“Good God, what are you doing here?” Mags demanded, looking equally shocked.
She was dressed in a stylish, demure afternoon dress and didn’t have a bit of makeup on, the curly hair that was tucked into a false bob at night now braided and drawn over one shoulder. Lounging in the corner of a sofa with a book in her lap, she looked far younger than she ever did at the Nightingale—seventeen years old, if that, Vivian thought, unable to stop herself from staring.
Mags stared back, both of them silently sizing the other up and trying to decide how to behave. In a jazz club, they could be equals. But here, as Margaret Crawford, society darling and heiress to a clearly not-so-small fortune, and Vivian Kelly, working-class delivery girl, neither of them knew what to do.
Vivian recovered first. She had done enough deliveries to know the script. “Miss Crawford. Miss Ethel sends her compliments. Do you want to see the gowns or try them on?”
Clearly Mags didn’t know her half of the expected exchange, though, because she stayed frozen. “I didn’t know you worked for a dressmaker,” she said, hesitating.
Vivian winced, wondering how she would look Mags in the eyes the next time they came face-to-face in the Nightingale. “Yes, miss. I usually do the sewing, but it’s deliveries for me today.” She began opening the box to lay out the dress inside, a flouncy green silk number that her fingers itched to stroke. “Should I call a maid to help you with trying them on?”
Mags tossed her book aside and swung her legs around abruptly. “God, no, never mind the dresses, I tried them on when they were fitted. Remind me of your name—Vivian, right?”
“Yes, Miss Crawford.”
The girl hesitated again, then shook her head, suddenly making up her mind. “Mags,” she said firmly, then laughed. “What a hoot this is.Worlds crashing into each other. Thank God Mother had one of her heads today or she’d have seen something was up for sure!” Taking in Vivian’s stiff posture, she gestured toward the other end of the sofa. “Sit down, why don’t you? This really is too funny.”
Bounding up, looking even younger, she stuck her head out the door and called loudly, “Anyone around? Oh, Charlie, there you are. Be a pal and bring two soda waters, will you? No,” she laughed. “You don’t need to mix anything in, there’ll be plenty of that at the party tonight. Unless you want some hooch?” she asked, glancing behind her. Vivian, not sure what was happening, shook her head. Mags turned back to the hall. “Just the soda waters!”
Turning back, she grinned at Vivian before flinging herself across the sofa once more. “Sit down, will you? I’ll get a crick in my neck if I have to look at you like that.”
Vivian hesitated, then perched on the edge of the sofa.
“This really is too funny,” Mags said again, looking more like she meant it this time. “And too perfect. I’m sure you hear absolutely everything when you visit places like this, and I love a good goss. Who else buys from you?”
The entry of Charlie with the soda waters saved Vivian from answering immediately. While he popped the tops off two bottles and handed one to Mags—he hesitated, his confusion clear, before handing the second to Vivian—her mind worked rapidly. Why shouldn’t she sit and talk for a few minutes, after all? Mags clearly lived in the Wilsons’ social circle, and who knew what she might be able to reveal about them? Vivian took a quick swig of her soda water and coughed as the bubbles went up her nose. If Mags wanted to gossip—well, all right then. That sounded like a grand idea.
“I only just started doing deliveries. Can’t sew with my hand like this,” she said, gesturing to the bandage. Leaning forward and lowering her voice—Mags leaned forward too—she added, “But I had to deliver mourning clothes today.”
“Ohh, who for?” Mags whispered.
“A Mrs. Wilson?” Vivian took another drink, watching Mags over the edge of the bottle. “Do you know her?”
“Hattie? God, what is that house like?” Mags’s eyes were wide as she sipped her own drink. “I’ve never been inside, but I’ve heard it’s the coldest place you can imagine. That’s what she gets, I guess, for marrying him.”
“Mr. Wilson?” Vivian asked, mirroring Mags’s posture and widening her own eyes to encourage the girl to keep going.
“He seemed like a peach before the wedding, and everyone thought they were just the bee’s knees together, you know,” Mags said eagerly. “Hattie’s a bit older than me, but I watched the whole thing happen, though I’m not strictly out yet. Hell of a cautionary tale. Just a few months after the wedding, suddenly she and Willard were never seen together. And I meannever.”
“Any idea why?” Vivian thought of Pretty Jimmy’s hints that Wilson had an eye for Mags.
“Well, of course everyone thought he had an affair or something when he was courting her, and she found out after the wedding.” Mags dropped her voice even lower. “I never heard that he was seen with anyone, though he could get awful friendly. I even thought he might have been trying to make a pass at me once or twice, at one of Mother and Dad’s parties. Don’t know what he was thinking, old fella like him.” She rolled her eyes to show just how ancient a man in his thirties was. “Even if he did have an affair, it was too late to do anything about it. Hattie’s not the type to risk her position with something as ugly as a divorce.”
“She seemed very proper,” Vivian agreed, though she wasn’t sure that was actually true. Mrs. Wilson had seemed careful and calculating and polite, but there had been an edge of ruthlessness there. “Her sister was another story, of course.”
“Myrtle? You met her?” Mags’s voice rose, then dropped again as she glanced at the door. “What did you think of her?”
“Wild. And unhappy,” Vivian said honestly.
The girl nodded, her curiosity plain. “No one’s ever seen much of her. She was too young to be out before the wedding. And they haven’t got parents anymore, you know, so she was living with Hattie and Willard afterward. I guess she wanted to escape whatever nastiness was going on there, because she left for boarding school right after things got so chilly between them.”
Vivian took another drink to hide her thoughtful expression. Something about Myrtle had put both her sister and the housekeeper on edge, something more than a girl’s normal wildness or surliness. But the family was hiding it well, if even an eager gossip like Mags had no inkling anything was amiss.
Maybe Hattie’s courtship with Wilson had left her without enough time to keep an eye on her sister. Maybe Myrtle had been rebellious in the face of her sister’s marriage—
“What is it?” Mags said eagerly. “Did Myrtle say something to you? About why her sister and Willard fell out?”
“Oh, no. No, nothing like that.” Vivian tried to think of an excuse for her silence and said the first thing that popped into her head. “I saw your fella Roy there. Talking with Mrs. Wilson.”
