An Unlikely Duchess (28 page)

“I came across them at Lord Parleigh’s—Deerview Park, that is—a few days ago,” the duke said. “The three of them were pursuing a Mr. Porterhouse, who had stolen Miss Middleton’s jewels, it seems.”

“Deerview Park? Jewels?” The earl was frowning.

“And Jo was with Bartholomew and Susanna?” the viscount said, his face brightening considerably. “She was not with Porterhouse?”

“Absolutely not,” the duke said, a hand straying to his quizzing glass. “That would have been most improper, I believe.”

“And they are on the way back?” The earl’s frown deepened. He looked somewhat blankly at Mitford.

And the duke remembered why it is always so unwise to tell lies. What on earth was he doing at Deerview Park when he was supposed to be at Rutland Park making an offer to one Miss Josephine Middleton? He clasped his hands behind him and rocked on his heels.

“Actually,” he said, “I heard about the stolen jewels and the pursuit when I stopped at the Crown and Anchor Inn on my way to Rutland Park.” He bowed to both gentlemen. “I joined the pursuit in the hope of being of some assistance. Miss Middleton has recovered her jewels, and no harm has come to her, I do assure you.”

Oh, Lord, he was going to find himself in very deep and very hot water if Josephine decided to tell the full truth and his double identity became known to the two flushed and bewildered looking gentlemen who were gazing at him, their breakfasts growing cold on their plates.

Not to mention the hot water he was going to be in when Josephine saw him again.

“This is a rather public setting,” he said, “and I am sure you will want to be on your way as soon as possible to assure yourselves that what I have told you is true. My lord.” He addressed himself to the viscount. “If I may, I will present myself at Rutland Park next week to speak to you about your daughter and to make my offer to her if I meet with your approval.”

He was alone with his cool coffee again ten minutes later, after a great deal of hearty laughter and hand-pumping and a great many assurances that there must be a good explanation indeed for Jo’s chasing about the countryside with her brother and sister. Jo was, apparently, a quiet and a dutiful girl under normal circumstances. Mitford had sent them on their way with a description of Burgess’s carriage, in which the Middletons were traveling.

Quiet? Josephine?

Dutiful? Josephine?

A waiter looked uneasily at the lone gentleman in the dining room, chuckling aloud to himself though there was no one else except the waiter within thirty feet of him. He decided after all not to approach the gentleman with fresh hot coffee.

Not that the Duke of Milford laughed for very long. Oh, Lord, he was in for trouble. Adventures were certainly not comfortable affairs.

***

Her grandfather’s description of her as a quiet girl certainly seemed to hold true for Josephine that morning. She sat next to Susanna in the carriage, one hand holding to the strep, and seemed totally oblivious to the conversation flowing about her.

Bartholomew looked at her a little uneasily from time to time but refused to relent. She had deserved every second of every minute of the tongue-lashing he had given her that morning. In fact, he felt rather pleased with himself. He was not sure he would have believed anyone who had told him he could rage with marvelous eloquence for twenty minutes, without pausing except for the occasional necessary breath.

Josephine had watched him the whole time with raised chin and uncharacteristically still tongue. Sukey had dissolved into tears after the first half-minute.

And Susanna watched Jo sorrowfully and ached to take her hand and tell her that all would be well. But Bart might begin scolding again if she did. And besides, there was a stranger in the carriage with them. A stranger who could make her heart flutter and her breath quicken, it was true, and who had proved to be a very kind gentleman indeed. But nevertheless, a stranger.

Besides, she had her queasy stomach to contend with.

Josephine did not notice any of the three of them. She would never see him again, and that was the only thought that had any reality to her that morning. He had had to leave in a great hurry before she had been able to fully steel herself to his leaving. And this morning she was feeling bereft, a great emptiness somewhere deep inside her.

And so she sat quietly. And remembered the hot embrace of the night before, and knew that she would never see him again, let alone touch him like that.

She wished they had not come to their senses so soon, she thought rebelliously. She wished there were more to remember. She wished they had made love. And she was not going to blush or feel guilty at the thought, either.

“Strange that both the Duke of Mitford and Villiers had disappeared by this morning,” Bartholomew said with a frown.

