Royal Regard

Chapter Eleven, Part 2

Perhaps it was her renewed confidence that drove her to ask, "Monsieur, why do you wear only black? Not even a white tie for evening."

He was silent as they passed four paintings.

"Excuse my prying, Monsieur. I am too forward."

"Forgive me, my darling. Only it requires some courage to speak aloud."

His face showed an extraordinarily tortured longing: his muscles loosened and eyes became unfocused, lost in a chaotic daydream she suspected he often visited, but which never brought pleasure. Rather than forbidding, his grim countenance turned forlorn, seeming almost too young to be so sorrowful.

"I once had a very large family—two brothers, four sisters, and my parents, who were very much in love. I am the youngest of all, but many years now alone. There is not enough black."

"Monsieur. I am so sorry. I had not meant to open a sore subject."

Regardless of her discomfort at disturbing his emotional sensibilities, now that he had gathered his courage, he saw fit to continue the conversation. "I have worn mourning nearly all of my life. My eldest brother took a fall from a horse when I was nine; at eleven, my father ate a bad piece of meat, and my remaining brother drowned when I was twelve. It was then I became the tenth duke, Maman and her brother stewards of my estate and guardians of my two sisters yet unmarried."

"You must have been their pet," she teased.

He replied in an ominous undertone, "I have never been any woman's pet, ma chère."

She heard the clear warning, but even if she hadn't, the look on his face when she glanced at him sent her gaze immediately to the varnished wooden floor.

His approval of her unconsidered movement was almost audible as he continued, "When I was ten-and-six, Maman was gathered to God, and I was called to Court to become head of the Fouret family. It was then I took up black as custom." His hand drifted to the velvet lapel of his fine wool jacket.

"Out of respect for your mother."

"And so it began, but the grief compounded two years later by the loss of the girl I would marry, then my uncle, who had been like a father, and just before the Revolution, my duchess and my heir. Finally, in La Grande Terreur, all of my sisters, their husbands, their children, were put to death by guillotine—twenty-six in all, two still in infancy, and innumerable aunts, uncles, and cousins."

Her hand flew to contain her gasp. "Monsieur! I am so sorry. I should have thought—" The back of her glove seemed stuck to her lips.

Malbourne allowed her to excuse herself just too long for courtesy, and Bella found herself reflexively curtseying and dropping her eyes.

"Monsieur, je suis vraiment désolée. I am deeply ashamed. I cannot ask you continue." Bella had come across many heartbreaking stories in her time, but the life of the Duke of Malbourne was the darkest she'd ever heard. Charlotte said he looked cold, and now Bella knew why. He had lost everyone he had ever loved.

"By the time my wife breathed her last in childbed, the revolution was already underway. I could choose life or death, and either way, would lose my estate to looters and thieves."

"Obviously, you escaped."

"Oui, but my family was spread throughout France, and my agent could not reach them. Like many aristos, they believed the monarchy would soon put down the rabble and there would be the end to it. By the time they would make their escape, it was too late."