

  “Nobody can talk to him. No one ever could. What about his sons?”

  “They’re either dead or emigrated. The old man’s the last one left.”

  “And now she wants him off the land. Why not just give him money and send him off to join his sons?”

  “He’d never go, and besides, where would I get the money? Sell another picture?”

  “What about your little heiress?”

  Until that moment Claire had been silent inside the chest, listening to every word and trying to figure out what they were talking about. The name MacTarvit meant something to her but she couldn’t remember what. When she heard Trevelyan begin to ask about her in his snide, insinuating way, she didn’t want to hear what Harry had to say. She was a little afraid of what she’d hear, and she realized that it was Trevelyan who had put doubt in her mind. She pushed up on the lid of the chest with her feet.

  “What the hell do you have in there?” Harry asked when he saw the chest lid move and almost dislodge Trevelyan.

  “I’ll show you if you want to see.”

  “No, thanks. I’ve seen enough of what you bring back from your trips.” He didn’t say anything for a few minutes as Oman came into the room and placed two glasses of whisky on a table by Trevelyan. When he was gone, Harry spoke again as Trevelyan handed him a glass. “Aren’t you afraid that man will slit your throat at night?”

  “Oman? Those people living in your house scare me a lot more than Oman does. Speaking of terror, when’s your marriage?”

  “Later,” Harry answered vaguely.

  “And is your little heiress happy living under the old hag’s rule?” Trevelyan said with great sarcasm.

  “Mother’s not so bad. You’ve never given her a chance. As for Claire, I believe she’s adjusting.” Harry finished his whisky and stood up. “I have to go.”

  “Off to visit some exotic creature?”

  Again Claire pushed up on the lid, but this time Harry ignored the movement. “Actually, I’m going south to look at a mare for her.”

  “Her? Your little heiress?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Buying gifts for her, are you? It must be true love,” Trevelyan said snidely.

  Inside the chest, Claire held her breath.

  “I like her well enough. Her head is a bit too full of dates and history and the romance of the world, but she’s all right.” Harry’s voice changed from its usual easygoing tone to one of warning. “Keep your hands off her.”

  “What would a man my age do with her if I did touch her?” Trevelyan said with great sarcasm.

  “You heard me,” Harry said. “Hands off.”

  “Tell me, is it her money or the girl you like?”

  Claire, who couldn’t see the faces of the men, thought Harry took a very long time before he answered. And when he did respond, all he did was laugh, but Claire couldn’t tell what the laugh meant, whether Harry was saying he liked her a great deal or he only wanted her money.

  Chapter Six

  Well?” Claire said as she stepped out of the chest. Trevelyan hadn’t bothered to open the lid for her or to help her out when she opened it, but that wasn’t what was on her mind. She was growing accustomed to his not helping her.

  He was already at one of his tables and writing. She went to stand in front of him. “What are you going to do about this man?”

  “Would you sit down? You’re blocking the light.”

  She stepped to one side but continued to glare at him. “Harry has asked you for a favor and you must do something about it.”

  Trevelyan put down his pen and looked up at her. “Because you’re willing to give the man your life doesn’t mean I am. I have no intention of doing anything except what I’m doing. Do you want some breakfast?”

  “Of course.”

  She followed him into the bedroom, where there were two plates of steaming eggs on a table. She guessed they ate in the bedroom because Oman could not fit so much as one more table into the sitting room. She took a bite of her eggs. “Who is this man MacTarvit?”

  “Enjoying your food?”

  “I’ve never had anything like it and it’s delicious. Who is MacTarvit?”

  “Curried eggs. From India.”

  She glared at him.

  “He’s some old man. His family’s always lived on this land.”

  She looked down at her eggs. They really were quite delicious. “Why does the name sound so familiar to me?”

  Trevelyan took a drink from his teacup—Claire didn’t ask if it was tea or whisky—and mumbled, “Tradition.”

  “What?”

  He narrowed his eyes. “I’d think that with your romantic knowledge of your precious duke’s clan you’d know exactly who the MacTarvits are.” At that he held up his cup in salute to her.

  Claire put down her fork and looked at him in wonder. “The whisky makers,” she said breathlessly.

  He gave her a little smile to acknowledge that she was right.

