A Season for Love

by Blair Bancroft

  Caroline looked up at her towering step-mother, her scowl slowly fading into a knowing expression far beyond her years. Almost, Jen wondered, as if her adversarial step-daughter was maturing and mellowing before her eyes.

  “I believe you forget I have spent the last eight years in a thatched cottage in a very small village,” Lady Caroline said. “It is my father who is high in the instep, not I. Indeed, I have discovered in myself a great curiosity about many people who are not considered part of the ton. Truthfully, if the members of society are anything like the Dowager Duchess, it seems likely I shall be considerably more comfortable with those from the fringes.”

  “That is settled, then,” Jen declared briskly, bent on escaping before either her whoosh of relief or surge of hope revealed themselves to Caroline. “My apologies for interrupting your fitting.”

  As Caroline once again lifted her arms so the young assistant might continue pinning, she stared at the door through which the duchess had departed. For a moment . . . just for a moment she rather thought they had come close to being civil to each other.

  Not that the duchess wasn’t civil . . . The second Duchess of Longville was always civil.

  And Caroline knew perfectly well who had not been civil. Ever since she had come to her father’s door that first fateful night, she had been demonstrating it did not take two to make a quarrel. She was quite capable of carrying on a feud all by herself.

  Yet her father seemed content, possibly even pleased, with his marriage. And the new duchess was Viscount Frayne’s sister. Possibly, just possibly, Caroline conceded, the time for compromise had come.

  Mama would not like it.

  But, then, there were many things the first Duchess of Longville had not liked. In all fairness, Caroline had to admit that for many long years before her death her mama had not been the gay, laughing woman she had known as a child. Nor could the second duchess be blamed for the failure of the first duchess’s health.

  Nor should her step-mother be blamed because the duke had chosen her to take the place of Caroline’s mama.

  Caroline heaved a huge sigh. And was promptly stuck once again by an errant pin.

  Jen had always believed she looked best perched in a saddle, where the horse might be blamed for her height above the ground. Although her mount today was frisky, caracoling around the brick driveway in front of Longville House, the duchess handled him easily. Her burgundy red habit was done in the military style, with gold braid and buttons, epaulets squaring her shoulders. Her dark hair was topped by a shako of magnificent proportions. This morning she was in her element, not at all disconcerted that the cavalcade setting off for a simple picnic in Richmond Park looked fit to rival one of Wellington’s campaign trains.

  Jen supposed she should have ridden in the barouche with Emily Bettencourt, instead of leaving the colonel’s daughter to fend for herself in the company of Lady Harriet Grantley and the Honorable Mr. Trimby-Ashford, with Sir Chetwin riding alongside. But since those few short days at Totten Court she had spent almost no time with her husband except in the intimacy of the night, so when he chose to ride to Richmond Park, his duchess had promptly chosen to ride as well.

  An older vehicle, a landau, held Miss Tompkins, with Laurence, Susan, and a nursery maid. Lord Frayne led the cavalcade in his curricle, with Lady Caroline by his side. The two fully loaded wagons, needed to carry the necessities for the picnic plus the servants, brought up the rear. To this, the duke had added so many armed outriders that the duchess could only wonder at it. If only they had had such a fine escort when following at the tail of the army in Spain.

  “Good God,” the duke exploded, his mount nudging close to hers. “Tell me that’s not the tavern wench with Laurence.”

  “Tavern wench?” Jen questioned.

  “There, right there in the carriage,” her husband ground out. “It’s that foolish girl from the Lake District. She returned to Little Stoughton when we picked up Laurence, so why is she here? Impossible,” he sputtered. “We can’t have her in the nursery. She can’t even speak proper English.”

  “One moment,” Jen murmured, maneuvering her horse until she was next to her brother’s curricle. When she returned, she was thinking hard, to little avail as the new duchess was incurably honest. “Lady Caroline says that is indeed Nell Brindley,” she told the glowering duke. “The girl was so enchanted with London, she wished to live here. It seems she was in the servants’ carriage on your return trip.”

