Alas, the next blow came precisely then. Lady Kingsley had prepared the seating chart the evening before, since Elissande had never dealt with rules of precedence. Elissande fully expected the seating to remain the same. To her dismay, however, Lady Kingsley produced a new seating chart for the evening, a chart that placed Lord Frederick three seats away from Elissande.
She hardly ate. The squeeze in her throat prevented any kind of meaningful swallowing—a whole day gone by, and she’d made no progress at all. Her uncle’s return, edging closer by the hour, was a chill between her shoulder blades, a chill no coat or fire could dispel.
The only silver lining was that Lord Vere had also been seated away from her. A very fortunate thing for him. If she caught him staring at her bosom one more time, she might just brain him with the epergne.
After dinner, the company played charades until quarter to ten. When her uncle was at home, this was usually the time when Elissande would gratefully bid him a good night and escape to the sanctuary of her own room. Last night, the ladies, after the ordeal of the rats, had retired at about the same time. Lord Vere, however, was determined to change things.
“The night is yet young,” he said. “Let us play something else.”
Miss Kingsley immediately took up his cause. “Oh, yes, do let us. May we, Auntie dearest?”
Lady Kingsley appeared hesitant.
“Oh come, Lady Kingsley,” wheedled Lord Vere. “There is no rule written in stone dictating that ladies must be in bed when the clock strikes ten.”
Elissande ground her teeth. She seemed to do that whenever Lord Vere made his presence known.
“Quite so. I say we play something else.” Miss Beauchamp joined the campaign.
“Well, the decision is not up to me,” said Lady Kingsley. “We are here at Miss Edgerton’s gracious hospitality.”
A chorus of pleas came at Elissande. There was not much she could say, other than, “Of course we can play something else. But what shall we play?”
“How about Pass the Parcel?” asked Miss Melbourne.
“We don’t have a parcel prepared,” said Miss Duvall. “I say La Vache Qui Tache.”
“La Vache Qui Tache makes my head hurt,” complained Lord Vere. “I can never remember who has how many spots. Something simpler, please.”
“Sardines,” Mr. Kingsley suggested.
“No, Richard,” said his aunt. “Absolutely not. No one is to run about the house disturbing Mrs. Douglas.”
“I know. Let’s play Squeak Piggy Squeak,” said Miss Kingsley.
Mr. Conrad quickly seconded the idea, followed by Lord Vere. The rest of the guests also voiced their consent.
“Well,” said Lady Kingsley, “it’s not something I truly approve of, but I suppose with both myself and Lady Avery present, you can’t get into too much trouble.”
The young ladies clapped to be allowed to stay up late. The gentlemen rearranged chairs. Elissande, who was unfamiliar with parlor games in general, asked Miss Beauchamp, “I’m sorry, but how does one play Squeak Piggy Squeak?”
“Oh, it’s quite simple,” said Miss Beauchamp. “We sit in a circle. One person is blindfolded and placed in the center of the circle. He is the farmer, and the rest of us are pigs. Someone spins the farmer three times around, then the farmer has to make his way to a pig and sit on the pig’s lap. The pig squeaks and the farmer guesses the identity of the pig. If he succeeds, the pig becomes the farmer. If not, the farmer goes on for another turn.”
“I see,” said Elissande. No wonder Lady Kingsley required two chaperones. For so many unmarried young men and women to be taking turns sitting on one another’s laps was, if not outright unseemly, at least a great deal less than decorous.
Mr. Wessex volunteered to be the first farmer. Mr. Kingsley blindfolded him and turned him about not three times but at least six. Mr. Wessex, who’d had a good few glasses of wine at dinner, wobbled dangerously. He stumbled toward Miss Kingsley. Miss Kingsley squealed and put out her arms to stop him from crashing directly into her person.
Mr. Wessex deliberately leaned his weight into her hands. Miss Kingsley squealed again. The other young ladies giggled. Mr. Wessex, suddenly not quite as unsteady, turned and sat down on Miss Kingsley’s lap.
“All right, my dear piggy, oink for me.”
Everyone laughed, except Elissande. It was one thing to hear the game described, quite another to see it in action. The extent of the contact between Miss Kingsley and Mr. Wessex dumbfounded her. The suddenly risqué atmosphere in the drawing room made her both unhappy and strangely curious.
Miss Kingsley squealed one more time.
“Hmm, yes, I know this little piggy. But a part of me wants to be the farmer for a bit longer yet.” Mr. Wessex crossed his legs and mused. “Dilemma, dilemma.”
Miss Kingsley laughed silently into her hands. Mr. Conrad forcefully opined that others deserved a turn to be the farmer. Mr. Wessex gave in to the pressure and identified Miss Kingsley, who, as the new farmer, promptly fell into Mr. Conrad’s lap and there stayed what seemed endless minutes, pondering her choices.
Good gracious, it was indecent.
And Lady Kingsley and Lady Avery allowed it? They did. The two of them sat a little behind Elissande, away from the game circle, Lady Avery talking animatedly, as she always did.
“…years ago, in a game of Sardines, she was hiding and he found her first and squeezed into the cupboard with her. They must have either thought her hiding place impenetrable or entirely forgot themselves. You should have seen her state of undress—and his!—when I went into the cupboard myself. So of course they had to marry.” Lady Avery sighed. “I do love a good game of Sardines.”
Elissande nearly screamed when somebody suddenly sat down on her lap. It was Miss Beauchamp, who tittered as if she’d been given an unhealthy dose of laughing gas.
“I can already tell it’s not a gentleman,” she said between bursts of mirth.
“How do you know?” asked Lord Vere, in all sincerity.
Behind Miss Beauchamp’s head, Elissande rolled her eyes.
“Silly, sir. Of course I know. My back is cushioned magnificently. I’m quite certain I don’t even need this piggy to make a noise to identify her. Such a marvelous bosom could only belong to our hostess. Miss Edgerton it is. Am I right?”
Elissande had to answer. “Yes, you are right, Miss Beauchamp.”
Miss Beauchamp leaped off Elissande’s lap and ripped off her blindfold. “I knew it.”
Now the blindfold went over Elissande’s eyes. She was spun, or so it felt, four and a half times to the left and then two and a half times to the right. So she should be facing more or less the same direction as she had when she first stood up from her chair.
Directly across from her was Lord Vere. She most certainly did not want to head that way. She turned tentatively to her right. A little more. Yet again a little more, perhaps? Would that be where Lord Frederick was?
What good sitting on his lap would do, she had no idea. But she’d rather land in his lap, if she must land in somebody’s lap.
Gingerly she set out in her chosen direction, her hands stretched out before her. But after a few steps, she stopped. The fireplace had crackled. The sound came from directly behind her, which meant that she was not headed for Lord Frederick.
She made a quarter turn to her left. In front of her someone whistled and to her right a woman chuckled. Did that sound like Miss Kingsley? If she were headed toward Lord Frederick, shouldn’t Miss Kingsley be more to her left than her right?
She scooted back a step or two. Was she returning to the center of the circle? She took another two steps—and stumbled backward over someone’s foot.
She gasped. And gasped again as a pair of strong hands caught her lightly by her waist. Deftly he righted her—it was a he; of that much she was sure. She was not built like a bird; none of the ladies present would be able to handle her weight so easily.