Pure and Untouched Page 6

  He had no wish to make love to anyone at the moment and he thought that even to touch Anoushka’s lips would make him remember Cleodel and the passion she had aroused in him.

  ‘How can I forget her?’ he asked himself and felt that she would haunt him for the rest of his life.

  *

  When he came down to breakfast, he sent for Monsieur Tellier and instructed him that a notice should be sent to the French newspapers with instructions to telegraph the news to London. This was the moment he was waiting for and was the rapier point of his revenge.

  The notice had been worded very carefully.

  His Grace the Duke of Ravenstock was married quietly in Paris yesterday. The Duke and Duchess, after a few days in the French capital, will proceed on their honeymoon to Nice in the South of France. The Duke had written it down carefully in his own hand, then read the announcement and re-read it to be quite certain it was exactly what he required.

  He only wished he could see and hear the consternation which such an announcement would produce when it was published in the English newspapers.

  At first, he thought, his friends would find it so incredible that they would not believe it.

  Then it would be realised that, coming so shortly after the previous announcement that his wedding to Cleodel had been postponed, there was something strange about it.

  It would not take long to discover that the bride was not the Earl of Sedgewick’s daughter.

  It was then that all the gossip and speculation would sweep through Mayfair like a whirlwind.

  “What can have happened?”

  “Who can she be?”

  “Why had the Sedgewicks no explanation?”

  “How could the Duke, unpredictable though he is, have treated Lady Cleodel in such a way?”

  Not even his closest friends like Harry would know the real answer and perhaps only Jimmy would have a suspicion of the reason for his disappearance from London and his speedy marriage to somebody else.

  He was sure that the women, who had been jealous of Cleodel for succeeding where they had failed and who had disliked her because she was young as well as lovely, would then gradually begin to guess what had happened.

  Why should he run away, which was very unlike him, unless he had a good reason for running? The answer could lie only with the woman he had left behind.

  It was a revenge even crueller and more hurtful because there would be nothing Cleodel could say and nothing she could do.

  It had all happened too quickly for her to pretend that it was she who had changed her mind at the last moment or even that the Duke and she had quarrelled.

  She would be too bewildered at first for her or her parents to find any plausible excuse for the sudden disruption of all their plans and the Duke was sure that the only possible action they could take would be to leave London and retire to the country.

  This would mean that once again Cleodel would have to forego the balls at which she had shone so brilliantly.

  She would not be able to attend the assemblies and receptions that were such an intrinsic part of the Season or indeed to appear in the Royal Enclosure at Ascot.

  Of course she would have Jimmy.

  But the Duke guessed cynically that Jimmy would be conspicuous by his absence and would make no effort to comfort the girl whom he had instructed so skilfully.

  It was a revenge, the Duke congratulated himself, that few men would have had the intelligence to think out and few the audacity to carry through.

  To make certain nothing went wrong, he also sent the courier who had accompanied him to Paris back to England to make that sure the newspapers published the announcement exactly as he had expressed it.

  And after two days at Ravenstock House he was to return to give a comprehensive report on exactly what had occurred.

  “If any of Your Grace’s friends wish to visit you in Paris, what shall I say, Your Grace?” the courier asked.

  “Tell them I am on my honeymoon and I have no need for company other than that of my wife,” the Duke replied. “You are to answer no questions about her, however hard you may be pressed on the subject.”

  To make quite certain the courier knew nothing the Duke arranged for him to leave Paris before the actual wedding took place and he wondered how the Earl would approach the man, veering, he was sure, between bribery and bullying in order to learn what he wanted to hear.

  There was an expression on the Duke’s face that his sister would have recognised as one of cruelty as, looking resplendent in the evening dress in which every Frenchman was married, he was driven by his coachman down the Champs Élysées.

  Because he was determined to start his marriage with Anoushka on what he thought was the right foot, he was wearing the Order of the Garter across the right shoulder.

  The Garter also glittered below his knee and he thought as he looked at himself in the mirror that it was a pity Cleodel could not see him and be aware of what she had missed.

  He realised now that under her soft, hesitating little act was an ambitious social climber who was determined to get to the top of that prickly tree that so many had attempted to scale and failed.

  But she had very nearly succeeded!

  This was what infuriated the Duke more than anything else, the knowledge that he who had always prided himself on his brains, his intuition and his almost uncanny perception where pretence, hypocrisy and insincerity were concerned, should have been caught by one of the oldest tricks in the world.

  There was never a man born who did not feel protective and at the same time chivalrous towards a very young and innocent girl and there was never a man who did not like to think of himself as a Knight in shining armour prepared to fight and kill the dragon that threatened the pure maiden.

  The Duke could deride himself for being so gullible, but Cleodel had in fact played her part very cleverly and of course Jimmy had been a good teacher.

  ‘Damn them! Damn them!’ the Duke wanted to cry out as he thought of how they must have plotted and planned every move of the game in which he had been as green as any yokel up from the country.

