Read The Wedding Game for Free Online Page B

of the table, so there was some conversational relief. Constance, up at Gideon's end, would be unable to participate in any conversation at the far end of the table.
    “Did Gideon do any of the cooking this evening, Prue?” Chastity asked her sister as she sat down.
    “No, but he did choose the menu,” Prudence responded. She turned to the signorina. “My husband, Miss Della Luca, is a considerable chef.”
    “Oh, really . . . how unusual.” Laura looked askance. “You would never find an Italian man in the kitchen. Most unmasculine.”
    “Ah, yes,” Prudence said. “But the Italian character is perhaps a little different from the English. Englishmen are perhaps less concerned about their masculinity. It is perhaps more innate, would you not say, gentlemen?” She smiled at the men on either side of her.
    “I think it's probably more to do with the type of cuisine,” Max suggested swiftly. “Pasta, as I understand it, is very time-consuming to create. Women, by the very nature of things, have more time at their disposal.”
    “Oh, that's a generalization, Max,” Chastity put in, hoping to divert the conversation from the competitive advantages of Italy over England. “Not all women have nothing to do but lie around reading magazines and gossiping all day. Apart from anything else, they make up the majority of the domestic workforce.”
    “My point exactly.” He was deliberately goading now. “Domesticity is a woman's natural inclination, and the preparation of food is but one example. Wouldn't you agree, Judge?”
    “Just so, just so,” the judge agreed, nodding vaguely as he dipped his spoon with rhythmic concentration. “Excellent soup, Lady Malvern. I congratulate your cook.”
    “Perhaps you can explain why so many of the best chefs are male,” Chastity said, seeing Laura Della Luca open her mouth. “In France, in particular. Are you well acquainted with France, signorina?”
    “Oh,
mais oui.
Paris is my second home.”
    “I thought that was the Uffizi,” Prudence remarked into her plate, but too softly for the signorina to hear, since she was expatiating at great length on the glories of the Louvre, in which she seemed to take a personal pride.
    It continued in this fashion throughout dinner. Laura Della Luca dominated the conversation, dragging it remorselessly back to her own opinions whenever someone managed to create a diversion. Even Chastity gave up.
    It was with relief that Prudence caught Gideon's eye at the end of the meal and rose from the table. “Ladies, shall we withdraw?”
    The gentlemen all rose to help the ladies to their feet and waited until the female half of the dinner party had left the dining room.
    Prudence led the way back to the drawing room, where coffee was laid ready for them. “I understand, Contessa, that you have bought a house in Mayfair,” she said, pouring coffee and handing the cup to the footman to deliver.
    “Yes, in Park Lane,” the contessa said. “A very gracious house.”
    “Not as large or commodious as our villa outside
Firenze,
” put in her daughter.
    “It is quite large enough for our purposes,” her mother said, taking the coffee from the footman. “With a very pleasant garden.”
    “And, of course, you have Hyde Park opposite,” Constance said. She glanced at Chastity, who seemed to be sunk in reverie. “We always used to enjoy riding there. Do you remember, when we were children, Chas?”
    Chastity looked up from her contemplation of her coffee cup. “I beg your pardon . . .”
    “Riding in Hyde Park,” Constance said. “We used to enjoy it.”
    “Yes, oh, yes.” Chastity seemed visibly to pull herself back into the room. “I still do, but we don't often get the chance. Our horses are in the country, and I don't really like the job horses the stables have for hire.”
    “Oh, I would never hire a riding horse,” declared the signorina with a wave of her thin hand. “Their mouths are so hard.”
    “My stepdaughter rides