* * *
The package had come quite late. Olga had set it aside, afraid it was something from Konstantin, some demand. Either that or canned jellies or some similar small token from the grand duchess. When she pulled away the paper and string, however, she found a flat rectangular box etched with the image of an artist at their easel.
She opened it and sighed with delight: a painting box, with compartments for all sorts of things, and brushes, of good horsehair, rested inside, too. What a lovely gift.
She paused, her hand over one of the brushes. Lifting the box away, she shook the paper, looking for a note. She found one; it must have been on top of the lid before sliding away.
In bold handwriting, the note said, “One gift deserves another.” Her gift giver had signed it “Douglas.”
She dropped into one of her chairs, clutching the note to her chest. One gift deserves another? What did he mean?
She remembered the shy touch of her lips against his. But the encounter had ended so awkwardly. He hadn’t seemed pleased with her attempt to see him. She agreed she’d been scandalous. It was only that she…
“Couldn’t stop thinking about him,” she said aloud.
What a muddle. She slid the paper across her mouth, remembering. Had he been sorry he’d rejected her? Or sorry she had run instead of talking about it like a mature person? But who could talk about kisses late at night?
She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. Just a little too low, the chair hit the back of her skull uncomfortably, making it hard to think. Peter’s promise of a comfortable chair had not materialized yet. Instead, she paced the room, every few seconds brushing past the delicious box. It would be a pleasure to finish Harold’s painting with those. Today was her day off from the Grand Russe. She could put on her smock, nibble on the rolls she’d taken from the kitchen basket at the end of her shift the night before, and stay in all day.
A few minutes later, she found herself in front of her easel, not inspired. She needed a cup of tea. Quickly, she washed in her for-now private bathroom, and dressed, then went to the den on her floor. The hotel’s live-in staff weren’t allowed to eat in the staff dining room or cadge anything from the Coffee Room when they weren’t working, but they did have the den, which had a small kitchen.
When she entered, she found Alecia Salter kneeling in front of the stove, checking something inside.
“It smells delicious,” Olga commented.
The new bride turned and grinned. Pink-cheeked and glowing with life, she looked nothing like the mousy secretary she’d been when Olga first saw her two and half months earlier.
“New apron?” Olga asked.
“Yes, I sewed it while I was living at the boardinghouse. Do you want one now that you have your own kitchen?”
Olga laughed at the absurdity of the idea. “I don’t know how to cook. I’m happy to have the stove to make tea.”
Chapter 10
Alecia shook her head in mock alarm. “Then what are you going to live on? Mr. Dadey’s housekeeper isn’t here to keep you fed any longer.”
“I can make do for one day when the hotel isn’t feeding me. My paintings are selling, finally, so I can afford to run over to the A.B.C. for some eggs.”
“How exciting,” Alecia exclaimed. “I heard you had done well at the gallery.”
“And here as well,” Olga said. “One of those Plash boys offered me a commission.”
“Harold? Gerald?”
“Harold,” Olga said. “He has hidden depths and a purse to match.”
“How exciting. Is he sweet on you?”
“No, he’s a child,” Olga said. “I doubt he’s a day over twenty-three. I don’t even know if Plash is his last name.”
“Oh, I think you’re right. I believe they are related to the late Mrs. Plash’s sister, not someone from her husband’s side. But truly, now that I’m married I see all kinds of romantic possibilities for everyone,” her friend said. “Love should be in the air. And my switchboard duties are four days a week, so I have a lot more free time than you or Ivan.”
“I have cast my eyes over the seventh floor,” Olga admitted.
“Who?” Alecia checked the oven again, then opened the door. A blast of warm, bread-scented air filled the room, and she pulled out a tray of cream scones studded with currants.
“Goodness. I’ll just pay you to bake for me,” Olga exclaimed.
“You needn’t pay,” Alecia said as she set her tray on the stove. “But if we make it a regular thing, you could help me with the grocery money, and then I’ll deliver you food.”
“That is very kind of you,” Olga said. “But I hope you spend some time outside of these four walls. We both need fresh air and fresh things to look at.”
“Even if they are opulent walls. I suppose it means nothing to you.”
“It means a great deal, having my culture around me,” Olga said. “I missed it terribly when I worked in Leeds last year. The Haldenes have a wonderful little hotel empire, but it’s very British of course.”
“Who are the Haldenes? I know this hotel was once the Grand Haldene.”
“Peter’s mother was married twice. Her first husband’s name was Haldene, and they had an inn in Leeds before he was murdered. She and Peter’s father went into business with her Haldene brother-in-law, and others, to open this hotel over thirty years ago. Ultimately they had four or five hotels, and Peter’s sister, Eloise, runs the larger one in Leeds.”
“Not her husband?”
“No, no husband. I didn’t become close to her. She’s more professional than anyone I’ve met. You know how remote Peter can be. She’s even more that way.”
“I see.” Alecia poked at the top of one of her scones and scooped it up with the edge of her apron to check the bottom. Satisfied, she placed it on a plate and added the others. “Who is this gentleman on the seventh? One of the film stars?”
“No. Lord Walling.”
