Excitement trembled through her. She was going to be out all night. For all her antics and peccadillos, she had never done anything like this before.
“Oh look! There’s one!” Olympia took one step out into the street and waved over an approaching hackney with her usual easy confidence. The driver slowed and pulled to the side.
Her friend strode up to the door and pulled it open. She waved for Prim to precede her into the coach.
Primrose moved forward and then hesitated at the door. She glanced uncertainly at Olympia and inquired with a stab of misgiving, “Are you certain?”
“Don’t lose your courage now,” Olympia cheered.
Prim’s chin shot up. She was in no way dissuaded from this evening’s adventure. It was her idea, after all. Only she had not thought through the matter of transportation to their destination when she had declared this night’s plan.
Mama always insisted that public conveyances were common and for ordinary folk, which the Ainsworths basically were, but Prim knew better than to point that out. It would only spark Mama’s temper.
The coachman called down impatiently. “Are ye coming or not? I’m not making a fare sitting here waiting on ye lasses.”
Primrose blinked. Never had anyone outside of her family spoken to her in such a direct manner.
Tonight, she imagined, would be a night of many firsts.
“We’re ready,” Prim answered. With a decisive nod, she ascended into the coach and settled onto the well-worn squabs. Olympia followed, calling up directions to the coachman as she did.
They fell back as the coach lurched forward, their hands falling onto the seat for steadying support.
“Ack!” Olympia exclaimed, lifting her hand from the velvet squabs. “There’s something sticky on the fabric.”
Primrose shuddered and carefully settled her hands into her lap so that they would no longer make contact with the cushion.
Olympia continued, “I don’t even want to imagine what it could be.”
Primrose nodded. “I wouldn’t.”
Olympia fished out a handkerchief from her reticule dangling from her wrist. She wiped clean her palm.
Olympia sighed with a nod. “Well, we are on our way now. Perhaps the hack we take on the return home will be nicer.”
Prim would worry about that later. There was a score of other things to consider before then. Such as reaching Vauxhall. They still had yet to do that. One obstacle at a time.
As the coach continued its journey, they both reached for their dominos. Prim helped Olympia when the ribbons of her mask became tangled in her lush dark curls, admiring them as she did so. What she wouldn’t give for Olympia’s raven locks. Her canary-yellow gown complemented her dark hair and skin perfectly.
Olympia followed suit, securing Prim’s domino in place by tying the ribbons at the back of her head. It was a strange and liberating sensation to have her hair swept up off her neck.
When they arrived at the waterfront, several groups were already waiting for boats to take them down the Thames to the South Bank. Some groups were large. Some were not groups at all, but rather pairs, like Olympia and Primrose. All the ladies present were accompanied by gentlemen.
That gave Prim pause.
“Um. Olympia?” she murmured as scrutiny fell on them. Them. Two lone females.
Clearly there was an element of danger to their adventure that she had not considered until this moment. Well, in a fashion. She’d always recognized there was risk. That was why she had decided to sneak out to Vauxhall, of all places. She wanted something that made her heart race to happen, and Vauxhall was the sort of place where things happened.
She wanted something to look back on when Mama was dragging her from one event to the next, forcing her to dance with gentlemen she deemed suitable.
Gentlemen with bad breath and furry teeth and long nose hairs who happened to be decades older than Prim. In short, gentlemen not of the man-boy variety.
“You there! You two!” A woman in a garish red gown waved them over. She and two other ladies were climbing into an awaiting boat. A single gentleman accompanied them.
The boatman followed the lady’s gaze, spotting Olympia and Primrose. “We have room for two more! Come on with ye!”
Locking arms, Olympia and Primrose hastened forward over the dock.
Primrose dug a coin from her reticule and passed it into the hand of the waiting boatman, who then assisted them down into the vessel.
Clinging to each other for support within the less-than-steady conveyance, they sank down on one of the rows’ plank seats.
“Thank you,” Prim murmured to the lady in red and her companions as the boatman pushed off from the bank.
“Not at all, not at all, my dear,” the lady chirped. “You looked a little lost up there on the dock and we had room for two more.”
Prim and Olympia exchanged looks.
“This is our first visit to Vauxhall,” Prim admitted.
“Oh la!” The lady in red slapped Primrose lightly with her fan. “You are in for a treat!”
The lone gentleman in their midst spoke up. “How old are you gels?”
“Reggie! For shame! You never inquire a lady’s age,” one of the other women in the boat admonished.
Reggie shrugged. “They barely look out of the schoolroom.” He moistened his fleshy lips. “A fine pair of morsels they will make for some pair of libertines this eve.”
Primrose felt her eyes widen behind her domino.
Olympia patted her hand reassuringly as she replied, “Indeed. Libertines far more polite than you, I am sure.”
The other ladies laughed at her quick rebuttal.
Reggie scowled.
Obviously, Olympia was accustomed to the flirtations of lecherous gentlemen. Of course, she received numerous advances. She must. Not that she ever mentioned anything of the sort to Primrose, but she was lovely and would obviously come with a considerable dowry.
“Well done,” Prim murmured.
Olympia shrugged. “As the daughter of an illustrious opera singer who hosts parties touting an assortment of colorful personages, I’m not entirely naïve in the ways of the world.”
“Oh stop trying to scare them, Reg. Clearly, it does not work,” the lady in red chided, and then turned back to Prim and Olympia. “Stay together. You will be fine, but don’t go off on a darkened walk with anyone, lest you know what you are about.” She dipped her chin and widened her eyes meaningfully.
Primrose nodded in understanding.
She might not be the most experienced in the ways of Society, but she was not naïve in the ways of the world. As the youngest of four sisters, and largely ignored by her family, she had overheard all manner of conversations not meant for her tender ears. Even their few servants tended to speak freely around her, as though she were simply part of the wallpaper. She was an expert observer.
Water lapped at the sides of the boat in a rhythmic cadence. The boatman worked steadily, the oars dropping and pulling through the water on either side of them its own lulling song.
Other boats dotted the dark waters of the Thames, some bigger, some actual ships with men crawling the riggings as deftly as monkeys and preparing for their imminent docking. She had never actually been on the river before. Her glimpses of it had been only from afar as she traveled in a conveyance, squashed on a seat between her sisters.