The New Duke Put His Father's Widow in a Roofless Farm — By Spring His Own Sisters Had Moved In

They buried the old Duke on a Tuesday. On the Friday his son held out a ring of keys on one finger, smiled, and sent his father's widow to live in a farmhouse with no roof. Selina Dymoke had been the old Duke's wife for fourteen years and had raised his two daughters from the nursery. She thanked the new Duke, put the keys in her pocket beside her husband's spectacles, and walked out to Hebb's End in her mourning black. The steward's cart followed her to take the red Turkey rug from her own sitting room. In the morning the thatcher's widow from the cottages, seventy years old and sharp as a needle, walked over the moor with a can of warm milk and looked at the roof before she looked at Selina. The Duke has wagered at dinner that she will be begging at the dower house by Martinmas. What did the old woman see in those rafters, and who will end up living under that roof? A Regency story about a discarded widow, a ruined farmhouse and a wager she has no plans to lose. This is original fiction: every person in it is invented and a grown adult. Subscribe to Michaelmas Rent for more Regency stories.