And now she was running away again from Charvil in the hope that she could reinvent herself alongside Eugenie . . .
‘But Eugenie is dying,’ she murmured to the boxes in the hallway. ‘Then what?’ Claire asked into the silence of her loneliness. She pushed her hand into her pocket and found his identification tag. J. W. Wren its letters challenged. She raised the metal to her lips and kissed his name. ‘Stop me running, Jamie. Come back to me.’ As she made this plea snow began to flutter past her windows and paint her world white.
She took it to be a sign. A fresh start? Virgin white. Definitely a new life. And if she was going to keep her date in London, then she needed a new outfit; she would wear it like armour.
________
Claire caught the bus into Reading the following morning with the vision of treating herself to an entire outfit, from new silk underwear to hat and gloves. It had been far too long since she’d splashed out and it wasn’t as though she didn’t have money. Claire was well aware that stepping into this calibre of salon would likely cost her a small fortune; she’d barely spent anything of her savings in years and it felt exciting and just a fraction wicked. Perhaps more than anything this was all part of turning the page and starting the new chapter she had promised.
‘Good morning,’ the woman said, approaching. She had to be fifty, Claire decided from the skin at her neck, but she looked amazing for those decades: so svelte, and of course her day dress was dazzling in its simplicity. ‘Welcome, I am Jemima Dove, owner of the salon.’
Another bird name. Another sign. Claire grinned, extending a hand. ‘Claire Nightingale.’
‘Ah, what a beautiful name you have, but then I’m biased.’ She smiled. Her make-up was immaculate, hair coiffed in perfect waves to her chin in the most up-to-date style, even though it was graphite grey. Claire felt positively dowdy standing before the elegant woman. ‘What are you looking for today, Miss Nightingale?’
‘Well, I’m looking for something special. I don’t really know what it is yet, but I’ll know it as soon as I see it.’
The woman smiled evenly and it crinkled the corners of her eyes with amusement. ‘Is it for an occasion?’
‘Not really.’ Claire fingered a silken gown in the window. ‘Oh, this is beautiful.’
‘To make an impression?’
Claire shook her head, moved on to the next outfit that was standing on a mannequin. It was a suit, appropriate for a day in the city.
‘For someone special?’
She turned, let out a breath. ‘Yes.’
‘A man, I am presuming.’
‘I haven’t seen him for years.’
The woman shrugged. ‘This is not so unusual. No need to be nervous – I suspect this gentleman would like you in a bed sheet.’ It was meant as a compliment but the unintended innuendo made them both blush. ‘Oh, do forgive me – that came out entirely wrong.’
‘Call me Claire,’ she said, ‘and why don’t you tell me what you would suggest?’
‘First, over a cup of tea, you will tell me about this young man.’
Tea was briskly served by an assistant and while that occurred, Claire began to pour out her heart to a stranger she felt instantly at ease with, speaking about Jamie as though he were alive. It helped her mood immeasurably.
‘. . . you see, look at you, it’s so effortless,’ she said, waving at the women’s chic attire.
Jemima Dove’s gaze narrowed. ‘It looks that way, yes,’ she said in a wry tone to make Claire smile. She put down her cup and saucer. ‘Claire, this is a man you see yourself marrying, so I like the idea of you wearing a colour that reflects this, especially given the romantic nature of your reunion. Wait here. Let me show you a dress but be prepared to fall instantly for it. It will fit you too, so you won’t have any excuse, I’m afraid.’
She whispered to her assistant standing nearby, who disappeared and returned with a long muslin bag on a hanger. Jemima pointed to a railing and the woman hung the bag there and withdrew.
‘Now,’ she said, unbuttoning the bag. ‘I defy you to say no.’
Claire gave a low gasp as a creamy-coloured dress emerged.
‘We call this buttermilk,’ Jemima explained, ‘it’s a play on ivory so there’s that slightly bridal undertone to it, but it’s definitely not white and it’s too warm to be pure ivory.’
