“Oh, do, Della,” Susannah said. “If memory serves, Mr. Tresham has neglected to dance all evening, and his uncle, dear Quimbey, will be pleased to see a lady has taken pity on his nephew and turned down the room with him.”
Oh, neatly done. Lady Della’s smile boded ill for Mr. Tresham, but she snagged him by the arm before he could dodge off to glower amid the potted palms.
“I believe I shall,” Lady Della said. “Even a man short on grace deserves the occasional turn about the dance floor. Come along, Mr. Tresham, and I’m sure we’ll find something to talk about.”
Tresham looked nearly amused, and oddly enough, so did Lady Della.
“My lady,” Will said, sweeping a bow. “May I have this dance?”
“I think not,” Susannah replied. “I don’t trust myself if you take me in your arms again, Mr. Dorning, but let’s keep an eye on Della and Mr. Tresham, shall we? Effington will be beside himself, and it’s about time.”
Before Susannah could abandon Will in the empty corridor, he kissed her fleetingly on the mouth. She could not trust herself in his arms, but she could trust him enough to make that admission.
How very exceedingly lovely.
Ten
“We almost had him,” Horace moaned for the fortieth time. “Great big bugger going at that bone like a dog on a—well, going at it nineteen to the dozen, and some toff has to come along and warn him off. Why’nt the Quality piss in the convenience, and leave the alleys to the regular folks?”
Because the alleys afforded privacy, and even the toffs needed privacy. What did the scent of the dung heaps and rotting kitchen slops matter when a man wanted to take a piss or parlay with a streetwalker?
“Toffs are stupid,” Jasper replied as a skinny orange cat went streaking past and scrabbled straight up a brick wall. “The fancy gents don’t know the alley’s the most dangerous place to be. No matter. The brute comes around our alley regular, and the King’s Comestibles serves good ale. We’ll snabble the mutt, see if we don’t.”
They ambled through the night, keeping to the twisted lanes and side streets rather than the main thoroughfares. Far less chance of being spotted in the shadows, and far more likelihood of coming across a sizable stray, or even a poor doggy left tied in a nabob’s garden. Mastiffs, terriers, Alsatians, wolfhounds—the baiters had jobs for them all.
“When do we get paid, Jasper? Me missus doesn’t like me being out ’alf the night when I don’t bring ’ome any pay.”
These nocturnal rambles gave Horace time to sober up, and when he was sober, Horace was the sort to ask questions. Complaining he could do drunk, sober, and every place in between.
“We’re paid when the baiters pay us,” Jasper replied. “I’ve told you and told you, but his lordship says we’re not to move the dogs until the baiters are willing to pay decently for them. We tried to deliver that big black devil to them, and look how that turned out.”
“I heard about the reward,” Horace said. In this part of town, May-La-De-Da-Fair, parties and balls went on until dawn, and the great ladies obliged the less fortunate by keeping the ballroom draperies open. The strains of violins—the nancy kind, not good, honest fiddles—drifted through the fetid darkness like perfume over the stink of an unwashed whore.
“The Quality treat us like dogs,” Horace went on, “with their parties and dancing. We stand outside the windows like starving curs and gawk at them in their finery. I know ’ow the dogs feel, Jasper, and all I want is me money.”
All the dogs wanted was their freedom, because unlike Jasper and Horace, the dogs could find their own food, and paid nothing for a place to lay their ugly, stupid heads.
“You cease that talk about the reward,” Jasper said. Three rewards, two of them sizable. “Here’s how it works with the Quality, Horace, me lad. They post the rewards, and when their little doggies are returned to them, they’ll cry and carry on, and thank you until the next Frost Fair, but they’ll not pay you.”
Horace stopped walking in the mouth of the alley they’d just traversed. “That’s not fair, Jasper. If they say they’ll pay, they should pay.”
Loyal, simple, and half-drunk, Horace was twice the man his lordship would ever be.
“They should pay, but whoever finds the dog is supposed to refuse the reward because of his gentlemanly honor. He’s supposed to pretend he had great fun tracking down a slobbering, stinking hound, and then pretend he don’t need the money.”
“That’s cracked, that is.”
“Aye, that’s cracked, and I’ve had enough for one night. Let’s have a wee nip, and find our beds. We can try again tomorrow, if his lordship doesn’t want us to move the dogs to Knightsbridge.”
“Say, Jasper?”
Like a dog on a bone, that was Horace. “Aye?”
“What if a woman finds the dogs? A woman don’t ’ave no gentlemanly honor. Would a woman get the reward for finding the dogs?”