CHAPTER THREEThe dinner came to an end and, as the table was cleared, the Marquis looked around once again at the other guests and saw that the majority of the gentlemen had had too much to drink and so had some of the women.
This resulted in their behaving in a very familiar manner with one another and he thought that what would happen for the rest of the evening was very predictable and bore out Charlie’s contention that it would not amuse him.
The two foreign men on either side of the Duchess were obviously flattering her and whispering intimacies into her ears, vying with each other doubtless to excite her.
She was actually, the Marquis thought, the only woman in the room who was being enticed rather than attempting to entice, with the exception, of course, of Aspasia, who had been
