Forever and a Duke Read online

  * * *

  Friday arrived on schedule, though Ellie awoke slightly groggy for having had two glasses of wine the night before.

  “And good claret it was,” she muttered to the cat. “I saved you some scraps of beef too.”

  Voltaire had liked the duke. She watched Lord Stephen from the safety of her windowsill on the rare occasions when he happened by, and most other visitors sent her scurrying under the sofa.

  “Don’t get attached to Elsmore,” Ellie said, putting the scraps on a piece of paper for the cat. “We will determine where the ducal vessel is leaking, and he’ll be on his way, married to a suitable parti.”

  She allowed herself a pot of tea to go with her jam and buttered bread, and settled in for a morning of absolute bliss among the ledgers. Drawing conclusions from too little information was a good way to miss important patterns, and Elsmore’s books were a puzzle in any case.

  A messy puzzle. After pleasant hours with the ledgers, Ellie pondered that conundrum as she walked to the Wentworth town house. She was still pre-occupied when Jane, Duchess of Walden, swept into the room, a big, black hound at her side.

  “Your Grace.” Ellie curtseyed, stifling the impulse to curtsey to the dog as well. Big dogs with big teeth should make anybody respectful, though the duchess’s pet was always beautifully behaved.

  “Eleanora.” The duchess wrapped her in a hug. Her Grace was taller than Ellie, and quite self-possessed, but she also had a bewilderingly maternal quality. “I so look forward to your weekly calls. Starting next Friday, I will send my coach for you. The weather grows too chilly, and you have better things to do with your time than hike across London.”

  “I like hiking across London.” When Jack kept his distance. “I spend too much time hunched over figures and account books. Fresh air keeps me sane.”

  “Many a mother has said the same thing. I am convinced that Mayfair’s proximity to Hyde Park is more than half its attraction for those who can afford the surrounds. Are we having tea or chocolate today?”

  Ellie had never had chocolate until the duchess had served it one frigid afternoon nearly a year ago. “Chocolate would be lovely, Your Grace.”

  When the tray arrived, and they were assured of privacy, Her Grace switched to French. Simple phrases that were easily mimed: Would you like more chocolate? Please and thank you. Today is cold, don’t you agree? Wodin is a fine dog. Yes, he is very fine. In return, Ellie explained the financial instruments and transactions that Quinn Wentworth gloried in with the natural affinity of a lamb at spring grass.

  When the small talk had been thoroughly reviewed, Ellie tried a question she could not ask anybody else.

  “Pourquoi les ducs sont-ils si compliqués?” Her syntax was questionable—Ellie still wasn’t quite sure what syntax was—but the duchess smiled.

  “Why are dukes so complicated? Is it the duke who’s complicated, Eleanora, or the dukedom—le duché? My Quinn is not complicated at all. He thrives on hard work, expects honesty and fair dealing from all who do business with him, and he’d die to protect those he loves.”

  “Did His Grace of Walden tell you…?”

  “That your services are on temporary loan to a peer with a delicate problem. Yes, he’s told me, and believe me, Walden does not like having the bank’s arbiter of accuracy off the premises. Tell me about your complicated duke.”

  British dukes numbered less than three dozen, and Her Grace doubtless had a good idea who among them had claimed Ellie’s time.

  And her interest. He’d also claimed a brief, maddeningly chaste kiss.

  “His Grace’s holdings are spread out all over Britain,” Ellie said, “and even on the Continent. He has more than twice the properties His Grace of Walden owns, and his family sprawls like topsy over the lot of it. He has aunts in dower cottages, widowed cousins living on quiet lanes in Chelsea, other cousins among the employees of the various enterprises he owns or oversees…I knew there were people with such wealth, but I’d never met one.”

  Had carefully avoided making their acquaintance, in fact.

  “How is your duke’s wealth different from what you see every day at the bank?” The duchess poured another cup of chocolate, and as good as the first cup was, Ellie always preferred the second. The chocolate was so rich as to approach bitterness, and nothing complemented that richness as well as warm, buttery shortbread.