“Ivan knows him. And Sadie’s husband.” Alecia raised her eyebrows suggestively.
“That should tell you something.”
Alecia moved her tray to the sink and filled the kettle and set it on a burner to heat. “I try not to think too much about the fix my sister has landed herself in, marrying someone who is obviously not the salesman he claims to be.”
“People like him are protecting England as much as any policeman or soldier.”
“But they are deceivers,” Alecia said. “I understand the need for double-dealing. We’ve made decisions in my family that I wish we hadn’t been forced to make with regard to Ivan’s sister, but I wish we didn’t have to.”
“Our world isn’t black and white,” Olga agreed. “I have my own secrets.”
“Everybody does at the Grand Russe. Are you sure you want a man who spends time in the shadows? I can understand why you’d want a viscount. That’s your world. But the rest is something else.”
“You can’t help but crave who you crave,” Olga said. “He’s the first man to intrigue me since my prince was murdered.”
“Then you have to see where it takes you,” Alecia said. “My husband took me from a mouse to an entirely new woman.”
“And you’re happy?”
“So happy,” Alecia whispered and giggled. “And we have our own little suite! No more valet room, no more bed in a boardinghouse or cot in a friend’s flat. Oh, it is such a relief to start our life. You will still be my friend when you are a viscount’s wife, won’t you?”
“Of course. We Russians have to stick together,” Olga said automatically. “And us too, women without much family to rely on. We have to make our own circles.”
“Exactly.”
“But I don’t know that I’ll be able to marry Lord Walling. We seem to send mixed signals.”
The kettle whistled. Alecia poured a stream of water into a waiting Brown Betty teapot. “You have to work at it. He’s too big a catch to risk losing.”
Olga bit her lip, considering Alecia’s w
ords. Her friend knew, as did she, how real the risk of becoming a surplus woman was for their generation, since so many men had died in the war. She had to keep trying, even if she made missteps. “He sent me a gift last night.”
Alecia set the kettle back on the stove. “How exciting. Something good?”
“It was perfect,” Olga admitted. She went to the icebox, found butter, and set it and a couple of plates on the table.
Ivan came in then, so she set another plate and some teacups and changed the subject. While she wanted to keep talking about Douglas, she’d be embarrassed to have the conversation in front of Alecia’s husband.
After she finished eating, she returned to her room and applied a little lipstick, just enough to stain her mouth a cherry shade. She didn’t like the heavy makeup some girls were wearing these days, but she wanted to look nice.
Hoping Douglas was downstairs, she took the lift to the Grand Hall so she could have a bellboy send a note to Douglas’s room, mindful that he didn’t want her on his floor due to the Russians. After the bellboy took her note, she went into the Coffee Room to enjoy her art exhibit. She’d checked it each day at the end of her shift but hadn’t enjoyed the works for any length of time since choosing them for the show.
The exhibit would probably have to be taken down at the end of the week, and the Coffee Room restored to full size, but she thought it had served its purpose. Glancing around at the colorful works, she drew in inspiration. One beautiful work, depicting white horses coming onto a beach from frothy sea-blue waves, made her think she might add a horse to the landscape she’d painted in the picture window in her little commissioned painting.
Staring at the brushwork of the thirty-year-old work, she didn’t hear Douglas come in. “The horses of Neptune, right?” he asked.
She smiled at him. “Yes.”
“The joys of a classical education.” His mouth twisted wryly. “Thank you for not coming to my room. I want you to be safe, Princess.”
“I know,” she said, putting her hand on his arm. “But I missed you.”
The corners of his eyes creased with pleasure. “You did? That’s a lovely thing to hear on a rainy afternoon.”
“I received that beautiful art box.”
“Did you like it?”
“The box? Very much. The sentiment concerned me, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t want a gift for a kiss. Do you know what I mean?”
“You’re afraid I sent you something because you kissed me, even offered yourself to me?”
Her heart skipped a beat. Was that what he thought? Was that what she had done? Of course, a different sort of men might think that way, but she didn’t think it of Douglas. “I didn’t mean to.”
He pressed his lips together. “I know you are an innocent, but you took a risk. A different sort of man would have taken advantage.”
“You’re good, though, a good man.” She hesitated.
“Thank you.” His eyes were grave. “And the box wasn’t a response to your kiss, wonderful though it was. It was in response to your bravery at trying to break through your shyness and reserve. I know you didn’t want to kiss me in the hotel, but the reality is that we are forced to be here most of the time.”
“Yes, but I don’t have to be here today. Do you?”
He tilted his head. She liked the roguish effect.
“I could make arrangements.”
“Please do.”
“It’s not a day for walking. Would you like to see a picture?”
She already had a plan. “Yes. I saw an advertisement in a paper. How about A Romance of Mayfair? It’s about a duke who falls in love with an actress.”
“Does it have a happy ending?”
“Of course.”
He smiled at her. “Neither of us has our coat, but if we duck right into a taxicab and go to a theater, we should be fine.”
“We can check the start time in the Reading Room.” She gestured to the door, and he followed her out and across the Grand Hall to the center of the Reading Room, where all the London papers and others were laid over wooden dowels. They chose a couple and looked through them until they found where the movie was playing.
