Bertrice Small - The Duchess

"Ohh, miss, I couldn't stay angry with you," Honor said with a reassuring smile. She was more aware than her young mistress knew of what the girl had had to put up with this season. The servants had a gossip mill that never closed. Still, Honor thought, her young lady was the best of them all no matter her breeding. And she'd have no one say otherwise!

The bath was made ready; the footmen hurrying up the back stairs with their buckets of hot water. Honor poured a bit of oil of lilac into the porcelain tub, and then set a painted screen about it so Allegra, who preferred bathing herself, could have some privacy. Then the maid laid out her mistress's petticoats and stockings. Allegra did not like the pink silk tights that were considered the height of fashion. She preferred stockings and garters.

When she had bathed, Allegra sat while Honor brushed her dark hair. Then she put on her stockings, which were held up with small garters sewn round with tiny rosettes; and two silk petticoats. She stood silent as Honor buttoned up her gown, and then sat while the maid dressed her hair into a mass of ringlets which she decorated with a bright green ribbon. Allegra then slipped her feet into balletlike slippers, and helped herself to a pair of coral earrings and a thin strand of coral beads to wear about her neck. She looked at herself in the mirror and smiled.

"I'll get yer parasol," Honor said as Allegra stood up. The clock on the mantle struck three.

Allegra smiled again. "You see, I shall not be late at all. Perhaps I should keep him waiting just to emphasize that I am not at his beck and call." Her violet eyes twinkled mischievously as a knock sounded upon her bedchamber door.

Honor shook a warning finger at her mistress, and hurried to answer the knock. A footman stood on the other side of the door. The two servants murmured, and then turning, Honor said, "His lordship is downstairs. I have said you will be down immediately. Do you want that nice little lace fichu for your shoulders? I know it's June, but there could be a chill in the park. Won't do to have you catching a sniffle now." Not even waiting for her mistress's answer she fetched the delicate shawl, and hurried downstairs after her young lady.

Honor curtsied to the duke, and put the lace fichu about Allegra's shoulders. He nodded slightly. Oh my, the maid thought. He is handsome, but he don't look easy. Miss Allegra is taking on more than she realizes, I think. She watched as the newly engaged pair made their way from the foyer and down the front steps where the duke helped Allegra into a handsome landau, then joined her. As the vehicle drew away Honor considered they would be the richest couple in all of England; their children would have the bluest blood; and they were certainly the handsomest pair of people she had ever seen.

“Your gown is charming," the duke told Allegra as the landau pulled away from the house. "Why do you wear no bonnet?"

Allegra opened her parasol, and adjusted it. "Because I wish to be seen, and I assume you wish to be seen with me as well."

"Ahh," he said, immediately understanding, "you are ready to take your revenge." She was proud, and pride was something he well understood. He favored her with a faint smile.

"Do you not wish to take your revenge too, my lord? How many mamas of more modest heiresses shooed their daughters out of your path with no regard for your exemplary family, because of your bare purse?"

"I am not certain I am comfortable that you understand me so well, so quickly," the duke said to her candidly.

She blushed at his remark, but replied spiritedly, "If our marriage is to be a successful venture, my lord, I must certainly understand you, and you me."

"How old are you?" he asked her.

"You don't know? I am seventeen. I will be eighteen on the ninth of December. How old did you think I was?" It suddenly occurred to her that they really didn't know anything at all about each other. Nothing. Their match had been made for other reasons. She began to worry her lower lip with her teeth.

Quinton Hunter was equally astounded by the reality that he knew naught about this girl except that she was rich. And, of course, there was the gossip about her mother. "Seventeen is a fine age to become a wife," he said slowly. "I was thirty-one this April third past, Allegra. I suppose that seems very old for you."

"You are not as old as my father," she replied frankly. "I think a husband should be older than a wife."

He laughed aloud, and she saw a flash of white teeth. "I suppose I deserved that," he responded.

"You are even more handsome when you laugh," Allegra noted.

