A Most Suitable Duchess

by Patricia Bray

  An hour passed, and then another. It was after noon when Marcus found at least some of the answers he sought, in the person of Mr. Stephen Wolcott.

  Marcus had been surprised when Mr. Campbell informed him of the identity of his caller. After a moment’s consideration he directed that Mr. Wolcott be shown into the small library, and there Marcus joined him.

  “Your Grace, I hope you will forgive my presumption in coming here unannounced. I promise I will only take a moment of your time,” Mr. Wolcott said.

  Marcus found himself at a loss. He had spent the past hours trying not to imagine Penelope lost in another gentleman’s embrace, only to be confronted by the very man he suspected of seducing his wife. Looking at Mr. Wolcott, whose immaculate grooming could not hide his thinning hair or growing paunch, it was impossible to imagine him seducing anyone. Nor would he credit him with having the gall to bed a duchess in the morning and then call upon her husband in the afternoon.

  Perhaps it had all been a product of his jealousy. Perhaps there was an innocent explanation, and when Penelope returned she would be able to set his mind at rest. Someday he would laugh at how he had allowed himself to be carried away by foolish imaginings. For the first time in hours he found himself beginning to hope.

  “I can spare a few moments,” Marcus said. “Although I am at a loss to know why you would want to see me. My wife is the scholar of our house, and she is presently not at home.”

  “I know Penelope is not here,” Mr. Wolcott said. “For she is the reason I have come.”

  Marcus’s world came crashing down. And perhaps the simplest explanation was the truth.

  “Yes?” Marcus asked, affecting a bored tone. He leaned back in his seat, stretching his legs out in front of him.

  “You may have noticed that Penelope and I have a rather…warm friendship,” Mr. Wolcott insinuated.

  It made his skin crawl to hear this worm use Penelope’s name.

  “My wife has many friends,” Marcus observed.

  “But only one with whom she has become intimate. One who shares her special passions, as it were.”

  A red haze covered his vision. Marcus’s fists clenched, giving lie to his pretense of unconcern. He wanted nothing more than to wipe the leering smirk from Stephen Wolcott’s face with his fists. But he held his temper, waiting to see what else Mr. Wolcott would say.

  “Others have noticed our closeness, as well,” Stephen Wolcott continued. “It is only a matter of time before our connection is common knowledge. And then there will be no avoiding scandal.”

  “I do not believe you,” Marcus said reflexively, clinging to the hope that Penelope had not betrayed him.

  “What else did you expect?” Stephen asked. “Your wife is a beautiful woman, left on her own in the city. Of course it was only a matter of time before she took a lover. You are fortunate that I have been so discreet. And that I am willing to be accommodating.”

  Discreet? Accommodating? Was this man insane, implying that he had somehow been noble in his treatment of Penelope? Did he not realize that even now Marcus was holding on to his temper by only the barest of margins?

  “Accommodating how?”

  “For a small consideration, I would be willing to leave Scotland, and return to my travels. Say ten thousand pounds? A gift of patronage, as it were. With such a sum I could support myself for several years.”

  “Ten thousand pounds seems a high price to pay to avoid scandal,” Marcus said. “You must think highly of yourself.”

  “On the contrary, it is quite cheap. Think of it as an investment in your family’s future. After all, you don’t want there to be any doubt about the legitimacy of your heir, do you?” He gave a knowing leer. “Truly I am being quite considerate. Penelope is so besotted with me that I am certain she would give me far more than ten thousand pounds in gifts, were I to stay in Edinburgh and enjoy her friendship.”

  “She would do no such thing,” Marcus countered, for the sake of arguing.

  “I see you know little of her character,” Stephen said. “Really, what else did you expect? Only a lightskirt would have answered that lunatic advertisement of yours. She always had her eye on the main chance. If it was not me, it would have been someone else.”

  Marcus’s restless hands stilled, and he looked down at the floor. Mr. Wolcott’s words echoed in his mind. He looked up, feeling a smile break across his face.

