“I think perhaps you’re meant to come with me.”
Miss Temple turned to see the woman in red, from Roger’s car. She no longer wore her fur-collared cloak, but she still had the lacquered cigarette holder in her hand, and her bright eyes, gazing fixedly at Miss Temple through the red leather mask, quite belied their jeweled tears. Miss Temple turned, but could not speak. The woman was astonishingly lovely—tall, strong, shapely, her powdered skin gleaming above the meager confines of the scarlet dress. Her hair was black and arranged in curls that cascaded across her bare pale shoulders. Miss Temple inhaled and nearly swooned from the sweet smell of frangipani flowers. She closed her mouth, swallowed, and saw the woman smile. It was very much how she imagined she had so recently smiled at the woman in blue silk. Without another word, the woman turned and led the way down one of the mirrored halls. Without a word Miss Temple followed.
Behind, she heard a distant buzz, of movement, of conversation, of the party itself—but this was fading before the sharp report of the woman’s footfalls on the marble. They must have gone fifty yards—which was but half the length of the hall—when her guide stopped and turned, indicating with her outstretched hand an open door to Miss Temple’s left. They were quite alone. Not knowing at this point that she could do anything else, Miss Temple went into the room. The woman in red followed, and shut the heavy door behind them. Now there was silence.
The room was spread with thick red and black carpets which absorbed the sound of their passage. The walls were fitted with closed cabinets, and between them racks of hooks, as if for clothing, and a full-length mirror. A long, heavy wooden work table was shoved against one wall, but Miss Temple could see no other furniture. It looked like some kind of attiring room, for a theatre, or perhaps sport, for horseback riding, or a gymnasium. She imagined a house of this size might well have its own anything it wanted, if the owner was so inclined. On the far wall was another door, not so fancy, set into the wall to look at first glance like one of the cabinets. Perhaps that led to the gymnasium proper.
The woman behind her said nothing, so she turned to face her, head inclined so as to shadow her face. The woman in red wasn’t looking at Miss Temple at all, but was fitting another cigarette into her holder. She’d dropped the previous one on the carpet and ground it in with her shoe. She looked up at Miss Temple with a quick ghost of a smile, and strode over to the wall, where she jammed the new cigarette into one of the gas lamps and puffed on the holder until it caught. She exhaled, crossed to the table and leaned back against it, inhaled, and exhaled again, gazing at Miss Temple quite seriously.
“Keep the shoes,” the woman said.
“Beg pardon?”
“They’re quaint. Leave the rest in one of the lockers.”
She gestured with the cigarette holder to one of the tall cabinets. Miss Temple turned to the cabinet and opened it; inside, hanging from hooks, were various pieces of clothing. On the hook right in front of her face—as if in answer to her fears—was a small white mask, covered in closely laid small white feathers, as if from a dove or a goose or a swan. Keeping her back to the woman in red, she threw off her hood and tied the white mask into place, weaving the strap beneath her curls, pulling it tight across her eyes. Miss Temple then shucked off her cape—glancing back once to the woman, who seemed to be smiling with wry approval of her progress—and hung it on a hook. She selected what seemed to be a dress from another hook—it was white, and silken—and held it out in front of her. It wasn’t a dress at all. It was a robe, a very short robe, without any kind of buttons or sash, and quite thin.
“Did Waxing Street send you?” the woman asked, in a disinterested, time-passing tone.
Miss Temple turned to her, made a quick decision, and spoke deliberately.
“I do not know any Waxing Street.”
“Ah.”
The woman took a puff of her cigarette. Miss Temple had no idea whether her answer had been wrong—whether there had been a right or wrong answer—but she felt it was better to tell the truth than to guess foolishly. The woman exhaled, a long thin stream of smoke sent toward the ceiling.
“It must have been the hotel, then.”
