A Governess for the faithless Duke (Regency Romance) (Regency Tales Book 3) by Regina Darcy Page A

notice the interest of the men—not all of them gentlemen—who paused in their labours and conversations to admire her impeccable posture, resplendent hair the colour of cinnamon, and her straightforward gaze which did not employ the coy habits of other women of marriageable age. Had any of them wished to engage her interest, they would have failed in their attempts if they chose to praise her for her beauty, or to strike a sonnet in tribute to her carriage. But if any of them had the inspiration to talk of ships, of ports in other countries or the products that sailed upon the ships populating the oceans of the world, or the unassailable legacy of seafaring London, they would have had no trouble in attracting her attention.
    Unlike others of her sex, who had been reared to regard themselves as matrimonial quarry, Elizabeth Hargrave had been raised by a widowed father who, a novice in the upbringing of daughters, had treated his only child like a beloved apprentice. Henry Hargrave was a merchant, a very successful one, and his faith in the East India Company was unswerving. The bustle of the docks, the crowds made up of merchants, ship-owners and shipbuilders in many ways had been her formal schooling. Her father had become a widower and a father in the same moment Elizabeth’s mother died in childbirth. But he had accepted God’s will and brought up his daughter with a reverence for England’s commerce that probably, if he considered it at all, rivalled his sense of duty to the Almighty. He was proud of his reputation and his business prowess and his daughter was an integral part of what he had built.
    There was always something new to discover on the docks and Elizabeth had grown up with London as her classroom. To see London through its ships was to witness the true England, the nation which had become an empire because its fleet was bold, its sailors experienced, and its seafaring identity one which had been constant throughout the country’s existence. The new century that was just two years old seemed so very modern compared to the previous one. While it was true that Great Britain’s King George III was regrettably mad, English eyes kept their focus on the goings-on across the Channel. There, the French bloodbath of the previous years had seemingly been staunched by the rise to power of a man named Napoleon; his ambitions kept politicians and military leaders throughout Europe and Russia vigilant. She thought of Napoleon often, as did most British, but Great Britain itself seemed to go on as it always had. Napoleon had been heard to dismiss the British as a nation of shopkeepers, but Elizabeth’s father, instead of being insulted by the reputed remark, had applauded it. Britain, he told Elizabeth, would continue to thrive as long as its shopkeepers, merchants, and the East India Company continued to be the backbone of the Empire.
    It seemed to Elizabeth that surely all the world passed through London by way of the docks. When she was a child, she had thought of the docks as London’s doors, opening wide to let in the ships of all nations and their products. She remembered her father laughing at her words, but with pride, as if she had happened upon knowledge beyond her years.
    As she made her way to her father’s office, it was the building, not the eyes of male admirers, along the dock that held her in rapt attention. The West India docks, now nearing the end of their construction, would soon be bearing the wealth of the world as it was unloaded from the ships; the docks would showcase the sugar, tea, grain and the other products of other places. They were a new mercantile adventure, one which bore close observation. Her father was a vigorous supporter of the enterprise and his hard work and advocacy were poised to enrich the commercial fortunes of London and also make Henry Hargrave a wealthy man.
    Having reached her father’s office, a three-storey building located in the pulsing heart of the commercial