Pure and Untouched Page 3

  Jimmy Hudson, with whom he had been at Eton, was the son of a country Squire who had a Manor House and a very small estate in the Shires.

  On leaving school, whilst the Duke went to Oxford, Jimmy had served for four years in the Brigade of Guards and then realised he could not afford to stay in the Regiment nor was it getting him anywhere. He decided that, if he was to live the life he enjoyed, the only possible thing for him to do was to marry an heiress.

  He contrived to obtain an introduction to one of London’s most renowned hostesses who had two rather plain, but very definitely rich daughters.

  What Jimmy Hudson had done was to underrate his own attractions.

  He was extremely good-looking in the rather conventional English manner and had, when he wished to use it, a charm which, combined with good manners, women found very attractive.

  It was not the daughters who were attracted to him in this particular house, but the mother!

  After he had squired her from party to party and was invited to her very exclusive house parties in the country where the guests included the Prince of Wales, Jimmy found a place in society to which even in his wildest flights of imagination he had never aspired.

  Because he was prepared to make himself pleasant not only to attractive women but to everybody else and, because he was a good card-player, an excellent rider and an amusing raconteur of after-dinner stories, he became one of the Marlborough House Set. The Prince of Wales had extended the boundaries of Society to include any man or woman who amused him and, as Jimmy definitely kept him laughing, hostesses soon realised his worth. As the invitations piled up on the mantelpiece in his lodgings, he often complained of how little time he had to answer them.

  His winnings at cards paid some of his tailor’s bills and provided him with enough money to tip the servants in the houses where he stayed. But everything else he desired was free.

  The ladies who found him a compelling and ardent lover provided him with gold cuff-links and a great many other luxuries that could certainly not be furnished from his meagre bank balance.

  Like the Duke, until he had met Cleodel, Jimmy had had no intention of becoming a married man.

  To be confined to one woman when he could find a welcome in almost every Mayfair boudoir would be unpleasantly restrictive when he was riding on the crest of the social wave in a manner which amazed not only his friends but himself.

  Thinking back, the Duke knew that it must have been before he arranged to ride the Earl of Sedgewick’s horses to compete in the steeplechase that Jimmy had met Cleodel.

  It would have been unlike Jimmy’s usual technique to pay any attention to such a young girl, but Cleodel, as the Duke was well aware, was different and the year she had lost in mourning would have made her eager for excitement.

  It would, he thought savagely, have been Jimmy who had taught her how to attract and capture the most glittering social attention in the whole country.

  He had often discussed with Jimmy the way women made the love affairs they both indulged in far too easy and in doing so eliminated the thrill of the chase, the excitement of being the victor in what had been a difficult contest.

  The Duke never mentioned a woman by name or indicated that he was talking of anybody in whom he was or had been particularly interested, but generalising he had said to Jimmy:

  “Dammit all, I like a run for my money!”

  He remembered now how Jimmy had agreed with him saying,

  “I often feel I am a fox with the whole pack of hounds after me and the field thundering behind.” They had both laughed.

  Other conversations they had had on much the same theme were now coming back to the Duke.

  He could see almost as if it was a picture forming in front of his eyes how Jimmy had understood exactly what he was wanting and what would be alluring because it was a new experience.

  When Cleodel had held off his advances and had never seemed over-eager to see him again, the times when he had felt frustrated by her indifference and her refusal to dance with him, it had all been a challenge he found irresistible.

  It must have been Jimmy, he thought, who told her even when they were engaged to keep him almost at arm’s length, although of course he now suspected that she was in love with Jimmy and found no other man as desirable as he was.

  The fact that he had been humiliated and made a fool of made the Duke want to climb the ladder and confront Cleodel and Jimmy in a way that would leave them embarrassed and ashamed.

  Then he told himself that would be too easy a revenge. Moreover it would spark off an almighty row and since he did not want the whole world to learn how he had been cuckolded by one of his closest friends, it seemed he must go on with the marriage and make Cleodel his wife.

  Then the Duke’s lips set in a hard line and he told himself he would be damned if he would marry any woman who was behaving as Cleodel was at this moment. The mere thought of it made him so angry that he seemed to see the whole house and especially the balcony crimson as if with blood.

  Then, as he took an impulsive pace forward, he told himself that he must be more subtle and hurt Cleodel and Jimmy as they had hurt him.

  A plan came to his mind and he turned slowly and walked back to the door that led from the garden into a side street.

  As he expected, it was possible to open it from the inside and he let himself out and started to walk slowly down the deserted road.

  It was only as he came to a dustbin that he was aware that he was still holding the bouquet of lilies-of-the-valley and the letter he had written to Cleodel telling her how much he loved her.

  He stared at both of them as if he had never seen them before.

  Then, slowly and deliberately, he crushed the delicate flowers into a pulp before he flung them into the bin and tore the letter he had written with its passionate expressions of love into small pieces and scattered them over the garbage.

  As he walked on, his face was set in hard cynical lines that made him look much older than his years.

