The Cruel Count (Bantam Series No. 28) Read Online Free PDF Page A

her mind like a menacing shadow.
    Something she had tried not to remember and yet she knew now she was forced to face the truth.

 
    Chapter Two
    Everything that had happened to Vesta had been so unexpected. Even now she still felt breathless at the manner in which it had occurred.
    She had been planning this Spring to enjoy her second Season in London. Her first season the previous year had been a success, as was to be expected when a debutante so important as the daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Salfont was introduced to the Beau Monde.
    But Vesta was, as it happened, already well accustomed to the social round.
    The Duchess of Salfont had been entertaining for her five older daughters one after the other ever since anyone could remember. And somehow it had been inevitable that Vesta should take part in the festivities even though officially she was still in the schoolroom.
    She had, therefore, since she was fifteen been invited to parties with her sisters because many of the Duchess’s friends, struck by her beauty, felt she enhanced any social occasion which she attended.
    A number of young men had even asked the Duke if they might pay their addresses to her, only to be dismissed summarily with the words—“she is much too young”.
    Then in February a month after her eighteenth birthday there had come a bombshell in the shape of the Prime Minister from Katona.
    Vesta could recall vividly her astonishment when her father had called her into the library of Salfont House in Berkeley Square and had said to her in a tone that was unusually serious:
    “Vesta, I wish to speak to you.”
    She had wondered uneasily what was coming. She knew of old that those particular words usually prefaced a complaint or a scolding. But instead the Duke said:
    “I have received today a visit from His Excellency the Prime Minister of Katona. He informed me that His Royal Highness Prince Alexander of Katona requests the honour of your hand in marriage.”
    As Vesta stared at her father too astonished to speak, the Duke added:
    “It means that, since Katona is an independent Royal Principality, you will in fact be virtually Queen of that small but important country.”
    For a moment Vesta could not believe she had heard her father correctly. Then she said almost childishly:
    “But I do not ... know the Prince.”
    Her father had taken her hand in his and drawn her down beside him on a sofa.
    “My dear, where Royalty is concerned marriages are arranged, and I cannot help thinking that the Prince’s advisers have been very wise in suggesting an English bride for their Ruler.”
    “You mean,” Vesta said slowly, “it is the suggestion of his ... Government not ... His Royal Highness ... that I should be his wife.”
    “As I have said,” the Duke replied, “these things are arranged for the best diplomatic and political reasons. I have in fact, Vesta, already consulted the Foreign Secretary Lord Castlereagh, who is extremely anxious that we should acquiesce in Katona’s wishes in this matter.”
    “But, Papa, I have never seen the Prince!” Vesta cried.
    “I believe he is a well behaved, charming young man,” the Duke answered, “who has as it happens, English blood in his veins; for his grandmother and his great-grandmother were both English.”
    He paused before he went on:
    “Katona has always been friendly with Great Britain and it is very important she should remain so.”
    The next day the Foreign Secretary, Viscount Castlereagh, made the same point as Vesta sat with him and the Prime Minister, the Earl of Liverpool in the Drawing-room at 10 Downing Street.
    It was rather awe-inspiring, but at the same time Vesta had liked Lord Castlereagh. Tall and dignified having inherited much of his mother’s beauty, his physical and moral courage had made him outstanding .among Foreign Secretaries.
    But because he was the idol of many women he knew better than the Prime Minister or the Duke of Salfont how to handle a sensitive