The Unwanted Wedding

CHAPTER ONE 1845-2

As far as he was concerned, tonight was not an evening he wished to repeat very often.

Then, as she danced by in the arms of one of the aides-de-camp, Aline Langstone gave him a glance from under her long eyelashes that he could not misinterpret.

For a moment he wondered if it had been perhaps too revealing.

Then, as she turned her lovely face to laugh up at her partner, he was aware that no one would have seen it or if they had, would have understood except himself.

She was certainly very attractive and he was looking forward, as he had earlier in the day, to the weekend when they would be staying in the same house.

He was sure that their hostess would contrive subtly, because she knew it was expected of her, that they should be together as much as possible.

Then he asked himself why he should wait for the weekend when Aline Langstone had already said that she particularly wished to see him tomorrow.

The Duke was sure that it was a mistake, when the Earl was in London, for him to go to their house and yet she had been so insistent that now he felt curious as to what she had to say to him.

Moreover the glance she had just given him told him very clearly how much she wanted him and that the fires he had ignited in her were still blazing.

‘I shall do as she asks,’ the Duke decided.

He walked from the ballroom with a smile on his lips.

*

The following afternoon the Countess of Langstone was waiting in the long L-shaped drawing room at Langstone House in Grosvenor Square,

It was not a particularly attractive building, having been in the family for nearly fifty years without having many modern improvements made to it.

At the same time the reception rooms were impressive and beautifully decorated with a profusion of flowers.

The Countess was well aware that the high windows with their draped velvet and tasselled curtains and the gilt decorated French furniture made a fitting frame for her beauty.

She had, of course, been painted by several distinguished artists, but of the portraits hung in her husband’s house in London and in his mansion in the country, including one particular picture that decorated his bedroom, none of them did her justice.

The artists had portrayed very faithfully the whiteness of her skin, the darkness of her hair with blue lights in it and the perfection of her features.

But they had none of them quite managed to capture the enticement of her lips or the irresistible invitation in her eyes.

Now, as she moved about the drawing room, she was reflected in several gilt-framed mirrors and, as she glanced at herself, she was well aware of the grace with which she moved and the sinuous length of her long neck.

Long necks, small waists and a well curved figure were most admired in the beauties of the day and while the Queen was too short to qualify, the Countess won on every point, as the Duke had told her.

‘How can I lose him?’ Aline Langstone asked herself now as she waited for him to arrive.

Ever since she had first burst into the Social world on the arm of the very eligible and very important Earl of Langstone, she had been admired and acclaimed in a manner that would have turned any young girl’s head.

Aline had been no exception.

But, while she flirted and certainly encouraged every man she met to compliment her as eloquently as he was capable of doing, she had been faithful to her husband until she had presented him with two sons.

After that, having done her duty, she had melted into the arms of one man after another, only managing to conceal her behaviour from the Earl because he believed her to be a cold woman.

He had certainly been unable to light the fires within her that flickered enjoyably with several lovers before they burst into a blaze for the Duke.

From the very first moment she had seen him, standing out among a number of other good-looking and well-dressed men, she had been determined to ensnare him.

He had been more elusive than she had expected, but she was confident that she would succeed.

When eventually she had captured the Duke, she had learnt that her instinct had been right in telling her that he was different from any other man.

A number of other women had thought the same thing, but to Aline the Duke was a revelation.

Only by holding tightly onto her common sense had she prevented herself from falling so desperately in love as to throw away all restrictions and precautions.

“Oh, Ulric,” she had said to him the last time they were together, “why could I not have met you when I was young before I married George?”

“If you had, I doubt if I should have noticed you,” the Duke had replied. “ I find young girls a crashing bore.”

“That is not the right answer,” Aline complained. “I was not as beautiful as I am now, but still lovely enough to make George swear the moment he saw me that I should be his wife. It was the only time he has ever been positive about love.”

The Duke did not bother to argue.

He only thought, as he had dozens of times before, that he had no intention of marrying if he could possibly avoid it.

Although he was prepared to make love to another man’s wife and to make a fool of her husband, it still made him feel a little uncomfortable when she disparaged the man she had married.

He knew if that ever happened to him it was something he would never forgive and he would undoubtedly defend his honour and his family name by killing the man who had cuckolded him.

