Page 108 of A Gentleman's Wager
The following evening took them all to the heart of the original hall in the east wing, the so-called Great Hall. Perhaps it had once lived up to its nomenclature. Not so, currently. It was little but rotting boards and cobwebs. Rank with damp and foetid with mildew. Drapes that had once covered the four windows that towered above the blackened oak wainscoting now sat in a festering, moth-bitten heap.
The purpose of the visit was restoration. Lucerne intended to re-open the currently sealed sections of Lauwine. Thus, he and the marquis were busy atop ladders, measuring and examining, while Charles, occupying the room’s only piece of functional furniture acted as self-appointed scribe.
Louisa had found her way into the minstrel gallery—a broad balcony up near the rafters accessed by a quaint tightly wound stair nestled in the juncture between the inner and outer walls. The air wasn’t so choking up here, plus it gave her the opportunity to observe without being obliged to be of service, while simultaneously sparing the awkwardness of interactions with Pennerley post coitus.
They’d shared a bed. She’d sat astride his chin and taken his cock in her cunny. It was difficult to look at him in entirely the same way. For a short time, they had been of one mind, one purpose. Now that was done, it was difficult to comprehend what precisely they were to one another. Not friends, nor lovers in the obvious sense. He caught her watching and blew a discreet kiss. It puckered her cheeks.
Curious. Only a day ago, she’d probably have quaked for an hour if he’d singled her out in such a way.
“What are you doing hiding up here?” Bella emerged from the narrow, arched entrance that led up from the floor below.
Louisa instantly endeavoured to wipe all the lewd remembrances from her mind. “Nothing much.” She rested her chin on her folded arms. Below, Lucerne was lighting the great iron cartwheel candelabra, and the scent of dusty beeswax was drifting upwards.
“Vaughan has Charles in fear of his life,” Bella planted her back to the balustrade. “But he won’t say why. I do wonder if I should ask Vaughan directly, though I don’t suppose he’ll reply other than to tell me to mind my nose.”
“Most likely you wouldn’t like the answer even if he did supply it,” Louisa muttered into her sleeve. She had not told Bella anything of what had occurred, even though they had spent the entire evening together. Bella, if she had noticed Louisa’s quietness, had not remarked upon it, but contentedly rattled on about all the local gossip and Mrs Castleton’s news.
“Lou? Do you know something? And if so, what? And how the devil did you learn it?”
Louisa bit her cotton sleeve. Ever since Vaughan had departed her room with the intention of collecting his winnings, she’d been bracing herself for Bella finding out about the wager. What she’d hoped, was that she wouldn’t have to be the one to tell. Yet, she could not maintain a façade of ignorance. “Charles owes him for a gambling debt.”
Miraculously, the strain knotting up her abdomen didn’t show in her voice.
“I didn’t think Pennerley condescended to playing cards.”
“Bella, it wasn’t that sort of wager.”
“No?” Bella’s brows rumpled. She jogged her head from side to side as she tried to fathom an alternative. “What else have they found to bet upon? Being here at Lauwine is a romp compared to the normal Reeth and Grinton tedium, but—”
“Us.” Louisa said, cutting her short.
“Whatever does that mean? Us.” Bella aped her delivery.
There was nothing for it. She would have to explain. Louisa drew herself up to her full four foot eleven inches. “Please try to stay calm.” She clasped hold of Bella’s arm as if the hold might restrain her. “They wagered sixty guineas that Pennerley could bed us both before Lucerne tupped you, and Frederick me. Now Vaughan has won, thus he demands prompt payment, while Charles quibbles over delivering it so soon.”
Bella’s mouth opened. Her eyes crossed. “But…” She floundered; mouth open. “I don’t… But you haven’t. You wouldn’t. Have you?”
Louisa timorously looked up through her eyelashes.
“Christ, Louisa!” She grasped her fast by the shoulders. “When? How? Did he force you? Is this why you’ve been trudging around so wan? I thought it was over Wake—”
“It was, and no, he didn’t. Bella, I don’t want to get into the details of it, but please know it was my choice. And I don’t regret it.”
Here followed some very unladylike spluttering from her friend, whose cheeks bloomed puce, prompting Louisa to thump her on the back to encourage her breathing. When she did finally release a proper breath, it spilled forth along with a string of vulgar curses.
“Bella, keep your voice down.” Louisa tugged her away from the edge of the balcony. “Tis a good thing there aren’t any other ladies present for they would surely faint dead away to hear you use such language. I don’t know that a fishwife would e’en be so coarse.”
“My God!” Bella was not to be derailed in her outrage. “Sixty guineas. He wagered sixty guineas on his ability to tup us both. The absolute snake. How is it that you are so calm? You realise that’s less than he spends on a cravat pin.”
“There’s no gain to be had from anger.” That Vaughan had agreed to a wager with Charles was irrelevant. It had no bearing on what she had chosen to do. The fact was, that for individual reasons, they had both sought to hurt Frederick Wakefield. Whether they had accomplished that by lying together remained to be seen, but it felt like a form of victorious revenge, nonetheless.
Bella stood shaking her head furiously. “You’re not making any sense. Why would you do that? I thought you hated him. Didn’t you blame him for Wakefield’s leaving. Didn’t he behave monstrously to you the night of the ball?”
“You swore you hated him too, but happily let him prick you.”
Momentarily chastened, Bella bit her lip, but her anger could not be contained. It made the very air around them bristle. “I do hate him. You’ve no idea what is going on.” She dived forth, clasping hold of the balustrade and leaning right over it. “You bastard,” she spat. Then she hurled herself into the stairwell.
By the time Louisa reached the bottom in pursuit, Bella had fled the hall. Lucerne stepped into Louisa’s path.
