Chapter Six #2
He squinted up at the ceiling. “If I recall correctly, Dulverton had to leave London because his father was dying. It was right in the middle of the Season and the lovely Christina remained in town and ran amok.” He brought his gaze back to Katie and smiled.
“I was just teasing you when I asked if he’d offered for you.
The Dukes of Dulverton don’t condescend to marry mere English misses. ”
“What do you mean?”
“They always take Dutch wives. It’s some ancient family tradition dating back to the Glorious Revolution.”
The young woman in the garden tonight now made sense. Dulverton must have been meeting her for the first time—and the two older people with her were probably Dutch matchmakers of some sort—and Katie had ruined their plans.
Not just theirs, but Fowler’s and Letty’s, as well.
“What is going on, Katie?”
Katie looked up from her unpleasant thoughts. “You said the marriage was a disaster? What did you mean?”
“Oh, didn’t I say? She ran off with another man.”
“What? Who?”
“Viscount Hendry’s youngest son. You won’t have met him as he never came back after running off with Christina.”
“Are you saying that Dulverton is still married?”
“No, no. He obtained a divorce.”
Katie’s jaw sagged. “A divorce!”
He looked amused by her reaction. “Hard to imagine old Dullness embroiled in such a scandal, isn’t it?”
Actually, Katie had a hard time imagining a woman running away from such an intimidating man. He did not look as if he would allow it. “Tell me the story, Andrew—all of it, please.”
“Well, as I said, Dullness—”
“Would you please stop calling him that?”
Andrew’s eyebrows shot up, and curiosity glinted in his sky-blue eyes, making Katie wish she’d held her tongue.
Thankfully, when he opened his mouth, it wasn’t to ask uncomfortable questions.
“His father arranged the match, and I gather the two of them met for the first time a week before they married. They’d not been in London very long when Dulverton was called to his father’s deathbed.
Foolishly, he left his new duchess in London, and she ran wild. ”
“And you helped her.”
“I wasn’t her first lover, Katie,” Andrew said, looking miffed. “And when I discovered what she wanted I ended our brief association.”
“What did she want?”
“Someone foolish enough to run off with her.”
“And she found one.”
“Yes. She and Hendry were packing their bags when Dulverton returned.” He paused and gave her a thoughtful look.
“What?” she asked.
“I probably shouldn’t tell you this next part—it’s not really for a lady’s ears and—”
“I cannot believe that you, of all people, would utter such rubbi—”
“Calm down, darling. I’m going to tell you.” He raised his hands in a placating gesture but quickly lowered them again at whatever he saw on Katie’s face—likely murderous rage at being told to calm down. “Dulverton challenged Hendry to a duel.”
“Good Lord! With swords or—”
“It was Hendry’s choice and he picked pistols.”
“And is Dulverton—”
“He is a crack shot.”
“Then why did Hendry choose pistols?”
“Because the duke is also an expert hand with a sword and damned handy with his fives, not to mention outweighing poor Hendry by at least two stone.” Andrew frowned and his gaze turned vague.
“I was a few years ahead of Dulverton at school, but I recall that he had a devil of a time his first year and got thrashed almost weekly.”
“But he is enormous.”
“Now he is. But he was a late bloomer. Back then, he was a spindly little lad. Not only was he puny and gangly and awkward, but he always had his nose in a book and spent every spare moment studying.”
“Then why do you keep calling him dull?”
Andrew said, with exaggerated patience, “I meant dull in the other sense of the word, darling. Even as a boy he had impossibly dull habits. He was no fun.”
“Fun?” she repeated.
“Yes. Fun. You know about fun, don’t you?”
“I know about stupid young bucks and their notions of fun,” she retorted. “Just get on with your story. What happened at this duel?”
“I’m getting there,” he said in a chastising tone.
Katie bit her lip.
“My point in mentioning his younger days was that when he came back to school the second year, he wasn’t that much bigger, but he suddenly knew how to fight.
Somebody had taught him well over the summer and that was the end of his weekly thrashings.
He also joined both the shooting and fencing clubs—and was bloody scary at both.
” Andrew shrugged. “As far as I know, Dulverton never did make any friends, but everyone left him well alone after the first year.” An almost fond smile curled his lips.
“What is it? Why are you looking like that?” Katie asked.
“I was just remembering that duel. I have to admit it was one of the most fascinating things I’ve ever seen.
“You were actually there?”
“Lord, Katie! You don’t think there was a man in the ton who missed that, do you?”
“All those men and nobody had the sense to try and stop it?”
He looked at her as if she’d just sprouted a second head.
“Never mind,” Katie said. “Men are truly idiots.”
Andrew didn’t seem to hear her, his thoughts obviously on the past. “Most of us expected Hendry to run for his life, but the man had a sliver of honor after all. Or he might have stayed because Dulverton made such a huge bloo—er, target that Hendry thought he might be lucky. In the end, he did get lucky—at least as far as the duel went—because Dulverton just stood there and let Hendry get the first shot off.” Andrew snorted and looked stunned.