  He knew that, however, now he had the last laugh and his revenge would brand Cleodel as clearly as if like the Puritans in America he had burnt an ‘a’ for adultness on her white skin – so very white, so soft to his touch.

  Then he could see her again, the light in her eyes, the radiant smile on her lips as she looked at Jimmy on the balcony and he realised that his revenge had so far not helped him to forget.

  Chapter 4

  The Duke waited in the magnificent salon of his Parisian house for Anoushka to come down to dinner.

  Once again he was wearing the elegant evening clothes in which he had been married, but without his decorations and the Order of the Garter.

  As he sipped a glass of champagne, he thought that he had certainly had an unusual wedding and very unlike what he had always anticipated he would have.

  The marriage he had planned with Cleodel would have been one of the events of the Season with St George’s Church packed to overflowing with the elite of the country, and leading the distinguished guests present would have been the Prince and Princess of Wales.

  The Queen would have sent a representative and there would have been members of many European Royal families present to make it such a distinguished occasion that it would have been talked about long after it had taken place.

  The Reception at Ravenstock House would have filled the ballroom to capacity and, if some of the guests preferred to walk in the garden, his gardeners had been working over the last month to make it a picture of perfection.

  Instead the only witnesses of his marriage to Anoushka had been his sister Lady Marguerite and an elderly nun who played the organ with what the Duke recognised as outstanding skill.

  He had expected that the other members of the Convent would be present, but then he had realised that it might have distracted them from their quiet life and perhaps put unsuitable ideas into the
novices’ heads.

  He had therefore on arrival at the Convent been escorted by the nun, who opened the door straight to the Chapel where his sister was waiting for him.

  “I thought you should know, Raven, that the Bishop of Paris under whose aegis we are as a Convent has come specially to marry you,” she said. “And he will be supported by our usual Priest and two servers. Otherwise, there will be nobody in the Chapel but ourselves.”

  The Duke had smiled.

  “A quiet marriage, Marguerite,” he said, “and the way I would wish it to be.”

  “If you will go in,” his sister replied, “I will bring Anoushka.”

  The Duke had walked into the small Chapel which he felt was redolent with the faith of those who worshipped there.

  The Bishop and the other Priest were wearing spectacularly ornate white robes, which he guessed had been embroidered in the Convent and the altar was massed with flowers.

  The organ played softly and after he had waited for a few minutes his sister came up the aisle with Anoushka walking beside her. The Duke turned to watch their progress and realised that, wearing the wedding gown he had sent her, Anoushka, for the first time since she was eight, was not dressed in the robes of a novice.

  The gown was softly draped at the front and swept to the back with frill upon frill of pleated gauze to make both a bustle and a train.

  He had also ordered a fine lace veil which covered her face and her head was encircled by a small wreath of orange blossom.

  She did not carry the bouquet he had sent her, but instead she held in her hand a prayer book with a mother-of-pearl cover that the Duke suspected belonged to his sister.

  He noted that Anoushka walked proudly with her head up and her eyes were not on the ground as was usual as a bride approached the altar and her bridegroom.

  Instead through her veil he could see her looking at him and he wondered what she was thinking.

  The Service began and, as it was a marriage of mixed religions, it was very short.

  The Bishop blessed them with a sincerity that made the Duke feel somewhat ashamed.

  His marriage was taking place primarily, in fact entirely as an act of revenge and he could not help remembering his sister’s words that she wanted Anoushka to find the love she had found with Arthur Lansdown before he died.

  ‘I will be kind to her and give her everything she wants,’ the Duke vowed pensively and knew equally that what he was doing was intrinsically wrong.

  When the marriage was over and the Duke walked out of the Chapel with Anoushka on his arm, he realised that his sister expected them to leave immediately.

  “The carriage is waiting, Raven,” she said, “and I can only give you my good wishes and pray ceaselessly that you will both be very happy.”

  She looked at the Duke as she spoke and he knew exactly what she was saying to him.

  He kissed first her cheek and then her hand.

  “Thank you, Marguerite,” he sighed.

  He helped Anoushka into the closed carriage that was waiting and, as they drove away, he turned sideways to look at his bride, thinking he had had no opportunity to do so until now.

  Her veil was thrown back over her head so that he could see her hair for the first time.

  He thought it was dark and then saw it was a strange indeterminate colour he could not put a name to.

  Perhaps, he thought, it was the result of her parents having different nationalities. It seemed almost to have silver streaks against a colour that was neither dark nor fair and made him think of the ashes in a burned out fire.

  Once again he realised how different her beauty was from that of any other girl he had known.

  Then, as he went on looking at her, her eyes met his and she asked anxiously,

  “Do – do I look – all right? I feel very – strange and when I first saw this gown it made me – laugh.” “Laugh?” the Duke questioned.

  She smiled, which he had never seen her do before, and her face seemed suddenly transformed as if by sunshine.

