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wedded bliss.”
` “What an interesting remark,” Mrs. Morrow said, with some surprise. “But I assure you
that neither of the Weavers cultivated social standing. He was too pompous to socialize with any
man below him in rank and they were all, you see, below him in rank.”
“Earlier today he told me that he breakfasted daily with the other retired men, here at the
Club. Said he did just that on the morning that his wife was killed.”
“And so he likely did, if by breakfasting you mean a group of men sitting silently about a
drawing room, each reading their separate newspapers and eating their kippers. Women generally
demand more of their friendships, but Rose’s only true companions were her complaints and her
ailments.”
`
“Have you met their son?”
“No,” Mrs. Morrow said. “He draws attention as he sits among the group, as does
anyone new, but we have not been introduced. Have you?”
“Unfortunately, yes. My impression is that the man combines the worse traits of both
parents. The bombast of the stepfather and the weakness of the mother.”
“Ah,” said Mrs. Morrow. “Then ‘tis a pity indeed he was seated beside your friend, that
nice young Miss Kelly. Look at him working over her. Trying to debone her as if she were this little
squab.”
***
“The flowers are lovely, are they not?” Michael Everlee said, leaning so close to Emma
that she could smell his cologne. “Orchids, you know.”
“Yes,” Emma said vaguely, for she was struggling with the latest dish of the evening, a
dainty bird perched whole on a silver plate. “They are such a rarity at home, that it is a shock to see
them growing in such profusion.”
“They remind me of women, you know.”
“Women?” she said, even more vaguely.
“The shape. So reminiscent of certain delights.”
“Of course,” she said, not understanding at all. She was beginning to wonder if Everlee
was mad. He had talked incessantly since they were seated, but had revealed nothing of
consequence. Although the wine was flowing freely around the table he had also brought in a cocktail
from the drawing room, which she had thought rather crass, but she wasn’t sure. For a group who
held protocol in such high esteem, the Byculla Club seemed to have no rules about drinking
whatsoever.
Now Everlee raised this same cocktail glass in her direction and said “These are called
pegs and do you know why?”
“Because each one is a peg in your coffin?”
“Quite right,” he said, setting down the glass. “And so you are clever. What a profound
disappointment.”
“I say, Everlee,” said a man sitting across the table, leaning forward to disrupt their
conversation to Emma’s great relief. “Are you here to see the historical marker?”
It was a potentially painful question, Emma thought with a wince. Most of the people in
the room presumably knew that the marker the man referred to was a plaque that had been placed in
honor of Roland Everlee. While the Thursday Night Murder Games group had traveled through the
Suez, Geraldine had explained that construction was underway on a large memorial at the site of
Cawnpore, but that the project was far from complete. All that presently marked the spot was a well