Mina gaped at him. “What?” she faltered. She surely had not heard him correctly. One of the horses tossed back its head and Nye was forced to release her to right his grip on the reins.
“Alright there, Nye?” called a voice, recalling Mina to her surroundings. Her bonnet had come loose and was hanging off her head. She made a grab for it and Nye swore under his breath.
“We’ll give it another go,” he said. “Later.”
“Er… yes,” Mina agreed, thankful for her reprieve. “Quite.”
She could see other figures milling round in the shadowy courtyard and felt horribly embarrassed they might have witnessed their awkward embrace.
“Reuben, hold her head!” Nye bellowed and Mina saw the man with the ginger beard spring forward to seize one of the horses as Nye clambered down. She had scarcely re-tied her bonnet, when Nye appeared at her side of the carriage and was holding a hand up for her to descend. Mina took it and precariously started to descend from the perch at the front. She only managed the first step and then found herself swung down with his hands at her waist.
“Get up to bed,” he said. “I’ll join you later.”
Mina’s face flamed as she turned away from him to scurry into the inn. He’d join her later? She hung up her cloak and bonnet and took a hurried wash in the scullery before hurrying up the staircase. She nearly spilled the wax from her candleholder when Ivy knocked on her door as she was setting it down on the bedside table. “Oh Ivy,” she said looking up with relief. “You did make me jump.”
“Just wanted to thank you for my gifts, Mrs. Nye,” Ivy said beaming. “Love a nice bottle of scent, I do, but you didn’t have to.”
“You’re most welcome,” Mina said, waving this aside. “And I wanted to. Do you think you’ll use the lotion? I wasn’t sure which type you favor...”
“Ooh yes, it’s ever such a nice one,” Ivy interrupted her. “Besides, I always has a different one each time!”
Mina sat on the bed and started efficiently braiding her hair. “Are you not serving at bar tonight, Ivy?” she asked.
“Not till after hours tonight,” she said with a wink, coming into the room and closing the door softly behind her.
“After hours?” Mina frowned, motioning to a chair. “How can you serve at bar when it closed?”
Ivy giggled. “You are a sheltered one and no mistake.” She sat in the chair and revealed a bottle she had been carrying under her arm. “Care to take a glass with me, Mrs. Nye?”
Mina changed her mind about her automatic refusal. After all, she was in dire need of some Dutch courage. Instead, she nodded. “Call me Mina,” she answered
Ivy’s eyes widened. “I couldn’t do that, Mrs. Nye. Wouldn’t be right.”
“Not even when no-one else is around?” Mina asked with a frown. First Edna and now Ivy. She sighed, feeling a little forlorn.
“Well, I dunno about that,” Ivy replied warily and produced two wine glasses out of her apron. She set them on the side and uncorked the bottle.
“How is it that you can serve an empty bar?” Mina persisted as Ivy poured. “Do you mean you are to do a stock-take?”
Ivy laughed merrily. “Lord bless you, he don’t let me do no stock-take,” she said, passing a brimming glass of red wine to Mina. “Very jealous Nye is about the state of his cellars. The one time I suggested it, you’d have thought I was a Customs and Excise man.” She picked up her own glass and held it aloft. “Here’s to a pair of shining eyes,” she toasted. Mina hastily held her own glass to chink with Ivy’s. She wasn’t sure whose eyes they were toasting, or if they were simply expressing a hope for their own. “Chin-chin,” Ivy added and took a liberal swig.
Mina took a tentative sip and found the wine to be very sharp yet simultaneously unpleasantly furry on her tongue. She plunked it down. “Very nice,” she lied.
“What it means,” Ivy said, leaning forward confidentially. “Is that there’s to be a lock-in tonight.”
“A lock-in?” Mina echoed, reaching for her bed socks.
“It’s when your regular patrons leave,” Ivy explained. “But a privileged few are permitted to remain after the doors is locked. And they’re permitted to carry on drinking till the early hours.”
“I see,” said Mina, drawing on her socks. “And what events determine its occurrence?”
“You what?” Ivy asked with a frown, knocking back the last of her wine and reaching for the bottle to pour another.
“I mean, is it a regular thing?” Mina asked, hastily rephrasing her question. She remembered Nye’s comment earlier about her being somewhat verbose. “Occurring say, once a month?”
Ivy’s expression of confusion lifted. “Oh!” she said. “I take your meaning now.” Once she’d refilled her glass, she held the bottle up with a quirk of her eyebrows.
“No thank you,” Mina said hastily, taking another miniscule sip of her own drink.
“Well,” said Ivy, resting her glass lovingly against her bosom. “It ain’t as straightforward as all that. You see, sometimes they’ll have ones with the regulars. Now, I don’t usually have no part in them ones, I just retires at the usual time and Nye serves at bar. Then other times it’ll be when the prizefighters are here overnight. I’ll usually serve at those, cos they likes a pretty face and Nye’s usually down to fight.”
“The night I arrived was one such night,” Mina said aloud. “Though I believe Edna was serving at bar.”
“I was rushed off my feet that night,” Ivy agreed easily enough. “Oftentimes you need two behind bar on such a night.”
“How often are prizefights held here?” asked Mina, reaching for her blue woolen shawl and wrapping it around her shoulders. She seemed to remember she’d had the impression Ivy had been with one of the fighters in a bedroom on the second floor, but perhaps she’d had that wrong.
“Oh, fairly regular,” said Ivy vaguely. “Usually have at least one bout a month.”
Mina wetted her lips with the red wine thoughtfully. “So… tonight’s is just a local lock-in?” she said. “Why is Nye not hosting this one?”
“We sort of takes it in turns,” Ivy replied easily. “See, sometimes he sits with Gus and Reuben and a few others and they’ll be in deep discussion all night.”
Mina considered this and could not help but think it rather odd. “Reuben is the one with the ginger beard is he not?”
“Yes, that’s him,” agreed Ivy. “He’s odd job man and stable hand around here.”
From the brief interactions Mina had seen between him and Nye, they did not seem to be on such terms. She wondered what on earth they could find to discuss so intently. Then a thought occurred to her. “So, if you’re behind the bar tonight then Nye must be intending to confer with his friends,” she said with some relief.
“Friends?” Ivy’s eyebrows shot up. “I wouldn’t call them that exactly. If he has any, it’s that prizefighter crowd. Anyway,” she said. “I wanted to hear what happened this afternoon. What’s this about you some gentleman importuning you in the private parlor?”