“Make friends. How sweetly you put it. No. Leaving aside the slight matter of incest—” Simon raised his voice to be heard over her exclamation of disgust. “—as I was saying, leaving aside the matter of incest, your brother doesn’t consort with nice women, and the sort of women with whom he does consort would never be invited home.”
“The fast and the fashionable?”
“There’s fast and there’s fast. We need to establish you as one of the latter. Fast enough to be interesting, respectable enough to be received. It isn’t your brother’s affections you need to win.” Simon took a long swig of his own drink, draining the glass as though it were water, not gin and goodness only knew what. “It’s your sister’s. Jicksy’s friends aren’t received at Caffers. Lady Olivia’s are.”
Of course. Lady Olivia. The favored child. Rachel could see her, demure in smudged newsprint, as dainty as a Dresden shepherdess on her father’s arm.
Rachel took a quick shot of her drink, just managing not to choke on it. “Is Lady Olivia one of the fast and fashionable, then?”
“No,” said Simon succinctly. “Lady Olivia is all that is good and pure, sans peur et sans reproche.”
Rachel felt a wave of irrational dislike. “In that case, how—”
“But,” said Simon, raising his voice over Rachel’s, “she does have a cousin who is. Fast and fashionable, that is. Cecelia Heatherington-Vaughn. Cece is the brightest of the Bright Young Things. No party is complete without her, no bacchanal sufficiently bacchanalian. We can’t get you to Olivia, but we can get you to Cece.”
This was all beginning to seem increasingly tenuous. “If Cece is so wild, why would the virtuous Olivia pay her any mind?”
“For all her many sins—and they are impressive in scope—Cece is still received. Her mother, Lady Fanny, is one of those awe-inspiring society matrons whom no one likes to cross. Cece will provide the introduction to Lady Olivia. Befriend Lady Olivia … and the doors of Carrisford Court will be open to you.”
“That easy?” said Rachel sarcastically.
“If it seems easy, you’ve already had too much of this.” Simon rose gracefully from the sofa, taking his own empty glass with him. “You’ll need a stunt.”
“A what?”
“A stunt,” said Simon, with painful patience. “Something to catch Cece’s attention. And the attention of my readers.”
She’d nearly forgotten about his column. Rachel set her drink down on the glass table. “Stunts weren’t part of the agreement.”
“This entire masquerade is a stunt,” Simon said bluntly. He emptied the dregs in the shaker into his glass. “But not one we can use to catch the attention of Cece and her jaded little friends. You might try dancing topless on a table—”
“Really, Simon—”
“How naturally you squawk my name!” Simon held up a hand. “Smooth your ruffled feathers, darling. It’s already been done. No one would look twice.”
Rachel wasn’t sure whether she was meant to be reassured or insulted.
“Would you like me to learn to juggle?” she asked tartly.
“Too crude.” Simon discarded both glass and shaker at the bar. “You don’t by any chance play the ukulele?”
“My education has been sadly lacking.” Rachel half rose, but Simon gestured her back into her seat.
“Don’t worry. We’ll remedy that.” Neatly, Simon scooped his hat off the table by the door, setting it jauntily on his head. “Think on it. I’ll call for you at nine.”
Rachel blinked, trying to regain control of the conversation. “Tomorrow?”
“Tonight.” Her evil genius didn’t wait for her to rise. He let himself out, pausing only to issue one last instruction. “Wear something decadent.”
SEVEN
It was nearer ten than nine when Simon rang the bell of the flat.
Rachel grabbed up the beaded bag that went with her gown and stalked to the door, ready with a series of choice comments about punctuality, the virtues thereof.
But the Simon in the doorway was a different Simon from the one who had sprawled on the white couch four hours ago. He wore his evening dress as one born to it. Nothing off the peg for Simon Montfort. His wardrobe bore the indefinable hallmark of a West End tailor, the pants and jacket perfectly tailored to his long frame. His cuff links were mother-of-pearl, as glittering and enigmatic as his eyes.
For a moment, Rachel felt as that long ago beggar maid must, when King Cophetua came along and swept her up willy-nilly: oppressed by the vast gulf between them and painfully aware of her own inadequacies.
