“Why are you shy?”
“I always ... thought that if you ... kissed me it would be ... wonderful,” she whispered, “but not so ... unbelievably ... glorious!”
He looked at her searchingly and yet the expression in his eyes was very gentle.
“I would believe, if it were not incredible, that this is the first time you have been kissed!”
“The ... only ... time!” Cassandra whispered.
“But why?” he asked.
As if the question was superfluous his lips found hers again, and he kissed her demandingly, insistently, and with a passion that made her feel as if he drew her very heart from her body and made it his.
Then as she felt herself quiver with the thrills which ran through her like quick-silver, the Duke released her.
He took his arms from round her so quickly that she had to hold on to him to steady herself.
She had no idea how beautiful she looked; her eyes wide and excited; her lips soft and trembling a little from his kisses; a faint flush on her cheeks; her neck very white against the severity of her riding-habit.
The Duke looked at her for a long moment and then he said almost harshly:
“For God’s sake do not look at me like that! I have a lot of explaining to do, but first let us have something to eat, and then I want to show you the house.”
His tone was so different from when he had spoken of his love, that Cassandra felt as if she had suddenly been shaken into wakefulness.
The Duke picked up the slippers from where he had dropped them into a chair.
“You can put these on,” he said. “They belonged to my mother!”
“I am ... sorry,” Cassandra murmured, and he knew she referred to the fact that she had been suspicious of a previous owner.
“You could hardly think anything else,” he said almost savagely, “seeing the type of company with which you had to associate last night.”
Cassandra put the slippers on and followed the Duke down the staircase and into the Hall.
She felt as if he had suddenly erected a barrier between them, and yet in a way she knew it was inevitable and that sooner or later they both had to face the future.
A very old Butler served their luncheon in a long Elizabethan Dining-Hall with a minstrels’ gallery and an oriel at one end of it.
They ate at a refectory table that was as old as the house itself and sat on high-backed carved oak chairs which had come into the family in the reign of Charles II.
The old servant apologised that there was not much to eat.
But a golden-brown omelette filled with fresh tomatoes was followed by pigeons stuffed with mushrooms. There was no pudding, but a big round cheese was served, which the Duke told Cassandra was a local speciality.
They talked of quite ordinary things while the old Butler shuffled round the table waiting on them, but they neither of them seemed very hungry, and Cassandra knew she was avoiding the Dukes eyes.
It was impossible, when she thought about it, not to thrill with the memory of how he had kissed her.
At the same time she had heard the harshness in his voice when he pushed her away from him, and she knew she was waiting in an agony of apprehension for what he would say to her when they were alone again.
She was afraid as she had never been afraid before that he would tell her that they must say good-bye to each other; that their love could mean nothing because he must marry a woman for her money.
‘How can I bear it?’ Cassandra whispered to herself.
When finally they rose from the table and left the Dining-Hall, she felt as if every nerve in her body was tense in anticipation of what lay ahead.
But first the Duke took her round the house.
He showed her small, panelled Salons, the Great Chamber where once the Manorial Courts were held, the Armoury filled with flags and ancient weapons that had been collected over the years.
There were flags captured at the battle of Worcester; others by an Alchester who had fought with Marlborough in his campaigns; one by an Alchester who had fought with Wolfe in Canada and two more by another Duke who had served at Waterloo.
But there was a sparsity of furniture, no tapestries, and in the Drawing-Room few objets dart. When they reached the long Picture Gallery, it was to find the walls were bare.
The Duke said very little.
He only led Cassandra through room after room until finally they came to the Library, and only there were the walls fully covered.
“The valuable editions have been sold,” the Duke said sharply. “What is left is not worth the expense of carting them away.”
She knew he was suffering and as she turned towards the fire which she saw had been newly-lighted, she said softly:
“Will you explain to me what has ... happened?”
“Sit down,” the Duke said abruptly, “because that is exactly what I am going to do.”
Obediently Cassandra sat down in a chair by the fireplace. The Duke stood in front of the fire not looking at her but staring across the room.
“I do not know quite where to begin,” he said, “but I want to make you understand that I was brought up to believe that this house and the Estate in which it stands was a great heritage.”
“Indeed it is,” Cassandra said.
“It was drummed into me almost from the moment of my birth,” the Duke went on. “I was told it was my destiny and my duty to expend my whole energy, my whole enthusiasm, my whole life, on being the ninth Duke.”
Cassandra looked at him, remembering their conversation of the other night.
“So inevitably you ... hated the idea.”
“Not exactly,” the Duke answered, “but it made me long for freedom, to be myself, to be allowed to have one independent thought, apart from what was almost a strait-jacket into which I had to live my life.”
Cassandra gave a little sigh. She was beginning to understand so many things the Duke had said to her.
