The Dressmakers of London

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Sylvia rushed through the door of the flat and tossed her handbag down on the entryway table. Toeing off her shoes as she went, she peeled off her jacket and let it dangle from her right ring finger as she reached up to take off her earrings.

She was late—why was she always late?—but this time it wasn’t a committee meeting or a luncheon she was rushing home for. She and Hugo were meeting Claire and Rupert at the club for dinner before going out dancing.

The door to her bedroom was open. She strode through it without thinking, stopping only when she saw her husband standing in front of the long cheval mirror that occupied the corner of the room. His eyes caught hers in the glass.

Once he might have teased her, saying, “We really must keep meeting like this, Mrs. Pearsall.” Instead, he glanced at the clock on the bedroom’s mantelpiece and frowned.

“You’re cutting it rather fine, Sylvia. Dinner is at half past seven,” he said.

“I do apologize. My bus became stuck in traffic near Piccadilly,” she lied smoothly as she set her jacket on the bed and then moved to her jewelry box to set her earrings safely inside. She hadn’t been anywhere near Piccadilly, but she hoped that he might assume she’d been visiting some society matron or another in Belgravia or Kensington. That at least should appeal to her husband’s sense of cultivating the right sort of company.

“You have ten minutes,” he said.

She bit her tongue to keep from sniping back that it was rather rich of him to order her about their flat when he was so rarely there. However, that was not the way to start what was supposed to be a pleasant evening with their friends.

There had been a time when this sort of dinner would have been de rigueur. Their social diary had once set her head spinning it was so full of Hugo’s friends and those he wished to make friends with, either because they might become patients at his discreet Harley Street surgery or simply because he wanted them in his circle. How thrilling it had been when she’d realized that she could help! While he had spoken to the husbands, she’d taken the wives, asking them about themselves and listening because her mother had taught her that most customers want little more than the indulgence of being allowed to speak about themselves.

She recalled how proud she’d felt when he’d begun to tell her a little bit about who he wanted to meet, and when she’d been able to make her first introduction, she’d practically floated to the ceiling. She’d done it all just to earn that satisfied smile from him.

Now, as she turned away from him to unzip her skirt and step out of it, she couldn’t help but wonder at the pleasure she’d derived from being Hugo’s helpmate. Now that the shop was her primary concern, she could hardly remember what it had been like when her only worry had been whom she would speak to on a given evening.

She dressed quickly in her navy silk satin gown. She’d bought it in 1938 from Molyneux, but it wasn’t too out of fashion. Besides, she knew that the wide slash of a boatneck showed her delicate collarbones off beautifully. On went the sapphires that had been a twenty-eighth-birthday gift. Silver shoes and a matching clutch finished the effect.

“Sylvia—”

Hugo stopped, and she glanced up. He was standing in the doorway, watching her.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

“You look lovely,” he said.

Despite herself, pride swelled in her chest. She knew that he’d fallen in love with her first for her beauty, and she was grateful that she could still make him stop and admire her fourteen years later.

She popped her lipstick into her handbag, closed it, and said, “I’m ready.”

He nodded and she followed him out of the bedroom into the entryway.

“Let me help you with your fur,” he said.

She turned, holding her breath as he settled her mink wrap onto her shoulders. His hands lingered for a moment. She closed her eyes, tempted to lean against him for a moment. But then he dropped his hands and straightened.

“We should leave,” he said.

She nodded, but as soon as his back was turned, she let a little smile play over her face. Perhaps all was not lost between husband and wife.

“It feels as though all of London is here!” Sylvia shouted above the din of band, dancers, and drinkers who filled the nightclub where she had decamped with Hugo, Claire, and Rupert after supper at the men’s club.

“They could be a little more discerning about their patronage,” said Claire, huffing as someone bumped into her elbow.

“Have another drink, darling. Perhaps it will improve your mood,” said Rupert as he reached for the bottle of champagne chilling next to their table.

Claire stuck out her glass without looking at her husband.

Sylvia raised a brow in Hugh’s direction, but he was watching the dancers on the increasingly crowded floor. There was something in the air that evening, and it wasn’t just the almost-manic desperation to drink and dance and generally let loose that had characterized all nights out since the Germans had started dropping bombs on London.

