 1. Hannah Reed, Duchess of Dunbarton, was free at last, free of the burden of a ten-year marriage, and free of the endless detidious year of deep mourning that had succeeded the death of the Duke, her husband. It was a freedom that had been a long time coming. It was a freedom well worth celebrating. She had married the Duke after a five-day acquaintance. His grace all impatient to be wed had procured a special license rather than wait for the bans to be read when she was nineteen and he sample complete ready to continue