The Duchess War

by Courtney Milan

  Chapter Ten

  The omnibus dropped Minnie a half mile from her great-aunts’ farm. She pulled her valise under one arm and began to walk the rest of the way home.

  When she’d left the few clustered houses behind her, she pulled out the letter in her skirt pocket and awkwardly—she had only one free hand, after all—broke the wax seal.

  The letter was dated two days past.

  My dear Miss Pursling, he had written. I want to make clear what I meant the other day when we encountered one another at the Finneys’ residence. Writing handbills is not some sort of a whim on my part.

  You told me the other day that you had looked high, and that you had been battered down. You’re not alone. It is the nature of English society to do precisely that: to keep the lower classes low and raise the upper classes even higher. It is lucky of me indeed to be able to look where I wish.

  My most ardent wish is that you, and everyone like you, will look up. That you’ll do so and never be beaten into the ground again. I write handbills because I can write those words without fear of reprisal—because if I am discovered, the House of Lords will never prosecute me. I write because those words must be written. I write because to not write, to not speak, would be to waste what I have been given. I keep it secret because otherwise, anyone who associated with me would become the target for an investigation.

  You are undoubtedly my superior in the matter of tactics. As proof, here you have a letter in my own hand, admitting what I have done. Use it to expose me, if that’s what you think will get you your good marriage to an ordinary man who wishes nothing more than to have a quiet wife. Use it, if you must, or keep it and say nothing. You told me the future terrified you. I can’t change the whole of it, but I can change this much.

  Or you could look up. You could put that superior mind of yours to real use and fashion a different place for yourself entirely. You could be more. You could be much, much more.

  Anything else would be a criminal waste of your talents.

  Your servant,

  Robert Alan Graydon Blaisdell.

  No title. But then, the only title he’d chosen for himself in his writings was De minimis—a small thing. Not so small a thing, though. Minnie could feel the tide of his hope lifting her up with every step.

  You could be more.

  She’d tasted more once—just the tiniest nibble, but enough to make her life now seem dreary indeed. It was like eating nothing but unsalted gruel every meal, but smelling sausage and pastries all day. After all this time spent choking down tasteless glop, someone was offering her meat.

  She couldn’t think logically. She couldn’t analyze. She could think of nothing but her hunger.

  I could be more.

  She had no idea what her future contained, but even the little hint of relief she’d felt at his admission—one less thing to fear, one worry put off after these last days of worry—seemed to ease her burden.

  That feeling of false comfort stayed with her through the walk home. It buoyed up every step, elevated every breath. It buzzed through her as she greeted her great-aunts, as she went and washed and prepared herself for the evening meal. And it changed nothing. It only made the burden of reality feel all the heavier when its full weight descended on her shoulders.

  By the time dinner came, Minnie found she couldn’t taste the soup.

  Her great-aunts sat before her, eating steadily, conversing as two good friends who had spent decades in one another’s company were wont to do. The conversation ranged from the production of turnips to the uses for the far field come spring.

  They chattered on as if nothing had changed, and she hated them because nothing had. Because on that fateful day when her life had upended itself, they had been the ones to come get her from London. They’d pointed her down this path.

  If you come with us, Great-Aunt Caro had said, Minerva Lane will die forever. You will never say that name. The person who you are today? She will simply vanish.

  Gruel. Nothing but gruel—and the fear that one day, there’d not even be that.

  “Did you know that Billy is courting?” Great-Aunt Caro said.

  “No! He cannot possibly be old enough.”

  “He’s eighteen,” Caro said. “And heaven help me if I know when that happened. Why, it seems as if it were just last month that he was born…”

  She couldn’t attend to the conversation. Minnie hadn’t just taken on a new name when her great-aunts took her away; she’d taken on a new personality. She hadn’t even known how to walk like a girl at first. For that initial year, her great-aunts had constantly corrected her behavior. Don’t contradict. Don’t speak up. Don’t step forward. Anything that drew attention was absolutely forbidden; she’d found herself shrinking smaller and smaller until a walnut could have encompassed her personality—and left room for it to rattle around.

