Excerpt from Never Deny a Duke. Copyright Madeline Hunter 2019

It was rare for Brentworth to receive a summons to Court. Granted, it had not been a true summons. More of an invitation, to the extent that kings ever invite instead of summon. His Majesty would be happy to receive you tomorrow at two o’clock.

He entered St. James’s Palace at fifteen minutes to two, wondering why the king would want to see him at all. He and the king did not rub well together. The king was a fool and Brentworth was not, so they had little in common.

He considered that it might have to do with the meeting he had attended earlier in the day. The king may have learned about the renewed efforts to again pick up the question of abolishing slavery in the colonies. He might want to voice his views on the matter and think an informal conversation with a duke would be the best way to do that.

Brentworth had no idea what that view would be. This king was not known for engagement in political questions, or in much, really, except his pleasure. He probably did have opinions, however. Most men did, no matter how ill informed those men might be.

It was not a drawing room day, so few people were about. There was no crush in the anteroom of those hoping to obtain vouchers to watch the nobility on parade. He strode through that chamber and the next and entered the drawing room. At most twenty people moved through it, chatting.

He did not announce himself to any of the pages. They knew him, and upon his arrival one hurried across the chamber and disappeared through the door that led to some offices.

He idled in the drawing room, awaiting either the king himself or an escort to wherever the king lounged. While he did he saw a young woman in serviceable blue garments and bonnet stride across the chamber. He recognized her as Miss MacCallum. He had been introduced to her at a party earlier in the week.

She was a writer with an unusual interest in medicine. She had impressed him with her ability to hold her own in a chamber full of nobles and members of the ton. He could not ignore that during their brief conversation she had been sincerely unimpressed with his title or status.

That almost never happened, especially with women. Most peers would be annoyed. He had been intrigued.

Her bonnet obscured most of her blond hair, hiding its short length. That cropping had been apparent at that party despite a heroic attempt to disguise it. He had concluded that her interest in medicine derived from a serious illness of her own, a recent one in which her hair had been cut off to help with the fever.

Right now she appeared both out of place and distraught.

He intercepted her before she could leave. “Miss MacCallum, what a pleasant surprise.”

She halted abruptly and blinked away whatever had been distracting her. She executed a neat curtsy. “Your Grace.”

“Are you unwell? You appear haunted.”

She glanced back at the door that led to the long wing with offices. “Not haunted so much as distressed that my business here is being treated lightly.”

“You have business at court?”

“I do. I think it unlikely it will ever be addressed as it should be, however. I learned that much today.” Her features, too bold to be fashionable, moved easily to express her thoughts and moods. Right now she appeared to be fighting both despair and fury.

“It is nothing serious, I hope.”

The anger won. “Do I appear to be a woman who would waste a monarch’s time with frivolous matters?”

“Of course not,” he soothed, drawing her aside. “If you were in some way insulted you must let me know. I will make sure it does not happen again.”

“Not insulted as such. Just dismissed as unworthy of fairness.” She looked down on herself, on the neat but simple blue muslin dress and deep blue spencer. “Perhaps if I had dressed like . . .” She gestured to the ladies chatting nearby. “Like them, it would have helped.”

Probably so. “Not at all. You look fine.” Solid and honest and with a character not dependent on garments and fashion. A self-possession that he had noticed when they met at the Duchess of Stratton’s party still ruled her, but her distress softened her enough that his protective nature emerged. “Can I help in some way?”

His offer startled her. She regarded him, cocking her head, as if she considered ways in which he could indeed help before thinking better of it.

“It is a private matter, thank you. Only the king can help me, and I fear he will not. I must decide whether to accept that or battle on.”

“If you are in the right, do not lay down your arms now. The Household strives to protect him and remove problems before they even know if a problem truly exists. If you persevere you may yet succeed.” Oh, how smoothly it all came out. He did not really believe a word of it. Those men back there would bury whatever she claimed needed fixing forever if they thought it best for their master.

She nodded firmly. “You are correct. Your reminder is well taken. I can still muster the evidence I need to get his attention.”

The door across the chamber opened and a balding crown emerged. Miss MacCallum noticed. “I must go now, Your Grace. I do not want to see that man again until I am ready for him.”

She dipped a fast curtsy then disappeared while the bald head worked its way across the large chamber. It finally stopped right in front of Brentworth.

“Your Grace, thank you for coming.”

