“It’s been safe so far,” Christopher said, his lips glistening red as he adjusted the sparkling headband over the short, black wig.
“I suppose that’s true.” We’d been in London for more than two months, and Christopher had attended several of the balls with no problems. “But surely the more often you tempt fate…”
“Don’t worry so, Pippa.” His eyes met mine in the mirror. “I promise to be careful.”
“See that you are,” I told him. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
“I don’t want anything to happen to me, either. I’ll be here by tomorrow morning, as always.”
Before I could say anything else, he jumped up. “Did I show you my new dress? It’s divine, darling. Absolutely divine.”
He hustled across the room on men’s size 42 patent leather pumps. Christopher has elegant feet, small for a man and with high arches.
I pivoted on the bed, so I could watch as he pulled open the doors to my wardrobe and reached in, turning with a pale blue confection of scalloped edge and beaded body clutched to his non-existent bosom. “Just look at this, Pippa! Isn’t it the most stunning thing?”
It certainly was. “Lovely,” I said, with the barest hint of envy that I hoped Christopher didn’t notice. “You’ll be the best dressed wo…”Oopsie. “—man there.”
“That’s the idea.” He tossed the hanger on the bed before he pulled the dress over his head. “Give me a hand, darling?” his disembodied voice requested from inside the beaded creation.
“Of course.” I went over and helped him smooth the dress into place before stepping back. “Oh, that’s gorgeous. It does a beautiful job of bringing out your eyes.”
Christopher is just about average height for a man, so he makes for a tall, but not outsized, woman. And he’s slender, with that figure we’re all longing for these days: totally flat fore and aft, leaving the nice, drop-waist gown to fall becomingly from the shoulders to the hem without getting caught up on anything unfashionable like breasts or bum.
“Thank you, darling.” He turned this way and that in front of the full length mirror.
I bit my lip. “I don’t suppose you’d let me come with you, would you?”
I was curious about the ball, I admit it. (I’m curious about most things.) But I was also a little worried, and I’ll admit that, too. Something was scratching at the back of my neck in an unpleasant manner, and it wasn’t the label in my blouse.
Christopher turned from the mirror to give me a look. “What’s wrong, Pippa?”
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “I have a bad feeling. Something feels like it’s about to happen. Something… not good.”
“You mean something bad?”
“I don’t know what I mean. I’m just… uneasy. I’d feel better if I were going with you.”
Christopher is the closest thing I have to a brother, slightly younger by a few months, and the idea of sending him alone into something I had reservations about, concerned me.
Christopher nodded, but said, “Well, you can’t. Not only is it not a place for a well-bred young lady, but what if you’re right and something happens, and I need you to come and get me from jail? If you’re in there with me, I’ll have to call Father to stand our bail, and that would definitely be not-good.”
Definitely. For one thing, Uncle Herbert would yank Christopher back to Wiltshire so fast my hair would flutter in the breeze, and for another, he’d probably disinherit him. He might even lock him up in a sanitarium or asylum or monastery or something, and that would be the end of life as we knew it for both of us.
“I’ll be prepared,” I said. “Although it would be ever so much better if you could refrain from getting arrested in the first place. Are you sure I can’t convince you to stay home tonight?”
He shook his head. “I can’t, Pippa. Although I’ll be as careful as I know how to be, I promise. I’ll be observant, and I won’t take any mad chances. And now I guess I’d better—”
He stopped at the sound of a knock on the hall door, and glanced at me. “Are you expecting someone?”
“Not me. Shouldn’t Evans ring up before he admits anyone?”
Evans was the doorman in the mansion block in which Christopher and I shared a flat, and part of his job was to announce visitors before sending them upstairs, in the event the tenants should wish to be not-in to visitors.
Not-in as opposed to actually out, you understand. In the same way that not-good doesn’t necessarily equate to wholly bad.
“He should,” Christopher agreed. “Perhaps it’s that young woman from down the hall. The American one with all the teeth.”
Perhaps it was. Or if not her, someone else who was already inside the building and wouldn’t need to be announced. Perhaps it was Evans himself with a package. But just in case—
