The Truth About Love and Dukes

by Laura Lee Guhrke

  Dedication

  For my father, whose courage, resilience, and optimism inspire me every single day. I love you, Dad.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  About the Author

  By Laura Lee Guhrke

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Chapter 1

  London, July, 1892

  Henry Cavanaugh longed for a well-ordered life. As the Duke of Torquil, he had many responsibilities, and they would have been easier to manage with a private life that was well-ordered and predictable. Unfortunately for Henry, he had two unmarried sisters, an impecunious younger brother, and a hopelessly indolent brother-in-law. He also had a pair of nephews who adored driving nannies away and a mother with artistic inclinations. A well-ordered life never seemed quite within his grasp. Henry mourned this fact on a daily basis.

  Today was no exception.

  “Jamie, really,” he said, frowning at his late sister Patricia’s husband as the other man’s twin sons entered the room, whooping like savages. “Is a bit of peace and quiet at the breakfast table too much to ask?”

  “It is on this particular morning, apparently,” his sister Sarah put in, pressing her hands to her ears.

  Jamie gave a shrug as he reached for the marmalade, seeming disinclined to check his sons as they ran behind his chair around the end of the dining table. “Nanny Smith’s gone. Crept away with her things before dawn this morning, leaving only a note behind. What’s a widowed father to do in such circumstances?”

  “Nanny or no,” Henry replied, raising his voice to ensure he was heard above the din, “your children are your responsibility, and not, I should think, a particularly difficult one to manage.”

  “Says the man with no children,” Jamie countered as he spread marmalade on his toast. “Wait until you have sons of your own in the nursery,” he added, waving his knife in Henry’s direction. “You’ll sing a different tune then.”

  “I doubt it.”

  Across the table, his brother, David, gave a laugh. “And your duchess, when you find her?” he asked. “What if she proves difficult to manage?”

  “That won’t be a concern. When I marry, you may be sure I will choose a wife whose views are in accord with mine. Especially when it comes to the raising of our children.”

  “Oh, that’s what you’ll think. But once the honeymoon is over, you’ll find your notions of accord were an illusion. After six years of marriage, I barely get an agreeable word out of Carlotta.”

  Henry could have pointed out that very few people got an agreeable word out of Carlotta, but just then, Colin gave a shout, snatched two slices of toast from the sideboard, and tossed one to his brother, Owen, and Henry decided that if Jamie wouldn’t manage the boys, he would have to do it for him.

  “That will be enough, gentlemen,” he said as he stood up, his voice carrying all his ducal authority and cutting through the boyish ebullience of the twins. “Colin, Owen, cease this gamboling about the dining room at once.”

  The boys went still and a blissful silence came over the room.

  “You will go down to the kitchens,” he went on, “and ask Mrs. Deal—politely, mind you—to make you a proper breakfast. Afterward,” he added with a pointed glance at Jamie, “your father will take you for an outing in Hyde Park, and I will commence a search for your new nanny.”

  The groans the twins gave at the notion of yet another new nanny were stifled by Henry’s arm stretching toward the door. “Out,” he ordered and the two boys obeyed immediately. They even managed to maintain a respectful silence all the way to the baize door at the end of the corridor, but a muffled whoop just before the door banged shut told Henry that this enjoyable silence would not be shared by those below stairs, poor devils.

  “Well done, Henry,” his sister Angela approved, looking up as she turned the page of her morning newspaper. “Something needs to be done with those boys of yours, Jamie.”

  “Hear, hear,” Sarah and David echoed together, and faced with the staunch disapproval of his relations, Jaime had the grace to look abashed.

  “They’ve become absolute hellions, I know,” he said, gave a sigh and leaned back, raking a hand through his brown hair. “Patricia was much better about keeping them in line than I. On my own, I’m not sure what to do with them.”

  “Do what most widowers do,” David said carelessly. “Send them to school.”

  “Should I?” Jamie looked doubtful.

  “Why not?” David gestured to the footman for more kidneys and bacon. “School would sort them out soon enough. It kept all of us on the straight and narrow path. Well, two of us, anyway,” he added with a glance at Henry. “Torquil was born on the straight and narrow, and I doubt he’s ever veered off of it.”

  Henry paused, thinking of his one and only deviation from the straight and narrow, a deviation his siblings and the world knew nothing about. “And I never shall,” he said after a moment. Not ever again.

  “Anyway, I’m not sure school’s a good idea,” Jamie murmured, reverting to the subject at hand. “The boys are only eight.”

  Henry did not miss the questioning glance Jamie sent in his direction.

  “If you think it time for the twins to go to school,” he responded, “I will stand the fees, of course. But in my opinion, you are right to deem them too young yet. They should wait another two or three years. In the meantime—”

  “Good Lord!” Angela’s sudden ejaculation interrupted Henry before he could underscore the importance of discipline and routine to a peaceful home. And when he turned toward his sister, her dismayed expression reminded him that perpetual drama, not peace, was the routine, at least in his household.

