Page 172 of The Ladies Least Likely
EPILOGUE
H arriette studied the canvas before her and rubbed the mound of her belly. Ren, standing at her worktable cleaning her brushes, caught the gesture with his sharp eyes.
Ever since she’d revealed to him that their family circle was about to enlarge, Ren had been worse than a mother hen.
He had been watchful of everything she was exposed to, tasted or smelled or even looked at.
Sometimes she wondered if he remembered too well what she had told him about ancient theories of childbirth, and he was taking care that no outside influence would mar the creature taking shape in her womb.
He insisted from the start that someone else help her with the more pungent aspects of preparing her paints and cleaning her brushes.
Melike had been doing it most of the time, trotting back and forth from Charles Street along the path that the Catherine Club, as they were now calling themselves, had worn to Renwick House.
But today her aunt’s entire household would arrive for the unveiling, and Ren was filling the office of apprentice, tidying her brushes and paints away.
“She’s moving about?” Ren asked.
Her back had pained her all night, but Harriette decided not to tell him that, as he’d worry.
She loved the interest he’d taken in every aspect of her gestation.
Unlike most husbands, who didn’t think about the child until it emerged, Ren delighted in the sturdy kicks and thrusts of their unborn babe.
Once the child had pressed so hard against her belly that she could see the imprint of its foot, and Ren’s face when he traced the shape of the tiny heel and toes, the shape a child’s foot was meant to be—that look had nearly broken her heart with fear and love.
Harriette knew she would love their child no matter what it looked like. But what if there were something different, and Ren blamed himself?
“ He ,” she said, rubbing under her belly, “has grown still in the last day. Sorcha says that means he’s making ready to come out.”
Thank heavens she’d had Sorcha to advise her through this new and terrifying journey. Sorcha, she’d learned, had borne three children, and all had died due to illness, malnutrition, or exposure. Ren was concerned about the shape of the babe. Harriette feared for worse.
“We can wait for the unveiling until after the little duchess is here.” Ren came to stand behind her, slipping his arms about her swollen sides and cradling her hands in his.
“Sorcha told me ways to, em, encourage the little one along if she’s too snug in there.
” He nipped at her earlobe, his breath tickling her ear, and Harriette laughed, linking her fingers with his.
She loved that Ren had allowed her to make her own choices around child-bearing, not forcing her to stay confined in darkened rooms like other duchesses and earl’s wives were obliged to do.
He allowed her to be up and active and among people.
He let her eat what she wished. He trusted her.
And instead of treating her as a broodmare who must be pampered for the prize inside of it, he showed that he still loved and saw and desired her .
She was the luckiest of women. She only hoped that luck would continue.
“Everyone is too impatient to see the portrait, and I am impatient to show them.”
Harriette draped the cloth over the painting, hiding her subject’s brilliant blue eyes. “We can have a proper party when the little earl arrives, to celebrate the completion of both my projects.”
A heavy tread approached the morning room, and Ren released her but did not step away. Dunstan, the butler, appeared in the doorway.
“Milord. Your Serene Highness.” Dunstan delighted in using Harriette’s full formal address in company. No paltry Your Grace as befitted an English duchess; his duchess was a Highness, and he made sure everyone knew it. He turned to announce her guests.
“Her Royal Highness Casimira, Princess of Galicia and Lodomeria. The Countess of Calenberg.” Princess would never give up her claim no matter how many people accused her of imposture, but she also knew better than to impose on her benefactor for long.
Princess swept into the room with a flourish, then stepped aside to let her aunt come to Harriette and peer into her face.
“I’m so glad you haven’t grown sickly, like some women do. You have a proper wet nurse secured?”
“Yes, Aunt. Hello to you, too.”
Her aunt’s eyes studied the straining shape of Harriette’s belly beneath the loose nightgown-style dress.
“I hope you won’t expect me to have a thing to do with her until she reaches the age of reason,” she announced, not for the first time.
“But once she does, expect her to spend lots of time with her grand old Aunt Calenberg.”
“Of course, Aunt.” Harriette squeezed her hands.
Her aunt still looked robust to her, but she was aging.
