Dukes to Fall in Love With: A Historical Regency Romance Collection

by Bridget Barton

  “Well, we are not bursting in on him unannounced, Sammy. He responded almost immediately to my letter and seems very keen that we should meet,” Georgina said.

  “Perhaps he has only agreed to see you because you are Elizabeth’s grandchild. Perhaps he thinks that you will look like her or somehow remind him of her.”

  “I do hope not,” Georgina said with a shudder. “Really, you remember my grandmother as well as I do, and I am sure that you can see that I look nothing like her.”

  “But you and I only knew her as an ageing woman, Georgie. Perhaps she was very beautiful when she was young, and perhaps there might be a resemblance there, however much you would wish to deny it.”

  “Is this mischief, Sammy, or are you being quite serious?” Georgina said and almost laughed at her own haughty tone.

  “I daresay it is a little of both, with a little emphasis on the former rather than the latter.”

  “Well, thank heavens for that,” Georgina said and laughed before turning serious. “Forgive me for saying it again, Sammy, but do you think it is sensible for you to come in also? I mean, what if David contacts his sister, and she discovers that you were here asking questions? Is it not just a little dangerous?”

  “If she finds out that you were here, it is the same thing. She is a remarkably clever old woman, Georgina. I know I did not meet her, but from everything you said I simply know it. She had discerned my identity before we had even arrived. She knew that Samuel White had somehow been elevated to the status of a Duke, so if she ever hears that you have been to see her brother, I am sure that she would treat the matter exactly the same whether I am here in attendance or not. It is just a risk that I shall have to take, and I am prepared to take it. Georgie, I have been lied to and deflected in my questioning for so many years that I will not allow one more ageing person with secrets to rule my life ever again. Whatever she is protecting means as much to her as finding out my identity means to me. She might well be convincing in her assertion that she will squash me like a bug, but I can only think that so fierce an attack comes from a deep sense of fear.”

  “You mean that we shall uncover something that she does not want uncovered?”

  “Exactly that, and so I say let us uncover it, Georgie.” He reached sideways and took her hand. “Let us uncover it all, for good or for ill.”

  When they finally arrived, it was to find a very neat and well-appointed little manor house in a particularly pretty part of Devonshire. Kellerton, whilst not on the coast as Rowley was, was easily its rival in terms of rolling meadows and soft and pretty countryside.

  David Ellington’s home was rather larger than she had expected, and the door was answered by a bright and smiling housekeeper in late middle age.

  “Your Grace,” she said and smiled warmly as she curtsied. “And Miss Jeffries,” she went on and curtsied again. “Mr Ellington is expecting you in the drawing room. I will show you the way, and then I shall bring you all some tea.”

  “Thank you kindly,” Emerson said as they followed the housekeeper through the entrance hall and down a narrow corridor.

  When they were shown into the drawing room, David Ellington was far from the man that Georgina had imagined. From the moment she had read his heartfelt letter to her grandmother, she had imagined him to be in some way delicate, slim, and with aquiline features and a sensitive face.

  But this man, despite his advancing years, was upright and strong and had a surprising build indeed. Anybody looking upon David Ellington in his dotage could be easily persuaded that he had spent his life tending a busy farm.

  He was upright, and his shoulders were broad, although whatever muscle had once been there was surely wasting. And yet even in his old age, he was not stooped in any way. When he had risen from his seat to greet them, it had not been as a creaking old man, but rather as a well-kept man who still had a fine degree of fitness.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Jeffries,” he said and smiled at her, his eyes, although as dark as his sister’s, seeming kindly and bright.

  He inclined his head graciously and then turned to Emerson.

  “Good afternoon, Your Grace.” As he tipped his head forward once more, Georgina could see that there was very little difference in height between the two men, and she found her spirits suddenly soaring when she realized that David Ellington was by no means the pitiful creature she had imagined.

  Somehow his health and vitality, the fact that he was not also bedridden, seemed to her like a victory over his sister Beatrice. And a victory very well deserved, she was sure.

  “Good afternoon, Sir,” Emerson said respectfully and returned the bow.

  “Mr Ellington, thank you so very much for agreeing to see us today.”

  “How could I not see you, Miss Jeffries? You must understand that I was full of curiosity. That Elizabeth Allencourt’s granddaughter would contact me after so many years was a treat that I could not possibly forego.” He smiled happily and did not seem at all upended by their visit.

  In no time at all, the party was settled with tea and sandwiches, and Georgina found herself so at ease in David Ellington’s company that it loosened her tongue.

  “I must be honest, Mr Ellington, and say that I knew nothing of your existence prior to coming to visit my relations in Devonshire. I did not even know of your sister’s existence, for my grandmother never spoke to me about her. Although it is true to say that my grandmother rarely spoke to me unless it was to chastise me for something.”