  “Keeping well out of my way.”

  “Yes, I imagine that is so,” Jen agreed, eyeing her husband with some trepidation. “Caroline says she is a great success with Laurence, since she is a familiar face from Little Stoughton.”

  Abruptly, the Duke of Longville swung his stallion away. Jenny suspected the snort she heard did not come from his horse.

  The day was perfect, as cloudless as could be expected in a country noted for its rain. The temperature was mild. By the time the cavalcade had negotiated the supposed dangers of the city streets and was well out in the country, passing by a series of imposing residences built along the Thames, even the Duke of Longville began to succumb to the beauty of the day. In the past few weeks his life had been so transformed he could scarcely credit it. Only a scant few months ago he had been alone, thinking his life complete, satisfied with his nearly solitary existence; seemingly content with the challenge of helping govern a country in a time of crisis. He had had friends; a few, like Frayne, good friends. But he had no wife, no children, only a series of mistresses whose interest was more fixed on baubles than on any care for what might lurk beneath the titled façade of the Duke of Longville.

  And now . . . Marcus came close to a grin. He had a wife who was turning out to be more than he had ever hoped for, three children, a brother-in-law . . . and more responsibilities than even a duke might expect. Each day seemed to bring sharp demands from Wellington for more men and more supplies, interspersed by complaints about dealing with an Allied Army composed of a dozen nations and independent principalities. And, above all else, he must face the fact that his son, his heir, might be in danger. Most certainly, the boy was the subject of scurrilous gossip—and yet here they were, traipsing about the countryside.

  He was Marcus Carlington, Duke of Longville, and he could do anything he demmed well pleased. He would protect his own. The children deserved normal lives. His wife deserved a normal life. God knows Jen had had little enough of that while following the drum. Therefore, after considerable and—ah—most interesting persuasion on the part of the duchess, they were off to Richmond Park, as if they hadn’t a care in the world. The duke ran his eye over the outriders, their shotguns, the pistols bulging in their pockets. He nodded his approval. They had safely negotiated their way out of London. The duke allowed his lips to curl into a benign smile. Very well . . . time to enjoy the day.

  Lord Frayne swung his curricle into a great arc outlining the area for the picnic, the riders, the barouche, and the landau pulling up behind him. The heavily loaded wagons had fallen behind. A giggle rose on the pristine country air as Mr. Trimby-Ashford swung Lady Harriet from the barouche. Sir Chetwin, not to be outdone, quickly dismounted, performing the same service for Miss Emily Bettencourt, who blushed furiously.

  For the first time the Duchess of Longville realized she was chaperon for the three young ladies, including Caroline. Merciful heavens, her head had been filled with thoughts of a long lovely day in Marcus’s company, and she was expected to keep track of three lively young couples.

  Unfair!

  “Until the supplies arrive,” her brother announced, “perhaps we might stroll along the path toward the woods, while enjoying the view of the river.”

  Woods. Jen blanched. Three sets of young people strolling off, out of sight.

  “Jen?” She discovered her husband, dismounted, beside her, holding up his arms to help her from her saddle. How utterly delightful. He had done that at Totten Court, but they had not ridden together since.
Being treated as if she actually needed help in dismounting was a memory of those halcyon days of courtship Jenny particularly cherished. She slid down into her husband’s waiting arms, thoroughly enjoying the extra moment he took before freeing her.

  She cast an anxious glance at the three couples strolling toward a small herd of red deer grazing peacefully at the edge of the forest. The children, shouting and laughing, would have outdistanced them except for the gentle admonishments of Miss Tompkins. Nell Brindley was heard to state that cities was grand, but she’d right forgot how good real country looked.

  “Don’t be foolish, Jen,” Longville told his wife, not missing her anxious frown. “This is your day as well as theirs. I doubt any young chit will be ravished on your watch.”

  “Marcus!”

  “Do you honestly believe your brother would invite escorts who were less than gentlemen?” the duke teased.

  “You know as well as I that gentlemen tend to lose their heads at the slightest provocation.”

