“I’m happy to tell you about the wedding trip.Paris is…delicious.But the newspapers have robbed me of much of the fun I had there.I’m here to enjoy your good company and your help.”
“What do you need, sweetheart?”her father asked, his brow quite wrinkled.
“Your friends.”
His mouth spread in a wicked grin.“How and when would you like them?”
“Here to reacquaint me with them say…perhaps…two weeks from now?”
Liv laughed, a hand upon the rise of her belly.“I can do that.”
“How soon now—?”Ada asked.
“The doctor estimates the first of September.”
“Another big baby then?”
Liv cast a rueful eye at her husband.“What else might we have in this family?”
“I don’t want to burden you with my needs.That’s why I’m hoping you could have a dinner party to announce my arrival in the town.A newspaper piece.Something showy.”
“I imagine,” Killian said, “we should invite the town council.”
“Yes, the mayor and town council.The church leaders of St.Anne’s, St, Paul’s and All Saints.The men who run old Prince Regent’s Royal Pavilion for the city.Who have I left out?”
Killian chuckled.“The lady who runs the lending library in the Lanes?”
“Exactly.We should have her too.”
Liv said, “Poor woman.She hands out leaflets for the women’s vote.Many a customer she’d lost because of it, too.”
Ada acknowledged that with a nod.“All the more reason to have her.She’ll add more lustre to our stance that women should have the right.”
“Victor endorses that?”Killian was surprised.
“And the new marriage bill in Parliament.He believes a woman can handle her own money.”She winked at her father.
“Ahhh,” he crooned, his Irish lilt strong in his voice.“And who could deny a woman such a thing, eh?”
“Not you.Not Victor, either.”She was happy to leave this topic for now and go to one less weighty.“There are a few other things I’ll need and I hope you can help me, Liv.”
“Name it, my dear.”
“I wonder if I might borrow your cook for a week or so.Perhaps a scullery maid, too.A few pots and pans.The new house has a meager supply of everything and if I’m to host weekly teas, I must quickly get up to snuff.”
Liv crossed her arms, an approving grin upon her face.“Weekly teas.Why I do like the idea.”
“Little teatime conversations,” Ada said with mischief in mind, “to acquaint the townsfolk with their potential new MP.”
“And his charming wife,” added her step-mother.
“His strongest supporter,” said her father.
By the third week in August, when many Londoners flocked down to Brighton on the train for a swim in the sea, Ada had already hostessed two of her afternoon tea parties for local dignitaries.Rather she should have called them Lemonade Parties because that had become the preferred beverage of her guests in the hot and sticky weather.This morning, she prepared for her third.
She thought she was ready.She had a new cook, a new scullery maid, two footman, china, silver service for tea, table linens, a bright Chinoiserie sapphire blue and yellow decor for her luxurious salon—and a bad case of nerves.
She was to receive today the mayor of Brighton, the three wealthy and influential members of the board of directors of the Cantwell Orphanage, the owner of the Albion Hotel, the haughty leader of the local Temperance Union—and her own husband.
