Holly was becoming aware that it was no longer as easy as it had been to tell where the persona of the splendid duchess ended and just plain Holly began. It made things even more confusing.
The duke was already there when she arrived, and he wasted no time examining her form with unmistakable appreciation.
Holly looked resplendent in a gown trimmed with a delicate border of ivory lace. Her loveliness, which had snuck up on Strathavon, now held him wholly spellbound.
Her hair had been swept back and pinned high atop her head, except for a few curls, which fell loosely about her ears. She wore a single white lily, with a sprig of greenery, to complement the coiffure.
The innocence of her, the freshness of hope and fun, set his blood coursing through his veins. It was entirely possible that there was to be no cure for his condition after all.
Holly was quickly engaged in conversation with Lord Upton, Lady Raike and Lady Louisa Somerville.
Try as he might, Strathavon still did not understand the friendship between the two women. Holly, who had been brought up in the secluded and conservative village of Millforte, did not seem in the least to mind the scandalous connection.
In fact, they appeared for all the world as though they were the dearest of friends and completely in each other’s confidences. No doubt, Lady Louisa was to blame for Holly’s recent transformation, he thought darkly.
Sylvester watched her through several rounds of whist, and was disconcerted to see how easily Holly laughed and spoke with the other gentlemen and ladies of the company. Her involuntary smile lit up her face so much that it was almost like a second dawn.
What would it be like, he wondered, to raise children with such a woman? To fill the halls of Pontridge with her light until the whole house glowed from within?
His playing was deplorable all night, and it was only lucky that they were playing for trifles rather than fortunes. The duke could not seem to keep his attention on his cards.
“Ah, newlyweds,” sighed Lord Upton, with a world-weary look at Strathavon, once they had given up their places to some new players. “I suppose I ought to have expected it. Take care not to gape too much, my boy, or you’ll forget to breathe.”
The duke fixed him with an astonished stare – did the whole room think him some silly pup in love? Was foolish sentiment written so clearly upon his face?
Upton had the nerve to chuckle at him, evidently reading his mind. “Only to those who know how to read the signs, my boy,” he said, reassuringly.
Fortunately, the card portion of the evening drew to a close in favour of recitations. Bad poetry was just the thing to help Sylvester come back to his senses, he decided with relief.
*
The poetry came as a blessing to Holly also. Half-way through the evening, she had been singled-out by the newly-affianced Miss Carolyn Sanford on the grounds of having been recently married.
Miss Sanford would speak of nothing but wedding trousseaus. Holly’s lack of interest in the subject did not seem to matter to the young lady at all, as she expounded at length on all the undeniable merits of a gown of point d’Angleterre made entirely of lace, which she meant to wear to church for her vows.
As soon as poetry was announced, Holly made good her escape.
Chairs were brought in and arranged in in the shape of a horse-shoe, with another chair placed at the front for the celebrated poets to present their works in comfort.
Holly wondered if the duke would sit next to her, since his eyes had been devouring her all evening, but instead he chose to sit on the side facing hers. She did her best to ignore her disappointment.
After everyone was seated and Lady Raike introduced the upcoming entertainment, Verity volunteered to go first. She looked nervous, standing in front of the room with a little book which contained her compositions. She spoke with all the modest charm that must have earned her much praise from the elocution mistress when she had been at school.
Verity read out a pretty poem, an Ode to a Sunflower, and then Sir John seemed to gather his daring enough to read a new poem about a bumbling knight, though his eyes kept straying up from his own notebook to Verity’s face.
The young lady appeared to be listening to his latest offering very raptly, Holly noticed. When there was a break in the poetry, a story was called for instead.
“I believe,” said the young Lord Ivison, “that it is Lady Strathavon’s turn to tell a tale. Or a poem, if she prefers – she has sat so quietly among us all night!”
This statement was met with voiced approval, and a laugh from Holly.
Strathavon looked up from his conversation with an elderly matron just in time to see her cheeks pink and a glowing smile grace her lovely face. He could not help but be charmed by the fact that she was never too high in the instep to show a true enjoyment of society.
“Oh, very well, Lord Ivison – if I must,” she consented with jovial modesty. “Though I shan’t torment you with my sorry attempts at verses. That would be most unkind. A tale it shall be.”
“A tale of love, I hope!” exclaimed Lord Hargreaves. “Sir John’s poem has given me a taste for chivalry, I find.”
Holly took the reciter’s chair, straightened her skirts demurely, and shoot a mischievous smile at her audience as she did so.
“Alas, no, Lord Hargreaves. This is a tale of horror most dire, as told to me and my siblings by my nurse, when she was especially put upon by all our rowdiness. I’m afraid I have never cared for the milk and water school of stories about love – flowery, over-written things.”
“I have heard that one should never tell dishonest stories to honest ladies,” drawled Lord Myles Wooley indolently from his chair, fixing Holly with a look of challenge.
The company fell silent, waiting to see how the duchess would respond.
“In that case, Lord Myles, I wonder that you ever find the opportunity to speak,” said Holly, matching his challenging smirk with her own.
“Hah! Very good, Lady Strathavon!” exclaimed Hargreaves. “’pon my word, you deserved that one, Wooley.”
