This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel
are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THE AMERICAN HEIRESS. Copyright © 2010 by Daisy Goodwin Productions. All rights reserved.
For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth
Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Goodwin, Daisy.
[My last duchess]
The American heiress: a novel / Daisy Goodwin.—1st U.S. ed.
p. cm.
Originally published as: My last duchess. London: Headline Review, 2010.
Summary: “Be careful what you wish for. Traveling abroad with her mother at the turn of the twentieth century to seek a titled husband, beautiful, vivacious Cora Cash, whose family mansion in Newport dwarfs the Vanderbilts’, suddenly finds herself Duchess of Wareham, married to Ivo, the most eligible bachelor in England. Nothing is quite as it seems, however: Ivo is withdrawn and secretive, and the English social scene is full of traps and betrayals. Money, Cora soon learns, cannot buy everything, as she must decide what is truly worth the price in her life and her marriage. Witty, moving, and brilliantly entertaining, Cora’s story marks the debut of a glorious storyteller who brings a fresh new spirit to the world of Edith Wharton and Henry James. “For daughters of the new American billionaires of the 19th century, it was the ultimate deal: marriage to a cash-strapped British Aristocrat in return for a title and social status. But money didn’t always buy them happiness.”—DAISY GOODWIN IN THE DAILY MAIL”—Provided by publisher.
ISBN: 978-1-4299-8708-0
1. Americans—England—Fiction. 2. Aristocracy (Social class)—England—Fiction. 3. England—Social life and customs—19th century—Fiction. I. Title.
PR6107.O6625M9 2011
823'.92—dc22
2010048539
First published in Great Britain by HEADLINE REVIEW, an imprint of HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP, an Hachette UK Company
Table of Contents
Part One
Chapter 1 The Hummingbird Man
Chapter 2 A Spirit of Electricity
Chapter 3 The Hunt
Chapter 4 Hot Water
Chapter 5 The Black Pearl
Chapter 6 A Link in the Chain
Chapter 7 Bows and Arrows
Chapter 8 We Have a Rubens
Chapter 9 The Double Duchess
Part Two
Chapter 10 Mrs Van Der Leyden Pays a Call
Chapter 11 Euston Station
Chapter 12 Two Cigarettes
Chapter 13 The Coiled Serpent
Chapter 14 Florence Dursheimer’s Day Out
Chapter 15 ‘That Spot of Joy’
Chapter 16 Madonna and Child
Chapter 17 Bridgewater House
Chapter 18 An Ideal Husband
Chapter 19 ‘The Faint Half-Flush’
Chapter 20 ‘That Pictured Countenance’
Part Three
Chapter 21 At Sea
Chapter 22 The Homecoming
Chapter 23 ‘A Bough of Cherries’
Chapter 24 Protocols
Chapter 25 Eros and Psyche
Chapter 26 ‘Never to Stoop’
Chapter 27 ‘Then all Smiles Stopped’
Chapter 28 ‘The Dropping of the Daylight’
Chapter 29 ‘Taming a Sea Horse’
Chapter 30 ‘A Nine-Hundred-Year-Old Name’
Acknowledgements
The American Heiress Page 41