Oh, for heaven’s sake. However well tailored, it was just a suit. She might be a by-blow, but he was a gossip columnist, singing other people’s secrets for his supper. King Cophetua didn’t come into it.
“You’re late,” said Rachel, but it lacked the bite she’d intended.
Simon looked Rachel up and down from her French heels to the gold filigree band that spanned her forehead.
“You took me at my word,” he said.
“About—oh, right.” Something decadent. Flustered, Rachel snatched up the matching wrap, an illusory nod to modesty; the fabric was as sheer as the dress. “You supplied the wardrobe.”
And quite a wardrobe it was. It must be nice to have a copper baron for a father. The clothes in the great white wardrobe in Simon’s sister’s bedroom might be a season old, but there wasn’t a one that didn’t shout Paris-made. Rachel had hesitated at first. All the money in her bankbook wouldn’t cover the cost of a torn flounce on one of those dresses.
But Simon had said to make herself free of them, hadn’t he? So, in the end, she’d succumbed to sheer lust and chosen a dress of flame-colored chiffon, glittering with a subtle pattern of beads on the bodice, the skirt falling in uneven layers around her legs.
Wearing it, she felt like a Vera, like a woman of the world, the sort of woman who went out at ten at night, who drank and danced, without another care in the world.
And from the look in Simon’s eyes, he clearly agreed.
“Credit given where due?” Simon put a hand on her back to lead her into the lift, the conventional gesture rendered fraught by the unusual sensation of skin on skin. The dress plunged in a deep V, baring Rachel’s back nearly to the waist. “One can only work with the material one is given.”
Simon’s breath ruffled the short hair by her ear. Rachel could smell spirits on his breath. Brandy, perhaps? She didn’t know enough to tell.
Rachel chose her steps carefully. The matching heels were higher than she was accustomed to and at least half a size too large. She had tried to cinch them in by tightening the straps, but it was a precarious arrangement at best. “I thought you had no interest in playing Pygmalion.”
“Not in molding marble.” Simon’s fingers stroked her bare back in a barely perceptible caress. And then poked. Hard.
Rachel jerked back. “Ouch! What was that in aid of?”
“Your posture. It’s far too good. Slouch a little. You look as though you’re about to have tea at the vicarage.”
“Not in this dress.”
“That depends on the vicar. Ah, Simms!” Simon raised a lazy hand to the porter, effectively cutting off any rejoinder. “My taxi is outside?”
“Right where you left it, sir.”
With a long sidelong glance, Rachel followed Simon out into the June night. The breeze fluttered her chiffon draperies, the chill cutting through the thin fabric. The florist shop and chemist’s across the street were both closed, the shutters drawn.
The taxi was, indeed, where Simon had left it, out front, the headlamps casting long shadows through the gloom.
The taxi driver had settled in for a smoke, and not his first judging by the butts in the street. Rachel mentally calculated the cost, all those cigarette butts translated to minutes, the minutes to pence and shillings. For a man who claimed to have to earn his living, Simon was remarkably free with his funds.
Bourgeois, Simon would call her. But she was bour
geois. Or, at least, she had been.
This was madness, wasn’t it? Put the girl from Netherwell in a daring frock and she was still the girl from Netherwell. One word out of her mouth and they’d be sure to know, all of them, Sylvia and—
Only it wasn’t Sylvia, was it? It was something else. Cecily—no, Cece. Oh, Lord. She’d failed and she hadn’t even begun.
Rachel stumbled on her too-high shoes, and would have tripped, but for Simon’s hand beneath her elbow.
As they climbed into the backseat, the taxi driver chucked his cigarette out the window, saying cheerfully, “Where next, sir?”
“Dean Street,” said Simon briefly.
“Right-o,” said the driver, and pulled away with a screech of wheels, past the shuttered shops and dark windows. The streetlights illuminated the odd person here and there, walking briskly, emerging from a cab, but for the most part the streets were quiet, the virtuous long since in bed.
“What’s on Dean Street?” asked Rachel, pulling her wrap closer around her shoulders. The inside of the taxi felt stuffy and close, redolent of stale cigarettes. Or maybe that was Simon’s jacket.