  “He’s not my duke.”

  The duchess made an elegant picture with her delicate china, engraved silver, and expensive attire, but the look she gave Ellie over the tray was plain enough to decipher.

  “You have speculated, Eleanora. We all start off by speculating. It’s harmless, though I don’t advise anything more than speculation where handsome, hot-headed, half-pay officers are concerned.”

  Her Grace’s first husband had fit that description.

  “The duke in question is simply a variety of ledger book I haven’t come across before. He’s more complicated, more complex. His Grace of Walden belongs with you. If he sold off his shares in the bank, donated all of his properties to charity, and set up shop as a blacksmith, he would still be every bit as much yours as he is now. With this other duke…”

  The duchess sat back, stroking a hand over the head of the dog sitting by her chair. “A duke is not a favorite reticule, Eleanora, or a new bonnet. He’s a flesh and blood man with hopes and fears and needs the same as any cobbler or yeoman.”

  Eleanora could speak the language of numbers at a great rate, but expressing unfamiliar sentiments took significant thought.

  “I meant he belonged with you, like the rich chocolate goes with the marvelous shortbread. Like a good claret and perfectly cooked beef. Why are my analogies all about food? I meant that you and Walden belong with each other—forever, not simply for as long as he’s the duke of this or that. I did not mean that you own each other.”

  The duchess studied Ellie over the rim of a fine porcelain teacup, looking at her the same way Ellie regarded a ledger kept in a crabbed hand. The numbers might be accurate, or they might be all widdershins. Only careful study and determination would reveal which.

  Ellie tried again. “I cannot see this other, complicated duke ever belonging with anybody the way he belongs with all those estates, accounts, ventures, and cousins. He is titled, but it feels to me as if his estates and relatives and siblings have title to him, not the other way ’round. You and Walden belong with each other, come what may, forever and ever, amen. The rest is mere trappings to you both.”

  “What a burden it must be,” the duchess said, “to have such an observant mind. You cannot help yourself, you take note of everything and everybody around you. You describe my relationship with His Grace better than I could myself.”

  When Elsmore had stood so close to Ellie, the scent of his shaving soap still detectable late in the day, she had noticed little, save utter amazement that he was about to kiss her. She could admit to finding him attractive, but hadn’t entertained the possibility that the attraction might be reciprocated. She’d braced herself for disappointment, for a brief pawing that would reveal Elsmore to be as heedless and self-absorbed as the rest of his gender, and then…

  Soft warmth against her cheek, a moment of closeness, and a quiet click of the door latch as he’d left her in solitude.

  His kiss had been perfect. Respectful, sweet, surprising…

  “You pose an interesting topic,” Her Grace said, sipping her chocolate. “I could never have envisioned myself married to Quinn Wentworth, much less becoming anybody’s duchess, but you are exactly correct: Were he a blacksmith, a pawnbroker, a candlestick maker, I would choose to be his wife, and choose only him to be my husband. Who or what, I wonder, belongs with you, Eleanora?”

  “Ledgers are my lot,” Ellie replied. “We get on well, and I am never bored in the presence of sums and tallies. The benefit of our association is that my expenses are paid and my cat and I eat well and regularly. That is as much perpetual bliss and forever a
fter as one lady needs.”

  “Have some more shortbread,” the duchess said, holding out the plate. “I suspect you are in need of the fortification.”

  “Thank you.” Ellie took two more pieces, because she was, indeed, in need of fortification. Elsmore might kiss her again or he might not. Either way, she’d need to be strong and sensible, and never lose sight of the fact that she could not have forever after.

  She of all women knew better than to pine for a duke, much less both forever and a duke.

  The duchess, as was her habit, walked Ellie to the door, and insisted on sending her home in the ducal coach. The weather was threatening more rain or possibly even sleet, so Ellie accepted.

  “And Eleanora, promise me something,” Her Grace said, re-arranging the drape of Ellie’s plain wool scarf.

  “I will be back next week, you may depend upon it.” Ellie treasured this odd, comfortable association, and suspected Her Grace did too.