  Angela leaned forward in her seat, a frown drawing her dark brows together. “It can’t be,” she murmured, still staring at the folded-back page in her hand. “It just can’t be. Mama would never . . .”

  Her voice trailed off, but just the mention of their mother was enough to send a ripple of disquiet through Henry. As far back as he could remember, Mama had always been his idea of the perfect duchess—a gracious hostess who worked tirelessly for charity, conversed intelligently on any subject, and performed her many duties in exemplary fashion. She was, in fact, the only member of his family who had never given him cause for concern. Of late, however—

  “Don’t keep us in suspense, Angela,” Sarah’s voice cut into Henry’s uneasy thoughts. “What sensation about our family has Society Snippets printed this week?”

  David made a sound of contempt. “That scandal rag? Why are you reading that, in heaven’s name?”

  “I—” Angela paused, turning to Henry, and in her eyes, the same pale gray eyes as his, he could see the reflection of his own growing apprehension. “This is Mama’s paper. I saw her reading it last night. On my way into breakfast, I found it with the morning papers, so I took it. I fancied it might be amusing to read a scandal sheet at breakfast. Amusing?” she repeated, her voice choking on the word. “What was I thinking?”

  “Whatever you’ve read that is causing you such distress, you’
d best tell me,” Henry advised. “Then, and only then, can I do something about it.”

  “I’m imagining things, I’m sure,” she said, but her voice was unconvincing.

  “Perhaps.” He braced himself. “But tell me anyway.”

  She nodded, lifted the paper higher, and began to read. “‘Dear Lady Truelove—’”

  A groan from David interrupted. “Do stop, Angela. Every time I visit my club, it seems the lads are reading that woman’s column—aloud to each other, if you please. Deuced distracting—”

  “David, stop rattling away,” Jamie admonished. “I fear something serious is in the wind. Keep reading, Angela.”

  Angela cleared her throat and began again.

  “‘Dear Lady Truelove, I am a lady of good society, highly placed within the ton. It is because of my rank that I find myself in an unbearable conundrum, and I am writing to you in the hope that you can help me resolve it. When I was young, a girl of only seventeen, I married a man twenty years my senior. I was not in love with this man—’”

  Angela broke off, her cheeks pink, clearly embarrassed to be reading such an intimate account aloud. In the pause that followed, she looked at Henry again, and the uneasiness in his guts deepened and spread.

  “Go on,” he said, his voice hard even to his own ears. “Read the rest.”

  Angela’s gaze dropped again to the newspaper in her hand. “‘Nor,’” she continued, “‘was I even particularly fond of him. I agreed to his proposal only at the behest of my family, for he was considered an excellent match for me. After many years in this loveless union, and having borne five children, I found myself a widow, and until recently, I was content with my situation. But now, in the autumn of my life, I have fallen in love, truly and completely in love, for the first time. The man whom I hold in such passionate regard, however, is not of my station. He is a painter, a brilliant artist—’”

  “What?” Sarah gasped. “So the gossip about Mama and Foscarelli is actually true?”

  Henry glanced around and appreciated that his youngest sister’s shock seemed to be shared by everyone at the table. But for his own part, he was not all that surprised. Loath as he was to admit it, the signs his mother was embroiled in an inappropriate liaison with the Italian painter had been there for months, yet he had chosen to believe his mother’s recent lessons in the painting of oils were borne of a desire for artistic expression, rather than desire of a more primitive kind. Suspicions to the contrary had been rattling around in the back of his mind, but he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge them. He thought of his own past indiscretions, and he appreciated just how his father must have felt on his behalf a decade ago.

  Slowly, he set down his knife and fork. “Go on,” he said again, and Angela complied.

  “‘For many months, I have tried to deny my feelings for this man, but I have come to accept that they are too strong for denial. He has proposed honorable marriage, and everything within me cries out to consent.’”

  Honorable marriage? Henry rolled his eyes. There wasn’t anything honorable about Foscarelli. He was a lothario of the worst description.

  “But what does she mean to do?” Sarah cried. “She can’t really be thinking to marry him. He’s Italian.” The last word was uttered as a devastated wail.

  “‘Needless to say,’” Angela continued, “‘my family would not approve—’”

  “She’s right about that,” David muttered.

  Angela paused again, giving an exasperated sigh. “If all of you keep interrupting, I shall never come to the end of this narrative. Do be quiet and listen.” She leaned forward in her chair and went on, “‘So, my dear Lady Truelove, the dilemma I face is this: should I suppress what I feel and refuse this man, as honor dictates? Or should I surrender to love, accept his proposal, and allow myself to be happy?’ Signed, ‘A Lady of Society.’”

  She lowered the paper, and in the silence that followed, all of them glanced at Henry, waiting for him to speak, reminding him of his duty as head of the family.

  “We don’t know that this lady is Mama or that the artist in question is Foscarelli,” he pointed out, trying to sound reasonable and logical, but the mere voicing of that man’s name in connection with his mother sparked his outrage and threatened to send reason and logic to the wall. And the idea that such a scoundrel would dare regard himself as worthy to marry their mama brought all Henry’s protective instincts to the fore.

