Devotion (40 page)

"Against nature to be controlled, Miss Ashton?
I think not.
At least, not when a five-hundred-year-old ancestry depends on it.
Aside from the monarchy itself, there is not another branch of the aristocracy that is more dependent upon its reputation, and the passing on of its heritage.

"But all of this rambling is neither here nor there. I didn't bring you here this morning to prattle on about our personal affairs. After much consideration, Miss Ashton, I feel it necessary to relieve you of your duties.

I'll make arrangements immediately to return you to
Huddersfield
."

Gripping the bedpost with one hand, Salterdon shifted his weight from one leg to the other, gritting his teeth against the discomfort that sliced like knives up the backs of his thighs. His body broke out in a sweat. His breathing caught as knots formed in the muscles just below his buttocks and burned like hot pokers all the way up his spine. He had managed so far to walk around the bed, holding fast to the posts and mattress. The temptation to fling himself onto the bed, to stop the excruciating pain, made him curse aloud. Instead, with his body sweating, he managed to turn, to focus on the distant, despicable and loathed chair in which he had spent the last grueling year of his life, and start back the way he had come.

The door flung open behind him.

He looked around, anticipating Maria—she would scold him, of course, for clambering out of that deviled steel contraption without her, then she would flit around like a fairy in enthusiasm over his accomplishment.

"Yer Grace!" cried Gertrude, and suddenly the rotund little housekeeper was beside him, her face flushed, her eyes wide as two farthings. "I know it ain't none of me own business, Yer Grace. I'm just a servant 'ere and wot goes on '.round me I'm to see and hear blind and deaf as a
bleedin
' poker, but I just come from the blue room, yer grace, where the duchess had called a
meetin
' with our Maria . . ."

The servant paused to take a much needed breath and as she continued to stare at Salterdon, the look of angst on her features dissolved into stunned amazement.

"Bloody hell," she muttered.
"Yer
walkin
'."

"Never mind that," he snapped, biting back the discomfort gnawing at his lower body. "What the devil is my grandmother up to?"

"She's gone and dismissed our Maria," Gertrude replied, still in shock over finding Salterdon afoot.

"The hell you say. Get me that goddamn chair, woman, and be quick about it."

The duchess waxed on about appreciation, about continuing all financial support until Maria had located another position. She would, of course, supply Maria with a letter of recommendation, assuring Maria that there would not be a door in England that would not be open to her now that she had succeeded so smashingly at Thorn Rose.

She would send a note immediately to Maria's parents, informing them that she would be returning to their home within the week. She would also send a short message to John
Rees . . .
as she was certain Maria would now reconsider the young man's offer of marriage.

"He'll make you a most appropriate companion, my dear, being that he's of the same class. God should look favorably on such a match of . . . equals.

"You must understand, my
dear, that
my reasons for employing you were to bring about some form of reformation to my grandson. Now that you have more than adequately achieved that,
Edgcumbe
and I believe the need for a companion is unnecessary and would prove to be a waste of your valuable time."

A door opened.

The duchess looked around. Her features became masked.

The sound of Salterdon's voice made Maria's knees slightly buckle. She grabbed the back of a chair for support but she refused to turn her face toward his. Her disconsolateness was too raw. She would reveal her emotions for what they were.

"Obviously someone forgot to inform me a meeting had been arranged," came his deep, deceptively calm voice as he moved his chair into the room.

"I thought it best not to disturb you,"
Edgcumbe
supplied with a slight bow and a smile that quickly faded as Salterdon pinned him with a look.

"I wasn't aware that my actions were being dictated by a mere
physician . . .
or have I already been exiled to Royal Oaks?"

"Hardly," snapped the duchess.

He looked toward Maria. Still she refused to acknowledge him, but stared straight ahead, willing
a strength
to her legs that was fast diminishing the longer he regarded her.

At last, he spoke. "Rumor is you've decided that Miss Ashton's services are no longer needed. I should think I would be included in such a decision."

"I simply felt that due to your vast mental and emotional improvement you're perfectly capable of residing on your own. Besides, you've never been one to care a great deal to participate actively in business resolutions, choosing instead to allow me to make whatever decision I thought best for your welfare and the future of our family. I think it best if Miss Ashton
leave
Thorn Rose."

With that, the duchess turned stiffly toward Maria and with a dismissive nod, said, "That will be all, my dear. I'll have my secretary draw up the necessary papers this afternoon."

How long she stood there, staring into the duchess's gray eyes, she could not fathom. What was she waiting for?
Some miracle change of heart on the dowager's behalf?
Perhaps to be informed that this sudden befuddling "business decision" was nothing more than a jest?

Or, God forbid, that she fling herself on her knees before the duchess and plead for her to reconsider—to explain what had brought on this sudden turn of events—beg the duchess not to send her away because the idea of never seeing her grandson again would prove to be more than she could bear.