“We’d better leave five minutes ago,” he announced.
“Oh, dear.”
“I’ll make a quick telephone call from the reception desk. You hold a taxicab for us and I’ll be with you in a minute.”
Olga nodded, and they left the room together. She went out, happy for the overhanging canopy over the main entrance of the hotel, and had the doorman whistle for a taxicab.
She and Douglas sat shoulder to shoulder in the taxicab. Olga felt naughty without a hat, coat, or gloves. When had impetuousness become part of her nature? She supposed Douglas was a different sort of creature altogether, forged by wartime and spycraft. Who knew what he might get up to?
“You have a very Mona Lisa smile on your face,” Douglas observed. “What are you thinking of?”
“Adventure,” she admitted. “I thought I’d spend the day with my paints, but here I am.”
“This is what comes of late-night kisses,” he said, as the taxicab pulled in front of a theater in Regent Street.
An usherette opened the door for them and they breezed in, chased by the wind. In the blink of an eye, they were seated in the back of the upper level with the aid of an usherette’s torch, the movie screen below them. A thousand people or more were spread out on the main floor, and the screen already flickered with a Pathé newsreel.
They watched the reel about the removal of the Eros statue at Piccadilly and the flower seller who still sold her wares as scaffolding was erected around the statue.
“This city can’t stand still,” Douglas muttered in her ear.
“Not all of us are lucky to live where we work,” she said back. “I’m sure we need the new Tube station.”
“Not a fan of underground spaces, not after the trenches,” Douglas said.
She jerked her head toward him at those words. She’d never thought about that, how many men in London must have flashbacks when they ventured into the underground stations. “I’m glad you can afford taxicabs.”
His lips quirked, but his eyes were sad. Boldly, she found his hand on the armrest between them, squeezed his warm fingers with her chillier ones, and didn’t let go until the film program had ended.
* * *
Glass woke up the next morning with not the romantic film scrolling through his brain or even the feel of Princess Olga’s chilly fingers warming under his on the plush theater armrest. No, what had stuck in his brain was that famous statue of Eros being covered.
All those men milling around, caps hiding much of their faces. Men in overalls were hovering about the scaffolding. The soot-streaked buildings and constant traffic, everything blending into the leaden sky. The noise and movement of cars, horse-led wagons, double-decker buses. All of London passed through Piccadilly. A place to blend in. A place for… Konstantin to hide?
He heard a knock on the door and went into his small entryway to speak to the floor butler. After he took his messages, he scribbled a note to Bill Vall-Grandly to ask him to come over, then ordered breakfast.
After he bathed and dressed, he ate his eggs and toast while reading his secretary’s, Miss Drover’s, summary of his section’s activities over Saturday and Sunday. A possible sighting of Konstantin on the east side of the West End had him deciding to look for the bomber where instinct suggested. It wasn’t confirmation by any means, but they knew the man loved concealed places, and with a Tube station being punched into the earth, new underground spaces were being created in Piccadilly.
He’d just changed the disk behind the Firebird when another knock came at the door. Bill Vall-Grandly, looking a bit more rotund than usual in an unflattering brown plaid suit, was accompanied unexpectedly by Miss Drover herself.
Glass let them into the suite. “I was going to have you run things here, Vall-Grandly,
while I nip down to Piccadilly Circus.”
“Checking out that report about Konstantin being seen near the Queen’s Theatre?” Miss Drover asked, tightening the curl at the ends of her bob with her fingers.
“I saw a newsreel about the construction of the underground station at Piccadilly.”
Vall-Grandly snapped his fingers. “He does love low places.”
“Exactly.”
“Busy place, Piccadilly,” Miss Drover said.
“Quite. What brings you by, Miss Drover?”
She opened a leather case and pulled out a sheath of papers. “Requisitions for Les Drake’s new operation up north. I need your signature to disburse funds.”
“In return for that, why don’t you stay at the listening post?” he suggested. “Generally, I don’t like women about this floor because the Russians have beaten up some prostitutes, but if you stay inside the room you should be fine.”
“Just show me what to do,” Miss Drover said eagerly, unbuttoning her coat.
He showed her how to open the painting and quickly demonstrated the equipment. “They usually have a meeting about eleven, but since you don’t speak Russian it will be gibberish to you.”
Her smile was bright. “I have been taking lessons.”
He’d known she was ambitious, but he hadn’t expected this. “I wasn’t aware of that. How?”
“My mother has a Russian cleaner, came from Petrograd just after the war. I’m paying her to teach me Russian. What am I listening for?”
Glass regarded his ambitious secretary with respect. A profoundly mousy woman in her late twenties, she must have thought she had lost her chance of finding a husband to work so hard in her career. Unfortunate, because she had a sharp mind and great energy. Any man would be lucky to have her. “Street names, ship names, anything that sounds like it is related to smuggling.”
“Excellent,” Miss Drover said with a brisk nod.
“The floor butler will be by in about twenty minutes on his next round. Order something, tea or whatever, and if you need to contact anyone, he’ll take the note downstairs. We’re a finely oiled machine.”
Lady Be Good Page 14