An envelope propped up against the mirror had “Edith” written on it. It had already been opened, so it was fair game as far as Kitty was concerned, although she would probably have steamed it open anyway. It was dated today and a bold, masculine hand had penned, Dear Edith, just a note to confirm I will be able to see you tonight. Pinoli’s at seven. Yours, A x. Not just “A” but “A” followed by a cross—a kiss! Without the kiss it might have been a note from the brewer who supplied the beer—but a kiss transformed it into something else. Unlikely as it seemed, Edith had an admirer.
Kitty had to make her own way to the Amethyst as no one had seen fit to arrange a cab. Nor had anyone left her any money, so taking Edith’s two shillings seemed quite justified to her mind. She left the house and, clutching her two shillings, was waiting on the pavement in the vain hope of a taxi—there were never any on the Outer Circle—when a car drew up against the curb.
The driver leant across and rolled down the window of the car. He opened the passenger door and smiled at her. He looked foreign, like a portly version of Valentino. “Hello, little girl,” he said.
“Hello,” Kitty replied politely.
“Hop in and I’ll give you a lift. I can take you for a spin, if you like. What do you say?”
* * *
—
Shirley and Betty were in the habit of travelling to the Foxhole and the Pixie together. They did most things together—they were “Irish twins,” born in the same year, and although very different were also very alike, both possessing a preference for style over substance. （“Substance,” Shirley said, “led to the battlefield, style rarely so.” “Perhaps a killing look,” Betty said, pleased with herself. They considered themselves to be wits.）
Nellie had insisted on educating them to within an inch of their lives. After their expensive private school they had gone up to Cambridge together, cutting a powerful swathe through Girton College. They had both been icons—for their sporty little cars, their couture clothing, their coiffed hair. Shirley single-handedly pioneered the raven-wing shingle that every girl in her year then copied, with varying degrees of failure. Their fellow students begged to do them favours, run errands, sit at their feet in front of their coal fire, toasting crumpets on a brass fork for them. And that was just the girls. Young men from the male colleges threatened suicide, offered Herculean labours, wrote poetry. （“Ghastly stuff,” Betty said.）
Although they had been fond of Girton, they had left their alma mater without a backward glance. Orpheus could have sent them in to rescue Eurydice from Hades.
Edith was too useful to Nellie for marriage and Kitty had already been abandoned to chance, so buccaneering Nellie’s ambitions for an entrée into the upper echelons of English society rested on Betty and Shirley. She would not be satisfied until they married someone who had climbed to the highest rung on Debrett’s ladder. Not her sons, she would just be relieved if they married at all. Particularly Ramsay.
Shirley was currently often in the company of the second son of a duke, a young man called Rollo, whom Nellie had been assiduously courting on her daughter’s behalf. To no avail. Shirley said she was fond of Rollo but had met more manly men in the chorus at the Palace. She was resistant to her mother’s matrimonial ambitions. She wanted to “be someone.” （“But you’re someone already,” Nellie said.）
Betty’s current admirer, he of the silver penknife, was not in Debrett’s. He was a Canadian railroad millionaire, which gave him a certain credibility in Nellie’s eyes. But perhaps not quite enough. To Nellie, money without a title was almost as bad as a title without money. The war had, disappointingly for Nellie, cut the bloodlines of the aristocracy. Their sons, sacrificed to the greater good, were no longer available to marry Shirley and Betty, and their wealth had been swallowed by the upkeep on their houses.
* * *
—
The Foxhole in Wardour Street was Betty’s favourite club. It was a jazzy place with an American bar and a Jamaican band and a glass floor, beneath which there were lights that changed colour all the time. The place got frantic after midnight. It drew its clientele from a mixture of bohemian men and women of the demi-monde and people of every colour and creed in a friendly stew, like Babel before the tower. Chorus boys, still in full stage make-up, often came straight from their encores and poured Brandy Fancies down their throats as if they were dying of thirst.
Betty was popular with this crowd. On some nights she could spend every minute from opening to closing on the kaleidoscopic dance floor. Both Betty and Shirley were excellent dancers, almost professionally spry, unlike Edith, who had two left feet. （“Even possibly three,” Betty said.） They had talked about setting up a dance academy within one of the clubs, where members would pay extra to learn the latest dances or polish up the old ones. Nellie was ruminating on the idea. They doubted she would ever digest it.