Duchess of Haverford

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Tea with Her Grace

Readers, shortly we shall be joined by our hostess, Her Grace, the Duchess of Haverford. For those who have not yet met her grace, or have seen her only in passing in one of my books, let me tell you a little of her biography.

Her Grace Eleanor, Duchess of Haverford, once hoped to marry the third son of the Duke of Winshire, James Winderfield. The connection was not illustrious enough for her father, the Earl of Creydon, and one of his close friends had also expressed an interest in the girl.

When that friend, the Duke of Haverford, insulted Eleanor in the hearing of her beloved, James challenged the Duke to a duel. The Duke was wounded and James’s father forced him to flee England.

Eleanor held out against her father’s pressure for a long time, but when word came that James had been killed in Persia, she married the Duke of Haverford to get away from her father’s bullying. The Duke’s bullying was much worse.

However, over the years, and particularly since she gave him two sons, Eleanor has learned to manage her life with little interference from her husband. She takes pleasure in helping Haverford poor relations, taking an interest in her vast array of godchildren, supporting philanthropic causes (particularly the education of women) and being an active guardian of her dear wards, three half-sisters who are all base-born daughters of her husband the duke.

In 1812, to the surprise and wonder of the ton, and to Eleanor’s amazement, her supposedly dead first love returned to England. He had spent the intervening years in central Asia, but the death of his older brothers had made him heir, and his father’s impending death called him back to England. He had married in the far off land that he had made his own. Now a widower, he had brought back with him six of his ten children, four of them adults.

To much time had passed to reignite their romance, and besides, Eleanor’s husband still lived. They could, however, be friends.

Ah. But I must leave the story there, and announce our hostess. Dear readers, I give you Eleanor, the Duchess of Haverford.

You’ll meet Eleanor in many of my books, but if you’d like to know more about her, her story is told in the series, The Return of the Mountain King.

 

 

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Tea with an apologetic duchess

The following excerpt is from a Christmas special I wrote about the mend in the breach between Haverford and his mother. It was a made-for-newsletter-subscribers story called Christmas at Hollystone Hall (password is in two-monthly newsletter). Another version of the same scene is told from Eleanor’s perspective in Paradise Triptych.

It was the day before Christmas, and the incessant rain had let up long enough for an expedition to bring in the greenery for decorating, and the windfallen log that had been marked as a Yule log for the massive fireplace in the great hall.

Four wagons set out for the woods, each driven by one of the party’s gentlemen, with the littlest children riding in the tray watched by various of the older sisters and mothers, and everyone else tramping along beside.

Haverford drove one of those conveyances known as a break, inviting anyone who did not want to walk or sit on the floor of the wagons to take their place in one of the long benches behind him, but found himself travelling alone.  No matter. The wagons would be full on the return trip, and the break would come in handy for the little ones.

Groundsmen, grooms, and footmen trailed the party, ready to lend a hand with the heavier hauling, but—for the most part—the family planned to collect their own raw materials for the garlands and other decorations they planned.

The woods were beyond the water gardens and up a small rise. Each wagon took a different turn from the main track, and Haverford carried on to the central clearing, where servants had started a fire and set up blankets and cushions for those who needed a rest from their excursions. Maids were already unpacking refreshments, and footmen hurried to the back of the break to offload the steaming kettles of hot chocolate, coffee and two different kinds of punch, with and without alcohol.

Haverford left them setting the kettles near the fire to stay warm and followed the sound of voices to join in the fun. Before he reached the main crowd, however, he encountered his mother, lifting Nate’s sister, little Lavinia, up into a tree to reach for a pine cone, while one of Lechton’s daughters, Millicent, held onto Mama’s gown and watched.

“Do you need help, Lavie?” Haverford asked.

Mama started. “Haverford! I didn’t see you there. The little girls wanted to help, and I remembered that last year some of the trees along here had pine cones under them, but the only ones I can see are still on the branches.”

