Free Lady Adventuress 01 - His Wayward Duchess by Daphne du Bois Page A

if it d id, which would be a pity. But that would not keep her indoors.
    Holly pulled her warm woollen shawl tighter around herself. It had not taken her any time at all to conclude that, like all stately houses of its pedigree, Pontridge Abbey was perpetually cold in the summer, no matter the weather outside. It would be chilling in the winter.
    She was very fortunate that His Grace could afford to have the fires lit all year round.
    She sighed and trudged on, wondering if there was anything new or interesting left for her in the world, or if life would always g o on as it had done these past weeks.
    “L ike being buried alive, surely,” she murmured to herself.
    The nature of Holly’s malady was a very simple one, but all the more painful for this: she suffered from a love entirely unreciprocated, and a loneliness that seemed to eat away at her spirit.
    Probably, Strathavon was to blame, for being what he was; for making it so easy to love him and so difficult to stop. And for being wholly unable to return her love.
    Hers was an impossible, hopeless passion, Holly knew with a mad sort of clarity. It was like being pulled down by the tide – there was no escape, no real choice. And if she were perfectly honest, she hadn’t the least desire to escape. That was the very worst of it.
    Perhaps she was to blame, too. Had she been too meek, too quiet? Ought she to have thrown a fuss, waxed wild at him until she broke through, to catch even a glimpse of what was hidden beneath his stony façade?
    But the moment she managed to get even a step closer to him, he would cut her off completely, become cold and reticent.
    And she had not a friend in the world to talk to. Loneliness was not a state she had ever known before.
    Now she knew it all too well: there was no state more grim and intolerable than loneliness, as the days dragged on.
    And lonely she was, in a house full of servants and a village full of ladies with whom she had not a thing in common except the ability to run a hou sehold with skill and economy.
    T hat hardly served as the foundation for a friendship.
    She felt angry at herself as tears threatened, blurring her vision and making her sniffle. This whole arrangement was unbearable.
    She felt a little as if she were drownin g and this was an entirely new feeling for Holly too. She was generally not given to melancholy and she had never really had any true cause for it before now.
    All alone at Pontridge, Holly felt deserted.
    This must be what it was like for all those Tudor nuns, banished from the glorious world of the court.
    She had been reading history books to pass the ti me, because novels left her sadder still, longing for a world that was better, kinder and fairer than her own.
    There were many books yet to read, which was a comfort, and the house still wanted a lot of work. There was even a piano in the front parlour, but Holly did not really play and it held no attraction for her.
    I t only served to make her miss Cassandra, who was wonderful at music. She would always let Holly sit on the piano bench next to her, and watch as her hands fluttered over the ivory keys like birds.
    Bu t pianos, books and houses were all things , and it was people she missed. People with whom she could freely talk, joke, and laugh. People in general, and one person in particular, though he did not really deserve to be missed.
    No doubt she had never belonged in the duke’s fast , glamorous world – but was she such a disgrace that he’d felt he had to leave her behind while he returned to London?
    Would a wife have been merely a nuisance to him? She had heard of the Duke of Strathavon long before she’d met him. She’d read a little about his exploits in the society journals to which her mama subscribed: the races which he had embarked upon, the light o’ loves and the many parties which he had attended.
    A likeness of his handsome f ace had even graced one piece – the sketch had depicted a man of inexplicable charisma,