Villiers's hands involuntarily curled into fists. He'd knocked the man out, taken all the boys away, and then spoken to a Bow Street magistrate he knew. Grindel was now in prison for life, but still he lay awake at night thinking about ripping the man's head from his body.
"Leopold!" Lisette called prettily. "Will you help me take down this lute?"
Normally he would have frozen out any person with the temerity to call him by name. Yet somehow Lisette disarmed his every criticism. It was an interesting realization that warranted further thought.
Out of the corner of her eye Eleanor saw Villiers trot after Lisette, but she didn't spare him a withering glance. Not that he'd be looking; the pathetic awe in his eyes when he looked at Lisette told its own story.
Instead, she hunched over and watched like a hawk to make sure that Tobias didn't try to palm any of the bones. She'd already caught him with one under his leg and another up his sleeve.
Across the room Lisette began tuning the lute. She had an angelic voice, and never seemed more the perfect lady than when she was singing. That was the sad thing about Lisette: it was no act. She was a lady... when she was a lady.
With an effort, Eleanor banished Villiers and Lisette from her mind. For the moment she just wanted to trounce this ill-tempered, ill-mannered, miniature Villiers. There was something about him that she liked. For one thing, he had been completely uncowed by her mother's glare.
They were tied going into the final game. He threw a perfect round. She countered. They switched to left-handed throws. Luckily, she was actually left-handed. He threw another perfect round, and again she countered. He returned to his right hand, but with a handicap of a bent little finger. Finally he missed. It was her turn.
She threw the ball, scooped—and the sixth knucklebone slid, smooth as butter, under her spreading skirts. She closed her fingers around the bones.
"You won!" Tobias cried, looking utterly shocked. "But I never lose."
She took a second to savor her victory. "That's likely because you've never played a woman before."
"You think girls are better at knucklebones than boys?" She'd seen that jutting jaw before. Villiers had it. Well, every boy had it when they were confronted with an unpleasant reality.
"I'm better than you are," she pointed out. "Why shouldn't the two of us stand as emblems for our sexes?"
He thought his way through that language. "I've played lots of girls before," he reported. "And I always win."
"Pride goeth before a fall," she said. And then she relented, grinning at him. "I cheated."
"What?" His voice suddenly dropped a register, taking on, in its disbelief, his father's low voice.
She whisked aside her skirt and showed him the hidden jack. "You should always count the bones when someone claims victory."
"I do always count the bones!" he cried. "Well, normally. But you're a lady!" His voice swooped from high to low. He would have his father's deep velvet tones someday.
"Your mistake," she said cheerfully. "I cheated—but I still won. You tried to cheat and you lost.
When I decided to cheat, I won because you didn't see it."
Tobias narrowed his eyes. "You're a strange lady."
"Very strange," Villiers said from above her shoulder.
"I have thought Eleanor strange since our nursery days," Anne laughed. She sounded a little drunk.
"Tobias," Eleanor said, ignoring them, "do you suppose that you're strong enough to haul me into a standing position?"
He jumped to his feet. "You're not so large." He had decided to like her, she guessed. Now that she had cheated. Men were strange, no matter the age. "I'll be taller than you in a month or so."
"You're as boastful as my dog," she told him. Sure enough, he managed to get her to her feet. She twitched her skirts so they flowed over her panniers.
He was longing to tell her that she was crazy and that dogs didn't boast, so she put him out of his misery. "My dog Oyster is a terrible braggart."
"What does he boast about?" Tobias asked.
"His tail, for one thing. He loves his tail. The problem is that he can't see it because he's too fat. So he goes around and around, barking so that I realize how important and beautiful and special that tail is."
Tobias had clearly learned not to laugh, because he just watched her with those curious, intent eyes that reminded her of his father. It made her itch to comfort him, which was absurd.
"Second, Oyster is ridiculously proud of his ability to defend me."
"Defend you? The nursemaid told me that he was the size of a piglet."
"I have to admit that there may be a certain resemblance. But my point is that he thinks he's very fierce. Extremely so. He likes to pretend that the fire andirons are about to attack me. He creeps up, attacks them savagely, and manages to save my life."