The Glass House

Chapter Six

The footman assisted me into the landau, and I found myself in a conveyance as opulent as Grenville's. The walls were fine parquetry, the upholstery, velvet. Boxes of coals warmed our feet, and coach lanterns lightened the gloom of the darkening evening.

As soon as I half fell into the seat facing Lady Breckenridge, the landau started with a jerk.

I found myself studying the pattern of Lady Breckenridge’s light yellow-and-ivory striped gown behind the undone buttons of her dark blue jacket. The gown revealed a modest amount of breast, the cashmere heavy enough against the chill of January but fine enough to flow like silk over her legs.

"Did you enjoy Mr. Inglethorpe's little entertainment?" she asked.

I was still a bit breathless from it. "What was it? The concoction, I mean?"

Lady Breckenridge lifted her shoulders in a smooth shrug. "Who knows? I am not a scientist. But you did not come for the magic air. You came to learn about Lord Barbury."

"I do not recall telling anyone so."

She gave me her usual stare. She was an intelligent woman, and no doubt had seen Grenville pull Lord Barbury aside at the soiree.

"You did not have to. I know that Mrs. Chapman was killed, and that poor Barbury is beside himself. Servants gossip, Captain. They love to talk about us. My maid is always ready with the latest tidbit about my neighbors."

I should not have been surprised. Bartholomew was part of a vast network of Mayfair servants who gathered information better than any exploring officer did for Wellesley. Bartholomew had connections below stairs in every house from Oxford Street to Piccadilly.

"Barbury doted on the woman," Lady Breckenridge said. "More than he should have, in my opinion. She was charming to him, but she was only an actress and not a very good one."

"Did you know her?"

She gave me a disdainful look. "Hardly. She married above her station and had Lord Barbury quite on a string. At least Barbury had the sense not to take her to wife."

I wondered why Chapman had married Peaches and how she'd had persuaded him to. Peaches had been a lovely young woman; I could imagine her convincing someone like me to marry her-someone with nothing to lose-but a barrister who hoped one day to take silk?

Lady Breckenridge and Thompson were correct; most actresses were considered common, not respectable enough for marriage. It did happen, from time to time, that aristocrats married actresses, and happily so, but aristocrats got away with much. Perhaps Peaches had made Chapman believe she'd be a model wife.

"Did they go to Inglethorpe's often?" I asked. I assumed Lady Breckenridge had been there before-she’d seemed familiar with the gas and how to take it. Mrs. Danbury, on the other hand, had not. She, like me, had been a novice.

"Good heavens, yes. Anything novel or exciting, Mrs. Chapman could not rest until she tried it. I believe she was not quite right in the head, if you ask me." Lady Breckenridge gave me a decided look. "She was always badgering Barbury to let her do things that were risky and dangerous. If he denied her, she pouted and fussed until he promised she could do as she pleased. Curricle races to Brighton, bloody fool things like that."

I wondered how Peaches had fared with Mr. Chapman, a man described by his pupil as deadly dull. For a young lady who craved excitement, living with Chapman must have been misery.

Of course, if Gower were to be believed, Peaches rarely saw her husband. She’d have had plenty of opportunity for excitement without him.

I had been a bit wild and reckless in my youth, and frankly, stupid, but I had always been able to stop myself when necessary. There were people, I had learned, who could not, who always had to have something interesting or, as Lady Breckenridge said, dangerous, in their lives. Perhaps to remind themselves that they were alive? Their humors were unbalanced in that direction, I believed, as mine were toward melancholia, and they could not help themselves. I wondered if Peaches had been that sort of person.

"What is your interest, Captain?" Lady Breckenridge asked, her eyes bright. "You could not have been Mrs. Chapman's lover. She liked only men of wealth."

I let the remark pass, because it was the truth, even if rudely put.

I thought again of Peaches lying on the shore of the Thames, small, pretty, alone. She'd sought danger, and danger had found her.

"She did not deserve what was done to her," I said. "She was too young for that. Young and helpless."

Lady Breckenridge snorted. "From what I knew of her, Mrs. Chapman was never helpless."

"She was certainly helpless against whoever killed her."

Lady Breckenridge lost her smile. I expected a sharp or sardonic retort from her, but she turned to look out of the window. I knew she could see only her reflection in the dark glass, because I saw it too, a gaze pensive under drawn brows.

"Did you attend the gathering at Inglethorpe's on Monday?" I asked her.

"I did." She turned from the window again, her expression composed. "If you mean to ask me whether Mrs. Chapman attended as well, the answer is yes, she did."

"With Lord Barbury?"

