distracted.
The idea that Grenville drove off Mrs. Bennington's suitors and took her to task for speaking to them was beyond belief.
'It is true,' Mrs. Bennington said fiercely. 'Ask Grady if you do not believe me. The last time he came to see me, he was in a horrible temper. He saw Mr. Carew try to kiss my hand. Mr. Grenville threw his walking stick across the room and threatened to give the poor Mr. Carew a thrashing if he ever came near me again.'
Grenville had? These actions sounded more like me in a temper, not those of the man whose sangfroid London gentlemen tried to imitate.
'Forgive me, Mrs. Bennington, but I find this difficult to credit. Was this Carew behaving badly to you?'
'Indeed, no. Mr. Carew was quite the gentleman. But Mr. Grenville did not like it.' Mrs. Bennington clasped her hands in a pleading gesture. 'You must believe me, Captain. I am not lying. I do not know how to invent things. Mr. Bennington says it is because I have no imagination.'
'Mr. Bennington should not be so rude to you.'
She shrugged, as though her husband's jibes slid easily from her. 'Mr. Grenville said so too. He also said that I should try to obtain a divorce from Mr. Bennington. Or an annulment. I have grounds, he says, because Mr. Bennington cannot father children.' She mentioned this impotency without a blush. 'But I did not marry him for children. I do not want children. I could not go on the stage if I were increasing. Mr. Bennington said he would allow me to continue acting, which is the only thing I like to do. I was very popular in Italy and Milan, but I had run into a bit of difficulty with debts, you see.'
'And he offered to pay them if you married him?'
'Mr. Bennington has ever so much money, from a legacy, from the Scottish branch of his family, he says. He paid my notes as though they were nothing.' She toyed with the frills on her bosom. 'His name is not really Bennington, you know. That's my name. He said I ought to keep it because I'm already well known by it, but I'm not supposed to tell anyone that.'
I wondered how many other people she'd babbled this to, and if Bennington knew she was the kind of woman who could not keep a thing quiet.
'What is his real name?' I asked.
'Do you know, I no longer remember. It has been five years since we married. I will be called Mr. Bennington, he said to me. And you are Mrs. Bennington. And none need to know any other. ' She did a fair imitation of Bennington's drawling voice, which might have amused me any other time.
I wondered. Perhaps the reason Bennington had lived in Italy was that he dared not return to England under his own name. Trouble with creditors? Or over a woman? Or some more sinister crime?
Perhaps those long-fingered hands had held a knife before, knew how to thrust it with uncanny accuracy into a heart to stop it beating.
Bennington, or whatever his true name had been, had promised to take care of Claire's debts and let her stay on the stage that she loved. So that he might return to England under a new name? His wife so eclipsed him that most people thought of him, when they bothered to, as 'Mrs. Bennington's husband.' A good hiding place. But hiding from what?
This young woman seemed to find the arrangement perfectly acceptable, at any rate. She had what she wanted-freedom to remain on the stage and security from creditors. And she provided a blind for a husband for whom she cared nothing. Her seeming vacant-headedness when she said she no longer remembered his true name sounded sincere, but then, she was an actress.
'I am beginning to agree with Grenville,' I said, half to myself.
Her eyes widened. 'Please do not say that you will take his side. He has me very frightened. His jealousy will be the death of me, I think.' Her voice rose to a fevered pitch.
'I will speak to him,' I promised.
She sighed, putting every ounce of her stage presence into the throaty little moan. 'Thank you, Captain Lacey. I knew you would not fail me.'
She flung herself away from me, the skirts of her peignoir swirling. Then, rather anticlimactically, she stopped and rang for her maid.
'You attended the ball at the Gillises' the night Henry Turner died,' I said, trying to bend to my true purpose for visiting.
Mrs. Bennington's dramatic expression faded, and she made a face, much like a girl who has been given porridge when she expected thick ham. 'Yes, that was quite horrible.'
'It was. Did you know Henry Turner?'
'No. I'd never heard of him until he got himself killed.' She sounded sublimely uninterested.
I asked a few more questions about Turner and whether Mrs. Bennington had seen him or Colonel Brandon enter the anteroom, but it soon became clear that she had noticed nothing. Mrs. Bennington noticed only the people who noticed her.
Grady entered the room in answer to the summons and frowned at me.
'Grady,' Mrs. Bennington said. 'Tell Captain Lacey how Mr. Grenville behaved the other night.'
Grady looked me up and down, like a guard dog eyeing an intruder. 'He did rail at her, sir, that is a fact. I was afraid I'd have to call for the watch.'
'And he threw his walking stick?' I asked, still surprised.
'Yes, sir. Look.' Grady marched to the wall and put her hand on the cream silk. 'Just there. It's left a mark.'
Below her work-worn hand was a faint black mark and a tear in the fabric. 'The footman couldn't quite get it to come clean. Have to do the whole wall over, like as not.'
I straightened up, very much wondering. 'I will speak to him,' I said.
Grady gave me a severe look. So had my father's housekeeper looked at me when I was a small boy and came home plastered from head to foot with mud. 'See that you do,' she said.
I would have smiled at the memory if the situation had not been so bizarre. I thanked Mrs. Bennington for her time, promised again that I would look into the matter of Grenville's strange tempers, and departed.
Grenville and Marianne had gone from my rooms by the time Bartholomew and I returned to Grimpen Lane.
I felt I could hardly look up Grenville that night to make him explain what he meant by terrorizing the feeble-witted Mrs. Bennington, so I went to bed, conscious that not much later, I would be breakfasting with James Denis and my Frenchman.
In the morning, I dressed with cold fingers and rode across London in a gentle rain to number 45, Curzon Street. The facade of this house was unadorned, and the interior was elegant and understated, in a chill way. Mrs. Bennington's sitting room had reminded me a bit of this house-cool and distant.
Denis's butler let me in and took me to the dining room. I'd been in this room before, but not for a meal. Two people now sat at the table, Denis and the Frenchman who'd attacked me in my rooms. A third setting had been placed at one end of the table, for me, I assumed.
James Denis sat in an armchair at the head of the table, elegant in dress as usual, betraying no sign that he'd stayed up very late last night and had risen relatively early this morning.
As I sat, I reflected that I had never seen James Denis do anything so human as eat. I'd always imagined that he must exist on water alone. However, he had a plate of real food before him-eggs and beef, a half-loaf of bread, and a crock of butter.
The Frenchman's plate held thick slices of ham, which he was shoveling into his mouth. He shot me a look of defiance over his fork.
'Captain Lacey,' Denis said in his cool voice. 'May I introduce Colonel Naveau.'
Colonel Naveau nodded once, his eyes filled with dislike. His close-cropped hair was a mix of gray and brown, and his eyes were dark. He wore a suit tailored to his lean body, a fact that spoke of expense. His emperor might have lost the war, but this colonel still had his fortune.
'Colonel Naveau is quite the pugilist,' I remarked, as a footman slid a plate of steaming sausages in front of me. 'Gentleman Jackson might be interested in some of his moves. Were you cavalry?'
Naveau watched me a moment, then inclined his head. 'A hussar.'
