The Wicked Duke

by Madeline Hunter

  * * *

  The next morning Marianne called for a bath soon after dawn. Then she dressed and went below. She asked for Calliope to be saddled. Once astride she rode directly to her uncle’s house, and barged in while he was eating his breakfast.

  Her mother sat there too. And Nora. They all looked at her. Mama’s mouth fell open.

  Marianne had no interest in anyone except the one man at the table. “I would speak with you, Uncle. In the library, if you do not mind.”

  He sat back in his chair. His eyes got that steely glint he liked to use at the petty sessions. “Perhaps I do mind.”

  She grasped the back of a chair so she did not spew forth right there and then. “Hear me well, sir. If you want to have any chance of being received by me in the future, if you do not want me to publicly repudiate our relationship, you will be in the library in three minutes.” She turned and strode out of the chamber to the library.

  Uncle Horace arrived in two minutes. He pulled himself to his full height and waved his long arms in dramatic indignation. “How dare you enter this house and speak to me like that in front of my daughter.”

  “How dare you barter my life for your own purposes. How dare you coerce a man into a marriage by threatening his good name and very life.”

  “He told you? Bold of him. Stupid too. Better if you never knew. I assumed he would have more courtesy than to rub your nose in the circumstances.”

  “After his meeting with you last night, there was no reason for him to pretend with me, and extend the courtesy he had before.”

  Her uncle sank into an upholstered chair and glared at her over his high knees. “You are a duchess, aren’t you? What complaints can you have? What do you care about the negotiations that led to that proposal?”

  “Do you think status and jewels can replace happiness? Excuse me. That was a stupid question. Of course you do. You had better finish it as you began, Uncle, or you will have gained nothing from your cleverness.”

  He laughed aloud so hard his eyes showed tears. “You are an ignorant provincial, Marianne. You know nothing about it. I already gained from it. I will continue to, even if you or he never speak to me again.” He brought his hand down on his knee, hard, and suddenly laughed no more. “I have been repaid for the insult to my daughter and myself. Finally. I will be repaid more, again and again, in the years ahead. Enjoy your jewels and silks, Marianne. Make the most of it, as I will. I have done you a great favor.”

  She could not control her fury. He spoke of her marriage as if it were nothing more than a sly fraud, with her as an accomplice. He spoke as if a lifetime bound to another person could be endured, even enjoyed, if she received luxuries and highborn friends. It mattered not to him that his scheme meant her husband saw her as a bad bargain at best.

  “You told him you had a witness, Uncle. Who is this witness?”

  “That is for me alone to know.”

  “Is this witness reliable?”

  “Anyone who swears information such as this man will is reliable enough when it comes to murder.”

  “Perhaps it is only a man who bears some resentment toward Aylesbury. A man willing to lie. Have you considered that?”

  Her uncle pursed his lips. “Of course. I happen to know this person holds no ill will against the duke. Rather the opposite. That is why he is willing to hold his tongue if I demand it.”

  “Yet he told you. No doubt he thought you a good man when he did. A person who could advise him honestly.”

  “I do not care for your tone.”

  “You will have to excuse me for that. I find that one thought will not leave me whenever I look at you.”

  “What might that be?”

  “You believed Aylesbury to be a murderer when you plotted to marry Nora to him, then me. What kind of man would do such a thing to a female relative?”

  He stared at her while his face turned red. He unfolded his body and stood, then walked to the door. He turned back to her before he left, and a snarling smile slowly formed. “Think what you like, but I said I had a witness who would lay down information. I never said I believed him to have actually done the murder.”

  CHAPTER 21

  The day had a bite in the air that heralded snow. Lance rode out anyway, and not to hunt. Instead he aimed his horse to a place he had avoided for months now.

  He approached an unoccupied cottage, one of the few not collected together in the little hamlet some earlier duke had arranged. It was the one his steward pressed him to let to a tenant. The one Ives suggested he tear down if he did not want it, so vagrants and poachers did not make use of it.

  He had been here once before. He discovered it while helping Gareth and Ives find some missing paintings soon after Percy died. He had not stayed long. As soon as he stepped inside, he knew his older brother had made use of the cottage. He had not only seen some evidence of that. He had felt it, as surely as if Percy’s ghost lived there, and woke with the intrusion.

  This, then, not the apartment at Merrywood, was the last duke’s lair.

  He tied his horse and threw open the door, then hesitated. He had not looked much the last time, or stayed long, because he knew, just knew, he might learn things he would rather not know. Ignorance had ceased to be a luxury he could enjoy, however.

  He stepped inside. A chill entered him. The cottage had gone long without heat from a fire. Its windows faced north, so little sunlight entered. Yet he could not shake the sense that once more Percy resented the intrusion.

  The evidence of use remained. Nothing had been moved. The bed still showed hard use, and that edge of a stain he had glimpsed last time. He flipped back the bedclothes. The stain revealed itself more fully. Blood, it appeared to be.

  A row of bottles lined the mantel over the fireplace. Wine, spirits, sherry, and port. Three were empty. The sherry and port still contained liquid.

