Page 63 of The Trouble with Anna

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s our betting book—I had it specially designed with blank pages inside.”

Anna gave a choked laugh. “Your gran might wonder if you show a sudden interest in being proper.”

“Gran has many wonderful qualities, but her eyesight isn’t one of them. She’ll think I’m reading dirty novels again and stay well away.” Charlotte ran her finger down a neat row of figures. “Look at this! I took nineteen bets last night. Makes your four look rather paltry, no?” She blew a curl off her nose. “It’s slow going, with these low-stakes bets. The real money is at gentlemen’s clubs, and we’re not allowed in. Men! They’ll bet on anything dreadful, butthey do it from the privacy of their wretched clubs where women aren’t allowed.”

Anna clucked sympathetically. “You’d love to bet on something dreadful.”

“Of course I would!”

“But you have plenty of money? Your allowance quite shocks me.”

“I don’t have five thousand pounds. Anyway, my allowance is from my brother. It’s notmine. I’m not free to do as I wish.”

Anna barked a laugh. “Many would bless the fact.”

Charlotte snapped the betting book shut. “Don’t say that! How tired I am of hearing such things.Oh, Charlotte, how spoiled she is. Oh, Charlotte, how outrageous.”

Anna’s face fell. “I’m so sorry. I only meant to tease.”

“I’m tired of teasing! I have ideas of my own, you know. Sometimes I think I’ll burst unless Ido something.”

There was real hurt in Charlotte’s voice, and Anna knew it all too well. She’d lived with that same suffocation her whole life, trying to squeeze herself into smaller and smaller spaces. “Charlotte, I apologize. You have the best ideas of anyone I know, truly.”

Charlotte let out a huff. “I’ve tried to explain it to Gran. You know how she is, so traditional. She keeps telling me to find a husband and make what I want out of him.” She made a rude noise. “I want to make something ofmyself.”

Anna leaned closer. “What would you do if you had your own money? Real money?”

“Start a silk mill with Josephine.” Charlotte clapped a hand over her mouth and looked over at Anna with wide eyes.

“But that’s bloody brilliant!” Anna exclaimed into a sudden hush. The two young women, their betting book between them, found themselves the center of a circle of slow-blinking attention.

Charlotte blinked slowly once herself, then dropped the hand from her mouth and gave the room a wide smile. She flashed thecover of her pink book at their audience. “Etiquette. Fiery stuff, you know. We were just discussing how wicked it is to eavesdrop.”

The Dowager gave a dark harrumph and conversation began to rumble through the room again.

Anna dropped her voice. “A silk mill would be marvelous! You know everything about fabric and no one has better taste than you.”

“I’ve thought about it for ages and even sketched out patterns. Josephine too! She knows the business and she’s wildly clever, and of course, I know everyone. And we would only employ women. No more men controlling the purse strings. No more men controlling anything!”

“Exactly. It would beyours, from the floor to the rafters.”

Charlotte nodded. “Mine, whether it’s a success or a failure.”

Anna’s eyebrows squished together as she thought it through. “We’d need alotof money, though. Can we up our stakes?”

Charlotte consulted her little pink book again. “We don’t have the funds to cover larger bets yet.”

An idea came to Anna, impossibly bold. “I’ll sell a horse.”

Charlotte rolled her eyes. “Oh, hurrah! Except that you’ve only said a million times that if you sell Chatham horses, the money belongs to Chatham.”

“I have another horse in mind. A rare, expensive one that belongs entirely to me.”

Charlotte frowned. “What other horse could you possibly—” Her mouth dropped open. “No!”

“Oh yes.”

“You wouldn’t!”

---