A Road to Romance Read online

  “What can we do? Except go hunting for more and meet here in a couple of months’ time to say exactly the same things to each other that we have said now.”

  Lord Alfred held up his hands.

  “What you want now is a good drink of champagne which I will stand you. Let’s decide to go somewhere new where we have never been before and see if the women are more attractive than those we find in London.”

  “If you are talking of leaving England, Alfred, you know as well as I do that we have to be here because of all the racing. Otherwise it’s not a bad idea and we certainly might do it in the autumn.”

  There was silence as they sipped their coffee.

  Then Lord Alfred remarked,

  “Well, the autumn is very far away. Let’s think of something exciting. Something we have never done before which we can do at once when you are down in the dumps. As I have already told you I am, at the moment, open to any offers made to me.”

  “They will be made all right,” the Marquis said in a gloomy voice. “Just as I know that Beaufort is determined that I will marry his daughter.”

  Lord Alfred gave a cry.

  “Oh, you cannot do that! She is a crashing bore! He tried to push her onto me for some time and I was fool enough to enjoy his food, his drink and the amusing people he entertained and was then very nearly forced up the aisle because of it.”

  “I have been in exactly the same position too,” the Marquis murmured. “It’s those people we must avoid at all costs.”

  Lord Alfred then called the Steward and ordered a bottle of champagne.

  “Now I am determined to cheer you up, Neil,” he said, “and you will find that champagne is always helpful on these occasions.”

  “I have a better idea,” a voice rang out.

  Both of them turned to look at the speaker.

  It was the Duke of Dunstead, who had been sitting behind them although they had not been aware of it.

  He was an old man and one of the most respected members of White’s.

  He walked round the Marquis’s chair and sat down between them.

  “I have been listening to what you were saying,” he said. “I found it amusing, because I went through exactly the same troubles myself when I was your age.”

  “I am sure you did,” Lord Alfred agreed. “After all, you became a Duke and I am certain that all the young debutantes dream that a Duke will fall down the chimney and ask her to marry him. Then, as a Duchess, she will be one of the most important people in the whole of Society.”

  The Duke laughed.

  “That is more or less true,” he said. “You are both going through what I went through a thousand times and thought I was unique, just as you think you are.”

  “We don’t think that we are unique,” the Marquis argued. “But you must admit that the Social world, Your Grace, can be extremely boring or perhaps it was better in your day.”

  “Only if it becomes, as you yourselves have found it, repetitive,” the Duke replied. “And that I understand is the reason why both of you are up in arms.”

  “I only wish we were,” Lord Alfred said. “And Neil is particularly fed up at the moment simply because they run after him too readily. Instead of enjoying himself as he ought to, he is more intent on not being caught.”

  The Duke smiled.

  “A sad, sad story! Well then, I have something to suggest to you two boys that I really wish someone had suggested to me.”

  “What is that?” the Marquis asked, now looking interested.

  “What I wanted and what you need at the moment is adventure,” he replied. “I don’t mean going out and exploring the world outside but seeing if there is adventure, which, of course, there is in our own country.”

  Both young gentlemen stared at him.

  “You said ‘adventure’,” the Marquis queried.

  “That is just what I mean,” the Duke said. “I have always believed it is to be found here at home if one looks for it or is fortunate enough to fall into it by the wayside.”

  Lord Alfred was looking at him with surprise.

  “Then are you really suggesting, Your Grace, that in your long and exciting life you have found adventure here in England?”

  “Yes, that is just what I am saying, my boy. As you know, I have fought abroad in the Army. I have been involved in many skirmishes and have travelled to strange places that I found very interesting if uncomfortable.”

  The Marquis laughed.

  “I would have thought that the adventures you had which, when they were happening, must have been most unpleasant for the body besides being somewhat explosive to the brain.”

  “You are absolutely right,” the Duke agreed. “But I have thought, as I am thinking now, that adventure is here for all of us if we are fortunate enough to find it.”

  “You mean here in England,” Lord Alfred asked, as if he must get it straight in his own mind.

  “Exactly! I am therefore going to suggest, although you may refuse, thinking I am a stupid old man to propose it or you may well think it is a new idea and something that you have never done before.”

  Both the Marquis and Lord Alfred sat forward in their seats with their eyes on the Duke.

  He could see that they were listening.

  “Because in White’s we have to put it down in the betting book,” he said, “I am prepared to bet you one of my best horses to one of yours that if you set out alone from here in London to, shall we say, the North of England or Land’s End, you will both find adventure you had never thought of before and certainly have never encountered.”

  They were silent for a moment.

  Then the Marquis said,

  “I cannot imagine what it could be unless we were held up by a highwayman or two.”

  “You could certainly do that but that is not what I am thinking of.”

  “Explain it to us,” Lord Alfred begged him.

  “Well, I am quite certain that for every man there comes a moment in his life when he encounters difficulties and problems either physically or mentally that require all his intelligence and all his training to solve. You have both been extremely well educated and you have also seen the Social world at its best – and its worst.”