"Not in the least. She arrived alone and went away alone."

"Do you remember what time she left?"

"Not much past four. She seemed in a hurry."

Peaches must have gone straight from Inglethorpe’s to meet her killer. "Did she leave by hackney or private coach?"

"I am afraid I did not notice. I was not much interested in Mrs. Chapman. I was just pleased she'd departed."

"A bit early."

Lady Breckenridge shrugged. "She had her take of the gas, and off she went."

"Does Inglethorpe's gatherings always begin at four?"

"Always. A man of regular habits, is Mr. Inglethorpe."

Regular habits and unnatural appetites. I wondered whether Inglethorpe himself had played a part in Mrs. Chapman's death. A woman who liked danger, a man who provided it for her in the form of his magical gas.

We had been rolling through Mayfair as I asked questions and listened to her answers. "Your coachman can let me down anywhere," I said. "I did not mean to take advantage of you."

"Nonsense, this is a nasty rain. I will take you where you like."

"Grenville's then," I said. "In Grosvenor Street. It is not far."

Lady Breckenridge tapped on the roof and gave the direction to her coachman. We rode the rest of the way in silence, she watching me with frank curiosity. We did not exchange the small pleasantries that I might with any other lady-Mrs. Danbury, for example. Lady Breckenridge had made it known the first time we'd met what she thought of small pleasantries.

She did not speak until the landau was drawing to a halt before Grenville's house. "I have a box at Covent Garden," she said. "Quite a fine one." She drew a silver card case from her reticule and extracted a cream-colored card. "Giving this to a footman at the theatre door will allow you up to it, any time you please."

I studied the card held between her slim, gloved fingers. "I do not go much to the theatre," I said.

"But you might. And you might want to ask me another time about a murder."

She smiled, but the lines about her eyes were tense. I realized, in some surprise, that if I refused to take the card, I would hurt her feelings.

I reached for it, glanced once at the name inscribed on it, and tucked it into my pocket. Lady Breckenridge’s expression did not change.

I bade her goodnight and descended before Grenville’s plain-faced mansion. As the landau rolled away, I saw Lady Breckenridge looking out of its window at me. She caught my eye, looked languidly away, and the landau moved on.

Grenville was home, in his dressing room. Matthias let me in, but neither Grenville nor his man Gautier offered greeting while they went through the very important process of tying Grenville's cravat.

Matthias brought me a glass of brandy while I waited. Grenville's toilette was always elaborate and could take an hour or more if he were preparing for a sufficiently important occasion.

As I sipped the brandy I felt a sudden chill. I rubbed my arms and took another drink of brandy, feeling the beginnings of nausea.

Another thing I felt was pain. The concoction was wearing off, and my leg began to throb with a vengeance. I gritted my teeth and drank deeply of brandy.

When Grenville finished, I rose to leave with him, and realized the height of my folly. My leg hurt like fire, and I had left my walking stick behind at Inglethorpe's.

Matthias offered to run and fetch it for me. Grenville forestalled him, somewhat crossly, and bade him fetch one of his own. I accepted with neither protest nor thanks, uncertain of Grenville's mood.

Not until we were inside his opulent coach, alone, did I open the subject I sensed he did not want to discuss. "What have you done with Marianne?" I asked.

Grenville shot me an angry look. "Do not worry, she is well. I have a house in Clarges Street. She is reclining there in the lap of luxury with plenty of sweetmeats to eat."

"She must be pleased." Marianne liked her comforts.

"Not really. She let me know what she thought of my high-handedness. But dear God, Lacey." His expression turned troubled. "I found her in your rooms, eating the leavings of your breakfast."

"I told her she might have the bread."

Grenville’s diamond cravat pin flashed as he turned his head. "She was shaking with hunger. If you had seen her… She was furious that I'd caught her eating like a starved mongrel. I cannot understand it. I've tried to help her, and yet, my charity seems to do no good."

"Marianne takes what help she likes and disdains the rest," I said. "That is why I leave my door unlocked. She pretends to put one over on me."

"Why the devil does she accept your charity and not mine?"

I shrugged, having no idea. "She has her own code of right and wrong."

"You are good to her, and good to worry about her. I have put her in a house where she might eat well and rest for a time, and she looked bloody indignant about it."

"Rather like caging a feral dog," I said. "Taking care of it might be best for it, but it still bites."

"Very apt. May we change the subject?"

I nodded, and he looked relieved. Grenville's motives were good, but I believed he'd met his match in Marianne. She liked luxury and money, but she also valued her freedom. I wondered how long she'd trade one for the other.

