“Who?” The woman squinted.
“There.” Vida pointed, and then remembered that that was the sort of thing that got a girl like her in trouble, and bent her arm back into her lap. Too late, though. The nobody, even all that way across the room, noticed, and his mouth slipped into a grin.
“Oh . . . no.” The word dropped right out of the lady’s mouth and she was violent in getting another cigarette lit. “And here I thought you were sharp. He’s a nobody, dear girl.”
“Oh yes. I know. I’m not desirous of meeting him—he was rude to me, that’s all, and I was curious where he got his gall.”
“He probably works for one of these gents with egalitarian ideals,” the woman went on, as though gents with ideals were an unfortunate but unavoidable part of life in these modern times. “Anyway, I see Mr. Selvedge has been through and done all the complimenting I was going to do, so I won’t bore you ladies with your qualifications, your stunning wit, and your fine dress and all that rot. But here’s what I do. I try my best to know all the pretty things, for that is where the stories are. My name is Dame Edna—Edna Sackville. I am sure you have read my column in The Daily Chimera.” Here she paused significantly, and met Vida’s eye.
So this was the lady who had written about her little spree of the night before! Vida knew she should be cross with this woman who had publicized her unladylike behavior, whose column had forced her to pack her bags in the fog of the morning and to find herself on the open ocean now. But in fact she was delighted. The way for a girl to have an adventure, as she had long known, was to make herself seem exciting to people so that she is invited absolutely everywhere. The social columnists were the most useful in making oneself seem exciting. And Vida chastised herself inwardly for having pursued Fitzhugh so artlessly, when the person whose connection she should have really been after was here before her. “Oh,” Vida said. “I’ve heard of it.”
“Yes, I’m sure you have. It’s all about the shiny young people like you.”
“Like me?” Vida asked, and gave Dame Edna a little smile to show she wasn’t shy of the attention.
“Exactly. I know a good story when I see one, and you’re it, dear. Anybody you would like to meet, just ask old Edna. They may not like me, dears, but they fear me. And that is better.”
She brandished a card of fine emerald-colored stock with her name printed in gold, and then she shook her arm so that a little gold pen, attached to her wrist by a gold chain, fell out, and she wrote on the back the number of her cabin. “Come any time, day or night, with whatever story you have to tell,” she said. “I will always listen, and I will repay you in kind.”
“Is this woman bothering you?”
For a marvelous stretch of minutes Vida had forgotten her failure of that afternoon, and had become absorbed instead in the juicy promises of Dame Edna. She had idly draped her fingertips on the edge of an empty crystal champagne glass, and allowed herself to imagine other adventures. But then the young man interrupted them, and it occurred to her that she had heard his voice before, that commanding yet unperturbed voice asking if she were bothered.
She glanced up at the face of Fitzhugh Farrar. Last night she’d seen it plenty, though that all seemed a bit fuzzy and faraway now. Somehow he was handsomer than she remembered. His sandy hair was neatly slicked up and away from his square forehead and cornflower blue eyes. His strong jawline was more or less parallel to his high white starched collar. His tie was very black, and his teeth were very white, and his cuff links were very, very gold. Here was a man who stood out in any crowd. He wasn’t smiling, and there was a bright intensity in his expression. Vida couldn’t be certain if Dame Edna actually whispered in her ear that she should say something, or if the moment was of such world-shifting consequence that the dame was briefly capable of reading minds.
“Hello” was the best Vida could do, being uncharacteristically tongue-tied. But she said it archly, with just a smidge of drama, and an extra-subtle raising of her shaped eyebrows, so that that single word had the energy of a brilliant witticism. “I am sorry,” she went on, “have we met?”
“Last night, though I suppose it was quite a well-attended party, and you certainly may have talked to several young men who own ocean liners.”
“I usually do,” Vida replied coolly, though she was experiencing an odd and overwhelming sensation, as though a flock of cherubim were fanning her with heavenly air. The humiliation of the last few hours lifted, and she felt curiously light-headed, just the way that lucky, lovely girl addressed by the most eligible man on the ship was supposed to feel. “But, now that you mention it, you do look a little familiar.”
“Strange,” he said, matching her ironic tone. “You don’t seem like the kind of girl who forgets easily.”
Vida fought the urge to smile at his knowing this about her. Yes, it was true, she remembered all the details of parties and stories. She remembered when she was insulted, too. But she resisted showing him how much she liked having this part of herself recognized, and kept her gaze quite steadily upon him. She allowed her smile to fade away and lifted her hand so that her fingers dangled in the vicinity of his. “I don’t,” she said evenly. “Where is Mr. Selvedge when you need him? Oh, well, why be formal about it. I am Vida Hazzard, in case you forgot.”
“I did not. Fitzhugh Farrar, at your service. My family owns this ship, if your memory is weak on that point,” he went on, as though he knew she knew all about it and he was not at all uncomfortable with the fact, “so if you have any complaints, I’m the one at fault.”
“That’s good to know, Mr. Farrar. It is a pleasure to meet you formally.”
“Oh, but the pleasure is all mine.” And then, when she was sure he was about to make a little bow and move on to meet other people, so that she could finally turn and look at Rosa in triumph—when she felt that her coup was complete, that she could rest easy knowing she still held his interest—he instead gripped her hand yet tighter, and bowed yet deeper, and said, in a voice so low it seemed at risk of breaking, “Miss Hazzard, would you dance with me?”
She had not noticed the music before. But now she heard the cascade of strings and the gentle swelling of melody in her belly and in her toes. Already they were moving across the floor, already his arms had made a structure around her body that led her into the rise and fall of a waltz and on into the center of the room under the great winking drape of the chandelier. Little murmurs escaped the crowd, and a thousand eyes seemed to be on them. But Vida—her lips pressed together to keep herself from smiling too much—was looking up into the face of the man her parents wanted her to marry, thinking that maybe for once they did know best, after all.
The moment was so perfect, so complete, that she could see it in the eyes of a bystander, could see the sweep of her red skirt, and the chandelier light dappling her bare arms, could see the brilliance of Fitzhugh’s smile, the neat black line of his tuxedo as he waltzed her across the floor. She thought that she could hear Rosa’s jealous murmur, could hear the scratch of Dame Edna’s little golden pen, recording this moment so that it could be serialized in the dozens of newspapers that ran her column around the world. It was as though she could hold this moment of gem-like perfection in her palm and have it always. She permitted herself one errant glance—across the room, in the direction of the grand door where that nobody had stood laughing at her, so that she could have the satisfaction of seeing his face at the precise second when he came to understand how entirely wrong he had been about Vida Hazzard.