He knew Haversham. The man had been in the king’s tow for decades. He could not see him without thinking of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Cassius has a lean and hungry look. Let me have men about me that are fat.

“My liege summoned me. Or so I thought.”

Haversham flushed. “I wrote at his instruction, but today he asked me to speak for him.”

“I am not accustomed to having anyone, even a king, foist me off on a clerk.”

“Foisted? Good heavens no. Not at all. It will save you much time if I do the preliminaries, so to speak. Explain a few things. Then should you meet with His Majesty you will not have to wait on his explanation, which might be less direct.” He coughed into his fist. “If you understand me.”

He understood. It could take the king an hour to say whatever Haversham would complete in ten minutes. “At least you were not so stupid as to have me delivered to you by a page.”

“Of course not! Truly, it is best if we speak privately before—that is, the matter is of some embarrassment to His Majesty and he would prefer if I— If you could sit with me over here, I will try to explain.”

Here were two chairs tucked behind a statue to create a bit of privacy. Brentworth threw himself into one of them and waited for Haversham to get on with it.

“As you know, after the Jacobite rebellion, a number of Scottish titles were attainted. In the case of some commoners, lands were taken,” Haversham began. “In a few cases, the lands of deceased feudal barons reverted to the Crown due to there being no heirs or descendants. In such cases, official attainder was not pursued.”

“All of that was settled a generation ago.”

“True, but—on occasion, we will still receive a petition to reopen the matter regarding this estate or that. Someone will claim to be the descendant of one of those men, and want the land back. Charlatans normally. Adventurers.” Haversham dismissed the frauds with a sneer.

“It happens more often than you would guess. Some petition the Crown after the College of Arms rejects the claim. We have a letter we send to all of them, warning them off under penalty of imprisonment. That normally does it.”

“And when it doesn’t?”

“I deal with them. It is lengthier, but eventually they go away.”

“Good. Why did this bring me here today?”

Haversham appeared surprised. “Oh! I thought you knew. Well, this is embarrassing.” He leaned in. “Recently, such a descendant came forth. Only this one has a letter from the last king that all but acknowledges the claim.”

“How awkward for you.”

“Most awkward. It is not a forgery. It is a signed and sealed letter all but admitting that the descendant is indeed a descendant and all but promising the estate will be returned. Well, of course the king was mad at the time. Who knows what he would write? Yet, there it is.”

“Do you want my advice? Is that why I was summoned here? I think you should—”

“With respect, Your Grace, that is not why you were invited. When I came out and saw you I assumed you knew.You were speaking with Davina MacCallum. She is the claimant in question. She is insisting on another audience with the king to discuss the matter. I have been charged with seeing that never happens.”

“Another audience?”

“I regret to say they met in Edinburgh.”

“If a five-minute audience will placate her, I don’t see why—”

“In addition to the letter from the last king, I regret to say she has a promise from this one, obtained in Edinburgh. The entire matter promises to be a potential embarrassment to His Majesty. A very big one. It is vital that the whole story does not be bandied about.”

Eric wanted to laugh. Davina MacCallum had the King of Great Britain all but hiding in the cupboard to avoid her. His estimation of her rose immediately.

“Haversham, all of this is interesting, even entertaining. I regret that I do not know the lady well enough to influence her, however.” He stood. “My advice is that the king just give her the land. I suspect he is no match for her.”

Haversham bolted to his feet. “My reasoning exactly. Not the part about whether he is a match—I would never be so disloyal as to agree to that—but about returning the land. Much cleaner. No embarrassments. There is only one problem. Someone else now holds that estate. He is not likely to think our solution is so clever.”

Finally they were down to it. “I will speak with him on the king’s behalf, if that is what is wanted of me. Who is he?”

Haversham licked his lips. He offered a trembling smile. “You.”

*     *     *     *     *     *

Davina stared in the looking glass, then groaned. Hopeless.

She had hurriedly changed into a decent dress, though hardly one suited to receiving a duke. That did not bother her as much as her hair. It hung in loose waves on either side of her face, skimming her jaw. It almost looked fashionable. Unfortunately, it hung the same way all around her head. Long locks had not been gathered into a knot on her crown the way anyone would expect.