  She’d been small and quiet. Having known so much more, her frustrated, pent-up ambition had chafed. She’d seized on what little charity work was allowed to women, but it wasn’t enough. And now she faced a lifetime of this affliction—of being forced to make her soul as small and as tasteless as possible, in hopes that it would fit into the confines of her life.

  You have steel for your backbone and a rare talent for seeing what is plainly in front of your face. I could make everyone see that.

  Damn his eyes. Damn his letter. Damn that smile, the one that made her want to kiss him back, just so she could know that she’d put that light inside him.

  Anything else would be a criminal waste.

  Damn him, because even if he didn’t mean it—even if it was all a way to try to fog her mind and lead her astray—he had made her believe that she could change things. And that this time, when she did…

  It struck her, that want, like a sharp fist to her solar plexus—painful and paralyzing. She didn’t just want. She hoped. She needed. She dreamed that this time, when she was revealed to the crowd for what she really was, they wouldn’t mob around her and throw stones. This time, they wouldn’t call her a beast or the spawn of the devil. This time, instead of stripping her of everything, someone would love her for who she was.

  A yearning like that was too big for the person she had to be.

  Damn the Duke of Clermont, for giving her that hope. Damn him for his admonition to look up. Damn him for making her believe.

  Her eyes stung. She aimed her fork at her plate and stabbed blindly.

  “Minnie,” Eliza said, her eyebrows drawing down in worry, “are you well?”

  “I am—” Perfectly well.

  She was supposed to say those words. Ask for nothing, admit to no discomfort. That was the way of a lady.

  But the lie could not pass her lips. She was full to bursting with emotion. And somehow, instead of murmuring her excuses and leaving the room as she ought to have done, she felt her fork fly from her hand—clear across the dining table, striking the far wall with a metallic clang.

  “No,” she said. “No, I am not well.”

  “Minnie!”

  “I am not well,” she repeated. “I am not well. How could you do this to me?”

  Eliza shoved to her feet and took one step toward her. “Minnie, what is the matter?”

  “You did this to me,” she repeated, her voice quivering with all those years of unshed tears. “You both did this to me. You made me into this—this—”

  She found her spoon next to her plate, and flung that bit of pewter across the room, too.

  “—this nothing!” she finished. “And now I am stuck in it and I cannot find my way out.”

  Eliza and Caro exchanged a stricken glance.

  “I have all of this inside of me—all these thoughts, these wants, these ambitions.”

  Caro winced at that last word.

  “And they are nothing,” she said. “Nothing, nothing, nothing! Just like me.”

  “Oh, Minnie,” Eliza said, gently—as gently as a stable-hand to a rearing horse. “I’m so sorry. I promised
your mother I would look after you when she passed away. Had I kept that promise, you would not feel that way now. You would never have known…”

  It wasn’t the words that worked, but the tone—cool and calming. She could feel her anger ebbing away in response. In another few minutes she would be placid again, with nothing to show for the evening but a few nicks in the wallpaper where the tines of her fork had left their impression.

  But she could still hear his voice. She could still see his eyes, so brilliantly blue, the intensity of his expression. That letter might have been a nothing-gesture for a man who could indulge in such things. But there had been just enough truth in what he said that she could not help but cling to it.

  You could have had this, the memory taunted, if only you were someone else.

  You could have had him if you were yourself. But you aren’t. You aren’t.

  Eliza crossed the distance to her and set her hand on her shoulder. “You should never have known,” she repeated.

  And that memory of herself—of that brash confidence, of that youthful excitement—seemed so distant that Minnie could feel herself nodding.

  You’re nothing. Nothing doesn’t feel.

  Eliza pressed on her shoulder, and Minnie collapsed back into her chair.

  “There, there,” her great-aunt whispered. “It’s nothing. It’s nothing.”

