An Ideal Duchess (7 page)

             
Her mother held her spectacles up to her eyes as she stared at the thick vellum envelope in her hand.

             
Amanda paused in the act of spreading fresh orange marmalade on her English muffin (crumpets the English called them—how singular).

“Melvins? I can’t think of any…” She gasped, nearly dropping her knife on the table. “Is it
Malvern
, perhaps?”

“Oh, why yes,” Her mother brought the envelope closer. “M-a-l-v-e-r-n, it is spelled. Not M-e-l-v-i-n!”

              “Still, do we know them? It isn’t quite correct to push an acquaintance on strangers,” Her mother lowered the letter into the pile of letters she designated as unimportant.

             
“Mother,” Amanda said slowly. “I think that is from the duke…”

             
“The duke?” Her mother’s reaction would be almost comical if Amanda hadn’t been so shaken. “My word, the Duke of Malvern?!”

             
“Neily, look!” Her mother waved the envelope at her father, who entered the dining room with her brothers, Lulu and Quintus.

             
“Let me have some breakfast, my love.” Her father said gruffly as he moved to the sideboard.

             
“When are we going home to America?” Quintus complained as he lined up beside their father with a large plate in his hand.

             
“Yes, Father,” Lulu sighed. “It’s deadly dull in this country. All everyone talks about are
dresses
and
parties
, and there are never any boys our age around.”

             
“They’re all at school—or in the nursery,” Amanda said to her brothers. “Where the two of you should be.”

             
“Cripes!” Quintus looked horrified as he joined the table, his plate piled high with eggs, toast and sausages. “I take it back.”

             
“We’ll be back at Groton soon enough,” Lulu said gloomily, sitting beside their mother.

             
“Now, my love,” Her father sat opposite her mother and began eating. “Go on.”

             
“The duke, Amanda’s duke, has…” Her mother paused to open the envelope and extract the letter. “He—or rather the Duchess of Malvern—has invited us for a garden party this Wednesday. Listen—‘The Duchess of Malvern requests the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vandewater’s company at a garden party on Wednesday, September 17th, 1902’.”

             
“He isn’t my duke, Mother,” Amanda said repressively. “And that is such short notice.”

             
“It’s only Monday, Amanda. Plenty of time to choose what to wear to show you off and to make the best effect.”

             
“Ugh!” Quintus groaned. “What did I tell you—dresses and parties!”

             
“The Duchess of Malvern?” Her father said between mouthfuls. “The chap is married?”

             
“I think that is his mother, Papa,”

             
“I dearly hope so,” Her mother said, her eyes lit with excitement. “Lady Hesketh will be green with envy. She hasn’t managed to get into one exclusive gathering at all this season.”

             
“So Puss, this duke of yours…” Her father raised his bushy eyebrows. “One of those impoverished ones, I’ll bet. They’re always in need of funds.”

             
“Papa, I wouldn’t marry a man for his title, and I certainly wouldn’t want a titled gentleman who would marry me for my money.”

             
“I think you’re seeing it from the wrong angle, Puss,” Her father argued. “It is the simplest business contract man has ever created: an exchange of one resource for another—in this case, a young lady acquires personal security in becoming a duchess—”              “Or a countess,” Amanda interrupted, eyeing her father suspiciously.

             
He inclined his head in agreement. “Yes, or a countess. The duke—or earl—acquires financial security for the future of his family.”

             
“But it sounds so cold-blooded,”

             
“Don’t tell me you’re turning female on me, Puss.”

             
Amanda flinched. “I’m not, but why do I have the feeling that you’ve already ordered a ducal coronet on my next box of stationary?”

             
“I wouldn’t force you to marry, but it would be nice to see my only daughter attired in crimson and ermine—like Consuelo Vanderbilt in her coronation robe.”

              “Mother would prefer I marry an American and remain in New York, wouldn’t you?”

Her mother looked to speak, but her father plowed on.

              “Nothing against the type, Puss, but there’s no challenge in it! You’re like me: you need to be plunged into a situation where you can use your brain, to stir up the stagnant waters, to fight if need be. That’s how I made my first million.”

             
“Marriage isn’t a
business
, Papa. It’s something involving two people, and that isn’t something you can control with a pen and a piece of paper.” She set her crumpet and marmalade on her plate, her appetite decreasing the more her father spoke.

              “Besides, I hadn’t planned to marry for a long while. I’m only eighteen—I haven’t seen anything or done anything of any purpose.”

             
Her father opened his mouth to speak, but she continued. “When you were eighteen, you left Albany from New York with only five dollars to your name, and managed to obtain a position in the sugar manufacturing company owned by Mother’s father. And don’t tell me I’m just a girl—you’ve always taught me to think outside the confines of my sex.”

             
“Well, I can be a fool sometimes,” He muttered into a cup of hot coffee.

             
The sharp breath she took was painful, as though a thousand knives stabbed at her breast. “Mother—”

             
“Neily, you wouldn’t force her to marry someone she didn’t love,” Her mother said gently.

             
“Of course I wouldn’t, my love, I’m merely suggesting to our daughter that she see this topic from a mature perspective. She has a duke practically fall into her lap, and it behooves her to accept her good fortune.”

             
“Was he hideous, or deformed?” Her father raised his eyebrows again. “Hunchbacked or clubfooted?”

             
“No,” Amanda said honestly.

He was not bad looking. He was handsome she amended. She had noticed his handsomeness even when he lay unconscious on the ground. In motion, he was even more devastating, and her knees weakened like a plate of aspic just thinking about the strong curve of his lips, the curl of his auburn hair at the nape of his neck, the golden freckles scattered across the bridge of his roman nose, and the dark slash of brows over his gray eyes.