Duels were forbidden both by the Queen and by law, but those who were too chicken-hearted to meet each other at dawn in Hyde Park crossed the Channel to shoot at each other in Calais or Boulogne.

Whichever way it was done, the Duke thought it was a messy business, and the easiest way to avoid such a confrontation was not to be married.

He himself was a very good shot and extremely quick with a pistol. He knew that any husband who suspected him of seducing his wife would think twice before he challenged him.

He himself would not hesitate for one moment, but as quite certainly he would be the victor, it would be unsporting to find himself in such a position.

“I shall never marry,” he often said to his friends.

“Don’t be so ridiculous!” was the reply. “You know you have to produce an heir.”

“There is no hurry for that,” the Duke always replied.

Now at thirty-three he had still managed to remain a bachelor despite the fact that certain ambitious parents with marriageable daughters plied him with invitations.

While the girls themselves looked at him with wistful eyes, they were aware as they did so that he had no idea that they even existed.

The type of woman with whom the Duke spent his time and who captured his interest was always very sophisticated, witty and at the same time extremely feminine.

He liked women with soft voices and soft bodies.

He had never found himself interested in women with sharp tongues and perhaps because he was almost aggressively masculine himself he preferred them to be small and fragile.

“I presume it brings out the protective instinct in you,” a man had said to him once, mockingly.

The Duke had smiled cynically since he was well aware that most of the women with whom he associated did not need protecting and were, in fact, very capable of looking after themselves.

Equally he knew that they looked up to him and accepted his domination and that no woman had yet ever wanted him to be anything but masterful both to her and to everybody else.

*

The following morning after the party at Buckingham Palace, the Duke rose early as he always did and rode in Hyde Park.

There were far more men riders than women and he wondered if it would have been easier for Aline to have met him there to tell him her secret, if that was what it was.

Then he remembered that she would not ride alone as it would be inconceivable for her to appear without her husband or a groom in attendance.

After breakfast in his house in Park Lane, the Duke dealt with a number of letters that his secretary had for him to sign.

He then attended a meeting of the Masters of Foxhounds, which was taking place in the house of the Duke of Beaufort.

This kept him busy until luncheon time and then, instead of returning home, he ate at White’s Club and listened to the latest gossip of its members who always had something to impart which no one else had heard before.

The Duke received several invitations for different ways of spending his afternoon.

But because he knew he would have to be at Langstone House at half-past four he first went to Lord’s Cricket Ground to sit in the pavilion and watch a game of cricket before finally he drove to Grosvenor Square.

He arrived at Langstone House only ten minutes later than he knew Aline would be expecting him.

The Countess had been pacing the room wondering frantically whether, because what she wanted was against his principles or rather one of the rules he made for himself, he would turn her down.

One thing about the Duke which women always found infuriating was that they could never be sure that he would do what was expected of him.

He was a law unto himself when it came to his own interests.

Aline Langstone knew that, if he chose to think it was a mistake for her to invite him to tea, he would not hesitate to leave her waiting for him while without making any explanation he did something else.

When she thought of how other men crawled on their knees for her favours, she found this an exasperating trait in the Duke.

And yet regrettably it made her love him all the more.

She knew, however angry she might be, he would only have to touch her for her to melt into his arms and find her heart beating against his so that it would be impossible to think of anything but her need of him as a man.

“Heavens knows why he is different from every other man I have ever met!” she exclaimed.

She stopped in front of one of the mirrors to look at her reflection and know that without doubt she was the loveliest woman in the whole of the Social world.

It was a gift for which she was always extremely grateful and, because she was so beautiful, she was sure she could hold the affection of any man for just as long as she wanted him.

With, of course, the exception of the Duke.

She always had the uncomfortable feeling when he left her even after hours of passionate lovemaking that she might never see him again.

It made her want to hold onto him with both hands and make him swear that what he felt for her was a love that was eternal and would never fade.

But she was astute enough to know that this was the last way of holding him and only by letting him think he was free would she keep him her prisoner.

Her long experience of men should, Aline thought, have made her know exactly how to handle the Duke.

Yet, because he was unlike any other man who had ever been her lover, she knew that if he wished to leave her he would do so and no amount of pleading or tears would persuade him to stay.

“Of course he loves me, I know he loves me,” she told her reflection.

But while her voice spoke positively, there was a question in her eyes to which she had no answer.