  Claire stood up and walked to the window. “All the great clans had other clans under them who were responsible for certain things. Some clans had families that were bards, men who wrote poetry for them and memorized the family’s history. Other clans had pipers.” She turned bac
k to look at him. “But Harry’s clan had the MacTarvits who made the whisky.”

  Again he raised his cup to her. “I congratulate you on your memory.”

  She sat back down and started on her eggs again. “And now this old man is the last one of his clan left in Scotland. The last of the great whisky makers. The—”

  “Certainly not the last whisky maker in Scotland. Harry won’t have to do without if MacTarvit goes.”

  “But what will MacTarvit do?”

  “I don’t think that concerns Harry’s mother, the duchess. I think she cares about her cattle being stolen.”

  “But what about tradition!” Claire said with passion. “Haven’t any of you read Sir Walter Scott?”

  At that Trevelyan laughed. But it wasn’t a pleasant laugh, it was full of cynicism. The laugh had the tone of a man who knows all, has seen all, and is amused by the ignorance and innocence of another.

  “I don’t care what you think of Sir Walter Scott, but it is tradition that the clans robbed one another. If this man has been making whisky for you for years I imagine he can afford to buy the cattle if he wanted to.”

  “The duchess doesn’t pay him.”

  Claire could only gape at him.

  “Her Grace doesn’t believe in Scotch whisky, thinks it’s nasty stuff and unhealthy, the peat, you know, so she doesn’t pay him. She doesn’t order it from him, so what comes into the house she feels deserves no payment. Besides, she has always hated the man and wants him off her land.”

  “It’s Harry’s land.”

  Trevelyan gave her a nasty little smile. “If you think that you don’t know anything at all.”

  Claire had finished her eggs and again got up and walked toward the bed, running her hand over the post at the foot of the bed. Here was a bed that Bonnie Prince Charlie had slept in, and they had been talking about a man of a clan that had been whisky makers to their clan for generations, yet they acted as though whether he stayed or not meant nothing.

  She turned back to Trevelyan. “You have to do something.”

  “Why do I have to do something? Why not your precious Harry?”

  “This is no time for argument. We have to do something to keep this man on the land. You can’t dismiss a man who has been loyal for generations. What would your ancestors say?”

  “My ancestors would probably say, ‘Good riddance.’ For all that you seem to have formed the opinion that this is a sweet old man who is being persecuted by my family, the truth is that the MacTarvits have always been the most cantankerous, stubborn, disagreeable men in the world. They make the whisky but they don’t sell it, we have to take it from them. We have to steal it.”

  “Just as he has to steal food from you.”

  Trevelyan stood. “You can stop looking at me like that. I’m not walking all the way to that old man’s house just to be shot at. I have work of my own to do and I don’t need MacTarvit’s ill temper to deal with.”

  She followed him into the sitting room. “You invented ill temper! The two of you should get along very well.”

  “We don’t. No one gets along with any of the MacTarvits. No one ever has. Heaven help the country the old man’s sons went to.”

  “Probably America. America appreciates men.”

  Trevelyan threw up his hands in exasperation. “I’m not going to go to MacTarvit, either for you or your dear duke, and that settles it. Now why don’t you sit over there and read like a good little girl? Oman will fix you something nice for lunch and I’ll give you a big glass of whisky.”

  “MacTarvit whisky?” she said through clenched teeth.

  “As a matter of fact, yes. Shall I show you the wound on my leg where one of his bullets grazed me?”

  “You mean you stole this whisky from him?”

  “Of course I did. It’s the only way to get any out of him. It’s your bloody tradition, remember?”

  “You don’t have to shout at me. I can hear you perfectly well. If you won’t go to him, then I will.”

  Trevelyan snorted. “You could never find the place. Only Harry and I know where the old man lives.”

  “And you won’t go to him? You’re going to do nothing to stop the duchess from sending him away from here?”

  “It is not any of my business. I’m a visitor here, remember? I just want to get well, write a bit, then leave. This place is nothing to me.”

  She looked at him for a long while. “After all Harry has done for you, allowing you to stay here and not telling anyone you’re here. You, sir, are an ingrate.” With that she turned toward the stairs.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To spend the day with other people. If you want your privacy so much you may have it. I won’t bother you again.” As she started down the stairs, she heard him say, “Now I’ll get some work done.” Claire kept her head up and went down the stairs and out the door into the garden.

