ELOISA JAMES
The Taming of the Duke
Contents
Dedication
1
In Which the Curiosities of Courtship are Reviewed
2
A Conversation Being Heard Out of Order, as It Took Place Some Three Months Previous
3
Lessons in the Art of Widowhood
4
In Which it is Discovered That Marriage is the Greater of Many Evils
5
In Which Imogen Meets a Man Unsuitable for Marriage…if Eminently Suitable for Other Pursuits
6
In Which Illegitimacy Turns Out to Be Less of a Barrier Than One Might Think
7
Of Pump Handles, Privy Counselors, and Other Bodily Necessities
8
In Which Miss Mary Spenser is Introduced to the Party at Large
9
Parched
10
Misery
11
Neighbors May Well Be the Nearest…But Not the Dearest
12
Of the Vulgarity of Greek Plays
13
A Council of War Involves a Division of Battlegrounds Amongst Generals
14
The Consequences of Dancing in the Sheets
15
In Memoriam for Good Whiskey and Crimson Skirts
16
In Which Imogen Issues an Invitation
17
A Mustache and a West Wind
18
A Chapter of Intelligent Conversation About Intelligent Subjects
19
Love’s Mistress
20
The Kind of Thing Rafe Would Say
21
In Which Holbrook Court Welcomes an Unexpected Visitor
22
In Which a Seducer is Brought Up-to-Date on His Private Activities
23
The Lucky Piece
24
The Virtues—or Lack Thereof—of Creatures Such as Dorimant
25
In Which Vulgar Behavior is Noted, Judged…and Punished
26
Loving Fools are Created Every Day
27
In Which Imogen Learns Something About Marriage Beds…and Other Beds
28
In Which Delicate Decisions to Do With Class are Made
29
In Which Various Improprieties Continue
30
It Doesn’t Take Shakespeare for a Man to Make an Ass of Himself
31
In Which Several Parties Warn of Ruined Reputations
32
A Chapter for Which Brazen Jokes About Holes Would Be Appropriate (But Your Author Refrains)
33
A Chapter Including a Performance…or Two
34
Temptation Takes Many, and Varied, Forms
35
Raphael Jourdain, Duke of Holbrook, Comes into His Title
36
Which is a gift from Eloisa to her Readers…because it is hard to say goodbye to the sweetness of Rafe and Imogen
Epilogue
A Note on Drinking Whiskey and Editing Plays, Though Not at the Same Time
About the Author
Praise
Other Books by Eloisa James
Copyright
About the Publisher
Dedication
With my great thanks
to everyone who helped with this book,
from my wonderful editor, Lucia,
to my astute and learned research assistant, Franzeca,
to a friend of mine named Kim,
who understands Josie about as well as I do.
1
In Which the Curiosities of Courtship are Reviewed
August 1817
Ardmore Castle, Scotland
“I wish I were a queen,” Miss Josephine Essex said to two of her elder sisters. “I would simply command an appropriate man to marry me by special license.”
“What if he refused?” Imogen, sometimes known as Lady Maitland, asked.
“I’d remove his head from his body,” Josie said with dignity.
“Given that men make slim use of their heads,” Annabel, the Countess of Ardmore said, “you don’t have to threaten decapitation; simply allow the fellow to believe that he made up his own mind about marriage.” She was tucked in Imogen’s bed and appeared little more than a tousle of curls peeking from under the bedcovers.
“That is precisely the kind of advice I need.” Josie snapped open a small book and poised her quill. “I am making a study of the skills required to succeed in the marriage market and since you two are both married, you are my primary sources of information.”
“I’m a widow,” Imogen said. “I know nothing of the marriage market.” She was sorting silk stockings and didn’t even look up from the dressing table.
“One should be able to dance,” Annabel noted. “You really must practice harder, Josie. You were stomping on Mayne’s toes the other night.”
“I need better advice than that,” Josie said to her. “You are the only one of us to have actually gone on the season, and you married into a title. You do remember that I’m to have a season next year, don’t you?”
Annabel opened one eye. “Only because you mention it every other minute. Lord, but I’m sleepy!”
“I’ve heard that marriage rots the brain,” her youngest sister told her cheerfully.
“In that case, I wonder that you’re so interested in it.”
Josie ignored that unhelpful comment. “There’s more to gaining a husband than not tripping over his feet while waltzing. I want to understand the challenges beforehand. I can’t rely on beauty, the way the two of you did.”
“That’s ridiculous. You are lovely,” Annabel said.
“I was in London for the better part of April,” Imogen said, “and I saw plenty of young ladies in your situation, Josie. It seemed to me that the primary requirement for a debutante is a smirk. An innocent simper,” she clarified.
“Smirk,” Josie noted in her book.
“And listen to everything your suitor says as if God Himself is speaking. Of course, sometimes it’s difficult to stay awake.”