              But he was so unsettling and mercurial, and quite difficult to know. He was not at all easy-going like his friend Mr. Challoner. She wasn’t sure she wanted to see him again…but his invitation showed
he
wished to see
her
, which was rather flattering and reawakened her unexpected attraction to him. She supposed she was like her father, as he said—needing a challenge and loving the fight of circumstances and people so different from her pampered and indulgent upbringing.

             
“There!” Her father’s voice broke into her reverie. “The duke is healthy and well formed, and you have not expressed that you find him repellant.”

             
Her father gestured towards the letter with his fork. “Reply in the affirmative, my love.”

             
“Do we have to go too?” Lulu asked plaintively.

             
“Yes, you do,” Her father said forcefully.

             
“Amanda, dear,” Her mother gave her a searching look.

             
“Write in the affirmative, Mother,” Amanda replied thoughtfully. “I should like to see the duke again.”

             
Ursula Malvern lifted her spectacles to her eyes to examine the young person her son had forced her to invite to Bledington. An
American
young person, she winced. Thus far, she took the hard line set by the late Queen in eschewing pushy Americans and their ilk—leave their boisterous millions to the His Majesty’s set. She had issued an invitation to these Vandewaters, but only to her annual garden party, the most informal and least intimate of entertainments. She did not have to actually invite them into her home. The gel was pretty enough, in a blonde, outdoorsy fashion—a little too tall for her taste, for she fairly towered over many of the gentlemen present—and her white costume was smart, but not too smart to show off that she, unlike most ladies in attendance, could afford to replenish her wardrobe in Paris.

             
She then scanned the lawn of the South Front of Bledington Park where the young people—Miss Vandewater and her loud brothers, Malvern, his friend Anthony Challoner, the Charteris children from Stanway, and a number of others—played a vigorous game of croquet, and lowered the lorgnette when she finally spied Viola in the crowd. Her companion made her way slowly through the guests milling about the lawn, pausing at intervals to glance at the croquet players, and Ursula raised a brow at Viola when the gel finally reached her side.

             
“Your parasol, Your Grace,” Viola bobbed a slight curtsey, opened the plain ivory parasol, and held it over Ursula’s head.

             
“My goodness, Viola, did you manage to lose your way between my bedroom and the lawn?” Ursula took the parasol and tilted it over her head, taking care for the upswept brim of her straw hat, and handed the dozing spaniel to her companion.

             
“No, Your Grace,” Viola said dully, cradling Button in her arms.

             
Ursula huffed quietly in exasperation. She never could get a rise of the gel; perhaps if she prodded her companion with the blunt tip of her parasol…She followed Viola’s line of vision directly to the American, who had paired with Squire Challoner’s wild son around a bridge, and frowned. She might not be entirely convinced of the gel’s suitability as the next Duchess of Malvern, but it wouldn’t do for the too handsome and too reckless Anthony Challoner to steal the heiress from beneath Malvern’s nose. She narrowed her eyes and cast a sidelong glance at Viola, whose fidgeting fingers woke Button, who promptly yelped and began wiggling.

             
“You are dismissed, Viola. Go play with the young people.”

             
“Your Grace!” Viola’s eyes widened as she struggled to hold the small dog. “You are much too kind.”

             
“I am nothing of the kind. One hour.” Ursula raised one finger to emphasize that one hour. “And hand me that dog.”

             
“Yes, Your Grace,” Her companion obeyed, curtseying once more, and backed away a few steps, before turning to hasten towards the game.

             
Ursula watched the young people for a moment, noticing Viola went directly for Malvern, who in turn looked over her companion’s head to visibly seek her out amongst the crowd. Ursula dipped her parasol in acknowledgement of his regard, and then smiled when her son immediately maneuvered Viola towards Challoner and the American, smoothly switching partners. They were of like mind, almost moving as one in his capacity as Duke of Malvern, and she almost regretted the breaking up of their delightful
à deux
for the necessity of his marrying to continue to line. Almost, was the key word, for she was greatly relieved that Auberon was now the duke instead of Alexander.

             
She felt a small pang of guilt and sorrow for the loss of her eldest son, but truth be told, she did not know him very well, since the rearing of the Marquess of Rodborough was the province of his father, leaving the younger children to her. Nevertheless, Providence worked things out in its own way, and now the rightful duke wore the strawberry leaves.

             
As Ursula strolled across the lawn with Button tucked in the crook of her arm, she  nodded graciously to guests seated in garden chairs and seats facing the game, and to those lounging beneath the tents erected by the footmen, in both a show of might and of confidence. She was well aware of the whispers that stopped when she approached, and of the pointed stares and sly innuendo from those ladies of equal enough rank to couch their nose for scandal in blandishments.

             
They were there to see if the Townsend family had toppled, if the Duchess of Malvern had fallen from her lofty height, if Bledington—she winced—was tumbling down about their ears. Not during her reign and not during her son’s if she could help it.                             Ursula paused to confer with Fowler, who was uneasy about the amount of punch Mrs. Alcock was sending up for the guests, and as she continued on after instructing her butler to hold the drinks back until the bowls had been emptied, she realized someone was calling after her. She turned to see Mrs. Sewell, the schoolmaster’s wife waving her handkerchief in greeting. Ursula waited patiently for the woman to reach her side, for this was her duty to the people in her parish, and hoped the meddlesome woman would not press for more than a brief exchange of pleasantries.