House of Bliss

by T T Thomas

  But the bust supporter and bust improver, called bustiere—now, it was the future because the marriage-age young women wished to endow themselves, however falsely, and support their assets.

  Her pattern makers were working up designs for the two-piece bust improver and corset combination that owed its existence to Madame Herminie Cadolle of Paris. Sabrina smiled at the memory of the excitable and creative Mme. Cadolle who she had the good fortune to meet several years earlier. The brilliant young Parisian had patented her invention, which she called a corselet-gorge. Sabrina expected to be designing many more of these two-piece corset replacements.

  Younger, modern women were beginning to revolt against the corsets, and Sabrina planned to be there when they threw off the whalebone yokes of fashion servitude. The new corsets would only contain the waist, while a second piece would uplift, enhance and cover the breasts. She hoped next season to show, discreetly, what she believed would be the future for women’s breast containment. Containment and yet, revelation. House of Bliss brassieres. The making of them would be an art borne of skill, but the selling of them would require a skill artfully employed. She would have to convince her younger clientele that brassieres were the future of well-dressed breasts.

  In the meantime, the House of Bliss was a most successful enterprise, and Sabrina Blissdon was the House of Bliss. Her dear father had wisely encouraged her drawing aptitude when she was young, and as she had not a single instinct for the legal profession in which he grew the family fortune, she was happy to have her art. Then, too, perhaps he saw how art helped alleviate his daughter’s melancholia after her mother died when Sabrina was only ten.

  She bowed her head as she recalled her mother’s warm smile, her protective arms, her absolute devotion to her daughter and husband. But Sabrina knew she must move on from such thoughts so early in the day, lest the hours ahead be filled with lethargy and sadness. She knew where that led. That is, she knew where it used to lead. She looked up at the sound of the rear door opening. Felicity West. She had found Sabrina’s hideaway.

  “Ah, Miss West, welcome to my studio and House of Bliss.”

  Felicity looked around, eyes widening at the array of pattern tables, sewing machines, fabric bolts, mannequins, all of it.

  “You make…corsetry?”

  “We make corsets and all other items of intimate wear a lady could want.” She rose from her worktable and came around to where Felicity stood. “Does my profession surprise you, Miss West?”

  “Yes. I mean, no. It’s just that…” she furtively looked over Sabrina’s outfit, which was a man’s suit. She seemed flustered.

  Thinking the law library and the man’s suit confounded her guest, Sabrina tried to help. “My father was a lawyer before he died.”

  “Yes, I know. I mean, I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “You’ve heard of my father, then?” Sabrina asked.

  She blinked but gathered her wits about her. “Oh, I believe many people have heard of Louis R. Blissdon,” she said. “The Glyver divorce,” she added.

  “Oh that, yes. Well, most of his work did not involve such publicity…or notoriety.”

  “Do you always wear men’s fashions?” she asked. It was the kind of sudden inquiry that revealed a different, more simmering question.

  “Not always, but usually. This was my father’s suit. I had the ladies tailor it. Well, Josie my Cutter does most of the work.”

  She nodded. “I love the way you had the jacket fitted at the waist.”

  “Yes, I was lucky, I suppose, that my father and I were the same height and had the same shoulder width. A few nips and tucks and here I am.”

  “You don’t wear his old shirts, then?”

  “No…I, uh, needed more room…on top, of course, but I’ll wear the odd one now and then as an over shirt when I’m slouching around.” She pointed to her guest’s frock. “I rehabilitate good materials. That dress, for instance, was originally mine. It’s yours now as I never wear it.”

  Felicity touched the skirt of the dress. “Oh. Thank you, it’s quite pretty.”

  “That’s exactly why I no longer wear it. Pretty is not my personal style. It’s becoming on you, though.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “Do we not have a newspaper delivered weekdays?”

  Sabrina was taken aback by the abrupt change in subject but assigned it to that large body of knowledge she had yet to possess about Felicity West. “We do—Monday through Friday and on Sunday. Perhaps Cath has it in the kitchen. Are you following a serial novel?”