“The Gargoyle Club.”
Simon slid a hand into his waistcoat. Paper crackled, but he passed over whatever it was in favor of a slim silver cigarette case. He tapped it against his hand, absently, before drawing out one of his Turkish cigarettes.
His face was turned away from Rachel, his profile illuminated by the shimmer of the streetlights through the window.
“Is that its name, or merely your opinion of the occupants?” Rachel pleated the edge of one of her chiffon flounces beneath her fingers.
The cousin’s name was Cece. She was Vera. She’d been living in France. She wasn’t to mention things like the cost of taxi fares.
“Its name,” said Simon. There was a click, and a small flame flared to life between them, lighting the strong lines of his jaw. Relenting, he said, “It’s a club in Soho, frequented by the artistic set. David Tennant founded it so he would have a place to dance with Hermione Baddeley.”
Rachel seized on the bit of that she understood. “Is Miss Heatherington-Vaughn artistic?”
If she was, Rachel was in trouble. She didn’t know the first thing about art, other than flower sketches and the sort of muddy watercolor de rigueur for young ladies.
Simon seemed to bring himself back from a great distance. “Not a whit. But it’s fashionable to dabble around the fringes of bohemia. Everyone’s painting a picture or writing a novel or sculpting little figurines.”
“Let me guess,” said Rachel, a little too loudly. “You’re writing a novel.”
Simon glanced down at her. “And stain these precious fingers with ink? I don’t like getting my hands dirty.”
“Fine words from a gossip columnist,” Rachel taunted.
“Ah, but there’s the difference. I expose the weaknesses of others. Not my own.” For a moment, Rachel thought she saw something on his face, something raw and honest. But then he shrugged, saying glibly, “One can’t write a novel without stripping one’s soul. Really, when you think of it, the entire endeavor is quite indecent.”
Rachel grabbed at her bag as the taxi rocked around a sharp corner. The lights were brighter here, the streets more populous. “That would depend on the soul in question, wouldn’t it?”
“Pious screeds went out with the nineteenth century. Judging by the latest crop of romans à clef, most of today’s souls are filthier than the window of your average taxi.”
“Which you,” pointed out Rachel, “are fouling with smoke.”
“Oh, we’re all complicit.” Simon breathed out another trail of smoke. “The whole rotten lot of us. But if Rome is burning, why not light a cigarette in the flames?”
“I don’t think the Romans had cigarettes,” said Rachel perversely. “Isn’t tobacco a product of the New World?”
“True, but immaterial. If they’d had them, they would have smoked them.”
Rachel started to say something, stopped, and shook her head. She’d give Simon one thing: he’d cured her nerves. She couldn’t be sure whether that was intentional or just Simon being Simon.
With Simon, Rachel was beginning to suspect, one couldn’t ever be sure of anything.
“Talking to you,” said Rachel ruefully, “is like tumbling through the looking glass. I always seem to lose my bearings.”
“True north,” said Simon. “If you count me mad north by northwest.”
“No one,” said Rachel sternly, “could make such a pretense of lunacy without being entirely sane.”
“I shouldn’t place too many wagers on that, but I’ll grant you the general point. I’m no madder than anyone else I know, which isn’t saying terribly much.”
“We’re all mad here?”
“You begin to understand.” Pinching the cigarette neatly between his fingers, Simon tossed the butt out the window. “Ah. Here we are.” Leaning forward, he tapped the cabbie on the shoulder.
“Here?” Rachel looked dubiously out the window. There was a cluster of women before the door with peroxide blond hair, crimson lips, and frocks that made Rachel’s flame-colored chiffon appear modest and retiring. The accents that wafted through the window of the cab were reminiscent of Shaw’s Miss Doolittle. “Are those…”
“Filles de joie?” Abstracting himself from the cab, Simon held out a hand to Rachel. “Yes, although it’s rather hard to tell the difference these days.”
Rachel took his hand, let him help her out of the cab. His attitude might be languid, but his grip was strong. “Now who’s being old-fashioned?”