Sylvia and Hugo had arrived at supper and found Claire and Rupert sitting at their table in silence. Both husband and wife had nearly finished their cocktails.

“Sylvia, thank goodness you’re here,” Claire had said, rising half out of her seat to give Sylvia her cheek to kiss. The distinct scents of gin and musky rose twined around the other woman.

“I hope you haven’t been waiting long,” she said, settling into her seat.

“Five minutes,” said Claire, as though five minutes alone with her husband was far too long.

“Claire is eager to see you both,” said Rupert, an edge to his voice.

She’d slid a glance at Hugo, but he was busy taking out his cigarette case.

“Claire?” he asked, holding the case out.

“Thank you, Hugo,” said Claire, accepting the cigarette and leaning over so he could light it. She caught Hugo’s hand to steady the flame and then let go to settle the cigarette between her long fingers. “Now, Sylvia, you must tell me everything you’ve been up to lately. I feel as though I hardly see you anymore.”

“Oh, everyone is so busy these days,” she said, again trying to catch Hugo’s eye, but her husband was already engaged in conversation with Rupert.

“Is everything all right?” she asked Claire in a low voice.

“Rupert’s just being a bit of an ass,” said Claire.

“What’s happened?” she asked.

“Apparently he’s been operating under the assumption that, while he was serving, I was going to sit at home like a nun and think about nothing but him. Ridiculous man. Anyway, we don’t need them to have an excellent evening.”

The two couples had spent most of the meal speaking husband to husband and wife to wife, but despite Sylvia’s gentle suggestion that perhaps they have an early night, everyone insisted on going dancing.

Now Sylvia was beginning to regret not being more forceful in her insistence. She really should find a way to speak to Hugo privately and suggest that carrying on with an arguing couple might not be the best idea as the night rolled on. However, before she could suggest that they dance, he said, “Claire, old thing, finish that and I’ll push you around the dance floor a bit.”

Claire gave him a look and then tipped her glass back to drain every last drop of champagne. Then she popped the glass down on the table and stuck out her hand. “If you insist.”

Sylvia watched Hugo place a hand on the small of Claire’s back and guide her friend out to the floor to join the throng. Perhaps she could defuse whatever was going on between the Monroes that evening.

“What do you say, Sylvia?” asked Rupert. “Do you fancy a dance yourself?”

It couldn’t be worse than sitting at the table with a fog of discontent hanging over it, so she nodded and rose.

Rupert was a better dancer than most of Hugo’s friends, and he led her confidently into a fox-trot, holding her at a respectable distance. They’d never been close the way she was with Claire, but he listened when she spoke, never made any inappropriate suggestion while drunk that he later tried to laugh off, and generally seemed like a good egg.

She was about to ask him about his time in Scotland, but he asked, “Have you seen much of Claire recently?”

“Well,” she said carefully, “we sit on the committee together and—”

“Do you see her socially?”

“I haven’t felt much like doing this sort of thing in the past few months,” she said with a tight smile.

“Yes, I imagine the war does rather put a damper on things,” he said.

They continued to quick-quick-slow step for a few bars, and then he said, “It’s funny being married.”

“Is it?” she asked with surprise.

“Do you think people believe half of the things that the priest asks them to repeat back?”

“Well, yes.” She certainly had.

He pursed his lips. “I suppose you would.”

She jerked back a little, stung.

“I just mean that you obviously were crazy about Hugo,” he said quickly. “As he was about you.”

“Thank you.”

“How long have you two been married now?” he asked.

“Fourteen years,” she said.

“It will be twenty for Claire and me next year. Two decades is a lot of time with the same woman,” he mused. “I haven’t always been the best husband to Claire, I’ll admit that. I don’t know if it’s in a man’s nature to be faithful.”

Good lord, was he going to confess to an affair?

“I’ve never thought it very fair that a man should be held to one standard of behavior and a woman to another,” she said rather curtly.

His gaze flashed to hers in surprise, as though just realizing he was saying all of this out loud.

“The band is very good, aren’t they?” he asked, pulling the conversation into a sharp left turn and saving them both the embarrassment of whatever was really on Rupert’s mind.

