Chapter Eleven
A chilling rain challenged the integrity of the ancestral pink granite manor house that bordered the Berkshire valley.
The voices within were muffled by infrequent claps of thunder.
Two sleek deerhounds dozed before a roaring applewood fire.
A bottle of hearty port and three crystal glasses sat on the Jacobean table that had occupied the same corner two centuries ago.
The Duke of Scarfield stood, his back straight despite the rheumatism that had settled deep into his bones alongside a decade of bitter regrets.
His heavy brows were knitted in a perpetual frown.
His craggy face betrayed no weakness or self-pity.
He was a man who believed fiercely in the duty of his birthright.
Begging the forgiveness of his firstborn son did not come easily to his pride.
In fact, it had taken him years to admit that he had wronged his late wife.
Almost a lifetime had elapsed before he’d found the courage to accept the fact that his jealousy had destroyed his family, and to invite Adrian home.
He knew his son had arrived in England a year ago.
And still he had waited for his return. Either this was Adrian’s revenge, or perhaps he merely did not care.
“A week,” he said, studying the dreary wooded landscape. “It’s been raining for a week.”
Miniature pools of rainwater glistened in the crushed oyster shells that comprised the circular drive. He had kept a vigil for several months for sign of Adrian’s return, always to be disappointed.
“The weather makes travel difficult,” his golden-haired daughter said from the chair where she plied a needle into one of her endless tapestries.
“Perhaps he is ill, my lord,” murmured Bridgewater, the estate manager, from the candlelit desk where he awaited the duke’s attention to his neglected accounts.
Indeed, the entire estate had slipped into neglect as if everyone counted on Adrian’s return to awaken whatever hope Scarfield had once known for the future.
Scarfield turned with a rueful laugh. “We play this performance every afternoon, do we not?”
His daughter Florence glanced up with a smile. “Every morning, every afternoon, every night.”
“At least Cedric could have sent word,” the duke said in a fretful voice.
“The weather, your grace,” Bridgewater said vaguely. “Travel is difficult at this time of year.”
Florence rose, dropping her needlework in a basket at her feet. “Well, I for one like the rain. I think I shall walk over to see Serena before the day darkens.”
“To tell her that her betrothed has not returned?” her father asked with a sigh.
She laughed again, the two deerhounds following her to the door. “You have not paid attention if you think it matters to her after all this time.”
“Of course it matters,” the duke snapped as he sank into his leather chair. “A promise is a promise.”
His daughter caught Bridgewater’s sympathetic glance before he looked away. “I shall be home before supper.”
“You must have the groom drive you, Lady Florence,” Bridgewater said. “There’s been another report of brigands on the road.”
Her father did not appear to hear, resuming the vigil for his prodigal son. Once she too had wished for Adrian’s return. But now the entire estate waited in suspense for the reunion of the duke with the firstborn he had banished on the basis of nothing but a false accusation.
She walked across the thick Turkey carpet, Bridgewater rising hastily to open the door for her. He was a white-haired elf of a man whose family had served hers for over a century. For a moment the flash of naked worry in his keen amber eyes saddened her. He saw everything that went on in the house.
He knew all of their secrets. He had witnessed her father unfairly accuse her mother of adultery, her mother’s brief illness and sudden death.
Bridgewater had served here during her father’s subsequent decline into spells of melancholy.
He knew which footman had impregnated the chambermaid, and what the butler was up to in the pantry late at night.
Did he fear, as she did, that Adrian’s return might be too late for Scarfield?
After the emotional upheaval of her older brother’s departure the house had settled into a predictable rhythm, if not a pleasant one. Adrian’s absence had ended the constant quarrels that erupted almost daily between him and his father.
In Florence’s estimation, the question of Adrian’s parentage should never have entered anyone’s mind. Still, by the time Adrian escaped, there was no one on the estate, from the scullions to the family’s maiden aunt, who had not been convinced that he had been conceived of an illicit seed.
Then, two years ago, all had changed.
On her deathbed, the children’s retired governess had told witnesses that the duchess had been indeed faithful to her husband, if not devoted.
Miss Mallory then confessed that it was she who had maliciously sent the duke anonymous letters describing his young wife’s love affair with a soldier who had stayed in the village.
Adrian, the author of these unsigned missives had claimed, was not Scarfield’s natural son.
His early arrival as an eight-month baby had proved this shameful fact.
Scarfield’s mistrust of his duchess grew.
She was fifteen years younger than he. She was so vivacious that it hurt him to gaze upon her.
He accompanied her everywhere, and his dark suspicions ruined their marriage.
When she died of a sudden lung infection, he refused to mourn her.
His sorrow, his resentment were turned upon his son Adrian, who at a young age resembled his mother.
When Adrian had left home and set upon his notorious career, it seemed to Scarfield that he had been proven right.
The boy was wild, uncontrollable, and showed none of the sense of duty that was the duke’s lodestar.
The base instincts of his birth father drove him.
He shunned his obligations because recognition of privilege was not in his blood.
And then Scarfield had learned that he had been deceived by the vindictive lies of a former governess, a simple act of revenge.
The duchess had caught Miss Mallory physically restraining Adrian in the nursery one day.
The young mother had dismissed her on the spot, accusing the woman of being unfit to care for the heir.
Miss Mallory had pleaded for another chance, which the duchess had refused to give. Years later the governess had paid her back.
So many years wasted. Scarfield had allowed a lie, his jealousy, to destroy everything that mattered in life. Self-remorse had not erased all traces of his arrogance, however, and never would.
He wanted his heir home. Never mind that those who cared for and served him, his elderly aunt, his daughter and second son, even his assiduous estate manager, who had pulled the estate from poverty more than once due to the duke’s ill-chosen investments, had cautioned him that a reconciliation of such a breach might take time.
Scarfield did not listen. The law proclaimed Adrian his rightful heir, past deceptions and suspicions notwithstanding. It remained for him now to bring the boy home and make amends. The duke was not a well man. He would not live much longer.
He did not give a damn what anyone said, or that Adrian’s profession had brought shame to the ancient family name. Scarfield would have his way.
Adrian would wed a neighboring young lady, the girl he had been unofficially pledged to in childhood, and the rightful order of things would be restored as it had been written in the stars centuries ago.
The village would prosper again. The brigands who haunted the outlying woods and roads would be chased off by a man strong enough to challenge them, for in a particular way, Scarfield took pleasure in his son’s self-assertion.
It never occurred to the Duke of Scarfield that his son would turn his back on his inheritance and refuse his offer of forgiveness.
But it had occurred to Florence and she could not sleep for dreading what was to come.