Murder While I Smile (17 page)

A steady stream of equipages clattered over the cobblestone paving. Stylish landaus and capacious barouches, each with its coachman and some with liveried footmen riding postern, tilburies, phaeton high flyers with towering wheels, bucks in yellow varnished curricles, and more sedate passengers in closed carriages, both with and without a noble crest on the panel. Carriage horses bucked and shied as a pair of Corinthians streaked past mounted on glossy blood nags, their manes flying in the wind. The riders bent tensely over their nags’ necks were obviously taking part in a race. Their anxious, determined faces suggested a high stake. It might even be the man’s entire fortune or estate that was at risk. The bucks were mad gamblers.

The air carried that undefinable aroma of the city. Here the milder country smells of leaves and earth gave way to urbanization. Oil from carriage wheels and smoke from chimneys and stoves blended with whiffs of perfume and men’s toilet water as pedestrians brushed shoulders. Food smells were adrift too: tempting coffee, the yeasty delight of freshly baked bread—and beneath it all, the unmistakable stench of horse.

After seven years, London still held a fascination for Corinne. She enjoyed stopping to exchange a few pleasantries with friends, and of course, examining the shop wares. She had written home to Kate that one could buy anything in London, and she was not far wrong. Fine food from all corners of the kingdom was available: ham and cheese, fresh butter and milk and eggs, bread, fruit and vegetables, fish and mutton. There were also spices from the East, sherry from Spain, smuggled brandy and silks from France, muslins from India, furs from Canada and Russia. It was like a giant, civilized bazaar, for all the goods were displayed in tidy shops, each with its hanging shingle, or more recently its name and product emblazoned in gilt over the storefront.

“I’d like to buy you an engagement present,” Luten said. He had been watching her to see what excited her interest. “I wish I had stopped at the abbey to get the Luten engagement ring out of the vault. Let me buy you something. Emerald eardrops, to match your eyes?” he suggested.

“You’re becoming maudlin, Luten,” she said, but she was pleased with his new sentimentality. “You once informed me that my eyes were nothing like emeralds but closer to the inferior peridot. Buy me peridot eardrops, if you want to give me something.”

“You have an excellent memory for an insult, madam. You once called me an egregious ass, but I have long since forgotten it.”

“So I see.”

“The trouble with ladies nowadays is that they don’t know how to take a compliment,” he scolded.

“Perhaps it is for lack of receiving them,” she retorted.

“Have they not heard of compliments in Ireland?”

“Indeed we have, and if you had told me I trotted over the bog with the lightest toe in the country, I would have known just how to smile and simper my thanks.”

He was happy to see they were back on their usual footing of friendly argument. “A high standard of coquetry to keep up with.”

“You English lack the silver tongue of my countrymen. We blame it on those silver spoons you are born with in your mouths. They cripple the tongue forever.”

“What we require is liberal lacings of poteen to free it. Unfortunately, we prefer to lead some part of our lives in sobriety.”

“Pity.”

He spotted a tea service in a shop window. It was snowy white and scattered with shamrocks. Without a word, Luten drew her into the shop and bought it, to be sent to her house on Berkeley Square.

“You will remember to make the tea so strong a mouse can tiptoe across the surface,” he informed her, when she thanked him very prettily. “The way you used to serve it when you first came to England.”

Corinne noticed he never said, “When you were married to deCoventry.” Did he dislike the notion so much? “Yes, I have drowned several mice since making it the way you like it,” she said.

Luten gave her a disparaging look. “Appetizing!”

As soon as Coffen finished his breakfast, he went across the street for a word with Prance, who was seated in his study, perusing the morning journals.

“Did Luten talk to you last night?” Coffen asked.

“Yes, he told me why he was seeing Yvonne. I am vastly relieved, especially since he no longer plans to visit her. Mea culpa, I fear. I told her of his engagement.”

“Just as well. I’m going with them to Boisvert’s place this afternoon.” He looked into the cold grate. “I see you haven’t got your fire going yet.”

“It is warm today.”

“Noticed smoke coming from Luten’s chimbley. Corinne’s as well. Not the kitchen chimbleys.”

“Chimney, Pattle. Chimney.”

“Eh?”

“Your pronunciation is execrable. You speak like an ostler.”

“There’s nothing wrong with my pronounciation.”