‘It’s magnificent. How much is —?’
‘Do not talk about the cost yet. Try it on.’ She gestured to the assistant. ‘I have stockings and shoes to go with this. Just trust me.’
Within minutes Claire was staring at her reflection in the long mirror, barely recognising her glamorous self. The colour reminded her of the pale cornsilk she’d seen poking out from the husked cobs roasting on open fires in Alexandria on the day she and Rosie Parsons had gone in search of a chilled drink on a cool verandah, the same day she had met Eugenie. The dress whispered towards the most pastel of yellows and yet somehow remained firmly in the group of rich creams. Its sheen reflected in her hair and suited the hint of sun-bronze that her hands and face had caught in Turkey. Its waist was fashionably dropped, and stockinged ankles that would not have been shown a few years ago now brazenly peeped above her low-heeled navy and cream shoes.
‘Yes?’ Jemima said, coming up behind her.
Claire shifted her gaze to Jemima’s reflection. ‘Yes,’ she murmured. ‘This is what I want to wear.’ She cocked her head to one side. ‘I’m just imagining my old brown coat on top of this. It will spoil the look.’
‘Absolutely – there is only one coat to wear with this dress.’
As if by magic, a new garment materialised from the shadows of the salon, carried by the assistant and placed in Jemima’s hands. She eased Claire into the sleeves before reverently pulling the coat onto her shoulders. ‘There we are . . . perfect, don’t you think?’
Claire loved it on sight and as she pushed her hands into the sleeves, she refused to regret a single pound she was about to invest in the outfit. In direct contrast to her dress, the coat was ultramarine blue – the colour she remembered from Egypt, with a belt that clasped loosely at the small of her back and a neat but eye-catching collar of floral blue and that same buttermilk colour. It fastened asymmetrically across her left breast.
‘The designer’s name is Eden Valentine,’ Miss Dove said. ‘She only makes a few pieces to please herself.’
Claire nodded.
‘I’ve urged her to open her own salon and do you know, there was something about her smile and the way she shook her head so modestly that leads me to believe she just might. Now, you look absolutely beautiful. And when you remove your coat in the Palm Court, Claire, he will not be able to mistake your intent.’
They both smiled. Claire’s was tinged with sadness. If only Jemima Dove knew that Claire’s handsome date was likely a ghost, alive only in her thoughts. Instead, she grinned. ‘I do love it.’
And so she’d bought it all, including a tiny new ruched ivory handbag. Not at all suitable for winter’s still stubborn hold, but irresistibly pretty all the same.
Claire prayed that Saint Valentine, so keenly associated with romantic love, was somehow imbued in the Eden Valentine outfit and that the love of her life was winging his way towards her.
24
1 APRIL 1919
There had been a snowfall in London but the momentary collective delight of the soft flutter of flakes had quickly darkened to a bleak mood. It had only taken overnight for the city to turn glistening, crystalline snow to a sad grey sludge that had been swept into small drifts against buildings. People slipped and cursed while drivers took it slowly with their carriages for fear of the animals creating havoc if they fell prey to the icy conditions. It had been both the wettest spring for years and arguably the coldest, with no sign of the harsh weather letting up. Forecasters were predicting that the snow would keep falling through April, and Claire began to wonder how much more punishment the world could take after war, influenza, and now a bitter
winter that should be thawing by now.
She shivered as she left the Oxford Circus Underground Station, pouring out with fellow commuters from the stale, fuggy warmth below surface to exit and brave the inclement British skies. Claire looked up. The sky was a void of blizzard white but mercifully inactive. She pulled her new coat’s collar closer to her neck.
Dodging horses and buses, she set off up the wide street, heedless of the sounds of traffic, people or the smell of roasting chestnuts, with her mind focused on guiding the man she loved to her.
