A Duke By Any Other Name

Chapter One

Somewhere in the West Indies, January 1809

“Y ou’re going home.”

Sunlight beat down on Captain Gregory Marmaduke’s head as he tugged his restricting stock away from his neck. A glare glinted off the sails billowing above him from HMS Minerva ’s masts, the sea sparkling like champagne.

He warded off the blinding brilliance with the palm of his hand and said stiffly, disbelieving the words that flowed out of his mouth, “I’m going home.”

By hook and crook, was he dreaming? After acts of desperation, death, and despair, he was finally returning to England and the woman he loved—Lady Jane Kerridge.

‘She whom I love now doth grace for grace and love for love allow.’

Standing at the taffrail, verses from Romeo and Juliet jogging his memory of their last meeting, he stared at the abandoned island which had housed his crew for almost three long agonizing years, a mixture of exhilaration and loathing coiling in his gut.

‘Alas, poor Romeo, he is already dead!’

“I am alive,” he said. “Two-thirds of my crew aren’t.” Perhaps, like Romeo, that was his penance, spending a lifetime haunted by what could have been.

‘Luck never gives, it only lends.’

A dose of glorious sea spray and salt fortified Duke as he half-listened to Captain James Eliot—commander of Minerva .

The ship beat through the troughs and swells, triumphant in rescuing Duke’s ragtag crew and sailing them further from the remote island they’d long struggled to escape. To survive, he’d clung to unforgettable places and images when faith deserted him—Jane’s brave face as he forsook her for Portsmouth and the West Indies; a last longing look at Lyme; Shakespeare, poetry, and duty and honor amid acts of heroism and hopelessness.

Eliot clapped him on the shoulder. “By Jove, it’s a miracle that you are alive. Tell me again how you managed it. How did you survive that god-forsaken place?”

Through no effort of his own. He’d risked everything to keep his men alive, nearly dying himself several times. The haunting pleas of drowning men, visions of the sick and wounded, the hungry and unstable assailed him but, just as quickly, diminished as the familiar symphonic snap of canvas, testy timber, and a charge of barefooted topmen straining against the ratlines filled his ears.

“It wasn’t easy. We salvaged what we could from the wreck, built shelter, foraged.”

Deckhands scurried to and fro in answer to a bosun’s whistle, a rhythm and structure he’d sorely missed.

Heaven.

His improved circumstances penetrated deeper than the weathered lines cutting into his face. Life had been hard won since they’d taken part in the Battle of San Domingo. Since then, they’d been tested by the power of nature, by time and Fate, endeavoring to withstand every challenge before them and existing by sheer force of will.

“I can honestly say I never thought I’d live to see this day.”

“Three years! I cannot imagine braving such low spirits.” Eliot placed his hands behind his back. After several moments of reflection, he added, “An uncharted island. God’s teeth. You, I have decided, are a better man than I.”

“Rubbish.” Duke regarded the captain, taking in his measure. “A man does what he must, using the tools he’s been given.”

He dragged his gaze away to study the rock which had tested his fortitude, safety, and reason, understanding better than anyone the resilience it took to rise above the strain of disorder and defeat. Even now, the island taunted and teased him, suggesting that this, too, was a dream like the thousands assaulting him before.

“I have but one rule.”

Eliot cocked his brow. “Just one?”

“Never give up.” Duke’s first mate, Lieutenant Fraser Norby, stomped his foot as he joined them astern. The boots generously supplied to his first mate didn’t fit properly, but who were they to complain? “Driven like a demon to keep us all alive, he was. ‘All we needed,’ he repeatedly told us, ‘was a firm deck beneath our feet to mend what ails us. And you shall get it!’ he’d roar. ‘This I promise you.’”

“Attitude,” Eliot said. “A man’s method of thinking controls the tide.”

The real fight was internal. Privation and peril were no match for syndromes shattering a man’s will.

The deck pitched, the ship’s wake chugging out a wild wash that trailed back to the small peninsula. Duke closed his eyes, suddenly immersed in a quagmire of uncertainty. What awaited them in England—at the Admiralty? Without a vessel to command, his crew would disperse and be put on half-pay until a position availed itself. Being idle allowed melancholy to set in, and that would be a deadly design.

He glanced about the stern, examining the faces of his men, recognizing the strain on their faces as they stared at what had imprisoned them—the dangerous reef and breakers. Were they, too, wondering how their families fared in their absence and what was to become of them?

He closed his eyes, summoning Jane’s image to appear.

‘By purgatory, torture, hell itself. Hence banished is banished from the world. And world’s exile is death. Then banished is death mistermed. Call death banished , thou cut’st my head off with a golden axe and smilest upon stroke that murders me.’

Had she kept her promise? Was she still awaiting his return?

Indubitably, that was too much to ask.

Beads of sweat trickled down Duke’s back, the wool uniform he’d borrowed to replace his own rags punishing him. Ignoring the urge to shrug off his jacket, he white-knuckled the taffrail and surveyed the two-mile trek of land that had sheltered them from sharks and that disastrous reef. Though attempts to signal passing ships had been futile for years, Fate, a change in the damn trade winds, or as Eliot succinctly put it, renewed interest in French activities in the West Indies had finally carried one ship into sight— HMS Minerva .

A plume of smoke danced from the burning signal pyre they’d set, soaring hundreds of feet skyward while waves pummeled the headland of the peninsula as if riotously protesting their escape.

