Christmas with the Duchess

by Tamara Lejeune

  Nicholas was appalled by the casual way in which she spoke of death and blackmail.

  “Your husband killed your lover,” he said slowly, “but he would not let you keep the child.”

  “No,” she said. “He would not. But he had no objection to my brother raising her as his own. He probably would have let me keep her if her father had been a man he respected. Let’s just say, my husband did not admire my taste in men.”

  Nicholas looked down at the ground. Her way of life was so very different from his own. He felt sorry for her, but also disgusted. “Well, you have your letter now,” he said quietly. “It cannot be used against you ever again.”

  Bowing, he took his leave.

  “Wait, sir!” she said suddenly. “You must allow me to thank you.”

  He flushed. “I do not want your gratitude,” he said.

  To Emma, it sounded like an insult, but she bore it without rancor. “You have it all the same,” she insisted.

  He bowed quickly. “Good-bye, your grace.”

  Turning on his heel, he left her before she could speak again.

  It was just as well. She had no idea what to say to him.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Four days before Christmas, the Duke of Warwick killed his first stag. After a chase of nearly ten hours, the beast was brought to bay in a stream. Harry took his shot, killing the red hart instantly, and, the ladies were assured, painlessly.

  Emma watched from her horse, shuddering as Harry’s cheeks were blooded after the kill. Harry himself glowed with the triumph of a successful hunter. There would be venison for the Christmas dinner, venison provided by himself, and the animal’s head would be mounted and hung in the trophy room with all the rest of them. He felt like a man. But, of course, his mother still saw him as a child.

  To please her, Harry rode out the next morning before dawn to select the tannenbaum, leaving it to the woodsman to cut it down on the morning of Christmas Eve. It took an hour to fell the enormous tree. Twelve men were required to carry it out of the woods, and four carriage horses dragged it up to the house, where it arrived safely just before noon. Even though its branches had been tightly bound with rope, the front doors had to be taken off to allow it to fit inside the great house.

  As he had promised, Nicholas oversaw the installation of the tree, which took longer than anyone had anticipated. It was not until well after three o’clock in the afternoon that the bindings could be cut and the branches fluffed out, leaving just a few scant hours for Emma and her staff to decorate the tree before the guests began arriving for the Christmas Eve Ball. Each shiny ornament of mouth-blown glass had to be tied onto a branch by hand, and the duchess was very particular about where each one went. In addition to the glass ornaments, there were clusters of nuts tied up in bags of netting with gaily colored bows. Emma had made these herself, with the help of the children, Harry excepted, of course.

  Somehow, the Herculean task was completed, but it was a very near thing. Glass and tinsel glittered like jewels on all the branches, reflected endlessly in the immense mirrors lining the walls. With her spectacles on her nose, Emma climbed onto the ladder to place the last ornament on the tree with her own hands. Nicholas instinctively went to hold the ladder steady. “Is that a pickle?” he asked her curiously.

  “The child who finds the pickle first gets an extra present,” Emma explained, trying to sound pleasant and normal. Since he had returned her letter to her, her feelings toward him had been confused by overwhelming gratitude. She felt nervous around him, and avoided him as much as possible. “The others will have to wait until tomorrow.”

  The duke came into the room and hurried over to them.

  “Harry!” Emma scolded him. “You know you’re not supposed to see the tree until after you’ve had your supper!”

  He scowled at her. “That only applies to the children, Mama,” he told her loftily. “I certainly won’t be looking for the pickle this year!”

  “You never found it anyway,” she retorted. “You were always rooting about in the presents like a pig looking for truffles.”

  “Shouldn’t you be getting ready for the ball?” he said coldly, his cheeks reddening. “Though you are my mother, I shan’t lead you out for the first dance looking like that.”

  Flustered, Emma hurried down the ladder.

  When she had left them, Harry stood looking up at the tree. “The children will be delighted with it, I think,” he said, once again deliberately separating himself from the ranks of the infantry. He never seemed to miss an opportunity to speak of “the children.”

  “I have never seen anything like it,” said Nicholas.