Thank goodness, she thought for what felt like the tenth time that day, and let the music take her.

Hugo was remarkably quiet as they took a rare cab home, but Sylvia didn’t mind. Her feet were aching from her now-unfamiliar dancing shoes, and she enjoyed the luxury of being ferried to her front door in a way she would have taken for granted before the war.

They rode the lift up to their floor, and Hugo unlocked the door.

“Would you like another drink?” she asked, the way she always had when they were first married. They would stay up with a nightcap and laugh about whatever had happened over the course of the evening, Hugo rubbing the ache out of her feet.

“If it’s all the same, I’d rather go to bed,” said Hugo.

“Of course,” she said. “It’s late.”

She trailed after him to the bedroom, picking up the shoes she’d abandoned in the corridor at the beginning of the evening. She placed them and her silver shoes in their respective boxes, emptied the contents of her evening bag, and removed her jewels. Then she turned with her back to her husband.

“Would you help me?” she asked.

After a moment, she felt his hands light on her back. She sucked in a little breath as he tugged down the zip of her dress. Her skin tingled with champagne and anticipation, wondering if he would slide his hands into the gap made by her zipper as he used to do.

“There you are,” he said, stepping away.

She swallowed her disappointment. “Thank you.”

She stripped off her dress and stepped out of her girdle and undergarments without turning around. Then she slipped on her light pink silk negligee and matching dressing gown before sitting down at her vanity to take off her makeup and pin up her hair.

Behind her, she could hear Hugo shedding his uniform and climbing into his pajamas. Then he retreated down the corridor to the loo.

When she finished with her cold cream and pins, Hugo returned, announcing, “It’s free.”

“Thank you,” she said.

In the loo she brushed her teeth. After she rinsed, she straightened and caught sight of herself in the mirror. Even in the harsh overhead light and with the greasy residue of cold cream on her face, she still looked beautiful. After all, thirty-two was not so very old, no matter what the ladies’ magazines seemed to imply.

Sylvia straightened as best she could in her tipsy state, admiring her trim figure exaggerated by the tightly cinched belt of her dressing gown. She was beautiful—Hugo had said so just that evening while standing in this very flat—and wasn’t that something?

With her chin lifted, she strode back to the bedroom, where Hugo’s attention was fixed on a book. He looked up as she stopped at the foot of their bed, untying her dressing gown.

“Is this any good?” he asked, showing her that the book he’d chosen was the copy of The Beautiful and Damned she’d just finished.

“Yes,” she said, letting her dressing gown slide down her arms. She tilted one hip to emphasize the drape of her silk negligee against the scoop of her waist.

“I never could get on with The Great Gatsby. What is this one about?”

“Two people who marry and proceed to destroy each other,” she said, sliding into bed. She could feel the comforting warmth of him that had been captured by the sheets.

“Sounds cheerful,” he said.

“Hugo,” she started, placing a hand on his leg.

“How do you think Claire and Rupert seemed?” he asked abruptly.

“Claire and Rupert?” she asked.

“Did they seem… off?”

She removed her hand and leaned back against her pillows. “Yes, they did. Something must have happened before we arrived.”

“I can’t imagine what,” he said.

She frowned. “I think Rupert is worried about how much Claire has been going out while he’s been away. He started to ask me about it while we were dancing, but then he started to talk about how he was far from perfect.” She paused. “Do you think he’s had an affair?”

He laughed. “Rupert? Claire would have his guts for garters if he ever tried.”

“Did she say anything to you?” she asked.

“She was drunk. It’s hard to get any sense out of a drunk woman,” he said, putting her book down on his bedside table.

“Do you know what I think?”

“What is that?” he asked.

She placed a hand on his leg once again and began to slide it upward.

For a moment she thought he would let her, but then he reached down and plucked her hand away and dropped it on top of the duvet.

“Don’t make a fool of yourself, Sylvia.”

“Is it so foolish to want one’s husband?” she asked, more than a little stung by his scorn.

“It’s late, and I need to be at the Admiralty early tomorrow.”

He reached over and snapped off his bedside light, plunging them into darkness and leaving Sylvia alone with her thoughts.