Lord Myles rose to his feet and bowed, though he levelled his eyes on Holly with unmistakable dislike, which she chose to ignore, turning to address her audience.
“Mine is a story for the entertainment of young masters and misses, so naturally it must be very dreadful.”
With that, she began her ghastly narrative. “In a little village, in a forgotten corner of Scotland, where the near-perpetual dark descends every winter…” It was a truly gruesome tale of a ghoul who prowled the night and stole the eyes of the wicked.
Much to her delight, Holly’s story succeeded in unsettling even her more esoteric listeners. After the story was told, they exchanged looks and quietly posited that one couldn’t be certain whether there was a shred of truth in such tales.
The company shuddered, and congratulated Lady Strathavon on having spun so ghastly a yarn that they were unlikely ever to be able to venture out of doors after dark again.
Despite himself, Strathavon had been completely unable to look away from Holly. She was a compelling story teller, her face and voice animated and chilling by turns. He was also impressed by the scope of her story, which was a far cry from the airy tales of love usually narrated by young ladies at such parties.
Watching her, he had wondered if he was the only one captivated, but the expressions on the faces of his fellow listeners made it plain that he was not. Strathavon wouldn’t ever had expected his wife to come up with such terrible tales.
“That was marvellous, Lady Strathavon,” declared Lord Hargreaves. “I shan’t be able to sleep a wink for weeks, for fear of your fearsome ghoul.”
“I wonder,” said Sir John. “Did the story have the desired effect when your governess told it?”
“It certainly did,” Holly laughed. “We were always much too frightened to be any more trouble by the time the story ended and for at least a fortnight after. As I recall, mama always felt unsettled by such an unh
eralded streak of good behaviour. ”
*
“If I didn’t know any better, my dear, I’d say you were plotting something with Sir John Compton,” said Lady Louisa casually on the carriage ride back to her townhouse. She shot Holly a look out of the corner of her eye, and Holly answered with a pleased smile of her own.
“Why, then, you would be correct. It is my hope and purpose to aid them in securing such a happiness as would be unparalleled all the world. Sir John, you see, is in love with Miss Verity Dacre, and I am convinced that Miss Dacre would love him too, if only she were to stop being so silly about imaginary heroes.”
Lady Louisa produced her fan absently as she considered.
“Love! Ah, yes, I am familiar with that notion. When I was not much older than you are now, I made an art of writing the most noncommittal love letters imaginable. It is a common problem for gentlemen to think themselves in love with ladies with whom they had but shared a single dance. That does not often lead to a very happy union once they are required to share a roof for an extended period of time,” said Lady Louisa. “I found that it never paid to give them false hope in that direction.”
Well, Strathavon had suffered no such delusions, Holly thought darkly.
“True, but I think Sir John and Miss Verity would suit remarkably well. They are alike of temperament and heart…”
When Holly finished recounting the entirety of the adventure, Lady Louisa nodded slowly, eyes narrowed.
“Yes, I do think you might have a point. Is that what your display with Sir John has been about? You have been sighted together remarkably often.”
Holly inclined her head. “Do you think me unconscionable?” she asked nervously.
“Unconscionable! Oh, no. I am duly impressed. You have taken to your part marvellously. There is no other way that poor Verity would notice your Sir John. You must make him fashionable. It would be doing her a favour. Lord Myles Wooley is the most dangerous kind of scoundrel, it ever I saw one. Underhanded scoundrels are the worst kind – especially handsome ones. And his ancestry is all trumped up, because Wooley thrives on deception. They say his grandfather made his fortune in the east.”
“The City?” asked Holly, surprised.
“Yes, a banker or a tradesman – so he has no grounds for the haute manner he has adopted towards everyone he perceives to be beneath him.”
Holly nodded in acknowledgement.
Lord Myles was a vain, over-dressed and unpleasant man beneath the gilded facade, and in Holly’s opinion he spent too much time at Mr Trumper’s the gentlemen’s perfumer of Mayfair. He always seemed to trigger an unladylike round of sneezing whenever he got too close to her.
He reminded her of nothing so much as Sir Fopling Flutter in The Man of the Mode, which she had seen with her mama during the Spring Season.
She had told Strathavon as much, when he had enquired about her embarrassing bout of sneezing at Lady Raike’s that evening, Holly recalled – it had very nearly charmed a smile out of him.
“Now, Sir John is a gentleman of the first distinction in character, fortune and lineage, I understand, though he is very quiet,” said Lady Louisa. “Yes, I do think you are correct: they would suit nicely. I wonder if you mean to tell your plan to the duke? He has taken a dislike to your baronet.”
“Well, he deserves to feel unsettled.”
“’ Pon my word, my dear, you are not at all kind to His Grace,” teased Lady Louisa. “I own the silly boy is quite in love with you. I wonder if he has realised it.”
These words summoned a smile to Holly’s face, and it was only a little uncertain around the edges. “I think so too. But I may yet be wrong – we shall see.”
“But shall we? He is very reserved. Now, I know you love the man, but I have to tell you that your Lord Strathavon exhibits the most appalling prudery I have ever had occasion to encounter. A great pity – for I understand he used to be a sporting lad, when he had the pleasure of being a younger son.”