  She wandered in the garden for a while but very soon it began to bore her. Yesterday had been so lovely when she’d had something to read and someone to talk to. Now she was alone again.

  She sat down on a bench and looked out over the little lake that some ancestor of Harry’s had created a hundred or so years ago. So far she didn’t feel she was doing a very good job of learning how to be a duchess. She wished she could be more like her mother, gregarious and social, never meeting a stranger, but, unfortunately, she wasn’t. She’d far rather know one or two people well than know a hundred people only slightly.

  “There you are.”

  Claire looked up to see her brat of a sister. “Those are my earrings,” Claire said without much concern, then looked back at the lake.

  “What’s wrong with you? Missing your lover man?”

  “Where do you pick up these disgusting expressions? And why aren’t you having lessons?” Sarah Ann started to open her mouth but Claire put up her hand. “Please don’t tell me what you’ve done to your poor governess. I wonder, have you learned enough to read and write?”

  “As well as Mother can.”

  Claire gave her sister a hard look, but Brat just smiled at her.

  “People are beginning to wonder what you do all day.”

  “Oh, nothing much,” Claire said. “I walk a great deal.”

  “And don’t eat at all. At least not at the table with the others.” Brat leaned forward. “You have some food caught between your front teeth.”

  Claire turned away and cleared her teeth with her nail. “Don’t you have something to do besides bother me? Such as putting my earrings back where they belong?”

  “I can’t take them off until my ears heal.”

  Claire shook her head. “You are much too young to have your ears pierced, and who in the world pierced them for you?”

  At that Sarah Ann looked off into the distance. “A person can have anything in the world done in this house.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Brat looked at her sister and there was wonder in her eyes. “Claire, this is the oddest place in the world and the queerest people live here. You know that skinny little man with the long hair who sits across from you at dinner?”

  “How do you know where I sit at dinner?”

  “I know a great deal. Anyway, that man lives at the far end of the east wing and he puts on plays. He’s the only actor and there’s no one in the audience. What’s really odd is that he’ll deliver a line, then change costumes, deliver another line, change clothes, et cetera, and it takes him at least twenty minutes to change into each different outfit. The plays go on for hours. He said that if I’d applaud his every line he’d let me be in a play, but we had a terrible fight when I wanted to be Elizabeth the First.”

  “No doubt you won.”

  “I did. He wanted me to shave my head and wear a red wig, but I refused. And you know those two little old ladies who sit near Father? They’re thieves. Honest. They steal from everybody’s rooms. At dinner, you watch, and at the end of the meal there won’t be a piece of silverwa
re left by their plates. They stick them up their sleeves.”

  “Must make for messy sleeves.”

  “The butler has to get the silverware from their rooms once a week, unless there’re more people for dinner and they need it sooner.”

  “What about Mother?”

  “She spends every afternoon with two old biddies who know everything about everyone. They tell Mother all the gossip about the dukes and earls and viscounts and—what’s the other one?”

  “Marquises.”

  “Right. All of them. You should hear what they tell about the Prince of Wales.”

  “You should not hear. Have you been listening at doors again?”

  “If you’re mean I won’t tell you what I know about Harry’s mother.”

  Claire tried to pretend to be uninterested. “You mean Her Grace?”

  “There’s a price.”

  Claire started to leave.

  “All right. I’ll tell you. The old woman hates all her kids except Harry. He’s her baby and she worships him. I heard she was glad when her two older sons died and Harry became the duke.”

  “What a dreadful thing to say!”

  “I’m repeating it, not saying it. Did you know she has a crushed leg? She can walk but not very well and there’s a rumor she was leaving her husband when her carriage overturned and crushed her leg. Harry was born six months later. They say Harry worships his mother, that he’ll do anything she wants.” Brat gave her sister a sly look. “He’ll even marry whoever his mother chooses.”

  Claire smiled coldly at her sister. “What a very interesting household. I should make an effort to meet these people. I don’t want them thinking my continued absences are out of the ordinary.”

  “In this family, you could eat live chickens for dinner and they wouldn’t consider you odd.” Brat stood up. “I have to go now. This afternoon I get to be someone called Marie Antoinette.”

  “Be careful. She was beheaded.”

  Sarah Ann looked serious. “I’ll remember that.”

  As she started running down the path, Claire called out after her, “And stay out of my jewels.”

  Brat waved as she kept running.