  “No, I…I was wondering, if it’s not too intrusive, if you can tell me about the prostitute who was murdered.”

  Sabrina raised her eyebrows. “Do you know many?”

  Felicity fiddled with her fingers and looked down. “No, of course not, why would I? One hears such awful things, and I feel bad for anyone who must live that way. To die that way is simply…too much to imagine.”

  Sabrina didn’t believe for a second that Miss West’s question reflected innate altruistic concerns, but she played along. This was Miss West’s second mention of the murder in as many days.

  “Well, apparently, she worked at Mrs. Janzek’s—she owns a tolerated house. It was one of her girls. But it happened away from the house.”

  “I see. I imagine it will be written up in the newspaper tomorrow.”

  “Maybe. Yes, I should think so.”

  Felicity West showed a sudden interest in the bolts of fabric that lined the walls.

  “So many choices…Oh.”

  “What is it?”

  She eyed a nearly finished corset on a manikin. “So this is you? The corsets with the blue embroidered B? I know these corsets.”

  “Indeed. Do you have one?” Sabrina knew for a fact she had never measured the body before her, but she was intrigued by the woman’s reaction.

  “Well, no, but my…” Felicity paused. “My dear friend wears your corsets.”

  Sabrina always thought that if one knows a woman’s body, whether by virtue of work, or pleasure, then one knows a woman’s body language. She naturally had the advantage of both kinds of knowing, and what she saw before her was a woman telling a lie.

  She could have asked for the “dear friend’s name” as all her corsets were bespoke, and thus she knew every one of her seven dozen clients. But she held onto her query and couldn’t have said why.

  “Well, that’s always nice to hear,” she said, nonchalantly. “Did you and the little angel see Dr. Wintermere yesterday afternoon? I’m sorry I had to leave before he arrived.”

  “Yes, all is well,” Felicity remarked turning to leave the studio, “I really didn’t need an examination, but I was grateful to have the baby looked at.”

  “I’m sure you know best,” Sabrina said amiably. “Dr. Wintermere will be here for dinner this evening. Will you join?”

  “Thank you, no.” She opened the door to leave. “I believe we’ll have a light bite in our room if that’s acceptable. I’m terribly tired from my ordeal, and I’ve been up for hours. I did hear you come in early this morning.”

  She turned back again to offer a tight smile.

  Sabrina made an effort to smile back. Then the mysterious Felicity West departed as quickly as she arrived.

  Sabrina put her sketch book aside and tidied up her desk. She wasn’t altogether sure she felt inspired enough to be drawing, but she knew she was intrigued enough to be day dreaming. So, she sat by the fire for a while.

  A comely young lady, she thought, but something was off about Felicity. She’d had a chance to tell Sabrina more about herself and yet chose not to. Here, today, would have been the perfect place and time—private, cozy, intimate. Surely, Miss West must have sensed she would have to be more forthcoming if she wished to remain a guest in Sabrina’s house. She hoped her houseguest would think about that, in-between tending to the baby and listening for Sabrina’s pre-dawn arrivals from her sojourns with Lena.

  Jeremy was unable to stay for
dinner after all. But he joined her for a quick whiskey in the library. He closed the doors behind him.

  “All’s well with the baby, I hope?” she said.

  He nodded in the affirmative, poured them a drink and came and sat next to her on the sofa.

  “She’s not the mother.”

  “What? How do you know?”

  “She told me,” he said after a gulp of his drink. “I offered to examine her, which would be natural after a birth, but she declined. I inquired as to the baby’s feeding, and that’s when she told me Cath feeds the baby. I thought maybe she couldn’t produce milk, but she was forthright. She said, ‘I’m not the baby’s mother, Doctor. She belongs to a friend of mine who cannot care for her.’”

  Sabrina stood up and brought the decanter of whiskey to the table in front of them. She poured them both another whiskey. “I’ll be damned. I knew something was peculiar about her. One has to wonder why she didn’t tell me that information?”

