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CHAPTER8
Verity was bemused by the arrival of Mistress Burbridge and her assistants, who delivered a note from the duke. The duke’s note, while perfunctory, reassured her. She did not like to accept presents from a man, but she would have to get used to not being so independent, and as a duke, he would expect for her to be well turned-out. It would reflect on his standing if his bride dressed like a pauper.
The seamstress had been one of the sisters’ most vocal critics, and her having to curtsy and treat her with the deference due to the duke’s bride, tickled Verity’s sense of humor. She was at her most dignified as she looked down her nose at the dressmaker, while that lady was most apologetic and obsequious in her manner. Verity admitted that she found the humbling of the old besom very satisfying. Then she rebuked herself for being so vengeful in taking pleasure in her humiliation. The woman was an excellent seamstress and could not refuse the duke’s bride. Verity was sure she would do her very best to please her, now that her status in society had so suddenly been elevated.
So she submitted to having her measurements taken, and selected fabrics and laces to produce a gown in the palest of blues, which would be correctly modest and moderately fashionable. She chose the most expensive of their lengths of lace for a veil, and selected some fabrics for a simple wardrobe to replace the shabbiest of her costumes. There would be no great urgency for the other gowns to be made, but at least she could choose brighter colors—blues, greens, amber, and gold—which would flatter her coloring more than the pastels suited to a young lady.
When she finally managed to get rid of the dressmaker and her entourage, a lad rode up with a huge bouquet of flowers for her. It surprised her and she shared a grin with Artie.
“Is he courtin’ ye?” Artie sniffed.
“I think he might want to appear to do things properly,” she said, struck by the awareness he did so because of her already tainted reputation. A smile bloomed on her lips, and she found herself, not for the first time, exceedingly curious about the man she was about to marry.
The note attached said,
Dearest Lady Verity,
I will send my carriage to transport you to St Lawrence’s parish church at half past ten this Thursday for the celebration of our nuptials. The vicar expects us at eleven o’clock. I look forward to being bound in marriage to you.
It was not very romantic, but she could picture the duke’s dark and mocking smile as he scrawled it upon the paper for her. He had signed it, Your most avid fiancé, which she admitted seemed infused with dry amusement.
“Who are you really?” she asked softly, tracing his elegant scrawl with the tip of her fingers. “And why am I now so eager to discover it?”
The very next day, Verity visited the lady from whom she and her sister rented. She had been one of the few people who had not turned against the sisters when Catherine’s disgrace was revealed to all and sundry around. Mrs. Andrews was a widow, having lost her husband, a ship’s captain, at Trafalgar, and had chosen to move in with her sister in the town, and so be able to rent out her cottage for a little extra income. It was on the outskirts of the town and very well maintained, even if it only boasted three bedrooms.
It was no hovel, but was the humblest dwelling that Verity and Catherine had ever resided in. Catherine had deeply felt the shame and mortification at the lowering of her status. Verity paid the rent to the end of the month and thanked her for benevolence in accepting them as tenants.
“I will be sorry to see you go—I heard that your sister had moved out.”
Her heart ached inside her chest, and despite herself, Verity desperately wondered where Catherine was, and with whom she had exchanged letters. “Yes, she has.”
Mrs. Andrews nodded. “I suppose you are moving to somewhere smaller, now she is gone?”
Verity was not sure what to say, but the news would be around the town, as Mistress Burbridge was sure to have revealed to all her cronies already that Lady Verity was to marry the Devil Duke. She was notorious as a gossip with a mean tongue. Verity thought she might have tempered her vitriol a little, with puffing herself up over having made the gown Verity was to be married in.
“I am sure it is no longer a secret, because Mistress Burbridge, as she likes to call herself, will have spread the news far and wide. But I have accepted a proposal of marriage from the duke, and we are to be married on Thursday morning at St Lawrence’s. The service will be held at eleven. Mistress Burbridge is making me a new gown for the ceremony.”
Mrs. Andrews chortled. “Oh, that is wonderful, my dear. I hope you will be very happy, and that is thumbing your nose at that old termagant. She will be boasting of her handiwork for the next decade. ‘Did you know I was honored to dress the new duchess for her wedding to the duke—charming couple and so very handsome.’” She said, mimicking the dressmaker’s shrill quavering tones.
Mrs. Andrews went on in her normal voice, “Her tongue is sharper than her shears. You do know the ‘Mistress’ part is a falsehood. No man would have a shrew with a tongue like hers. Still, she needed to pretend to marriage, with her bearing that drunken sot of a son of hers. No one knows who his father is! Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! Such canting insincerity to denigrate you and your sister. The only reason she is tolerated at all is because she is the best seamstress for miles around. Many people can put up with a lot for a decently sewn gown.”
Verity smiled and shared a pot of tea with her and some of Mrs. Andrews’s best fruit cake. Then she went to the cottage and started packing all her belongings with Artie’s help. Then they scrubbed and polished everything in the cottage until it shone. The gown arrived the night before her wedding, along with Mistress Burbridge, who fussed as Verity tried it on and made a few minor adjustments. It was a beautiful gown, and the old besom and her assistants must have worked hard to get it finished in time. She thanked her and tipped her a half guinea for her speedy work, but first asked if she would sew one strand of her long auburn hair into the hem of the dress.
She was a virgin bride, and traditions were important to keep.
* * *
Verity hardly sleptthe night before her wedding. She was frightened and a bit unsure about marrying the duke. She knew what he was and had been, and hoped that he would keep his word and try to be a faithful husband. Rolling onto her stomach, she thumped the pillow.
“What does it matter if he keeps his word or not?”
Her heart twisted upon itself, and though she had long given up the fanciful girlish dreams she’d owned about the ideal kind of husband, if she could not have the duke’s eventual love, she would want his faithfulness.
But how can a man with a moniker as wicked as Duke of Every Sin confine himself to one woman?
“Perhaps the rumors are exaggerated,” she said into the softness of her pillows. “There was that one that said he was caught in bed with a countess and her footman. Surely such licentiousness simply cannot be true.”
Verity knew the duke desired her, and that he had promised to be loyal. And she admitted to herself, he made her heart flutter, her toes curl, and her knees go weak. Just kissing him had turned her into a wanton. It had been so hard to return to the cottage, when she had wanted to beg for more of his reprehensible advances.
A soft thud landed on the bed, and she rolled over to scoop one of her charming companions into her arms. Verity smiled and almost purred as she stroked Columbine, her white cat with the comical black face markings.
Life will not be boring as the duke’s wife.
As her mind veered off into shocking imaginations of her wedding night, and his salacious promise that he would bed her over and over and over, she forcefully dragged herself back to practicality and whispered to her cat, “The most important thing is that Thomas will be brought up in a family, as he deserves. So I should quit my worrying and remember all brides are jittery the night before their wedding.”
