“I have set an appointment with a few of our companions from the Regent’s supper table,” he announced. “Comte Desjardins is home and will welcome our visit.”
Brewster, as usual, accompanied us as we set off on foot to Desjardins’ lodgings. Grenville rarely walked anywhere in London, using his carriage or phaeton to keep his pristine boots from the mud, but during this sojourn he was delighting in tramping everywhere.
Comte Desjardins had taken a residence not far from our square, in a new house on the west end of town. Brewster made his stolid way down the outside stairs to the kitchen while a footman admitted Grenville and me through the front door.
We followed the footman up a flight of stairs to a sitting room filled with light. The room faced the sea, and the late evening sunshine flooded it.
That sunlight touched the long barrel of a gun, which was pointed straight at us.
Chapter 10
Iinstinctively stepped sideways to my right, out of the line of fire. Grenville ducked aside as well. I noticed that the footman had quickly vanished down the stairs.
“Steady on,” Grenville said sternly.
Comte Desjardins, his round face flushed under a shock of pale hair, did not move the shotgun. “It is no matter,” he answered in French. “It is not loaded.”
He pulled the trigger to demonstrate.
An explosion sounded, gunpowder bursting from the firing pan. A scattering of shot whizzed between me and Grenville and out the open doorway, pockmarking the hall’s paneling.
The comte, a tall, well-muscled man, tanned from the outdoors, blinked blue eyes at the gun. “Ah. I am so very sorry.” He’d switched to English, his accent heavy, and now returned to French. “It is a Purdey. A gift for me from the Regent. I hear they are very fine guns for hunting.”
He lowered the piece, and I breathed out, lingering gunpowder stinging my eyes and throat. How the devil the man hadn’t realized the gun was loaded was beyond my understanding. He was either a liar or a fool.
Pounding footsteps sounded on the stairs and seconds later, Brewster tumbled into the room. “Guv!”
Before I could stop him, Brewster lunged forward and wrested the gun from the startled comte’s hands, pointing the barrel to the floor.
“What daftie would shoot off a birding gun inside a parlor?” Brewster demanded.
Desjardins began snarling at him in French, and Brewster backed away, still holding the gun.
“Can’t understand a word he says,” Brewster said. “Same below stairs.”
Grenville came forward to interpose. “Forgive our servant,” he said to Desjardins in French. “He feared we’d been killed. He’ll take the gun away and clean it for you. As you say, it is a fine piece.” Grenville touched a gloved finger to the barrel in Brewster’s arms.
Even I’d heard of James Purdey, a manufacturer of fowling pieces and guns in a shop in Princes Street near Hanover Square. His weaponry was highly praised and widely sought after by thehaut ton.
Desjardins relaxed. “It was a mistake. I said I was very sorry. The man who delivered it from the Regent never told me it was loaded and primed. A joke, I think.”
“One in poor taste,” Grenville said tightly.
I translated to Brewster what Grenville had said and advised him to take the gun to the stable yard behind the house for the task. Brewster gave me a sour look.
“Not leaving you alone with a bloke what aimed a gun at you. He wants the thing cleaned, I’ll sit here in this room and do it. He might pull out a knife next.”
Ordering Brewster to do a thing he did not want to was useless, I knew. Grenville, always the diplomat, asked leave to ring for a servant, whom he bade bring tools so Brewster could begin, as well as a sheet to protect the carpet.
The bemused footman, the same who’d showed us upstairs, complied, and Brewster fell to it, taking apart the gun with the dexterity of a professional.
The comte sent him a worried look. “That shooter is quite fine. Will the oaf ruin it?”
The “oaf” did not understand French, and continued with his task. “I trust Mr. Brewster,” I answered.
Brewster glanced up as I said his name and scowled, not trustingme.
“A splendid gift,” Grenville said. “The Regent was generous.”