“Men can be very boring,” Annabel agreed. “They have such a penchant for discussing themselves. You have to learn to endure, which is not one of your best qualities, Josie.”
“To this point, you have shown no ability to suffer fools gladly,” Imogen said. “Yet fools have the deepest pockets. It’s a proven fact that lack of brains and a large estate go hand in hand.”
Josie had been writing busily in her book but she looked up at this. “So I smirk at the fool as he talks about himself? Essentially, toe-curling boredom buys a spouse?”
“I think Imogen is overstating the importance of a smirk,” Annabel put in. “There are moments in courtship that can be rather interesting. In my view, for example, a prospective groom might prefer engaging in a mildly scandalous activity to a mutual smirk.”
“Annabel has a point. I suppose you might occasionally engage in an impudent act,” Imogen said, “but only if you found yourself in the company of a truly engaging young man.”
“That’s a bit steep coming from you,” Josie said. “You devoted yourself to outrageous efforts from the very moment you saw Draven Maitland. Remember how he kissed you, after you arranged to fall out of a tree at his feet?”
Imogen’s hands stilled for a moment. “Of course I do. It was spring and the apple tree was in bloom.”
“And then you fell off a horse, and finally you fell into marriage. Your example seems to go against the model of the innocent simper,” Josie said. “I intend to be practical abo
ut this business, and I have no particular disinclination to creating a scandal, if that is the most efficacious route to marriage.”
“My foolishness is nothing to emulate,” Imogen said, returning to her task and folding two pale blue stockings together. “You would do better to find a husband by a more conventional means.”
Josie made a note in her book. “Employ an innocent look, no matter how imprudent one’s private conduct may be. It sounds like that gentleman thief who is always getting described in the Times. One moment he appears as a fine gentleman and then with a twist of a dish clout, he’s transformed into a beggar.”
“In fact, the reverse of Imogen’s style,” Annabel pointed out, a hint of mischief in her tone. “Since Imogen specializes in appearing debauched, no matter how innocent her private activities may be. According to Griselda, all of London now believes you are carrying on an illicit amour with Mayne, whereas in truth the man has achieved slightly more intimacy than a footman.”
“Every woman should have an occupation,” Imogen said. “Mine is to provide interest to the old biddies.” She tossed a few stockings over her shoulder. They gently drifted to the bed and fell on Annabel’s legs.
“Well, as to that,” Josie said thoughtfully, “you seem to be slightly behind the times, Annabel.”
“She’s more than behind the times. She’s utterly out of style,” Imogen said. “Last night she was flirting with her husband at supper. That kind of behavior is beyond unfashionable; it’s practically indecent. No one is supposed to pay attention to her spouse in public. Or,” she added, “in private either.”
Annabel grinned and said nothing.
“I saw Ardmore kissing you in the breakfast parlor yesterday,” Josie remarked. “Your husband has lost his head, which suggests that you should be able to help me. You must have better suggestions than improving my dancing.”
“I hardly planned my course of action in a thoughtful manner,” Annabel pointed out. “I was desperately unhappy with this marriage, remember? The only reason you two are in Scotland is to save me from my terrible fate.”
“A slight miscalculation on our parts,” Imogen said. “I could be in London at this very moment, surveying the dubious temptations of men interested only in my estate.”
Annabel snorted. Imogen’s hair was a glossy black, and smooth as a raven’s feather unless she decided to curl it—whereupon it kept a perfect ringlet. Her eyes were wide apart and framed by brows in a flaring arch. Her mouth was just as wide and made for laughing, even though she’d done precious little of that since her husband died the previous year.
“There are more than enough besotted men throughout London to catalog your features for you,” Josie said impatiently. “The really interesting point here is that Annabel doesn’t seem to realize that you have been making a concerted effort to woo Mayne into far more intimate activities than are generally enjoyed by footmen.”
She ducked as a stocking flew over her head.
“Really, Imogen?” Annabel asked.
“I told you in London that I intended to take a cicisbeo,” Imogen said with a snap in her voice.
“But I thought you meant merely a gentleman escort, not a cher ami.”
“It has been my distinct impression,” Josie said, “that Imogen has demanded that Mayne prove his reputation as a Lothario is not exaggerated.”
Imogen’s scowl should have silenced Josie on the spot.
“And I regret to report,” Josie continued, apparently unruffled by her sister’s fiercest glare, “that to all appearances Mayne has refused the challenge and kept his virtue intact.”
“How surprising,” Annabel exclaimed, pushing herself up on the pillows and looking altogether more awake. “I was under the impression that he had no virtue.”
“To the contrary,” Josie said. “No matter how Imogen batted her eyelashes at him during the trip to Scotland, he kept to his own bedchamber.”
“Josie,” Annabel said. “You should not speak of bedchambers—no, or even contemplate such behavior. You sound positively hurly-burly. It would be disastrous for your marriage prospects if anyone heard you talking in this fashion.”
