“Please – don’t ask so many – questions,” she stammered. “Just let me get out when we – arrive and forget I have ever been – here and you have ever – seen me. It will be – embarrassing for you – otherwise.”
“You mean when I am called to give evidence,” the Duke persisted.
“This has – nothing to do with – you.”
“But you have made it my problem and something that I have to solve,” the Duke said, “Janeta, do be sensible. Now that you have told me so much, tell me the rest.”
“I cannot – say anymore – I must not!” she whispered.
The Duke put out his hand, and unexpectedly took her chin in his fingers.
She made a convulsive little movement and then was very still.
He saw that she was looking up at him with huge frightened eyes and he could feel her whole body trembling.
“Now tell me,” he said, “who you are and I intend to have an answer.”
Just for a moment he thought that she would defy him.
Then in a voice he could hardly hear she said,
“Lady Brandon – whom you have just been visiting is – my stepmother!”
“Then you are Lord Brandon’s daughter by his first wife!”
“Yes.”
“I had no idea that he had any children.”
“He had only me,” Janeta replied, “and because Stepmama hates – me I have been kept away at school for the – last four years.”
“How old are you?”
“I am eighteen.”
“Eighteen?” the Duke repeated. “And with all your life in front of you, you want to destroy it!”
“You – don’t understand.”
“Then make me understand.”
“She – she says I am to marry a horrible – cruel man over whom I think she has some – hold. He is very old – and lives near Papa’s house in the country. He has a – reputation that – frightens me.
“And you say he wants to marry you?”
“Stepmama found him trying to – kiss me. I was struggling and – fighting against him – and after that she talked to him and he told me I was to – m-marry him.”
“And you refused?”
“I told him I would not do so – then I came to London to tell Stepmama that it was something I could not do.”
“What did she say?”
“She said I had to, that I had no choice because she would make me – and I know that I would rather – die!”
The Duke was silent, thinking over what Janeta had said to him.
After a moment, as if she felt that she must explain herself, she said,
“Last night I went into Hyde Park – but there were so many people by the Serpentine and – a man spoke to me. I was – frightened – so I ran home.”
“You went to the Park alone!” the Duke exclaimed. “How could you do anything so foolish?”
“I could not think of – anywhere else. It seemed a long way to the Thames,” Janeta said simply.
The Duke did not speak and after a moment, as if she felt that she must go on explaining, she said,
“Tonight I was looking out of a window at the front of the house and wondering whether if I went back to the Park much later – there would be nobody there. Then I heard what you said to your footman – and that was why I hid here in your carriage.
“Now, listen, the Duke said. “I understand your problem, but surely you don’t have to marry this man whom your stepmother has chosen for you? Why do you not talk to your father?”
“For one thing, I don’t think that Papa – would listen to me. He was always disappointed because I was not a boy. I think that was – why he married – again.”
The Duke thought that this was very likely the truth and he said,
“All the same I cannot believe that he would force you into marrying an old man who you say is someone you dislike.”
“Papa always does what Stepmama wants of him,” Janeta said, “and I would much rather – die than marry Major Hodgson.”
“Is that his name?”
“Yes. He bought a house near ours – and our grooms told me that he is cruel to his horses and beats them – unmercifully.”
She paused and then said in a voice that was little above a whisper,
“Also one of the maid-servants told me that he was – said to have – beaten his wife, which was why she – died.”
The Duke felt his anger rising.
If there was one thing he loathed more than anything else, it was cruelty and there was nothing crueller than sending a child who had heard such stories about a man into his keeping.
‘What can I do?’ he asked himself. ‘What the devil can I do about her? Or, for that matter, myself?’
Chapter two
They drove on for a short while in silence until the Duke said,
“Why have I never heard about you before?”
He thought, although he was not sure, that Janeta drew in her breath before she replied,
“Stepmama did not want to – acknowledge that I even – existed. That was why I was sent away to school four years ago and not allowed to come – home for the – holidays.”
“For four years!” the Duke exclaimed.
He could hardly believe such a situation was possible, but Janeta went on.
“I was quite happy with the nuns, but it was very lonely being the only girl who – appeared to have no family.”
The Duke calculated that she must have been fourteen when she went to school and he asked,
“How old were you when your mother died?”
“I was twelve,” Janeta replied, “and for two years it was unutterable misery being – without her. Then after Stepmama arrived I was always – afraid.”
“Afraid?” the Duke questioned in surprise.
There was no answer and yet he felt her shiver in the same way she had when she spoke of Major Hodgson.
Perceptively he then asked,
“Are you saying that your stepmother was cruel to you? Did she beat you?”
“She – hated me because I was – Papa’s daughter,” Janeta murmured in such a low voice that he could hardly hear her, “and she beat me – herself and engaged a Governess for me who was also very – unkind.”
