Ferguson was turning into his father after all. The night before proved it - when Madeleine refused his proposal, his first instinct was to kidnap her and drive straight for Gretna Green. Or, even easier, drag her to Salford, still wrapped in his coverlet, and prove that she needed to marry him. She was lucky he was still new to his inheritance. His father would have forced the issue before she even left his bed.

But he wasn't quite his father yet, and he had tamped down the desire to claim her long enough to let her flee. After he watched from a window until she safely crossed the alleyway, he returned to their bed, still warm from their bodies, and stared at the ceiling as he waited for sleep to take him. He couldn't let her go, couldn't lose her. He would just have to find a way to win her.

That would require finding out why she said no. When he had awoken to sunlight streaming through the windows of their little house, he realized he hadn't even asked her for a reason.

He cast another glance at the clock across from his desk and sighed. After coming home and changing clothes, he had succumbed to duty and met his London steward for their daily exercise in overseeing the vast estate. They were in his father's study, and the clock, like every other object in the room, was intimately familiar to him - either from his boyhood, when his father used to let him play with the exotic objects, or later, when he stared at anything but his father during the endless lectures. He swore the clock was rigged to make time seem like it had stopped - and it still felt that way, even though he was the master.

Berrings, the steward, coughed discreetly. Ferguson sighed. The London house's steward also oversaw the duchy's city holdings. If Ferguson could concentrate, there was more than enough work to distract him from the topic of Madeleine.

"What are your thoughts on the lease for Legrand's Theatre, your grace?" Berrings asked. "Have you thought any more about the establishment?"

The man had a knack for raising controversial subjects in the blandest possible voice. He surely knew how well Ferguson was acquainted with the place. Anyone smart enough to survive nearly two years in the old duke's service would pay close attention to his master's actions.

"You must know I've attended, but the proprietress did not seem nervous about my presence. Does she not know I own her theatre?"

Berrings shook his head. "Places of that ilk are leased through a subsidiary so that your grace's name is not besmirched by their entertainments."

At least the gossips did not know of Ferguson's ownership. It would look positively feudal for him to sample the charms of the theatre's top performer. "We can leave the theatre alone for now, but I may wish to revisit the matter at the end of the season," Ferguson said. At least he would have leverage if Madeleine continued to refuse him.

He winced. That was exactly what his father would have thought.

Berrings made a notation in his ledger. Then he looked up, awaiting more orders. He was nondescript, a man with a medium build, standard brown hair, and a moderate tone of voice - the type who would blend into the backdrop and work himself to death without complaint.

"How do you feel about your work, Berrings?" Ferguson asked.

The man carefully set his pen on the traveling desk he used to the left of Ferguson's chair, and his face paled as he looked up from his writing. "Have I done anything to displease you, your grace? I know we've not worked together for long, but I assure you I hold your interests dearer than my own."

"No, you've pleased me quite well. With your knowledge, I would be a fool to cut you loose."

Berrings's shoulders slumped just slightly, like a man given a reprieve he did not expect. "You are very kind, your grace."

Ferguson laughed. "'Kind' is not a word I am accustomed to hearing. But I do intend to treat you fairly if you choose to stay on."

Berrings was not likely to leave of his own accord. The position as a Rothwell estate manager would be very hard to eclipse. Although another steward oversaw the grand Rothwell estate on the Dover coast and a third managed the industrial interests in the north, Berrings was responsible for a substantial portion of an income that totaled more than £150,000 per annum. Rothwell rivaled Devonshire as the greatest non-royal duchy in England and made Ferguson's comfortable inheritance in Scotland look like the meanest poverty. Berrings would be a fool to leave it. He said as much, stammering over his words, somehow navigating a course between pride in his work and abject flattery of the dukes who had hired him.

Ferguson waved all that aside. He would need to see if the other two stewards were as loyal, but since his father would have had them transported at any hint of fraud, he guessed they were more than competent. "Since you've no intention of leaving, I am relieved that the duchy will be under your expert care when I return to Scotland. You will still send reports, of course, but it is good to know I do not need to be involved."

Berrings compressed his lips, looking down at his ledger as though searching for a new topic of conversation.

"You are far too easy to read," Ferguson observed. "How did you ever survive my father with such a distinct inability to hide your thoughts?"

He laughed for the first time since Ferguson had met him, a rusty sound that left him mortified. "His grace asked me to sit behind him, your grace. He thought it easier to sign papers and toss them back to me, and he had no need for my opinion."

Ferguson remembered the last time he had seen his father - ten years earlier, in this very room. The duke did not ask Ferguson's opinion either. But he made sure his son stood right in the center, feeling like an insect pinned to the carpet, while he castigated him for being an insult to every ancestor who had conducted themselves honorably since the days of the Conqueror.

Then he ordered Ferguson to get out of his sight and never return. It was the victory Ferguson had fought for. So why had it hurt when his father did not see him off?