  “On the contrary, it is you who have demonstrated your ignorance of my wife,” Marcus said. “In every way.”

  Mr. Wolcott had made a fatal error. He had been halfway to convincing Marcus of Penelope’s guilt, his sly insinuations fed on by Marcus’s own guilty suspicions. But there was one thing that Mr. Wolcott did not know. Penelope had not written in answer to the advertisement. Indeed, Marcus had been the one to persuade her into this marriage.

  He did not know what Mr. Wolcott’s game was, but he was damned if he was going to play along.

  “I believe our business is concluded,” Marcus said, rising to his feet.

  Mr. Wolcott rose as well. “And our arrangement?”

  “There is no arrangement,” Marcus said. “I will not dignify your slander. You may count yourself lucky that I allow you to take your leave. Should you ever call on this house again, poet or not, I will call you out.”

  “You will regret this,” Mr. Wolcott said. “I will cause such a scandal that it will ruin you and your wife.”

  Marcus shook his head. “I advise you to think very carefully before you do anything rash,” he said, allowing all of his pent-up anger to seep into his tone. “Do not mistake me for one of your literary set. I am a man of deeds, not of words. Threaten me or my wife again, and I will make you suffer. Is that understood?”

  Mr. Wolcott paled as Marcus stepped closer, allowing his sheer physical bulk to intimidate the smaller man. It gave a brief satisfaction. Beating Mr. Wolcott to a bloody pulp would be more satisfying, but doing so in his own library would undoubtedly lead to just the sort of scandal that Marcus was trying to avoid.

  “Is that understood?” Marcus repeated.

  “Yes,” Mr. Wolcott hissed, turning on his heel and stalking from the room.

  Marcus watched him go with a sense of satisfaction. He owed Penelope the chance to make her own explanations for her behavior. He would trust in her to tell him the truth.

  Sixteen

  Penelope’s heart was heavy as she returned to the house at Charlotte Square. She handed her wrap to the waiting footman, and untied the strings to her bonnet.

  “Lord Torringford wishes to speak with you, at your convenience,” the footman said.

  “I will see him at once,” Penelope said. Postponing their discussion would only give her more time to fret. “Is my husband in his study?”

  “I believe he is in the library,” the footman said.

  “Then I will meet him there. Oh, and has my maid Jenna returned?”

  “Yes, some time ago.”

  Jenna had accompanied her as she called upon Mr. Wolcott. It had made her skin crawl to see him again, but she dared not put her answer in a letter, which he might later try to use against her.

  Their encounter had been brief and acrimonious. Penelope had flatly refused to pay the blackmail he demanded, insisting that her innocence was the only protection she needed. She mocked his threats, reminding him that she and Marcus had already survived one great scandal, and that there were few who would give credence to any tales he might care to spread.

  It had been a brave performance, but after she left his rooms, Penelope had begun to shake. Her brave words had masked the real fear she felt inside. Mr. Wolcott could indeed blacken her name, if he tried. After all, she had given him plenty of ammunition by allowing him to appear so frequently as her escort. But it was not the blackening of her name she feared, so much as it was the damage his accusations could do to her marriage.

  She had even thought about giving in, and paying the money he demanded, though she had no idea h
ow on earth she would obtain such a sum. But after a long and sleepless night she had rejected the idea. She knew better than to suppose that five thousand pounds represented the sum of his ambitions. If she gave him the money now, he would return again and again, until he bled her dry.

  And if Marcus ever discovered that she had paid blackmail, it would seem confirmation of her guilt.

  Jenna had waited outside as Penelope met with Mr. Wolcott. Her presence was a comfort, even though the maid could not hear the conversation; still, bringing her there paid at least lip service to the forms of propriety.

  After meeting with Mr. Wolcott, she had sent Jenna home. There was one more person she needed to speak with, and for this encounter she wanted no witnesses. And indeed the doctor confirmed what she had suspected for these past weeks, and now she had another dilemma. How ever was she to break the news to Marcus? Her timing could not possibly be any worse.

