The Husband Hunters

by Barbara Cartland

  From the moment they appeared at the Devonshire House party there was no doubt as to their success.

  Andrina listened proudly to the flattering remarks that were made to her about Cheryl and Sharon and, although she was often included in the almost overwhelming flattery, she told herself that it was just politeness and that she was of little importance beside her younger sisters.

  And yet she found people were far more interesting to talk to than she had expected.

  That first evening she sat next to the Duke of Wellington at dinner. She was thrilled, as she had always longed to meet the man she had admired all her life.

  He was extremely pleasant and she was not to know that the Duke had always had an eye for a pretty woman and was well known for his amatory affairs even though he was discreet about them.

  She told him how her father had spoken of the battle of Assaye and how brilliant the Duke had been in command.

  “What brought me through many difficulties in the Mahratta War and in the negotiation for peace, was the British good faith and nothing else,” the Duke told her.

  Andrina noticed his flashing eyes and remembered that after Waterloo, she had read that Sir Alexander Frazer had said,

  “Cold and indifferent in the beginning of battle and, when the moment of difficulty comes, intelligence flashes from the eyes of this wonderful man and he rises superior to all that can be imagined.”

  On the other side of her she found herself neglecting the Earl of Crowhurst, which was inevitable in comparison with the Hero of Waterloo.

  He was not attractive, in fact Andrina thought he was ugly and there was something debauched about the deep lines under his heavy-lidded eyes and the fullness of his sensual lips.

  As she was so busy talking to the Duke, she did not have any conversation with him until the dinner was well advanced and, when at last, remembering her manners, she turned to the Earl, he said,

  “You have been ignoring me, Miss Maldon, and I am extremely piqued about it!”

  “Please forgive me if I have seemed rude,” Andrina pleaded, “but I was so thrilled to meet the Duke of Wellington. My father has talked of him ever since I was a child and I have read about every battle in which he has ever taken part.”

  “I have fought on different battlefields,” the Earl remarked, “but in my way I have been equally successful!”

  “In what battlefields has that been?” Andrina enquired.

  “That of love!” he replied.

  He saw the surprised look in her eyes and added,

  “You are very beautiful, Miss Maldon, as I am sure an army of men have already told you!”

  “On the contrary, my Lord,” Andrina replied, “I have only just arrived in London and in the country people are not so outspoken.”

  “Is it true the noble Duke is setting up a nursery in Broxbourne House?”

  “If you are referring to the fact that he is introducing my sisters and me to Society,” Andrina answered coldly, “then it is!”

  The Earl looked across the table at Cheryl and then at Sharon.

  “I must compliment Broxbourne on his excellent taste! Where could he have found three such exquisite creatures?”

  Andrina felt that this was dangerous ground and said quickly,

  “We are relatives of the Duke, but will you not tell me about yourself, my Lord?”

  “As long as I may talk about myself and you, that is all I ask,” the Earl of Crowhurst said softly, “and I want to talk about you, lovely lady!”

  There was a caress in his voice that made Andrina look at him a little apprehensively.

  Then she told herself that he was only like one of those tiresome old men who used to flirt with her when they called on her father.

  “Are you interested in horses, my Lord?” she asked, hoping that she could divert his attention.

  “I am interested only in the prettiest little filly I have seen for many years!” he answered. “And I have just learnt that her name is Andrina!”

  He went on paying her compliments and talking in a low intimate voice that made her feel embarrassed, so that in the end she was glad when dinner was finished and the Duchess took the ladies from the room.

  After dinner there was dancing and Andrina expected that the Earl would think himself too old to take the floor with the Duchess’s relatives, the young Cavendishes and girls who were mostly Cheryl and Sharon’s age.

  But he came up to Andrina as soon as the gentlemen had left the dining room and, although at first she refused, he finally persuaded her to dance a waltz that had been introduced to London after the War.

