72. The Impetuous Duchess Read online

  It stopped at a somewhat precarious angle and the Duke opened the window nearest to him.

  Instantly snowflakes came flooding in, blown by the wind, which, while it had abated somewhat, was still quite strong.

  The Duke put his head out of the window.

  “What is the matter Higman?” he called. “Are we stuck?”

  Even as his voice rang out, the coach turned over –

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Duke opened his eyes and for a moment found it difficult to focus his sight.

  He then saw two grey-green eyes beneath some tumbled red curls and with an effort remembered where he had seen them before.

  “You are awake!” an ecstatic voice exclaimed. “I am so glad!”

  A sudden weakness made the Duke close his eyes only to open them again quickly, as he remembered the crash of the falling coach and the pain that had shot through his head before it brought oblivion.

  “Where am I?” he asked and was relieved to hear that his own voice sounded almost normal.

  “I have been so worried about you!” Jabina exclaimed. “I thought you would never wake up! In fact at first I thought you were dead!”

  “The coach turned over,” the Duke said speaking slowly but distinctly. “Was anyone hurt?”

  “Only you. You were looking out and your head must have struck a rock. The doctor has put six stitches in it!”

  The Duke tried to raise his hand, but found that it was underneath the bedclothes and was aware for the first time that he was in bed.

  Under the circumstances, he told himself, he was surprisingly clear-headed. However, his mouth was dry and he felt thirsty.

  As if she read his thoughts, Jabina suggested,

  “Would you like a drink? I have some lemonade here.”

  She poured out a glass and brought it to him. Putting her arm under his head in quite an expert fashion, she raised him so that he could drink.

  As he drank, he noticed with some detached part of his mind that the glass was of engraved crystal and that the sheets that covered him were of fine linen.

  It hurt his head to move and, when he had drunk a little of the lemonade, he lay back against the pillows and thought that it was almost too much trouble to go on asking questions.

  Then he remembered Jabina was with him and made an effort.

  “Is this an – inn?” he asked, thinking as he spoke that the room seemed very large and impressive for what was usually obtainable in a roadside Posting house.

  “No indeed,” Jabina replied. “We are at the home of Sir Ewan and Lady McCairn. When the coach overturned one of their farm hands was passing and fetched assistance from the house.”

  ‘It sounds very satisfactory’, the Duke thought and then fell asleep.

  It must have been several hours later when he awakened to find that Jabina was still with him.

  The lights were lit in the room and the curtains drawn over the windows.

  Jabina was sitting by the fireside and he watched her for a moment without her being aware of it, noticing how the firelight lit up the vivid red of her hair.

  He saw too that her figure, silhouetted against the firelight, was very young and graceful.

  He did not speak, but she must instinctively have been aware that he was awake, for she turned her head and he saw her eyes light up with pleasure when she saw him watching her.

  She rose and came to the bedside.

  “Do you feel better?” she asked. “The doctor has been and is very pleased with your wound. He says he is doubtful if it will even show after a year or so.”

  “A year or so?” the Duke repeated. “It is fortunate that I am not vain about my looks!”

  “As a matter of fact,” Jabina said frankly, “I was thinking that you looked quite handsome and interesting with a bandage round your head! You might easily be the hero of one of the romantic books I like reading.”

  “It’s a part I have no wish to play!” the Duke said firmly. “And as soon as I am well enough, I must be on my way South.”

  “It will be at least three days before the doctor allows you to get up,” Jabina answered. “You are very lucky that your injury was no worse!”

  “Tell me exactly what happened?” the Duke demanded.

  “It’s rather difficult to remember in all the excitement,” Jabina replied, “but apparently the wheels of the coach went into a ditch or a trough under the snow. When the carriage turned over, it fortunately fell on so much snow that nothing was broken, not even the glass in the lamps!”

  “And the horses?” the Duke asked.

  “They were all right, only rather frightened. Your coachmen led them here and they are housed in the stables waiting for us to continue our journey.”

  The Duke raised his eyebrows.

  “Us?” he enquired.

  Jabina, who was standing by his bed, looked away from him.

  There was something in her manner that told the Duke that she was uneasy and perhaps embarrassed.

  “What is it?” he asked. “What has happened?”

  “I think I will tell you tomorrow,” Jabina said. “It’s only that – ”

  She stopped.

  “Only what?” the Duke enquired.

  “I don’t wish you to talk to anyone about – us until I have told you – something.”

  The Duke tried to raise himself a little against his pillows, but the effort hurt his head and instead he said,

  “Come here, Jabina! Come near me! I want to look at you.”

  She hesitated as if she would refuse him, then she turned and came two steps nearer.

  “Now,” the Duke said looking into her face, “tell me what you are trying to hide from me, for I am well aware that there is something!”

  “It really would be better for me – to tell you when you are well.”

  “I am perfectly well now,” the Duke replied. “I am not such a weakling that a blow on the head will knock me out permanently!”

  “It was a very nasty cut,” Jabina said. “You bled profusely! I thought you must be dead! I was terrified! I was – really!”