  “Of course you will, but beyond that. Soit prudent. Les ducs peuvent être dangereux.”

  The reminder was timely, also wise. “Yes, Your Grace. I know.” Better than most, Ellie well knew that titled men could be dangerous. “I will be very careful. You needn’t worry about me, or about the duke.”

  * * *

  “Your Grace, I feel it only fair to warn you that continued intransigence on your part will serve no purpose other than to aggravate me past all bearing. You will not care for the consequences.”

  Rex leaned over Mrs. Hatfield’s desk, his hands braced on the blotter. “Madam, do you know what the consequences are for aggravating a duke?”

  She tidied a stack of foolscap. “Indeed, I do. An annoyed duke will fume and splutter like a rejected flirt. He assays brooding silences and gimlet-eyed glowers, while all the mice cower and attempt to placate him. That drama goes dull after the third performance.”

  Rex straightened. “Do you mean to tell me that His Grace of Walden carries on like that before bank employees?”

  Next, she took up a penknife and pared a fresh point on her pencils, one by one. “Of course not, but the bank has among its patrons a sprinkling of titled ninnyhammers. Their tantrums exhibit a lamentable sameness.”

  Rex resumed his seat, half amused by her self-possession, half awed by it. “I am not having a tantrum. You postulate that my own sisters are stealing from me. Allow me to be affronted on behalf of all concerned.”

  The quill pens were her next project, each one sharpened with a few deft strokes of the knife. “Not stealing. I did not say stealing. Your sisters look to be engaged in one of the oldest ploys known to womanhood for amassing private funds.”

  Her fingers weren’t ink-stained today, but she had turned back the cuff of her right sleeve, revealing a slender wrist. A tiny smear of ink graced the soft, pale underside of that wrist.

  “And you posit that my siblings learned this scheme from my own mother.” A simple enough plan, as Mrs. Hatfield had explained it: Mark down in the books that pin money was spent on dresses and, indeed, order and have delivered a garment or three from some fashionable establishment, complete with a detailed invoice marked paid in full.

  Return the garment for coin rather than credit. Pocket the coin.

  “I suggested you investigate the possibility,” Mrs. Hatfield said, folding her hands like a dame school headmistress. “Have a look at the invoices and consult your memory to see if any of the dresses described ever graced the persons for whom they were sewn. The modiste your sisters favor is renowned for being very understanding about returned merchandise, and even the Duchess of Walden doesn’t go through dresses at the rate your sisters do.”

  Rex’s head had begun to pound before he’d left the hallowed corridors of Dorset and Becker that afternoon. An argument with his valet over the choice of cravat pin hadn’t helped—Rex did not favor gaudy displays—and now this: allegations of pilfering aimed at the present Duchess of Elsmore and her daughters.

  “I cannot recall what my sisters wore at breakfast much less to the last ball. They have an endless progression of pretty frocks, and it is my pleasure to pay for the lot.”

  Mrs. Hatfield’s gaze bore into him with the thou-art-doomed implacability of a cat beholding a caged canary. “Then have a look at their wardrobes, Your Grace. Trouble yourself to wander into their dressing closets at the odd hour, and seek out the last three dresses for which you have paid. If that is beneath your consequence, have a word with the lady’s maids. They are typically given cast-off clothing to sell, and they know their mistress’s wardrobes quite well.”

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “The notion that I’m to skulk about, spying on my sisters, attributing nefarious schemes to them and to my dear mother is insupportable.”

  Mrs. Hatfield folded her arms. “The notion that you’d rather be stolen from than attempt a discreet inventory of a single wardrobe suggests the problem is your pride rather than family honor.”

  The throbbing at Rex’s temples became an anvil chorus, some of which involved self-recrimination for that pride. “Do you never give quarter? Never show mercy?”

  She smiled. Not a grudging quirk of her lips that masked impatience, but an impish, self-satisfied smirk that lit her eyes with mischief.

