The Glass House (26 page)

"Your friend Percy has no manners," I
observed. "He should not have left you alone."

"He is ghastly." The diamonds in her hair
sparkled as she turned her head. "He believes I should give up
being the dowager Viscountess Breckenridge to become his wife." She
shuddered. "I could not bear to be called
Lady Percy
."

"You might be called Duchess of Waverly
later," I said.

"He is a younger son and unlikely to ever
become the duke," she said dismissively. "Do you know, Lacey, that
just for a moment, when you came in, you looked remarkably like
Breckenridge."

I blenched. Her late husband had been a brute
of a man with little to redeem him. "I am sorry to hear you say
that."

"I do not believe there has been a morning I
have not awakened thanking heaven that he is dead." Lady
Breckenridge punctuated the callous remark by removing a cigarillo
from a silver case. She lit it with one of the candles on the table
and put it to her mouth. "Do sit down, Lacey. Unless you would
rather listen to that racket that is supposed to be opera."

I did not, so I took one of the Louis Quinze
chairs, waiting for her to sit before I did.

She leaned back as she looked me up and down,
tendrils of acrid smoke weaving about her head. "You seem in much
better health, this evening, I must say."

"Indeed. Your butler's cure worked
wonders."

"Barnstable is marvelous. But I see you have
not recovered your walking stick. Although that is a fine one."

"Grenville kindly lent it to me."

"Pity about the other," she said, taking a
pull on the cigarillo. "It must have been a wrench to lose
something that close to you."

I was surprised she understood that. "It is,
yes."

"And I read in the newspaper this evening
that Mrs. Chapman's husband, of all people, had been arrested for
Inglethorpe's murder. Do you think he did it?"

"He confessed," I said.

"Probably mistook Inglethorpe for having an
affair with his wife," Lady Breckenridge said with uncanny
perception. "Mrs. Chapman was a silly young woman, and I am not
surprised she brought everyone around her to a bad end. She was
quite common, as I told you."

"Yes, so you said." Her opinion coincided
with Marianne's. Peaches had been a woman other women had little
use for.

"Do not pity her too much," Lady Breckenridge
said, observing my expression. "She brought many of her troubles
upon herself."

"I can't forget seeing her lying on the bank
of the Thames," I said softly. "It was a brutal death."

"I daresay it was. But do not let that cloud
your judgment to what she was."

"You are a bit brutal yourself tonight," I
said.

Her eyes took on an enigmatic light. "I am
honest. And not always polite, I am afraid."

I smiled a little. "I am surprised you speak
with me at all. I am hardly in your class."

She returned the smile. It was surprisingly
warm, and her eyes twinkled almost as much as Lady's Aline's.
"Nonsense. You come from a fine lineage. I looked you up."

"A rather overly pruned family tree," I said
dryly.

"And you have no sons?"

I shook my head.

"But you were married, weren't you?" she
asked.

I regarded her in surprise. My marriage was
not common knowledge, not because I wanted to hide it, but because
I didn't like talking about it. Why cause myself more pain?

Her smile deepened. "You have the look of a
man who's had a wife, who has experienced the hell that can be
marriage. A widower, you know, looks a different man from a
bachelor."

I only nodded, not correcting her that I was
not a widower. My wife still lived, in France, possibly with the
French officer for whom she had left me. She had changed her name,
but I still knew her as Carlotta.

Lady Breckenridge smoked in silence for a few
moments, letting smoke trail from her lips.

"My news is scarcely news any more," she said
at last. "Now that you know who murdered Inglethorpe. But I thought
you'd like to know just the same."

My interest quickened. Lady Breckenridge,
though acerbic, was also observant. "Yes?"

"I know who took your walking stick." She
laid the cigarillo in a porcelain dish, where it continued to burn.
"I have no idea how Chapman got hold of it, but I know how it left
the house that day."

"Do you?" I stared. "Why the devil did you
not say so at the inquest?"

She shrugged a slim shoulder. "Because I am
not as callous as people believe I am. I do not truly think that
the person who took the walking stick killed Inglethorpe, but Bow
Street would have pounced on her at once, would they not have?
Possibly dragged her off to the magistrate then and there. What a
disgrace for her and her family. I did not wish that on poor Mrs.
Danbury."

