The Very Daring Duchess Part 42

Horrified, Francesca crouched down to gather the shards that had been the vase. The biggest unbroken piece was the base, and as she reached for it, she saw a lumpy white package still stuffed inside. With care she pulled the package free, a lady's fine linen handkerchief knotted with a note scribbled on a sc.r.a.p of Francesca's own drawing paper.

Given to you Little Robin to ease your way in London

Yr. Friend Emma Ldy H.

A gift from Lady Hamilton, hastily tucked inside the vase when Francesca had been packing her belongings, a gift impulsive and innocent but also as generous as the giver, a gift of value enough to help stave off a refugee's poverty. With fingers made clumsy by excitement, Francesca unknotted the handkerchief and pulled the makeshift bundle apart.

And into her lap tumbled the dead queen's diamond plume, all glitter and folly.

"Francesca, my girl," rumbled her uncle crossly from the doorway behind her, his cane tapping with impatience as he leaned on the footman's arm. "I am tired of waiting for you to come to me, and we have too much to say for us to wait any longer. Come, come, and tell me the truth. What mischief have you fallen into? Are you in fact wed to the Duke of Harborough?"

Swiftly Francesca tucked the diamond brooch into her pocket before she turned toward him, knowing that even with her uncle there must be degrees of truth.

"Yes, Uncle Peac.o.c.k, I am married to the Duke of Harborough," she confessed. "But oh, santo cialo, that is only the beginning...."

It was a corner of St. James's Park much favored by navy officers for settling affairs of honor. A small hill combined with a copse of trees offered some measure of privacy, yet the tall brick chimneys of Whitehall with the Admiralty's telegraph tower were just visible in the distance, oddly comforting in times like these. Snow had fallen in the night, just enough to dust over the winter gra.s.s and ice the bare branches of the trees and make a bleak landscape even more stark in the gray morning light.

"Cheerful sort of morning you've picked, Ned," grumbled William, blowing into his cupped hands to warm them. "Colder than a witch's t.i.t."

Edward's smile was obligatory as he leaned back against the leather squabs of the chaise. The chill of the morning suited him, as did the colorless landscape. Duels often began with heated tempers, but like the battles he'd fought at sea, they were won with cold reason and an icy composure. He must focus his anger, narrow it to build his concentration instead of scattering it. He'd only have one shot from that beautifully crafted pistol. He needed to make it count. There'd be time enough later to sit before the fire with his boots off to warm his feet and Francesca on his lap to warm the rest.

If, of course, there was a later. And d.a.m.nation, he couldn't let himself think of Francesca, or he'd never get through this.

"Remember what I've told you about McCray," said William hurriedly as the chaise began its final lurching path down the hillside. "I've heard he's fought a score of duels in the West Indies, dishonorable scuffles in tavern-yards, but enough to make him a c.o.c.ky b.a.s.t.a.r.d now. Because he's near blind in his right eye, he'll use his left to aim, and cross his right arm over his chest. You won't have much of his shirt to shoot for. And odds are he'll have found his courage in a bottle, too, so as soon as you take your pistols, be wary of a jumped start or misfire. He'll cheat any way he can. He's like that, scarce what you'd call a gentleman, and for the life of me I still can't say why he's meeting you like this."

"Because he believes I've had too much good luck in my life, while he has had none," said Edward dryly. "I daresay he feels the imbalance should be corrected, beginning with insulting my wife."

But this will be the last time, Francesca my love, the last time, I swear....

"If he kills you," said William grimly, "he'll learn about true bad luck. Spencer himself will make sure he'll spend the rest of his days on land on half-pay."

Edward smiled. "That makes me almost wish to be killed, just from spite."

"For G.o.d's sake, don't even make jests like that," ordered Will with a grimace. "No use in tempting fate. Blast, look at all the gawkers!"

As the chaise drew to a stop, Edward could see the small crowd that had gathered to watch. Word had traveled fast overnight. They were mostly men in dark boat-cloaks and captain's hats, the ribbon c.o.c.kades standing out like bristling little birds against he snow, though Edward couldn't guess whether they'd come in support or simply for entertainment. There was also a smattering of other gentlemen in the group, stomping their feet in the snow like horses trying to keep warm, and a handful of boys darting among the men. Horses had been tethered at a respectful distance, where they wouldn't bolt at the gunshots, and footmen and drivers sat on the roofs of their parked chaises and coaches to get a better view.

"It's like a d.a.m.ned circus," said Edward. The other duels he'd fought had been small, private affairs on foreign beaches, without any scandal or fashion attached, nothing like this. "What a pity McCray didn't choose swords, so we could give them all a better show."

"If it had been swords, McCray would have backed down," said William with a sniff of contempt. "No skill or talent to pointing a pistol and blasting a man's fool head away."

"Ah, words of true comfort," said Edward wryly as the footman hopped down to unlatch the door. "Now come, time to give them all the blood and thunder they're hoping for."

But William paused, holding his fist out to Edward. "Mates forever," he said softly. "Good luck, Ned."

Edward smiled, and tapped his fist to his friend's, their old boyhood signal. "Mates forever. And I don't intend to rely upon luck."

He climbed down with his head high and the slightest of smiles on his lips, terribly conscious of how every head turned to watch him and how the murmur of excited conversation seemed to wash around him like a lapping wave. He felt like a Drury Lane player who'd just made his entrance, and he understood now why William had insisted they come in the chaise, instead of walking across the park from Harborough House as Edward had suggested.