“At first it did not seem quite so constricting as it did later,” the Duke said. “I had the idea of going into the Foreign Office, believing I could have there a career of my own. Then I learnt that it was impossible: I had too many responsibilities here. Moreover it infuriated my father to think I should have any interests outside the sacred circle of the Alchester domain.”
“So there was no escape?”
“None,” the Duke answered in a hard voice. “I was also told that in the pattern of Royalty I had to marry money, so that the Estate could be kept up and I myself could live as befitted my rank.”
“And you agreed?” Cassandra asked.
“My assent was taken for granted,” the Duke replied. “My marriage was arranged by my father and I accepted it as something inevitable that must happen to me at some time in the future. Then I went round the world.”
“That was important to you?”
“I realised that in other countries men of my age were making money by using their brains and their energy. In England it is considered degrading for gentlemen to work for a living. But that does not apply elsewhere.”
His voice deepened.
“In Australia I saw a chance of making a fortune, and I found even greater opportunities when I reached South Africa.”
He paused for a moment and Cassandra saw he was looking back into the past, recalling perhaps his enthusiasm at what he had discovered.
“I came back to England with ideas that I was certain could be the foundation stone for restoring the family fortunes.”
“What ... happened?”
“My father laughed at me, refused to invest one penny either in the mining possibilities I had envisaged in Australia or in the prospecting for gold that I was sure would prove to be a success in South Africa.”
He was silent and Cassandra saw the bitterness on his face.
“So you could not do what you wanted to do.”
“But I did!” the Duke answered. “I borrowed the money!”
Cassandra looked up at him.
&
nbsp; “From ... whom?” she asked, her voice hardly above a whisper.
“Need you ask?” the Duke replied. “From Carwen. He offered me anything I wanted. He is a very rich man.”
“And you trusted him?”
“He made himself very pleasant,” the Duke said. “He listened to my ideas, he flattered and encouraged me. That was something I needed desperately at that particular moment.”
“What happened?”
“I was making up my mind to tell my father the truth and to ask him to reconsider his decision and be my sponsor, when he died,” the Duke said. “It was then I realised I was my own master—until I learnt how utterly impoverished the Alchester coffers were!”
Cassandra saw that it had been a shock, but she did not speak and after a moment the Duke went on:
“There were death duties, and my father had spent far more than he could afford on his horses—banking, I suppose, on being able to pay off all his debts through the rich marriage he had arranged for me.”
There was so much sarcasm in his voice that Cassandra drew in her breath.
“I realised that if I was to stand on my own feet I had to have money. I mortgaged part of the estate to Carwen. I sold everything that I did not consider a family heirloom. Then when the money was invested Carwen began to show himself in his true colours.”
“What did he do?”
“He began to manipulate me as I had been manipulated all my life by my father. He used my name to further his own interests and insisted that I should be his representative on Boards which I considered to be shady. He also asked for security against the loans he had made me in my father’s life-time.”
“What did you give him?” Cassandra asked.
“Horses, among them those we rode today, a large amount of furniture and the family pictures,” the Duke replied. “He deliberately took them off the wall so that every time I looked at the spaces where they had been I should feel under a deeper obligation to him!”
“He is despicable!” Cassandra cried.
“He is a sharp-headed business-man,” the Duke replied, “and I was a fool to get into his clutches.”
He was silent for a moment before he went on:
“I know that in a few years the money I have invested in Australia and South Africa will increase a thousand-fold. Already the reports from both countries are fantastic, but I cannot wait.”
“Why not?” Cassandra asked.
“Because I cannot maintain the estate and pay the wages. Because I refuse any longer to be beholden to Carwen!”
He paused to say slowly:
“Now there is only one thing I can do.”
“And what is that?” Cassandra asked and her voice seemed almost to have died in her throat.
“I can sell the house,” the Duke answered, “pay off the mortgage and the monies that Carwen has loaned to me. That will leave enough to pension off the old retainers and provide cottages for their old age. What part of the estate is left will, in time, pay its way.”
“Is there not ... another alternative?” Cassandra asked hesitatingly.
“Of course there is,” the Duke answered. “I can marry the heiress that my father procured for me. She wants my title—I want her money. A very sensible arrangement, you might say.”
Cassandra did not speak and after a moment the Duke went on: “I was prepared to do it. I had made up my mind that it would be better to be beholden to a woman—any woman—than to Carwen. And then you know what happened.”
“What ... happened?”
“I met you!”
For the first time he turned to look at her.
“Oh, God! Why did this have to happen to me now at this moment? And yet would I have it any different?”
His eyes showed her the anguish he was suffering.
He put out his arms and drew Cassandra from the chair.
“I love you!” he said. “I love you and I know that really nothing else matters. Will you be poor with me, my darling—for a few years at any rate?”
“You mean...?”
“You will have no pretty gowns, no gaiety, just a rather dull life in a small house, but we shall be together.”