  “That sounds about right, my dear,” he said with a laugh. “Although I am bound to say that it was not always the case. It is true that Elizabeth Allencourt was a fiery sort of a girl, and she certainly never got along with her sister Mirabelle. Oh, and Mirabelle was such a dear, it would seem impossible that anybody could have any objection to her. But Elizabeth did, and I had always assumed it to be nothing more than a little rivalry between sisters. Mirabelle was very pretty, but then so was Elizabeth.” He laughed again.

  “But you are not surprised to learn that my grandmother was quite sour by the time I was born? For I had never known her to be any different.”

  “No, I am not surprised at all.”

  “Forgive me, Mr Ellington, but is that because of the influence of your sister?”

  “Well, you have met her, my dear, so you have likely seen a little of what she would have been capable of as a young woman. It is true that my sister was something of an anomaly in our family. There was not another one like her, so where she learned to be so cold-hearted, I will never know. And yes, she was a great influence upon Elizabeth Allencourt. I blamed Beatrice for a great many years for coming between the two of us.”

  “I believe that you and my grandmother were quite close, Mr Ellington,” Georgina said in a gentle, kindly fashion.

  “Oh, how I loved Elizabeth Allencourt. My head was so turned by that young lady that I no doubt ended by making a tremendous fool of myself.”

  “I am so very sorry, Mr Ellington.”

  “I blamed Beatrice for so long because she was very easy to blame. She was such an unpleasant creature, almost evil at times, that she was the perfect target for my anger and disappointment. But in the end, Miss Jeffries, there was only one person to blame for it all, and that was Elizabeth Allencourt herself.”

  “Yes, she was not a pleasant lady.”

  “And as nice as she could be as a young woman, she was not at all simpleminded. I do not believe for a minute that she was an innocent who had been so easily overpowered by my sister. A person cannot be turned into such an ambitious and uncaring person if they have not already a mind to be that way in the first place. But I loved her so much, I was so infatuated, that I could not see it. I refused to see it.”

  “And I suppose a thing like that has quite an effect upon a man,” Emerson said in solidarity. “We have our finer feelings too, do we not?”

  “We most certainly do, young man, and you would be well advised never to deny them. At least not to yourself
, at any rate. I am rather afraid that my generation was brought up to be very different; the men that is. We were not taught to hide our feelings, but rather to not have any in the first place.” He reached for his tea and smiled, his lined skin wrinkling pleasingly at the corners of his eyes.

  Georgina smiled, warmed by his elderly grace and that feeling of security that comes from being in the company of a person who has not only grown old but has grown wise with it.

  “I thank you for that advice, Mr Ellington, and I shall concentrate on taking it.”

  “It will come to you; I can see it in your face.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “So, how is my sister?”

  “I believe her character to be largely unchanged, Mr Ellington, although I am bound to say that she is somewhat frail and predominantly bedridden,” Georgina said truthfully.

  “Goodness me, that must be irking her,” David said and laughed. “Forgive me, I do not mean to be cruel; I am simply amused by the irony of it all. I had always thought that her body would go before her mind did.”

  “It would certainly seem to be the case, although I believe she uses a pretense of mental frailty at times to suit her own purposes,” Georgina went on.

  “I do not doubt it for a moment. If she is no longer able to get about, Beatrice will find other ways in which to amuse her twisted humour.

  “Did you ever hear from my grandmother again after the two of you parted?”

  “No, not once. I had sent her a letter not long after her marriage to your grandfather. I had already begun to foster the opinion that I perhaps had something of a lucky escape.”

  “I can assure you, Mr Ellington, that you did.” Georgina laughed.

  “But I still loved her back then, and I wanted her to know it. Not that I wanted to upset her marriage or anything of that nature; I just wanted her to know that I did not harbour any ill will towards her. But I never received a reply, and to be honest, I had not expected one.”

  “And what of Beatrice?”

  “Once she had moved to Cornwall, I never saw her again until our father died. He had lived long, lasting two years more than Beatrice’s own husband.”

  “Beatrice attended your father’s funeral?”

  “Yes, she came back to Rowley with her daughter, Esme. It was the one and only time I have ever seen that child, and yet I have never truly been able to get her out of my mind.”

  “How so?”

  “She would have been barely eighteen years old when I saw her, and hardly like a woman at all. She was such a delicate creature, such pale hair, and a pale face, she was so frail and slight. But the thing I remember most of all is how very cowed she was by her mother. I had been in my sister’s company again not one hour before I realized that she undoubtedly treated her own daughter in the same way that she treated everybody else, perhaps even worse. And to see the young Esme was to see her delicacy and frailty so distinctly; my sister would have despised her for it.”