Miss Temple said nothing, then nodded, slowly. Her mind raced—what hotel? There were hundreds of hotels. Her hotel? Did they know who she was? Did her own hotel supply young women as guests to luxurious parties? Did any hotel do such a thing? Obviously so—the mere question told her that—yet Miss Temple had no idea what this meant as far as her own disguise, what she ought to say or how she was expected to behave or what this exactly implied about the party, though she was beginning to have suspicions. She looked again at the wholly inadequate robe.
She turned to the woman. “When you say hotel—”
Her words were cut off brusquely. The woman was grinding out her second cigarette on the carpet, and her voice was suddenly annoyed.
“Everything is waiting—it’s quite late. You were late. I have no intention of serving as a nursemaid. Get changed—be quick about it—and when you’re presentable, you can come find me.” She walked directly toward Miss Temple, reached out to take hold of her shoulder—her fingers surprisingly hard—and spun her so her face was half-way into the cabinet. “This will help you get started—given the fabric, think of it as an act of mercy.”
Miss Temple squawked. Something sharp touched the small of her back, and then shifted its angle, driving upward. With a sudden ripping sound, and a simultaneous collapse of her garment, Miss Temple realized that the woman had just sheared through the lacings of her dress. She whirled around, her hands holding it to her bosom as it peeled away from her back and off of her shoulders. The woman was tucking something small and bright back into her bag, crossing to the small inner door, and jamming a third cigarette into her holder as she spoke.
“You can come in through here.”
Without a further glance at Miss Temple the woman in red opened the door with impatience, paused to get a light from the nearest wall sconce, and strode from view, pulling the door behind her so it slammed.
Miss Temple stood, at a loss. Her dress was ruined, or at least ruined without immediate access to new lacing and a maid to tie it up. She pulled it off of her upper body and did her best to shift the back section around so she could see it—fragments of green lacework were even now tumbling to the floor. She looked at the door to the hallway. She could hardly leave like this. On the other hand, she could hardly leave in her corset, or in the pitifully gossamer silk robe. She remembered with relief that she did still have her cloak, and could surely cover any less than decorous attire with that. This made her feel a little better and, after a moment of steady breathing, she was in less of a hurry to escape, and began to wonder once more about the woman, the party, and of course, never far from her thoughts, Roger. If she could return to fetch her cloak at any time and simply put it over her corset or ruined dress, then what was the harm in perhaps investigating further? On top of this, she was now intrigued by the reference to the hotel—she was determined to find out if such things happened at the Boniface, and how other than by continuing could she pursue her brave plan? She turned back to the cabinet. Perhaps there were other things than the robe.
There were, but she wasn’t sure if she was any more comfortable at the thought of putting them on. Several items could only be described as undergarments, and probably from a warmer climate than this—Spain? Venice? Tangier?—a pale silken bodice, several sheer petticoats, and a pair of darling little silk pants with an open seam between the legs. There was also another robe, similar to the first, only longer and without any sleeves. The ensemble was all white, save for the second robe, which had a small green circle embroidered repeatedly as a border around the collar and the bottom hem. Miss Temple assumed this was why she was allowed to keep her shoes. She looked at her own undergarments—shift, petticoats, cotton breeches, and her corset. Except for the corset, she didn’t see too much of a difference between what was in the cabinet and th
e items on her body—save for the former being made of silk. Miss Temple was not in the habit of wearing silk—and it was only rarely that she was provoked into a choice outside her habits. The problem was getting out of her corset and then back into it, without assistance. She felt the silken pants between her fingers and resolved to try.
Her fingers tore behind her at the knotwork of the corset, for now she was concerned about taking too long, and did not want anyone coming in to collect her when she was half-naked, and once she was free of it—and taking deeper breaths than she was used to—she pulled the corset and her shift over her head. She pulled on the silk bodice, sleeveless, with tiny straps to keep it up, and tugged it into place over her bosom. She had to admit that it felt delicious. She pushed her petticoats and breeches down to the floor and, balancing on one foot and then the other, kicked her shoes free of them. She reached for the little pants, feeling a strange thrill at standing in such a large room wearing nothing but the bodice, which did not stretch below her ribs, and her green ankle boots. Stranger still, pulling on the pants, was how she felt somehow even more naked, with the open seam along her delicate curls. She ran her fingers through them once, finding the exposure both exquisite and a little frightening. She removed her fingers, sniffed them by habit, and reached for the silken petticoats, holding them open and stepping through the circle one foot at a time. She pulled them up, tied them off, and then reached again for her corset.
