Sir Richard and Rupert Carter rose to greet her formally. ‘You Grace.’
‘Duchess,’ I said.
She kissed me on the cheek. ‘Raphael. This is a sad day I hoped never to witness.’
Then she bent to kiss Susannah who had remained seated. ‘I wish I could have prevented it, my dear.’ She turned to the two fathers. ‘Truly, I do.’
When we were all seated once more with Frances beside me, she spotted Castlemaine and Catherine and tilted her head in towards me. ‘Never have I seen two ladies display such surfeit of bosom and deficit of intellect.’
The doors to the hall were closed by an attendant and a buzz of excitement travelled around the room, followed by a collective gasp when the door behind the dais opened. The Lord Steward and the two judges – red robed with grey rice-powdered peri-wigs – too