  *

  The Duke crossed the Channel the following morning in his yacht, which was always kept in Dover harbour ready to sail at an hour’s notice.

  Because a courier had arrived long before the Duke, the Captain could actually weigh anchor immediately His Grace had come aboard.

  The efficiency the Duke expected from his staff and which resulted in the almost perfect organisation of his houses and estates had been put to the test when on arriving back at Ravenstock House after midnight he had sent for Mr. Matthews.

  The night-footman had hurried upstairs and in under ten minutes Mr. Matthews, conventionally dressed, had joined his employer in the library.

  The Duke’s orders, given sharply and briefly, resulted in a number of the servants being awake most of the night packing, a courier departed for Dover at dawn and the Duke’s private railway carriage was attached to one of the early trains leaving for Dover.

  Having issued his commands, like a General going into battle, the Duke had retired to his bedroom.

  The next morning he appeared downstairs for breakfast elegantly dressed but, his servants thought apprehensively, with a scowl on his face they had not seen since he had fallen in love.

  When Mr. Matthews handed the Duke his passport and a very large sum of money, he said quietly,

  “May I ask, Your Grace, what I am to say to any enquirers as to your whereabouts?”

  “After you have sent the notice to The Gazette, The Times and The Morning Post, as I instructed you,” the Duke replied coldly, “stating that my marriage to Lady Cleodel has been postponed, you will have nothing else to impart.”

  “Nothing, Your Grace?” Mr. Matthews asked nervously.

  “Nothing!” the Duke answered him firmly. “If Lady Cleodel and the Earl – ” Mr. Matthews began.

  “You heard what I said, Matthews!” the Duke interrupted.

  “Very good, Your Grace, I will carry out your orders and see that everybody else in the house does t
he same.”

  The Duke did not reply. He merely walked away to step into the closed carriage that was waiting to convey him to the station.

  The Channel crossing was smooth. His courier met him at Calais and he was escorted by several high-ranking railway officials to a private carriage that had been attached to the Express to Paris.

  The house in the Champs Élysées was ready for his arrival and the next morning a carriage driven by four finely bred horses was ready to take him out of Paris on a road that led in the direction of Versailles.

  The Duke, however, did not intend to look at the residence of forgotten Kings. Instead his horses stopped in a small village outside the Convent du Sacré Coeur.

  Anybody who knew the Duke would have thought it a strange place for him to call. Yet once again he was expected and a smiling nun opened the iron-studded door and led him through cool cloister-like passages to a room overlooking the Convent garden, through the windows of which the sun was shining in a golden haze.

  “His Grace, le Duc, Reverend Mother,” the nun said as she opened the door.

  A woman in white writing at a desk in the window rose to her feet with a little cry of gladness.

  She held out her hands and the Duke took them in his and bent his head to kiss her cheek. “How are you, Marguerite?” he asked.

  “It is delightful to see you, Raven dear,” she replied, “but it is a great surprise. I thought you would be far too busy in London to visit Paris unless it was on your honeymoon.”

  She saw as she spoke that her brother’s eyes darkened and a scowl disfigured his handsome face.

  Perceptive as she had always been, Lady Marguerite said quickly,

  “What is wrong? What has happened?”

  “That is what I have come to talk to you about,” the Duke replied. “Shall we sit down?”

  “Of course. I have ordered you some wine and some of the little biscuits that you remember are a speciality of my Convent.”

  The Duke smiled, but there was no need for a reply for, as the Reverend Mother spoke, a nun came in through the door bringing the wine and biscuits on a tray.

  She set them down beside the sofa, made a respectful curtsy and left the room.

  The Duke looked at his sister.

  Although she was fifteen years older than he was, she looked, he thought, still a young woman and had not lost the beauty that had made her so outstanding when she made her debut.

  The late Duke of Ravenstock and his wife had been confident that their only daughter Marguerite would make a brilliant social marriage.

  The ball they had given at Ravenstock House had been attended not only by every eligible young aristocrat in the whole of Debrett’s, but also by a large number of younger sons of reigning Monarchs and foreign Princes.

  It was not quite what they expected, but at the same time it was considered acceptable when Lady Marguerite had fallen in love with the elder son of Lord Lansdown.

  He was somewhat older than she was and had made a name for himself in the Army and was a serious, rather unsociable character. His name had never been connected with any woman and he was in fact known to be dedicated to his Regiment.

  The moment he saw Lady Marguerite he had known that she was the one woman who had ever mattered to him and he had lost his heart irretrievably.

  The Duke and Duchess had agreed to the marriage and it was arranged that it should take place in six months’ time.

  Marguerite, because she felt as if she was walking in the sunshine of Paradise, was prepared to do anything that was asked of her as long as eventually she could many the man she loved.

  They were together every moment that Arthur Lansdown could get away from his Regimental duties. Then two months before they were due to be married he was sent abroad on a special mission to the Sudan where there was a rumour of trouble among the tribes.

