She found Zach’s brothers and cousin there enjoying the spectacle now too.
“You will not stand!” Gabe roared.
“Any of you!” Nathan added.
“Row closer, in case any of you fall in and need saving!” Michael called.
“I say, Percy, have a care,” Sir Milton said as a plume of water headed their way as his oar slapped the water.
After some jostling, the boats managed to move apart and head closer to the bank.
“We need a recap. Plunge, do you remember how the last book finished?” the Duchess of Yardley asked him when they had stopped still a short distance away.
Mary watched as Monty pondered that.
“Oh for pity’s sake,” Alex Hetherington yelled from the bank. “How is it possible you cannot remember, Plunge? You read these books weekly, or so you told me.”
“My mind, you know, Hetherington,” Monty said, waving his lace-edged handkerchief about, “discards information at an alarming rate.”
“I’ll do it,” Cambridge Sinclair said from the middle of his family, who took up most of the room on the bank’s edge. “In the last book, it was decided Horatio—”
“Plunge, if you say one word,” Zach said. “You know those names were given to Captain Broadbent and Lady Nauticus for ease of reading.”
Mary muffled her laugh behind a glove as Monty tilted his head to the side, considering Cambridge Sinclair’s words.
“As I was saying, it was decided Horatio had yet to tell Dorothea he loved her,” Cambridge continued.
This was met with resounding boos from several of the spectators.
“As if a woman’s lot in life is not wretched enough, she has to wait for the man she loves to declare himself,” Lady Levermarch snapped.
“Exactly. Cad,” Dimity agreed.
“Yes, I can see how horrid your life is, my love,” Lord Levermarch drawled from beside Phoebe. She elbowed him in the side.
“It really is a crime to be that beautiful,” Mary whispered to Beth.
“Almost painful to look at due to her flawless beauty?”
“Exactly so,” Mary said.
“Ssssh!” the Duchess of Yardley hissed.
“They were also being attacked by Gallic Roosters, when Miss Pollycock appeared. Of course, she was our hero’s ex-fiancée, which did not sit well with our Dorothea.”
“Lady Nauticus, Plunge,” Nathan thundered as Monty opened his mouth again.
“But, as Captain Broadbent had just declared he would wed his lady, she was relieved,” Cam added. “They then were saved from the roosters and took tea. Eclairs, I believe were on the menu.”
“But of course they were,” Warwick Sinclair drawled.
“There is also the not insignificant matter of Cerise arriving on the pages of the last book.”
“Egads, yes,” Gabe drawled.
“A French lady of the night who is a double spy and… the mother of Lady Nauticus,” Cam added.
The crowd oohed.