  Harry glanced at Nicholas. “You should know, my lord, that my mother has no desire ever to marry again.”

  “I beg your pardon?” said Nicholas.

  “It has come to my attention that you have been aspiring to my mother’s hand,” said Harry, using a courtly, almost pompous turn of phrase. “I have nothing against you, mind, but Mama is a wealthy woman in her own right. She has no need to marry. Besides, you will need an heir, and Mama is much too old to be thinking of having any more children. You would do well to look elsewhere for a bride.”

  Nicholas was red in the face. “Indeed, your grace,” he murmured. “I have already chosen a bride. My cousin Octavia has agreed to do me the honor.”

  Harry blinked in surprise. “Oh, I see. Aunt Susan’s got it wrong as usual!” he laughed cheerfully. “My, but you do like older women!” he added merrily. “Octavia must be twenty-five if she’s a day!”

  “Your grace will excuse me,” said Nicholas, with a curt bow.

  “Of course,” said Harry. “You need to get changed yourself. I will see you at the ball.”

  As Nicholas hurried to his room, guests were already arriving for the ball, exclaiming in awe over the duchess’s strange and extravagant decorations. The duke received them with a mixture of warmth and condescension, accepting their flattering attentions as his due.

  At nine o’clock, the duke opened the festivities by dancing with his mother. Emma looked exquisite in a low-cut gown of raspberry silk. Diamonds glittered at her throat and in her hair. Harry directed her attention to Lord Camford, who was leading Octavia Fitzroy onto the dance floor. “Theirs will be a great match,” he told her, laughing.

  “What do you mean?” said Emma.

  “Why, Camford and Cousin Octavia,” he said. “They are to be married.”

  “Nonsense!” said Emma.

  “I have it from the horse’s mouth,” Harry insisted.

  “Octavia?”

  “No; Camford himself. So you needn’t worry about him mooning after you anymore.”

  Emma did not know what to think. “That is a relief,” she murmured.

  After the first dance, the children were allowed to come down from the nursery to see the Christmas tree. Some of the adults left the ballroom to watch the spectacle as the candles on the tree were lit. The duke, of course, could not be bothered with such a trifle, but, instead seized the chance to dance with his pretty cousin Julia, who had been allowed out of the nursery with the rest of the children.

  Lady Aleta Grey found the pickle. As her special present Emma gave her the gilded ivory fan that had once belonged to the Empress Josephine. “And I have another present for you,” she told the child, hugging her close. “Next month, when the boys go back to school, and your mama and papa go back to London, you and I shall sneak off to Paris together. Just the two of us.”

  “Ahem!” said Colin. “I’m coming for a visit!”

  “A short visit,” said Emma.

  As he watched Emma teaching the child how to make different signals with her new fan, Nicholas began to see a resemblance between them, although it was clear that the black-haired, black-eyed child took after her father. She certainly looked nothing like Otto or his wife.

  “There is something in the ballroom you must see,” Colin said in Emma’s ear. Taking her hand, he dragged her from th
e room. “They make a lovely couple, don’t they?” he said, directing her attention to the dancers. In the center of the throng, Julia Fitzroy was dancing with her second cousin, the Duke of Warwick. Emma was dismayed, to say the least.

  “That hussy!” she muttered. “I could just about strangle her!”

  “Now we know why Julia is not yet Out,” said Colin. “They’re saving her for Harry. Julia, Duchess of Warwick. How do you like the sound of that, Emma?”

  “Over my dead body!” Emma said violently. “She’s too old for him.”

  He laughed. “She’s only two years older than he. ’Twas not so long ago that you were practically engaged to a man nearly ten years your junior.”

  “I was no such thing!” Emma snapped.

  Colin could not resist teasing her. “Harry is thirteen now, you know. That’s old enough to marry—with his guardian’s consent, of course.”

  “That will never happen,” Emma said grimly.

  “I’m sure you’re right,” he said dryly. “Uncle Hugh would never allow his precious daughter to become Duchess of Warwick.”

  Across the room, Lord Hugh and Lady Anne were watching their youngest daughter with the utmost complacency.