  “I can well believe it,” the Duke answered, “but I am still waiting to hear what you have to tell me, Jabina.”

  She would have moved away, but he reached out his hand and held onto her wrist.

  “Tell me!” he ordered. “I know that something is wrong and the sooner I learn about it, the better!”

  He felt Jabina quiver and was surprised.

  Then she said hesitatingly,

  “It is – just that when we – arrived here at – the house, you were being carried on a gate that was lifted from its hinges, Lady McCairn – recognised me!”

  The Duke was still.

  This was something he had not expected.

  “You mean – you have met her before?” he asked.

  “Yes, some years ago,” Jabina answered, “and she knows my father, although they dislike each other heartily.”

  “I see!” the Duke said slowly, “so it was rather difficult for you to explain why you were in my coach. Did you tell her that you had run away from your home?”

  There was a silence.

  “What did you tell her, Jabina?” the Duke asked, tightening his hold on the small wrist.

  For a moment he thought that Jabina was not going to answer and then the words seemed to burst from her lips.

  “I told her we were – married!”

  “Married?”

  The Duke was so astounded that he let Jabina’s wrist go and, lying back against his pillows, could find no words with which to express himself.

  “There was – nothing else I – could do,” Jabina explained. “I had no time to – think – I was not expecting to see Lady McCairn – and when she said to me, ‘Jabina Kilcarthie! What are you doing here?’ I just panicked.”

  “So you said we are married!” the Duke exclaimed.

  “Well, Lady McCairn then asked, ‘who is this man?’ and I replied, ‘he is my husban
d’.”

  The Duke digested this information for a moment and then he said,

  “Well, the sooner I see Lady McCairn and explain the circumstances to her, the better!”

  “You cannot do that!” Jabina cried. “You cannot! She has told everyone in the house – that I am your wife. I have been given the room next door – and she expects me to nurse you. It’s the sort of thing a wife would do.”

  “My dear child,” the Duke said, “there is only one possible way to extricate ourselves from this impossible coil you have involved us in and that is to tell the truth.”

  “And what do you suppose Lady McCairn will think then?” Jabina asked. “We were travelling together; going towards the Posting inn where we were both staying. She would hardly think it correct behaviour on your part – let alone mine!”

  There was some sense in this and the Duke digested it slowly.

  Then suddenly he exclaimed angrily,

  “Why the devil did you not tell the truth? How could you be so foolish – so incredibly naïve as to say that we were married?”

  “As I told you – I did not have time to think,” Jabina explained.

  “But surely Lady McCairn will tell your father that we have been here?”

  Jabina seated herself on the side of the bed.

  “Well, I worked it out this way,” she said seriously. “Lady McCairn dislikes my father and he loathes her. He says she is a malicious old gossip – which she is!”

  “That, of course, is a great help!” the Duke remarked sarcastically.

  “What I thought was,” Jabina went on as if he had not spoken, “that, if I had told her we were not married, she would have been delighted to write to Papa so as to make trouble and make him feel embarrassed because his daughter was behaving badly.”

  “Which you are!” the Duke remarked crossly.

  “On the other hand,” Jabina continued, ignoring his remarks, “as she thinks I am married to a Duke, she is so piqued that I have made such a good marriage that I doubt if she will mention it to anyone – let alone Papa!”

  There was some sort of twisted logic in this, the Duke thought. At the same time he was appalled at the position Jabina had put him in.

  “We will go away as soon as you are better,” Jabina went on soothingly. “When I have reached my aunt in France and am living there, everyone will soon forget about me. After all Scotland is a long way from your estates in England.”

  “The whole situation is preposterous!” the Duke stormed. “I am sure that the sensible thing for me to do would be to tell Lady McCairn the truth. I will inform her that I was merely giving you a lift, that I had never even set eyes on you before yesterday.”

  “I am quite certain that Lady McCairn will never believe that sort of story,” Jabina retorted. “She would be certain that you were abducting me – or that there was some discreditable reason why we should be alone together late in the evening in a coach. She is the sort of person who always suspects the worst.”

  ‘How could any man,’ the Duke asked himself, ‘have got into such a fix merely by performing a kindly action and giving an elderly lady a lift?’

  He felt like shaking Jabina, but it was at the moment too much of an effort even to be angry with her.

  Perched on the side of his bed, her eyes watching him with an apprehensive expression in them, she looked, he had to admit, extremely attractive, which did not make the situation any better.

  As he did not speak, Jabina said after a moment,

  “You do see that explanations will only make matters worse?”

  “I don’t believe that anything could be worse!” the Duke replied gloomily. “You have certainly managed to damage my reputation, Jabina, and, as for yours – !”

  “Our reputations at the moment are as pure as the driven snow,” Jabina contradicted him, “and Lady McCairn is purring like a Cheshire cat at the thought of having a Duke as her guest.”

  She smiled and the dimple appeared at the side of her mouth.

  “I had no idea that you were so important. I am really rather impressed with you now.”

