Did she truly have to rely on a duke to teach her? To help her? Why did ladies need gentlemen to protect them from other gentlemen? Absurd. That’s what it was.
They were past the Age of Enlightenment. They had passed the age of Rousseau, passed Montaigne and Thomas Paine. Had they not had Newton, Descartes, and Burke?
Had not great women, too, made their mark, such as Aphra Behn, Elizabeth Montagu, the Duchess of Devonshire, and Mary Wollstonecraft?
Were women still to be relegated to bed and board? And being protected?
Not if she had a say.
There was promise of change upon the horizon. And though the duke was like many men in his lack of understanding of the state of women’s lives, she wanted to make him see. To make him help her on simply more than a boxing match. If she did not, and if England did not embrace change, they would go the way of France. And that would be utter catastrophe!
The French had almost gotten it right. Life, liberty, and all that for men and for a brief, shining moment! Vive la France!
And then it had all gone horribly wrong.
But surely it couldn’t be like that forever?
The longing for more was so intense it was a physical pain. She thought of her mother and father, who had loved and respected each other in a way she’d not seen again.
Sometimes…if she admitted it to herself, she was lonely.
And the way the duke made her body feel as if it was awakening from a long sleep… And caused her mind to crackle in debate…
Could a man and a woman truly align? Could she be tempted by the duke and pursue her cause at once? Her mind rioted at the confusion. From her experience, the answer was no. She’d not met a single man who would see her as a true equal and love her, too. Men did not generally love. They worshipped. A very different thing, indeed.
Could the Duke of Blackheath ever see her as an actual person with passion, desires, dreams, thoughts, and rights equal to his own?
All evidence told her no.
Yet to her utter annoyance, the tiniest spark had been lit, daring to think of him in carnal terms.
But humans were ever a disappointment. And she couldn’t bear to be disappointed.
“If you think any harder,” Maggie warned, “your hair shall burst into flame.”
She looked back at her cousin, who was almost laughing. But only just.
“Do not laugh!” she exclaimed, her lips twitching at her cousin’s own bemused expression.
“I would never do such a thing,” Margaret said with exaggerated seriousness. “But I can see the feelings are positively radiating off you.”
It was true that sometimes she did grow so impassioned that the only thing Margaret could do was nod and murmur at her. Still. Was it wrong to be angered for every woman and for every person who was the subject of the current system? No.
Was it wrong to long for more and settle for nothing less?
It was an impossible system, allowing only a few men to make the decisions for all. Allowing women to be put on pedestals but never be seen for who they were.
Who truly had thought that was a good idea?
Well, she knew: men. A few men, that was.
“Few people have any rights to make any decisions at all, Margaret. It’s preposterous!”
Margaret’s eyes widened, and she nodded dutifully.
Beatrice groaned. “I’m lecturing, aren’t I?”
“A bit,” confessed Maggie. “But I adore your lectures.”