  Jeremy sloshed the golden liquid in his glass before drinking it straight down. “Curious, isn’t it? I wish I could stay, dear girl, but I got another call from the Chief Investigative Officer. Another autopsy. They’re running three a day in this vile and wonderful town. Pray it’s not a homicide, but the likelihood is that it’s exactly that.”

  Chapter 4

  The aroma of opium, for surely scent is too tender a word, is like a woman one is afraid to touch and yet must possess. It is seductive, sweet but with a tinge of tang, pungent high notes with a musky middle and a bottom floor of ripening melon. It is at once familiar and foreign, an aromatic intimation of dry, dusty rose with fragmented undertones of fresh gardenia. At the crown of desire and defloration, it is soft as a shadow, then sharp as absinthe. The louche bouquet of contradiction and mystery is a blend designed by the Goddess of Lies. With my single intake of breath, the poppy seduced first the unprepared purity of olfactory innocence. Then it overcame my remaining faculties by the force of irresistibly kind, yes kind, clouds. A haze of thick smoke kissed my cheek and whispered of the appealing apostasy of indifference. I expelled the white vapor and shrugged off all earthly cares with the slow, sick smile of a stupor that cannot comprehend satisfaction to call it that. It was everything posing as nothing. Incurious beauty, inglorious sensate.

  I loved it.

  It tried to kill me.

  I considered letting it.

  Excerpt from Sabrina Blissdon’s journal, Exhibit 2, Evidence File No. 1.

  As she usually did, she leaned up against multiple bed pillows reviewing her life. She had brought her journal upstairs, wrote in it for a while, then bounced erratically amidst various thoughts.

  Despite, or perhaps because of, her affluence and apparent success in the world, she had never fully sorted out whence came the essential woman she was. She knew women who never wondered about their attraction to other women. Lena never questioned her own choices. Annabel used to say only, ‘I am either fortunate or damned to be alive, but either way, it’s God’s will now. For you, my sweet.’

  Jeremy first told her about the tolerated houses when they developed a friendship while he ministered to her ailing father. One evening, as she and Jeremy drank whiskey in front of the fire, he wondered aloud if she might find a woman within the bawdy houses to whom she could confess her lustful tendencies.

  But three years ago, she was too afraid to go alone, so Jeremy accompanied her, both of them dressed as men. He pretended a headache, and paid Mrs. Tornage, the owner of Shelter House, to let him sit alone in the lounge, while Sabrina made her way upstairs with an unsuspecting woman.

  Ostensibly a boarding house, Shelter House was protected by both the police and its pricing. Mrs. Tornage, rightfully deciding that the higher prices would deter the rougher trade, prided herself on the cleanliness of her girls and her house. She had rules, and if any of the working women or their clients caused trouble or a scene, they were both asked to leave.

  Sabrina followed the woman as they ascended the stairs. She had dark brunette hair and a pleasing, fair face. Her hips swayed gently as she climbed the steps.

  As they walked past other rooms, Sabrina blanched with trepidation and excitement. She saw unmade beds, unkempt occupants and the odor of spent sex assaulted her senses unfavorably. Her anxiety increased with every step in the long, dimly-lit hallway. Perhaps Jeremy’s idea had not been a good one. Maybe her own judgment and desperation of the libido lacked the sanity of reasonableness and forethought. Maybe—

  They came to the last door on the right, and Annabel led Sabrina over the threshold into a large room that was neat as a pin. The bed dressings were crisp and clean, and the scent of evening jasmine was light and sweet as it wafted through the partially open window. Sabrina closed the door behind her and moved toward the center of the room. The lighting was soft, and so was Annabel’s voice when she turned to address, and undress, her client.

  Sabrina froze, unable to speak or move. The last thirty seconds had sent her bouncing off walls of fear and feckless despair, and the sudden counterpoint of the sensuous serenity in this room stunned her.

  “I must kiss you, then,” Annabel said, “which I don’t usually do. Which I never do.”

  She kissed Sabrina on the mouth, lightly lingering on her lips. As Sabrina leaned in for more, Annabel wrapped her hands around Sabrina’s neck. The mysterious woman teased her lips, slowly pried apart her teeth and took the liberty to circle Sabrina’s tongue with her own until they shuddered in shared arousal that seemed to surprise both women.