“There are some further along, the way I came,” Haverford told her. He reached up and took Lavie’s hand, guiding her to push the cone up so that it detached from the branch. It evaded her snatch at it and plummeted into the undergrowth, and Millicent let go of Mama and dived in after it, emerging triumphant with it in her hand.

Mama lowered Lavie to the ground, saying, “The two of you make a good team.” She darted a glance at Haverford. “Perhaps I should take them back to the others.”

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. Cherry was right. He had to fix this, or at least try.

“They know the little girls are safe with you,” he said. “Bring them this way, Mama, and they will be able to fill their basket with cones to paint.”

Lavie sealed Mama’s fate by slipping her hand into Haverford’s. He would have taken Millicent’s hand, too, except she was shy of him. Besides, that would leave Mama carrying the basket, which was hardly gentlemanly. He picked it up and led the way to a small cluster of fir trees of different kinds, with cones scattered on the nearly clear ground beneath.

Mama would have helped the little girls who were scurrying to and fro, picking up all the cones they could find, but Haverford said, “Mama. A word, if I may.”

She stopped, and the anxiety in her eyes had him hiding a wince as he added, “Would you meet with me in private when we get back to the house? I think we need to talk.”

She inclined her head, her social mask firmly in place and her eyes opaque. He had learned the skill from her—to hide his feelings behind a bland and unreadable exterior, but neither of them treated family to that distancing. Given the situation between them, he had no right to feel bereaved at her shutting him out.

Cherry would remind him that his armour was most impenetrable when he felt most threatened. Doubtless, Mama was the same. “Nothing too terrible, Mama. Even if I had stopped loving you, which I haven’t, I wouldn’t want to upset Cherry.”

She gave him the ghost of a smile. “The pair of you are good together,” she acknowledged, then turned her attention to Lavie, who had dropped her side of the basket so that all the cones the little girls had picked spilled onto the ground.

Haverford crouched to help pick them up, while Mama soothed the wailing child.

The afternoon had been set aside to create and put up the decorations. The foliage and other items they had collected was spread out on tables in the ballroom, where it would be formed into garlands, wreaths, and kissing balls decorated with ribbons and paper chains and flowers that the ladies had unearthed from previous Christmases or made from their own supplies.

Mama was seated with a flock of girls, watching them dip pine cones into paint and set them to dry. Haverford beckoned to her, and she murmured a word or two to Jessica, who was helping her and the girls.

He took her to the library, to a chair near the desk he’d taken over for the work that followed him everywhere. He was neglecting it today, but it wasn’t going to go away. He’d get back to it after Christmas.

As he settled in his own chair, and before he could pour her tea from the waiting tray and start his prepared speech, Mama spoke. “Haverford, I have apologised for interfering between you and Cherry, but I would like to do so again. I have known all along that I was wrong to go privately to Cherry as I did. You are adults, and I should have said what I thought to both of you and trusted you to make your own decision. I am truly sorry for the distress I caused you.”

Haverford opened his mouth, but before he could speak, Mama put up a hand to stop him. “I have a second apology to make, Haverford. Watching you and Cherry together in the past week shows me that I was wrong again—wrong to believe that your love for Cherry was less deep than hers for you. Wrong to think that you would fall out of love once you had achieved your prize. All I ever wanted was for both of you to be happy. You are perfect for one another, and I shudder to think how close I came to preventing that happiness.”

Mama had rendered him speechless, taking all the best lines from what he had been about to say to her. All he had left to say was, “Thank you, Mama.”

“I will never interfere again,” Mama promised, then, with a slight frown, “or, at least, I will try my very best.”

Haverford smiled at the thought of his managing mother keeping her fingers out of any situation she thought she could improve. “I shall not ask such a sacrifice, Mama. Both Cherry and her mother have pointed out what a marvellous gift you have for interfering, as you call it. All I ask is that you consult us first on any plans you have that involve us and don’t proceed without our agreement.”

Mama had tears in her eyes. “I can promise that,” she agreed.

Cherry had been right to push him to reconcile. All his irritation had melted away. “Tea, Mama?” he asked.