"So you think me handsome, do you?" He chuckled. "You are very beautiful, but then, of course, you know that. Beautiful and rich were all the congratulations I heard last night."

"The women were confined to: 'Aduke! A duke, my dear!'" She laughed. "Please tell me we do not have to live in London, my lord. I really do not enjoy this world that is so regulated and rigid. At least in the country we will be accepted as a plain married couple, and not some rule by which all other heiresses and poor, but noble gentlemen are to be judged by in future seasons."

"I thought you wished to take your revenge, Allegra. You must become a famous hostess giving outrageous balls, and other entertainments. You must run up enormous debts in the best gambling halls like the Duchess of Devonshire. You must set the fashion. You cannot do it by living an anonymous existence in the country."

"No, thank you," Allegra said. "I shall have my own back in the next few weeks on the silly chits who have snubbed me. If the kind of lady you describe is the kind of lady you want to wed, then I am not that lady, my lord. I am appalled at the amount of money my papa has expended in just this one season on Sirena and me. Our weddings will cost a fortune. Invested, that money would have yielded a handsome profit. Now it is all gone. As for gambling, I am as opposed to it as are you. Another waste of both time and good coin."

"How do you invest your monies?" he asked her, curious.

"In foreign trade mostly," Allegra told him. "I also own a little spinning mill in Yorkshire that makes thread, and interest in several wagon way routes. I have the controlling interest in one route that is entirely built with cast iron rails."

"It is amazing that a young girl as yourself should find interest in such matters," the duke remarked. "Most girls spend their time at less rigorous pursuits."

"Why?" Allegra demanded. "Women have intellects as well as men. If they are educated, they are capable of almost anything," she told him. "Education is the key to everything. I intend to see that our daughters, as well as our sons, are educated to the utmost."

"You say women are capable of almost anything," he replied.

"I don't think I should like to be a member of the local fire brigade," Allegra answered him with a chuckle.

The duke's borrowed landau had now turned into the park where they joined the throng of other carriages parading through the greensward this June afternoon. There were also a number of ladies and gentlemen riding upon beautiful horses. Allegra leaned back and feigned boredom. There was that appalling Lady Hackney and her buck-toothed daughter, Lavinia. She ignored their desperate attempts to catch her eye.

"Nicely done," the duke murmured. He reached for her little hand, and raising it to his lips, kissed it as another carriage carrying the Countess of Brotherton and her daughter passed by. The Brotherton girl's dowry had been generous, but not showy. Her mama had made a great point of seeing her darling daughter was allowed nowhere near the poverty-stricken Duke of Sedgwick. He had found himself greatly offended even though he knew better. The girl would have to come back next season as she had failed in the husband hunt this year. And her papa would have to increase her dowry, for she wasn't the prettiest of creatures.

"Sedgwick!" A voice familiar to them both pierced the air. "Stop at once! I want to join you!" Lady Bellingham's small carriage drew up next to theirs, and its occupant, with help, transferred herself from it to the duke's landau, giving her coachmen instructions to follow behind.

"Good afternoon, Aunt," Quinton Hunter said. He leaned forward and kissed her cheek.

"Good afternoon, Lady Bellingham," Allegra said. Aunt?

"Your fiancé's mama and I were first cousins," Lady Bellingham explained. "Now, when is the wedding to be, my dears?"

"Madame, we have not yet had time to consider a date," Allegra said.

"Why not?" demanded Lady Bellingham.

"This is the first time we have been alone together, Aunt, since last night's festivities and announcement," the duke spoke up.

"Well, you had best proclaim a date within the week, or else the gossips will be saying that one of you has cried off. I shall not have the match of the decade ruined by idle gossip!" Lady Bellingham said.

"It will be sometime in the autumn," Allegra responded. "I plan to spend the summer at Hunter's Lair overseeing the renovations needed. Papa is sending an architect down next week."

"You are not being married before the season ends? You are not being married in London?" Lady Bellingham was shocked.