“Ah, yes,” Sir Thomas said.

“I would have liked to have a word with Villiers,” Bartholomew said testily.

“Yes,” Sir Thomas said. “But it was good of him to bring Miss Middleton so quickly in pursuit of Miss Susanna.”

Bartholomew said no more.

“Papa!” Susanna cried suddenly, craning her head to see out of the window. “That was Papa’s carriage.”

Bartholomew turned sharply to the window and was soon pounding on the front panel for Sam to stop.

Josephine swallowed and closed her eyes briefly.

“Come on, little lady,” Sam said a moment later, throwing open the carnage door and reaching inside to lift Susanna to the roadway.

But he looked around in some surprise as another carriage—one that had been tooling along in the opposite direction—made a sharp turn in the road and pulled up behind theirs. And then everyone was spilling out of both carriages, and everyone was talking at once, each fresh voice at a slightly higher volume than the one before. Sam stood and scratched his bald head.

And so amid hugs and laughter and scoldings and threatenings the story they had agreed to that morning was told—all of them standing at the edge of the king’s highway for all the world to observe.

Mr. Porterhouse had been taking Jo to Aunt Winifred’s when he had suddenly seized her jewels and made off without her. Jo had stayed at the Crown and Anchor Inn for the night and been found there the next morning by her brother and sister. The three of them had pursued Mr. Porterhouse, come up with him a few days before at Deerview Park, followed him back along the great North Road, and recovered the jewels just the night before.

“Oh, and Sir Thomas Burgess was at Deerview Park and was kind enough to help us," Bartholomew added, gesturing to the man who was still sitting quietly inside the carriage. He made the introductions.

“So, all is well, you see," Susanna said, an identical smile on her face to the ones on Josephine’s and Bartholomew’s.

“But what about the Duke of Mitford?" the earl asked, frowning.

The identical smiles all persisted for the moment. None of their owners recognized the cue. What about the Duke of Mitford?

“He was at Deerview Park, too,” Sir Thomas said, climbing down to the road and looking casually about him. “He is a friend of mine. He had come out of concern for Miss Middleton, I believe. He left before us.”

“Yes,” three voices said. And all resumed their smiles.

Sam was seated at the roadside, sucking on a blade of grass and watching the world go by long before his charges and the other two gentlemen decided to divide into two groups again and resume their journey south.

Josephine was taken into her father’s carriage and was subjected to a far lengthier and even more eloquent scolding than the one she had received from Bart earlier.

Which seemed somewhat unfair when one considered the fact that they knew far less than half of what Bart knew.

But by far the worst of it all—ten thousand times worse than all; the scoldings doubled and then tripled—was the news that the Duke of Mitford had met Papa and Grandpapa on the road and had announced his intention of calling upon her the following week.

Paul. Oh, Paul.

She would have cried, except that she never cried.

Chapter 17

“Jo?” Augusta stood in the middle of the schoolroom, looking hopefully at her sister’s back.

“No, not today, Gussie. I am not in the mood.” Josephine continued to stare listlessly from the window. “Besides, you know we are expecting visitors.”

Bartholomew, who was sitting in his favorite chair reading a book, looked up and stopped swinging the leg that was dangling over one of the arms. “And you know that Papa has promised a walloping if Jo is not here when they arrive,” he said. “And if Papa should happen not to keep that promise, Jo, I will positively keep it for him.”

“Stuff and nonsense,” Josephine said without looking around, but with something of her old spirit. “I would push your front teeth down your throat if you tried, Bart.”

Her brother chuckled and returned his attention to his book.

“Sukey?” Augusta asked, the hope still in her voice.

Susanna was sitting staring from another window, her chin in her hand. She did not look around, either. “No, Gussie,” she said. “I have the headache.”

“Again?” Augusta wailed. “You had the headache yesterday, Sukey.”

“Oh, come along, then,” Penelope said, putting down her embroidery with some impatience. “I will come walking with you, Gussie. You can be such a pest.”

Bartholomew put down his book. “I’ll come, too, Gussie,” he said, getting to his feet and pulling affectionately at one of his youngest sister’s braids. “I need to have the cobwebs blown away. And I do not have to stay to make polite conversation with Lord Ainsbury and the Countess of Newman.” He looked for the expected sharp retort from his eldest sister, but merely shrugged when she said nothing.

