Page 13 of The Captive Duke
He turned, his expression for the first time yielding to an emotion—consternation. “She has gone into a decline. I did not know children could.”
Gilly’s opinion exactly, but the doctors had scoffed. “She has lost weight. She no longer plays, but rather, dresses and undresses her dolls by the hour, sits and stares, or draws.”
“What do the physicians say?”
“That she is being stubborn and willful and attempting to dictate to the adults around her.” Stubborn andwillful were apparently the most frequent complaints men made against females of any age, and yet, where would Gilly have been without a full complement of stubbornness to see her through her marriage?
“What doyousay, Lady Greendale?”
Gilly was so used to keeping her opinions to herself, every one of her opinions, regardless of the topic, that His Grace’s question caught her off guard.
His expression suggested he truly wanted her view of the matter. Mercia was tall, and he was male, but if his question was any indication, his resemblance to Greendale ended there.
“Lucy has lost her family, Your Grace. She needs family, and until recently, I could not oblige.” And Greendale had enjoyed ensuring it was so.
Mercia ran his hand over her jacket, which he’d folded across the back of a chair. “Your bereavement is recent?”
Whatever else Mercia was doing, he wasn’t catching up on gossip. “More than a month past. Lord Greendale succumbed to an apoplexy, according to the official inquest.”
He twisted the gold signet ring about the middle finger of his right hand, an unusual location for such a piece. “My condolences. Perhaps you’d like more tea?”
His Grace had not yet addressed the problem Gilly had brought to him, and the hour grew later. “Bother the tea.”
He was not offended by her lapse in manners. Maybe after wintering with the French, little offended him, andyet, Gillian was a guest in his home, at a peculiar hour, and clearly, His Grace was not faring well.
She extended an olive branch, for the child’s sake. “We’re family, Your Grace. You are welcome to call me Gillian. To Lucy, I am Cousin Gilly.”
More consternation shone in his remarkable blue eyes, as if to whom and when familiarities might be granted had been misplaced on some French mountainside, along with the roles of husband and father.
And the ability to appreciate a strong cup of tea.
And the ability to sleep through the night.
His Grace resumed a place beside Gilly on the sofa, settling carefully, like an old fellow who had not enough padding on his bones to tolerate even a short tenure on a hard chair.
Or perhaps the duke was too exhausted to stand for more than a few minutes?
“I am inclined to take your suggestion that I remove to Severn sooner rather than later. The curious and inconsiderate have been leaving their cards by the dozen, and I am summoned to Carlton House several days hence for a private audience with the Regent. My health is not much better than precarious, and I am loath to subject myself to the remaining weeks of the Season. At your prompting, I will repair to Severn at week’s end.”
“Thank you.” She nearly told him he should observe mourning for Helene—Evan had been too young—because mourning kept the curious and the inconsiderate away for a few months.
“I have a condition.”
With men, every concession came at a price, and yet, Gilly did not anticipate an onerous request from the weary, soft-spoken duke. “Name it.”
“You will accompany me, and until I go, you will act as the lady of this house. You will deal with the invitations, you will deal with the squabbling, smiling housemaids. You will see to the closing up of the household, and you will assert your presence during daylight hours so I needn’t bother with housewifery all throughout my nights. If you are disinclined to meet this request, I will take that much longer to make the journey south.”
Again, he’d surprised Gilly.
His condition called to the long-denied part of her that delighted in the role of caretaker, a part of her that had shrunk to a husk under Greendale’s criticisms, that had wished even if Greendale were the father, Gilly might have had children to raise and love.
And yet, what came out of her fool mouth? “What of a chaperone, Your Grace?”
He did not smile. Gilly’s sense of his amusement was unsupported by anything save the way he turned that signet ring, played with it almost, the band loose around his finger.
“First, my lady, we are family, as you’ve noted yourself. You are Helene’s cousin, and widowed. If your own family could not provide for you, I would naturally expect you to apply to me in their stead. Second, you have apparently been a frequent visitor at Severn inmy absence. As a kinswoman, you would be the logical choice for my hostess, were I to entertain. In any case, you are beyond chaperones now, are you not? Third, you are the logical choice of female to take a continuing interest in Lucy’s development, because you are the only one who might sponsor her come out ten years hence.”
Quite a speech from him. Gilly sorted through his words and concluded he was offering her a home at Severn, however temporarily. Absenting herself from Greendale represented the closest thing Gilly had to a goal, besides seeing to Lucy’s welfare.
