“No one curtseys,” Harriet announced. “We’re all aristocrats.”

“I certainly am,” Jacob said, lifting his black silk tall hat and bowing.

“Here,” Mimi directed. “Let’s all squeeze in together in front of the mirror.”

They obeyed, and smiled at the sight.

Harriet was the most beautiful, with a wreath of holly and ivy in her blond hair. She wore a red silk gown that managed to elevate her marvelous breasts upward. Over that, but not completely over that, she wore a red velvet cloak.

Next to her, and unabashedly looking sideways down Harriet’s magnificent bosom, stood Jacob, wearing a black tailcoat with a red vest and a white bow tie and a very tall black hat.

Next to Jacob stood Christina, who knew she looked fabulous in her green velvet cape with the white hood and matching white fur muff. She’d swept her long brown curls up and tied them with red and green silk ribbons, letting the ribbons and some of her hair curl down around her face.

The truth is, her Inner Christina whispered, you’re more beautiful than Harriet.

Stop that, Christina whispered back. Be good!

By far the most sensational was Mimi, clad in a purple velvet cape embellished with black embroidery and an enormous purple hat ornamented with fake flowers and jewels and black bows and even a cluster of purple grapes.

“These costumes really set the mood, don’t they?” Mimi said. “I swear I’m going to walk out and find a horse and carriage waiting for us beneath the gaslight lamps.”

“Okay,” Jacob said, “it’s time to get going.”

“Now I’m nervous,” Christina confessed.

“Don’t be,” Harriet assured her. “I’ll be there.”

With all their capes and skirts bustling, they crowded out into Elsa’s hall.

Mimi, with the other three behind her, stuck her head into Elsa’s living room. Elsa, in her seventies and widowed, sat in a wingback chair in front of the fireplace.

“We’re ready to go, Elsa!”

Elsa clapped her hands together. “You all look beautiful! Have fun!”

Mimi directed the others to her SUV. “I’m driving. Christina, you ride shotgun. Harriet and Jacob can share the backseat.” Her mouth quirked up in a mischievous grin.

Once they were settled in, Mimi handed Christina a bag of throat lozenges. “Pass them around,” she said. “Can’t hurt.”

It took only ten minutes to drive up the winding road to the cliff and Oscar Bittlesman’s house.

A BMW was parked in the driveway. All the lights were on downstairs and a few upstairs, too.

“I guess they don’t worry about electric bills,” Harriet grumbled.

“Now, now,” Mimi cautioned. “No negative feelings. We’re here to entertain and delight.”