  Annabel stepped back half a pace and looked into Sabrina’s eyes. “You’ve not done this before, have you? With…anyone?”

  Sabrina shrugged. Certainly no man, but did the girl in her boarding school count? Probably not, but in her mind, she had taken their youthful and chaste kiss to its natural conclusion and decided she had found her way. But actual experience? No.

  Annabel accepted her shrug as an answer and began to undress Sabrina. “Such a wonderful camouflage,” Annabel teased, as she helped Sabrina out of her male attire. “It hides a heaven of grace.”

  Annabel’s eyes were the lightest blue with a hypnotizing dark blue limbal ring around the iris. Sabrina saw the world of a woman in those eyes, and she could not look away. She wanted to drown in the liquid blueness, and she felt her body give away her secret. Annabel smiled and her eyes danced as if to show Sabrina how well she had read that body.

  They made love, quickly, urgently, then again slowly, tenderly. After, Sabrina dozed in a daze of sated half consciousness. She could have slept a dreamy sleep with Annabel and held her all night. She wondered if she alone had such feelings but reality intruded and, remembering where she was, sat up quickly.

  A fully dressed Annabel was sitting in a chair looking at her. Sabrina apologized and put on her clothes, suddenly embarrassed by her own nudity and perplexed to sense an invisible shroud of sadness around Annabel’s shoulders.

  Annabel smiled and pointed to the other chair. On the table between them, a small pot of tea and two cups, a pitcher of milk and a ramekin of sugar cubes. A pair of miniature silver tongs glistened on a dark linen napkin next to the sugar. Silver teaspoons shone brightly atop two more napkins.

  “You are welcome to visit me again,” she said. “And I hope you do.”

  How fortunate that she sensed Sabrina’s uneasiness, remained calm in the face of the evidence and appreciated her client’s willingness to pay double. Her name was Annabel North. Sabrina called on her a half-dozen times a month over a full year, and the woman was consistently attentive to her. A naturally pretty woman in her early thirties, Annabel seemed amused with Sabrina’s awkwardness but gentle with her desires.

  Sabrina became more than fond of her. She looked forward to their encounters, thought about Annabel when not with her and imagined gifts she’d love to give her. She could tell Annabel was surprised, and pleased, when given the gift of a small expensive bottle of perfume. “It’s prettier and softer,” Annabel said
, implicitly comparing it to the cheap perfume she usually wore.

  After several visits, Sabrina paid Mrs. Tornage to reserve an extra hour with Annabel so they could talk. She had not expected the prostitute to be well spoken and knowledgeable about many subjects. She had a beguiling shyness that intrigued Sabrina. Most of the women in the house were loud, even boisterous, and the language of the house was both crude and cant.

  Annabel’s clothing was more reserved than the other residents and, Sabrina noticed, made of finer materials. Annabel’s face, although rouged, was lovely, and her skin, not counting the rouge, flawless, almost translucent. She had a perfectly straight, patrician nose. But it was her air of civility and quiet demeanor that made Sabrina wonder. What had driven this woman to a career in prostitution?

  One day, as Annabel walked Sabrina out, one of the women shouted out from her bedroom. “Look at lucky Annie. Annie’s got a nice beau, now, innit?”

  Sabrina blushed as she walked out the door. She wanted to find a way to see Annabel without coming to this group house, but it was Annabel’s living quarters as well as workplace.

  After a dozen months, Annabel told Sabrina her weakness. “Have you discovered the blessings of the poppy?” she asked Sabrina. Sabrina didn’t know what she meant, but once she found out, she shook her head. No, she did not know the poppy other than by reputation as more of a curse than a blessing.

  Annabel cautiously nodded her agreement and admitted she was grateful her client hadn’t recoiled in horror. And then, Annabel was…she was generous with her show of sensuous gratitude. Oh, good heavenly Father, such exquisite generosity. The woman was blessed with a wealth of knowledge and the desire to please her client.