  Still, as tempting as it was to find the notorious painter and thrash him within an inch of his life, Henry knew his first priority was to reassure his siblings, then determine the true facts. “That man has been linked with many women of society other than Mama,” he went on. “Sometimes accurately, and sometimes not, I imagine. As for the letter to this Lady Truelove, I daresay it is an invention, the product of a journalist with a vivid imagination and a salacious mind.”

  “But the similarities are so striking,” Sarah said, her voice faint. “If this is Mama, and if she were ever to marry that man . . .” She stopped, clearly too overcome by the horror of such a possibility to continue.

  “Any similarities have no doubt been taken straight from the gossip columns, Sarah,” he pointed out. “Mama’s lessons in art have been fodder for the gutter press all season, and that has obviously provided this Lady Truelove with the inspiration for her latest fictitious offering.”

  They all nodded in agreement, but Henry didn’t know if any of them were reassured. He certainly wasn’t.

  “I suppose we ought to hear the rest,” David said with a sigh, gesturing to the paper in their sister’s hand. “Carry on, Angela.”

  Their sister gave him a blank stare. “Carry on with what?”

  “It’s an advice column, isn’t it? What advice did this Lady Truelove have to offer?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Henry pulled the newspaper from Angela’s fingers, and set it to one side of his plate to be taken away by the footman, who would toss it into the dustbin where it belonged. “Let’s not validate this so-called journalist with another moment of our attention.”

  Despite his own words, Henry couldn’t resist a glance at the paper beside his plate as he picked up his knife and fork, and the reply of London’s most sensational columnist made him feel even grimmer than before.

  My dear lady, in matters such as this, what else can one do but capitulate to passion and follow one’s heart? Life is a short and often painful experience, and we must take our joy where we can find it . . .

  He looked away, suppressing a sound of disdain. Following one’s heart and capitulating to passion sounded so exciting, so appealing, but as he well knew, the reality of such a course was painfully different from the romantic picture painted by lurid writers such as this.

  The silence at the table pulled him out of his contemplations, and he looked up to find that no one had resumed eating. They were, instead, staring at him.

  “Mama is a sensible woman,” he said, impelled to offer further reassurances. “And discreet. She would never allow her private life to be put on display by writing such a letter. And however similar this fiction might be to her own situation, she’d never follow this silly woman’s advice anyway.”

  Those words were barely out of his mouth before a pointed cough intervened, and all five of them looked up to find the housekeeper, Mrs. Jaspar, standing in the doorway.

  She turned to Henry with an apologetic look. “Forgive me for interrupting your breakfast, Your Grace,” she said, “but Her Grace, the Dowager Duchess, is gone.”

  “Gone?” Henry frowned at this imprecise choice of words. “What do you mean? Gone where?”

  “We don’t know, Your Grace. But she is not in the house.”

  “She’s probably gone out. It’s a bit early, but—”

  He stopped as the housekeeper shook her head, her face taking on an apologetic cast, and he knew there was more to this than a shopping excursion or visit to a friend.

  “Mrs. Norton—that’s Her Grace’s maid—nev
er goes up until Her Grace rings the bell,” the housekeeper explained. “But when the clock struck half past ten, Mrs. Norton decided it would be best to go up and take a peek, as Her Grace might have been taken ill, you see. When Mrs. Norton went in, she found Her Grace was not there. The bedsheets had been turned down just as they always are, but the bed’s not been slept in.”

  “She’s done it, then,” Angela cried. “Oh, God, I knew it the moment I read—”

  Henry arrested this flow of words from his sister with one hand. A lack of discretion, even in front of long-trusted servants, was never a good idea. “And are you absolutely certain, Mrs. Jaspar, that our mother is not in the house?”

  “Oh, yes, Your Grace. We would never presume to worry you with a matter such as this before having a full search of the house. Mrs. Norton says a valise, a hatbox, and some of the Duchess’s clothes are missing. And there’s this, found on Her Grace’s mantelpiece.”

  Henry rose as the housekeeper approached his side and pulled a folded sheet of paper from her pocket. She placed it on the table, and he took it up, breaking the seal as he resumed his seat.

  As he read the lines penned in his mother’s hand, his anger widened to include not only Foscarelli, but also the scandal-mongering woman who dispensed reckless, radical advice for the sole purpose of creating sensation and selling newspapers.

  He knew, however, that he had to contain his outrage for the sake of his siblings, and he folded the note with slow, deliberate care. After tucking it inside the breast pocket of his morning coat, he looked up, his gaze skimming past Angela’s white face to rest on the housekeeper who had moved to stand again by the door. “Thank you, Mrs. Jaspar,” he said. “That will be all.”

  After Mrs. Jaspar had left the room, Henry turned to the remaining two servants hovering nearby. “Boothby,” he said to the butler, “have my carriage brought around. Samuel,” he added to the footman, “have my valet fetch my hat and stick. I’m going out immediately after breakfast. And close the doors behind you, please.”