They enjoyed a peaceful cup of tea, and the kind of conversation he had so enjoyed in the past, ranging far and wide on topics as diverse as family, the corn tax, and the Luddites.

“Come on, Mama,” he said, when her cup was empty, “We have a house to decorate.”

He offered her his hand to help her rise, and his elbow to escort her back to the ballroom, just in time to see a footman moving a ladder away from the arched doorway. A kissing ball hung in the middle of the arch. Cherry stood looking up at it, and she glanced their way and smiled to see them together.

Haverford put his arm around his mother, reached up for a mistletoe berry, and pressed a gentle kiss to her cheek. “I love you, Mama,” he told her. “Merry Christmas.”

She patted the side of his face, the tears welling again. “It will be,” she agreed. “I love you, Haver… I wonder, would it be a great impertinence of me to call you Anthony, as Cherry does?”

“I would like that, very much,” Haverford assured her, blinking back a little moisture of his own. The candles must be smoking.

She patted his cheek again, then reached out to Cherry, who was beaming at them. “Here, Anthony. You would be better off kissing your wife than your old mother.”

Haverford thought both was better still, but he was certainly glad to follow up his peace-making kiss to his mother with one of gratitude and jubilation shared with Cherry. He drew her into his arms, and sank into one of their soul-moving kisses, while around them the family stopped what they were doing to applaud, laugh, cheer or jest, according to their natures.

It was, indeed, going to be a very Merry Christmas.

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Tea with a nephew

This week’s excerpt is Eleanor’s first appearance in print, in the novel Farewell to Kindness.

The sun was setting on Saturday evening, and Rede was beside himself with frustration, before the Duchess of Haverford’s coach was finally seen tooling up the road to the castle.

He was waiting when she entered the front door, and she greeted him with pleasure. “Rede, darling. What a lovely surprise. Have you been waiting for me long?

“Such a circus in Deal. The electors were inclined to listen to the merchants, and the merchants did not favour Haverford’s man. Not at all.

“So I had to visit every shop in the town and buy something. The carriage, I can assure you, is laden. But Haverford believes that it may have done the trick.

“Just as well, dear, for I have enough Christmas presents for every one of my godchildren for the next three years. And some of them are not of the best quality, I can assure you.”

She was talking as she ascended the stairs, giving her cloak to a maid as she passed, her bonnet to a footman, and her reticule to another maid.

“You want something, I expect. Well, you shall tell me all about it at dinner. I left most of the food I purchased at the orphanage in Margate, but I kept a pineapple for dessert. Such fun, my dear, have you tried one?”

“No, dear aunt,” he managed to say, sliding his comment in as she paused to give her gloves to yet another maid. Or it may have been the first maid again.

“Well, today you shall. Join me in the dining room in—shall we say one hour?” And she sailed away towards her apartments, leaving him, as always, feeling as if he had been assaulted by a friendly and affectionate hurricane.

Over dinner, he laid all honestly before her. Well, perhaps not all. The lovely widow, betrayed by George, the three sisters, the little daughter. No need to mention that he’d played fast and loose himself with the lady’s virtue. Just that he needed to rehabilitate her. Just that he wanted to marry her and she had refused.

“She has refused you, Rede?” Her Grace was surprised. “But you are handsome, wealthy and charming. And rich. What does she object to?”

Rede hadn’t been able to work it out, either. “I know she cares for me, Aunt Eleanor. But she keeps saying no. The first time—to be honest, the first time I made a disaster of it. I told her… I gave her the impression that I only wanted her for a wife because she was too virtuous to be my mistress.”

Her Grace gave a peal of laughter. “Oh Rede, you didn’t.”

“I’m afraid I did. But the second time I assured her that I wanted her for my Countess.”

“And you told her that you loved her,” the Duchess stated.

“No. Not exactly. I told her I wanted to keep her safe. I told her I wanted to protect her.”

“I see. And I suppose you think if you bring her into society, she will consent to marry you?”