“Oh, will you, Bart?” Augusta brightened visibly. “And you will not scold every step of the way as Penny always does, will you?”

Bartholomew grinned and winked over her head at Penelope, who looked as if she were about to explode with wrath. “I shall walk between the two of you,” he said, “one on each arm, and if you are to come to blows it will have to be through my body. Come along, then. Perhaps we will be able to find out what Jo and Sukey are finding so fascinating through the windows.”

There was a lengthy silence after they left.

“Why does he still want to marry me, do you suppose?” Josephine asked eventually, though it was not clear whether she spoke to her sister or to the beech tree that she stared at.

“He thought you were nursing Aunt Winifred last time,” Susanna said. “He probably admires you, Jo.”

“But he followed me almost every step of the way,” Josephine said. “Did he not realize it? Was it really just coincidence? Sir Thomas Burgess and Papa said he followed me.”

“He must not have taken a disgust of you, anyway, Jo, if he made arrangements with Papa to come here again,” Susanna said.

Josephine sighed. “And to send his mother and his grandfather on ahead of him,” she said. “Oh, I hate him, Sukey. But I cannot refuse him, can I?”

Susanna echoed the sigh. “You could say no, I suppose,” she said.

“What?” Josephine finally withdrew her attention from the scene beyond the window to look at her sister. “After I disgraced myself so the last time? And after all of Bart’s scoldings and Papa’s fumings and Grandpapa’s lecturings? And your tears? No, I cannot refuse, Sukey. I can only be grateful, I suppose, that someone is still willing to marry me.”

Susanna sighed again. “He did say he would ask Papa if he could call on me here,” she said. “But he won’t, will he, Jo? Once he returns to London and sees all the grand ladies there, he will forget all about me. Won’t he?”

Josephine frowned. “Are you talking about Sir Thomas Burgess?” she asked. “He was kind enough to bring Bart in search of you. And he did kiss your hand at the inn the morning after you were found. And sat across from you all day in the carriage until we came up with Papa. And lifted you down the twice you were forced to stop. He is a handsome gentleman. Do you like him, Sukey?”

“He asked me if he could call,” her sister said. “And when I said yes, he said that he would ask Papa. But I daresay he did not. He was just being gallant.”

“That would not be gallant,” Josephine said, “to raise a girl’s hopes only to dash them again. If he said he would come, then I think he will.”

“Do you really think so?” Susanna said with anxious hope in her eyes.

Josephine sighed and returned her gaze to the window again. “Oh, Sukey, I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know anything anymore. Except that the Duke of Mitford’s mother is coming here today and he is coming tomorrow. I wish I were dead.”

“But perhaps he will not be too bad,” Susanna said. “When I met him at Deerview Park, he seemed quite a proper gentleman, Jo, if a little stiff in his manner. But I daresay it is not always easy to be a duke.”

“I wonder where he is now,” Josephine said, her eyes glazed.

“I daresay he is on his way here,” Susanna said. And then she looked more closely at her sister. “Oh, you don’t mean his grace, do you? You mean Mr. Villiers.”

Josephine said nothing.

“Do you love him, Jo?” Susanna asked. And after a silent pause. “Oh, poor Jo, you love him.”

Josephine said nothing.

“Oh, Jo, is it not dreadful?” Susanna said.

Josephine drew a deep breath. “Perhaps we should run away, Sukey,” she said. “Do you think we should?”

“Oh, Jo,” Susanna looked at her sister with gentle reproach. “We cannot. Where would we go? To Aunt Winifred’s?”

Josephine laughed. “There is not much point, is there?” she said. “We cannot possibly go and find them. It would be most unladylike. And what if they did not want us when we had done so? Think of the humiliation, Sukey.”

They sighed simultaneously, caught each other’s eye, and giggled.

“Can you imagine their faces, Sukey?”

“We have come, sirs, ” Susanna said dramatically, spreading her arms and batting her eyelids.

They snorted with mirth.

***

“Do you think she will be glad to see me, Paul? She is very young and has had no chance at all to look about her yet.”