  The footman cleared his throat, and Penelope gave a startled jump as she realized she had been standing in the entryway, lost in her thoughts.

  “Thank you,” she said, dismissing him.

  She made her way to the library, and found Marcus pacing back and forth on the small carpet before the unlit fireplace. As he glanced at her, she realized that he looked weary, almost as weary as she herself felt.

  “Are you feeling better?” he asked.

  “Yes, thank you,” Penelope said. “Well enough that I needed to take care of some errands that would brook no delay.”

  “Please, take a seat,” Marcus said. “You still do not look well. I do not think it was wise for you to be up and about today.”

  Penelope sank down on a padded chair. Marcus took his seat directly across from her, pinning her with his gaze.

  She took a deep breath and gathered her courage, realizing that the time had come for her to speak.

  “I fear I have been most unwise,” Penelope began. “And I need you to hear me out before you pass judgment.”

  Marcus nodded gravely. “I am listening.”

  Penelope clasped her hands in her lap. “I believe I told you when we first met that as a girl of sixteen I had once been in love? Or at least back then I thought it was love.”

  Now she knew it had not been love. It had been nothing but a foolish infatuation on her part. But knowing such did not assuage the hurt.

  “In my youthful folly I might have indeed ruined myself. But my father, far wiser than I, made arrangements for the gentleman to disappear from my life. He paid him to leave Edinburgh. The gentleman was Stephen Wolcott.”

  “I see,” Marcus said. His tone was even, but he would not look her in the eye.

  “I never knew what my father had done,” Penelope said. “I spent years convinced that I had lost my own chance for true love, and then Mr. Wolcott reappeared.”

  “You discovered you were still in love with him,” Marcus said in a low voice.

  “No, I knew there could be nothing between us but friendship. That is what I wanted, and what I thought he wanted as well. But it seems he wanted more.”

  “He wanted to be your lover.”

  If only it had been that simple. But Stephen Wolcott’s passions had been far colder.

  “He wanted my money. Or, rather, your money,” Penelope explained, looking at the patterned carpet as she revealed the full extent of her humiliation. She could not bear to look at Marcus. Could not bear to see either condemnation or sympathy in his gaze.

  “He was not particular about how he got it. When I told him we could be no more than friends, he tried to blackmail me. Said that he would tell you we had had an affair, unless I gave him five thousand pounds. Naturally I refused. But I am afraid that he is not done making trouble. I do not know what to do, and so I need your help.”

  “Today his price is ten thousand pounds,” Marcus said slowly.

  Her eyes flew up to his face. “What? What do you mean?”

  Marcus nodded. “He came here today, demanding such a sum, or else he would go public with the scandal.”

  She swallowed hard, tasting bile. Stephen Wolcott had been here. He had already poisoned Marcus’s ears with his lies. The very thing she had feared most had come to pass.

  “And what did you tell him?” she asked. She was almost afraid to know. Afraid to find out that Marcus, like her father, had not trusted in her virtue. Had chosen instead to pay off the rogue, to protect what was left of her reputation.

  “I told him to go hang,” Marcus said.

  “Truly?”

  “Truly. I knew his accusations were false.”

  “But how? How did you know he was false? Even I was tricked by him. Twice.”

  “I will admit his words made me angry,” Marcus said. “And I was jealous. But then I realized that he did not know you. Not the way that I do. And that while you may have bestowed your friendship unwisely, you would not betray your husband.”

  “I did not betray you,” Penelope said. It was important that he know this. “There was nothing between us, except the foolish kisses I gave him as a young woman.”

  “I believe you,” Marcus said.

  She searched his face. He looked weary, but the grimness had left his expression.

  “So what do we do now?” she asked.

  Marcus rose, and crossed over to sit beside her on the sofa, taking her hand in his. She took comfort in his nearness, remembering the closeness that they had once shared. Perhaps it was not too late to find that closeness again.

  His thumb idly traced the back of her hand. “What shall we do? As for this Mr. Wolcott, we will ignore him. I have already warned him. Should he try to make trouble, I can deal with such as he.”