“Q.E.D.”

“Eh?”

Prance tossed his white hands into the air.
“Quod erat demonstrandum.”

Fearing this strange tongue was a forerunner to the
Rondeaux,
Coffen quickly returned to his subject. “The odd thing is, I was at Luten’s earlier on. The grate in his breakfast parlor wasn’t lit. Nor the saloon.”

“He’s had Simon light a fire in his boudoir. Luten likes his creature comforts.”

“That must be it. Odd, though, this time of year.”

“It gets chilly at night,” Prance said.

“That’s because you open your bedroom windows. I wouldn’t if I was you.”

“If I ever become you, I shall bear that in mind.”

Coffen frowned, but could make nothing of this statement. “You mean if I ever become you.”

“That’s what I said.”

“No, but when
you
say it
—
”

“Oh, never mind.”

“Right, demmed foolishness. I’ll never be you. I haven’t the stamina for it. Let us go on the strut.”

Prance set aside the journal and rose. “Yes, I must buy a little
quelque chose
for Yvonne. A diamond bracelet, I believe, is the customary token for the first favor.”

“I’ll go with you to see you don’t get carried away.”

“A wise precaution. When I relive last night, as I do—constantly—I feel I ought to send her a bushel of diamonds. She was sublime, Coffen. We mated like tigers. Twice.”

“It might be best to keep that sort of thing to yourself, Prance.”

“Oh, but you must let me boast a little. I have never had this sort of purely physical relationship before. I now comprehend the power of lust. I find it has much to recommend it. It jars me out of my usual emotional turpitude. I am an intellectual at heart, you know. And I owe this new vista to you.”

Coffen frowned, wishing he had never suggested that visit. “What you ought to buy is a chair and a whip for when you call on her. That’s what they use for tigers, I believe.”

“Only when one wishes to tame them,” Prance said coyly. “I do not.”

“Behave yourself, Prance. You’re talking like a lecher.”

He uttered a long, luxurious sigh. “Soon I shall be behaving like one.”

“Tarsome fellow.”

Chapter Sixteen

“I’m
worried about Prance’s fondness for that hussy,” Coffen said to Corinne. He had called on her for a consultation before they went to Boisvert’s. “I’d give the skin off my back to help him, but there’s no getting any sense out of him. As well try to get an oink from a hen. You ought to see the bracelet he bought her this morning. Paved with diamonds, with a big black one in the middle, to match her eyes. You’d think a dirty diamond would be cheap, but it ain’t. It cost more than a real one.”

“It is real, Coffen. Colored diamonds are rare; that’s why they cost more.”

“I thought it was pretty ugly myself. It might be enough to turn her off, but there’s no counting on it. What we could do is tell him about her stunt with the
Rondeaux,
giving the book he gave her to Marchant.”

“It was an honest mistake. Marchant picked it up in error. Reg would have noticed if she didn’t have her copy in her saloon.”

“He’d never notice if she had an elephant in her saloon. Too busy fighting the tiger off. Not that he does fight her. He says she jumped on him like a dog on a bone. The minute he sat down, she was all over him. Says she makes love like a tiger.” He shook his head in disgust. “French.”

Corinne had a moment’s anxiety about Luten’s former acquaintance with Chamaude. How long had he been friends with her? If it had been more than a week, then they had certainly made love. She doubted that her own expertise in that area could match the tigerish efforts of Chamaude. When he said Yvonne had not been his mistress, that didn’t necessarily mean he had never made love with her. Corinne knew he had had mistresses in the past. One could hardly expect a bachelor of thirty years to be chaste. She didn’t mind the others; she knew they were history. It was only the beautiful Lady Chamaude who got under her skin in this unsettling way.

The trouble was, she didn’t really feel she deserved Luten. Until coming to London, she had never met anyone remotely like him. So debonair, intelligent, handsome—and a rich marquess besides. It had been understandable that deCoventry should want her. He had been three times her age, but that such an eligible bachelor as Luten should offer for her still seemed like a fairy tale. Half the ladies in London were throwing their bonnets at him. Her dowry was insignificant compared to his fortune, and she was a widow of twenty-four years besides. Gentlemen usually preferred well-dowered debs.

“Let us hope Luten can prove she’s a criminal,” she said. “I believe Prance is too fastidious to consort with a known felon.”