“Dulverton’s a dull duck, but there’s no denying the man has ice in his veins.
Poor Hendry’s hand was shaking so badly that he didn’t come close to hitting Dulverton even though the duke faced him head on rather than turning to the side to make a smaller target.
” He cut Katie a look. “Which is what a man with any sense would do. After Hendry’s shot went wide he looked on the brink of fainting away, but again he surprised us and held his ground.
And then Dulverton did something nobody expected.
” He met Katie’s gaze and shook his head in wonder.
“What?” she demanded. “What did he do?”
Andrew laughed. “He handed the pistol to his second without even taking a shot.”
“And that is… odd?”
“Unprecedented, is more like.”
“But surely Dulverton would have faced repercussions if he’d killed the son of a viscount?”
“Lord, Katie. Hendry was in the process of running off with the man’s wife. There wasn’t a peer in the land who’d have punished Dulverton for killing the man.”
“So why didn’t he?”
“That is actually the best part of the story.
He did Hendry one worse than killing him; he humiliated him.
Twice. First, he lowered his pistol without shooting.
Then he marched up to the man and said, “Christina is yours, now. That is the only reason I left you alive; so you can take her and be gone. And then he hopped in his carriage and left.”
“I do not understand why you are so amazed. It seems a sensible thing to do to me,” Katie said. “Why keep a wife who didn’t want him?”
Andrew rolled his eyes. “There speaks a woman.”
“A sensible woman,” she muttered.
Andrew was still caught up in the past and did not appear to hear her. “As far as I know, that is the only time Dulverton did not behave dully.”
Katie rolled her eyes. “What happened afterward?”
“Hendry and Christina left soon after. Dulverton’s divorce was granted with startling celerity, even for a duke. Even though she was free, Hendry never married her, and she died in childbed a few years later.”
“I cannot believe I never heard so much as a whiff about this duel and his divorce.”
“It was almost two decades ago.”
“That shouldn’t matter with such a scandalous tale. Divorces are as rare as hen’s teeth and that duel sounds like the stuff of legends.
“Gentlemen do not gossip to ladies about duels.” Andrew must have realized what he’d just said because he looked a bit sheepish.
“I only told you because it seemed so important. As for not hearing about the divorce, the man has hardly shown his face in a ballroom for decades. That doesn’t make for a very interesting gossip.
People haven’t just forgotten about his divorce, they’ve forgotten about the man.
You’ve been on the town for five years—have you ever heard of any matchmaking mamas scheming to catch Dulverton? ”
“Now that you mention it, I haven’t,” she said. Katie had to admit she’d not thought of the duke herself until she’d put him on her list, more for entertainment value than any real belief that one of them would be in a position to kiss him. The irony of that was not lost on her.
“He is a duke. Why aren’t women scheming to marry him?” she asked.
“Because the Dukes of Dulverton only marry Dutch women.”
Katie wondered what Andrew would say if she told him that was no longer the case. That Dulverton would be proposing to her on the morrow…
The urge to laugh hysterically suddenly struck and she needed to swallow hard. Twice.
“I know you do not want me to say it,” Andrew went on, “but the man is dull and there is no denying that contributes to the lack of gossip. Dulverton doesn’t have friends, and I’ve only seen him at White’s a handful of times.
He is a loner and always has been. Aside from that duel he’s never made time for anyone or anything other than books and rocks. ”
“Rocks?”
Andrew squinted thoughtfully. “Er, perhaps fossils. Or maybe dirt. I don’t know.
” He gave a dismissive wave of his hand.
“Something of that sort. He is a member of the Royal Society, but I doubt he spends much time even with that boring lot.” He fixed her with a too piercing look.
“You still have not told me why you are so curious about him, Katie.”
“Dulverton was at the Sutton ball tonight.”
Andrew’s eyebrows arched. “Ah. And he piqued your interest?”
Katie shrugged.
“I shouldn’t have thought such an ugly fellow would appeal to you. Or is it the title?”
Katie ignored his question.
“You aren’t going to tell me why you are so curious about him, are you?”
“No.”
He laughed. “You cannot keep any secrets from me, darling. Chatham will tell me.” Andrew smirked. “He tells me everything.”
“Bully for you,” Katie muttered.
“Oh, by the by, Stacia and I won’t be going to Chatham Park this summer.”
“But you can’t miss it, Andrew!”
Hy and Chatham’s annual house party was second only to her family’s Christmas gatherings as Katie’s favorite time of year. And Stacia and Andrew had been regular fixtures every year since their marriage five years ago.
“I’m sorry, my lovely, but we simply have too much to do at Rosewood.”
“Oh, I know. But it will not be the same without you and Stacia.”
“We’ll go again next year, darling.”
Of course, if Hy and Chatham and Dulverton had their way tomorrow then Katie would probably be married and tucked away at the duke’s remotest country estate by this time next week. Something told her that a man who abhorred the London Season would not be fond of house parties, either.