The Venus of Lebanon

Set in the midst of the events of A Right Honorable Soldier, demoted Union soldier Elias Hower finds himself down on his luck on Christmas. At the gambling tables of the disreputable Sterling House, he's in the hole with no funds to pay up, and is unwittingly roped into an elaborate game between the ladies of the house.

This story is an homage to the yellow-jacket novels often surreptitiously passed around Union camps during the Civil War, so much so that Congress felt compelled to legislate in 1865 by making it illegal to send obscene materials through the US postal service.