  “Then you have invited young ladies who are—ah—provocative?” he purred.

  “One of them is your own daughter!” Jen shot back.

  “Decidedly provocative,” the duke mused. “I fear Frayne is lost.”

  Jen stood very still, nodding absently as a groom stepped up to lead her mount away. “Do you think so?” she asked in a small voice. “They seem such a strange match. Tony so much a figure of the ton and Caroline so suspicious of it.”

  “They will be good for each other, I think. I hope,” the duke added softly. “But, come, my dear, this is our day as well. Ah . . . here come the wagons. Would you prefer to walk or settle onto a blanket and watch others exert themselves while we sample a rare bottle of wine? I chose a special vintage just for us,” he confided, bringing his lips close to his duchess’s ear.

  Jen quivered. There was no question of walking; her legs had turned to jelly. A wave of the duke’s hand, a blanket appeared as if my magic. The duchess, leaning her back against a giant oak, accepted a glass of wine in a crystal goblet and gave herself up to enjoying her husband’s company. After all, Miss Tompkins, two children, and Nell Brindley ought to be enough deterrent to any untoward behavior in the woods of Richmond Park.

  As the picnic cavalcade lumbered off down the dusty road leading back to the heart of the city, Lady Caroline turned to her companion with an unreserved smile of approval. “A splendid picnic,” she approved. “Laurence and Susan ran themselves quite into the ground. And trestle tables for the food. Who could have imagined such luxury? Truly, Tony, it was quite wonderful.”

  “’Twas nothing,” the viscount demurred. “I turned to m’mother and m’sister and let their respective cooks slip into a frenzy of picnic rivalry.”

  “Oh!” Caroline gasped. “Should you not have invited your mother?”

  “I did. She declared her years of eating al fresco long since over.”

  Caroline chuckled, eyeing, with considerable thoughtfulness, the perfect London gentleman sitting beside her. “I have begun to understand you better,” she informed him. “Anthony Norville, the quintessential gentleman. You never betray the slightest effort, and yet, quite miraculously, things are accomplished around you. Somehow Laurence, Susan, Miss Tompkins, and I saw the beasts at the Tower, the spectacle at Astley’s, the wonders of St. Paul’s, the docking of a great ship come all the way from India—”

  The viscount discounted her praise with a negligible wave of his hand, but his face lit with a slow smile. “It is easy to amuse children,” he murmured.

  “I was amused, Tony, and I am not a child.”

  His deep blue eyes swept over her, obviously taking in every inch from her charming chip straw hat to her biscuit-colored half-boots, his eyes lingering over the honey gold curls framing her piquant face and straying to the bodice of her azure muslin, whose high waistline, held tight beneath her breasts by a teal blue ribbon, did little to conceal a figure that was far from childish. “Ah, no, you certainly are not,” the viscount agreed.

  Abruptly, he snapped the reins, setting the chestnuts in motion. “I believe,” he said in quite a different tone, “the others are far enough ahead that we will not have to eat their dust.”

  Disconcerted and more than ready to take her cue from the viscount’s tone, Caroline searched frantically for another topic of conversation. But her head was awhirl, a crimson blush still reddening her cheeks. This, undoubtedly, was why young ladies were supposed to be chaperoned at all times. But her step-mother had had eyes for no one but her papa. It was possible others had discreetly averted their eyes, but Caroline had not. The duke and the duchess had even fed each other grapes, as if they were attending a Roman orgy. Not, of course, that she was quite certain what an orgy was, but at that moment Caroline’s own food had soured in her stomach. Yet the day was so beautiful, the children having such a fine time, the food and the wine and the company—if one did not count the duchess, of course—so truly glorious that she had allowed herself to forget her grievances. Indeed, she had to admit she had totally forgotten them by the time she turned to Tony with unalloyed praise of the picnic.

  And now, because the viscount felt obligated to be the last person to leave, the one responsible for making sure no guest, no servant, no box, or stray chicken bone was left behind, she was alone, completely alone with him, in the vast acres of Richmond Park. Caroline was quite certain that if the duchess had realized what was happening, she would not have allowed it. Even the viscount’s groom had mysteriously disappeared.