  “I am showing mercy, you daft man. I’m starting with the harmless, predictable adjustments women make to maintain some control over their funds. When you can take that medicine without complaint, we’ll move on to more troubling symptoms.”

  Clearly, she wasn’t troubled by sororal pilfering. “This is harmless and predictable? Misrepresenting what funds are used for? Pocketing coin in secret?”

  “The only person from whom the scheme has been kept secret is likely yourself. The modiste can resell the dresses, and the clients returning the merchandise give the same shop their considerable legitimate custom. Think of this as a banking system for the ladies, and nothing you fellows need concern yourselves about.”

  “What use have my sisters for ready coin?”

  The humor faded from her gaze. “The coin is only part of it, for most women. The possession of independent funds, the exercise of ingenuity necessary to amass those funds, the use of relative invisibility not as an insult but as an asset, that’s the heart of the transaction.”

  I cannot recall what my sisters wore to breakfast…

  “Let’s assume the scheme is ongoing,” Rex said. “The sums involved must be modest, and if I arrive to a family meal blind to my own siblings, then they deserve to dip an occasional hand into my pocket in compensation.”

  Mrs. Hatfield rose and went to the sideboard, rummaging in its cupboards. “What or who has given you yet another headache?”

  My family. “How can you tell?”

  “Your eyes. They aren’t…Usually, you look out on the world with a benevolent tolerance. You are annoyed today.” She set out a mug and crushed some dried herb or other into a strainer, then swung the kettle from the fireplace and poured steaming water into the mug.

  She passed him the brew.

  “What is this?”

  “Peppermint with a dash of feverfew. You have to hold the cup in your hands while it steeps if the remedy is to be most effective.”

  Rex complied rather than earn yet another scold. The warmth comforted, the scent soothed. “I had a meeting at the bank today.”

  Mrs. Hatfield closed the account book on the blotter. “Banks and meetings, meetings and banks. I loathe meetings. While everybody is gathered around listening to their superiors bleat about some procedure they’ve concocted without consulting the underlings, nobody is doing the work that keeps the bank in business. Better to send around a decree—the managers and partners do as they jolly well please most of the time anyway—and leave the clerks to their labors.”

  Well, yes. Rex had made the same point more than once. “An account was closed last week amid some irregularity.”

  She took the seat beside him rather than resume her place at the helm of the HMS Accurate
Ledgers. “I was afraid of that.”

  Not good, when Mrs. Eleanora Hatfield predicted trouble. “Tell me the rest of it, madam.”

  “If your personal books are vulnerable, then it stands to reason that your commercial establishments will also be victimized. In all likelihood, schemes set up several dukes ago are still bearing fruit, and as each generation of factors and stewards sees what the one before got away with, they add a new layer of inventiveness to the means by which your dukedom is robbed.”

  She emptied the pen tray of its contents and used it as a saucer for the strainer. “Have a taste.”

  “It’s too hot.”

  “It’s meant to be hot.”

  Rex liked arguing with her. That realization dropped into his mind amid the miseries of the day with the unexpected beauty of a late-blooming rose dusted with the first snow of the season. He tried a sip of the drink, which was both calming and refreshing.

  “Dorset and Becker does business with many old and respected families,” he said. “That’s another way of admitting that some of our customers are a bit eccentric.”

  “Go on.”

  “Mr. Purcell Butterfield is elderly, reclusive, and very particular about his accounts. His transactions are usually handled by mail. He used to send us banknotes torn in half. One half delivered one week, the other the following week, the better to reduce the chances of a mishap with the mails.”

  “Many a poor family does likewise when resorting to the post. Drink your tisane.”

  Rex also liked when Mrs. Hatfield fussed at him in the usual female manner. “Mr. Butterfield came into the bank last week and closed one of his accounts in person.” Rex would have set the mug on the desk, but Mrs. Hatfield passed it back to him.

  “You have to hold the mug. My grandmother claims something about the heat in your hands helps with the headache. The person who closed the account wasn’t Mr. Butterfield. You learned that when the real Mr. Butterfield came into the bank today intent on closing the same account.”