There was a pain in the young voice that the Duke had never expected to hear in a woman and he said quickly, as if he could not bear to think about it,
“It must have been a relief to go to school.”
“I was ill and our doctor – insisted I leave home,” Janeta explained. “I think he – understood what was – happening.”
There was silence as they drove on and the Duke was thinking of the intolerable position that Janeta had found herself in.
He could understand that, having been frightened by being beaten by her stepmother, now to be told that she had to marry a man who was cruel and had a reputation of using a whip on his animals would terrify any woman, let alone someone so young, sensitive and vulnerable as the girl beside him.
As if she knew what he was thinking, Janeta said suddenly,
“You must not – worry over me. Just let me do – what I want to – do and forget you have – ever met me.”
“That is impossible,” the Duke replied. “Quite impossible! Now we have met and talked, Janeta, you must understand that as I am not entirely without a conscience, I should feel that your death, since that is what you are contemplating, was entirely my fault.”
“How could it be?” Janeta asked. “I know now it was very wrong of me – to hide in your carriage, but I did not think for a moment that you would find me.”
“I expect it was Fate, or perhaps God, who was determined you should not do anything so wicked as to destroy yourself,” the Duke said severely.
Janeta gave a little gasp.
“Surely you must understand, there is no – alternative?” she asked. “Stepmama told me I must go back to the country today and – agree to marry Major Hodgson at the – end o
f the month.”
Her voice trembled and then she added,
“She told me that if I did not – obey her, she would make me – sorry I had ever been – born.”
There was no doubt from the way she spoke that the threat had terrified her and the Duke knew that once again she was thinking of being beaten.
It was nothing unusual for parents to beat their children or to allow their Tutors and Governesses to do so, but he could understand that for anyone so frail as Janeta, it would be a torture that would hurt her mentally as well as physically.
He did not know why he was aware of this, although he had been unable to see her properly.
Yet from the way she spoke and from her proximity sitting beside him, he was acutely aware of her as a person and what he was thinking about her was true.
He felt he could, although it seemed strange, look beneath the surface and be aware of her as an individual in a way that he could not explain.
It was then he became aware that they were driving past a high brick wall and a moment later the horses turned in through the impressive wrought-iron gates that formed the entrance to The Castle.
It seemed extraordinary that the time had passed so quickly. Yet the Duke knew that he had been so intent on thinking about Janeta that he was surprised to find himself home without being bored as he usually was by the long drive from London.
But now they were back, he had to think quickly as to what he should do about Janeta.
As she was thinking the same, she turned towards him and said,
“Let me – go.”
The words were a little more than a whisper and the Duke said firmly, his voice almost ringing out in the closed carriage,
“No!”
She turned towards the window and he knew without her speaking that she was planning, once the carriage came to a standstill, to run away before he could stop her.
He put out his hand and covered hers, feeling her fingers quivering in his grasp like the fluttering of a small frightened bird.
“I know what you are thinking, he said, “and if you do run away, I shall be obliged, because of what I know you intend to do, to run after you. My servants will follow me and it will be extremely humiliating.”
Janeta drew in her breath and then she asked like a child who is afraid and unsure of herself,
“Then – what can I – do?”
“I suggest you stay with me as my guest,” the Duke replied. “Tomorrow we will talk over your position and I feel sure that I shall find a solution to your problem.”
“That is – impossible.”
“We will talk about it tomorrow,” he said firmly. “Nothing, and I mean nothing, is impossible!”
“But how can I – stay with – you?”
He smiled as he replied,
“Quite easily. Leave all the explanations to me. You will find that I am quite imaginative when I have to be.”
“You are very kind – but I know I should not have – involved you in – this.”
“But I am involved, Janeta,” the Duke said, “and now we are here, all you have to do is to obey me and go to sleep for what is left of the night.”
As the carriage came to a standstill outside the long row of stone steps that led up to the front door, he added,
“Give me your word of honour that you will still be here in the morning.”
Just for a moment Janeta hesitated, until, as the Duke’s fingers tightened on hers, she said with a little sob in her voice,
“I – promise.”
He knew from the way she spoke that she would keep her word and, as the door of the carriage was opened by a footman, the Duke stepped out and turned to help her alight.
He suspected the coachman and footman were looking at her in astonishment.
They walked up the steps, which were covered in red carpet, side by side, to where waiting in the hall was the butler and several footmen besides the Duke’s secretary, Mr. McMullen.
“Good evening, Your Grace,” Mr. McMullen said respectfully, but the Duke did not miss the slight expression of surprise in his eyes as he saw that his Master was accompanied by a young woman.
“Good evening, McMullen,” the Duke said. “I have brought with me an unexpected guest.”
As he spoke, he remembered that it would be a mistake to call Janeta by her name.