Before she put it on, Miss Temple stepped in front of the large mirror. The woman who stared back was unknown to her. It was partially the mask—the experience of looking at herself in a mask was extremely curious, and not unlike running her fingers along her open pants. She felt a tingle crawl down her spine and settle itself right among her hips, a ticking restless hunger. She licked her lips, and watched the woman in the mask of white feathers lick hers as well—but this woman (her pale arms bare, her legs muscular, throat exposed, roseate nipples at plain view through the bodice) licked them in quite a different way than seemed normal to Miss Temple—though once she saw that image, its sensation was, as it were, taken into her, and she licked them again as if some transformation had indeed been made. Her eyes glittered.
She dropped the corset back into the cabinet and put on the robes, first the shorter one with sleeves, and then over it the larger, almost like a tunic, with the borders of green embroidery, which did in fact have several hooks to keep it closed. She looked at herself again in the mirror, and was happy to see that together the two layers of robe provided enough of a barrier for decency. Her arms and lower legs were still semi-visible through their single layers, but the rest of her body, though suggested, could not in any detail be seen. As a final precaution, because she had not fully lost her sense of place or perspective, Miss Temple fished in the pocket of her cloak for both her money and her all-weather pencil, which was still rather sharp. Then she knelt on alternating knees, stuffing the money into one boot and wedging the pencil into the other. She stood, took a couple of steps to test comfort, closed the cabinet, and then walked through the inner door.
She was in a narrow unfinished hallway. She walked a few paces in gradually growing light and reached a turn where the floor slanted up toward the bright light’s source. She stepped into glaring light and raised a hand to block it, looking around her. It was a kind of sunken stage—above and around it rose a seating gallery pitched at a very steep angle, covering three sides of the room. The stage itself, what she took for playing space, was taken up with a large table, at the present moment flat but with a heavy apparatus underneath, which, she assumed from the large, notched curve of steel running the length of the table, could tilt the table to any number of angles, for better viewing from the gallery. Behind the table, on the one wall without seating, was a common, if enormously large, blackboard.
It was an operating theatre. She looked to either side of the table and saw holes that dangled leather belts, to restrain limbs. She saw a metal drain on the floor. She smelled vinegar and lye, but beneath them some other odor that prickled the back of her throat. She looked up at the blackboard. This was for teaching, for study, but no mere man of science could afford such a home. Perhaps this Lord was their patient—but what patient would want an audience for his treatment? Or patron to some medical prodigy—or himself a practicing amateur—or an interested spectator? Her flesh was chilled. She swallowed, and noticed something written on the board—she hadn’t seen it from the entrance because of the light. The surrounding text had been erased—indeed, half of this word had been erased—but it was easy to see what it had been: sharp block printing, in chalk, the word “ORANGE.”
Miss Temple was startled—indeed, she may have squeaked in surprise—by a throat being cleared on the far side of the stage, from shadow. There was an opposite rampway rising up from the floor she hadn’t seen, hidden by the table. A man stepped into view, wearing a black tailcoat, a black mask, and smoking a cigar. His beard was elegantly trimmed, and his face familiarly ruddy. It was one of her two dogs from the train, who had been sitting across from Roger. He looked at her body quite directly, and cleared his throat again.
“Yes?” she asked.
“I have been sent to collect you.”
“I see.”
“Yes.” He took a puff on the cigar but otherwise did not move.
“I’m sure I’m sorry to make anyone wait.”