  “I am glad to hear it!” the Duke said. “Perhaps you will now be a little more polite!”

  “I still think that you are far too dull and staid,” she admitted frankly. “When I think that you could be part of the Carlton House set, I cannot believe that you find those musty old books more interesting!”

  “I thought you did not approve of the German upstarts who constitute our Monarchy!” the Duke remarked.

  Jabina laughed.

  “That is of course a score to you!” she exclaimed. “But at the same time the extravagances, the drinking, the gambling, the parties and balls must all be very entertaining.”

  “Who has been telling you all this?” the Duke asked. “Lady McCairn?”

  “She is an absolute fund of information about everything and everybody,” Jabina replied. “She even knows the size of your estates and how much money your father left you when he died.”

  The Duke groaned.

  He was well aware that the gossiping busybody would not hesitate to relate to all and sundry that she had entertained the Duke of Warminster and his Scottish bride.

  “I suppose Lady McCairn enquired when we were married?”

  Jabina blushed.

  “I had to tell her something.”

  “Knowing that fertile imagination of yours,” the Duke said, “I cannot believe that you found it hard to invent a wedding, a honeymoon and doubtless a prolonged courtship!”

  Jabina was silent and after a moment he said,

  “The only solution is for us to get away from here as soon as possible and hope that her Ladyship forgets our very existence.”

  “I am afraid she is not likely to do that,” Jabina said. “At the same time I must escape from Scotland. I am so afraid that Papa will catch up with me.”

  “I can think of nothing that would please me more!” the Duke remarked.

  Jabina hesitated a moment and then she asked slowly,

  “You will not – hand me over to the – Sheriff?”

  “I think at the moment that such an action would invite the very unpleasant publicity I am trying to avoid.”

  “Oh, good!”

  Jabina almost bounced on the bed.

  “I thought that you would change your mind after the accident. I looked after you – I did really. I might have run away and left you to die!”

  “Unless both my servants had died in the accident as well, I cannot imagine that whether you stayed or went made much difference!”

  “Oh, do stop being so dampening!” Jabina ejaculated. “After all, it was very frightening and if I had been that dull musty sweetheart you are so keen on, I would just have sat down and cried!”

  “What did you do as a matter of fact?” the Duke asked curiously.

  “I crawled out of the coach,” Jabina replied, “and helped the coachmen drag you free. We could see that you were injured and for a moment they did not know what to do. What with the horses plunging about and the wheels of the carriage waving in the air, it was a bit of a nightmare!”

  She saw the Duke was listening and went on,

  “I wiped some of the blood away from your forehead and then I told your second coachman, who was not so concerned with the horses, to wave one of the carriage lamps from side to side as a call for help. I shouted too and, as if by a miracle, a farm labourer appeared going home from work.”

  “So he told you where we were?”

  “He said the house was quite near,” Jabina answered. “It was not until too late that I learnt it was the house of Sir Ewan and Lady McCairn or I would have let you go there alone.”

  “I doubt it!” the Duke said. “You were enjoying the drama. Tell the truth, Jabina!”

  “Well, it was rather exciting,” she admitted, “only I was so worried about you. It seemed that there was only me to give orders. Your first coachman kept saying, ‘His Grace would do this’ and ‘His
Grace would do that’. But I said that, as His Grace was not capable of speaking, I would give the orders. It was I who thought of carrying you on the gate.”

  “Why did they have to do that?” the Duke asked.

  “The labourer came back with some men, but they had not thought to bring with them anything they could carry you on. They talked of going back for a carriage. But it was growing very cold by that time and you were lying in the snow.”

  She smiled.

  “Of course I covered you with the rugs. I thought of that too!”

  “I can see that you were extremely resourceful,” the Duke commented, “and I suppose you are expecting me to be grateful to you?”

  “I know you think I am a nitwit,” Jabina replied. “All I am trying to point out is that another woman – the sort of trembling creature you like – would have been quite useless in an emergency!”

  She had spoken scornfully and she went on,

  “On the other hand the Scots are always ready to improvise and that is exactly what I did!”

  “So I must thank you.”

  “You are not still – cross with me – are you?”

  “I am furious!” the Duke replied, “but there is really nothing I can do about it at the moment.”

  “I thought you would see sense!” Jabina said frankly.

  “Sense!” the Duke groaned. “There is nothing sensible about the whole situation, but, as you have got us into this mess, I cannot for the life of me see any way out of it except flight!”

  “That is exactly what I thought,” Jabina agreed with satisfaction.

  *

  The following morning the Duke was visited by Lady McCairn.

  She was, he thought, the type of domineering, gossip-loving woman that he most disliked and in a way he could understand Jabina’s action in saying that they were married rather than tell her the truth.

  Lady McCairn was, she assured the Duke, delighted to have been of assistance to him.

  In the space of a few minutes she mouthed over the names of a number of distinguished personages with whom they were both acquainted and by only the slightest inflection of her voice conveyed the impression that she was surprised in the Duke’s choice of a bride.