  Since no hostilities had broken out there was not the slightest expectation of his being in any danger. But he was assassinated by the knife of a tribesman intent on a revenge that existed only in his own distorted mind.

  For Marguerite her world came to an end. She would listen to nothing anybody said to her or accept any form of consolation from her family.

  Because she could not bear to be anywhere she had been with Arthur she left England despite every protest and entered a Convent in France.

  She was accepted into the Catholic Church and, although her father and mother pleaded with her almost on their knees to give herself time to recover from her bereavement, she would not listen to them.

  She eventually took the veil irrevocably when she had not yet reached her twenty-first birthday.

  Because she was extremely intelligent and also very rich, as the years passed she rose from being an ordinary nun to having what was to all intents and purposes her own Convent on the outskirts of Paris.

  It housed a number of nuns who came from families of equal standing to that of her father, and also novices who the Church thought should consider and think before they finally vowed away their freedom to spend their lives in prayer and chastity.

  Lady Marguerite won the approval, not only of her Cardinal in France, but also of the Pope and Officials of the Vatican in Rome.

  The Duke could understand that she provided in her own way a service that was unique within the Church, giving those who were as intelligent and as well born as herself a chance to serve God and at the same time not to waste their talents.

  Some of the nuns under his sister had written books which had been acclaimed in the outside world, while the embroidery and the lace that came from the Convent of the Sacré Coeur evoked the admiration of everybody who saw it.

  Every time he visited his sister the Duke realised that, despite the fact that the Social world thought she had wasted her life, Marguerite was in fact a very happy woman and entirely self-sufficient.

  What was more, her vocation had given her a sympathy and understanding which made him know that he could turn to her in any emergency in his own life and that was why he was here now.

  Lady Marguerite poured out the wine for him and then seated herself beside him to ask gently,

  “What has happened, Raven?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” her brother replied harshly. “But I want you to find me a wife who is pure and untouched!”

  If he had meant to startle his sister, he certainly succeeded.

  But Lady Marguerite did not exclaim or in fact say anything. She only looked at him with an expression of surprise in her blue eyes, which turned to one of compassion.

  “Why have you come to me, Raven?” she enquired after what was a long pause.

  “Because I know that only here among your young women who think they may have a vocation will I find a girl who has not been contaminated by the world – or should I say other men?”

  There was no escaping the bitterness in his voice which told Lady Marguerite without explanation what had happened.

  She clasped her hands in her lap and looked away from her brother before she said,

  “If ever I doubted the efficacy of prayer, you have convinced me now that it is always answered.”

  The Duke did not speak. He merely waited for her to go on and his sister continued,

  “I have been praying about a certain problem for some time and now, when I least expected it, when I felt the answer lay in a different direction altogether, you are here.”

  “You can give me what I have asked for?” the Duke enquired.

  His sister gave a sigh.

  “I could do so. At the same time I am afraid. I question whether it is something I should do.” The Duke’s lips twisted as if he knew what she was thinking and after a moment he said,

  “Suppose you explain to me in so many words what you are thinking and the reason for your prayers?”

  As if she was shaken out of her habitual serenity, Lady Marguerite rose and walked towards the window.

  She stood looking out on the formal sunlit garden and
on the green lawns she could see some of her young nuns wearing white habits that she had designed to seem less austere and certainly less ugly than those worn in most Convents.

  The veils of the novices were white and transparent and, instead of the heavy leather shoes that were habitual to other nuns, those in the Convent of the Sacré Coeur wore light slippers so that they moved more gracefully.

  The Duke waited and after a little while, as if she had made up her mind to tell him what she was thinking, his sister turned from the window.

  “Eight years ago,” she began, sitting down again in the chair she had recently vacated, “a child was left outside the gates of the Convent. She arrived in a carriage and, after those who had conveyed her here had rung the bell, they immediately drove away. A nun then opened the door and brought her to me. She carried in her hand an envelope that contained the sum of five thousand pounds and a few words written on a piece of paper.”

  “Five thousand pounds?” the Duke exclaimed.

  “It was a very large sum,” his sister said, “and the letter, which I will show you, said,

  “This is Anoushka. Her father is English and wishes you to bring her up. She is, however, not to take the veil until she is over twenty-one and only if it is her wish to do so. Money will be provided for her to have the best teachers available.”

  Lady Marguerite ceased speaking and the Duke asked her,

  “Was that all? There was no signature?”

  “No, nothing. The writing was educated and I think that of an Englishman.”

  The Duke raised his eyebrows and his sister gave a little laugh.

  “I was guessing, just as I have guessed all through the years and come to no conclusion.” “How many years?” the Duke asked.

  “Anoushka is now nearly eighteen and my problem has been what I should do with her.”

  “You don’t intend to keep her until she is twenty-one and let her become a nun?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “For two reasons. First, because I do not think that she is suited for the confined life. She is brilliantly intelligent, extremely talented in many ways and has a strange character that I find hard to understand.”