"Mrs. Danbury?" I clearly pictured Mrs.
Danbury smiling at me in Inglethorpe's drawing room while we
danced, and then later, looking at me with innocent gray eyes when
I'd questioned her at Sir Gideon's, declaring she had not seen what
had become of the walking stick. "Are you certain?"

Candlelight danced in the diamonds in Lady
Breckenridge's hair as she nodded. "Of course. I saw her."

"Saw her? When?"

"As my carriage pulled away from
Inglethorpe's. I looked out of the window and saw her walk out of
Inglethorpe's front door with your walking stick in her hands,
probably chasing after you to return it. Not seeing you, she went
to her own coach and got in."

"Bloody hell," I said, with feeling. "Why the
devil didn't you say so at once? As I recall, I was in the coach
with you at the time."

"I assumed she'd send it back to you. You
dine at the Derwents' and were likely to see her soon. But I
happened to speak to Mr. Grenville yesterday afternoon, and he told
me that you were still very puzzled about the walking stick. So I
wrote and invited you here."

I got to my feet. "Oh, good God. Much trouble
might have been saved if you'd told me right away."

She rose to meet me. "Well, I had no idea the
bloody thing would end up in Inglethorpe, did I?"

We faced each other, both angry, her eyes
glittering.

Mrs. Danbury had lied to me. She'd sat before
me and lied and lied. "Damn it to hell," I muttered.

"I am sorry if I have distressed you,
Captain. I thought it only a peculiarity at the time."

I balled my hands. My gloves, cheap,
stretched over my fingers until the stitching split. "The next time
you come across a peculiarity, for God's sake, tell me right
away."

"You have a foul temper," Lady Breckenridge
observed.

"I know that."

"I hardly thought it your way to swear at a
lady."

I looked up at her, fire in my eyes. "You
seem to want me to tell you my true thoughts."

"Yes, but you are rather straining the bonds
of politeness."

"To hell with politeness," I growled. "No
doubt baiting me amuses you, but I grow tired of it."

She breathed rapidly. "I want friendship. I
told you."

"Your definition of friendship is decidedly
odd."

"You mean because I lay in bed with you the
other morning? You looked as though you needed comfort, to be in
too much pain for anything else."

"That did not give you the leave to take such
a liberty. You ought to have a care for your reputation."

She gave me a pitying look. "I will worry
about my reputation. I did not notice you sending me away, by the
by."

I recalled her head on my shoulder, her warm
arm across my chest. It had been comforting, without heat or
fever.

"I did not wish to send you away," I said.
"That does not mean I acted well in the matter."

"It was meant in friendship," Lady
Breckenridge said stubbornly.

No doubt she thought so. She was maddening,
one of the most unfathomable women I'd ever met.

"Why did you not tell me about the walking
stick?" I repeated. "As you observed, it was not something I wanted
to lose."

"Well, I do not quite know," she said. "I was
not paying sufficient attention. I do apologize." Her voice dripped
with sarcasm.

I ran my hand through my hair. I was
frustrated and angry, so angry at all the lies and deceit and
cruelties. Lady Breckenridge had probably not thought the matter of
any importance, possibly found it amusing that Mrs. Danbury would
rush after me with the walking stick. She did not see what I saw,
feel what I felt. I could not expect her to.

"I beg your pardon," I said, lips tight. "I
am out of sorts. I have had a terrible afternoon."

"Poor Captain Lacey."

The words were mocking, but I liked that she
said them.

Perhaps because I was angry at Mrs. Danbury
and also at Louisa that I realized that when I'd been ill and in
pain, Lady Breckenridge had been the only one to soothe me. She had
said
friendship
, but she meant companionship, something she
had certainly never gotten from her husband.

Her black hair curled around her forehead,
loose from her headdress. She had a pointed chin and laugh lines
about her eyes. I touched one of those lines.

She looked at me, startled. I thought she
would back away, fling more scorn at me, but she only lowered her
lashes. I traced her cheekbone with my thumb. Lady Breckenridge
stilled a moment then she silently leaned into my touch.

