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.