Lord John and the Private Matter by Diana Gabaldon

gleam in the Countess’s eye and the slight curve of her lips. His mother delighted in answering rhetorical questions.
    “No, don’t tell me,” he said hastily. “I don’t want to know.” The Countess pouted prettily, then folded her fan with a snap and pressed it against her lips in a token of silence.
    “Have you eaten, Johnny?” she asked, flipping the fan open again.
    “No,” he said, suddenly recalling that he was starving. “I hadn’t the chance.”
    “Well, then.” The Countess waved one of the footmen over, selected a small pie from his tray, and handed it to her son. “Yes, I saw you talking to Lady Mumford. Kind of you; the dear old thing dotes upon you.”
    Dear old thing. Lady Mumford was possibly the Countess’s senior by a year. Grey mumbled a response, impeded by pie. It was steak with mushrooms, delectable in flaky pastry.
    “Whatever were you talking to Joseph Trevelyan so intently about, though?” the Countess asked, raising her fan in farewell to the Misses Humber. She turned to look at her son, and lifted one brow, then laughed. “Why, you’ve gone quite red in the face, John—one might think Mr. Trevelyan had made you some indecent proposal!”
    “Ha ha,” Grey said, thickly, and put the rest of the pie into his mouth.

Chapter 6
    A Visit to the Convent
    In the event, they did not visit the brothel in Meacham Street until Saturday night.
    The doorman gave Quarry an amiable nod of recognition—a welcome expanded upon by the madam, a long-lipped, big-arsed woman in a most unusual green velvet gown, topped by a surprisingly respectable-looking lace-trimmed cap and kerchief that matched the lavish trim of gown and stomacher.
    “Well, if it’s not Handsome Harry!” she exclaimed in a voice nearly as deep as Quarry’s own. “You been neglectin’ us, me old son.” She gave Quarry a companionable buffet in the ribs, and wrinkled back her upper lip like an ancient horse, exposing two large yellow teeth, these appearing to be the last remaining in her upper jaw.
    “Still, I s’pose we must forgive you, mustn’t we, for bringing such a sweet poppet as this along!”
    She turned her oddly engaging smile on Grey, a shrewd eye taking in the silver buttons on his coat and the fine lawn of his ruffles at a glance.
    “And what’s your name, then, me sweet child?” she asked, seizing him firmly by the arm and drawing him after her into a small parlor. “You’ve never come here before, I know; I should recall a pretty face like yours!”
    “This is Lord John Grey, Mags,” Quarry said, throwing off his cloak and tossing it familiarly over a chair. “A particular friend of mine, eh?”
    “Oh, to be sure, to be sure. Well, now, I wonder who might suit? . . .” Mags was sizing Grey up with the skill of a horse trader on fair day; he felt tight in the chest and avoided her glance by affecting an interest in the room’s decoration, which was eccentric, to say the least.
    He had been in brothels before, though not often. This was a cut above the usual bagnio, with paintings on the walls and a good Turkey carpet before a handsome mantelpiece, on which sat a collection of thumbscrews, irons, tongue-borers, and other implements whose use he didn’t wish to imagine. A calico cat was sprawled among these ornaments, eyes closed, one paw dangling indolently over the fire.
    “Like me collection, do you?” Mags hovered at his shoulder, nodding at the mantelpiece. “That little ’un’s from Newgate; got the irons from the whipping post at Bridewell when the new one was put up last year.”
    “They ain’t for use,” Quarry murmured in his other ear. “Just show. Though if your taste runs that way, there’s a gel called Josephine—”
    “What a handsome cat,” Grey said, rather loudly. He extended a forefinger and scratched the beast under the chin. It suffered this attention for a moment, then opened bright yellow eyes and sharply bit him.
    “You want to watch out for Batty,” Mags