________
Jamie accepted help from another soldier to alight onto the Paddington Station platform from the train, which had suffered serious delays due to the snow. The queue for a hackney cab was so long and the London Underground couldn’t lure him – despite its speed – after too many years spent in the trenches. Wishing for the luxury of being able to stick his hands deep in his overcoat pockets, he ignored the strange nervous signals from an arm no longer there and the protestations of the other one leaning on a crutch. He had worked hard to strengthen that side but it would take a year at least, the doctors had warned, before he was fully adept and strong enough. A scarf wrapped around his mouth helped to keep the wind chill down as he approached one of the hackney cab drivers.
‘Afternoon, sir?’
He manoeuvred his chin free of the scarf and his breath billowed in front of him; he was already wearied from exertion. ‘Can you tell me the way to the Langham Hotel, please?’
‘I could, yes. But I have to chuckle first if you plan to walk.’
Jamie could see the man had wanted to say if you plan to limp. ‘I do, mate. I can’t wait in this long queue. There’s a woman I have to meet and all the trains were delayed today so I’m running late. I made a promise. I can’t risk missing her.’
The driver grinned. ‘There’s always a girl behind every drama. Where did you fight?’
‘Gallipoli, Palestine, all through the Jordan region. Australian Light Horse.’
‘Thought you had a funny accent but I’ll forgive yer because you lads were brave. I didn’t think any of your lot survived.’
Jamie nodded sadly and leaned down harder on the crutch. ‘Most of us didn’t. Near enough a generation of fine blokes gone, left behind in the scrub of southern Turkey, but you lost just as many.’
The man nodded. ‘Two of my sons are buried in France.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
The fellow grunted, shifted the burning cigarette that clung to the corner of his mouth and pointed. ‘Head down ’ere and stay north. You’re making for Hyde Park, all right?’
Jamie nodded.
‘Get onto the Edgeware Road and before you reach Marble Arch, turn left onto Seymour and at the top of that road as soon as you see Regent Street loomin’, you turn left onto it – the hotel is right there, opposite All Souls Church in Langham Place. If I tell you any more you’ll get confused. It’s more than two miles away even if you don’t get lost. My advice is ’op on a bus if you can.’ He grinned at his unintentional jest and coughed. ‘Or flag down a ride. But anywhere is easier than ’ere.’
‘Thanks, mate. I’ll find it.’ Jamie turned back into the biting cold. His dexterity with the crutch meant his speed had improved even if his strength was wanting, but the snow would hinder him. He was going to be late, no matter how fast he tried to get there.
‘Women,’ the hackney cab driver muttered as he flicked his cigarette butt away, lifted the reins and clicked at the horse to move on into traffic beyond the forecourt of busy Paddington Station.
________
Rifki Shahin prided himself on his ordered mind that fed into an ordered life; within its safe cocoon was protection from most emotional impact. Being forced to give up Sehr when love made it feel as though nothing else mattered had cooled his approach to life, as did having to marry a woman he shared no connection with. Her shrewish ways had taught him how to bury his romantic nature and hide in his chilled world of numbers, money, ambition. Losing his only son had seemed predictable, given the way his life had moved from the hot-blooded years of his teens to the slow decline into his seemingly cold-hearted acceptance of the misery of a life without romantic love.
Until the golden presence of Claire Nightingale had arrived to warm up his existence, Rifki Shahin had not imagined his pulse would ever quicken again. The depth of his loss when she departed left his emotions in tatters. He would find himself trembling in the bathrooms of his university mid-tutorial, or weeping silently in his large, lonely house. He had taken to lying down in Açar’s bed with his son’s prayer book clutched to his chest, dry sobs his only companion as he drifted into unhappy sleep. And it was Claire who had haunted those fitful hours of the night . . . her touch against his cheek, her wry smile, teasing words. That sad farewell he relived over in his mind repeatedly. If only he had kissed her. If only he had made her understand that she had unlocked the door to his desire. If only he had held on to her somehow . . .