  “Of course it’s nothing,” Minnie whispered. “That’s all I have ever been.”

  After that, there was no holding back the flood of ugly tears. She cried until she’d expunged all the want from her heart—her wistful longing for the past she’d lost, entwined with the future she could not contemplate.

  “Maybe,” her great-aunt said, when her tears tailed off, “maybe you need to take some time away from the whole…marriage…thing. Just stay here on the farm. A few weeks. What do you think?”

  She didn’t have a few weeks. She had his letter, though—the proof that she needed. She could end the suspicion Stevens held toward her tomorrow.

  So why wasn’t she doing it?

  Minnie shook her head. “It won’t help,” she said. “It never helps. Nothing helps any longer.”

  The table at the hotel could have been laid for eight, had it been necessary. Today, it accommodated Robert’s mother at one end, and at the other, separated from her by six feet of polished mahogany, himself. It seemed as if every silver fork that the hotel owned had been laid out for them, and most of their spoons beside. He could have constructed an entire clock tower out of the assembled cutlery.

  From across the length of the table, Robert’s mother laid her fork down gently.

  This was his mother’s way of sending a signal. She’d changed the date. She’d agreed to the meeting, knowing Sebastian and Oliver were both in town. That meant that this was not just a meal, but a palaver—two independent, faintly hostile parties meeting to come to an agreement on the tariffs between their nations.

  As always, she had not a single hair out of place. She dressed in what he supposed was the height of fashion, if he’d bothered to follow it. Her gown was a dark blue, the hems embroidered in a white-and-gold pattern two inches thick. Her waist was slim, but not too tightly laced; a shawl of black lace looped over her shoulders.

  She had always seemed imposing, like some faraway castle tower looming on the horizon. Even when she’d visited him when he was a child, she had been distant.

  Now, the two yards between them could have been a furlong. In the years since he’d gained his majority, they’d come to a comfortable accommodation. When they were both in town, they had dinner together—no more than once—and talked of nothing. Her charitable work, his work in Parliament. Everything they said at those meals, they might have found out about one another through the society pages. He had no expectations of her and she no longer disappointed him.

  But her coming to see him…this was new.

  “Well, Clermont.” She set her spoon down as a servant removed her soup bowl. Her gaze was fixed on him—affable, polite, and unexceptionable. “You must know why I have come.”

  “No,” Robert said. “I don’t.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t recall? The last time we spoke, you mentioned that you were planning on taking a wife.”

  The last time they had talked had been two months ago. He had, in fact, agreed when she’d said that as a man approached his thirties, he ought to consider marrying. It had seemed an innocuous enough statement at the time. It had been talk that was not just small, but miniscule.

  “You agreed to do your duty,” she said calmly.

  “I said I would marry,” he said carefully. “I don’t believe I spoke a word about duty.”

  Her nose twitched and her lips flattened, as if the idea that marriage could be more than a duty made her want to sneeze. Still, she didn’t say anything until the next course had been laid in front of them. Then, she waited until Robert had taken a bite—and couldn’t protest—before speaking.

  “If we are to approach the matter properly, it might well take years. Such a thing cannot be taken on cavalierly. There are backgrounds to inquire into, information to obtain.” She picked up her fork. “We must make lists. I’ve started three already.”

  Robert swallowed the bite of fish even though his throat had just dried. For all that the woman sitting before him was his mother, she was a stranger. He’d scarcely seen her when he’d been a child. There had been a time when he’d wanted her to care for him. He’d wanted it desperately; he’d made excuse after excuse for her absence. But she’d made it painfully clear that his excuses were just that, and that she wanted nothing to do with him.

  “Your pardon,” he said, realizing that the room had been cloaked in silence since she’d spoken. “What do you mean, we must make lists? Who is we?”

  “No need for you to worry about it.” She gave an elegant wave of her hand. “I can show you what I have thus far. I’ve organized the names I’ve gathered so far into three categories: peers’ daughters, heiresses, and other.” She sniffed. “With a little work on my part, I should be able to obviate the need to consider any women in the other category.”