“Don’t be a goose, Annabel,” Josie said unrepentantly. “It’s not as if I intend to imitate that behavior. I know the difference between what’s allowed a widow and an unmarried girl.”
The color was rising in Imogen’s cheeks under Annabel’s interested gaze.
“I suppose the crucial point is not the position for which you considered Mayne,” Annabel said to her, “but the position he has agreed to take.”
“There’s the rub,” Josie said. “He managed to get all the way to Scotland with the unblemished virtue of a—a debutante.”
Imogen threw a petticoat over her head but Josie just talked right through the frail lace. “There she was, batting her eyelashes, as I said—”
“I never bat my eyelashes!” Imogen put in.
“She batted them,” Josie repeated, “and spent a great deal of time trying to convince Mayne that she was besotted with his dark eyes.”
Imogen threw a whole heap of petticoats on top of her little sister. “Hurly-burly is too good a phrase for you.”
Annabel was clearly fascinated. “Mayne is very handsome. I can certainly sympathize with the impulse.”
“No, I—”
“I never said she was truly struck by his eyes,” Josie said from under a heap of linens.
“Yes, you did—”
“No.” Josie pulled the cloth off her head. “To call a spade a spade, Imogen, you may have tried to turn the earl into your cher ami. But you never, ever looked at him with that besotted expression with which you used to watch Draven.” She turned to Annabel. “So I would deduce that Imogen was not entranced by his eyes. Perhaps by an arm, a leg, or some other…part of his anatomy?”
Annabel frowned at her. “Josie, you wanted advice about the marriage market; I have a serious piece of counsel. Do not indicate that you have the slightest notion what a cher ami is. And never make a joke about parts of the male anatomy that you do not feel comfortable naming.”
“I have no reluctance to name—” Josie began readily, but Annabel cut her off.
“That’s enough! I don’t wish for any anatomy lessons from you.”
“If Imogen wishes to forgo a life of celibacy, am I supposed to ignore her behavior?” Josie said plaintively. “It’s not as if people ignored the fact that Mayne took up with the sister of a woman he jilted. You do remember that he jilted our eldest sister at the altar, don’t you? Mayne’s reputation was ruined the first time he danced with Imogen, given his behavior last year toward Tess.”
“Nonsense,” Imogen said, finally breaking into the conversation. “Mayne hasn’t had a reputation in years. I had nothing to do with it. Any reputation he had left was shattered by his ill-mannered act of jilting Tess in the first place.”
“I suppose your disrespectful tone reflects pique,” Josie said. “It must be highly annoying to be refused by a man who has so generously spread his attentions around the ton.”
“Mayne is an idler, and I have no wish to engage in any sort of intimacies with him.”
“Excellent,” Josie said heartily. “I shall follow your lead and thoroughly dislike all gentlemen who don’t instantly succumb to my charms. Of course, given my girth, I just ruled out most of the available gentlemen in London.”
“You are an extremely annoying person,” Imogen said. “That alone may keep you unmarried.”
“Could we return to that particular challenge for a moment?” Josie asked. “I am serious: I need to know how to attain a proposal of marriage, preferably within a few weeks of the season opening.”
Annabel shook her head. “None of us has married in a conventional fashion, Josie. Tess married Felton only after Mayne jilted her. I married Ewan because I had to after that scandal broke.”
“I eloped with Draven, but I did choose him in the normal way,” Imogen said, “and Lord knows
that didn’t work out very well.”
“It would have, if Draven had lived,” Annabel pointed out. “You can hardly blame his death on your elopement.”
“It’s very annoying,” Josie muttered. “How am I to do this? How am I to find a husband?”
“I’ll be there,” Imogen said consolingly. “And Griselda has already agreed to be your chaperone. You know that she knows all the ins and outs of the ton.”
“She told me that her father arranged her marriage,” Josie said, looking uncharacteristically helpless. “We don’t have a father.”
“We have Rafe,” Annabel said.
Imogen shrugged. “When he’s sober.”
“You’re just cross because he didn’t like it when you took up with Mayne,” Josie said.
“Rafe doesn’t seem to understand that my marriage freed him from the need to act as my guardian.”
“But you were only married a few weeks,” Annabel said gently. “I can see why Rafe still feels responsible for your welfare.”
“I have agreed to return to his house, haven’t I? I had planned to set up my own establishment, but instead I’ll be living with Rafe and trundling around with Griselda as my chaperone. I’m a widow. Why do I need a chaperone?”
“You seem to have left me out of that delectable picture,” Josie said. “So, on that note, Annabel, would you consider allowing me to stay with you for the winter? Apparently, dancing is the only practical skill I need to polish before next spring, and I’m sure there must be a tutor somewhere in Scotland. It’s so lovely to be back in the Highlands; I loathe the thought of returning to the south.”