The Husband Hunters

  Chapter One 1816

  “I have solved the problem!”

  The door of the breakfast room had burst open as the gay lilting voice continued,

  “I lay awake all night thinking about it and now I know exactly what we must do!”

  Her entrance caused the two young women sitting at the table to turn their faces towards her and there was instant eagerness in two pairs of eyes as they replied,

  “What have you decided? Tell us, Andrina, quickly!”

  Andrina walked into the room to sit down at the head of the table.

  It would have been difficult looking at the three sisters to imagine that there could be anywhere in the world three girls who were so exquisitely beautiful, but each so different.

  Andrina was the oldest and least spectacular.

  Her second sister, Cheryl, was at eighteen-and-a-half so lovely that most people on seeing her were struck speechless by her appearance.

  She had golden hair, the colour of ripening corn, blue eyes – the translucent blue of a thrush’s egg – and a pink-and-white complexion that reminded people irresistibly of strawberries and cream.

  What was more, she had a slim elegant figure and moved gracefully.

  Sharon, her younger sister, took after her father and was dark-haired with a magnolia-like skin and eyes that were sometimes blue and sometimes purple in their depths.

  Colonel Maldon had always said that Sharon was a throwback to a Spanish ancestor who had occurred somewhere in the Maldon family tree, but whatever ancestor she resembled Sharon was lovely and also the wittiest and the liveliest of the three sisters.

  She found everything amusing and was insatiably curious about life and people. She longed for the Social whirl, which she read about in the ladies’ magazines and occasionally in the more sedate Morning Post, which her father had taken every day.

  Andrina would have been outstanding in any company that did not include her sisters, but if she appeared to compromise between them it was because her hair was neither fair nor dark.

  “Mousy” she herself called it disparagingly, but her mother had always said firmly that it was the ‘colour of a shadow that people found comforting and protective after the glare of the sunshine’.

  As if to complement her hair, Andrina’s eyes were grey, although in some lights they appeared to be green and she thought despondently that nature might have been kind enough to give her red hair to go with them. Her face, however, had a sweeter expression than her two sisters had in theirs.

  Because she was the oldest she had forced herself to be the practical one and after her mother’s death five years ago she had, even though she had been little over fifteen at the time, taken complete control of the household.

  Her father had been ill during the last two years of his life and Cheryl and Sharon being so young it was left to Andrina to be hostess, housekeeper, nurse, teacher and maid-of-all-work.

  The girls had a Governess who came in from the village.

  But it was Andrina who had remembered and passed on all her mother had taught her, and it was she who had instilled into Cheryl and Sharon the exquisite good manners that Mrs. Maldon had thought essential, the rules of etiquette that every young lady should follow and all the other qualities that Andrina thought her mother would expect to find in each of her daughters.

  They had been quite easy to manage, not only because they loved Andrina, but also because Cheryl was far too good-natured not to agree to anything that was suggested to her, while Sharon was exceedingly ambitious.

  It was Sharon who had put the idea into Andrina’s head that she had puzzled over during the night and which now seemed to burst from her lips as she said,

  “I have decided that I must go to London immediately!”

  “To London?” Sharon exclaimed. “But what for? And why you?”

  “I will tell you,” Andrina answered, helping herself to coffee from a pot that stood in front of her on the table before she continued,

  “I lay awake thinking of what you said to me last night, Sharon.”

  “What I said,” Sharon interposed, “was that if the two Miss Gunnings could take London by storm, we could do the same. And what is more, there are three of us!”

  “You also said,” Cheryl remarked, “that you thought I was lovelier than Elizabeth Gunning and that Andrina looked rather like Maria.”

  “Yes, that is what I said,” Sharon agreed. “But I – ”

  “And that is exactly what I have been thinking about,” Andrina interrupted. “It is perfectly true. You are both lovely, far lovelier than I am, but I would have to come with you to look after you.”

  She paused for a moment and then added,

  “Let’s face facts. We are not going to be able to live here in any comfort, much less in any luxury, on what Papa has left.”

  “What is it exactly?” Sharon asked.

  Andrina drew in her breath.

  “Under two hundred pounds a year!” she said. “We own the house, but it is badly in need of repair and I don’t see, if we are to feed and clothe ourselves, that we can afford more than one horse on that income.”

  There was silence as both her sisters looked at her apprehensively before Andrina went on,

  “That is why, when I was feeling desperate, a solution came to me.”

  “What is it?” Sharon asked. “Tell us quickly!”

  “I am going to London to see the Duke!”

  “The Duke?” her sister echoed. “What Duke? I had no idea we knew one!”

  “We have never met him,” Andrina replied, “but Papa said that he was a very distant relative and he is my Godfather.”

  “Not a very good one,” Sharon said scornfully. “As far as I know he has never sent you a present!”

  “He has never paid the slightest attention to me,” Andrina replied, “and that is why it is about time he did!”

  “Who is he?” Cheryl asked.

  “The Duke of Broxbourne,” Andrina replied. “He must be getting very old, but Papa was fond of him. When he was young, he used to go with his father to stay with the Duke and he once described to me how grand and important the house was.”

  “Why did he become your Godfather?” Cheryl enquired.

  Andrina smiled.

  “I am not certain, but I am sure that it was due to Mama. You know how she always wanted us to know what she called ‘nice people’ and she and Papa moved in Society before he lost everything through gambling.”

  “How could he have been so stupid?” Sharon asked angrily.

  “That is what he often used to ask himself,” Andrina said. “He was always bitterly ashamed of having thrown away his inheritance in such a stupid manner! But I daresay it was difficult when all the gentlemen whom Papa knew were gambling wildly in London Clubs and he being so gay and handsome would have been unable to resist following their lead.”

  “I can understand that while he was still unmarried,” Sharon said, “but you would have thought that Mama would have been able to restrain him.”

  “She tried,” Andrina replied, “but she said herself that she was so young and thoughtless, and as you know, she adored Papa and always wanted him to be happy.”

  “It is not very happy for us now,” Sharon remarked.

  “Yes, I know,” Andrina agreed, “and that is why I intend to see the Duke and insist that he does something.”

  “How can you insist?” Cheryl quizzed.

  “I am not certain,” Andrina answered. “Perhaps his conscience will prick him when he realises that he has neglected not only Papa as a friend and relative but also all of us down the years since we came to live here.”

  “Papa once said,” Sharon commented, “that the rich have no use for
the paupers sitting outside their front gates.”

  “That is obviously what the Duke thinks,” Andrina said, “and I am going to point out to His Grace that the very least he can do is to introduce us to Society and help you both to find yourselves husbands.”

  “Husbands?” Cheryl ejaculated.

  “Of course,” Andrina answered. “Why else should you go to London?”

  “Yes, you are quite right,” Sharon agreed. “That is what the Gunning sisters did. Elizabeth married a Duke – two Dukes for that matter – and Maria, an Earl!”

  The story had always been one of Andrina’s favourites.

  The two desperately poor sisters had come with their mother from Ireland in 1751 to take London Society by storm. Newspapers chronicled their movements, verses in their praise filled the magazines.

  “Brightly Etherials! Matchless Pair.

  Modest, Lovely, Blooming, Fair.”

  Having known Elizabeth only a month, the Duke of Hamilton offered her his hand and heart and they were married at midnight in the Great Chapel in Curzon Street.

  Five days later Maria married the Earl of Coventry and set out for Lord Ashburnham’s seat at Charlton in Kent ‘to consummate their nuptials’.

  Not only beautiful, Elizabeth was loyal, sympathetic, brave and compassionate, all qualities that were very necessary when she found that she had married a notorious drunkard.

  However, after two children had been born, one being a son and heir, the Duke, worn out by intemperance, died aged thirty-three.

  Elizabeth, lonely and unhappy, soon married again. Her second husband was Colonel Ian Campbell, a man of high character and noble ambitions, who later became the fifth Duke of Argyll.

  To Andrina it was the most romantic story she knew and, as she thought about it, she was sure that Elizabeth Gunning could have been no more beautiful than Cheryl.

  “You too must marry a Duke,” Cheryl was saying to Sharon. “I personally think it would be frightening to be a Duchess.”

  “I would love to see you a Duchess, Cheryl,” Andrina interposed. “There could never have been a more beautiful one and I know that when we reach London every man who sees you will propose to you, except those who are proposing to Sharon!”

  “What about you?” Cheryl asked.

  “I shall have no time to think about myself until you are both safely settled,” Andrina replied, “and you know, girls, that it is a question of urgency. We shall have just enough money for this Season only – one Season and no more!”

  “How shall we have even that?” Sharon asked.

  “Have you forgotten Mama’s necklace?” Andrina asked softly.

  Both her sisters gave an exclamation at the same time.

  “Mama’s necklace, of course!” Sharon cried. “It must be worth hundreds of pounds!”

  “Except for the emeralds, the stones are not very big,” Andrina replied. “But Mama told me once that she was certain, if she sold it, she could get five hundred pounds for it!”

  “That is a lot of money!” Cheryl exclaimed.

  “It will be enough for our purpose,” Andrina said. “Don’t forget, the reason Mama kept it hidden all the years we have lived here was that it should be a little nest egg for us, should we ever need it.”

  “I wonder Papa did not make her sell it,” Sharon commented.

  “She persuaded him first to put it on one side and later I think he forgot about it,” Andrina answered. “Anyway, I know she would have sold it if any of us had married and now we are going to sell it for that very reason.”

  “If we get five hundred pounds for it,” Sharon said practically, “that would be almost one hundred and sixty-seven pounds each!”

  “Yes, if we divided the money equally between us,” Andrina agreed. “But as a lump sum it will be enough for us to rent a house in London for the next two months and to buy some pretty new gowns.”

  “The Gunnings had only one between them!” Sharon remarked.

  “You are going to have more than that,” Andrina said, “I have a feeling that people have grown more sophisticated than when the Gunning girls first caused such a sensation.”

