When he arrived back at Peel Street, the Kensington Palace footman, John Goring, was waiting for him. Goring knew of no suspicious servants or unusual goings-on. Goring himself hadn’t known of Sussex’s plans for the night.
“His highness’s man might have known, sir, but his highness doesn’t stand much on ceremony.”
“Do you know where the Duke of Kent and the Duke of Clarence might have lodged in Town?” Braydon asked.
“No, sir.”
“There must have been messages and replies. Find out about them.”
That was a reminder to himself, so when Goring had left, he returned to Mrs. Courtenay’s house.
“Messages, sir?” the butler said. “Only one that I know of, from the Duke of Sussex to my mistress, upon which she commanded the dinner.”
So Sussex had coordinated the event. Therefore he must be interviewed, and not by one of Hawkinville’s staff.Sidmouth? Hell, no.It would have to be the highest-ranking man available, and that was himself.
As Braydon put on his greatcoat, he went over what he’d learned. But as he left the house, his mind turnedtoward home. Or, to be precise, toward his wife. Would she be in his rooms or gallivanting around Town, shopping, as women seemed to like to do? She’d have to return home eventually.
Damn Beaumont’s dinner.But he couldn’t drag his wife to bed as soon as it was dark.
What did dark have to do with it? He could drag her to bed as soon as he returned home—except that he wasn’t that sort of man.
The dinner would end at a reasonable hour. Tonight his wife would sleep in his bed and learn ways of enjoyment that Kit Kat had never known.
Chapter 29
Kitty inspected the town house, accompanied by Henry and Edward. She’d decided to leave Sillikin behind in the care of the cook, who had become the dog’s devoted slave. The spaniel would need plenty of exercise or she’d become fat on the tidbits he fed her.
The Dauntry town house was a typical Mayfair one similar to the row opposite Braydon’s building. The door was promptly opened by a short, plump woman in black bombazine, who seemed rather anxious as she bobbed a curtsy.
“We’re all shrouded up, milady. I hope you don’t mind. I didn’t think you’d want everything uncovered, but we will if you prefer, milady.”
“Of course not,” Kitty reassured her. “I simply wish to get a sense of the house. Edward, you may wait below.”
She’d already asked the footman to assess the servants’ area and the servants, such as they were. He might welcome that task, for it was probably warm down there. Up here Kitty was very glad of cloak and muff.
“Are you warm enough?” she asked Henry, and the maid confessed that she’d be happy to go belowstairs.
It was possible that Mrs. Grant was cold, but perhaps some of her roundness came from extra layers, and she wore a thick shawl and woolen fingerless gloves.
The ground floor held a small reception room, a reasonably large dining room, and a larger parlor that had enough book-filled shelves to perhaps be called a library. There were paintings on all the walls, but all were shrouded in dust cloths.
Narrow carpeted stairs led up to a drawing room that took up the front width of the house. Three windows gave good light, and Kitty thought it could be a pleasant room in a warmer season. In fact, she thought this could be a pleasant home.
She’d expected a viscount’s house to be grand, but there was nothing overwhelming here. The rooms were a decent size, and what details she could see, such as papered walls were... unobjectionable. She smiled at that word. If the unobjectionable house turned out as well as the unobjectionable husband, she’d have no cause to complain.
At the back of the house she found two bedchambers and a smaller room, which the housekeeper described as “His lordship’s dressing room, ma’am.”
It contained a narrow bed. Kitty had heard of this, that some fashionable people kept the fiction of a shared marriage bed, but that the gentleman had a separate room disguised as a dressing room. Perhaps it was simply that these town houses were quite small, so an additional bedroom would take up too much space. Perhaps it was so that the husband could come home late or not at all without disturbing his wife. All the same, the arrangement confirmed that it wasn’t the usual thing for aristocratic couples to share a bed. She thought it a shame.
A higher floor contained another small bedroom and two even smaller rooms that were unfurnished.
The housekeeper said, “This could be a nursery area, milady.”
“Did the former viscount’s children ever visit here?”
“Not as I know, ma’am, but I’ve worked here for only eight years.”
They had to use the servants’ staircase, plainer and even narrower, to reach the attic rooms. The servants’ accommodation seemed adequate.