“And anyhow, she’ll be locked up. He’d never go to Bridewell for his courting.” He looked into the grate and noticed no fire was laid. “No fire, eh?” he said.

“On such a warm day as this? No, are you chilly?”

“Can’t say I am. Just wondering about that smoke coming out of your chimbley this morning. Luten’s as well.”

“That was in my bedchamber. It was chilly.”

“Have you got damp in your attics?”

She hesitated just an instant before replying. “Yes. I should have the roof looked at, I expect.”

“I mind deCoventry saying it was a new roof when he bought you this place a few years ago.”

“Newish. Shall we go?”

“I’ll be driving my own rig, in case you two want to do something else after. Don’t mean to make a pest of myself at this time, when you two want to be alone. Together, I mean.”

She saw Coffen’s plain black carriage standing in the road. Luten’s carriage had not been brought around yet, but she hustled Coffen out the door to distract him as he kept frowning at her grate. He was like a bulldog when something was bothering him. They waited at Luten’s house until his hunting carriage arrived. Coffen employed the time by looking across the street to examine her roof with his forehead corrugated in confusion.

“That what you’re driving?” Coffen asked.

“In case anyone is watching,” Luten explained. “One plain black carriage is much like another. We’ll get out at the corner of Curzon and walk the last bit. You’ll follow us, Pattle?”

Coffen’s coachman, like the rest of his servants, was incompetent. He had been known to get lost going around the block.

“I’ll not let Fitz lose you. Follow that carriage, Fitz,” he ordered.

Luten’s groom set a leisurely pace. Fitz managed to keep sight of the rig as they drove through the polite West End. The passengers dismounted at Curzon Street, walked around the corner and on to Shepherd’s Market. As Boisvert’s studio was on the corner, they just slipped into the alley leading to the back door without attracting any attention. Boisvert had not even bothered to lock the back door. It opened with a simple turn of the knob.

“Pretty lax for a fellow with paintings worth thousands in his studio,” Coffen muttered. “I wager he’s left someone to guard the shop.” He listened a moment at the open door. No sound came from within.

“You two hide around the corner, and I’ll give a shout inside,” Coffen said. “If anyone comes, I’ll let on I’m looking for someone else. We’ll have to come back later.”

Luten said, “If there’s anyone there, then the front door will likely be open, too. If you get an answer, keep the fellow occupied. We’ll go in the front door and search the studio.”

Luten and Corinne darted around the corner to listen. Coffen opened the door and shouted, “Hallooo. Anyone home?” When he got no answer after three shouts, he beckoned the others forward and they all went inside. The door opened into a sliver of kitchen, where the remains of a simple lunch of bread and cheese were still on the table. In fact, the teakettle was still spouting a faint column of steam. As they continued down a narrow, dark passageway with two doors leading off it, they were assailed by the familiar reek of oils, turpentine, and food. At the end of the hall was a doorway into the studio.

The room was as they remembered. The only difference was that one of the easels was empty. Luten wondered if Boisvert had removed the Watteau he was working on before leaving. He went to the spot where he had discovered the original Watteau resting against the wall the day before and began lifting the canvas that had concealed it. The Watteau was gone.

Coffen began a systematic examination of the canvases stacked two and three deep against the wall. He saw landscapes of points of historical interest in London. Saint Paul’s, Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament. Dull stuff, but well enough done if you had a taste for buildings. He preferred dogs and horses and people himself.

Corinne decided to take a look in the bedroom, thinking there might be a desk there with some incriminating note from Chamaude. There were two doors in that narrow corridor. She went back and opened the first
one. It was indeed Boisvert’s bedroom, but she never got around to searching it. As soon as she entered the dark, cramped little room, she felt a frisson run up her spine. It wasn’t just the fetid air, or the mess left behind by a bachelor without a servant to tidy up after him. It wasn’t the bare wood floor underfoot or the tumbled pallet he obviously used for a bed.

Even before she saw the dark hump on the bed, she sensed the presence of something awful. She quelled the scream that rose in her throat and took a step closer. It looked like a heap of old clothes. His smock, was it? She thought Boisvert must have changed into his good clothes to go to the elegant Clarendon. Then she saw the arm dangling over the edge of the cot and the lifeless hand, with the fingers frozen in a curved position, and the scream could no longer be restrained.