  The Duke paused before he went on,

  “I would like to think that if you went out alone, incognito, you would encounter a very different world to the one you know already. After all you have both come from famous families and you both hold titles which are respected and envied.”

  He smiled as he went on,

  “It would be good for you to see your own country in an entirely different way from how you view it at the moment.”

  They looked at him in astonishment.

  Then Lord Alfred enquired,

  “What exactly is Your Grace suggesting we do?”

  “As I have already said, I am making a bet of it. I will bet one of my best horses and you know that my stable is one of the best, if you win. But if you lose then I have the pick of one of yours.”

  Lord Alfred laughed.

  “That is certainly a magnificent bet and a similar one I feel sure is not in the betting book.”

  “No, I don’t think that it will be,” the Duke agreed. “But it means if you accept my bet that you set off one of you going North and the other one going South and return when you reach the end of your journey.”

  The two of them gazed at each other in amazement.

  “If I lose my bet,” the Duke carried on, “then my stable is at your disposal, otherwise you give me a choice of all your racehorses, several of which I admit that I have envied for some time.”

  The Marquis grinned.

  “It’s a good way for Your Grace to acquire them.”

  “Exactly. Of course you can easily turn down my suggestion. But I think if you are as adventurous as you sound and as adventurous as I was in my youth, you will find that it gives you a new outlook, a new knowledge of people and above all a new interest which is something
you apparently find lacking in your lives at this moment.”

  “That’s true!” Lord Alfred exclaimed. “As I expect Your Grace heard us saying, we are bored. Both of us at present have no particular female interest that will prevent us from accepting your very unusual and original bet.”

  “Do you really think,” the Marquis asked, “that we would find anything outstandingly different or particularly interesting on our long ride.”

  “I am quite certain you will,” the Duke answered. “I think, too, it will be good for both of you to become one of the ordinary people, which means, of course, that you must disguise yourself as ordinary Englishmen.”

  “I am glad that we will at least be allowed to do that,” Lord Alfred commented a little sarcastically.

  “It would be difficult to disguise the fact that you are well-bred,” the Duke replied seriously. “Therefore if you are just Mr. Smith or Mr. Jones, no one will question that you are anything else. Why should they?”

  Unexpectedly the Marquis laughed.

  “I can hardly believe it! I came to White’s feeling depressed and, as Your Grace has heard, bored stiff with life that has become incredibly humdrum. The same thing happens day after day and the same applies to nights which are never quite as exciting as one expects them to be.”

  The Duke nodded.

  “I know that, too. As you are both aware, but too polite to say so, there were a great number of women in my life. In fact, as you know, I was called a roué before I was twenty-five!”

  He paused for a moment and then added smiling,

  “I don’t regret any of it. Nor do I regret the times I have felt it wise to leave England because my reputation had become so outrageous that it rivalled that of the Prince Regent!”

  Both of them laughed.

  “It must have been most satisfactory in some way,” Lord Alfred said.

  “I suppose it was,” the Duke replied. “But it must have meant a great deal of worry for my family. I freely admit now, that on many occasions, I left England simply because things had grown too hot for me here.”

  “At least then you were never bored,” the Marquis remarked, “as we are at present.”

  “That is true, even though I was at times scared, although I would not admit it, at the chaos I had caused.”

  “And you think, Your Grace, that because we are bored and somewhat blasé,” Lord Alfred said, “that we will find a cure for all our ills on the hard road.”

  “I will be very disappointed if you don’t find a new interest and a new outlook. What we all need in our lives is variety and, of course, stimulation of the brain.”

  They looked at him in surprise.

  They had somehow never expected the Duke, who, as he had said himself, was well known as a roué, to talk so seriously or in fact to be so concerned with them.

  “Are you saying, Your Grace,” the Marquis asked, “that you regret a great many things you did in your life?”

  The Duke thought for a moment.

  “I do not exactly regret them. But I often wonder if I had taken a different road or found a different solution it would have been better not only for me but for the people concerned.”

  “Well, one thing we cannot do is to put back the clock,” Lord Alfred said. “I am sure, Your Grace, you do not regret the life you have led, which to us sounds a very exciting one. It would undoubtedly be better to have all the difficulties you have experienced rather than remain here feeling poor and getting nowhere.”

  “I agree with you completely,” the Duke replied. “That is why I have made this suggestion, or rather this bet, and I do hope you will both take me up on it.”

  “I certainly will!” the Marquis said. “Even though I feel that Your Grace is wrong and all I will have is a lonely road North and nothing exciting will happen except, as I have already suggested, a highwayman will strip me of my money and my horse.”

  “Well, at least you can take a pistol with you to prevent that from happening,” Lord Alfred remarked. “It is something I will do.”

  The Marquis laughed.

  “I think maybe, Your Grace, you should come with me and protect me,” he said.

  The Duke put up his hand.

  “Definitely no! My bet is that you should go alone. An adventure might not drop from the skies for two men together. But for one man alone, I am certain it will be lurking in every shadow.”

