Page 23 of Murder at the Seven Dials
He closed the drawers with a frown, and when he turned back to the duchess, saw she was holding something in her fingers, inspecting it.
“What have you there?”
She clasped it into her palm, out of view. “I thought you weren’t interested in investigating.”
“I’m interested in the evidence against your husband that you’re attempting to dispose of.”
She sent him a withering look, and then opened her fingers. A round, milky gem about the circumference of her thumbnail lay in her palm. Hugh strode toward the vanity for a closer look. He’d seen one like it before.
“The Seven Sins,” he said, plucking it from her palm.
“Excuse me?” she asked, pulling on her gloves again.
“A gaming hell in Temple. These lockets are given out as tokens.” Hugh flipped the locket, exposing a flat brass backing. He slid the backing aside on a miniscule hinge. “It’s for storing opium,” he explained.
“Opium,” she murmured, staring at the locket. Doubt swept over her expression before it hardened again. She took the locket back, and Hugh let it go. He had no need for it. “So, she was a member of this gaming hell.”
“Women cannot be members,” Hugh replied. “They can accompany members, however, and are permitted with these tokens. You’re aware of what a gaming hell is?”
Again, she slammed him with a look of derision. “I’m not a complete simpleton, Mr. Marsden. I am aware men have their clubs.”
“Gaming hells are not gentleman’s clubs,” he said.
She turned to show interest in a painting on the wall and slipped the locket inside her reticule. He rolled his eyes. Not as smoothly done as she believed.
“Thedemimondeis not allowed entry at White’s or Brooks’s, but they are at most pleasure dens,” he went on, making no indication that he’d seen her little sleight of hand. “I assume your husband has a membership to White’s?”
The gentleman’s club ranked as the best in London, reserved for only the most illustrious of ton. The Duke of Fournier had been among that ilk. Until two days ago. Now, Hugh wondered if the duke’s membership had been pulled.
“Yes, but he prefers Brooks’s,” the duchess said.
“I can’t imagine he’d have shared with you whether he belonged to any hells like the Seven Sins.”
“My husband is not the gambling sort.”
Just as he was not the philandering sort, as she so staunchly believed. The woman was either ignorant to a fault or playacting as astutely as the actresses at the Theatre Royal.
“As you say.” He felt the bedroom grow smaller as the duchess strolled toward the front windows overlooking Yarrow Street.
The fact that he was alone in a bedroom with a duchess was not lost on him. The scandal, should anyone stumble across them in this moment, would damage her reputation, and likely earn him an ear blistering from the magistrate. Perhaps a suspension. Then again, the house was closed up, the previous resident deceased. No one would find the pair of them here. Unless someone spotted the lady’s rather recognizable brougham parked out front.
“You haven’t yet answered my other question, Your Grace.”
She peered at him, the derision not yet fully gone from her eyes. “What question is that?”
“Your lock picking prowess,” he replied. “You don’t strike me as a typical cracksman.”
She’d worked smoothly and quickly; she’d done this before.
“Ladies must be accomplished in all manner of subjects, Mr. Marsden,” she replied lightly.
The huff of laughter was out of him before he could stifle it. Her sheer gall kept knocking his feet out from under him. “Forgive me, I thought that meant excelling at languages and painting landscapes.”
“I’ve never been very adept with landscapes.” She moved around the end of the four-poster and toward the door. “I’ll bid you good day.”
Hugh reached the door before she could and held the edge, blocking the corridor. “How did you learn Miss Lovejoy lived here? Don’t lie to me. After last night, Bernadetto would have nothing to do with you. Did your husband give you the address?”
The duchess pulled up short. A muscle in her jaw tensed. Her fair complexion revealed every emotion rippling just under the surface. Right now, it was a curious combination of impatience and panic.
