Pride and Percabeth

Chapter Seventeen

"Mermaids off the port bow, Lieutenant," Jason announced to Percy.
"Any whiff of a proposal?" Miss Chase continued.
"No, not yet," Miss McLean replied.
"My,my, my..."
"Are you going to propose to Miss McLean?" Percy asked Jason.
"I love her," Jason said. "And I wish to marry her. I plan on speaking to my parents about it."
"I'm happy for you, Grace."
"And I'll be happy for you when you and Miss Chase finally decide to put this ridiculous feud of yours aside and you decide to pop the question yourself."
"That will never happen."
"I distinctly remember you telling me that you were in love with her."
"Well, I was mistaken then."

After supper, the gentlemen retired to the smoking room for port and snuff. The newly built smoking room was decorated in the Turkish style: colorful and garish and filled with bright colors (particularly red, green, and gold), elaborate designs and patterns, gilt, and silk and velvet cushions and curtains.

A/N the smoking room was an English country house's answer to the man cave.

Percy sat on a sofa with young Di Angelo and they rehearsed their exchange of dialogue from act one: scene one: where Lysander and Demetrius argue over Hermia. Jason played whist with his father, the Duke.
"When are you going to propose to Dona Reyna?" The Duke asked.
"I think you mean Miss McLean, Sir?" Jason replied.
"No, Dona Reyna."
His Grace put down the Queen of Diamonds.
"Then you're mistaken. Miss McLean is the one I'm in love with."
Jason placed the Queen of Hearts the to the Queen of Diamonds. Heart was the trump suit, so Jason won this trick.
"She's pretty, I've give you that, but Dona Reyna is every bit as handsome. Miss McLean is a lovely little rustic but Dona Reyna is a duchess if I've ever seen one."
"I hold Dona Reyna in the highest esteem but I don't see her as a wife."
"And why not? She's beautiful, intelligent, well-bred, wealthy, and boasts one of the most illustrious pedigrees in all of Spain. You could even take little Miss McLean as your mistress, once she's properly married herself, of course."
Jason put down his hand of cards.
"Sir, you insult Miss McLean by suggesting such a thing."
"Alright. I apologize."
His Grace took a sip from his glass of port punch.

"I married a pretty face for love and I tell you: it doesn't matter if you marry a goddess you adore or a gorgon you despise, the pleasures of marriage are short lived."
"Though you've hardly been a model husband."
"And what do you mean by that, boy?"
The Duke threw his hand down on the  table. His glass of punch wobbled off of the table and came crashing to the ground.
"I know about Miss Alcmene in London and her love child and Mrs. Leda in Olympus, right under my mother's nose, and her two little bastards. No wonder mama is always tipping opium."
Zhang entered the drawing room with a fresh bowl of punch and new box of snuff. His Grace walked past him and out the door in huff.
"Will you be needing anything else?" Zhang asked Jason.
"No," Jason replied. "That'll be all, Zhang."
Zhang turned to leave.
"Wait! Have a drink with us."
Jason filled a glass with punch and handed it to him.
"Do you take snuff or do you smoke a pipe?"
"A pipe."
The snuff box was passed around. Percy, Di Angelo, and Jason each took a pinch and snorted it. Zhang settled into an armchair with a pipe that Jason had prepared for him.
Percy tried to drown the unpleasant events of the day in port punch but they bobbed at the surface like the lemons and oranges which floated inside the white and blue porcelain mixing bowl.

Damn you, Castellan, he swore. Of all the girls in the village, why did you have to ask Miss Chase for her favor? Of all people, why did you have to beat me in the race?"