During the rest of the drive to Whitechapel, I told Grenville about Inglethorpe's gathering-who I had seen and what I had observed, and what Lady Breckenridge had related to me about Peaches and Lord Barbury. I omitted that fact that I had capered about like a fool with Mrs. Danbury.

I asked Grenville about the gentlemen I had recognized at Inglethorpe's, and we discussed them until we reached The Glass House, although Grenville could not tell me much. He knew them from his clubs, but not much deeper than that. He agreed it worth investigating whether they'd known Peaches and where they'd been when she died.

Rain still beat down as we drew up in St. Charles Row. The sun had long since descended, and early winter darkness swallowed the street.

We waited in the warm carriage while Matthias hopped down and darted through the rain to rap on the door. The same man I had seen before peered out, but this time, the reception was different. Matthias spoke to him, and the door was opened, wide and inviting.

Grenville descended, and I followed more slowly. Inglethorpe's concoction had definitely worn off, leaving me slow and sore and more fatigued than before.

I entered the house behind Grenville, and the doorman gave me a measuring look. I pretended to ignore him as I stripped off my greatcoat and hat. Matthias took charge of our things, not the doorman, who only watched in silence.

The few candles in tarnished sconces threw off a only a feeble light, and the gloomy evening made the dark-paneled front hall darker still. The doorman led us up a staircase that twisted round on itself to a wide hall containing one double door.

Laughter and voices poured from behind the door-talking, querying, pontificating-nothing I would not hear in any club or tavern. Our guide pushed open the doors and ushered us inside, and at last I understood why the ordinary looking building was called The Glass House.

We stood in a well-furnished, softly carpeted room as dark as the hall below, its walls lined with drapes, brown velvet and heavy. One curtain stood open to reveal a window, but it looked into another room, not outside. The room beyond was dark, the glass reflecting the light of the front room, much as Lady Breckenridge's carriage window had reflected only her own face. I assumed that the other curtains hid windows, the room surrounded on three sides by them.

Men lounged on Turkish couches and armchairs, talking, smoking, drinking brandy or claret, passing snuff boxes back and forth. Card tables occupied one half of the room, where a dozen gentlemen played whist and piquet, no doubt for high stakes.

A smattering of women roamed the crowd. They were, to a body, beautiful of figure, and wore their expensive silk gowns with grace. Their jewels had been chosen with taste, their hair carefully dressed. They were nothing like the painted girls of Covent Garden or even actresses like Marianne. These were courtesans of the highest order-experienced, well-bred, beautiful.

I'd met a few of the gentlemen here before, including an infantry officer, but I did not really know them. All recognized Grenville. He glided languidly into the room, embracing his man-of-fashion persona.

I did not see Lord Barbury among them. Perhaps he truly was beside himself with grief, as both Grenville and Lady Breckenridge had indicated, and home.

I wondered why this house had such an unsavory reputation. I saw nothing that I would not find in any gaming hell in St. James's, although perhaps the ladies enticing gentlemen to play cards here were a bit cleaner. Gentlemen regularly brought their mistresses to the hells, and the mistresses gambled as avidly as the gentlemen.

"It seems rather ordinary to me," I said to Grenville in a low voice. "Why would Peaches want to come here?"

"If she did like to come here, it does not say much for her character," Grenville said darkly. "Come, I will show you."

I followed him to the first heavy curtain, which lay beyond the card players, who took no notice of us. Grenville raised the velvet drape. The window looked into a small lighted room, cluttered with chairs and sofas and tables arranged in no pattern I could discern. Other than the furniture, the room was empty.

"Nothing there," Grenville said, and moved to the next window.

Behind that curtain we found gentlemen gathered around a hazard table while a lady dressed in a corset, knee-length skirt, and riding boots retrieved the thrown dice and handed it back to the caster. Her face dripped perspiration, and the muscles of her shoulders played as she reached for the dice.

Grenville dropped that curtain. "There is also a room for faro," he remarked, "and other more chancy games."

"So, it is a gaming hell."

"Somewhat." Grenville raised the next curtain. "They also have opium, if you like, and of course, this."

He gestured to the window. The room beyond was small, and only a chaise longue and a chair reposed in it. A lady lounged in a bored manner on the chaise, an open book on her lap. She wore a wig of bright red curls, and had a pointed, but pretty face. "You choose your vice behind the glass," Grenville said, "then give the house master your bid. You may buy only one vice per night, so choose well."

I didn't yet see the attraction. "Why not simply go to the usual gaming rooms? You can find hazard and willing ladies there."