“I don’t know, aunt. I only know that she deserves a better life than stuck in a worker’s cottage in the back of nowhere working as a teacher so she can one day give her sister a decent life. If she won’t have me… Well, she has been to see a lawyer about a small inheritance she has coming. I thought perhaps I could make it a bit bigger. Without her knowing.”

“You do love her,” said the Duchess, with great satisfaction.

“Yes, but… Yes.” There were no buts. He loved her. At least he hadn’t told her so. He had no taste for laying his heart on the floor for her to walk on.

“You need to tell her so.” The Duchess echoed and denied his thinking, all in one short sentence. “She is probably afraid that you are marrying her out of a misplaced sense of duty. You are far too responsible, Rede.”

“No, she couldn’t think that. Could she?”

“Who knows? Well, I will do it. I cannot have my niece-in-law having her babies in scandal. I take it there is the possibility of a baby? You would not be feeling so guilty otherwise.”

Rede was without a response for a long moment, finally huffing a laugh. “Aunt Eleanor, a hundred years ago you would have burnt as a witch,” he told her.

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Tea with a daughter-in-law

Another excerpt post from Paradise At Last, published this week as part of Paradise Triptych. Eleanor has a heart to heart with Cherry, the new Duchess of Haverford.

They took tea one afternoon in the little parlour Cherry had made her own. The previous evening Haverford had escorted them both to a formal dinner, with dancing afterwards, at the home of Lord Henry’s daughter Susan.

“You will be able to take up the work again, now that you are feeling more energetic,” Eleanor told her daughter-in-law. “I’m very happy to hand it all back to you, or to continue with some of it. You must just tell me what you need.”

“We shall see,” Cherry commented. “I expect I will need your help later in the year. You have guessed have you not?”

Eleanor acknowledged the truth of that with a smile and a nod.

“I thought so. You have not fussed over me as much as Anthony, but you are always there with a snack or a drink when I need it, and always ready to take over when a nap overwhelms me.” She put a hand over Eleanor’s and squeezed. “You and Mother are the only ones to know, apart from Anthony.”

“And, I imagine, your dresser,” Eleanor joked. “It is hard to keep such a secret from one’s maid.”

It was Cherry’s turn to smile and nod.

“Dearest, I could not be more thrilled,” Eleanor said. “And not because of that nonsense about an heir to the Haverford duchy. I have seen enough of you together to know that the love you bear one another is far more important than who carries on the title after we are all gone. But you deserve the little blessing you carry. You and my son will be wonderful parents.”

Cherry burst into tears. “Excuse me, Aunt Eleanor. I seem to have little control over my emotions at the moment.” She put her arms around Eleanor and Eleanor hugged her back, then offered a handkerchief so she could dry her eyes.

“And what of you?” Cherry asked. “I always thought you and Uncle James would make a match of it after the old duke died. We would all be so pleased. Can you not talk to him, Aunt Eleanor?”

Eleanor shook her head. “I expect you know what he thinks of me. Sarah was there when he found out what I had done. I cannot even blame him for it, for I was wrong.”

Cherry made an impatient noise. “And I suppose he has never made a mistake in his life? To throw away all of your history and the friendship you have found in the last few years—surely he is not so foolish.”

Eleanor sighed. “Shall we talk about something else, my dear? What dreadful weather we are having.”

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Spotlight on Paradise Triptych

Long ago, when they were young, James and Eleanor were deeply in love. But their families tore them apart and they went on to marry other people.

Paradise Regained

James Winderfield yearns to end a long journey in the arms of his loving family. But his father’s agents offer the exiled prodigal forgiveness and a place in Society — if he abandons his foreign-born wife and children to return to England.
With her husband away, Mahzad faces revolt, invasion and betrayal in the mountain kingdom they built together. A queen without her king, she will not allow their dream and their family to be destroyed.
But the greatest threats to their marriage and their lives together is the widening distance between them. To win Paradise, they must face the truths in their hearts.

