Page 57 of A Duke to Undo her
“Lady Josephine is not for Benedict,” Duchess Nerissa said, still choosing her words carefully. “I told him that and I hope he understands. It is not that I have any objections to Lady Josephine as a daughter-in-law. It is only that there are noneof the feelings between them that must exist for a marriage to succeed.”
“Lady Josephine doesn’t love Benedict,” the duke said with certainty and some guilt.
“Nor does Benedict love Lady Josephine,” added his mother, slowly and carefully once again. “Yet, she is so very lovable, is she not?”
It felt to Cassius as though she had almost put a hand on an open wound in his body and he physically flinched from it, trying to disguise this involuntary gesture in moving to the sideboard to offer his mother a brandy.
“No, I will not drink anything more tonight,” Nerissa Emerton declined. “But there is one favor I would ask, before you retire, Cassius.”
He inclined his head in agreement, hoping that this request signaled a welcome change of subject.
“Would you come to the gallery again with me now? I should like to look at that portrait of you and your father tonight.”
Ah, why this again?! It was the only thing almost as bad as talking of Lady Josephine, and also the one thing Cassius knew he could not refuse after his promise to his mother on their last viewing.
“Very well,” he answered quietly, offering an arm to the dowager duchess.
One more difficult conversation before bed. He was equal to that, no matter how much it might hurt.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Light this one too,” Dowager Duchess Nerissa instructed the Duke of Ashbourne, passing him yet another candelabra to add to those now illuminating the gallery room.
Disquieted, and hoping that their visit to this room need not be a long one, Cassius obeyed. He preferred to focus on the task of lighting candles and moving one candelabra after another into place rather than looking at the largest painting on the wall where he knew his attention would shortly be directed.
Finally, all available candles were blazing and there was nothing for Cassius to do but join his mother in front of the painting. It was entitled “Henry, Ninth Duke of Ashbourne, and his son Cassius, Earl of Telsington,” with the date of its completion engraved on the same small golden plaque. Sixteen years ago…
The duke’s eyes slid sideways from the title plaque rather than upwards to the picture itself. How different the various smaller portraits in that room looked at night. The flickering candlelightgave them a warmth and movement that brought their subjects to life. Maybe all portraits should be viewed at night while non-human subjects were better viewed in daylight, rivers, mountains, seascapes and so forth…
“Cassius,” his mother’s light, clear voice called him back from this escapist reverie. “Can you tell me what you see in this picture?”
With a distinct force of effort, the Duke of Ashbourne set his jaw and shifted his gaze to look at the painting before them. It had never been easy to look at this picture but it had also never felt quite this hard before.
“Father and myself,” he answered tightly. “Father’s last portrait, three months before he died. I believe it is both accurately painted and of artistic merit. The artist earned his fee.”
Duchess Nerissa had taken his arm again and Cassius knew she must feel the tension in his body. It was not just looking at the painting that required such self-control, it was waiting for his mother to reveal why she had really brought him there. She was not a manipulative woman and rarely had a hidden agenda, but in this case her motivation was opaque and unnerving to him.
“Henry loved you very much, Cassius,” she told him as she gazed on the portrait. “He would have been so very proud of you, as I am.”
Cassius could only nod at this. He had never doubted his father’s affection and pride. It was even visible in this painting, the smileon the older man's face somehow seeming directed at the youth in front of him as well as out at the observer.
“It was so long ago, I suppose you won’t even remember sitting for this painting…”
“I do remember sitting for it,” the duke blurted out, surprising himself after feeling so lost for words only a few moments earlier. “It seemed interminable but Father talked to me of all kinds of things and I forgot to be bored. We even planned my Grand Tour…”
He gave an unhappy laugh that was half a gasp at the end. There had been so many plans made during those sittings: a new dog on Cassius’ next school holiday, Oxford university after he finished school, a Grand Tour across half of Europe after that. All had been blasted by the family tragedy.
It was Benedict who had received first the dog, then the university education and the Grand Tour. It had been Cassius who bestowed them, wanting for his little brother everything that their father had promised to him.
Ah, poor little golden-haired Benedict, carefree and laughing as he chased his hoop through the portrait sittings, and soon after left without mother or father.
“I am so sorry, Cassius,” his mother told him, but the duke immediately shook his head as he always did at her apologies.
“None of it was your fault. You were ill,” he said, giving the usual automatic response.
They had been over this point many years ago, once Duchess Nerissa had been well enough to return to society. The duke thought that his mother knew and accepted that he did not blame her for leaving so much on his shoulders, but her mood seemed strange this week and perhaps her guilt had returned.
“I didn’t mean that,” she replied. “You lost so much and I feel for you, Cassius. You should have been able to finish your schooling, to play like other boys, to travel like other young men. You should have been able to grow up in your own time.”