“It’s an impressive sight,” Eliot said. “However you accomplished it, you and your men are aboard Minerva and that is a testament to your good fortune.”

Good fortune? He swallowed back bile. ‘Tis torture, and not mercy.’

Was it more providential to be mortally wounded in a wrecked ship or to live in endless privation, driven mad by the heat? In his opinion, the lucky ones were buried inland in a lush meadow serenaded by exotic birds.

For all intents and purposes fortune had abandoned them. They knew nothing of what awaited them in London, and the uncertainty roiled inside each one of them like a southwesterly wind.

The last of his young midshipmen, fifteen-year-old Thomas Colley-Rivers, the third son of a baron placed under his care asked, “Do you think our families have given up on us?”

“Steady as ye go,” William Hales, Argus ’s sailing master, said. “What difference does it make? Either way, we be dead men walkin’, mark me words.”

“Rich men if the Jupiter made it safely back to—”

“ HMS Jupiter? ” Eliot’s reaction gave them a start.

Duke nodded. “Aye.”

“ Jupiter was received by the Admiralty three years ago and commissioned HMS Maida .”

Duke exchanged a look with Norby. “And the prize money?”

“What of it?” Hales grumbled and wiped chewing tobacco off his mouth.

Sensing their unease, Eliot said, “The prize money was dispersed to the crew responsible for its capture.”

“Huzzah!” Colley-Rivers cheered. “Does that mean we are rich?”

“That... I cannot say.” Eliot’s cautious answer unnerved Duke.

“What are you not telling us, Captain?” Norby asked. “We captured her, took her crew prisoner, and equipped her with thirty men. Did they not arrive hale and hearty?”

Eliot’s brows drew up. “Are you saying Argus captured Jupiter ?” They nodded. “Then, I must inform you that Donegal took credit for her seizure.”

The Argus ’s ragtag crew rose to their feet and shouted. “What?”

Duke raised his hand to silence the outcry. “Thirty-three of Argus ’s men died storming the deck to capture that ship. Are you saying it was for nothing?”

“We lost fifty more men when a gale wrecked our ship,” Norby complained. “What happened, Captain Eliot?”

“All I can say is that Jupiter was recommissioned after Captain Malcom rescued Brave in a very heavy gale. I suspect that was the same storm that wrecked your ship.” He rocked on his heels. “Damn fine sailing. Malcom received a gold medal for his daring deeds.”

“Of all the blackhearted—” Norby pinched his lips. “I suppose I might have claimed Jupiter for myself if the circumstances were reversed.”

“Might?” a gunner named Gould shouted.

Laughter engulfed the quarterdeck.

Eliot regarded those loitering on deck. “Get to work. The lot of you!” Turning to Duke, a deep crevice notched between his brows, he said, “I tell you true, Marmaduke. Malcom is a hero. He commands Donegal off the coast of Brest.”

“Understood.” With Argus lost at sea—whereabouts unknown—and his men a minority aboard Jupiter , who would believe their exploits? Why not, Donegal ? “Forgive our disappointment. My men have counted on that prize money for three years.”

“What would I do with a fortune anyway?” Hales complained. “I belong at sea. Landlubbers need no navigatin’.”

Norby chuckled. “Mark my words, heads will turn when the Duke of Castaway Cay arrives to set things right.”

“The Duke of Castaway Cay?” Eliot asked. “Am I missing something?”

“Fools talk,” Duke said. Though his father was an earl and a primary stakeholder in a successful shipping company at Lyme, Duke had no grandiose ambitions other than marrying the woman he loved. “Let it go.”

“Letting go is foreign to us. And it should be for you.” Norby eyed Duke. “We haven’t struggled this long to wind up empty-handed. Right, men?”

“Aye, aye,” Argus ’s crew responded.

Duke studied the sails flapping overhead, disappointment weighting his shoulders.

“You still haven’t answered my question,” Eliot said. “Who is the Duke of Castaway Cay?”

“Unlike the sea, soil must have order.” Norby pointed to the diminishing land on the horizon. “We unanimously elected Captain Marmaduke, or Captain ‘Duke,’ as we fondly call him, to be the Duke of Castaway Cay.”

Argus ’s crew burst out laughing.

Eliot bowed before Duke. “Your Grace, it appears we have much to discuss. Will you join me in my cabin for refreshment?”

Norby, Colley-Rivers, and Hales stepped forward to follow.

Eliot’s sharp-eyed gaze held them captive. “The invitation is for your captain only.”

“Relax.” Duke slapped Norby on the shoulder. “I’ll get this sorted.”

Casting an apologetic look at his men, he followed Eliot down the companionway. The news that Donegal had claimed the prize money for Jupiter was a crushing blow, disrupting his plans and putting all their futures in jeopardy. Surviving Castaway Cay was the least of their worries now. No one knew better than he the tight rein harnessing their strained emotions. The situation would become disastrous for everyone aboard Minerva if his men snapped and this revelation drove them to violence.

Duke’s men were weary and worn, and the endless efforts to elevate their spirits had taken a toll on him. He needed a drink, something to numb his escalating anxiety so he could figure a way out of this mess.

‘Then mightiest thou speak, then mightiest thou tear thy hair, and fall upon the ground, as I do now, taking the measure of an unmade grave.’

He knew more than anyone what was at stake. He’d gone to war to earn Lord Kerridge’s approval.

But how could he marry Jane now without a farthing to his name?