Paradise Lost

In 1812, the suitor Eleanor’s father rejected in favour of the Duke of Haverford has returned to England. He has been away for thirty-two years, and has returned a widower, and the father of ten children.
As the year passes, various events prompt Eleanor to turn to her box of keepsakes, which recall the momentous events of her life.
Paradise Lost is a series of vignettes grounded in 1812, in which Eleanor relives those memories.

Paradise At Last

Now Haverford is deceased nothing stands between the Duchess of Haverford and the Duke of Winshire. Except that James has not forgiven Eleanor for putting the dynasty of the Haverfords ahead of his niece’s happiness.
Can two star-crossed lovers find their happiness at last? Or will their own pride or the villain who wants to destroy the Haverfords stand in their way?

Paradise Triptych contains two novella and a set of memoirs: Paradise Regained (already published), Paradise Lost (distributed to my newsletter subscribers) and Paradise At Last (new for this collection).

Preorder now for 15th March: https://books2read.com/Triptych

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Tea with James

(Or brandy, to be precise. This is another excerpt post from Paradise at Last, which will be published as part of Paradise Triptych. It’s on preorder now and out in three weeks. In the excerpt, Eleanor has been sitting by Cherry’s bedside.)

When the clock struck the hour—three bongs—Ruth yawned and stood. “Go to bed, Your Grace. Get some sleep. Please send someone to sit with these two, and I will go to bed myself.”

Eleanor found a footman in the hall, waiting to take messages. She told him to find someone to replace Lady Asbury, and he said Lady Rosemary had asked to be fetched. He set off to knock on the lady’s door.

When he was out of sight, Eleanor realised that she had no idea which bedchamber she had been assigned. She set off for the guest wing on the other side of the stairwell, hoping a footman might be awake there to direct her. But as she crossed the upper landing, she saw light spilling from a doorway downstairs. Someone was in the drawing room.

Perhaps it was Rosemary. Eleanor should check, and if so, send her up to Ruth.

But when she entered the room, she found James sitting, staring into the embers, deep in thought. He must’ve heard her in the doorway, for he turned, stood, and took a step towards her. Whatever he saw on her face, he held out his arms and Eleanor ran into them and burst into tears.

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James had no idea what kind of nonsense he spouted as he held Eleanor tenderly, supporting her weight with his arms around her, patting her back, letting the long hours of iron control loose in an abandonment of grief.

He had heard the reports, how she had taken charge at the scene of the accident. She did everything that needed to be done, except, perhaps, she could have thought to send someone after the assailant. All the reports he had received so far said the same thing—no one had a single clue that led anywhere.

He was thinking as a military commander. Eleanor’s focus was on Cherry, as it should have been—on getting her to help as quickly as possible. Then she spent fifteen hours supporting Cherry and Haverford through their ordeal—always calm, always encouraging, Ruth had said when he had met her on her way to bed.

The respect she had won from him since his return to England four years ago, that he thought lost, had returned full force.

Eventually, the stormy tears settled to a quieter weeping. He coaxed her to the chair by the fire and sat, settling her on his knee. He wiped her eyes with his handkerchief. She rested against him, totally spent, occasionally hiccupping another sob. “I have made your shoulder all wet,” she murmured.

“Not for the first time,” James assured her. “I have four daughters, remember.” Although it had been years since his had been their favoured shoulder when life was too cruel to bear. He had not held a woman in his arms for a long time, and this one was not his daughter. Tired as he was, his body reminded him that he desired her.

He shifted her slightly away from the evidence of his inappropriate response. “Would you like a port or a brandy? Something to help you sleep?”

She chuckled. “I will sleep as soon as my head hits the pillow. But I don’t know which room my things are in. I saw the light and came to see if it was someone who could direct me.” She reached and cupped his face with her hand, and he had to exert an iron control not to turn his mouth into her palm and kiss it. He would not seduce her while she was so emotionally raw.

And his mind raced on to a future time, when she was not so vulnerable. For he would seduce her. Yes, and marry her, too, if she would have him.

She was speaking again, and he must pay attention. “I did not intend to weep all over you. I apologise, James.”

