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After she let him crush her to the bed and begged for more? After she gasped and cried and even screamed? After she licked him, and spread her legs—
He wrenched his mind away. He had no greatcoat, and he was wearing pantaloons that wouldn’t disguise a cock-rise.
“May I see what rapier you’re wearing today?” Valentine asked.
Dominic put a hand on his glass-studded hilt and withdrew the blade just enough so that Val could see it wasn’t matte black.
“May I have that one when you’re dead?” Valentine asked. “It’s beautiful.”
“I shall add it to my will,” Dominic said, thinking that the twins were altogether too familiar with the idea of death. Hopefully he and Torie would live into old age, and the children would stop thinking about inheritances and ghosts.
He hadn’t been to Smithfield in a decade or more, but from what he saw through the window of the coach, nothing had changed. The huge field was dotted with pens stuffed with animals, surrounded by crowds of men smoking, brawling, and trading money. Innumerable hounds wove their way around a forest of legs, barking vociferously and adding to the lowing of unhappy cattle. A small herd of goats was bleating loud enough to be heard distinctly amidst the discord.
The moment the barouche door opened, the smell struck like a blow to the face: manure, urine, and mud, mixed with salt, juniper, pepper, cinnamon, and all the other spices used to preserve meat. Jumping down, Florence took it in gulps; Valentine wrinkled his nose. Torie clasped Dominic’s hand to step down, turned rather pale, and slapped a handkerchief to her nose.
Florence’s boots were sinking in filth. “Ew,” she said, pulling up one foot and examining the clumps of reeking manure. The carriage had necessarily drawn up along the same route by which cattle were driven to market.
“I’ve never seen so many people,” Valentine breathed.
“You haven’t been to a county fair?” Dominic asked.
His nephew shook his head. “Nanny didn’t like us to leave the nursery because we always seemed to get dirty.”
Dominic gritted his teeth, once again blaming himself for having no idea that his sister was erratic at best in her parenting skills, if not entirely neglectful.
The crowd surging around the pens seemed virtually impenetrable, a ragged mob of odorous, sweaty men bellowing and quarreling, roaring for attention and gasping for breath amidst clouds of brown dirt kicked up by cows desperate to free themselves from the shoddy corrals.
“Do you see the drovers with their flat red caps?” Simons asked Valentine and Florence. “They’re in charge of bringing the stock to market. Those with brown caps are countrymen who raise cows. Then there’s the butchers, choosing a good animal to bring home and sell tomorrow. You can see them feeling the animals along the loin and rump to make sure they’re nice and fatty.”
“Quite a few pickpockets amongst that crowd, I’d expect,” Dominic said. “Are you carrying a reticule, Torie? It might be best to leave it here in the carriage under Mulberry’s supervision.”
“I don’t think I care to wade onto that field. How on earth would we find a rabbit amidst such confusion?”
“We needn’t go into the center,” Simons said. “There’s only one rabbit seller. He has a hutch along the fence, close to the stalls selling pickled beef and the like. We shall avoid the crowd altogether.”
“Thank goodness,” Torie said. “I wish I’d brought a fan.” She waved her handkerchief in front of her face.
“I like the smell,” Florence said, sniffing loudly. “It’s much more interesting than flowers, even more than a rosebush. Flowers are dreary in comparison.”
Torie pressed the handkerchief to her nose.
“I’ll take my lady’s arm,” Dominic said to the coachman. “Keep the blunderbuss on the ready, in case someone tries to pinch the vehicle. Simons, you are in charge of Master Valentine and Miss Florence. Do not allow them out of your sight. In fact, you’d better take their hands.”
“I am so glad you came with us,” Torie told Dominic as they picked their way along the fence, trying to avoid liquid puddles of muck. “I had no idea what Smithfield was like.”
“Look at all the bacon!” Valentine called. They’d reached a row of stands from which hung sides of beef, pungently smelling of saltpeter, sugar, and honey; long strings of dried herbs and garlic; and bouquets of rushlights made from melted tallow from rendering mutton or beef.
“We should buy a present for Cook. Mrs. Cottage would like one of those big haunches,” Florence said. “A haunch is the buttock and thigh of an animal,” she told Torie.
“Buttock,” Dominic began, but the twins interrupted him in a chorus.
“Goes on the Prohibited List!”
“We wouldn’t know how to choose the best haunch,” Torie pointed out.
Dominic thought his wife had turned faintly green.
“Simons knows.” Florence tugged on the groom’s hand. “Don’t you think we should buy a side of beef? Then Mrs. Cottage would know we were thinking of her when we came to Smithfield. I’m sure she wishes she could have come with us.”
