Crowned and Dangerous (A Royal Spyness Mystery) by Rhys Bowen Page A

say platitudes about it all being for the best and at least the chap had done the right thing. Fig would have a malicious gleam in her eye and say that everything she had heard about that family was that they were no good and this proved it. I looked around me like a trapped animal. I had to escape. I had to talk to somebody, but who? Belinda hadn’t had too much success with men herself. And she would probably say the same kind of thing as Binky. Given the circumstances, it was all for the best. That left me with two choices: my grandfather or the Princess Zamanska. I realized thatI hardly knew her but I had seen that she didn’t care a hoot for the rules of society. And she did care about Darcy.
    Then I decided that I needed to be hugged and comforted. The princess could come later. Right now I knew who I needed to be with. I put on my coat and hat hurriedly, before anyone could come out into the hall, and fled through the deserted smoggy streets to the nearest Underground station. When I disembarked an hour later at the quiet little stop at Upminster Bridge, the smoky London fog had turned to estuary mist, damp and curling about me. My footsteps echoed as I walked up the slope to my grandfather’s street. It felt as if I was the only person alive in the world.
    Granddad lived in a pleasant little semidetached on a quiet back street. It boasted a pocket-handkerchief-sized lawn on which stood three serious-looking gnomes. The rosebushes, so pretty in summer, stuck out dead bare branches, but a light shone through the leaded panes of the front door and I heard voices coming from inside. He was home but he had company. That was the last thing I needed right now, especially if it was his neighbor Mrs. Huggins, who was sweet on him and trying to lure him into matrimony. She was nosy and gossipy and I could say nothing in front of her. But I wasn’t going all the way back to Belgravia now. I rapped on the knocker and I heard my grandfather’s wheezing cough and a voice said, “Hold on. Hold on, I’m coming.” Then the front door opened.
    He peered out, frowned, then raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Blimey, love, you’re the last person I expected to see. Well, ain’t you a sight for sore eyes. Come on in, do. I was just about to have me tea.”
    “You’ve got guests?” I asked as I stepped into the narrow hallway and he shut the door behind me. “Because I don’t have to stay. . . .”
    “What? Oh, that. No, ducks, that’s just the wireless. Keeps me company. I’ll turn it off.” I hung my hat and coat on the pegs of the hall stand, then followed him to the kitchen. The voices were suddenly silenced. A steaming plate piled with what looked like steak and kidney pudding sat on the table.
    “Oh, you’re having your supper,” I said, never having got the terminology for meals of the lower classes quite right. Dinner at lunchtime and apparently tea at what would be for us an early dinner. “Sit down and eat it. Don’t let it get cold.”
    “Her next door brought it round for me,” he said. “Steak and kidney pud. My favorite. There’s plenty here. Can I get you some?”
    I shook my head. “I’m really not hungry, but I’ll have a cup of tea if there is one in the pot.” Another thing I had learned about people like my grandfather was that there was always a cup of tea in the pot. They drank it by the gallon and the kettle was always ready and hot in case a neighbor came to visit.
    “Of course there is,” he said. “Help yourself. The milk jug’s in the larder.”
    I poured a cup of tea then came to sit opposite him as he tucked into the pudding.
    “I’m glad you’ve still got a good appetite,” I said.
    He nodded. “She may be a bit of a nuisance but she certainly can cook. How’s that relative of hers getting along with you, then?” Mrs. Huggins was Queenie’s great-aunt.
    “Between the two of us she’s as hopeless as always,” I said and managed a smile. “I don’t think