“It was my privilege. You have carried your family today; I am proud to be the person you did not have to be strong for. I think, perhaps, you do not realise how amazing you are, for it is what you always do. It is I who should apologise to you, for my cruel words and my coldness after your mistake with Cherry and your son. I hope you will forgive me for being such a self-righteous idiot. My female relatives have pointed out that I am not so perfect myself that I have a right to demand perfection from my friends. Can we be friends again, Eleanor? Will you forgive me?”

The tears welled again but she smiled as she dashed at them with his handkerchief. “I am not usually such a watering pot,” she complained. “James, if you can forgive me, I can forgive you.

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Villains on WIP Wednesday

I’ve been having fun with the last surviving villain from the group of them that have hounded my Haverfords, Redepennings, and Winshires through a dozen books. My WIP excerpt today is from Paradise at Last, the last novella in Paradise Triptych, which I plan to publish in March. My Duchess of Haverford puts her trust in the wrong employee. Please share an excerpt that includes your villain. Just pop it in the comments.

“How could you, Marigold?” Eleanor asked her former secretary. Not that she had fired the treacherous female, but conspiring with a criminal to disable her servants and abduct Eleanor herself was surely tantamount to a resignation.

“I am merely seeking a better position, Your Grace,” Marigold sneered. “One your money will buy me.”

“Us,” said her collaborator. “You will buy us a future, Ellie. Do your friends call you Ellie? Your son took everything I have and you owe me. My first idea was to kill you, Haverford’s wife, and all three of his sisters. Let him feel what I felt when he took everything away from me.”

He slipped his arms around Marigold from behind and fondled both her breasts. She tipped her head back, and he bent to kiss and then lick her neck, which made the girl groan.

Marigold surrendered utterly to the sensual spell the boy wove, but he was watching Eleanor the whole time, his eyes cold and alert.

She gave no reaction—to his words, or to his behaviour.

One of his hands crept down Marigold’s body to the cleft between her legs. Eleanor steeled herself to show nothing.

Marigold’s words stopped his hand. “But you have me, now, Kit. And when we get our money, we will be able to run far away. We will have everything, you and I.”

Kit nuzzled her neck again, before letting her go. “Everything,” he said. Including my revenge. You should be grateful, Your Grace. Marigold’s idea was much better than mine. Have you written the letter, darling?”

Marigold nodded. “Ten thousand pounds, in gold. It will take them a while to get that much, Kit. Could we not settle for less?”

He rounded on his accomplice, snarling. “I am already settling! They owe me their lives!” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly then visibly forced a conciliatory smile. “We will give them time, darling. I have it all planned. You have done a wonderful job, and no one will know where we have gone.”

He turned his attention back to Eleanor, his smile gone. “Now. I can untie you, and you can walk out of here yourself, keeping your mouth shut, and climbing into the carriage like a good little dowager duchess. I will have a gun and a knife on you at all times. I warn you not to make any fuss! I really did like my first plan.”

He sighed. “But I have promised Marigold not to hurt you as long as you behave, so if you cannot give me your solemn promise that you will not attempt to escape or to attract attention, I will just have to knock you out, gag you, and take you out the back door rolled up in a sheet.” His smile was stretching of the teeth without an iota of humour.

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Tea with various philanthropic ladies

(This post is an excerpt from Paradise At Last, which I am currently frantically trying to get finished. I hope to publish in March.)

“I did not realise that the Duke of Winshire was a close acquaintance of Mrs Kellwood,” Eleanor commented. An intimate acquaintance? Perhaps. He had certainly emerged from her house well before the usual visiting hours. She wrestled with the hot jealousy that attempted to escape her iron control. It is none of my business. James and I have—had—no understanding. Especially not after…

Henry, Baron Redepenning, leaned closer to the carriage window to watch the couple strolling down the street together, Mrs Kellwood clinging to James’s arm. “They are much in one another’s company at balls and concerts and the like, but I have not heard of an affair,” he said.

Not consoling. If James had taken the woman as a lover, he would be discrete, though leaving by her front door in full daylight was hardly inconspicuous. Did that mean they were not lovers? It is none of your business, Eleanor, she scolded herself.