  They were moving very slowly, the chestnuts walking instead of trotting. Very odd for such a high-couraged pair. “Are we not dropping too far behind?” Caroline asked.

  “Believe me, you do not wish to arrive in London coated with dust. Or do you think I don’t know the way back to town?”

  “I think the duke and the duchess may not be best pleased,” Caroline declared with a sniff.

  “Ah-h, then I am accused of nefarious schemes?”

  “Of course not,” Caroline huffed, suddenly aware of just how much she had revealed by indicating she did not look on the viscount as a safely avuncular companion.

  “Then you were considering nefarious schemes?” Tony suggested, still keeping his horses at a walk.

  “Pray do not be absurd.”

  The viscount heaved an elaborate sigh. “Then you do not consider me the least bit dangerous?”

  “I know you do not wish to meet papa over pistols at dawn,” Caroline retorted.

  “Indeed not,” the viscount agreed with great sincerity. He dropped his hands, and the chestnuts broke into a brisk trot.

  After perhaps ten minutes of silence, Caroline managed to get her chaotic thoughts into line with proper social conversation. “Did you notice that somehow Mr. Trimby-Ashford managed to whisk Miss Bettencourt away from Sir Chetwin?” she said. “Truthfully, I had not thought he had it in him.”

  “Peyton has remarkably good taste. I confess I found Lady Harriet a bit . . .”

  “Forward?” Caroline supplied.

  “A flirt,” Tony agreed. “Much more in Chet’s line than Peyton’s.”

  “I understand Miss Bettencourt has very little dowry,” Caroline mused. “Will that matter?”

  “It was a picnic, Caroline,” Tony snapped. “Nothing but a picnic. Pray do not make a match out of one afternoon at Richmond Park.”

  “I beg your pardon.” Caroline’s tone was intended to freeze his bones. Men were quite abominable. She had only been attempting to make conversation. Rather than think about being alone with him on the long road back to London.

  But, of course, that didn’t happen. Two of the armed outriders came charging back in a cloud of dust, announcing that the duke had sent them to ensure the safety of the tail end of their procession. Very few words were exchanged between Viscount Frayne and Lady Caroline on the remaining miles back to town.

  ~ * ~

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Caroline, please attempt to look inte
rested, even if you are not,” the Duchess of Longville said with a sigh as they exited their carriage in front of Almack’s.

  Truthfully, Lady Caroline Carlington was scowling because she did not wish anyone to know how fiercely she was willing away the butterflies cavorting in her stomach. An unexpected and unwanted reaction to this pinnacle of the ton that placed her, willy-nilly, on the same level with all the other silly young things displaying themselves on the marriage mart. She was not hunting a husband. Husbands brought nothing but grief. Countless times her mama had told her so. Yet here she was, escorted by a father who looked as inexorable as he was austerely handsome and distinguished. He did not even seem to mind the patronesses’ inflexible rules that dictated he must wear knee breeches and carry a tricorne beneath his arm in the fashion of the previous century.

  Caroline swept another glance at her father as he waved the ladies ahead of him toward the entrance to Almack’s. No . . . even in knee breeches, the Duke of Longville was no eighteenth century gentleman. No long colorful velvet or satin coat graced his broad shoulders. Her father’s jacket was of black superfine wool, waist-length in front, dropping to squared tails in the back. His waistcoat gleamed with silver thread woven into the white brocade and punctuated by a short row of intricately entwined silver buttons. A single perfect diamond sparkled in his equally perfect cravat, tied in a Trone d’amour.

  Lady Caroline stifled a sigh. Her father was impressive. And in the matter of his daughter’s come-out, he was as inexorable as a mail coach on a downhill run. His daughter would make her debut at Almack’s. She would have a proper come-out ball at Longville House. She would give serious consideration to the array of London’s finest young gentlemen who would undoubtedly flock to her side.

  He wished to be rid of her. So he might have more time with his bride, the great gawk.