  “I thought it seemed very amusing that a gown should have so much decoration at the back and so little at the front,” she explained. “That is the vogue set by Mr. Worth, who is the king of fashion,” the Duke replied.

  He realised that Anoushka was looking at him to see if he was serious.

  “Are you saying that a man made this gown?”

  “He designed it,” the Duke corrected, “but he has over a thousand people working for him.”

  Anoushka laughed and he thought it was a very pretty sound, clear and spontaneous, quite different from the rather affected laughter of other women he knew.

  “I cannot imagine a man designing gowns for women,” she said. “I thought sewing was an entirely – feminine occupation.”

  When the Duke laughed, she added,

  “I was thinking last night what a lot of things I have to learn – but if they are all going to be like my gowns, then I shall find them very funny.”

  That was true, the Duke thought now and, if Anoushka had been surprised at what she saw and heard, he was astonished at her reactions to the new world which, as his sister had said, was to her like stepping onto another planet.

  When they had first talked, she had been dressed as a novice and she had been very serious as she considered whether she should or should not marry him.

  So he had anticipated that he would find her seriously weighing up everything they discovered and approaching each issue in the same way as a pupil attending a lesson with a teacher.

  Yet so many things seemed to amuse her that the Duke found himself laughing too and the afternoon passed very differently from what he had expected.

  He found that when she was animated, especially when she was laughing, her face had a new beauty that rather intrigued him and she had a sparkle in her eyes which for the moment at any rate swept away the mystery in them.

  Above all he liked the sound of her laughter.

  It struck him halfway through the afternoon that Cleodel had seldom laughed and when she did so it was a hesitating little sound as if she forced it to her lips in the same way as she had made her voice sound shy, young and a little nervous.

  Thinking of her, there was a frown between the Duke’s eyes and his lips tightened.

  Anoushka, who had been inspecting the pictures in his house turned from one of them which they had been discussing to ask him a question and the words died on her lips.

  “What have I – said that is – wrong?” she asked.

  “I did not hear what you asked me,” the Duke admitted.

  “B-but you are – angry.”

  “Not with you,” he replied quickly. “It was just something I thought about.”

  He tried to smooth away the frown and force a smile to his lips, but he realised that Anoushka was looking at him in the same way as she had done at the Convent when he had felt she was looking beneath the surface and seeking his soul.

  Because he could not help being curious he asked her,

  “What are you thinking?”

  She did not reply, but turned her head away to look at the picture.

  “I asked you a question, Anoushka.”

  “I-I don’t wish to – answer it,” she replied, “because it might be – something you don’t – wish to hear.”

  The Duke paused for a moment before he stated,

  “I think we should establish now once and for all that, as we are married, it would be a mistake for us not to be frank with each other. You have asked me to teach you, so I shall tell you honestly if you are doing or saying something wrong and shall not expect you to be offended.”

  “No, of course not,” Anoushka agreed quickly.

  “And the same applies to me,” the Duke said. “I will not be offended or upset at anything you say to me and let me beg of you to be frank and truthful. The one thing I will not tolerate is if you lie to me.”

  He spoke almost furiously as he remembered how Cleodel had lied to him.
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  “I will not lie,” Anoushka said, “and the answer to your question is that what you were thinking was – ugly and in some way – spoiled you.”

  The Duke stared at her.

  “What do you mean – spoiled me?” he enquired.

  “You look so magnificent but it is not only about how you look,” Anoushka replied. “I think you are also noble, kind and compassionate, which is why I agreed to – marry you.”

  She paused and, as the Duke could not find words to reply to her, she went on,

  “Because just now you were – different from what you have appeared before, I-I – thought it was something you should control and forestall.”

  The Duke was speechless.

  Anoushka had spoken to him in a quite impersonal manner, which he realised was the way he had been speaking to her.

  There was nothing intimate about it, nothing of the soft allurement that might be expected to pass between a man and a woman, even if they were not attracted to each other.

  Instead it was an entirely logical, dispassionately well thought-out appraisement and he was intelligent enough to recognise it as such.

  “I understand what you are saying,” he said after a moment, “and thank you for being so honest with me.”

  “You are like your pictures,” Anoushka said, “and I could not bear to think that any of them might be – damaged.”

  Then, as if the subject was closed she asked him questions about the very fine examples of pink Sèvres porcelain, which led the Duke to tell her the story of how Madame Pompadour had started a china factory.

  She listened to him attentively. Then she remarked,

  “I have read about Madame Pompadour in one of the history books, but when I asked my teacher about her she refused to answer, saying that she was not a woman I should concern myself with. Why was that?”

  The Duke thought this was a hurdle he would have to jump sooner or later and he replied:

  “She was the mistress of Louis XV.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You have no idea?”

  “Not really,” Anoushka replied. “In the history books of France there seem to have been a lot of women who wielded great power though they were not aristocrats. How am I to understand if nobody will explain to me why they were so important?”