Harriette’s children were the one hope of continuing her family and its rule of the duchy of Lowenburg, since Franz Karl was not like to sire heirs.
She knew her aunt was determined to live long enough to see to their education the way she’d seen to Harriette’s.
“The High and Well-Born Natalya Dobraya,” Dunstan went on. He never wearied of this, no matter how many times the girls visited. “Miss Darci Kilcannon. Miss Melike Yilmaz. Miss Sorcha Cowley. And Miss Chima?—”
He looked with a small challenge at the last girl.
Lady Cranbury’s former companion had become a fixture of the Catherine Club.
She and Sorcha were constantly together, and she showed no small skill for writing and spinning tales.
She was working on a novel about a kidnapped girl who turned out to be an African princess, and Harriette was desperate for her to reach the end so they could publish it.
“Miss Chima Smythe,” Chima said, with a bold wink at Harriette, and Harriette grinned.
“I didn’t miss it, did I?”
Amalie swirled into the room, hair powder floating gently in her wake.
In the year since Harriette had married her brother and come to live at Renwick House, Amalie had gained every day in health and vitality.
The grey line above her teeth was gone and her gums no longer bled.
Her eyes were bright and clear, her hair thick and healthy, and there was nothing dainty about her appetite.
Jock was teaching her how to ride, Abassi was teaching her how to shoot, and Beater, of all people, was teaching her how to dance.
The three men ambled into the room, carrying on a strenuous argument about the results of a recent mill they’d all gone to see, the specifics of which Beater was critiquing with some flair.
Abassi was no longer in hiding, now that advertisements for the bounty on his head had ceased, and he dressed the part of a gentleman with white stockings, a multitude of gleaming buttons on his embroidered coats, and a handsome cane that went rakishly well with his eye patch.
He strolled to stand behind where the Countess of Calenberg had seated herself, one hand resting on the back of the couch near her shoulder.
Harriette smiled to herself. She didn’t know the full relationship between her aunt and the much younger man, and frankly it was none of her business, but she was glad to see his protective, affectionate gesture.
The Countess of Renwick no longer resided at Renwick House.
She had consented to attend her son’s marriage, accepting congratulations with stiff hauteur, then had taken up an invitation to tour the Continent with the disgraced Dowager Duchess of Hunsdon.
She did not write to her children, other than to say she would take up residence at Bolton Abbey whenever she returned.
Harriette held out the hope that healthy grandchildren might soften Ren’s mother in time.
But they would have to be strong and healthy. She would accept nothing less.
“You’re just in time.”
Harriette moved to the easel as the company arranged themselves about the room.
Ren had let her appropriate the morning room of Renwick House for her studio, as it captured the most natural light.
The subtle golds and greens of the room soothed her but didn’t distract, and Amalie and Ren were happy to take callers in the library or, for more important guests, one of the formal drawing rooms upstairs.
Ren had given her anything she asked as far as accommodating her wish to paint and her wish to have someone else see to the housekeeping, and Harriette again acknowledged her good fortune.
A silence held as she pulled the cloth from the tall canvas. It was followed by the small sigh that Harriette had learned to crave more than any other response to her art: that sigh that said the viewer was touched and moved by the beauty of her creation.
Amalie stared from the canvas at them, meeting their eyes with an expression both frank and demure.
She stood in profile, light gleaming on her gown of lilac silk.
Her left arm rested on a small table in its ubiquitous, identifying muff; Amalie’s muff had become the rage of the Season, and every young lady demanded one. Paris couldn’t send them fast enough.
In her right hand she held a small book, open as if the viewer had surprised her in the act of reading.
Her hair was lightly powdered, her unmarked cheek pink with health, but it was the light in her eyes that was most marvelous.
With a few bits of paint, Harriette had captured her intelligence, her strength, and a trace of her vulnerability as well.
“Hari,” was all the countess said, but her voice was full of pride.
Harriette peered into Amalie’s eyes, then at the canvas. “You don’t think—just a touch more silver in the blue?”
“Leave it,” Princess said firmly. “You have her to the life, Hari.”