“Do you know, I think I will, too,” Margaret said. “I don’t have any interest in getting drenched at my age.”
The woman’s kindness had lifted Evelyn, and she felt like she might actually be able to handle this. Seeing Mr. Van Borgh coughing into a napkin, she excused herself to talk to him, persuading him to walk outside with her so Camilla might see her with a Lake James elder. After a conversation with Mr. Van Borgh and Maisie somebody and Wim somebody else, who were trying to sort out the best treatment for tartar on dachshunds, Evelyn turned toward the croquet game, which Camilla and Nick were just wandering away from.
She planted herself in Camilla and Nick’s path, in front of a table filled with cheeses. She showed her back to Camilla first, so it wouldn’t seem like she was trying to wedge her way in, and then reached for a cheese knife at the same time as Nick.
“Oh, excuse me,” Evelyn said, and flicked her eyes up. “Oh! Nick! Sorry, I didn’t mean to be a cheese Nazi.”
“NBD, Evelyn,” Nick said, which stood for “no big deal.” “Get down with your Roquefort.”
“Thanks.” Evelyn smeared a wedge of cheese on a hunk of bread, and then let her eyes go to Camilla. “Oh! Hello.” She looked to Nick expectantly.
“You two know each other? Camilla Rutherford, Evelyn Beegan.”
Evelyn let Camilla, as the higher-status person, extend her hand first, a Babsism she remembered. “Thank you so much for having us. We’re staying with the Hackings. You know Preston Hacking, I’m sure? It’s so nice to formally meet you.”
“Nice to meet you,” said Camilla. On her wrist, a gold charm bracelet, with what resembled tiny waffles hanging off it, jangled as she grasped a drink that looked to be a Dark and Stormy.
“I love your bracelet,” Evelyn said, trying to hold on to the conversation before Camilla got distracted. “What are those?”
“Oh, Racquet Club championships. That my grandfather won. It was my grandmother’s,” Camilla said.
“Amazing,” Evelyn said. She let the importance of the bracelet sink in; the Racquet Club, still, defiantly, men only, still elite, still so traditional it allowed members to swim nude. Of course, everyone in the know would know precisely what Camilla was wearing and precisely why it was so much more valuable than a bracelet of rubies or diamonds. Camilla gave it a musical shake.
“My grandfather was a serious court-tennis aficionado,” Evelyn said, so fast that once the words were out, she didn’t know how to explain them. She barely even knew what court tennis was, only that it had arcane rules and was extraordinarily preppy.
“Really? Where did he play?”
“Oh, in Baltimore, before it urbanized.” In truth, her grandfather had been an accountant who hadn’t gone to college and who’d left his family when her mother was a kid, and Evelyn doubted he’d even played regular tennis. She hoped desperately that Camilla wouldn’t ask for specifics; luckily, Camilla, warming up, wanted to talk about her own foray into court tennis.
When Nick weighed in on the cork core of court-tennis balls, Evelyn took the opportunity to cast her eyes around the lake. Evelyn’s eyes passed over one camp and then the next. When she was ready, she lifted her chin at Camilla’s empty glass.
“I think Camilla could use another drink, Nick, my dear,” Evelyn said.
“Oh, of course. Just a minute.” Nick headed off toward the bar.
“It’s so interesting about Camp Piemacum, isn’t it?” Evelyn said, moving closer to Camilla and throwing out one of the camp names she had heard on the boat ride over.
Camilla narrowed her eyes. “What about Piemacum?”
“Are the owners here?”
“The Pratts? No, they’re in Maine for their daughter’s wedding.”
“Ah.” That made things easier. “I’d heard that the head of NBC, or was it the head of ABC, had made an unsolicited offer on the camp, but it was contingent on his building an Italian villa on the grounds.”
“Really?” Camilla cut herself a corner of blue cheese, but was observing Evelyn as she picked it up. “Don’t they have a conservation easement? I thought that limited what they could do with the land.”
Evelyn fluttered her hands in the air; she needed to stay vague. “That might be right. I thought someone posted about it on People Like Us, but, honestly, I’m terrible with details. It may not even have been Camp Piemacum. Maybe it was something in Upper St. Regis?”
Camilla ate the cheese with tiny bites. She was absorbed in the party and didn’t seem to be interested in what Evelyn was saying, and Evelyn was trying to think of another way in. Then Camilla said, “Posted about it where?”