"Not ladies such as these," Grenville said, nodding at the reclining woman. "They are courtesans who once enticed Napoleon and the king of Prussia and the Austrian emperor. They are the highest of the high."

"And Peaches was a second-rate actress. Why should she want to come here with such ladies present? Why should she want Lord Barbury here?"

"I have no idea. Barbury told me that the proprietor provided them a private room. He and Peaches never came down to the windowed rooms. It is certainly a house her husband could never enter."

"Hmm," I answered, not satisfied.

Surely Lord Barbury could have found a better place in which to meet his ladybird. I knew that if I'd had a pretty young lady with whom I kept company, I'd want a cozy, private place to be with her, not a room in this rather seedy hell. But then, Peaches had craved excitement. Perhaps she'd not been satisfied with an ordinary nest.

"The Glass House is a novelty," Grenville said, dropping the curtain. "It will wane, as all novelties do. For now, it is a place to see and be seen. Because I have come tonight, it will experience a new surge of popularity."

He spoke in a matter-of-fact voice, without a trace of pomposity. But he was correct. Any place Grenville visited instantly became the height of fashion.

Grenville lifted the drape of the next window to find the blank back of another drape behind it. He released it at once. When I looked a question, he said, "When a room has been taken by a patron, the curtains inside may be closed, or left open, as the buyer dictates. Some like to be watched."

I frowned my distaste. We moved down the walls and looked into other rooms.

Grenville hadn't exaggerated. Every vice was available. Some of the things I saw fueled my growing rage. I would be certain to mention this house to a reformer I knew; that is, if I did not begin breaking the windows myself.

"Have you found something to your liking, gentlemen?"

A small, plump man with a sharp nose and round brown eyes looked up at us, a salesman's smile on his face. His nose bore a scar from a long-gone boil, but his suit was fine and well tailored.

Grenville regarded him with a look I’d come to recognize as true disdain. Grenville sometimes feigned the look for the benefit of his audience, but he genuinely disliked this man, whoever he was.

The man's dark eyes glittered with a cold light even as he fawned at us. "My name is Kensington. Emile Kensington." He held out a hand.

His palm was warm and dry, though his handshake was a bit limp. "Room number five is quite intriguing," he said.

I expected Grenville to say something, to go along with our pretense. Instead, Grenville stared at the man with cold annoyance. He was angry, as angry as I was, but I needed to keep to my purpose.

"I am interested in a woman called Peaches," I said.

The man jumped. I swore I saw his feet leave the ground. He pondered his answer then fixed on a simple truth. "She is not here."

"I know that," I said. "She died two days ago."

Kensington's mouth dropped open. For a moment, pure astonishment crossed his face, then his glittering stare returned. "Died?"

"Found in the river," I said. "She came here often, I am told. Was she here on Monday?"

Kensington's eyes narrowed as he looked me over again. "Who are you, a Runner?"

"An acquaintance of Lord Barbury. He is, as you can imagine, deeply distressed."

I watched the thoughts dance behind his eyes. A woman who came here regularly, dead. Her lover, a powerful man. Trouble for The Glass House?

"I am sad to hear of his loss," Kensington said.

"Indeed," I said, unable to keep the chill from my voice. "Had she come here Monday?"

"I don't think so. I don't remember."

"But she did used to come here?" Grenville asked. "I believe you provided her with a private room."

Kensington looked back and forth between us and wet his lips. "There was no harm in it. She wanted somewhere to meet Lord Barbury, safe from her husband."

"And they paid you well for it, I'd wager," I said.

Kensington looked offended. "Not at all. Amelia-Peaches-and I are old acquaintances. I knew her when she was a girl, just come to London to make her fortune. She wanted to bring Lord Barbury here, and I was willing to oblige. They enjoyed it."

I wondered about that very much. If the house had been Peaches' choice, because she knew this Kensington, why on earth had Barbury gone along with it?

Kensington's gaze shifted again as though he'd argued with himself and at last reached a conclusion. "Ah, I remember now, gentleman. She did come here Monday. In the afternoon."

His memory was very convenient, I thought. "Are you certain?"

"Yes. I had forgotten, what with one thing and another. She must have been at the laughing gas again, because she was in high spirits."

"What time was that?"

"Around four or so, I believe."

He was a little off; Lady Breckenridge put Peaches leaving Inglethorpe's shortly after four, and she could not have reached here for another half hour.

"When did she leave?" I asked.

"As to that, I have no idea. I did not see her go. Never saw her again after she went up to the room."

"Which I would like to see," I said.

Kensington looked distressed. "No one goes above this floor, sir."

