Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
When Heddy appeared behind her shoulder in the looking glass, Effie bit her lip on a startled cry; her thoughts were far away.
“You look lovely,” Heddy said. “And sad.”
Effie stared at her gown, a virginal white silk with the straight neckline flaring to gigot sleeves that billowed around ebullient arm puffs.
Her skirt belled out over a petticoat lined with horsehair to add stiffness.
The outer gown, a dark green velvet cut and gored and clasped around her waist, made it appear as if Effie was emerging from a lily.
Her hairpiece of green ribbon and ostrich plumes bloomed around the Apollo knot tied high on her head.
And her shoulders drooped, giving her the shape currently prized by fashion. She did look sad.
“You look delectable,” Effie told her friend.
Heddy nodded. “I know.” Heddy’s gown of antique gold silk had beret sleeves that bared her arms and was ruched at the bodice into a V that emphasized her tiny waist. Cascades of ruffles and bows swooped around the hem.
Her hair was an equally fearful arrangement of loops and knots and round curls, blooming with lilies.
“Was it worth it?” Heddy asked.
Effie gulped and nodded. “Every moment. Heddy.” She dropped her voice to a whisper, even though Heddy’s lady’s maid had gone downstairs with their cloaks. “He gave me the forbidden kiss.”
Heddy’s eyes widened. “He did?”
“And I—returned it.”
“Glory.” Heddy waved her fan. “And now?”
Effie put her hands over her face, careful not to smudge the cosmetics Heddy had lightly but artfully applied. “I don’t know how I can ever be happy with my cousin after this. Hed, he was going to ask me to marry him.”
“Oh, duckling. He was enchanted with you, of course. And,” Heddy added, scowling, “you know how I feel about your cousin.”
“Effie,” she said. “He was going to ask me. Effie. Not Lady Erato. He didn’t even know I was the same person!”
“He didn’t know?” Heddy fussed with Effie’s headgear, shaping a few curls with her finger. “Well, that pleases me, I have to say. The point is that my guests have a successful disguise.” She paused and met Effie’s eyes in the mirror. “Are you sorry I teased you into coming?”
“Of course not. You know I’ve supported your ambition from the very first tableaux as Miss Gregoire’s. You’ve certainly expanded your dream.”
“And I mean to keep at it as long as I might.” Heddy tweaked one last bow to make it stand at attention. “We needn’t go tonight. I can say you are ill. Or I am.”
“I want to see him. It’s foolish, I know. But I don’t know how I am to let him go.”
A knock sounded at the door below, then voices as Heddy’s maid admitted their guest. Heddy kept a small staff, fewer servants to gossip about or disapprove of her lifestyle.
Their eyes met once more. A shiver passed through Effie at the sound of Jay’s voice.
Just knowing he was near made everything in her lift and want to go to him.
She was ruined. Utterly and impossibly ruined.
Jay, standing in the foyer of Heddy’s townhouse, looked more magnificent than she had ever seen him.
His charcoal gray evening coat with deep lapels hung open to reveal two waistcoats, one a shimmering walnut brown and the second white.
Instead of his cravat he wore a crisp white stock with a collar, which set off the fierce, hard line of his jaw.
He held his silk top hat and a walking stick and glared at her with brimstone in his dark gray eyes.
He was still angry with her.
But he was here.
“Where is our destination?” Heddy inquired.
“It’s only ten minutes away, if you do not mind walking.” Jay transferred his attention to Heddy and reared his head back, eyes flaring. “Lady Hedone, I presume?”
“You may call me Miss Zuylestein. Or Heddy.”
“You do not live on the same premises as your club, Miss Zuylestein.”
Ah, so he was angry at both of them. Heddy lifted her brows.
“Norfolk Square is fine quarters for Hedone. But this house, here in Bedford Square, belongs to my father. It is a better place for my guests. Like Effie.” She linked her arm through Effie’s.
“You have been friends for some time, I take it.”
“Since school.” Effie lifted her chin. How dare he be short with her? She hadn’t lied. She’d assumed he recognized her as readily as she’d known him. He ought to have known her.
He’d done those things with Erato while planning to ask Effie to marry him. She wanted to be angry in return, but she remembered how he’d said he felt he was betraying another, and he’d been mixed up over her. The thought made her heart a bruised balloon.
He hadn’t betrayed anyone. Why wasn’t he thrilled they were the same person?
Because she belonged to another. Or perhaps he no longer wanted to marry her now that he knew Effie, gentleman’s daughter, liked to explore the beach by day and act in sensual tableaux featuring liberated women at night.
