"Send the Plain One, He'll Reject Her," They Laughed — But the Duke Could Not Take His Eyes Off Her
Chapter 5
Theme:
Font Size:
24px
At dinner, while Arabella sparkled at his right hand, his face kept turning down the table towards the plain cousin in brown. In the drawing room, he crossed the floor to sit beside her, though one of the young ladies was singing Italian arias directly at him. And every afternoon, to the open horror of four ambitious mothers, he asked Miss Larkin to walk with him in the gardens."It's a whim," sniffed one of the mothers. "Gentlemen take odd fancies.""It's pity," said Lady Marchbank through her teeth. "He's being kind to a poor relation."But it was neither of those things. If any of them had walked close enough to hear, they would have found the Duke and Miss Larkin talking in low voices that sounded nothing like courtship."Tell me what's in front of us," the Duke would say as they walked.And Hester would tell him. "The beech avenue, Your Grace. The leaves have turned the color of a fox's back, and the low sun is coming through them sideways, so the whole path looks as if it's been laid with copper pennies. There's a gardener's boy on a ladder at the far end. He's supposed to be cutting back the ivy. Instead, he's eating an apple and watching a girl from the dairy."The Duke laughed—a real laugh, rough and surprised. "Is she watching him back?""She's pretending very hard not to," said Hester. "Which means yes."They walked on, Bramble the spaniel trotting at his knee. And bit by bit, as the days went on, he told her.The fever in Spain had damaged something behind his eyes. At first, it had only been a little mistiness at the edges. Then the edges had crept inward, year by year. Now he saw the world as though through thick frosted glass: shapes and light; large print if he held it close to a candle; faces only at arm's length, and only in good light. The best physicians in London had all said the same thing: within the year, perhaps less, there would be nothing."So, you see," he said in a flat voice, "the cuts in the street were not pride. I simply didn't know they were there. And the ladies who curtsied across the ballroom were blurs in muslin. I couldn't have told a young lady from her own mother.""Why not tell people?" Hester asked. "They'd understand.""Would they?" He stopped walking. "My mother wants me married. She's frightened, and she has a right to be. If I die without a son, everything goes to my cousin Rupert. And Rupert would sell the woods for timber before my coffin was cold. So, I must marry. But think of the choice, Miss Larkin: either a woman marries a blind man out of pity, which I couldn't bear, or she marries a duke and wakes up a year later chained to an invalid she never chose, which I couldn't bear either."Hester was quiet for a while. Then she said, "May I tell you something my grandfather said?""Please."