How to Fake It in Society

Nico headed up to Carey Street, aware he looked well. He dressed with more flamboyance than most gentlemen in London, as a French count and a Valois: not for him the tedious Brummell uniform of blue coat, white linen, beige breeches adopted by so many.

Mr. Brummell, who had ruled London Society for years, had decreed that the well-dressed man should be a model of plainness and understatement, but Mr. Brummell had lost a fortune at the gaming tables and fled England to avoid debtors’ prison.

Nico had spent long enough in hells to develop a profound aversion to people who played and lost, in case it was contagious.

He didn’t care to take Brummell as a model, and anyway, he had never been understated in his life and didn’t intend to start.