In a different world, she had said. Claire had as good as admitted that he had ignited a longing in her too. When the invitation had come through for a sabbatical at King’s College, London – no doubt promoted strongly by Professor Leavers – he had surprised himself by accepting immediately: no time to consider or calculate. It was the teenage Rifki, spontaneous and driven by his heart. It would put him closer to Claire. Perhaps her world could be different?
He would know soon enough, for today was the day that Claire hoped to be reunited with Wren. If the Australian was indeed dead, then maybe Claire, in time, would consider him. Rifki needed to know if the Australian soldier turned up – and if he didn’t, then he might make another approach to the woman consuming his thoughts. If the soldier kept their long-promised date, then Rifki would not trouble the couple again. He was ashamed to acknowledge that he had silently cast out his desire, clutching his son’s precious prayer book, that James Wren did not make it to the arranged rendezvous.
It was a bitter English afternoon and Rifki, dressed in the preferred dark suit of Londoners, had replaced the increasingly defunct fez for a homburg and regarded himself in the mirror of the main foyer of his university building. He checked his watch. He planned to arrive by two-thirty. It was one-fifty now and that gave him plenty of time to walk from the university to the Langham.
Shahin stepped out of the neo-classical, grey-stoned building of the embankment entrance of King’s College that overlooked the Thames, and with an optimistic set to his features he began a brisk walk towards Drury Lane, heading north towards Oxford Street, Regent Street and the rendezvous in Portland Place.
________
Claire once again stood with her back to the Church of All Souls and faced the towering prospect of the golden-coloured stone of the Langham Hotel that today in the dreary weather appeared a dull bronze. She took a slow, deep breath to steady herself before adjusting her coat so it sat absolutely perfectly over her angular shoulders and glided across the road, avoiding the ice. She skipped up the shallow marble stairs and smiled at the doorman rising from a polite bow.
‘Good afternoon, miss.’
‘Afternoon.’
He reached to open the door. ‘Let’s get you in from the chill.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled again, and tiptoed up the six marble steps to the grand foyer she recalled from her childhood and remembered her aunt explaining that the vast, white-tiled corridors were built wide enough to take a horse and carriage.
Mind you, darling, in terms of its practicality, what that really meant is that two ladies in voluminous crinolines could pass each other in the corridor without getting trapped.
The notion had amused her as a child and she remembered now how she had spluttered over her elderberry cordial when her aunt had recalled that snippet. But Claire was too nervous, too churned up, to be amused now. She slipped back her sleeve to look at her watch. Unbeknownst to her, one of her admirers had already arrived early, the other running late. Her timing was i
mmaculate as always. It was nearing ten to three.
‘Twelve minutes,’ she muttered.
‘Pardon, miss, can I help you?’ one of the pageboys offered. He was dressed in the distinctive maroon uniform with polished brass buttons and somewhere at the back of her mind a thought bubbled and burst to consciousness that she was glad this sweet-faced youth had not been sent to war. If he’d been born just a year earlier she may well have attended to him in Europe or Turkey.
‘I . . . er, I’m going to the Palm Court,’ she replied.
He smiled, nodding to where she should head. ‘Straight fru, miss.’
She already knew where it was but she smiled politely at where he pointed. ‘Thank you, I might sit in the lobby a while and wait for my friend.’
‘Of course,’ he said and gestured to a dark velvet sofa positioned against the rich cream walls, which were gilded, and beneath an enormous silk hanging against exquisite hand-painted wallpaper. A chandelier featuring pale-pink glass shades sent a soft rose light upon her from beneath the tall ceiling with its massive detailed architraves. Exquisite plasterwork of wreaths and trailing roses danced beneath the architraves and framed decorative archways, beyond which stood Corinthian-style columns, which made her think instantly of the Column of the Goths and, of course, Rifki Shahin. She banished that memory although she knew she must walk past those columns shortly if she was going to meet Jamie at the appointed place.
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