"Perhaps you were lucky he did not seat you before him," Ferguson said, pulling himself out of the memories.

Berrings nodded. "If you will forgive me for being bold, your grace, may I offer my opinion?"

So the man did have a voice of his own - even better, if he were to manage the duchy during Ferguson's absences. "I am not my father. Your job is to offer me counsel on the estate."

"Then my counsel is that you should remain in England," Berrings said in a rush, determined to get the words out before his courage failed. "There are thousands of people on your estates who would benefit from your leadership. You could do much good if you were directly involved in your affairs."

"I hardly think anyone is clamoring for my leadership. As long as the estate's coffers don't run dry, they would be just as satisfied if a monkey sat at this desk. Maybe more, since the monkey wouldn't be out making scandals." Ferguson said.

Berrings had an obstinate set to his jaw that Ferguson hadn't seen before. "The previous duke was very astute. It is why this estate prospered when so many are on the verge of failing. But he did not have a gift for talking to the lower classes. The tenants would appreciate knowing that you are both qualified to lead and approachable enough to consider their requests."

"Are any of the tenants starving?" Ferguson demanded, feeling his temper spark.

Berrings shook his head.

"Then they will be fine without me. If they survived my father's presence, it will be even easier for them to survive my absence."

"Very well, your grace," Berrings said stiffly. "But if you will pardon my boldness one more time, I believe everyone is relieved to have you, and not your brothers, at the helm. Your father wanted it too, although not in these circumstances."

"I very much doubt he wanted me to inherit," Ferguson said with a bitter laugh.

"He only said it once, your grace - when another of his letters to you came back unopened."

Ferguson scowled. The letters had started several years after he left, shortly after Henry's funeral, which he refused to attend. The first two offered to let Ferguson back into the fold if he would apologize to his father for the trouble - as though that would ever happen. He never read the letters after that, sent them all back with their seals intact. He wouldn't have even read the one telling him about his father's death had Sophronia not sent four footmen with it to drag him back to London if necessary.

If his father wanted him to inherit, it could only be because he thought Ferguson stood a better chance than Richard of being a "proper" duke - cold, aloof, obsessed with winning. All the qualities that served the Rothwell dukes on ancient battlefields were a nuisance now - but Ferguson had them in spades, if his autocratic need to steal Madeleine away could be used as proof.

He gave Berrings a look that said the conversation was over. At least his ducal tendencies put a quick end to Berrings's meddling. "Is there anything else to discuss this morning?"

The steward picked up a pile of envelopes. "Your correspondence, your grace. I sorted the invitations, requests, and the like, but there was one I thought you should see now."

Ferguson took the note from his hand, recognizing Caro's handwriting even upside down. He frowned as he slipped the inner sheet free of the wrapper.

Another threat, this time written on a caricature from a cheap newspaper. The drawing was poor, but it was obviously him - wearing a kilt that looked like a dress - and Marguerite, dressed in men's trousers. He was speaking gibberish, and Marguerite said, "Alas, poor duchess!" - an allusion to the line about Yorick from Hamlet, and to his family's rumored insanity, with a jab at his masculinity that insulted him more than all the rest. The pile of jewels she sat on made it clear why she stayed, and the footmen standing guard behind her showed how little she thought of his stability.

The caricature was ugly, but he had been caricatured before. Caro's note was worse. "The artists will have much to savor if I publish a memoir of our time together. May I suggest you leave both Lady Madeleine and your mistress before either of them are pulled into the scandal?"

Damn. He crumpled the cartoon and tossed it toward the fire. Her threats were becoming more direct, and he did not think she would listen to reason. He had to get Madeleine to accept his proposal. She would be safe from the ton's curious eyes if she went to Scotland with him.

"No response, Berrings," he said flatly. Then he looked at the clock again. It was still too early to call, but he couldn't wait any longer.

"One more task - I need you to retrieve my mother's jewels. I assume they are in the vault at the bank?"

Berrings made a note. "I will bring the entire casket, your grace. But if you are looking for her engagement ring, I am afraid his grace had the stone reset into a ring for himself. He was wearing it when he died. Since you were not here to decide how to proceed, I took the liberty of returning it to the vault rather than burying it with him."

Why would his father have remade the ring? He was not a sentimental man. Years earlier, he had burned everything of his wife's that it was possible to consign to the flames, including the crofters' huts on her Scottish estate. Any feeling that demanded the displacement of an entire clan to assuage his grief was not sentimental. Still, he may not have lost all feeling for her if he had decided to wear her ring.

Ferguson would have to find another option. He dismissed Berrings - and his remarkably perceptive suspicion about why Ferguson wanted the jewels - before striding up the stairs to his chambers. If he were to embarrass himself by calling too early and demanding an explanation for her refusal, he would at least look presentable.

He just had to hope that Madeleine's objection was something he could overcome - and as Ferguson, not as the duke he would otherwise become.