She had encountered Henry at Chirbury House when she called to collect Frances. Frances had greeted her with enthusiasm, but was less delighted at the idea of returning to Haverford House.

She, Daisy, Antonia, and a couple of other acquaintances had a full timetable of activities planned, “And very little time to complete them all, Aunt Eleanor,” Frances had explained, “since Daisy is leaving London at the end of the week to go back to Gloucestershire. Coming home would mean extra time travelling every day, and I would miss out on all the fun in the evenings. I may stay, may I not?”

And so Eleanor had left without Frances, but with Henry, whom she had offered to drop at the headquarters of the Horse Guard where he had his office, on her way back to Haverford House.

On second thoughts, she might call on a couple of other acquaintances while she was out. Her niece-in-law, Anne Chirbury, had mentioned a few people who were in town, and had talked about the difficulties facing the country-folk with the summer’s poor harvest. And, too, Henry was concerned for the injured and sick soldiers and sailors who were still trickling home from foreign ports after the tragedy that was Waterloo ended the long war with France.

Surely Cedrica Fournier would be home, and she would have a different perspective on the problems facing Londoners, since she lived here year round, and she and her husband owned a successful restaurant.

None of the Winderfield women were in town, though Eleanor would, in any case, be reluctant to call on James’s family without a direct invitation. But Henry had mentioned that the Earl of Hythe had arrived back from Vienna, and his sister, Lady Felicity Belvoir, had co-operated with Eleanor on several philanthropic causes. She could think of one or two others, too.

By the end of the afternoon, she had met with five of the woman she had worked with before, three in high society and two with a firmer finger on the pulse of the merchant ranks of Society. All of them had causes to espouse, and all of them were doing something about it.

“I learned from the best, Aunt Eleanor,” said Cedrica, who was a distant cousin and had once been Eleanor’s secretary. “I see a need and figure out how to bring it to the attention of others, as you taught me.”

The other women repeated variations on the same theme. They credited Eleanor with the inspiration, which was kind of them, but the fact was they were doing very well without her. When they realised she was looking for work, they all suggested roles for her. And all of the roles were minor, and could have been done by anyone.

In penance for her pique at that thought, she accepted them all. At least she would be busy for the few weeks until Haverford and Charlotte returned from Paris, and they all retired to the country.

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Emotions on WIP Wednesday

Make ’em laugh, make ’em cry, make ’em wait, says the old advice to aspiring writers. I’ve done the last with my story about Eleanor, Duchess of Haverford. I’m having a go at the first two. Here’s a bit. What do you think? And what do you want to share?

Ah yes. Of course. It should have occurred to her, but it had not. She had been about to ascend to the traditional chambers of the Duchess of Haverford—an entire suite of rooms that mirrored and were adjacent to the duke’s suite.

Another reminder that she was no longer the mistress of this house and the other houses of the ducal estates. She climbed the stairs with her heart sinking, turned into the family wing, and stopped at the indicated door.

Tears welled in her eyes. The suite had been fully refurbished. She saw new wallpaper and drapes in her favourite colours, the comfortable chairs that had sat for years either side of her fireplace looking as fresh as the day they were purchased, now each side of her new fireplace. Above it was the same painting of her two sons as little boys that had been over her mantle since the day the painter delivered it.

She drifted around the room, touching one familiar item after another, and stopping to examine the new pieces that someone had selected with care and an eye to her comfort. A warm throw rug in soft fur. A replacement for the old footstool that had always been just a little too low.

And, yes, the fireplace chairs had been recovered, but the original fabric had been copied exactly.

Following her dresser through the door into her new bedchamber and beyond into her dressing room, she found the same touch, redolent of love in every detail. Her study, too, on the other side of the sitting room, was perfect—almost a duplicate of the one she had created in the duchess’s quarters, with her delicate desk, all her books in glass-doored bookshelves, and her own comfortable reading chair. The one addition was delightful: a window seat from which she could look over the formal gardens enclosed in the u-shaped formed by the main house and the two large wings that stretched towards the river.

