I took Serena to be Lady Richard. "It seems to be finished."
Lady Breckenridge lined up another shot. "They were rowing over my husband, if you want to know. Lord knows why. The little bitch can have him."
I wondered if she meant Lady Richard or the maid. I leaned against the table as Lady Breckenridge went on with the game. The cigarillo burned steadily and a bit of ash floated to the floor.
Balls clacked. "She's already put an heir in the nursery," Lady Breckenridge went on, "and Eggleston does not want her. Breckenridge does not really either, but the silly fool believes herself enchanting."
She missed her shot. She straightened and almost snatched the cigarillo from my hand. She drew a long breath of it. "Oh, do not look so shocked, Captain. Are you a Methodist?"
"No," I answered.
I leaned down and sighted along my cue. Three balls plus one cue ball occupied the table. We would generate points for ourselves by sending balls into the six pockets about the table, or by caroming the cue ball from the table's side into one of the other balls. A simple game, but one that took some skill.
I shot. Balls clacked to the corner of the table, and one disappeared.
As I leaned down for another shot, Lady Breckenridge asked suddenly, "Why are you here?"
As she probably had intended, I started, and my cue slipped. I straightened it, not taking the shot, and answered, "I came with Mr. Grenville."
"I thought you were a journalist. Like Egan."
"No," I said.
But like Egan, I'd come to pry. I shot, and missed. She gave me a triumphant look and handed me the cigarillo.
"You do not say much for yourself," she observed.
I leaned on my cue. "Grenville is more interesting."
"Of course he is. My husband worships him like a god. Lord Richard wants to sleep with him."
I hid a start, but upon reflection, I was not terribly surprised. Grenville had attracted such attentions before, though he did not return them. Such were the hazards, I supposed, of a raging popularity.
Lady Breckenridge was staring at me again. She glanced at the cigarillo, then at me, and her lip curled derisively.
I preferred my tobacco in the form of snuff, but under Lady Breckenridge's dark stare, I lifted the cigarillo to my lips and drew its smoke into my mouth. She watched me with calm dispassion until I exhaled slowly, then she lifted her cue and shot both cue ball and secondary ball into a net pocket.
She won that game and suggested another.
Fortunately, though she was obviously prepared to trounce me at billiards, she had no qualms about discussing her husband, not even when I asked a direct question about the incident with Captain Spencer on the Peninsula.
"I suppose you are asking because Westin managed to kill himself last week and so escape a trial," she said. "Serena told me. Full of glee she was. But she is sordid and likes sordid things to happen."
"And do you?"
She gave me an amused smile as if my fishing delighted her. "The entire incident was entertaining. Mrs. Westin holds herself above everyone else, and yet, her husband was about to be arrested for murder. Happy escape for her when he died, was it not? Her marriage was cold, Captain, very cold. That is why she is so brittle."
"She has borne much," I pointed out.
"As have I, married to Breckenridge. Pity me that the war ended and he came home." She carefully sighted down her cue, then shot. The cue ball slammed into the table's side then hard into another ball. "Do you know what happened when the Westins stayed at Eggleston's in Oxfordshire? Lord Richard proposed the card game. Mrs. Westin grew so upset when she learned what it was all about that she nearly swooned. She begged her husband to take her away, which he meekly did."
She leaned over the table again, and proceeded to gather up ten more points. At long last, she missed and I took my turn. I lined up my cue.
A sudden flake of hot ash landed on my hand. I jumped. Lady Breckenridge gave me a malicious smile. "So what do you think of her?" she asked.
"Of who?"
"Lydia Westin, of course." The smile broadened. "Oh, come, Captain, it is all over the newspapers. You and the wife of the deceased colonel. It is the delight of Mayfair."
I ground my teeth, silently cursing Billings.
She touched the lapel of my coat. "You are a gallant gentleman, leaping to her side. And not without ambition, I wager."
I stared at her. "Ambition? I beg your pardon?"
"You are penniless, Captain. Mrs. Westin is a wealthy woman. It is natural, but do not expect warmth from her. Gentlemen have dashed themselves to pieces on those rocks before."
I was rapidly tiring of Lady Breckenridge. "What are you suggesting?"
"I am suggesting that you are in want of a bit of blunt." She traced her finger down my coat. "To pay your tailor's bill, to settle your billiards losses. Not to mention a soft bed to lie in, a comfortable chair at supper. What gentleman would not want this?"
Of course, she was saying, any man would rather make a whore of himself to a wealthy woman than live the way I did. "I would not take such a thing from Lydia Westin."
Her smile deepened. "You would, Captain. I read it in your eyes. If she offered, you would, in an instant."
She drew on the cigarillo. "But she will not," she said through the smoke. "I've told you. Gentlemen have dashed themselves to pieces against her. You will do the same." She touched my lapel again. "But other ladies would not."
Her breath, scented with acrid smoke, touched my face. Her eyelashes were sharp points of black.
I decided I very much disliked her.
We finished that game, her smiling, me uncomfortable. After that, commotion began in the drive as guests and observers began to arrive for the exhibition match of Jack Sharp. Lady Breckenridge announced that I owed her five guineas, which I doubted, but I led her from the billiards room and to the pavilion set up for the fighting at the end of the garden.
A flock had descended upon Astley Close to witness Jack Sharp's fight. Boxing attracted men from all walks of life, from landed peers and wealthy nabobs to publicans and hostlers. These same gentlemen could be seen in the studios that enterprising pugilists set up to teach the fine art of boxing. I had accompanied Grenville to Gentleman Joe Jackson's rooms in Bond Street more than once, where we watched dukes eagerly strip down to shirtsleeves to fight Gentleman Joe.
Today they arrived in fine carriages or in hired hacks, on elegant blooded steeds or on broken-down cobs. They streamed from the road and across Lady Mary's brother's park, intent on obtaining their fill of boxing satisfaction.
Grenville shot me a weary look as I entered the pavilion. A woman who must be Lady Mary-this was the first I'd seen of her-clung to his arm and chattered loudly in his ear, no doubt about roses. A woman in her fifties, she wore a fantastic cap puffed like a Yorkshire pudding festooned with ribbons. Her chin sank into her neck, and she seemed to have plucked out all of her own eyebrows and drawn in new ones. The hem of her white gown was coated with mud and grass stains, as though she'd busily dragged Grenville all over the grounds.
Lady Richard Eggleston entered on the arm of Pierce Egan. Mrs. Carter, the fourth woman of the party, appeared now with Lord Breckenridge. I recognized Mrs. Carter from the stage-I had recently seen her in a production of As You Like It in Drury Lane. I had not gone with Grenville to sit in his elegant box, but paid my shillings and watched from the gallery. I had enjoyed her performance as Rosalind, and she looked as Rosalind should-tall and straight, with hair a natural yellow, an elegant face with a long and straight nose, and a pair of shrewd gray eyes.
That she had been won by Breckenridge was a crime. He paraded her about as though she were a prize mare, sleek and groomed and beautiful. That his wife stood not five feet from him while he whispered in Mrs. Carter's ear and nearly drooled on her neck seemed to bother him not at all. At one point, he slid his broad hand down to cover her backside and squeezed.