  “That one will not go quietly back to the nursery,” Colin warned Emma. “You’ll have better luck putting a genie back in the bottle. Pity Nicholas could not be persuaded to take her.”

  Emma flinched, remembering what Harry had told her about Nicholas’s marriage plans.

  But, before she could speak, Lady Harriet was upon them, wearing a decades-old ball gown of emerald-green watered silk. “You owe me seven hundred pounds, you loathsome, mangy little squirrel,” she told Colin without preamble.

  “Look who’s talking to me,” Colin said lightly. “A super-annuated virgin! I thought I was dead to you, madam.”

  “You are dead to me, scum,” she answered. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t collect on a bet. Lord Camford is to marry Octavia Fitzroy. You owe me seven hundred pounds.”

  Colin laughed. “They are only dancing, you toothless old baggage. Besides, we called off our bet. I paid you for your trouble. Now move along, why don’t you. For a dead person, I’m awfully busy.”

  “They are engaged,” Lady Harriet insisted. “Octavia and Lord Camford are to be married. Ask your sister, if you don’t believe me.”

  “It’s true,” said Emma. “Harry just told me. I can’t imagine how it happened.”

  “Oh, can’t you?” said Lady Harriet. “Well, I can tell you how it happened. Camford agreed to marry Octavia in exchange for your letter, Emma. It’s as simple as that.”

  Emma’s face was ashen. “I don’t know what you mean, Aunt Harriet,” she stammered.

  “Pish!” said Harriet. “You know exactly what I mean. I want my seven hundred pounds in gold, if you please,” she went on, turning to Colin. “I don’t trust these banks and their paper money.”

  “They are not married yet, old woman,” Colin said darkly, but Emma silenced him, placing an unsteady hand on his arm.

  “Aunt Harriet, are you saying that Camford offered himself up like some sort of human sacrifice?” she said breathlessly. “For my sake? For my letter?”

  “Of course,” Lady Harriet said impatiently, “and his offer was immediately accepted. How did you think he got your letter back for you?”

  “I did not think,” said Emma, with growing distress. “I supposed he must have stolen it.”

  Lady Harriet snorted. “Camford? Steal? He’d consider it a disgrace to the Royal Navy, I’m sure. He’d sooner cut off his right arm.”

  “How do you know all this?” Emma demanded.

  “I heard it from Cornelia,” Lady Harriet said proudly. “She’s beastly jealous, so it was not very hard to get her to talk. Camford is to marry Octavia. They mean to announce it tomorrow, on Christmas Day.”

  “Oh, no,” Emma murmured.

  “Why Octavia?” Colin wanted to know. “Why not Julia? What did you do, old woman? You must have cheated! We agreed to let nature take its course!”

  “To be perfectly honest,” said Lady Harriet, “I don’t think the young man cared which one of them he married. He chose Octavia because she is the eldest.”

  “Would you be good enough to excuse us, Aunt Harriet?” said Emma. “I need Colin to make the punch.”

  “Don’t forget my money, boy,” Lady Harriet called after Colin.

  Taking a firm hold of her brother’s arm, Emma led him into the refreshment room, where a splendid German-style Christmas banquet had been laid out. In the German states, Christmas Eve was known as Dickbauch, meaning, simply, “pot belly,” and the long table groaned under the weight of numerous tiered silver dishes piled high with rich meats, fruits, and pastries.

  “Emma, this is no time for punch,” said Colin. “I can feel my seven hundred pounds slipping away. I’ll be damned if I let that scabby old hag beat me.”

  “I thought your bet was only ten shillings,” said Emma. “No! Never mind your stupid bet!” she went on, shaking her head. “Nicholas is about to make the worst mistake of his life! I should have guessed as much. Oh, he can’t be that great of a fool, can he?”

  “I’d say yes, he can, but, then again, you know him better than I do.”

  “You’re right,” Emma said sadly. “If he’s promised to marry Octavia, then marry her he will, come hell or high water! He’s that sort of man. Honorable, dependable, chivalrous.”

  “Idiotish,” Colin added helpfully.

