Page 11 of The Duke Who Loved Me (The Duke's Estates 1)

They had begun a discussion of fashion when all four girls’ eyes shifted, focusing on something behind Cecelia. What could be making them look so apprehensive? Cecelia turned her head, and was treated to the spectacle of Lady Wilton bearing down on them in full glare.

James’s grandmother, a small, gnarled woman with snow-white hair and a nose designed for looking down on her inferiors—a wide and ever shifting group seemingly—wore a rich gown of deep-green velvet, magnificent emeralds, and a sour expression. She’d passed the venerable age of eighty without any sign of mellowing. Cecelia had sometimes wondered if she’d been such a bundle of prejudices and complaints when young—in the middle of the previous century—or had acquired them gradually along the way.

She stopped beside them. Sarah leapt up to offer her a chair, and Lady Wilton took it as a matter of course, with no thanks. She looked at Cecelia’s companions one by one and visibly dismissed them. “I hear Tereford’s town house is in a dreadful state,” she said with her characteristic relish for the misfortunes of others.

Cecelia had known that her maid and footman would make a good tale of their visit. But gossip about the place was inevitable in any case. James would have to bring in workers to restore order. “There is quite a bit of clearing up to do,” she replied.

“Percival always was a disgrace.”

Lady Wilton and the deceased duke were of the same generation, Cecelia remembered. Indeed, she had been married to his younger brother, Wilton Cantrell.

“They threw him out of Eton for stealing, you know. Put it about that he wasunwell. Odd sort of disease that made him cram his truck with other boys’ treasures. Seems he never got over it.” Lady Wilton loosed one of her disturbing cackles of laughter—loud and cruelly mocking. People nearby winced. Some moved farther away. Cecelia’s four new friends faded back a few degrees.

“Not what I want to talk about,” Lady Wilton continued. “Percival’s dead.” She clenched hands twisted with rheumatics in her lap. “Something must be done about Ferrington.”

“I’m not sure I—” began Cecelia.

“Ferrington!” the old lady interrupted. “Surely you remember that my daughter married the Earl of Ferrington.”

Cecelia didn’t know why she should be expected to recall a wedding that must have taken place long before she was born.

“Not a bad match,” Lady Wilton conceded. “I arranged it, of course. And Fanny did her duty. Two sons in two years. I thought all was well settled. Though she died not long after the second one.”

She spoke without any sign of grief. Pity for this woman’s daughter filled Cecelia. She saw the same emotion in the other young ladies’ eyes.

“But then, Ralph turned out to be intractable,” Lady Wilton went on. “Practically from the moment he could walk.”

“Ralph?”

“The younger boy. Will you pay attention, Miss Vainsmede!”

Cecelia looked around for a means of escape. A new set was forming, but no gentlemen looked likely to approach them in the face of Lady Wilton’s fierce glare. And James was out of reach, naturally. Despite the fact that this washisgrandmother.

“Ralph fell prey to every vice imaginable,” the old lady continued. “I had to pack him off to America before he was eighteen.”

“Youdid?”

“His father was a drunkard. There was no one else to take charge.”

Visions of a horrid childhood under this woman’s thumb rose in Cecelia’s mind. She could imagine acquiring a few vices herself under those circumstances.

“He was matching his father bottle for bottle at fourteen!”

“Ralph?”

“That is who we are speaking of. Can you not keep up?” Lady Wilton’s frown grew more pronounced. “I had thought you a fairly intelligent girl. Do not tell me I was wrong.”

This was too much. “It is just that I don’t know why you are telling me this story, Lady Wilton.”

“Because my idiot elder grandson broke his neck on the hunting field without producing an heir,” the old woman replied. “And Ralph’s son inherited the earldom.”

“I see, but why…”

Lady Wilton bared her yellowed teeth. “This…American is the only one left,” she said. “The estate’s man of business had a dreadful time finding him, and he appears to be no better than Ralph. Gambling, of course, and who knows what else. Not to mention his moth…but none of that. We hauled him over here, though the fellow actually claimed he had no interest in being an earl!” She snorted her contempt at this idea. “Idiot. I informed him that I was capable of transforming even a graceless bumpkin into reasonable shape for his position. The next day, he was gone.”

Thinking one could scarcely blame the man, Cecelia attempted a summary. And hopefully a conclusion to this strange conversation. “So one of your grandsons is the new Earl of Ferrington.”

“Great-grandson,” Lady Wilton interrupted. “My daughter married at seventeen. Did as she was told like a sensible girl. Tereford’s father put it off until he was nearly twice that age. Always stubborn as an ox.” She sniffed irritably.

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