  He pictured his brother here, perhaps with friends. Oh, yes, Percy had friends, youngbloods from this county and others nearby. He probably brought them here to drink. Lance glanced at the bed. And for other things.

  He began a methodical examination of the premises. A wardrobe stood next to the fireplace. Odd to have one in the sitting room. He opened it, and found an assortment of weapons. Not only swords, muskets, and pistols. Also a teamster’s whip and a cane such as was used to punish boys at school. Heaped below them lay a pile of used, soiled cravats. He lifted one. It had never graced a neck. The ends showed the results of having been tied together.

  A high chest of drawers almost filled the wall facing the fireplace. He opened the drawers, one by one, and lifted the contents out. Clothing. Women’s garments. Two chemises, showing soiling. A corset, its lacings cut as if a knife sliced them while still tied. Hose. Lots of hose.

  Finished, he stood in that chamber, wishing he could avoid the conclusion forming but knowing he could not. He had suspected it, after all. Even before he found this cottage was used by Percy. His brother possessed a cruel and ugly character as a boy. His own scar proved that. Apparently he had not outgrown it.

  He pivoted and left the building. He threw himself onto his mount and rode hard. Two questions repeated over and over in his head, keeping pace with the beating of his horse’s hooves: Who had known? And whom had his brother harmed?

  * * *

  Marianne could not bring herself to return to the house. She sat in the garden, under a barren tree, wrapped in an old cloak that she had worn for years in Wiltshire. There were fur mantelets inside the house, and exquisite wool pelisses that her fingers loved to stroke. She had taken this cloak instead. It fitted her. She belonged in it.

  Aylesbury had been gone when she returned from her uncle’s house, but he was back now. She had heard the grooms leading his horse to the stables. She lacked the courage to face him. Not because of last night. She simply did not know what to say to him, or how to go forwa
rd in this marriage, knowing what she did now.

  She felt foolish. Stupid. She had lied to herself that this marriage could be anything more than the peculiar union it was. She had imagined the intimacy she thought they shared. Her optimism had betrayed her better sense.

  The late afternoon sun gave some warmth to her bench, but soon it would not. She could hardly remain out here forever. Still, she did not move.

  A figure appeared on the terrace. She squinted against the bright, low sun, to see who it was. Aylesbury. He stood by the terrace balustrade, not moving. He held a glass in his hand. Spirits, she guessed. He looked deep in thought. Perhaps he would remain distracted, and not notice her.

  Fortune refused to smile on her, even in this one small thing. He walked over to the stairs, then came through the garden toward her. Without greeting, he sat beside her, set his head against the tree trunk behind, and closed his eyes.

  He did not truly rest there, however. She sensed that darkness in him, and chaos. Both poured out of him, far worse than yesterday.

  “Has something happened?” She asked mostly because the silence turned awkward, but also because she worried for him. She did not know why she did. He was a duke. A man at the top of the world even when he faced adversity. A person so confident and in command of himself that it inspired one to seek sanctuary with him or from him, but not for him.

  He did not reply. He did not appear to have heard. She left him to his thoughts, and retreated into her own, the ones that had occupied her the last hour. She wondered again if, as a duke, he could end the marriage due to having been hoodwinked. If he could, it would be best if he did.

  “I discovered something today.” He spoke unexpectedly. “Something I should have known before. Or guessed. Or at least had the courage to discover sooner.”

  “From your tone, it was not pleasant.”

  He actually smiled. To her surprise, he took her hand in his and held it. He did not open his eyes, though. His face still angled toward the setting sun.

  “Not pleasant, pretty flower. Far from it.”

  If he was unhappy, there was no point in seeking her out. She was only the source of more unhappiness.

  “There is a cottage that my brother used for his own purposes. He indulged himself there in ways he never could in the house. I think—no, that is the coward in me, or the man trying to spare his family name—I am sure he brought women there. Girls sometimes, from the size of the garments I found. I do not think his tastes were of the normal kind either.” He paused. “I saw evidence of violence. Nor do I think he always acted alone.”

  Her mind pieced through his words rationally, but her heart understood at once. Her breathing came hard for a few moments, as if her lungs ceased functioning. When her mind grasped it all, one thought, and one alone, yelled silently inside her. Nora.

  “I have been wondering how long he had this habit,” Aylesbury said. “I have tried hard to believe neither of my parents knew. However . . . ” He shrugged.

  “Would they not have stopped it?”

  “My mother had ready excuses for him.” He touched his scar. “For this. For the time he tried to kill Gareth. Oh, yes, he did. Neither Ives nor I doubted Gareth’s story. As for my father—I believe he knew what he had in Percy, even if he arranged to never learn the worst of it. Like me, he probably turned a blind eye when he could.”

  Nora. “What will you do?”

  He finally opened his eyes. He turned his head and looked right into hers. “I will learn to live with the suspicion that had I been at all vigilant, I might have spared someone a great deal of pain.”

  Nora. “I meant about him. About what you found.”

  “Nothing. He is dead. Unfortunately, there may have been more than a few people who wanted to see that. Those women and girls had families, didn’t they?” He looked at the house. “I wonder how hard it is to get in there in the evening, if one had a mind to poison a duke’s food.”