  “Yes, a damn fool!” she agreed angrily. “He must really have loved me,” she added sadly. “Well, I can’t let him do it. I can’t let him throw his life away. What do we do, Colin? How do we save him from himself? Oh, God! If only Otto were not still suffering from that trifling cold! He would know what to do.”

  “We do not need Otto,” said Colin, annoyed. “I know exactly what to do.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing so easy! You get Nicholas to go to his bedroom at the stroke of midnight. If anyone can do it, I know you can.”

  “Do you think Octavia will release him if she thinks I’m his mistress?” Emma shook her head. “Frankly, I don’t think she’d bat an eye if she found him in bed with you. She is determined to be Lady Camford.”

  “You leave Octavia to me,” Colin said airily. “Just get the damn fool to his bedroom at midnight.”

  “What if he won’t go? I’m sure he hates me. The last thing he will want is a rendezvous with me!”

  Colin took out his watch and checked it. “Don’t be a self-pitying ass,” he told his sister bluntly. “He’s obviously in love with you. Why else would he agree to marry the gruesome Octavia? He’ll jump at the chance to meet you in private. Tell him not to light the candle. Just have him take off all his clothes and get into bed. I’ll take care of the rest.”

  “What are you going to do?” she asked, wincing. “I’m not going to like it, am I?”

  “Do you want to save him from the proverbial fate worse than death?”

  “Yes, of course I do!” Emma exclaimed. “But—”

  “But me no buts!” he said. “Obviously, if my plan doesn’t work, we can always try your plan.”

  “I don’t have a plan!” she wailed.

  “Then you had better hope that my plan works,” he told her, before slipping back into the crowded ballroom.

  Nicholas had finished dancing with Octavia. Emma nearly collided with him as he made his way to the refreshments.

  Nicholas frowned down at her. “Good evening, your grace. You are not dancing?”

  Emma stared mutely into his blue eyes, her heart pounding. Even if she suggested an assignation now, she was not at all certain he would accept. She did not care to be rejected face to face. Her courage deserted her. She felt like a clumsy schoolgirl at her first dance.

  “Are you looking for Mr. Palafox?” he suggested woodenly. “I know he has been looking for you.”

  “Yes,” she said, seizing on the suggestion
with absurd gratitude. “I was indeed looking for Mr. Palafox. Have you seen him?”

  Nicholas knew perfectly well that Captain Palafox was currently performing the Boulangere with Miss Cornelia Fitzroy as his partner. “No,” he said stonily. “I haven’t seen him. But, then, these army officers all look alike to me.”

  “Oh,” said Emma. “Thank you, my lord. He must be in the card room.”

  “Very likely,” Nicholas said, moving on.

  Feeling quite like an idiot, Emma ran to her room to find pen and paper. She wrote quickly, before her courage deserted her again, hardly knowing what she wrote.

  Dear C—

  I beg you will do me the honor of meeting with me privately in your room at midnight. I implore you.

  Yours,

  E—

  Folding the page over, she sealed it with a wafer, gave it to Carstairs, the butler, the only servant in whom she had perfect trust, and instructed him to place it in Lord Camford’s hand personally.

  Nicholas was all astonishment when he read it. Why, he wondered, would she send him a note when they had been face-to-face not five minutes before? She had been looking for that scoundrel Palafox, with a rather desperate look in her eyes. This must be a mistake, he thought grimly. And the rascal’s first name was Charles—with a C.

  Of course, he thought grimly. The invitation was for Charles Palafox.

  Did Emma have so many lovers that even the servants could not keep them straight?

  “Are you quite sure this note is for me?” Nicholas asked, detaining the butler.

  “Certainly, my lord. Would your lordship care to reply?”

  Nicholas opened his mouth to argue the point, but then thought better of it. It would not be such a bad thing, after all, if Charles Palafox never got the duchess’s note.

  “No,” Nicholas said. “No reply. Thank you, Carstairs.”

  “Very good, my lord.”

  But before Carstairs could withdraw, Nicholas had changed his mind. It would be uncivil to keep Emma waiting for a man who would never come. Worse yet, what if Palafox decided to go back to his room for some other reason?