She scowled at her reflection, but not in distaste at her appearance. Rather, she fumed over the idiocy of cutting her hair. Had Sir Cornelius gotten to her in time, the quack her landlady in Edinburgh called in would not have had the chance. Sir Cornelius was a scientist and knew the ancient practice of cutting off hair during bad fevers did nothing a cool compress would not achieve.

You are alive, aren’t you? that quack had snapped when she complained after the fever passed. Yes, alive, but that illness had taken a toll in her face, her weight, her hair, even her outlook. She had gone into that fever a girl and emerged a woman.

That was what she saw in the looking glass. A woman with features too bold and hair too short and goals too ambitious. A woman with something she had to do that had now been delayed too long.

She stood and smoothed the pale ocher muslin of her skirt, and left her chamber to go down to the library. She did not expect it to be a pleasant meeting. There was only one reason the Duke of Brentworth would have come here today.

She found Mr. Hume loitering outside the library door.

“He has gone to the garden,” he said, falling into step and guiding her toward the back of the house. “I had intended to have my mother sit with you as a chaperone, but in the garden there is no point because he will only request you walk with him.”

“I do not need a chaperone, least of all with this man. Nor did you think so. You just wanted your mother to listen.”

“That is not true. You are as yet unmarried. You should not—”

“Mr. Hume, we both know why he has called. I am in much more danger of being browbeaten than importuned.” She paused at the door in the morning room, which led out to the garden. “I appreciate your concern and your interest in my welfare, but, please, allow me a moment to collect myself. A dragon waits out there, and my sword is very small.”

He patted her shoulder in reassurance. “Find me in the library when he leaves.” He went away.

Davina faced the door, closed her eyes, found the core of her strength, then walked outside.

The duke stood twenty feet away. He did not stroll amid the plantings or even look at them. Rather he stood tall and erect, his profile carving the landscape, his brow slightly furrowed. He appeared crisp and precise and sternly, impressively handsome. And displeased.

He must have heard the door, because he turned his head to watch her approach. Oh yes. Very, very displeased.

Amanda had said that mothers with eligible daughters did not even try to lure him because they found him too formidable. Davina understood that now. Here he was in all his privilege, his lean strong form containing an energy that contradicted his casual stance.

She made her curtsy and he his bow. “How generous of you to call,” she said. “I fear the household will not be the same for days.”

“I will not stay long. I apologize for taking you away from your duties.”

“Nora, my charge, is delighted, and I don’t mind having an excuse to partake of the garden in midday.”

He looked toward the house. “Would you walk with me? I need to discuss something with you in privacy.”

“Of course.”

He set his hat and crop on a nearby bench. They began to stroll through the garden. She ignored how his proximity made him very large and a bit overwhelming. She would not allow him to bully her. Not that he had done anything to imply he sought to do that. Then again, she wondered if it was the goal of how he presented himself to the world.

“I have been to the palace,” he said. “I was informed why you were there when I saw you. I know about your claim, and your petition.”

She turned her head to look up at him just as he turned his head to look down. “You could have told me,” he said. “If not at the salon when we were introduced, then at St. James’s when we met there.”

“I thought it better not to until I heard back from the king.”

“More likely you were hoping I would not learn about this nonsense until you wreaked all the trouble you could.”

“Did you come here to insult me? We do not know each other well, and this is not looking like a promising friendship.”

His jaw flexed. “The king is no more pleased by your persistence than I am.”

“Then he should not have promised me to take up the matter.”

“How did that happen? What exactly did he say to you?”

“He was in Edinburgh for the Scottish festivities. My father was associated with the university and had many friends there who helped me after he passed. One is Sir Cornelius Ingram. He was knighted for his scientific work.”

“I know of him.”

“He agreed to try to arrange for me to see the king. He had me attend a banquet as his companion, and introduced me after the meal.”

“A meal at which His Majesty drank freely, no doubt.”

“I could not say. I did not count the glasses of wine he consumed.”

“Trust me, he was well into his cups by then.”

“He was not foxed, if you are trying to suggest that he did not have his wits about him.”

He stopped and faced her. “Such wits as he possesses are easily lost to drink. So, the meal was done, Sir Cornelius pushed you forward and made an introduction, and there was no cut from the king.” He narrowed his eyes on her face. “Your hair was longer then. It was cropped more recently. The king saw before him a pretty young woman with a winning smile and he behaved as all men do.”