  Fortunately the girls, who all enjoyed dancing, had learnt the quadrilles, which Sharon informed them were all the rage and also the steps of the new Viennese waltz.

  “The Belle Assemblée” had reported that a highbrow party met daily at Devonshire House to learn dancing all over again.

  “I want to put my arm around you,” the Earl said. “Your figure is exquisite! I really think someone should sculpt you as Venus.”

  Andrina, unsophisticated though she might be, was quite aware of what he insinuated, and she stiffened in his arms and decided that she had taken a dislike to the Earl of Crowhurst.

  When they left Devonshire House, the Duke did not accompany them and they were alone in the carriage with Lady Evelyn when she exclaimed,

  “What an evening! You have all been a huge success! Cheryl, I could see that the Marquis of Glen was delighted with you and Andrina has certainly made a conquest of the Earl of Crowhurst!”

  “I hope not!” Andrina said quickly. “I think he is a horrible man!”

  “My dear child, he is a great catch!” Lady Evelyn said.

  “He has never been married?” Sharon asked.

  “Twice, as it happens,” Lady Evelyn replied. “His first wife died a year after they married when he was very young and his second wife had a bad fall out hunting three years ago. They tried to save her life, but had they succeeded she would have been a helpless cripple, so it was in fact far better that she should die.”

  “That was very sad for her husband,” Cheryl said, who was always touched by any tale of suffering or unhappiness.

  “He soon consoled himself,” Lady Evelyn remarked dryly. “At the same time, if he should be serious where you are concerned, Andrina, it would be a great feather in your cap! He is extremely wealthy and his estate in Hampshire is, I believe, magnificent!”

  “I am not interested in the Earl,” Andrina said coldly, “nor, for that matter, in anyone else. It is Cheryl and Sharon who must find nice husbands.”

  “Well, the Marquis of Glen is certainly nice,” Lady Evelyn remarked. “He is the oldest son of the Duke of Arkrae and is, of course, Scottish, but none the worse for that!”

  Andrina drew in her breath.

  How wonderful it would be if the Marquis should fall in love with Cheryl and she would eventually become a Duchess. It was what she had always longed for her to be.

  She had noticed the Marquis, a sandy-haired young man, dancing with Cheryl and had thought him rather insignificant. But he appeared quiet and polite and he would not, she thought with satisfaction, frighten Cheryl as someone like the Earl would do.

  Cheryl was, she knew, already frightened of the Duke. He was the type of man she did not understand and Andrina had made up her mind to keep her away from him as much as possible.

  Sharon was different. She was never in awe of anyone and as she had already said, she found the Duke fascinating.

  At the Devonshires’ party she seemed always to have two or three men standing around her, laughing at what she said.

  Andrina had never doubted that wherever Sharon went she would be a success.

  Then the thought came to her that perhaps Sharon might marry the Duke. If Cheryl was to be the Duchess of Arkrae, why should Sharon not be the Duchess of Broxbourne?

  It was certainly an idea and she wondered whether the Duke preferred fair or dark-haired women. If the for
mer, it might be very difficult to persuade Cheryl to consider him as a husband.

  Andrina’s thoughts about marriage for her sisters kept her awake long after she had gone to bed.

  The girls were tired after their long drive but, despite all that she and Lady Evelyn had done during the day and the excitement of dining at Devonshire House, Andrina found it impossible to sleep.

  Finally she rose from her bed and walked to the window.

  Her room looked out over the front of the house and, as she drew back the curtains, she saw a carriage coming up the short drive and turning beneath her under the pillared portico.

  It was the Duke returning home and she wondered where he had been. It must be three hours since they had left Devonshire House.

  Had he been to his Club? Or had he perhaps visited some lady who had been waiting for him when he was no longer socially engaged?

  Andrina knew, because she had listened to her father talking about it, that gentlemen were interested in actresses, in the singers at Vauxhall Gardens and in ‘ladies’, who might be very beautiful, but were not accepted by any social hostess.

