Barbara Cartland - Dollars for the Duke

DOLLARS FOR THE DUKE

Barbara Cartland

Barbara Cartland Ebooks Ltd

This edition 2012

Copyright Cartland Promotions 1981

eBook conversion by M-Y Books

Barbara Cartland, who sadly died in May 2000 at the grand age of ninety eight, remains one of the worlds most famous romantic novelists. With worldwide sales of over one billion, her outstanding 723 books have been translated into thirty six different languages, to be enjoyed by readers of romance globally.

Writing her first book Jigsaw at the age of 21, Barbara became an immediate bestseller. Building upon this initial success, she wrote continuously throughout her life, producing bestsellers for an astonishing 76 years. In addition to Barbara Cartlands legion of fans in the UK and across Europe, her books have always been immensely popular in the USA. In 1976 she achieved the unprecedented feat of having books at numbers 1 & 2 in the prestigious B. Dalton Bookseller bestsellers list.

Although she is often referred to as the Queen of Romance, Barbara Cartland also wrote several historical biographies, six autobiographies and numerous theatrical plays as well as books on life, love, health and cookery. Becoming one of Britains most popular media personalities and dressed in her trademark pink, Barbara spoke on radio and television about social and political issues, as well as making many public appearances.

In 1991 she became a Dame of the Order of the British Empire for her contribution to literature and her work for humanitarian and charitable causes.

Known for her glamour, style, and vitality Barbara Cartland became a legend in her own lifetime. Best remembered for her wonderful romantic novels and loved by millions of readers worldwide, her books remain treasured for their heroic heroes, plucky heroines and traditional values. But above all, it was Barbara Cartlands overriding belief in the positive power of love to help, heal and improve the quality of life for everyone that made her truly unique.

The Barbara Cartland Eternal Collection is the unique opportunity to collect as ebooks all five hundred of the timeless beautiful romantic novels written by the worlds most celebrated and enduring romantic author.

Named the Eternal Collection because Barbaras inspiring stories of pure love, just the same as love itself, the books will be published on the internet at the rate of four titles per month until all five hundred are available.

The Eternal Collection, classic pure romance available worldwide for all time .

1. Elizabethan Lover
2. The Little Pretender
3. A Ghost in Monte Carlo
4. A Duel of Hearts
5. The Saint and the Sinner
6. The Penniless Peer
7. The Proud Princess
8. The Dare-Devil Duke
9. Diona and a Dalmatian
10. A Shaft of Sunlight
11. Lies for Love
12. Love and Lucia
13. Love and the Loathsome Leopard
14. Beauty or Brains
15. The Temptation of Torilla
16. The Goddess and the Gaiety Girl
17. Fragrant Flower
18. Look Listen and Love
19. The Duke and the Preachers Daughter
20. A Kiss for the King
21. The Mysterious Maid-servant
22. Lucky Logan Finds Love
23. The Wings of Ecstacy
24. Mission to Monte Carlo
25. Revenge of the Heart
26. The Unbreakable Spell
27. Never Laugh at Love
28. Bride to a Brigand
29. Lucifer and the Angel
30. Journey to a Star
31. Solita and the Spies
32. The Chieftain Without a Heart
33. No Escape from Love
34. Dollars for the duke

Following the sudden death of his rakish father, Seldon Burn unexpectedly inherits the title of Duke of Otterburn. Returning to the family estate, he swiftly discovers that the title is the only thing he has inherited along with a mountain of his fathers debts and nothing to pay them with.

A brave and proud soldier, nothing has prepared the new Duke for the devastation to the family coffers caused by his late fathers love of lavish entertainment, Gaiety Girls and good living. Meeting with the family Solicitor, the Duke is horrified to discover the Ducal properties are crumbling, everything of value is entailed and even the racehorses have not been schooled properly.

Desperately seeking to rebuild the family fortune and honourably fulfil his duty of care to the old and infirm of the village, his cousin Edith, a sophisticated Socialite, offers a solution.

She suggests that he follows in the footsteps of many an impoverished English aristocrat and marries a wealthy American heiress she even has a fitting bride in mind from her recent visit to New York.

With no viable alternative and a pressing demand for money, a wedding is hastily arranged but will the English traditions of generations of the Burns family be overshadowed by the razzle-dazzle of the Dukes mother-in-law to be, Mrs. Vandevilt, the renowned New York hostess?

Horrified at being married for his title and not love, the Duke is so angry that he barely considers the feelings of his young and vulnerable bride. Meanwhile, the lovely Magnolia Vandevilt, one of the richest heiresses in America, is equally disgusted and contemptuous of a man who is marrying her only for her money.

Joined together in holy matrimony, can this marriage of convenience ever be more than a disappointment and battleground as both parties dream of the love they might have had?

I have set out the whole amount, Your Grace, as you asked me to do.

The accountant put a sheaf of papers down in front of the Duke.

He looked at them and then stiffened, as if he could hardly believe what he read. There was a long silence as he turned over several pages before he said,

Is it possible, Fossilwaithe, that my father could have run up such a mountain of debts without you or anyone else remonstrating with him?

I assure you, Your Grace, the accountant said respectfully, both I and my partners spoke to His late Grace on several occasions, but he brushed us aside. Once he even informed me that I was to mind my own business!

The Duke sighed.

He was quite certain that the accountant was telling him the truth, remembering that his father was always exceedingly impatient when anyone argued, let alone opposed him.

He looked down at the figures again as if he thought that by some miracle they might be changed.

Then he said,

Well, Fossilwaithe, what do you suggest we do about it?

He had no idea that the elderly man had been watching him with an expression of compassion in his eyes.

Now he made a little helpless gesture before he said,

It is a problem that has kept me awake for nights, Your Grace, and quite frankly I do not know the answer.

The Duke sat back in his chair.

Lets put it more bluntly what have I to sell?

Again Mr. Fossilwaithe, Senior Partner of the Solicitors firm that had looked after the Otterburn estates for many years appeared to have no ready answer.

As if he felt the situation was intolerable, the Duke rose from his desk and walked across the room to stare out with unseeing eyes over Park Lane towards the green trees in Hyde Park.

Otterburn House in London was large, impressive and a fitting town house for the Dukes whose name it bore. But the present and fourth Duke of Otterburn was currently thinking of The Castle and the huge estates in Buckinghamshire he had inherited unexpectedly and to which he had returned from the East only a month ago.

He had never expected to find himself in the position of being the Duke of Otterburn since he had an elder brother besides a father who had seemed a young man at fifty and likely to live for at least another forty years.