“Not all men. You, for example, are behaving boorishly whether I am pretty or not. As for the king, he was polite and gracious, which is what I would expect a king to be.” She tipped up her chin and looked him in the eye. “We spoke a few minutes, then I explained my situation. He was sympathetic.”

“I’m sure he was.”

“He said that when he returned to London he would direct his men to look into the matter and see what could be learned, and that he would support a bill in Parliament to rectify any oversight and to clarify matters, lest someone claim there should have been an attainder even if there was not.”

He appeared surprised to hear that last part. She suspected his mind had gone in that direction. Your great grandfather died at Culloden fighting against Great Britain, and if there had been an heir there would have been an attainder due to his criminal act.

“He probably did look into the matter and learned you have no claim and there was no oversight. Hence his avoiding you.”

“If he had looked into it, he would have learned I am completely at rights.”

He inhaled tightly. He appeared like a man reining in his temper. Only she had not seen anything to indicate he had become angry.

“Perhaps you would be good enough to explain your situation, as you call it.” He gestured to a stone bench, inviting her to sit.

She perched herself on the bench. He did not. He loomed in front of her. Huge now. A tower of black garments and chiseled visage watching her.

“Before my father died, he shared a family secret with me,” she began. “He also entrusted a letter into my care. One from the last king. It all pertained to my family’s history and my grandfather’s identity as the rightful heir of the Baron of Teyhill.”

“The baron perished at Culloden. He had no heirs. His only child, a son, died around the same time.”

“So it was believed. That son, however, did not die. He was spirited off to Northumberland and given into the care of a farming family there.”

“Why?”

“For his safety. The baron’s people did not trust the British army. They believed that after the defeat and his father’s death he would be harmed. And so he was raised there,” she continued. “My grandfather became a clerk, and married, and my father was born. He in turn eventually returned to Scotland and studied to become a physician in Edinburgh. Before my grandfather died, however, he revealed his true identity to him.”

“It would ring truer if he had revealed it to the Lord Lyon much earlier.”

He referred to the authority in Scotland that served much like the College of Arms in England, as arbiter of titles and heraldry. “He was not sure of it earlier. Nor did he hold the land as is required in Scotland of those feudal baronies. He sought proof, so the lands would be returned to him, and then the title. Sought evidence.”

“Which he did not find before he died, correct? If he had, this claim would not have been delayed by over a generation.”

“In his own mind he was sure enough that he wrote to the king and presented himself as the son of MacCallum of Teyhill. Whatever that letter said, it resulted in the king responding with great encouragement. Had my grandfather lived longer, it would all have been settled then. Only he didn’t live longer. Before he died, however, he gave my father that letter and told him about the history.”

He paced away slowly, thinking. “You have no proof of this except a family story from the sound of it.”

“My grandfather had more, I am sure. It was in the letter to the last king. Only now I am told that letter is lost. Or so Mr. Haversham claims.”

“He has no reason to lie.”

She stood. “Doesn’t he? How awkward it must have been when the king’s men realized who now held that land. Not some other Scot, or even an English lord from the border lands. Not some viscount or baron of recent patent.No, it was a duke. Not any duke. Brentworth. A powerful duke who makes lesser men tremble. The king must have thought it was the worst luck for it to be you.”

“If you are accusing the king of lying to you in order to avoid an argument with me, you overestimate my influence. He and I have argued plenty in the past over more important matters, but as the king he wins. That is how it works, Miss MacCallum. He and I are not friends and he does not care if I am the object of a claim from a Scottish woman with nonexistent proof.”

“If you and he were not friends, he would enjoy giving me the lands. Instead they are claiming all the proof is gone.”

“That is because it is in fact gone if it ever existed. You should give this up. It will come to nothing.”

“I will find the proof. My grandfather was not a fool or dishonest. If he wrote to the king, he knew he was the heir. I will find whatever he found that convinced him of that.” She sat again, firmly. “You are the one who should give it up.”

He paced forward and glared down at her. “There is no way that will happen. I am Brentworth. We do not hand over parts of our estate easily, least of all to women with dubious stories about unfounded inheritances.” He made the vaguest bow. “I will take my leave now, lest we have a row. Good day to you.”

“I thought a row was what we were having already.”

With a quelling glance in her direction, he began walking up the garden path.

“Don’t you fear being known as a cheat?” she called after him.

He paused long enough to face her. “Don’t you fear being known as a fraud?”

Never Deny a Duke, copyright © 2019 Madeline Hunter

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