Why did he not speak up? Say something? Do something?

Had she been so horribly naive that she had misread his feelings toward her? Mayhap the fondness in his eyes and smile had been some ruse to simply seduce her.

Somehow, Maria forced herself to curtsy, to wood-
enly
turn toward the door, refusing to allow herself to look down at Salterdon.

He grabbed her arm.

She closed her eyes.

"No," he said.

"I beg your pardon?" replied the duchess.

"Miss Ashton will remain at Thorn Rose . . . until I see fit to dismiss
her . . .
As head of this family, I make the decisions on who we will employ, and when."

"As head of this family—?"
Her tone mocked him.

"My birthright, grandmother . . . as you've reminded me for the last twenty-five years of my life." To Maria, he said, "Sit down, be quiet, and wait. There." He motioned toward a chair on the far side of the room.

"
Your
Grace," she whispered urgently. "I would not be the cause of a breach between you."

"Sit down," he stated more firmly, never taking his gaze from the duchess.

Maria crossed to the chair and sat, her fists buried within the worn folds of her skirt. She wondered if it were her past illness that made her
feel
as if she might faint.

Having taken her chair, the duchess regarded Salterdon with a fixed intensity, a flush of emotion on her normally pale cheeks, her frail, bejeweled fingers gripping the chair arms fiercely. It occurred to Maria in that instant that while the duchess, until her death, controlled the majority of the family wealth, Salterdon was in the position of authority. The sudden clash of wills resounded in the air between
thern
.

Voice tight, lips thinned, the duchess finally said, "While I'm accustomed to butting heads with Clayton, I'm not inured to confrontations with Your Grace. Forgive me if I seem . . . taken aback. Obviously, I underestimated your dependency on Miss Ashton."

"Obviously."

Another silence ensued, making the stillness in the room almost palpable.

At last, the duchess took a deep breath, drummed her fingers on the chair arms and set her chin. "In light of this determination on your part,
Í
will ask Your Grace if we might have privacy to discuss a rather important family matter."

"As Miss Ashton has accompanied me during some of my most private moments, I can't imagine what you could say that she won't, eventually, be subject to."

"Perhaps you're right." Raising one eyebrow, a smile drawing up one side of her mouth, her expression one of sudden excessive satisfaction, she said, "Of course you're right. As long as Miss Ashton remains at Thorn Rose, we might as well make the most of her abilities.

"The realization occurred to me last evening that because of your emotional and mental improvement and as portrayed by your behavior
today, that
you, as head of this family, will desire to give some thought to your responsibility to Lady
Dunsworthy
."

Lady
Dunsworthy
.

Maria fixed her gaze on a portrait of a boy and hound on the distant wall. Her body turned unbearably warm.

How had she forgotten Lady
Dunsworthy
?

The duchess said, "In case you were unaware, Miss Ashton, at the time of my grandson's mishap he was just one week from marrying Lady Laura
Dunsworthy
, a young woman of his peerage of whom
I
much approved. At the time of their joining
I
had intended to reward him with half of his inheritance—enough to see
him fixed for the remainder of his life. Another quarter would be awarded him upon the birth of his first son.

"Certainly, after the tragic occurrence, all plans were put on hold. For the last year the young lady has patiently and devotedly waited for his improvement, at which time she fully intends to honor the vow she took to marry His Grace. She's quite beautiful.
And bright.
She'll eventually mature into a more than satisfactory duchess. As I recall . . . His Grace was most fond of her."

Focusing on her grandson again, she added, "I'm certain that His Grace will approve of my writing to Lord
Dunsworthy
informing him of Salterdon's vast improvement." Reaching for an envelope on a side table, she turned it over in her hand and said, "They'll be arriving day after tomorrow."

Maria locked her doors. She took to her bed. Throughout the remaining hours of the day, she stared up at St. Peter's image and considered this black turn of events was God's retribution for so vainly believing that she somehow fit into the duke's life as something other than a mere domestic.

Occasionally, someone came to her door and lightly knocked.

Long after dark, she quit the room, slipped through the deep shadows of the corridor and left the house.

The night was starless and cold. A wet drizzle crept into the folds of her thin cloak and clothes, making her flesh shiver and her bones ache. She fled to the stables. The horses were bedded down for the night. The grooms had long since turned in to their cots. For a long while Maria sat on the edge of an overturned crate, hugging herself, feeling her toes go numb with cold while around her the horses shuffled in their straw and occasionally let out a long, contented sigh.

She would leave Thorn Rose, of course. Life with her father would be preferable than spending these next weeks helping Salterdon prepare for his wedding to Lady
Dunsworthy
. The duchess's directives had been explicit: