The Unwanted Wedding Read online

  He knew if that ever happened to him it was something he would never forgive and he would undoubtedly defend his honour and his family name by killing the man who had cuckolded him.

  Duels were forbidden both by the Queen and by law, but those who were too chicken-hearted to meet each other at dawn in Hyde Park crossed the Channel to shoot at each other in Calais or Boulogne.

  Whichever way it was done, the Duke thought it was a messy business, and the easiest way to avoid such a confrontation was not to be married.

  He himself was a very good shot and extremely quick with a pistol. He knew that any husband who suspected him of seducing his wife would think twice before he challenged him.

  He himself would not hesitate for one moment, but as quite certainly he would be the victor, it would be unsporting to find himself in such a position.

  “I shall never marry,” he often said to his friends.

  “Don’t be so ridiculous!” was the reply. “You know you have to produce an heir.”

  “There is no hurry for that,” the Duke always replied.

  Now at thirty-three he had still managed to remain a bachelor despite the fact that certain ambitious parents with marriageable daughters plied him with invitations.

  While the girls themselves looked at him with wistful eyes, they were aware as they did so that he had no idea that they even existed.

  The type of woman with whom the Duke spent his time and who captured his interest was always very sophisticated, witty and at the same time extremely feminine.

  He liked women with soft voices and soft bodies.

  He had never found himself interested in women with sharp tongues and perhaps because he was almost aggressively masculine himself he preferred them to be small and fragile.

  “I presume it brings out the protective instinct in you,” a man had said to him once, mockingly.

  The Duke had smiled cynically since he was well aware that most of the women with whom he associated did not need protecting and were, in fact, very capable of looking after themselves.

  Equally he knew that they looked up to him and accepted his domination and that no woman had yet ever wanted him to be anything but masterful both to her and to everybody else.

  *

  The following morning after the party at Buckingham Palace, the Duke rose early as he always did and rode in Hyde Park.

  There were far more men riders than women and he wondered if it would have been easier for Aline to have met him there to tell him her secret, if that was what it was.

  Then he remembered that she would not ride alone as it would be inconceivable for her to appear without her husband or a groom in attendance.

  After breakfast in his house in Park Lane, the Duke dealt with a number of letters that his secretary had for him to sign.

  He then attended a meeting of the Masters of Foxhounds, which was taking place in the house of the Duke of Beaufort.

  This kept him busy until luncheon time and then, instead of returning home, he ate at White’s Club and listened to the latest gossip of its members who always had something to impart which no one else had heard before.

  The Duke received several invitations for different ways of spending his afternoon.

  But because he knew he would have to be at Langstone House at half-past four he first went to Lord’s Cricket Ground to sit in the pavilion and watch a game of cricket before finally he drove to Grosvenor Square.

  He arrived at Langstone House only ten minutes later than he knew Aline would be expecting him.

  The Countess had been pacing the room wondering frantically whether, because what she wanted was against his principles or rather one of the rules he made for himself, he would turn her down.

  One thing about the Duke which women always found infuriating was that they could never be sure that he would do what was expected of him.

  He was a law unto himself when it came to his own interests.

  Aline Langstone knew that, if he chose to think it was a mistake for her to invite him to tea, he would not hesitate to leave her waiting for him while without making any explanation he did something else.

  When she thought of how other men crawled on their knees for her favours, she found this an exasperating trait in the Duke.

  And yet regrettably it made her love him all the more.

  She knew, however angry she might be, he would only have to touch her for her to melt into his arms and find her heart beating against his so that it would be impossible to think of anything but her need of him as a man.

  “Heavens knows why he is different from every other man I have ever met!” she exclaimed.

  She stopped in front of one of the mirrors to look at her reflection and know that without doubt she was the loveliest woman in the whole of the Social world.

  It was a gift for which she was always extremely grateful and, because she was so beautiful, she was sure she could hold the affection of any man for just as long as she wanted him.

  With, of course, the exception of the Duke.

  She always had the uncomfortable feeling when he left her even after hours of passionate lovemaking that she might never see him again.

  It made her want to hold onto him with both hands and make him swear that what he felt for her was a love that was eternal and would never fade.

  But she was astute enough to know that this was the last way of holding him and only by letting him think he was free would she keep him her prisoner.

  Her long experience of men should, Aline thought, have made her know exactly how to handle the Duke.

  Yet, because he was unlike any other man who had ever been her lover, she knew that if he wished to leave her he would do so and no amount of pleading or tears would persuade him to stay.

  “Of course he loves me, I know he loves me,” she told her reflection.

  But while her voice spoke positively, there was a question in her eyes to which she had no answer.

  Suddenly the door behind her opened and she turned sharply as the butler announced,

  “His Grace the Duke of Tynemouth, my Lady!”

  “What a lovely surprise!” Aline managed to exclaim as she moved towards the Duke holding out her hand.

  “We will not wait for my other guests, Dalton,” she said to the butler. “They may be late, so bring the tea now please.”

  “Very good, my Lady.”

  As the door closed, the Duke raised Aline’s hand to his lips to ask with a twinkle in his eyes,

  “Who else is expected?”

  “Oh, quite a number of friends,” she replied airily.

  “You are a liar, but a very beautiful one,” he retorted, “and, of course, I am waiting to hear why it was so necessary for me to come to see you this afternoon.”

  “Come and sit down.”

  Aline seated herself on a brocade sofa with flowers arranged behind it so that they made a perfect background for her beauty while he took a chair opposite her.

  He waited until the servants had brought in a large and elaborate tea and, as the door closed, Aline, making no pretence of touching the teapot, bent forward to say in a low voice,

  “I had to see you and there was no other way I could do so.”

  “Why is it so urgent?” the Duke asked. “We are meeting each other at the weekend.”

  “I know,” Aline replied, “and I am looking forward to it more than I can possibly say. But, darling, something terrible has happened that you must know now – at once!”

  Because there was such a note of urgency in her voice, he said sharply,

  “Then tell me what it is!”

  The Countess drew in her breath.

  “The Queen has decided that you shall marry the Princess Sophie of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha!”

  As she spoke, the Duke stiffened.

  Then he stared at her as if he thought that he could not have heard her aright.

  “What are you saying? How do you know this?” he asked at length.

  “Th
e Prince told George yesterday morning and, of course, he has arranged it as she is his cousin.”

  “Are you absolutely sure that is what he said?”

  “You know George never exaggerates and naturally he was delighted. As I have told you before, he suspects that we are seeing too much of each other.”

  The Duke rose to his feet to stand holding onto the mantelpiece and looking down at the fire.

  He was not seeing the flames flickering over the coals, but the fat plain face of Princess Sophie whom he had met a month ago at Buckingham Palace.

  She had come to England at the invitation of the Prince and the Queen, to please her adored Albert, had made a great fuss of her.

  The Duke had actually met the Princess on several occasions and had thought her a typically dull dowdy German Fraulein, who would grow even duller and uglier when she became a German Frau.

  She was already too fat and too red-faced and her clothes accentuated all the worst points of her body just as the way she did her hair brought out the worst features of her face.

  He could imagine no worse fate than being married to the Princess and since German families, especially the Saxe-Coburgs, clung to each other like leeches, he would be permanently entertaining her even duller and uglier relations.

  He was silent for so long that at last Aline asked in little above a whisper,

  “What are you going to do?”

  The Duke turned round.

  “That is just what I am wondering. What the hell can I do except refuse point-blank to contemplate such a life of unmitigated hell?”

  “I guessed that was how you would feel! Oh, Ulric, it is terrifying for you, but somehow you must be clever about it.”

  She was silent for a moment before she added,

  “That was why I thought you had to know at once before the Prince or the Queen tell you what they have in mind.”

  “What has happened so far?” the Duke asked. “How far has this absurd idea progressed?”

  “I think from what George told me,” the Countess replied, “that after they had stayed here the Princess, or perhaps it was her father, wrote to Prince Albert and said how happy they had been in England. They also insinuated that the Princess would like to marry an Englishman.”

  She looked up at the Duke’s scowling face apprehensively before she added,

  “George thought that Prince Albert had said she had actually named you as the type of Englishman to whom she would like to be married.”

  “She may want to marry me,” the Duke exclaimed furiously, “but I am damned if I will marry her!”

  “Darling, if the Queen decrees it, you will have to.”

  “This is supposed to be a free country and a democracy!”

  “Not where the Queen is concerned and you know if she is determined, the Prince has an obstinacy that is very German.”

  The Duke knew this was true.

  At the same time the Queen could if she wished be extremely dictatorial, even towards the husband she admired.

  It flashed through the Duke’s mind that the Queen always got her own way.

  When the Prince had become her husband, he had assumed, the Duke had always been told, that he would have a say in the choice of his own household.

  But the Queen did not agree.

  She had chosen the gentlemen who were to be closest to him and, when he had wanted a German as his private secretary, the Queen had been absolutely adamant.

  In fact, she had already chosen young Mr. Anson and that he actually became a close friend of the Prince was just a matter of luck.

  No one could be constantly at Buckingham Palace without being aware that the Queen when she became ‘Royal’ was quite prepared not only to be a ruler but also at times a tyrant.

  Although as a Duke he might be omnipotent in his own particular sphere, he had the uncomfortable feeling that if he came up against the Queen on a subject on which she had set her heart, he would be the loser.

  To be married to the Princess Sophie was so unthinkable that he could hardly believe that Aline was not making up the whole idea.

  However, he supposed it was something he might have anticipated would happen, although it had indeed never entered his mind.

  To begin with he was not only, as his father’s son, one of the most important and certainly the wealthiest Duke in the United Kingdom, but his grandmother on his mother’s side had been related to the Royal Family.

  He would therefore be acceptable as the husband of a minor Royal and in this case a Princess who was not only of Royal Blood but related to the husband of the Queen of England.

  As he thought of her plain face and the platitudes she had mouthed when he had talked with her, he could only fling himself down in the chair he had just vacated and ask despairingly,

  “Having told me of the horror that is encroaching upon me, have you any idea what I can do about it?”

  He did not wait for Aline to reply, but added,

  “Other than to go abroad and stay there!”

  She gave a little cry.

  “Oh, Ulric, you cannot do that! I cannot lose you! That is why I have been thinking that there is just one possible way out of this.”

  “I should certainly be interested to hear it.”

  “It may sound a little crazy,” she went on, “but I have thought and thought about it. The only way I can think of how you could avoid marrying Princess Sophie and having to spend months of the year travelling backwards and forwards to Saxe-Coburg is for you to be married to somebody else!”

  The Duke looked at the Countess as if she had taken leave of her senses.

  “Did you say – married?”

  “Yes, darling, and as I say, it may seem mad. But surely to be married to an ordinary English girl who is young, pleasant and complacent and ready to do what you wish would be better than having all those Royals sitting on top of you?”

  “I have no wish to marry Princess Sophie or anybody else,” the Duke insisted.

  “I know that,” Aline agreed, “but it would be much worse to be married to her and have Prince Albert lecturing you from morning to night than it would be to choose your own wife.”

  There was a certain amount of twisted logic in this, the Duke thought, and after a moment’s silence he said somewhat grudgingly,

  “I suppose even to be engaged might prevent them from ordering me to marry the Princess.”

  “Exactly!” Aline said. “And, although I cannot bear to think about it, you have to be married sometime.”

  “But not for many years.”

  “But you cannot afford to wait for years, the Queen will see to that.”

  There was silence until the Duke said disagreeably,

  “Well, who do you suggest I should marry? Before you suggest again ‘a young girl’, I don’t know any.”

  “I am aware of that,” Aline answered, “and besides there is no time for you to go wooing one. Your engagement, if you are to be saved from the Princess, will have to be announced immediately.”

  “Can I not invent some woman I have never seen and who does not actually exist?” the Duke asked hopefully.

  “No, of course not!” Aline replied. “But I have somebody in mind that you can marry and there will be no difficulty in announcing your engagement the day after tomorrow.”

  There was silence before the Duke remarked,

  “I suppose I am being rather obtuse, but I cannot see quite how you come into this, Aline, or why you are so interested.”

  “Can you really ask such foolish questions?” she enquired. “I love you, Ulric, you know that I love you, and I will do anything to prevent us from losing the happiness we have found together.”

  Her voice sharpened as she finished,

  “You know as well as I do that if you marry the Princess we shall never have another chance of being alone together.”

  She gave a groan as she added,

  “You have been at Buckingham Palace long enough to know that the Queen is aw
are of everything that concerns her household and I expect too that she knows about us however discreet we have been! But if you were actually one of the family they would keep you so occupied that you would never have a free moment to yourself.”

  The Duke knew that this was true, but, as there was no point in merely agreeing with Aline, he said nothing.

  “I have been thinking,” the Countess continued, “ever since George told me what was going to happen that if you married somebody completely outside the Royal Circle, then it would be impossible for the Queen to interfere between you and me.”

  She paused before she went on,

  “Actually the girl I have in mind will make it even easier for us to be together than it is now.”

  “‘The girl you have in mind’?” the Duke repeated sharply. “What girl? Who is she?”

  “That is what I am going to tell you. But don’t look so cross! This is the only possible way I feel I can save you.”

  As she spoke, the Countess rose from the sofa and crossed to the chair where the Duke was sitting.

  She knelt down beside him turning her beautiful face up to his as she said,

  “I love you! I love you! Oh, Ulric, I cannot lose you! That is what will happen if the Queen and the Prince have their way − ”

  She was not able to finish the sentence.

  The Duke bent forward to put his arms around her and now his lips were on hers kissing her passionately, demandingly and, because he was upset, almost brutally.

  The fire that was never far from the surface in either of them leapt into a blaze.

  As their kisses became more insistent, the Duke lifted her until she was lying in his arms and she could feel his heart beating as frantically as her own.

  The sound of a coal falling in the grate made them both aware of the risk they were running.

  In a choked little voice, because she found it hard to breathe, Aline managed to say when the Duke raised his head,

  “We must be sensible – but it is very – difficult when you – kiss me like that.”

  “I want you!” he said. “It is damnable that we have to wait until the weekend!”

  “I know, but there is a great – deal you have to – do before then.”

  It was still difficult for her to speak in anything but a gasp, but she extricated herself from his arms and with an effort moved back to the sofa.