“It is all to do with his brother’s passing, I think. Though I do not rightly know what happened,” Holly sighed. “I wonder if I shall ever know.”
Chapter 8
His Grace of Strathavon was nothing if not well known about town and his unexpected nuptials in the spring had been received with a great amount of curiosity.
Now that the world had had a chance to meet his chosen bride, he discovered himself to be lauded as the most fortunate man in London, to have taken to wife the beautiful, vivacious Lady Strathavon.
The journals could not seem to get enough of this illustrious pair, which was present at every significant social event of the Little Season.
Holly had taken society by storm with her modishness and wit. Strathavon was sure that in just a matter of weeks, everyone would be lying at her pretty feet. Provided she did not first elope with that tiresome baronet.
And that was another puzzle. Compton had always been quiet, reserved – and not the least bit a scoundrel. He had always been boring, in fact. What appeal could such a dull specimen have for Holly?
The journals had yet to pick up on that, but it was just a matter of time. Already they were speculating why, with the obvious attraction that sizzled between the duke and duchess, Her Grace stayed so long at the townhouse of her friend and spent so much time with Sir John Compton.
That piece had been the final straw as far as the duke was concerned.
If the foolishness were allowed to continue, she would land herself, indeed, both of them, in the most appalling scandalbroth, Strathavon told himself firmly. It was his duty to stop her and protect the honour of the family name.
His decision had nothing at all to do with his maddening desire to have her under his roof, and in his bed – it was mere common sense. It was the only way to put an end to all the speculation.
Holly had done things to his heart which were completely intolerable, and she should not be allowed to go on in that vein – at least not while summarily living under any other roof but his.
And that was precisely why he turned up at Lady Louisa’s townhouse for the second time, and demanded that his wife stop making them both ridiculous and move into his house on St James Street as she ought to have done from the first.
Holly had been about to go out for a walk, but she received him in the little drawing room, looking every inch an empress and inviting him to walk with her.
The look she levelled at him upon receiving his command nearly stopped his heart. She looked fierce and lovely. He wondered how he had ever considered her placid and ordinary.
Stopping in the middle of Park Street, Strathavon’s hands seized her blue silk mantalet, and Holly looked in astonishment into his frantic eyes, wondering if he meant to draw her into his arms right there.
“My dear husband,” she said, “I daresay you are about to make a spectacle. I beg that you do not – it would make us the talk of the town.” Holly had to admit to herself that she enjoyed crossing swords with the man.
He seemed at a loss of what to say, now that he had her attention.
Then he recovered himself and stepped back, while Holly adjusted her cloak. “We are already the talk of the town, and it is entirely your fault.”
“Mine!” she said with a look of appalled innocence.
“Quite so. It was shockingly infamous of you to flee Pontridge as you did! And now this business with the damned baronet…”
“Flee? I don’t recall fleeing. I simply removed to London, to visit with a friend. Lady Louisa, in fact, with whom I think you are acquainted. I found that incarceration is not much to my taste.”
“Lady Louisa, you say! Lady Louisa Somerville is nothing more than a thoroughly immoral meddling baggage!” Strathavon declared angrily. “I expect that she is to blame for this, too.”
Holly chuckled at that. “You mean to be rude, I believe, but Lady Louisa would be very diverted to hear you say that. Besides, you said this was entirely my fault.”
“It is – and she put yo
u up to it. Incarceration! I don’t recall ever making you my prisoner.”
“Indeed. That is why I chose to move here.”
“Then you won’t mind moving again. You will return with me to St James Street – we won’t have any more of this nonsense. My duchess living elsewhere! And racing in the park.”
“Oh, are you still in a temper about that little incident?”
“All of London has heard of it.”
“I wonder,” she said, with in infuriatingly unhurried air, “if you mean to give another scold for it?”
His eyes locked with hers and her gaze was involuntarily drawn to his thin, sensual lips.
Remembering their encounter at Hyde Park, Strathavon wanted nothing more than to kiss some sense into his erstwhile bride.
“We’ll just have to see about that,” he growled and marched her back to Lady Louisa’s before he really did make a spectacle of them.
It did not help matters that Holly looked supremely smug all the way back. He had the unmistakable feeling that he had only succeeded in marching her home because she had let him.
*
When Lady Louisa returned to Park Lane from her midday engagement, Holly wasted no time in asking her advice.
She could not seem to decide what she ought to do. To be in such proximity to Strathavon might just help her cause – but there was also the chance that it would drive her distracted. And she didn’t wish for him to think that he could simply move her around on a whim.
“And so he is demanding that I move to St James Street, to live with him as a proper wife should,” Holly said, frowning. “Only I am not at all certain I should care to do so. I also suspect, from what he has said, that there will be a scene if I do not. But such a prodigious uproar would injure his nerves much more than it would mine.”
“How very droll. Well, dear, I think you ought to linger here a few days longer – it would help make a point. And a little torment has never hurt a love affair. Once he is quite distracted, you may do him the singular honour of returning under his protective mantle. ”
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