To Love A Duke

Proud of you

Song. Recommendation: Somewhere only we know by vitamin string quartet

Ladies do not wear gentlemen garments! Ooh but on a second thought a dreary or chilly weather makes for an exception..

By evening they were on the path that led home and the footmen walked a good distance behind. The night air was chilly and she shivered for she hadn’t brought a shawl with her. He shrugged out of his jacket and rested it on her shoulders.

“Oh” she blurted.The jacket didn’t fit, it was much bigger as his shoulders were wider. It was big and awkward but it was warm and comfortable.

“Thank you” she said and looked up at him. He regarded her for a while and then he nodded. She stepped closer to him and brushed her fingers to his, he didn’t seem perturbed, so she linked their hands as they were in sight of the mansion. She looked ahead cause she knew he would be looking at her.

“When I had asked about you, I wasn’t asking about the duke but the man” she said before she lost the courage to speak her mind. he paused and she glanced up at him.

“There isn’t anything to say about him” he replied gripping at her hands tighter and walking towards the gates.

“Yet there is” she whispered and she was sure he heard her. she had seen more of him today than she had in the past weeks since their marriage and wondered why he didn’t feel worthy of his fathers pride. Had his father perhaps made him feel less of his brother Apollo? The thought made her rage. She couldn’t explain this wild emotions, to protect him from everyone who didn’t see him as she did. Those who judged him from afar, yet she couldn’t help but think that wasn’t she just like the others? Still his own father? She had thought fathers weren’t proud of their daughters because they were simply girls and in a society were the females existence was reduced to a single moment and importance-to be married- she could understand why her own father had never loved her, had never been proud of her but then to have a son and still not count him worthy of your affection and pride seemed crazy.

The fact that he felt his father would not be proud of him made her want to stamp her foot and hug him all at once for from what she had seen of him today she knew in her heart he took his responsibilities as nobly as he should, and if his man didn’t value that then screw him for he may ignore the parliament season and philander about in London from a hell house to another. But here on his turf, here is its this villagers who needed him he was as responsible as any Lord, more than most she knew intact who did nothing but live of the backs of the tenants in their land. She had watched him repair the leaking roof of a widow, she had watched him pet those kids and give them a treat of tarts. She had watched him proffer solutions to the farmers with irrigation challenges. She watched him rescue a drowning calf and all of it hadn’t been an act of heroism, Tis simply who he was. Who he is, and all the while he had done it without a frown, but with the grace of the purple flower, perhaps she would compare him to the lavender flower but it wouldn’t be right, for he was no soft flower, he was hard, and noble, responsible and hard working and no matter the lezafer attitude he tried to put forth no matter how vain and frivolous and revenge driven he seemed to be. He was the best man she had ever known and he was her husband, for that she had never been more proud.