It must have been Charlotte. For the first time in months, Eleanor allowed the hope that she had been forgiven to unfurl in her heart.

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Tea with James, Duke of Winshire

An excerpt post, taken from To Claim the Long-Lost Lover.

Winshire looked around as he knocked on the door. The cottage had been kept in good repair, but nevertheless had an air of abandonment. He was trying to nail down what details indicated it was unloved in when the door opened. He turned to ask to be shown to his hostess, or allowed to wait for her inside until she could see him. There she stood, her warm smile the only welcome he needed.

He could feel his own smile growing in response. “Eleanor.”

The Duchess of Haverford stepped back to give him space to enter. “James. Come in!”

He followed her across a small entrance hall to a cosy little parlour, where a fire burned in the hearth and a tray with a tea set waited on a small table between two chairs. Eleanor took the seat closest to the tea pot and waved her hand to the other. “Be seated, dear friend. Would you care for tea?”

Tea was not what he hungered for. For ten years after Mahzad’s death, he had thought himself beyond desire, but Eleanor brought it roaring back the first time he saw her on his return to England. Getting to know her again had only increased his longing; she was even lovelier, both within and without, than when they had first met long ago, before her father accepted the Duke of Haverford’s suit for her hand, and rejected that of James, who was only the third son of the Duke of Winshire.

James was forced into exile and Eleanor was made to marry Haverford.

He kept his feelings to himself. If he told her his hopes, and if she shared them, he didn’t trust himself to be alone with her like this without besmirching his honour and insulting hers.

Eleanor was a married woman and virtuous, even if her husband was a monster. Even if the old devil was rotting from within and locked away for his own good and to protect the duchy. James accepted the offered seat and the cup of tea; asked after the duchess’s sons and wards and caught her up to date with his own family; exchanged comments on the war news and the state of the harvest.

“James,” she said at last, “I proposed this meeting for a reason.”

“To see me, I hope. Since Parliament went into recess and we both left London, I have missed our weekly visits to that little bookshop you frequent.”

Eleanor smiled, and James fancied that he saw her heart in her eyes for a moment, and it leapt to match his. But her smile faded and her lashes veiled her eyes. “That, too, my dear friend. I have missed you, too. But there is another matter I need to bring to your attention.”

She grimaced and gave her head a couple of impatient shakes. “It seems I am always muddying our time together with gossip and scandal. I am so sorry, James.”

“One day, I hope we will be able to meet without subterfuge, and for no reason but our pleasure,” James said. The last word was a mistake. He might be old, but at the word ‘pleasure’, his body was reminding him urgently that he was not yet dead.

Eleanor seemed unaffected, focused on whatever bad news she had to give him. “You are aware, I am sure, of the history of your niece Sarah’s ward?”

“Her son?” James queried. He had assumed Eleanor knew. She was a confidante of his sister-in-law.

“Indeed. What you may not know—what I have just found out—is that Society is making that assumption and spreading the story.”

James shook his head. “I guessed the gossips and busybodies would reach that conclusion, but without proof or confirmation, and with the family firmly behind her, the rumours will die.”

“True, if that was all. But James, you may not know—Sarah may not know—that her little boy’s father is back in England and, if my sources are accurate, seeking a bride.”

James stiffened. “The coward has returned?”

“As to that,” Eleanor said, “Grace always suspected that Sutton and Winshire had something to do with his disappearance, and it is being whispered that his father has recently bought him out of the navy, where he had worked his way up to being a surgeon.”

“And your sources are connecting Sarah and her child with this man?”

Eleanor shook her head. “Not yet. The two rumours are separate. But if the two of them meet, people may make connections. Especially if the child resembles his father.” She shrugged, even that small elegant movement unusually casual for the duchess. “It is all very manageable, James, but you needed to know.”

“I appreciate it, Eleanor.” He sighed. “English Society is more of a snake pit than the court of the Shah of Shahs or that of the Ottoman Sultan Khan.