Grey glanced about the thinning room, his eyes drifting indifferently over the Comte de Penfleur. “Then I suggest we repair to the library.”

“I would beg that you allow the Comte to accompany us.”

Grey frowned. “Is that necessary?”

“What I would say must necessarily concern him.”

“Very well.” The banker turned for the door abruptly. “But he shall not be privy to my words. He may listen to the Justice, and pack himself off to Dover. Bastable!”

The housekeeper appeared in the doorway, an affronted expression on her countenance. Presumably she preferred the master to ring for a maid, rather than to shout like a common publican. “Yes, sir?”

“Pray be so good as to summon a lad for the purpose of conveying our guests around the grounds,” he said impatiently. “They may be some time at it, and will require refreshment in the temple. Have you adequate shoes, Mrs. Austen?”

“Perfectly, sir, I thank you.”

He eyed Lizzy's elegant slippers. “You shall be swollen and blistered before a quarter-hour is out; but no matter. The park does not give up its beauties so easily; they must be teazed into submission, like a spirited woman. And you, sir? What is your pleasure?”

This last was directed at Henry. He had been most intent upon the study of a very fine snuff-box abandoned on a marquetry table, but lifted his gaze at Grey's address, and said in as colourless a voice as possible, “My shoes are perfectly adequate to your grounds, Mr. Grey, if that is what you would know. My stockings, perhaps, might be thinner; and as for my smallclothes—”

Grey threw back his head and laughed with undisguised delight There was a difference in his manner of behaving this morning, from what it had been in his interview at Godmersham; he was at once reckless and carefree, grim and abandoned. It was as tho' a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders, or as tho' he found himself in the thick of battle, and had wagered his all on the toss. Intriguing. His entire air suggested a man with nothing to lose, and everything to defend.

“Come into the library, Austen,” he said, “and send the rest of your family out into the garden. Unless the weight of your brother's smallclothes prohibits the tour.”

“I believe they should be admirably suited to visiting the stables,” Henry offered mildly. “I quite long to see the filly Josephine at closer quarters. You may have heard, Mr. Grey, that your late wife's horse bested my own at the Canterbury Races, on the very day of her tragic… accident”

There was the briefest of silences. The Comte de Penfleur adjusted his cuffs, a look of abstracted pain upon his countenance. Then Grey said, “I should be happy for you to inspect the filly, Mr. Austen. The bulk of the stables will be sent down to Tattersall's in a matter of weeks; and if, having seen Josephine, you wish to make an offer for her, I should not be loath to consider it.”

“You would sell her horses?” Penfleur cried, all complaisance fled.

“I cannot send them out of my sight fast enough,” Grey replied, with a bitter emphasis.

“Then I shall take them all!” The Frenchman's face had reddened, and he walked slowly towards Grey, his hands clenching slightly.

The banker regarded him with undisguised contempt. “I regret to inform you, monsieur, that they are not for sale.”

The Comte tore his glove from within his coat and dashed it in Grey's face. The other man neither flinched nor dropped his gaze from Penfleur's; but breathing shallowly, as tho' an iron band constrained his lungs, he said, “I beg you will ignore what the Comte has just done, Mr. Austen. It can have nothing to do with you; and I should abhor your interference in so delicate and private a matter.”

“Just as I should abhor the necessity of mounting a watch upon your movements, Mr. Grey,” Neddie replied steadily, “or yours, Monsieur le Comte. I have no wish to post men outside your door all night, for the prevention of a dawn meeting; so pray retrieve your glove, sir, and let us hear no more about it.”[50]

“You saw how he insulted me.” Penfleur's voice, in that instant, was colder and more deadly than I could have imagined. “I cannot allow such abuse to go unaddressed. My honour—”

“—cannot have been abused by a simple truth,” Neddie protested. “Mrs. Grey's stables are presently not for sale. They shall be under the gavel at Tattersall's in a matter of weeks, and did you wish to appear in the ring, and place your bids with the rest, I am sure you would be heard as readily as another. Now, may I suggest, gentlemen — as Mrs. Bastable has appeared with the lad who is to guide the ladies — that we repair to the library? The Comte must not delay on his road to Dover; and the news I would communicate is decidedly pressing.”

Neither Grey nor the Comte offered a word in reply; the malevolence of their mutual regard was chilling. The banker was the first to turn away, and at last the Frenchman followed him through the door.

He did not deign to retrieve his glove.

Chapter 17

Warring Theories

24 August 1805, cont'd.

I WAS SEVERAL HOURS IN LEARNING THE NATURE OF THE interview among the three men, for the tour of the gardens so transported Lizzy and me, that we quite forgot the ugly scene. We traversed the wood, and descended into the valley, and allowed the ferryman to ply his boat for our amusement. Then we sent the gardener's lad away, and perched in some chairs arranged amidst the columns of the Temple of Philosophy.

“I cannot believe that Mr. Grey is very well-acquainted with Aristotle,” Lizzy observed, wrinkling her nose, “nor yet with Heracleitus. And yet he installed those massive figures of them here as one might pose a favourite grandfather above the drawing-room mantel. It is quite an extraordinary taste. One has an idea of them come alive at midnight, and discoursing on the nature of eternity.”

“Perhaps Mr. Grey possesses talents of which we know nothing.”

“I quite pity the little Francoise,” Lizzy said idly. “There is no end of steel beneath his reserved exterior; he should be a formidable adversary. Hardly congenial for one bent on having her own way, and wild for amusement. I wonder she did not desert him long since.”

“For the Comte?”

“Ah, the Comte.” My sister smiled. “He is thoroughly reprehensible, is he not? Too clever for his own good; too careless of his morals for safety; and too intrigued by the effect of his meddling in the peace of others.”

“Whether he cared a jot for Francoise or no,” I agreed, “he should attempt to destroy Grey's happiness for the sheer satisfaction of it. The contest, I suspect, has always been between the two gentlemen; the lady was merely a token. Grey first won a critical round, in securing Franchise's hand, and the Comte thought to rout him entirely by eloping with her at the last.”

“Penfleur is not a man who endures his losses, Jane. He will have his satisfaction in everything — including the matter of the horses.”

“I tremble for Henry, does he attempt to offer for Josephine.”

“What ridiculous creatures men are.” She sighed. “As tho' honour were a stuff one could fashion and discard, like the latest modes! Poor Neddie will be dozing in Mr. Grey's sweep for most of the night, in terror of a dawn meeting.”

I was only half-attending to her, for a lone figure traversing the iron bridge had caught my eye. “Is that Henry come in search of us? Or — yes, it is Mr. Grey!”

“You are far too intrigued by the man for safety, Jane,” she observed. “He is possessed of a deep and impenetrable character; and such an one will always prove of fascination to yourself. Take care.”

“Perhaps he shall presently strike into another path,” I suggested.