He held her close in his arms. His eyes were looking into hers as if he was searching once again for something that was of the utmost importance to him.
Cassandra tried to speak but the words would not come to her lips.
“I am asking you to marry me,” the Duke said very softly. “What is your answer, my beloved?”
He saw the sudden light in her eyes and there was no need for words.
His mouth came down onto hers, holding her captive.
“I love you ...” she tried to say but he was kissing her wildly and it was impossible to speak.
Only inside herself Cassandra felt waves of happiness like white doves flying up to the Heavens.
She had won! He loved her!
He loved her enough to sacrifice everything that had mattered to him in the past.
He loved her and she felt his lips demanding her complete surrender.
No-one she thought, could know such happiness and not die of the wonder of it!
CHAPTER NINE
Cassandra shut her eyes so that Hannah, thinking she was asleep, would stop grumbling.
“I have never in all my life known such a carry-on!” Hannah had exclaimed last night.
She said it not once but a dozen times when Cassandra had returned to Park Lane to inform the old maid that they were leaving for Yorkshire by the seven o’clock train the following morning.
“There’s a good train, stopping only a few times, that leaves at nine-thirty,” Hannah said.
“I know that,” Cassandra answered, “but I wish to leave at seven. If you cannot be ready, Hannah, I will go alone and you can follow later.”
She had known this was the surest way to make Hannah get the packing done and be sure that they left together.
Listening with her eyes closed to the rumble of the wheels on the track, Cassandra found herself reliving the wonder she had felt when she knew that the Duke loved her enough to give up his ancestral house so that they could be married.
She was well aware of the immensity of his sacrifice and how despite his complaints about being tied to the Alchester Estate, it was in fact a part of him, and to sell it would be like losing an arm or a leg.
“Are you ... sure?” she had asked him later when they were seated together on the sofa so that he could still hold her in his arms.
“Sure that I want to marry you?” he asked. “I am more sure of it than I have been of anything else in my whole life.”
“But we have ... known each other such a ... short time,” Cassandra murmured.
“I feel that you have always been there in my heart,” he answered. “The woman I have always been looking for, the wife I have wanted beside me, but whom I could never find.”
There was a depth of sincerity in his voice that told Cassandra he spoke the truth.
“I love you!” he went on. “I love everything about you. Your absurdly red-gold hair, your little nose, your blue eyes! But more than all these I love the quickness of your brain and the kindness of your heart.”
“You are ... flattering me!” Cassandra demurred.
“I am telling you what I believe to be the truth,” the Duke answered. “But I forgot to mention something else which I love.”
“What is that?” she asked, lifting her face a little to look up at him.
“Your lips!” he answered.
Then he was kissing her again and it was difficult to say anything more...
A long time later Cassandra looked at the clock on the mantelpiece and realised it was time they returned to London.
It was then she could not help asking the question which had trembled on her lips for some time.
“What are you ... going to do about ... the girl you were supposed to ... marry?”
The Duke rose from the sofa to stand with his back to her
looking into the fire.
“I admit that in some ways I have been a cad,” he said. “Our engagement should have been announced two years ago, but she was in mourning for her grand-father and we did not meet. Then, after my father’s death, I decided to make it clear that I did not intend to go on with the arrangement he had made with the girl’s father. But I was afraid—”
“Of what?”
‘That my business commitments would fail and I should be left at the mercy of Carwen! I had begun to find out the sort of swine he was.”
The Duke paused to add:
“So I did nothing.”
“And now?” Cassandra asked, her eyes on his broad shoulders and his head bent to look into the flames.
“I must behave decently,” he said speaking as if to himself. “I will go to Yorkshire tomorrow and see Sir James Sherburn. After all, he was my father’s greatest friend. If nothing else, I owe him a personal explanation.”
“And what will that be?” Cassandra asked.
The Duke turned round.
“I shall tell him the truth,” he said, “that I have fallen in love with someone so utterly adorable that not all the gold in the world could prevent me from marrying her!”
‘He loves me!’ Cassandra said to herself now. ‘He loves me! And everything I ever wanted or dreamed of in life has come true!’
At the same time she was aware of a real fear within herself that the Duke might be angry when he learned the truth.
She had known she could not confess her deception while they sat in front of the fire in the Library at Alchester Park.
It had also been impossible to do so when they had ridden back to London, arriving late at the stables of Alchester House where the Duke kept his horses.
The house was closed because he could not afford to live there, and in the stables, which could accommodate a dozen horses, there were only the pair which they had driven to the country.
The Duke saw them in their stalls and said to Cassandra:
“Your luggage will be waiting for you at the flat.”
When Cassandra and the Duke arrived at Bury Street, it was in fact waiting for her in the Hall, and the porter had charge of her jewellery case.
“I was told to give it only into your own hands, Miss,” he said.
The Glittering Lights (Bantam Series No. 12) Page 18