  “The gowns are simpler,” Sharon replied, “but there is less of them – very much less! The Ladies’ Magazine said last week,

  ‘Fashions from Paris adopted by the girls at Vauxhall and other places are the thinnest muslins offering glimpses of breasts and legs to ardent young men’.”

  “Sharon!” Andrina exclaimed. “I have never heard anything so improper! You and Cheryl will wear nothing of the sort!”

  “We have to be in the fashion, Andrina!” Sharon retorted. “La Belle Assemblée said that

  ‘Ladies in a most reprehensible manner in Paris and in London are damping their muslins so as to make them cling to their figures so that they appear almost naked’!”

  “I cannot think what sort of ladies they are talking about!” Andrina said sharply. “You will be modest if nothing else! I am quite certain that the type of husband I want for you would not wish his wife to look fast or improper!”

  “We will do whatever you want us to do,” Cheryl said meekly.

  Andrina smiled at her and her eyes softened.

  “Thank you, Cheryl. I want you to trust me and believe I know what is best for you both. It is terribly important that we should not do anything wrong or appear in London under the wrong auspices.”

  “That is true,” Sharon agreed, “and the most important thing, far more important than anything else, is for us to get into Almack’s!”

  “What is Almack’s?” Cheryl asked.

  Both sisters looked at Sharon who, although she was only just over seventeen, always had more knowledge of the fashionable world than either of them.

  “Almack’s,” she replied, “is the most exclusive and the most important supper and dancing Club in the whole of London.”

  “Tell us about it,” Cheryl begged.

  “I have read all about it,” Sharon answered, “and it is ruled by a group of patronesses such as Lady Jersey, Lady Castlereagh, Lady Cowper, the Princess de Lieven and several others.”

  She paused to look at her two sisters and added dramatically,

  “If one does not get on the list and receive a voucher-invitation issued by one of the patronesses, then you cannot visit Almack’s and you are a complete social outcast!”

  “It sounds very snobby!” Andrina remarked.

  “That is what they want it to be,” Sharon answered.

  She rose from the table.

  “I will read you a poem, I found it in one of the magazines last year. I know where it is.”

  She ran from the room and Andrina looked at Cheryl.

  She looked exquisitely beautiful in the spring sunshine coming through the window, which had just touched her hair and turned it into living gold.

  Andrina bent forward, a smile on her lips, to say,

  “You cannot stay here, Cheryl, dearest, meeting no one and seeing no one but Hugo Renton.”

  “But I like Hugo,” Cheryl protested.

  “He is a very nice young man,” Andrina agreed, “but you know as well as I do that he has no money of his own and his father would put every obstacle in the way of your marrying him. Besides, Hugo is of little importance except here in Cheshire and there are all sorts of exciting young men waiting for you in London.”

  “Perhaps they will frighten me,” Cheryl suggested.

  “They will admire you!” Andrina said firmly.

  She looked a little apprehensively at her sister as she spoke.

  Cheryl was easily frightened by people and on any social occasion Andrina was always very careful to keep beside her and prevent her from being upset.

  Cheryl was extremely sensitive and if one of the local Dowagers was rather brusque she would feel that she was being snubbed and would want to creep away from the party unnoticed.

  “You are going to be a success in London,” Andrina said now, “a big success, Cheryl! You wil
l be the belle of every ball, feted and acclaimed! Every man you meet will want to lay his heart, his name and his fortune at your feet!”

  Cheryl did not answer, she merely looked rather anxious and Andrina was glad when Sharon returned with a copy of The Ladies’ Magazine in her hand.

  She threw herself down in her seat at the table.

  “Listen to this,” she said. “It is written by Henry Luttrell,

  “All on that magic LIST depends,

  Fame, fortune, fashion, lovers, friends,

  ’Tis that which gratifies or vexes

  All ranks, all ages, and both sexes.

  If once to Almack’s you belong,

  Like monarchs, you can do no wrong,

  But banished thence on Wednesday night,

  By Jove, you can do nothing right.”

  There was silence for a moment after she had finished.

  “Supposing we are banished?” Cheryl asked in a trembling voice.

  “We will not be,” Andrina replied positively. “If the Duke of Broxbourne cannot get us invited to Almack’s who can?”

  “I hope you are right,” Sharon said, “but, as I have already said, it depends entirely on the patronesses and whatever the Duke does or does not do, we will have to have a chaperone.”

  “I have thought of that,” Andrina replied. “That is something else the Duke will have to provide for us.”

  “Will we have to pay her?” Sharon asked.

  Andrina was still for a moment.

  “I hope not,” she said at length. “That is something I did not take into consideration.”

  “But there should be enough money when we have sold the necklace. Where is it?”

  “It is in Mama’s bedroom where I looked at it last night,” Andrina answered. “I knew where she had hidden it and I left it there after she died just in case Papa should take it into his head to lay his hands on it.”

  She met Sharon’s eyes, but neither of them said anything.

  They both knew that their father in the last years of his life had been increasingly querulous and resentful of the poverty that prevented his enjoying many of the luxuries that he began to crave.

  He wanted food such as could not be bought in their small village and anyhow if they had shopped in Chester it would have been much too expensive.