His servants, and he was sure McMullen also, would be aware of the time that he had spent with Lady Brandon and it was important that they should not connect Janeta with her.
He therefore gave Janeta the first name that came into his head as he said,
“Miss Scott has travelled down from London with me and will be staying for what is left of the night. Will you arrange that one of the senior housemaids sleeps in the dressing room next to her bedroom and tomorrow, unless she leaves us, I will arrange for a more conventional chaperone.”
“I understand, Your Grace. Shall I take Miss Scott up to her room?”
“Thank you,” the Duke replied. “I feel sure that she is as eager to go to bed as I am.”
“Will you come this way, Miss Scott?” Mr. McMullen asked, moving towards the staircase.
“Goodnight, Janeta,” the Duke said lightly. “Sleep well and don’t trouble to get up early in the morning.”
As she spoke, he looked at Janeta for the first time and saw that she was in a way very different from what he expected.
In the darkness of the carriage she had seemed so small and young that he had expected her to have the baby-face of a child even though she had told him that she was eighteen.
Now he saw that the huge eyes in her heart-shaped face were those of a young woman and, although her body was very slim, almost unnaturally so, the soft curves were those of maturity.
There was also, he thought, something very different about her from anyone he had ever seen before.
To begin with her eyes were a very dark blue and seemed even darker because in her fear the pupils were dilated and almost obscured the colour of them.
Her hair, as he had seen in the carriage, was fair, but not gold as he might have expected with blue eyes, but in the light of the candles almost silver.
It was a strange almost inhuman little face and, because she was frightened, Janeta reminded him of the spotted deer in the Park, who were always hard to tame and rushed frantically away at the first sight of a stranger.
As she looked at him with her large eyes, she seemed to be pleading with him not to leave her.
The Duke smiled at her reassuringly and she turned away to follow Mr. McMullen. But he sensed that every pulse in her body was tense as she walked up the stairway.
The Duke did not watch her for more than a second and then walked across the hall into the room in which he habitually sat when he was alone.
As he expected, there was a large amount of papers and correspondence waiting for him on his desk.
He crossed to the other side where there was a grog table on which he knew there would be an opened bottle of champagne awaiting his arrival, besides a plate of pâté sandwiches in case he should be hungry after his journey.
He was sure too, although he did not need it, that his under-chef, if not the Head Chef, was waiting in the kitchen in case he should require something more substantial.
He felt, however, the only thing he needed at that moment was a drink and he hesitated over whether he should have a strong brandy as being more appropriate for his feelings.
He, however, decided on the champagne and, pouring himself half a glass, drank it down without even tasting it.
Then, knowing that Janeta would have been looked after by now, he went up to his bedroom.
His valet was waiting for him and, having been with the Duke a number of years, he was aware that at this time of night he would not wish to talk.
He therefore assisted him silently and it was only when he left and the Duke was in the bed that he said,
“Goodnight, Your Grace. It’s real nice to have you home
again.”
It was, the Duke thought with a smile, the sort of thing that Travers would say.
Then, as he lay back against the pillows in the huge four-poster bed in which many generations of his ancestors had been born and died, the problem of Olive Brandon swept over him and it was like being immersed in the full force of a tidal wave.
He could almost feel her in the darkness menacing him.
He could imagine all too clearly how if she had her way and they came to The Castle as man and wife, she would be sleeping in the Duchess’s room and be reigning here and over all his other possessions.
Then he told himself that if he was forced to marry Olive, he would have to leave England never to return and his whole being cried out against leaving the house he loved, which was redolent of the history of the Chesters all down the ages.
Flags they had captured in battle hung in the Great Hall and as a boy they were the first things he looked for when he came home in the holidays.
The pictures of the Dukes who had reigned before him and the Earl before them hung on the walls in the Great Hall, up the stairs and in the Picture Gallery, which filled one wing of the house.
Portraits of their Duchesses hung beside many of them.
They had faces that were beautiful and distinguished, sometimes unattractive, but none of them, the Duke thought to himself, had the craftiness or the self-scheming of Olive Brandon.
“I will not marry her! I will not!” he shouted aloud in the darkness and felt as if he could hear her laughing scornfully in that silvery contrived manner he once thought attractive.
He knew now it should have warned him that everything about her was artificial and insincere.
Strangely, because he had not expected to sleep, he fell into a deep asleep while he was hating Olive Brandon with an almost fanatical hatred and awoke to feel exactly the same about her.
Although it had been nearly four o’clock in the morning when he went to bed, Travers, as usual, called him at eight o’clock and, as he bathed and dressed, the Duke was not the least tired, but preoccupied with the same problems that had beset him before he went to sleep.
He breakfasted alone and, when he was finishing his coffee, Mr. McMullen came into the room.
“My horses are waiting, McMullen,” the Duke said, “so it’s no use trying to delay me.”
The Love Trap Page 3
