In front of the fireplace, Dominic Rivers and the Honorable Reggie were in the middle of their obsequies. Laetitia looked gracious, while Crispin eyed the Honorable Reggie with amused disdain and Rivers with something more like calculation.
They got along well enough, from what I knew. Crispin had occasionally made use of Rivers’s services in the past, although the last time I had seen them together, he had been trying to lure Rivers into a trap, one that Rivers had noticed and managed to avoid.
If there was bad blood between them at this point, it wasn’t evident, however. Crispin responded graciously to Rivers’s greeting and—I assumed—his felicitations, while Rivers seemed to extend them in all seriousness.
I turned my back to them, in time to see the door to the hallway open again, and Lord Geoffrey Marsden slip through.
He is, like his sister, extremely good-looking, with the same glossy, black hair and vivid blue eyes that she has. The little clique of girls tittered as he approached them, and Lady Violet went weak in the knees for a moment in what was either anabbreviated curtsey, or simply a response to such ostentatious male beauty. “Lord Geoffrey.”
The brunette—not the Honorable Cecily, the other one—fluttered her eyelashes and simpered up at him. “How simply marvy to see you, Geoffrey!”
I applied my elbow to Christopher’s ribs. When he glanced at me, I inquired, “Who’s that?”
He glanced in the direction I indicated. “You know Violet Cummings, don’t you? The blonde? And Cecily Fletcher is the one who looks a bit like you.”
I nodded. “I meant the brunette.”
“The one in blue? That’s Olivia Barnsley.”
“Lady Olivia Barnsley? The Honorable Olivia Barnsley?”
“The latter,” Christopher said, “I think.”
“Another of Crispin’s conquests?”
Francis suppressed a snort, not very successfully, and Christopher shook his head. “Not as far as I know. Or if she is, not exclusively.”
Clearly. Right now she was giving the impression of someone working overtime to keep Geoffrey’s attention on her, and away from… was it Cecily or Violet? Her eyelashes fluttered, her dimple quivered, and her bosom heaved. Lady Violet looked amused as she watched the display—a mere Honorable can’t compete with a Lady in the matrimonial stakes, and I’m sure they both knew it—while Cecily simply looked blank.
“Any idea what’s wrong with Cecily Fletcher?” I asked.
The other three looked at her and then, as a man, shook their heads. “She looks doped,” Francis opined, which was certainly something he ought to recognize. “Downers, not uppers.”
“Sedatives, do you mean?”
He nodded. “Veronal or valium or something like that. She looks out of it.”
She did. Olivia Barnsley’s attempted flirtation with Lord Geoffrey got no reaction, nor did Lady Violet’s response to it. Cecily merely blinked at them both, slowly, as if her eyelids were too heavy to move easily.
Violet put her hand on Geoffrey’s arm and as he turned towards her, Olivia shot her friend a look of concern. Cecily didn’t seem to notice that either, but simply sank back below the surface of her thoughts, her eyes vacant.
Olivia watched her for a second before turning her attention to the group in front of the fireplace. I twisted my head in that direction and saw Reggie Fish and Dominic Rivers expanding under Lady Laetitia’s regard, while Crispin watched, two steps removed. He looked indulgent, as an impending husband ought, although to someone who knows him well, the coolness in his eyes told its own story.
When I turned back to the other small group, Geoffrey was in the process of kissing Violet’s hand. That done, he kissed Olivia’s. When Cecily made no move to present him with her hand for kissing, Geoffrey looked blank for a moment before he gave a sort of mental shrug and moved on.
“Incoming,” Francis murmured.
I nodded. “I see him.”
“Who?” Constance made to turn her head, but was too late.
“Cousin Connie.” Geoffrey stopped beside her and leaned in to peck her cheek. Constance flinched, but by the time he straightened, she had managed to paste a polite smile on her face.
“Cousin Geoffrey.”
She might as well not have bothered, because Geoffrey didn’t look at her again. She wasn’t available to him—probably wouldn’t have been even if she hadn’t been engaged to marry Francis—and so he couldn’t care less about her presence. He nodded to Francis—“Astley,” and to Christopher—“Astley,”before turning to me, with what he undoubtedly thought was a seductive smile.
“Miss Darling.”
