Least Likely To Marry A Duke. Louise Allen

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      ‘That you love them? That is obvious.’ And, surprisingly, she realised it was true. ‘That they know it I can tell from the way they respond to you. They do not sulk or send you unpleasant looks when your back is turned. Are the younger three as intelligent as these?’

      ‘They are bright,’ he agreed, as though reassuring himself. ‘And, yes, the others are as intelligent. They all were,’ the Duke added, his voice so soft that she thought he was speaking to himself.

      Verity guessed she had not been intended to hear those last three words, but she answered the pain in his voice anyway. ‘There were others?’

      ‘Just one. My eldest half-sister, Arabella. She would be seventeen this year. She died just before my grandfather took me to live with him.’

      ‘An illness?’ He had fallen silent. Verity suspected he wanted to talk, but was simply unused to speaking to anyone about such an emotional subject. Or perhaps did not think such revelations proper.

      ‘It was a virulent fever. It is not something that we speak of in case it distresses the children.’

      You cannot admit that it distresses you, of course.

      ‘You may be assured that I do not repeat confidences, Your Grace,’ she said as she got to her feet. ‘Perhaps we should be making our way back.’

      ‘Indeed. We should return to the sunshine or you will become chilled,’ he said as they began to wind their way back to the entrance.

      The Duke seemed happier reverting to his starched-up self, she thought. A pity—she had almost liked the man who had confessed to his anxieties over his siblings, had allowed a little humour to touch him.

      ‘Is the Bishop fit enough to travel a short distance?’ he asked as they emerged into the sunshine and Verity waved across the garden to where her father sat with Mr Hoskins. ‘Might I hope he will be able to return my call? I would be pleased to entertain him at Stane Hall.’

      ‘On a good day, certainly. He usually drives to church every Sunday and the Hall is only a short distance beyond that. His health is not entirely predictable, however. I would not want to commit him to any specific day long in advance.’

      ‘You must be congratulated on your daughterly devotion in keeping house for your father. His indisposition, coming as it did, I believe, at a time when you must have been making your come-out, would have been most difficult for you.’

      Verity opened her mouth and closed it again with a snap. Dukes, presumably, thought themselves as entitled as archbishops to make pompous personal observations. A lack of response, she hoped, would choke him off.

      ‘It is an uplifting example of daughterly duty and devotion to see you sacrificing your own hopes of marriage in this way,’ he continued, finally finding something about her he approved of, it seemed.

      Apparently silence was not a strong enough hint. ‘I had no particular hopes, as you put it, at the time of my father’s seizure and I am most certainly not sacrificing anything.’ By the time her father had suffered his stroke her heart had been broken, her hopes betrayed. ‘So many women are yoked in marriage and lose all their freedoms by it. I fully intend to retain mine, Your Grace.’ Her head told her that marriage was too great a gamble and she had proved to herself that her judgement of men was so faulty that she could not trust her heart.

      ‘Do I understand that you do not approve of marriage?’ The Duke’s tone now was as frosty as she had made hers.

      ‘It seems to me an excellent way of perpetuating the human race in an orderly manner. It provides for the civilised upbringing of children and shelters the elderly. It certainly contributes greatly to the comfort of men. It is unfortunate that all of this is so often achieved by the sacrifices of the woman concerned.’

      ‘Sacrifices? A lady is protected and maintained by marriage. Her status is usually enhanced.’

      ‘And in return a woman loses all freedom, all control of her own money and lands, all autonomy. She becomes utterly subject to the wishes and whims of her husband. I love my father, and will always care for him, but beyond that, I live my life as an independent woman, Your Grace.’

      ‘None of us is independent, Miss Wingate. Freedom is an illusion. Ladies are restricted by their natural delicacy, gentlemen by their duties and obligations.’

      ‘Some of us have more freedom than others, it is true,’ she said.

      Natural delicacy, my hat! The temptation to say something very indelicate indeed was great, but she controlled it.

      ‘A duke has a great deal, a married woman very little. I have the privilege of birth and prosperity and I am fully aware that if I were the daughter of an agricultural labourer or a weaver as disabled as my father is now, my life would hold very little freedom. My delicacy, as you put it, would have to be disregarded. I am fortunate and I do not intend to throw away that good fortune simply because social pressure dictates that I should be married.’

      The words, And who would be foolish enough to ask you, with that attitude? were almost audible, she thought.

      The Duke closed his lips on them. That clearly caused him a struggle because it was a moment before he spoke. ‘I trust that you find the freedoms are worth the sacrifice, Miss Wingate. I see that the children have extricated themselves from the maze. I must bid the Bishop good day and remove them before they disturb his peace any further. Thank you for a most delightful afternoon.’

      Liar, Verity thought, as she walked with him towards her father’s seat. He thoroughly disapproves of me and he is clearly regretting those indiscreet confidences in the maze. He never intended to make them so he will like me the less for that.

      She kept a smile on her lips as she showed the party out, but it took several minutes pacing up and down the hallway before she could recover it sufficiently to go out to her father. It was a shock to find herself so upset at the unspoken disapproval. She did not like the man, so why should it matter what he thought of her?

      ‘What did you think of our new neighbour, Papa?’ She exchanged a quick glance with the Chaplain over the Bishop’s head and he nodded encouragingly. Her father was not overtired, it seemed.

      ‘A fine figure of a man,’ Mr Hoskins translated as her father’s hands moved. ‘A considerable asset to the neighbourhood. He has suffered two bereavements in a short time and finds himself with many responsibilities in addition to acquiring the care of six younger siblings. I feel confident that he will rise to the challenge.’

      Her father nodded and mouthed, Most impressed.

      ‘And what do you think, Mr Hoskins?’ It was too easy to forget that the man had opinions and a voice of his own and she always tried to bring him into the conversation in his own right.

      ‘His Grace’s reputation does not lie. He seems a perfect paradigm of what a nobleman should be. One cannot envy him the responsibility of so many brothers and sisters as well as having to assume the burden of his great rank at so young an age.’

      ‘He must be twenty-seven and he behaves as though he is fifty-seven,’ she muttered.

      Her father was speaking again. ‘Charming children. Intelligent СКАЧАТЬ