Simon raised a brow. “Did I say I was complaining?”
Rachel glanced uncertainly back over her shoulder at the gaggle of women in the doorway, peacocking in their tawdry finery. She felt suddenly very aware of her own bare arms, legs, back. Wearing a dress she hadn’t paid for.
She didn’t feel fast and fashionable; she just felt cheap. In inverse proportion to the cost of her dress.
As they made their way through the gaggle of prostitutes up a long flight of stairs, she said quietly, “You wouldn’t take my sister here. Would you?”
The steps seemed to go up and up and up. “I’m not in the habit of taking your sister anywhere at all.”
The sounds hit Rachel first, with the force of an oncoming locomotive, a wave of sound so strong, she could practically feel her hair blow back with the force of it. The wail of the saxophone competed with the clatter of glasses, the staccato tap of heels, and, above it all, an overwhelming wave of high, shrill chatter, voices upon voices, all talking at once.
The man at the door knew Simon. In the din, Rachel caught only, “… cousin…” and “list.” A few coins changed hands and they were waved through into a room that glittered with glass, set into the floors, the walls, arranged in complex mosaics whose patterns taunted the eye; a million tiny bits of mirror reflecting jagged bits and pieces.
It was like walking into a kaleidoscope, the same dizzying feeling of everything being broken and reassembled, whirling around and around and around.
Rachel wasn’t entirely sure she liked the effect. She preferred to be left in one piece, thank you very much.
“Vera. Vera.” Simon poked her again.
Rachel jerked away. She wasn’t going to do very well at this if she couldn’t even remember her own name. “Isn’t my posture bad enough?”
“No, but that’s beside the point.” He ran a finger down the side of her cheek, tucking a strand of dark hair back into her golden fillet. “Flirt with me.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Simon’s lips were smiling, but his eyes rolled back in a discreet gesture of impatience. “Stop looking so censorious. People are here to drink and dance and forget their woes. And, incidentally, to flirt.”
“Is that my stunt?” asked Rachel.
“No. It’s just normal human behavior. Take this.” He pressed an ebony cigarette holder into her hand. “If you won
’t flirt, you can pose wreathed in smoke and ennui. You’ll be surrounded with eager admirers in no time.”
Rachel turned the cigarette holder over in her hands. It was an objet d’art in its own right, chased with gold bands that echoed the bangles clasped above her elbows. “I don’t smoke.”
Simon slipped a cigarette case into her bag. “Consider it a prop.”
Rachel clipped the bag closed, moving it to her other hand. “And here I thought I had you for that.”
“Surely you know better than to rely on me.” The room shimmered with cigarette smoke, filming the mirrors with a haze like mist. “One foot on sea and one on shore, to one thing constant never.”
“That’s just pure self-indulgence,” retorted Rachel. “Excusing yourself in advance doesn’t make it right.”
Simon smiled charmingly. “But it does constitute fair warning, don’t you think?”
“Some would take it as a challenge.”
“Don’t.” Before she could respond, Simon raised a hand in the air, trilling in a saccharine falsetto, “Cece, my sweet! How too thrill-making to find you here.”
A woman in an ice-blue frock was standing in the middle of a chattering group, a cigarette dangling dangerously from one hand, a cocktail spilling sideways from the other.
At the sound of Simon’s voice, she lurched forward, wrapping a pair of slender arms around his neck, her drink dribbling down the dark wool of his jacket. “Simon, darling! Have you come to rescue me from boredom?”
With her retroussé nose and puckered lips, Cecelia Heatherington-Vaughn looked like the more pampered sort of pug dog. If pug dogs wore slips of ice-blue satin embroidered with strings of tiny crystals. Her hair was faded fair, an indeterminate ash blond, her cheeks sallow beneath a dusting of powder.
“My dear, I never undertake charity work.” Simon detached her arms from about his neck, looping an arm about her waist instead, presumably to keep her from tipping headfirst into the champagne cooler. “Cece, my cousin, Vera Merton. Vera, this is the woman I’ve been telling you about, the inimitable Cecelia Heatherington-Vaughn.”
“How do you do?” said Rachel politely.