Effie took his elbow as he held it out to assist her down the outside steps, and he stiffened as she touched him.
A flare of longing rolled through her like a wave.
She would think about her cousin and the consequences of her actions tomorrow.
Tonight, she had a chance to be with Jay in the open, as herself, not hidden behind a mask or disguise.
She wanted one more night with him. She would pay whatever price was demanded for it.
Jay led them up Bedford Square Road to the wide thoroughfare of Western Road, paved and lined here and there with gas lamps which sprang to life as the lighter reached them.
The glow picked out the architectural details of the rather impressive buildings, part of the scheme of the trio of architects who, it was said, had transformed the muddy fishing village of Brighthelmstone into a royal retreat.
The Gothic House stabbed the pinnacles of its tower into the night sky, its medieval touches a stark contrast to the Neoclassical symmetry of Sillwood House and the row houses of the Western Terrace.
Across the street, incongruent, stood the Western Pavilion, built in imitation of the Royal Pavilion, complete with minarets, an onion-shaped dome, and Oriental motifs.
Was it any wonder, Effie thought, that Brighton had become home to Heddy’s fantasies, and then her own?
They’d merely been following in the footsteps of a king.
“No bricks in this dressing as far as I can tell,” Effie remarked when they reached Wykeham Terrace, only a ten-minute walk. She wanted to crack Jay’s rigid facade and thought perhaps his work might be the way in.
“Cement and stucco,” he said shortly. “My friend has his lodgings here.”
“So does my cousin,” Effie said, surprised, as Jay paused and rapped on a door.
She gaped at the man who opened it. He was dressed just as splendidly as Jay in a dark blue cutaway coat, checked waistcoat, and striped trousers looped beneath his evening shoe. His hair, as usual, declined to be smoothed by pomade.
Jay ushered them inside and began the introductions. “Effie, this is my friend, Lord—”
“Farren?” Effie said in disbelief.
He blinked at her. “Effie? What are you doing here?”
Effie turned on Jay and spoke at the same time Farren did. “This is my—”
“Burnham, what are you doing with my cousin?”
Jay looked back and forth between them, his brows rushing together in that scowl she found so irresistible. “Effie is your cousin? The girl you’re going to marry?” He closed his eyes. “Good God.”
Heddy stepped inside and shut the door behind them, which Farren’s manservant, gaping at the group, had forgotten to do. “Well, this is all quite interesting.”
Farren threw back his shoulders. “Lady Hedone! What the blazes?” He, too, turned a scowl on Effie. “Iphigenia, you must not associate—”
“Oh, good heavens, Kent, this is my friend from school. I’ve been visiting her club for weeks now, ever since I arrived in Brighton. You came and looked straight past me once.”
“You have? I did?” Kent Farren, 4th Lord Farren and the 6th Baronet Sawtry of Greystones, whirled on his friend. “Burnham, if you saw my cousin at the club and didn’t tell me—”
“How could I have?” Jay threw up his hands, casting Effie an accusing look. “I didn’t know until today that they’re the same girl.”
“Hold a moment. The girl you were going to see? Is my cousin? Effie?” Farren’s voice climbed an octave.
“We are all going to sit down to dinner,” Heddy said firmly, “and we will have a very civilized and, I hope, delicious meal.” She took Farren’s arm and dragged him down the small hallway toward the first open door.
Effie took the arm Jay held for her out of instinct and the need for support. Her head was a whirlpool, and he looked equally knocked off his feet. “How do you know my cousin?”
“We are mates from school,” Farren answered her. “King’s Ely. We go way back. Now I want answers from you, Iphigenia. What the devil were you doing at a brothel?”
“My club is not a brothel.” Heddy took her seat, head held high, every inch of her showing the elegance she’d attained by careful instruction, since she couldn’t lay claim to breeding.
Effie collapsed in her seat, elegance abandoned. Her corset was laced too tightly, pushing her heart up into her throat.
“What did you come to Hedone for?” she asked Farren.
“Er.” He made a show of flipping back the tails of his coat and taking a seat at the head of the small mahogany table, beautifully laid with a silver and china service.
Rented, Effie supposed. All the heirlooms were in the London townhouse, where her Aunt Valencia stayed, or at the family seat in Sawtry, where no one had properly lived after Valencia’s husband, the previous baron, died.
Greystones was due to become Effie’s home. This man across from her was supposed to become her husband. And she knew so little about him.