Miriam had scuttled back to her hotel room and had perched on the edge of her bed and had stared at nothing for hours. When the worst of her panic had subsided she had opened her little notebook, the one into which she had copied the list of designers Monsieur Dior had given her, together with addresses for their London workrooms. Only then had she noticed that two of its pages had been stuck together, and she had somehow managed to skip over the first name on the list.
Norman Hartnell. The designer who, according to Monsieur Dior, had the best embroidery workroom in England.
She had seen pictures of the gowns Monsieur Hartnell made for the English queen, the grand crinolines and softly serene day dresses that weren’t especially chic but suited her so well. Surely his premières would appreciate someone with her training and experience.
It had been stupid and foolhardy to persevere after that deplorable woman at Lachasse had rejected her, and she had only compounded her stupidity by working her way through every name on her list but one. It had left her teetering at the edge of a precipice, and if she were to stumble . . .
She would take a step back. Take the time to polish up her English, immerse herself in its awkward idioms and ridiculous grammar, and sand away the veneer of desperation that had tainted her brief conversations at every workroom she had visited that day.
She would take some of the money Monsieur Dior had given her, and she would buy herself some time.
Two days later she had moved to cheaper lodgings, a dismal little pension in Ealing that charged the same for a week as did the hotel for a single night, and then she had set about practicing her English. After breakfast each day she had gone to the Italian café near the Underground entrance, had bought a coffee—it was far nicer there than at the Lyons and A.B.C. cafés that seemed to be on every corner—and had eavesdropped on the other customers, writing down words she didn’t understand so she might look them up later. Most afternoons she had gone to the cinema, silently parroting the actors’ words under the cover of darkness, trying to make sense of the strange idioms they used.
And everywhere she had gone, though it grated at her solitary soul, she had engaged people in conversation: the other women in the breakfast room at her pension, the man who sold newspapers on the corner, even the sweetly flirtatious waiter at the Italian café, though his English was worse than hers.
It had taken her more than two months, but now she was ready. Today she would try again.
Checking her A to Z to ensure she was heading in the right direction, Miriam set off for Mayfair, alighting at Bond Street station. Ten minutes later she turned onto Bruton Place, her heart pounding, her hands clammy beneath her gloves.
It was easy to find the staff entrance to Hartnell, for a gleaming delivery lorry was parked about halfway along the mews, and a series of enormous white boxes were being loaded into its open back doors. A man in a white coat was checking the boxes off against a list, his expression so serious he might have been in charge of delivering chests of gold bullion. Rather than interrupt, Miriam hung back and waited for him to finish.
“That’s everything, then,” he said to the waiting driver a good fifteen minutes later, once the last of the boxes had been placed in the lorry. “Off you go.”
Before the man could vanish inside, Miriam came forward. “Excuse me.”
“Yes? What do you want?” He looked her up and down, a puzzled frown furrowing his brow. “The salesroom entrance is on Bruton Street,” he offered in a marginally more courteous tone.
“I would like to see your head of embroidery.”
The frown returned. “For what reason?”
“I wish to seek employment. I have with me a reference from Monsieur Christian—”
“You’ll have to go through the usual channels.”
“Very well,” she said, her patience fraying. “What are they?”
“Buggered if I know, but they don’t involve letting in strangers off the street.” With that he darted through the door and pulled it shut behind him.
Panic bloomed in her throat, her heart, her mind. What to do, what to do, what to do? She had come to the end of Monsieur Dior’s list. There was nowhere else to go. She was trained for nothing else.
She spun around, ready to flee, and caught sight of her reflection in a window. The man in the white coat had thought she was one of Monsieur Hartnell’s customers. Only for a moment, but it might be enough.
She walked to the end of Bruton Place, turned the corner, then doubled back along Bruton Street itself. She held her head high. Straightened her spine. Remembered how she had managed such moments before. If she could keep her cool when presenting false identification to the Milice, she could maintain a veneer of serenity when entering the front door of a London dress designer. This she could do.