“I didn’t mind. I like to look around.” He looked again, frankly examining her, and stepped fully up from the ramp into the theatre, raising his cigar hand above his eyes to block the light. He glanced over the gallery, to the table, and then to her again. “Quite a place.”
Miss Temple adopted, without difficulty, a knowing condescension. “Why, have you never been here?”
He studied her before answering, then decided not to answer, and stuck the cigar into his mouth. With his hand free, he pulled a pocket watch from his black waistcoat and looked at the time. He replaced the watch, inhaled, then removed the cigar, blowing smoke.
Miss Temple spoke again, affecting as casual an air as possible.
“I have always found it to be an elegant house. But quite…particular.”
He smiled. “It is that.”
They looked at each other. She very much wanted to ask him about Roger, but knew it wasn’t the time. If Roger was, as she suspected, peripheral, then asking for him by name—especially a guest in her strange position (as much as she did not fully understand what that was)—would only arouse suspicion. She must wait until she and Roger were in the same room and—while both were masked—try to engage someone in conversation and point him out.
But being alone with anyone was still an opportunity, and despite her terrible sense of disquiet and unease, in order to try and provoke this canine fellow further, she let her eyes wander to the blackboard, looking fixedly at the half-erased word, and then back to him, as if pointing out that someone had not fully done their job. The man saw the word. His face twitched in a quick grimace and he stepped to the board, wiping the word away with his black sleeve, and then beating ineffectually on the sleeve to get rid of the chalk smear. He stuck the cigar in his mouth and offered her his arm.
“They are waiting.”
She walked past the table and took it, bobbing her head as she did. His arm was actually quite strong and he held hers tightly, even awkwardly, as he was so much taller. As they walked down the ramp into darkness, he spoke, nodding his head back to the theatre. “I don’t know why they had you go through there—I suppose it’s the shortest way. Still, it’s quite a sight—not what you’d expect.”
“That depends,” Miss Temple answered. “What do you expect?”
In response, the man only chuckled, and squeezed her arm all the harder. Their ramp made a turn just like the other had, and they walked on level ground to another door. The man pushed it open and thrust her deliberately into the room. When she had stumbled several steps forward he came in behind and closed the door. Only then did he le
t go of Miss Temple’s arm. She looked around her. They were not alone.
The room was in its way the opposite of where she had changed clothes, for just as it was on the opposite side of the theatre so it must be used for an opposite kind of preparation—an entirely different kind of participant. It felt like a kitchen, with a flagged stone floor and white tiled walls. There were several heavy wooden tables, also fitted with restraints, and on the walls various bolts and collars, clearly meant for securing the struggling or insensible. However, and strangely, one of the wooden tables was covered with an array of white feather pillows, and on the pillows sat three women, all wearing masks of white feathers and white robes, and each of them dangling their naked calves off of the table, the robes reaching just below their knees. All of their feet were bare. There was no sign of the woman in red.
No one was speaking—perhaps they’d gone silent at her arrival—and no one spoke as her escort left her where she was and crossed to one of the other tables, where his companion, the other dog-fellow, stood drinking from a flask. Her escort accepted the flask from him, swallowed manfully, and returned it, wiping his mouth. He took another puff from his cigar and tapped it against the edge of the table, knocking a stub of ash to the floor. Both men leaned back and studied their charges with evident pleasure. The moment became increasingly awkward. Miss Temple did not move to the table of women—there wasn’t really room, and none of the others had shifted to make any. Instead, she smiled, and pushed her discomfort aside to make conversation.
“We have just seen the theatre. I must say it is impressive. I’m sure I don’t know how many it will seat compared to other such theatres in the city, but I am confident it must seat plenty—perhaps up to one hundred. The notion of so many attendees in such a relatively distant place is quite a testament to the work at hand, in my own opinion. I should find it satisfying to be a part of that endeavor, however much as a tangent, even as a distraction, even for only this evening alone—for surely the fineness of the facility must parallel the work done in it. Do you not agree?”