  Twenty-eight years of near-indifference from the woman, and then this?

  “So when you say we,” Robert said slowly, “you are really referring to yourself.”

  “Well…” She looked startled at the question. “You needn’t sound so put out, Clermont. Of course your wishes are to be considered.”

  “My wishes are to be considered,” he repeated. “Such generosity. And such curious phrasing, absent any actors at all. Might I inquire after the name of the person who so kindly volunteers to consider my wishes? It is only my marriage, after all.”

  His mother licked her lips and fell silent. Her gaze fell to her plate, but her fingers curled around her fork.

  “Thank you, Duchess,” Robert said. “But your assistance will not be needed in this matter.”

  “Clermont.” Now a hint of exasperation touched her voice. “It may be your marriage, but your choice will affect me.” Her head tilted up, wide-eyed. “If your marriage is the subject of gossip, why, everyone connected with you will suffer. I have decades of experience with the ton. It would be foolish of you not to draw on it.”

  She had drawn herself up stiffly. Little blooms of pink touched her cheeks. No doubt she’d realized that once he married, she’d become the dowager Duchess of Clermont, and she was loath to give up her place in society to some chit who didn’t respect her as she wanted.

  “No offense, Mama,” Robert drawled, “but I do not consider you an expert on marriage. Expertise, I think, would require you to actually stay in one.”

  Her lips pinched together. “Insults.” She sniffed. “You become more like your father every day. Do think my offer over, Clermont, and talk to me when you are less emotional. You cannot simply bumble around London until you see a candidate whose looks you like. This is one of the most important decisions of your life. Your wife will share yo
ur life for the remainder of your days.”

  “She needn’t,” Robert contradicted. “She can always move out.” He looked across the table at her. “In the event that she needs to do so, I’ll point her in your direction. You have some qualifications on that front, I believe.”

  Her nostrils flared; he almost thought she might stamp her foot and paw the ground, like an angry bull. But she simply turned her head away and took another bite of her meal.

  There was a reason they’d kept their conversations to inane niceties up until this point. There was no way to talk about anything else without bitterness. They had no common past to draw on, almost no shared acquaintances. His mother had spent more time visiting Sebastian’s mother—her husband’s sister—than she had lived in Robert’s household as a child.

  And she’d chosen to do it. He might have forgiven her at one time. At one time, he would have forgiven her anything. Knowing what he did of his father, it seemed unfair to hold her to account for leaving the man. But when she’d left her husband, she’d never looked back at her son. No matter how he asked, she’d never looked back.

  “At least,” she finally said, a little stiffly, “at least you might make use of my lists.”

  “No, Your Grace.” Robert felt as cold as ice as he spoke. “I don’t believe we will be needing your lists.”

  She blinked. She looked down in contemplation of her food. “We,” she finally said. “Who is this that is encompassed by your we?”

  “Why, didn’t I say? Sebastian Malheur.” Robert gave her a smile. “Why do you think I asked him down?”

  Her eyes widened. “That man!” she hissed. “He has already called on me, and…” She hissed in displeasure. “He wouldn’t know propriety if it came up and shook his hand. It is all very well for you to associate with him out of some sense of familial loyalty, but to actually treat him as an intimate—”

  “Don’t worry, Your Grace,” Robert cut in. “Oliver Marshall is here, too, and he’ll lend—”

  “That is the company you keep? A reprobate and a bastard?”

  Robert nearly sprang to his feet, his temper rising at that. But shouting had never got him anywhere. Slowly, he exhaled his anger, letting it flow from him until the serenity of ice returned.

  “Ah,” he finally said. “Insults.”

  She snorted.

  “It appears that I take after you, despite everything. I hope you’re not too horrified by the discovery.”

  But she didn’t look upset. Instead a faint smile appeared on her lips—the first he’d seen from her since her arrival.

  “I knew that already,” she said. “Why else do you suppose I am here?”