  “Perhaps you should find out.”

  He closed his eyes again. “Maybe I should.”

  He still held her hand. It touched her that he had confided in her.

  She watched his profile, and the subtle frown he wore. She touched his cheek, then leaned toward him and kissed it. “I think you are blaming yourself. You must not. He had little to do with you, and you with him, once you were grown. Nor could you have stopped him. He was a duke’s heir, then a duke, and he believed he answered to no one, least of all you.”

  He rested his forehead against hers, and slid his arm around her shoulders. He stayed like that a moment, then lifted his head. The frown was gone. He appeared more himself.

  “You have a talent for lightening my life, pretty flower. You always have.” He stood. “You have been out here a good while, I think. Your nose is cold. Come inside.”

  They shared a quiet dinner, then read by the fire in the library. All the while Marianne’s mind examined the day’s conversations, first from one side, then the other. She was right about Nora. She would learn for certain tomorrow.

  She looked over the top of her book at Aylesbury. He appeared lost in whatever he read. An emotion swelled in her chest. She had held a part of herself back from the sentiments he evoked in her. Whenever they wanted to take her too far, she thought of Nora. Now that barrier fell like the straw wall it had always been. Her heart no longer had even that defense.

  Theirs was a marriage built on the worst deceptions and game. She doubted the brief intimacy they had known could revive, or grow. To love him would be a mistake, and offer only pain. And yet . . .

  A heart does not understand such practicalities, she realized. It turned toward love if given any chance at all. And she could no longer deny that hers had done just that.

  * * *

  “You again.” Uncle Horace muttered the dismissal after turning to see who had brought a horse alongside his.

  “Yes, me again,” Marianne said. “It was fortuitous to find you out riding. I feared I would have to ask you while we were in the house. That might be awkward.”

  “Ask me what?”

  “I would like you to tell me exactly what Nora said while she was ill, that made you blame Aylesbury for her condition.”

  He waved at her, as if pushing her away. “I do not choose to talk about it.”

  “I must insist that you do. I no longer trust your judgment, on this or anything else. Tell me, so I can find my own conclusion.”

  He stopped his horse. He sighed heavily. “She was raving from the fever. Talking nonsense mostly. I sat with her sometimes. One night, in her mumblings, she began pleading. Begging him to stop.” He looked away, then closed his eyes. “Hemingford, she would mutter. Hemingford. Well, that made it clear enough.”

  “It does not sound very clear to me.”

  “There were three sons. The first was the duke, Percival. Not known as Hemingford then, but Aylesbury, and well respected and a good man. The third was an upstanding barrister in London, on whom ill repute never fell. Well, not until that business with the woman he married and her father. The middle one, Sir Lancelot Hemingford at that time, was a seducing scoundrel known far and wide as a man without scruples when it came to women. Is that clear enough now?”

  “Has no one ever referred to a duke by his family name? It is how relatives and neighbors knew him for his whole life before he inherited. It was what Nora would have heard him called most of her life too. In fact, I think I have heard you refer to the current duke as Hemingford.”

  “Friends from boyhood might still address a peer the way they did for years. Friends he caroused with. Siblings. His mother. No one else would address him that way.”

  “She was a young girl. She was hardly in the condition to stand on ceremony regarding forms of address.”

  He looked at his saddle. Then at the field. Then at her. “Are you done? If so, I will continue my
ride.”

  She turned Calliope so there were no farewells. Her uncle galloped off in one direction, and she in the other.

  * * *

  Nora ran over and threw her arms around Marianne. “I am so glad you came. Your mother said you had to leave their dinner early. I was so sad not to see you.” She pulled Marianne toward the window. “Look at my friends. I have so many now.”

  Her plant collection had grown. A dozen little pots formed a circle on a table now placed near the window.

  “You do not talk to them, do you?”

  “Of course I do. I think it helps them grow better too.” She petted one plant’s leaves. “Mr. Llewellyn said this one may flower before winter is out, if I keep it warm. I wonder what color the flower will be.”

  Marianne admired the plants. She watched her cousin, noting her good color and how she did not appear so blank now. Perhaps she should leave well enough alone where Nora was concerned. Then again, perhaps the truth would help everyone, Nora included.

  Of two minds, and hardly secure in the wisdom of her actions, she encouraged Nora to sit beside her on the bed. “I want to ask you something. I hope you will try to answer me, even if it is difficult.”

  Nora slipped her arm around Marianne’s back. Marianne did the same, so they sat next to each other in a half embrace.

  “Ask what you want. I do not mind. I have no secrets.”

  “It is about the day they found you out in the storm.”

  Nora stilled. “Oh. That.”

  “Where had you been? I think you met someone earlier. A beau perhaps.”

  Nora shook her head. “I met no beau.”

  “A man who flattered you? Someone who lured you to an assignation?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe instead you came upon him while you rode.”

  “No.” Her voice rang with the frantic note that heralded nothing good.

  “Who was it, Nora? Tell me who it was, and what happened.”