Resurrection Row - Anne Perry [50]
Altogether he was feeling in a very pleasant mood when he arrived at Gadstone Park on Thursday morning and presented his card to the maid.
Alicia received him with delight, almost relief, and they spent a totally happy hour talking trivialities, and meaning everything else. Just to be in each other’s company was sufficient; what was said was immaterial. Augustus was forgotten; empty graves and wandering corpses did not even stray into their minds.
He left a little before luncheon, walking briskly back across the Park, coat collar turned up against the north wind, finding it exciting and sharpening rather than bitter. He saw a figure coming the other way. There was something familiar about the step, the rather lean shoulders, that made him hesitate, even consider for a moment taking a sidecut across the grass, even though it was rough and wet. But he was not even sure who the person was. It was far too tidy for Pitt, too elegant, and not quite tall enough. Pitt’s coat always flapped, and his hat sat at a different angle on his head.
It was not until he was close enough to see the face, too close courteously to go another way, that he recognized Somerset Carlisle.
“Good morning,” he said without slackening his stride. He had no wish whatever to speak with the man.
Carlisle stood in his path. “Good morning,” he said, then turned and fell in step beside him. Short of being appallingly rude, there was nothing Dominic could do but make some attempt at conversation.
“Pleasant weather,” he remarked. “At least this wind should keep the fog away.”
“Good day for a walk,” Carlisle agreed. “Gets one an appetite for luncheon.”
“Quite,” Dominic replied. Really, the man was a confounded nuisance. He seemed to have no idea when he was intruding, and Dominic had no desire to be reminded of their previous meal together.
“Nice leisurely meal by a good fire,” Carlisle went on. “I should thoroughly enjoy a soup, something savory and delicate.”
There was no way to avoid it. Dominic owed the man a meal, and obligations must be honored if one wished to remain in society. Such a gaffe would quickly be remarked, and word spread like fire.
“An excellent idea,” he said with as much heart as he could muster. “And perhaps a saddle of mutton to follow? My club is not far, and I should be delighted if you would consent to dine with me.”
Carlisle smiled broadly, and Dominic had an uncomfortable feeling he saw something funny in the affair. “Thank you,” he said easily. “I should enjoy that.”
The meal fulfilled none of Dominic’s fears, in fact it was extremely pleasant. Carlisle did not mention politics at all and proved an agreeable companion, talking neither too little nor too much. When he did speak he was cheerful, and occasionally witty.
Dominic thoroughly enjoyed it and determined to repeat it as soon as opportunity arose. He was thinking along these lines when he found himself outside again, where the wind was sharper and beginning to carry a fine rain. Carlisle hailed a cab immediately, and, to Dominic’s astonishment, fifteen minutes later he was deposited in a filthy back street where precarious houses huddled together like a lot of drunken men supporting each other before the final collapse.
“Where in God’s name are we?” he demanded, alarmed and confused. The street was swarming with children, noses running, clothes dirty; women sat in areaways, hands blue with cold, presiding over rows of worn-looking shoes; and light glimmered from below-street rooms. The whole air was pervaded with a stale, sour smell he could not identify, but it clung to the back of the nose, and he seemed to swallow it with every breath. “Where are we?” he said again with mounting fury.
“Seven Dials,” Carlisle replied. “Dudley Street, to be precise. Those people are secondhand shoe sellers. Down there”—he pointed to the rooms below pavement level— “they take old shoes or stolen ones; remake them out of the bits