She had brazenly thrown herself at me in
Kent. Now, all fever gone, she gently lifted her hand and caressed
mine. Emboldened, I leaned to her and lightly kissed her lips.

She laughed, just as I'd wanted Louisa
Brandon to. "Oh, Lacey," she said, and slid her arms around me.

For a time, I forgot about my frustrations,
the tragedy of Peaches and her husband, my walking stick, Mrs.
Danbury's lies, the opera. Lady Breckenridge soothed me again, and
I let her.

*** *** ***

In the morning I awoke to the peal of church
bells all over the city. St. Paul's Covent Garden, chimed the
loudest, with the church of St. Martin in the Fields, on the west
end of the Strand, a close second. Those bells blended with that of
St. Mary's le Strand, and beyond that, in the distance, the booming
bells of St. Paul's Cathedral.

They chimed and rang in the winter sunlight,
and Bartholomew whistled a tune in the front room as he stoked my
fire to overflowing.

I lay in bed, listening to the sounds of
Sunday, thinking about Saturday, and all that had happened.

Barbury's death, Chapman's arrest, our boat
ride up the Thames, Kensington's revelations, the opera. I needed
to write Sir Montague Harris of our findings and about Kensington.
If Peaches had been ready to betray him, how much easier for
Kensington if she were dead. He'd had the opportunity, been on the
spot. The circumstances were damning. I simply needed the tiniest
piece of evidence, or a witness.

A witness. I turned that thought over in my
mind. I would ask Sir Montague to accompany me to speak to the
potential witness I had in mind.

I also thought about Lady Breckenridge. After
a heartbreak last year, I was not in the mood to fall in love with
another lady, but Lady Breckenridge had demanded nothing of me. She
was intriguing and interesting, and, I admitted, refreshingly
candid. She took me for what I was and did not ask me to be
anything else. Her kisses had been unhurried, without heat. She'd
kissed me because she enjoyed kissing me. It was a heady feeling. I
lay back to enjoy the first sunshine in a long while and listed to
the music of the church bells.

When I rose, I began to prepare myself for
moving to Berkshire.

Mrs. Beltan was unhappy to learn she'd lose
me as a tenant and even said she'd hold the rooms for me in case I
changed my mind. I wrote of my decision to the few acquaintances,
such as Lady Aline Carrington, who would care, and even to Colonel
Brandon. I had Bartholomew hand-deliver these missives as well as a
letter to Sir Montague Harris with my information and outlining my
ideas of finding a witness.

I informed Bartholomew I would be dining at
the Derwents' that evening, and he brightened at the chance to
brush my regimentals again. Dining with the Derwents would also
give me the opportunity to question Mrs. Danbury about the walking
stick. The questions might pain me, but I would ask them. I needed
to know the truth.

Sir Montague sent a message in return that
he'd made an appointment to speak to Lady Jane at a Mayfair hotel,
courtesy of James Denis. He invited me to join him there at two
o'clock that afternoon.

I spent the morning putting my affairs
together then journeyed to Davies Street to arrive at two, my
curiosity high, hoping we'd see an end to The Glass House this very
day.

The hotel on the corner of Davies and Brook
streets was fairly new, lived in by those staying in London for the
Season but not wanting the bother of opening a house. Lady Jane was
not staying there, Sir Montague informed me when I arrived; rather,
we were using the hotel as neutral ground.

We followed a footman to a private sitting
room, and there, we met Lady Jane.

She was a stout matron, and so unlike what I
had been expecting that I could only stare at her at first. She
wore a widow's cap over her black hair, and her face was round,
red, and lined, a provincial woman's face. Her mauve pelisse of
fine fabric was tastefully trimmed with a gray fringe, and her gray
broadcloth skirt shone dully in the candlelight. The suit spoke of
care and expense, but her eyes held a light as hard and shrewd as a
horse trader's.

She extended a hand to me, and I bowed over
it as expected. She withdrew, scarcely looking at me, and sat down
in a chair. The hotel's footman set a footstool at her feet,
fetched another for Sir Montague, and faded away.