Rochester had held up his wine cup, his five fingers lacing over the top of its lid. He, shaking the cup, could not stop looking at the dancing liquid; a hue of brownish-yellow floating near the rim. That was his third shot. He would need to stop at his fourth to retain his sobriety by the time he left.
The lantern at the corner of the long wooden desk in front of him highlighted that segment of the Bagnio. That was the corner reserved for wine service; numerous skins of different wine bottles clustered on the wall behind the Barkeeper.
To his right, on a tall wooden stool, sat Simon; his personal conscience. Rochester could sense the Butler's yearning to speak up a revolt because of how the older man with a globular spectacle was mixing up a fresh jar of rum.
The whorehouse was a bloody sight at that hour of the night with rich Colonials trooping in to catch some fun—old and young, short and tall, married and unmarried.