  Was that the sort of woman, Andrina wondered, that the Duke had been to see at this hour of the night?

  She told herself it was very probable. After all, that was the sort of woman he had thought she was when he had kissed her in the parlour of the Posting inn.

  She felt herself once again growing angry at the thought.

  Then she remembered the strange feeling that his kiss had evoked in her, a sensation like forked lightning running through her body, a pain, then a pleasure that was indescribable.

  “How dare he?” Andrina asked herself aloud and abruptly pulled the curtains together again.

  Chapter Four

  Andrina looked round the ballroom with a feeling of triumph.

  Nothing could have been more impressive or magnificent than the ballroom at Broxbourne House decorated with garlands of white flowers and with the long French windows opening onto the garden, which glittered with fairy lights.

  The band was wearing a uniform of red with gold braid and the dancers were a spectacle in themselves from the glittering jewels of the ladies to the flashing decorations of the gentlemen.

  The Prince Regent had honoured the Duke by dining at Broxbourne House and they had sat down forty to dinner. Afterwards two hundred guests had arrived, all of them, Andrina knew, among the most important and distinguished people in London.

  Watching the dancers, she thought that Cheryl had exceeded all her hopes and expectations.

  Her gown of white gauze, decorated with tiny rows of lace caught up with small bunches of snowdrops, was the ideal frame for a debutante. And who, she asked herself, could be more beautiful than Cheryl when she was laughing and happy?

  Her golden hair glinted beneath the thousands of candles in the huge crystal chandeliers and her blue eyes turned upwards to look at her partner, the Marquis of Glen, were sparkling.

  Everything, Andrina told herself, was almost too good to be true.

  She thought the Marquis a somewhat ineffective man and he was certainly not good-looking compared with the Duke or with many of the other resplendent and handsome gentlemen in the room.

  But Cheryl liked him and was obviously not nervous or shy when she was with him and that was the first step in the right direction to her becoming a Duchess.

  There was a satisfied smile on Andrina’s lips as she looked round for Sharon to be replaced by a faint frown between her eyes.

  Sharon, in a gown of silver lace over a petticoat of silver lamé, looked exotic and exciting. Only the slimness of her figure and the look in her eyes revealed to those who were perceptive how young and innocent she was in reality.

  In her dark hair she wore two diamond stars, which glittered in the candlelight.

  Andrina’s only decoration was a wreath of pink roses that matched her dress and to look different from her sisters, her gown was of rose pink gauze over a pale satin, decorated only with small bunches of roses and velvet ribbons.

  A number of gentlemen, with lamentable lack of originality, had told her that she looked like a rose and she knew without conceit that the gown was very becoming.

  But Andrina had in fact hurried over her own toilette when dressing for the ball and she was supervising Cheryl’s when there was a knock at the door and without waiting for an answer Lady Evelyn joined them.

  “Can you imagine it possible, girls?” she asked. “I have just received a message from His Grace to say that we can wear any of the family jewels that take our fancy!”

  “The family jewels?” Andrina repeated and at that moment Sharon came in from an adjoining room.

  “That is just what I was thinking we lacked!” she exclaimed, having overheard what Lady Evelyn had said. “We are all very elegant, but we need the extra touch that only gems can give to make us really smart!”

  “That is exactly what I thought myself,” Lady Evelyn said. “At my age jewels are as important to a woman as the cosmetics with which she embellishes her complexion.”

  “Where are they?” Sharon asked.

  “I will show you,” Lady Evelyn answered with a smile.

  They all went downstairs to Mr. Robson’s office to find him waiting for them, having already received his instructions from the Duke.

  He opened a heavy iron door that was situated in a corner of the room and they saw what Andrina privately thought of as an Aladdin’s cave.

  There were shelves on which reposed leather, velvet and satin covered boxes and, when each one was opened by Mr. Robson, the jewellery they contained made them all gasp in astonishment.

