"Not as badly as I'd been prepared for," Brat said, watching her thin capable hand manipulating the glasses. That hand wouldn't lie soft and confidential and insinuating in one's own.
"Did Docket tell you how he got his wound?"
"Docket was at market," Bee said. "But we had hot buttered scones from Mrs. Docket."
"Dear Mrs. Docket. What did Miss Hassell give you?"
"Shortbread. She wasn't going to give us that, but she succumbed to Brat's charms." So Bee had noticed that.
"I'm not surprised," Eleanor said, looking at Brat over her glass. "And Wigsell?"
"Do you remember that brown horse of Dick Pope's? The one he swept the board with at Bath last year?"
"Certainly."
"Gates has bought it for Peggy."
Eleanor stopped sipping sherry and thought about this in silence for a moment or two.