“Beth. I wondered if you were lost. Your needlework is here. Are you coming back?” Her comment drew Beth’s reluctant gaze. She shook her head at the girl, reminding her of her promise to behave.
Beth sighed. “Cuz, I can’t sit still another minute. I’m going to take a walk, rain or no rain. I’ll try not to dampen our room with wet clothing from it.”
“Take a servant with you.”
Beth cast a hopeful glance back at the servant whose calves even Althea could appreciate and nodded.
Althea wondered what she’d find, given the number of additional structures they’d seen on the property as they made their way up the long driveway. Then she worried, given her cousin’s penchant for trouble. By the time she retired to change for dinner, Althea still had not seen Beth and her worry had climbed to distress.
Then Beth rushed in as a servant finished pinning Althea’s hair back. The bedraggled girl shucked her wet dress, borrowed Althea’s bath for a quick splash-through, and climbed into a more suitable and drier gown.
The dining room awed both women when they first entered, and they gazed around with open mouths. Fit for a palace, it seated every last guest, despite this house party being larger than most. The table appeared to be a solid slab of mahogany, and heavy Tudor chests shared wall space with more delicate glass-fronted hutches from the last century.
Dinner was a boisterous affair, everyone chattering with excitement as they found their seats. Wine ran freely into glasses, and the energy level and resulting noise rose with each course. Althea’s nerves ratcheted up with each roar of laughter and high-pitched giggle. She sat primly, her hands in her lap, wondering when she would be able to corner Lord Cheltenham for a serious conversation.
Beth kept eyeing her. Althea suspected her cousin thought she might bolt to hide in their room and was poised to stop her, which did indeed stop her. Althea barely ate, although each course put before her was more delicious than the last.
She watched their host as he laughingly deflected questions about the week’s activities, declining offers of suggestions and requests for games from previous years. He seemed in his element. And why shouldn’t he be? This was his home, his fête.
As the guests scraped the last of dessert from their plates, Cheltenham stood and raised his glass. “Ladies, gentlemen, and the rest of us—” He waited while the guests laughed obligingly. “—shall we?”
Beth and Althea followed the crowd to the east side of the main hall where the ballrooms sat. One was brightly lit, with some seating areas and a few musical instruments. The other was more dimly lit.
Althea tugged on their linked arms to direct her cousin to the right, toward the brighter room. As they passed, Lord Cheltenham stepped out of the darker doorway to pull in a quiet man with dark blond hair and a neatly trimmed beard who she vaguely recognized from a year ago. It appeared she was unlikely to get to speak to her host this evening then, unless she braved the darker room.
Not ready for that on the first night, she preferred to get the lay of the land.
When she slowed, Beth glanced at her. “Come, Althea. I shall stay close. There are card tables. I’m sure we can find people to play whist, and you love that game. You rarely lose.”
Althea cocked her head, considering.
“Remember what I said about it being worth some discomfort? ’Twill only get harder if you wait, as one of the maids told me the evening entertainments get bawdier each night of the party.”
Althea gulped.
“Come.” Beth caught her hand and tugged. When Althea stepped to follow her, her cousin looked back with an encouraging smile.
Clutching the hand she held as a lifeline, Althea glanced around the crowded room. Beth was already leading them to the card tables to one side. Cigar and cigarillo smoke hung over the area in clouds, and husky feminine laughter interlaced with men crowing floated through the mist.
As they found an unoccupied table, two men approached. Introducing themselves, they requested a game.
“What are the stakes?” Althea asked.
The men looked at her, surprised by the question. They glanced around at the other tables, and both ladies’ gazes followed theirs.
She gasped. The game wasstripwhist, the stakes were articles of clothing.
Her gaze darted to Beth’s, and she read her cousin’s silent message in her eyes.
We can do this. You are the best whist player I know. And oh! The housemaid told us to wear extra petticoats tonight and drawers—how helpful.
Althea was confident about two things despite her strict upbringing and marriage—managing her shop and her skills at this card game. Much of winning was watching people for tells, and she had mastered that by observing shoppers closely, to ensure she spent her time with buyers rather than browsers. She could do this.
She glanced around once more, then nodded to Beth and took the cards in hand. “Gentlemen, shall we draw for the first deal?”
An hour later, the gentlemen were in shirts, breeches, and hose and were debating whether the hose or the shirt would go next. Beth was, of course, offering her unsolicited opinion. “Shirts, please?”
Althea rolled her eyes as the men acquiesced, laughing and dragging their shirts off, adding them to the growing piles by their chairs.