  “I am bound to say that that is the impression I got on speaking to Beatrice, although she did not talk of her daughter for long.”

  “After my sister returned to Cornwall, I never heard from her again until I received one final letter. For some reason, she had chosen to write to me to tell me that my poor dear niece had died at the County Asylum in Ainsley.”

  “Ainsley?” Emerson said and looked confused.

  Georgina looked from one man to the other and wondered what had stirred Emerson so.

  “Yes, my sister told me that her daughter had been committed to the County Asylum when she was but eight and twenty years old and that she had died there just two years later. I cannot think of it even now without the sadness of realizing that I am still alive in this world, aged and of little use to anybody, and that young, beautiful creature has already been dead these eleven years. I daresay it is all part of God’s plan, but I am afraid that the understanding of it evades me.”

  “But Ainsley is the County Asylum here in Devonshire, Mr Ellington,” Emerson said as he put down his cup and saucer. “Surely it would have been the thing to have had her committed to the County Asylum in Cornwall. For her to have been in Devonshire would have made it incredibly difficult for her mother to visit.”

  “Knowing my sister as I do, I daresay that was all part of it. She wanted her out of the way, forgotten.”

  “Dear me, what an awful thing,” Georgina said and was suddenly hit by a little wave of emotion as she imagined the poor young woman hidden out of the way, so alone in a county that she had not grown up in and with her family so far away. “How abandoned she must have felt.”

  “If she had the capacity for it, my dear. I am bound to say that I do not know the extent of her mental frailty,” David Ellington said with a sigh. “All I know is what I see before me, a lovely young woman who has more kindness and caring in the smallest corner of her soul than her own grandmother had from head to toe.” He smiled at her warmly. “I am very pleased to say that you are by no means your grandmother’s granddaughter, my dear.”

  “Thank you kindly, Mr Ellington. I cannot tell you what that means to me.”

  They spent the rest of the afternoon in convivial conversation, with Georgina pleased to discover that David Ellington had had a most contented life, following his own passions for painting and literature.

  He was by no means the sad and lonely figure that she had imagined, but rather a man who had followed the bachelor’s life in complete comfort and contented happiness.

  It was with some regret that their afternoon finally came to an end, and they left David Ellington with a firm promise that they would call upon him again in the future.

  Chapter 30

  “I cannot thank you enough for coming with me today, Jeremy. It really would have been too much of a risk for Emerson to come along, although I suppose this particular inquiry is a risk anyway.”

  They had just drawn up on the great gravel apron in front of the large and imposing County Asylum known as Ainsley. It was built of a much darker stone than any other building she had seen in Devonshire, and it gave it such a sinister air that Georgina shuddered involuntarily.

  She was glad that she had chosen to ask Jeremy to come with her and even more glad that she had not risked insulting Fleur in the process.

  Fleur really did wear her heart on her sleeve, and it would have done no good to take her cousin in and have her so openly disturbed throughout the entire thing. It would have put Georgina off dreadfully, and she knew it.

  In the end, however, Fleur had been relieved that her brother had stepped into the breach and had declared that he would accompany Georgina to the County Asylum.

  “Yes, I suppose this is the one line of inquiry that is the riskiest of them all. After all, although Lady Esme Montgomery has been dead these eleven years, the warden might still feel a certain duty to make contact with her mother as a result of our inquiries. Especially if he distrusts us, my dear.”

  “Then I shall have to do everything in my power to appear trustworthy,” Georgina said and sighed.

  “Now come along, you can manage this very well. Do not suddenly lose your courage, Georgina, for I am afraid to tell you that the responsibility is yours entirely. Although he would not do so openly, Emerson is relying on you just as he did in Cornwall. So, do not underestimate your abilities in this area, for it is clear to me that the Duke of Calder does not underestimate them. If he is so convinced that you are capable, then you are capable, do you hear me?”

  “My goodness, I do not think I have ever heard you speak so sensibly, so seriously, Jeremy,” she said with wide eyes. “And I am bound to say that it is unsettling.”

  “You must not be unsettled by it, my dear. You must take heart and do what must be done. The time has come for you to discover Emerson’s true origins, and I think you know that everything seems to rest upon that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Emerson is very keen to discover that he truly is a man of so
me standing before he can get on with his life. And by get on with his life, I am sure that you rightly perceive that I mean marriage and children and what have you. With you, obviously.”

  “He told you all of this?”

  “No, he told me some of it, and the rest I simply extrapolated from the data I did have.”

  “In other words, you are making it up.”

  “No, I had the bare bones of it from the man himself, and I think you know very well that my own perception is not only correct but very much as your own is.”

  “You are far more intelligent and far less silly than I have previously given you credit for,” Georgina said with a mischievous smile.