The Dressmaker (29 page)

Elinor watched her sister closely. “If I tell you she was, you must promise not to get hysterical.”

“Oh, dear Lord.”

“Promise? If you don’t, I will walk out of here and get on a train for Los Angeles right now.”

Reluctantly, Lucile agreed. She sat in horrified silence as Elinor told her about the slashed wedding gown. How Tess had set about to repair it; how it had worked.

“Who would do such a thing?”

“She doesn’t know. But the absence of your general manager’s assistant was suspicious.”

“She didn’t tinker with my design, did she?”

“She did what she had to do.”

“That means she did. And she was afraid to admit it.”

“I said, she did what she had to do. And you seem prepared to berate her. Why did you send her in your place, then?”

“I had no choice.”

“What does Cosmo say?”

“He actually thinks I’m feeling maternal. Which is nonsense.”

“Trying
not
to feel maternal is more like it,” Elinor said

The weight of an old, unspoken hurt descended between them.

“I’m not asking anything.”

Lucile turned her head away before answering. “Mind you don’t,” she said.

The muted sounds of the city—horses clattering along the street, the chugging of motorcars and children calling to one another—floated through the open window, the only sounds in the silence that followed.

Elinor sighed, reaching over to pat her sister’s hand. “Well, back to your spring show. I’ve struck a bargain with a young woman who is going to be a star in the movies, but right now she needs money.”

“What kind of a bargain?”

“We give her one of your gowns and she promises to wear it here and in Hollywood, extolling your virtues as a designer.”

“What is the bargain?”

“We pay her a thousand dollars.”

“My Lord, that’s insane!
She
should be paying
me
!”

“Lucy, she’ll be a big customer very soon. Haven’t you heard of Mary Pickford?”

“I’ve read about her. I don’t need such cheap advertising. No, I won’t hear of it.”

Elinor settled back in her seat and reached once again for her cigarette holder, taking time to again light a cigarette. “My dear sister, you can’t afford to pass this one up,” she said.

On Tuesday morning Tess slipped out of the hotel with a small valise, avoiding Lucile’s suite. It was a relief, knowing she would no longer be a pretender to these lavish surroundings. Cosmo and Elinor surely had no inkling of how much having a place of her own meant to her. She brushed her hair away from her face, hoping she didn’t look as tired as she felt.

The night had been filled with more dreams, the Darlings entwined through them all. She couldn’t get them out of her mind. That affable, happy man, he and his wife the embodiment of fantasy—gone, vanished. Yesterday she had pushed her thoughts into a tight corner, knowing they would be waiting for her later. And now they were hammering to be heard.
Cruelty
. The word Jean Darling had used. But Lucile didn’t kill her husband—no one could say that. How ironic that a man could be cowardly and then muster the courage—or did it take only shame?—to take his own life. She skimmed the
Times
in the hotel’s lobby, reading Pinky’s story
about yesterday’s testimony. No mention of Jim; nothing about the Duff Gordons. A picture of Jordan Darling and one of his weeping wife.

And no way to offer them comfort. None, certainly not from anyone working for Lady Duff Gordon. Jim must know what happened by now. What did he think?

She climbed into the waiting car, her heart heavy. She must pull herself together. Today, just one step at a time. The shop would be frantic; the show—how could it matter in the face of such tragedy—was only days away. Last night James had ticked off all the things that needed to be done, and she felt enormous gratitude that he had so quickly rallied to her side. He was ordering the canapés and the wine. He had even arranged for reminder cards to be hand-delivered to Lucile’s patrons today. What else? She tried to focus on her concern about the models. Yesterday one of them had seemed restless and bored, unwilling to stand for final pinnings—and she was the one slated to wear the centerpiece wedding gown.

Tess rubbed her eyes; oh, she was tired, and the day had barely begun. “Lucile, come back soon,” she whispered quietly. “This is more your world than it is mine.” She pulled her purse close, comforted once again by the weight of the keys inside.

“There’s a problem,” James said as she came in the door of Lucile’s office. His bald head glistened with sweat. “The tucks in the wedding gown made it too tight for the model.”

“I can fix that with a piecing of silk, I think,” Tess said, trying to appear confident.

He shook his head wearily. “She pulled it off and tore it again. Said she’d never seen such a mess before a show. Then stomped out, probably with a job offer from this woman Chanel already in her back pocket.”

“Bring me the dress. And another model—I don’t care who.”

James nodded and hurried from the room.