  There was a set of sapphires and diamonds, which comprised an enormous tiara, a necklace, bracelets, brooches and rings and there were other sets equally magnificent in emeralds, rubies, diamonds and pearls.

  There were other pieces of jewellery, many of them historical, which had been brought into the family either through marriage or by being acquired by the various Dukes on their journeys abroad.

  Sharon went into ecstasies over each new jewel she was shown and even Cheryl seemed a little excited by them.

  “What shall we choose?” Sharon cried.

  “I should have liked to wear the sapphires,” Lady Evelyn said, “but alas they will not go with my gown. I always thought that they were the finest gems in the Broxbourne collection and I remember His Grace’s mother looking absolutely magnificent in them!”

  She turned to the secretary.

  “Is that not so, Mr. Robson?”

  “Her Grace was one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen,” he answered.

  “Will the Duke mind their being worn by anyone else?” Andrina asked.

  She was really speaking to Mr. Robson, but Lady Evelyn heard and intervened,

  “I see no reason why he should mind. His mother died when he was six and it is unlikely that he directly remembers her.”

  Andrina said nothing, but she felt quite sure that the Duke did remember his mother. After all, she could remember hers long before she was six and her father too in the years when he had been young and gay and always good-tempered.

  “I will wear the diamonds,” Lady Evelyn said with a last wistful look at the sapphires.

  “Now, girls, what is your choice?”

  “I think all Cheryl will need is a small string of pearls,” Andrina said firmly. “I am sure that it would be incorrect for a debutante to wear much jewellery.”

  Lady Evelyn gave her a little smile.

  “You are quite right, Andrina. I should have said that, not you. It would be ostentatious and in bad taste. A string of pearls would be perfect for Cheryl.”

  “I want something that glitters,” Sharon insisted firmly.

  “Why not these, Miss Sharon?” Mr. Robson suggested.

  He opened another box and inside they saw two brooches shaped like stars and glittering with blue-white diamonds.

  Andrina fixed them in Sharon’s hair and
they certainly much enhanced her appearance and were in perfect harmony with the glittering silver of her gown.

  “And what about you, Andrina?” Lady Evelyn asked.

  Andrina shook her head.

  “I have no need for jewellery,” she said. “There is a wreath that goes with my gown and that is all I require.”

  She spoke so firmly that nobody argued.

  Then having thanked Mr. Robson they returned upstairs.

  “Why did you not choose a pretty bracelet?” Cheryl asked when they had reached the bedrooms.

  “It would only be hidden by my gloves,” Andrina answered her quickly.

  She could not explain to Cheryl or to anyone else why she felt a reluctance to accept the Duke’s offer of appearing in the Broxbourne jewels.

  She somehow felt it was too incongruous to wear something that was so closely connected with him personally when she knew that she disliked him and that he, as he had said himself, had embroiled himself in their ‘crazy senseless scheme’ against his better judgment!

  It was different where Cheryl and Sharon were concerned. She was the one who had forced the Duke into agreeing to introduce them to the Social world and in consequence she would not accept from him anything that was not entirely necessary.

  Looking at Sharon now Andrina realised that she was dancing for the second time that evening with a tall and handsome Russian whom they had met at Almack’s.

  It had been Sharon who was almost too excited to speak when on Wednesday night Lady Evelyn had told them they were to visit Almack’s.

  The Temple of the Beau Monde about which she had read in her magazines and which was the most exclusive, most select place in London, was to open its doors to them and they were on the list!

  It was, Andrina had thought at first sight, disappointing after so much had been said and written about it.

  A suite of assembly rooms in King Street, St. James’s, it seemed a quite ordinary place of entertainment with refreshments consisting of lemonade and tea, bread and butter and stale cake, until one looked at those who were being entertained.

  Lady Evelyn, of course, knew everyone and she had already told her charges on the way to Almack’s how fortunate they were to have received their vouchers from Lady Cowper within a few days of arriving in London.