  If Marcus stood by her, then there was hope they could escape this mess unscathed. If Penelope and Marcus showed a united front, then Mr. Wolcott’s lies would be seen as no more than scurrilous slander, and swiftly forgotten.

  “And what about us?” Penelope asked. “Shall you go back to Greenfields once this is over?”

  “What do you want?” Marcus asked.

  It was time to speak her heart. She should have done so weeks ago, when they first returned to Edinburgh. Instead she had kept her silence, assuming that Marcus still planned to hold to the original terms of their agreement. A marriage of convenience, no more.

  She had been a coward, and she had paid the price, for Marcus had returned to Greenfields, leaving her alone in Edinburgh. Where, in her misery, she had allowed herself to be led into folly.

  Now she said what she should have said all those weeks ago.

  “I want to be with you. Here, at the Abbey, or even at Greenfields, if you will take me there.” Penelope bit her lip, then added, “There is one blessing to come from this affair. I realized that I am indeed in love with you.”

  Marcus squeezed her hand. “I, too, have a confession to make,” he said. “I lied about my reasons for coming to Edinburgh. I came here because I missed you. Because I realized I love you. I do not want you to be my duchess, I want you to be my wife.”

  Moments ago she had been in black despair, and now she felt an upwelling of joy within her. Marcus loved her. It was impossible. It was glorious. It was everything she had wanted, and had thought that she had lost forever through her folly.

  “Yes,” she said, as her face split in a foolish smile.

  Marcus leaned forward, and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around him, cherishing the feeling of his body pressed against hers, as he claimed her with his lips, the warmth of his passion washing away her fears.

  “Come home with me,” Marcus said.

  “Yes,” Penelope replied. “Our child should be born in the country.”

  Marcus drew back a moment. “Our child?”

  Penelope nodded. “I saw Dr. Harris this morning. It seems we will always have a reminder of those days at Torringford Abbey. I will have a child before the springtime.”

  “A son,” Marcus breathed.

  “Or a daughter,” Penelope said.

 
“Let us hope she has your beauty,” Marcus said.

  “And her father’s sense of honor,” Penelope replied.

  Epilogue

  The June sun shone brilliantly overhead as Reginald Heywood rode into the stableyard of Torringford Abbey. As he dismounted, he heard his name called out, and looked over to see his brother Marcus emerging from the main house.

  “Reginald,” his brother called again, striding across the cobblestones and embracing him. “I did not expect you until tomorrow at the earliest.”

  Reginald returned the embrace, and then stepped back. There were faint creases of tiredness around Marcus’s eyes, but his face was relaxed, and his smile open and unguarded. Marcus looked happy, he realized. Far happier than he could ever remember seeing him in these many years since their parents’ deaths.

  “The weather was fine, and I could not wait to see you,” Reginald said. “And my new niece and nephew. They are well, I trust?”

  “They are perfect. In every way,” Marcus said.

  “I stopped in Edinburgh on my journey, and there is a package of correspondence for you from McGregor,” Reginald said, nodding toward his saddlebags. “Plus I must tell you of the new works at Greenfields, and get your advice.”

  Marcus shrugged. “That can wait. Come, you must see the children for yourself. Penelope and the nurse have brought them out to enjoy the fine day.”

  Reginald followed Marcus through the stable yard, past the small kitchen garden, and onto the south lawn. They paused as they rounded the corner, Marcus’s eyes drinking in the sight before him.

  Colorful blankets had been spread on the grass, and on them sat Penelope and a young woman who must be the nursery maid. Each held a rosy-cheeked baby in their lap, while Princess, the beagle who had adopted Penelope, sat nearby, jealously guarding her mistress.

  “They look very fine, do they not?” Marcus asked.

  “They look beautiful,” Reginald said, feeling a sudden pang of envy. He did not begrudge Marcus the fortune and title he had inherited, but indeed he envied him his happiness. For it was clear that Marcus had found everything he wanted, in the company of his new wife and children. No wonder he wore the look of contentment.