  “Now you are making me determined to prove you wrong,” the Marquis parried. “After all, that is the whole point of a bet, is it not?”

  “Of course it is,” the Duke agreed. “And if you take my bet, Whisinford, I am quite certain that you will find it will help you in your future. Who knows you may find a new interest or a special happiness you have never known before.”

  “Now Your Grace is being really optimistic and I only hope you are right. When would you like us to start?”

  “At the very latest, tomorrow! What is the point of staying here? You will go to a party tonight which you will find as boring as the party you attended last night. Or you will both be involved in a new affaire-de-coeur which instead of going to the country will keep you in London.”

  “He is quite right,” Lord Alfred said to the Marquis. “You will remember that the party tonight is being given by the Countess of Coventry for her two extremely plain and unattractive daughters.”

  The Marquis groaned.

  “I was, in point of fact, wondering how I could excuse myself at the last moment, but so far I had not come up with any reasonable excuse.”

  “Well, here is one that you cannot argue about,” the Duke said. “You can write a polite letter to your hostess saying you have been called away on important business and just hope she will understand that in consequence, you cannot be present.”

  “What am I to say?” Lord Alfred then asked.

  “I think your excuse should be that you have a very bad headache,” he answered, “and feel that you would be poor company to anyone you danced with and might in fact be infectious.”

  Lord Alfred clapped and lay back in his chair.

  “I am extremely grateful to Your Grace for saving me from a very dreary party and you must tell us what time you wish us to leave in the morning and from where?”

  “I have thought of that already. You will come to my house in Berkeley Square at seven o’clock precisely where breakfast will be waiting for you. I would presume that both of you have horses stabled in London.”

  He paused before he added quickly,

  “In fact I am sure you have, as both of you have runners at Henley on Thursday.”

  “You are right,” the Marquis agreed. “I brought three horses up from the country just in case one was not up to scratch on the day of the races.”

  “Because Neil convinced me that was the best thing to do, I have done the same,” Lord Alfred joined in.

  “Very well! You will come to breakfast with me. Then your grooms will bring your horses to the Mews and so you will leave at eight o’clock exactly with Whisinford going North and you, Middleton, going South-West. The bet ends as soon as you have reached your destination and you will doubtless wish to return perhaps by sea or in a quicker and more comfortable manner.”

  It passed through the Marquis’s mind that he had friends who lived just outside Northumberland who would undoubtedly loan him horses and a phaeton if he needed one to return home rapidly.

  As if he knew what he was thinking, the Duke said, with a twinkle in his eye,

  “Then, of course, you may want to stay longer than is necessary, so you should take enough money with you and a change of clothes which any good horse can carry as well as his Master.”

  “You think of everything!” Lord Alfred exclaimed. “Actually I am feeling extremely excited at your bet as it’s something I have never done and, as you have doubtless heard me saying to Neil that we are not only bored with what is happening but becoming bores ourselves!”

  The Duke smiled.

  “I would
think you have a few years of dissipation to enjoy before that happens. At the same time, as you well know, people who live in large houses with every possible comfort do become bores in their old age. It is, in fact, the adventures of life and the difficulties which make them not only human but also quite interesting.”

  “Like yourself.” the Marquis proposed.

  The Duke smiled again.

  “Thanks for the compliment, my boy. At the same time it’s true. I often think that, if I had been a good lad as I was expected to be until I took my father’s place, I would not have lived as fully as I have.”

  He hesitated for a moment before he went on,

  “Not that people have always approved of me, in fact, very much the opposite. Equally I have made a great number of good friends who, believe it or not, still find me somewhat amusing and interesting and who will then seek my company whenever I come to London and follow me when I go to the country.”

  “Of course they do,” the Marquis agreed, “and we are flattered and, of course, intrigued by your interest in us. I only hope that we will not disappoint you and come back with nothing new to tell.”

  “I am betting there will be plenty,” the Duke said. “It will give me a great deal of pleasure to feel that I have, at least, directed you onto a new road that you have never journeyed on before.”

  “That is indeed true,” Lord Alfred said. “But now we have to think of what names we will call ourselves so that, if by any chance we need your help, you will not think it is from a stranger.”

  “I suggest you take very ordinary names so that you would not strike anyone as being particularly unusual.”

  There was silence while both of them thought.

  Then the Marquis said,

  “I had a teacher at Eton who I remember as being a very clever man. So I think I will call myself by his name. He is dead, so he will not mind my impersonating him.”

  “Which one are you talking about?” Lord Alfred asked.

  “Barlow,” the Marquis replied. “Do you remember Barlow? He coached us at cricket, amongst other things.”

  “Of course I remember him. So you will be Neil Barlow and then I will be Alfred Milton. Do you remember Milton?”

  “Yes, indeed I do. We are setting out on a new and extraordinary adventure. Only I cannot help feeling that His Grace may be disappointed and we will return even more despondent than we are at the moment.”