Her hands trembled as he handed her the gown and she saw the tear. She would have to change the line of the bodice, and that meant the skirt would need to be reconfigured. Lucile would be upset, but there was no choice. As Tess pulled out the seams and retucked the material—why did it need that underskirt?—she felt something totally unexpected and startling: a sense of euphoria. She could do this. She could salvage Lucile’s creation.

The model, a tall, slender girl of about eighteen, stared straight ahead as Tess worked, not seeming to care about or to question anything. Engrossed in the cutting and refitting, Tess worked in silence. The underskirt had bunched under the torn material; it had to go. Scissors poised, she hesitated. Would it be too sheer, or would it just give a hint of the wearer’s legs? Anything else would be disastrous. She knew it would work, she was sure of it; the beading would soften the transparency and the entire gown would float much better. Sharp and sure, her scissors began cutting away the underskirt.

Just as she finished, James came bursting in, his eyes alight. “Miss Glyn called,” he said. “Isadora Duncan says she will attend the show. That helps make up for Mrs. Wharton backing out, I’d say.”

Tess lifted her eyes from the fabric, her breath catching. “My goodness!” she said.

“Madame has made her some beautiful clothes,” James said, anticipating her question. “And she doesn’t have to buy anything. She just has to
be
here. Come quick, see the carpet—they’re laying it now.”

Tess peered through the door and caught her breath again. From the entrance near the shabby elevator to the back of the loft, a sweep of rich, thick purple carpet was being unrolled and hammered down. The seamstresses and fitters were watching and giggling. This factory they labored in every day, crammed with sewing machines and billowing reams of silk and soft wools, was being transformed. Chiffon curtains were being arranged around the stage, creating a silvery cloudlike setting; a workman was fiddling with the lights, dimming them to a soft glow. The effect was magical.

“Lucile knows how to do this, doesn’t she?” James murmured. “Such a sense of drama. Amazing woman, as maddening as she is.”

“Yes,” Tess said. Could she, too, do all this someday? Maybe, she thought, letting herself slip back to the night on the
Titanic
and Jack Bremerton’s unexpected vote of confidence in her. She would probably never see him again, and his faith in her that night had been unearned at the time. But what she knew for certain was how much she wanted to try.

TERRITORIES CONFERENCE ROOM
WASHINGTON, D.C.
TUESDAY, APRIL 23

Pinky had trouble dragging herself to the new hearing room on Tuesday morning. That cheap Van Anda had put her up in a hotel filled with boisterous late-night partygoers, and no amount of banging on the walls or shouting down the corridor had stopped the noise. She had tried to talk with Bonney yesterday, but Smith’s people spotted him in the entrance hall and hustled him away with the rest of the crew. Too many witnesses and contradictions; that had left her cranky. A leather-goods man said crew members shot pistols in the air to keep panicked men from filling the boats, while a Brooklyn cleric insisted that there was complete decorum on the ship, no panic at all. She had worked until her early-edition deadline, distracted by anxiety about her father. There was a neighbor “looking in” on Mrs. Dotson, hopefully with some delicacy, so the woman wouldn’t guess that Pinky didn’t completely trust her. She probably knew it anyway.

She slipped into a seat near the front, glad she had again come early. She missed the presence of Mrs. Brown—the eminently quotable Mrs. Brown—but that ebullient lady had returned to New York, making lavish predictions for Jim’s future as an artist—all a bit over the top, in Pinky’s view. But then rich people always made making money look easy.

People were clamoring outside, angry that the hearing had been
moved to a room with better acoustics. They didn’t care about acoustics; they just wanted to be there and hear all the sad, enraging stories that patch together any disaster, making it tasty and satisfying. God, what an awful thing to think, she told herself. How cynical am I, anyway?

The first witness to take the stand was the lookout in the
Titanic
’s crow’s nest—Frederick Fleet, a shabbily dressed man fumbling with a ragged cap. His eyes kept darting nervously in the direction of Bruce Ismay, which was no surprise. How could Smith expect to get complete candor from men whose livelihood depended on White Star?

“Mr. Fleet, your job was to report any danger ahead, is that correct?” asked Smith.

“Yes, sir. They told us to keep a sharp lookout for small ice. And, well, I reported an iceberg right ahead—a black mass.”

“How long before the collision, or accident, did you report ice ahead?”

“I have no idea.” Again, a nervous glance in Ismay’s direction.

“About how long?” Smith pressed.

“I reported it soon as ever I seen it.”

“You are accustomed to judging distances, are you not, from the crow’s nest? You are there to look ahead and sight objects, are you not?”