Page 77 of Miss Dashing
“While avoiding the near occasion of locked linen closets.” He waited until Hecate had knocked and been admitted, and he was still lounging across the corridor when she closed the study door.
“One cannot find proper rest in the country,” Portia said, dropping a third lump of sugar into her tea. “The wretched birds, the bellowing cows, the neighing horses… I forget what sheep do—something that begins with a B—but it’s most unpleasant to the ear. They all make such a racket, and then the sun is so disgustingly bright and at such an unspeakably early hour. I vow my head will never recover from this enforced rustication.”
Flavia, who had made it out of bed and even changed into a morning dress, regarded her from the escritoire by the window.
“Drink your tea, Porry. Whether we are in Town or the wilds of Hampshire, you are never fit company until your third cup. Though as to that, what were you thinking, sampling the brandy last night?”
Portia had done more than sample the brandy. She’d allowed Johnny to be a bad influence, at which he apparently excelled. Between them, they’d downed a considerable portion of Nunn’s library stock.
“A nightcap aids with sleep,” Portia said, stirring her tea. “Any dowager admits as much. If you must scold me, please keep your voice down.”
The maids had come and gone, but they had a way of circling back with a fresh pot or flowers or some other excuse to eavesdrop on their betters. Portia sipped her tea and wished she’d thought to ask one of the maids for a headache powder.
But then, Mama would doubtless get wind of that request, and an interrogation would follow.
“You deserve a scolding,” Flavia said. “I know Johnny is a cousin of some sort, but he’s also a grown man, and we don’t really know him that well. If Mrs. Roberts hadn’t assured me she’d remain in the library for the duration, I would have been kept awake until all hours watching you make a fool of yourself with Johnny.”
Portia tried a bite of toast. “I did not make a fool of myself. I merely kept up with him. I took one sip for every two of his—his rules—and won sixpence off him. I took very small, almost invisible sips, Flavie, so don’t be a nag.”
Had Mrs. Roberts been there the whole time? Lurking on the mezzanine perhaps. The evening’s details were a bit hazy.
Flavia regarded her with something that looked very like pity. “You undertook a drinking contest involving strong spirits and an unattached gentleman. Portia, that will not serve.”
Portia’s conscience, when last she’d consulted that tiresome article, did not care in the least that Flavia had turned up puritanical at this late date. Flavie had no sense of adventure and was doomed to live a dull life. Portia’s inherent shrewdness nonetheless admitted the rebuke was deserved.
If Johnny got to boasting in his clubs, if he let the wrong words slip over cards with fellow former officers…
“I’ll give him back his sixpence and swear him to secrecy, but honestly, once I get him compromised with Hecate, he will be forever in my debt, and you will think me the greatest genius ever for putting him there. Besides, Johnny is almost as aged as Mr. DeGrange. Tippling with him is nearly like tippling with an old uncle.”
Flavia spread jam on a croissant and did so without creating the usual cascade of crumbs. “We saw Johnny and Mr. DeGrange in the altogether, Porry. They are nobody’s doddering uncles, and you have been foolish.”
Portia set aside the tea tray, flipped back the covers, and pushed to the side of the bed. “I’m foolish because I engage in the occasional minor diversion? Foolish because I make the smallest inconsequential wager when ruralizing at the family seat? Flavia, I despair of you. We are no longer schoolgirls, and gentlemen like a woman with a bit of dash. We will be in ourthird Seasonnext year, and you know what that means.”
Flavia bit off the end of her croissant and munched placidly, like the silly cow she was. Three Seasons and no offers was tantamount to ruin, only without the adventures.
“Porry, you are apparently intent on getting Johnny compromised with Hecate, so why does it matter if he likes a woman with a bit of dash? You don’t need to attract his notice. You plan to solve all his problems by discovering him inflagrante linen closet-owith the family heiress. Instead, you have given him the worst sort of gossip—true gossip—aboutyou.”
Portia steeled herself for the rush of pain that always followed upon rising after a bit of indulgence. She stood, and the pounding in her temples became the afflictions of the damned.
“Please don’t make me cross, Flavie. I will say things I regret if you make me cross.”
“You should be regretting what you did last night, Portia. I found you asleep in the window seat on the landing.”
“No, you did not. I’d recall that if you did.” A vague wisp of memory, of cold glass at Portia’s back and Flavia undressing her, tried to intrude.
“You doubtless waved off the maid who was to light you up, and that will have caused talk belowstairs.”
Flavia was beginning to sound a lot like Mama, and Mama lately had taken to sounding like Hecate.
“I hate the countryside.” Portia’s mind, still a bit foggy—from excessive fatigue, of course—lit upon a consoling thought. “Perhaps I need a tonic.”
“You need a spanking,” Flavia said, rising. “Let’s get you dressed.”
A spanking, like a naughty girl. On any other day, that comment would have been merely the sort of annoying observation Flavia was prone to, one of a hundred petty vexations Portia brushed aside in a morning.
“Don’t be insulting, Flavia. If I’m currying favor with Johnny, I’m doing it for you and Mama. When he has control of Hecate’s fortune, you will thank me for humoring him last night.”
Flavia disappeared into the dressing closet and emerged with a muslin day dress at least three years out of fashion. Little better than a schoolgirl’s rag.