A king's officer cannot simply stroll to his affair of honor, William had argued, not like some rustic farmer off to his fields, and besides, there was the surgeon to consider. Considering the surgeon had been William's discreet way of not mentioning a body, much to Edward's macabre amus.e.m.e.nt. But he did have to admit that the chaise would be far more convenient for hauling away a mangled corpse, especially with such a bloodthirsty crowd eager to see exactly that.

McCray was already waiting, standing off to one side with Robinson and the surgeon. He'd already removed his coat and waistcoat, standing in his shirtsleeves and swinging his arms, yet his face gleamed with an anxious sweat. When Robinson offered him a pewter flask, McCray grasped it eagerly, drinking long before he handed it back with a shuddering whoop and a teeth-baring grimace.

"Wouldn't you hate to rely on that face beside you in battle?" muttered William beside him. "No wonder he's banished to the Indies. Can you fathom what the men must make of a grinning ape like that for their captain?"

"Haul it aback now, Will," said Edward softly, "else you'll find yourself facing him next."

William snorted with disgust as he stepped forward to meet Robinson. Edward watched, tugging off his gloves finger by finger, while Peart took his cloak and then his coat, folding them neatly over his arm, and Edward began unfastening the long row of bra.s.s b.u.t.tons on his waistcoat. It really was like a drama, with roles to play and lines to be spoken, even marks on which to stand. Perhaps that was why Edward felt so calm, almost resigned. The reality of the danger he would shortly face was still missing; ritual like this always disguised the threat of death.

"My Lord Bonnington, sir," called Robinson with a wobbly bow and bloodshot eyes that showed he, too, had applied himself to the pewter flask. "I've, ah, come to see if the duke wishes to, ah, withdraw his challenge."

William bowed back. "Only if Captain McCray is willing to make a complete and abject apology to Captain His Grace the Duke of Harborough, and to retract in writing his slanderous calumny in regard to Her Grace the d.u.c.h.ess of Harborough."

Nervously Robinson swallowed, glancing over his shoulder for reinforcement from McCray, who shook his head. "Captain McCray regrets that, ah, he is unable to accept such terms," he said from carefully rehea.r.s.ed memory, "when they would, ah, require him to deny what is known and accepted truth about the, ah, lady and her past."

The thread holding the last waistcoat b.u.t.ton snapped beneath the jerk of Edward's thumb, the bra.s.s disk arcing high before it plopped and vanished into the snow.

For every foul word that McCray had said of Francesca, he must suffer; for every lie, he must pay.

His Francesca, laughing, teasing, dancing away from him with her hair loose around her shoulders...

"Forgive me for interrupting, Your Grace," said an older gentleman in an old-fashioned wig, leaning heavily upon his cane for support. "My name is John Peac.o.c.k, Your Grace, and I come bearing a final plea for peace in this matter."

"Your servant, sir," said Edward uncertainly, struggling to place the man's name and face, the brightness to his eyes that seemed uncannily familiar. "But as you can see, there is no hope of any peaceable resolution as long as Captain McCray insists on insulting my wife."

The gentleman nodded. "My niece would be willing to forgive every insult, Your Grace, and urges you to do the same."

He started, the man's name now where it belonged. "Forgive me, sir, for not realizing you were Francesca's uncle."

"Given your distractions, Your Grace, you are absolved," said Peac.o.c.k with a grunt. "But you are the one who must find forgiveness for your enemy in your soul. Come, captain, come! Your wife waits."

"Francesca is here?" Aghast, Edward looked to where Peac.o.c.k pointed with the tip of his cane.

She stood alone on the hillside, not far from the carriages, at the end of a path of snow flurried by her skirts. Above the sea of somber dark uniforms and cloaks, she wore a red gown and a cloak over it to match, her dark hair loose beneath the hood and her hands inside an oversized black fur m.u.f.f, and even at this distance he could see her face was pale despite the cold.

Red for pa.s.sion, red for fire, red for love, red as the blood that would soon spread across the white snow...

"She insisted on coming, Your Grace," said Peac.o.c.k. "You know how strong her will can be. She thought perhaps her presence would alter your mind."

"Then she was mistaken," said Edward sharply. d.a.m.nation, she did not belong here! No ladies attended duels, especially not when they were the cause of them. Already she'd been noticed, pointed out, remarked on, and a.s.sessed. He was proud of her beauty, and that other men would admire his wife, but he didn't want her linked in any way to McCray's slanders, which her presence here would irrevocably do. "Please, Mr. Peac.o.c.k, take her back to your house directly."

But Peac.o.c.k only sighed, and solemnly shook his head. "She will not go, Your Grace. She says she will stay until you change your mind, and if you don't, she will watch."

She was watching him now. He glanced up at her again, furious at himself for doing it, and saw her draw her black-gloved hand from the m.u.f.f to raise it in silent salute. Her red skirts fluttered in the breeze, the hood ruffling around her face.

She was stealing his focus being here, weakening him, robbing the power from his anger. Instead she was making him think of how infinitely much more he'd prefer to be with her beneath the velvet coverlets in his enormous bed in his house, their house, across the park with that red gown on the floor, how her skin would be warm and fragrant with her womanly scent, how she'd sink into the featherbed beneath him, how tightly she'd hold him with her thighs curled around his waist, sleek and wet and willing and he must not think of this now.

Or he would die.