"Except Lord Barbury, and Peaches, and you," I answered, my voice hard. "And now I will."

Kensington opened his mouth to further protest, then closed it. I must have looked quite angry, and although Grenville's walking stick had no sword in it, it was made of ebony, hard and strong. Kensington could always call for the ruffians that every hell employed to keep order, but not before I could swing the stick.

Finally, he shrugged, produced a key, and led us to a door behind one of the curtains.

That door led to a dimly lit hall and a narrow flight of stairs. At the next landing, Kensington unlocked a door, lifted a taper from one of the sconces in the stairwell, and ushered us into a cold chamber.

The neat plainness of this room contrasted sharply with the tawdry finery on the floor below. The chamber held a bed hung with yellow brocade draperies, a dressing table, and two comfortable-looking chairs. The room was dark now and fireless, but I imagined it could be cheerful. Here, if Kensington spoke the truth, Peaches and Lord Barbury had carried on their liaison.

I moved to the dressing table and began opening the drawers. Kensington looked distressed, but he made no move to stop me.

As I expected, I found nothing. Kensington would have had ample time to remove anything from this room he wanted no one to see. Grenville looked over my shoulder as I pulled from the dressing table a silver hairbrush, a handful of silk ribbons, and a reticule.

I opened the reticule, but found little of interest. A viniagrette, which a lady would open and apply to her nose when she felt faint, a bit of lace, a comb, and a tiny bottle of perfume.

Grenville lifted the perfume bottle and worked open the stopper. The odor of sweet musk bathed my nostrils. "Expensive," he pronounced, then returned the stopper to the bottle. "A gift from Barbury?"

"Probably." I returned everything to the reticule.

We found nothing more in the drawers. Kensington stood inside the doorway, watching us, looking more curious than alarmed.

"Why did she come here Monday?" I asked him as Grenville closed the dressing table.

Kensington shrugged. "Why shouldn't she? She was probably meeting her lordship."

"She'd made an appointment to meet him much later that night," I said. "Yet you say she was here after four in the afternoon. Why should she have come?"

Kensington hesitated, and I watched him choose his words carefully. "Gentlemen, as I told you, I'd known Amelia Chapman a very long time. She was a young woman who found life tedious, and it was no joy for her being married to a plodding gent like Chapman. She did not like to go home, and I sympathized. She'd retreat here when her husband grew too dull for her, and I was happy to let her. I believe she had told her husband some rigmarole about visiting a friend in the country, in any case, so she would not be expected home. She had done such a thing before."

"Did she meet anyone else here that afternoon?" I asked. "Someone not Lord Barbury?"

"Now, as to that, I do not know. I told you, I saw her, but I did not see her after she came up to her room, and she was quite alone then. And I have no idea when she departed. You may, of course, ask the footman who opens the door."

I certainly would ask him.

"Now, gentlemen." Kensington rubbed his hands. "I have been very good natured, letting you rummage through my rooms and ask about my friends. But this is a house of business."

Grenville gave him a look of undisguised disgust. He opened his mouth to denounce him, to tell him we would not stay another moment, but I forestalled him with a look. Another woman of the house might have seen Peaches that day, might know who she had met. Peaches had died here, or very soon after leaving here, and I wanted to speak to anyone who had seen her.

"Please," I said to Kensington. "Choose a room for us."

Kensington smiled. It was not a nice smile. "I have just the thing, Captain. Allow me to prepare." He gave me a little bow and glided away, leaving the door open behind him.

Once we heard him close the door at the bottom of the stairs Grenville turned to me. "Why on earth did you tell him that? I'd have thought you'd want nothing more to do with this place."

I explained, but he looked skeptical. "Such a lady may know nothing or be paid to know nothing."

"Perhaps, but it is worth a try. Now, while we have the chance, shall we see what else this room can tell us?"

"Kensington would not have left us alone if it could," Grenville pointed out, but he turned his hand to the task.

We went over the room again, looking under the bed covers, through the dressing table, behind curtains, under the bed. I examined the tools at the fireplace, studied the heavy brass grating. I finished my search, finding nothing. The room was neat, well-dusted, impersonal.

Grenville found nothing either, but I knew that Peaches could very likely have been killed in this room.

We found no evidence that she had been, of course. Her killer would have had time to tidy up behind themselves or he had paid Kensington to do it. Or perhaps Peaches had left with her killer and met her death somewhere between here and the Temple Gardens.

Kensington was waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs when we came down. He told me that he'd chosen Room Five for me and that he wanted three hundred guineas for the pleasure.