Romance Classics (129 page)

Her enthusiasm had a disarming youthfulness, and in spite of himself Leon relaxed a bit.

“I was worried about you because I was afraid you’d be late for our dinner engagement.”

“Dinner engagement? But, Leon, you didn’t ask me to dinner.”

“Marisa asked both of us to dinner,” Leon told her, and now his eyes were eager. “She called, and her aunt came on the phone and said they were very eager for us to have dinner with them. They’re sending a car for us. Wear one of the Nina frocks. We want to make a good impression.”

“Yes, of course, Leon, if you think it’s wise.”

He scowled at her, understanding but not wanting to admit it.

“I hardly see how we could afford to decline,” he pointed out. “After all, George Newman is practically our boss, and
these six weeks here mean a lot to The Act. Why shouldn’t we accept a dinner invitation from the Newmans?”

“No reason at all; it was silly of me.”

Her voice was so subdued that Leon smiled.

“Well, run along now and make yourself very beautiful,” he said cheerfully. “Come down to the lobby when you’re ready. I’ll be waiting.”

He nodded and turned away as Kristen went across the lobby to the elevators.

Leon was waiting for Kristen when she came across the lobby, looking very handsome in his white dinner jacket, a dark red carnation in his buttonhole. As he watched her coming toward him, the delicate white lace skirts belling about her slender figure, he nodded in satisfaction.

A moment later, a deferential bell-hop announced the arrival of the Newman car, and they went out across the terrace to where it waited.

A very tall, very black chauffeur stood immobile at the open door of a dark limousine.

Leon helped her into the car, followed her, and the door was closed softly behind them.

They were both silent as the big car slipped along until they were well outside the town. And then it turned at right angles from the highway and mounted a winding road that led to a vast house that crowned the hill. The house was ablaze with lights, and as the big car slid to a halt, there was the sound of voices and laughter. Leon, helping Kristen from the car, murmured, “All the sounds of a good party, don’t you think?”

Before they reached the front door, it opened and George Newman came to greet them.

“No ill effects from this afternoon, I see,” he said to Kristen as he drew them into the house.

“None visible, I hope, but I still feel an awful fool,” Kristen told him.

“Oh, but that’s unthinkable.” George grinned at her, divesting
her shoulders of her chiffon stole. “We never arrest a tourist for anything short of murder.”

Kristen laughed as they crossed the wide, tile-floored hall and entered an enormous drawing room with wide French doors opening to a terrace beyond where there was a breathtaking view of the bay. Before she had time to do more than glimpse the dark waters, Marisa came toward them.

“Kristen, I’m so glad to see you. And how lovely you look,” Marisa said eagerly, and turned to Leon, giving him her hand. “Come and meet the others. This is Eileen.”

A woman in her mid-forties, unashamedly plump, in black chiffon, her dark hair swept back into a chignon, greeted them with gracious warmth. But Kristen saw her dark eyes rest appraisingly on Leon before she turned, drawing them to be introduced to the others.

As she smiled and accepted the introductions, Kristen appraised the guests: a dozen young people approximately Marisa’s age and a few older ones who were obviously family friends of George and Eileen. They were all pleasant. But Kristen sensed that she and Leon were outsiders.

After cocktails, when dinner was announced, George came to Kristen and offered his arm, smiling down at her.

“I insisted that you be my dinner partner,” he told her, “and Eileen is going to look after Westerman. I hope that’s agreeable?”

“I’m flattered,” Kristen assured him.

The dining room was large and handsomely furnished. The long table was covered by an embroidered cloth, and set with exquisite crystal and china. In the center was a low mound of brilliantly colored fruit. There were flowers about the room and the glow of tall candles everywhere.

The table conversation was gay and animated.

While George chatted for a moment with the dowager on his right, at the foot of the long table, Kristen watched Leon and Marisa, opposite one another, and felt a touch of uneasiness in her heart. One had only to look about this lavishly beautiful place, its evidences of great wealth that had gone hand in hand with cultivated good taste, to realize the vast world that lay between these two people.

George spoke quietly. She turned, startled, to meet his smiling gaze, that had followed the direction of her eyes toward the tall, copper-skinned white-coated figure of the butler.

“What do you think of Pompey?” he asked.

“He looks like an Indian,” she admitted.

“Oh, his great-grandfather was a full-blooded Carib,” answered George. “Pompey shows the Carib strain far more than would be expected in one who really has so little Carib blood.”

“Are Caribs Indians?” asked Kristen, her eyes widening.

“Of course; surely you knew that?”

Kristen gave a small, abashed laugh.

The man on her left said, “Be sure to tell her what you do with your sugar cane at Beau Rivage, George.”

George laughed. “Oh, but I’m sure she must know. After all, Martinique rum is famous all over the world.”

“Is that what you do with sugar cane?” Kristen marveled. “I thought you made sugar out of it.”

“Oh, about seventy-five percent of the island’s cane goes into sugar, but the remaining twenty-five percent into rum,” said George. “And the rum is far more profitable. And even the best isn’t difficult to produce. You must spend a few days at Beau Rivage and see us at work.”

“I’d love to, but with the opening tomorrow night, I doubt if I’ll be able to,” Kristen thanked him with genuine regret. “We are to be here only six weeks, and with a show to give every night, and afternoon rehearsals, I’m afraid I couldn’t get away for that long.”

“Oh, but surely you won’t be leaving immediately after your engagement ends?” protested George. “Stay on for a week or so, as our guest at Beau Rivage.”

“I’m afraid I couldn’t,” she answered with obvious regret. “You see, Leon and I have other engagements. His agent is planning a tour.”

George looked down the table to where Leon was chatting with Eileen, who seemed quite interested in what he was saying. Then George’s eyes moved across to where Marisa sat, watching Leon with her heart in her eyes. And George’s jaw set hard.

“Oh, yes, of course. You will have to leave as soon as your engagement at the hotel ends,” he agreed. “But you will remember that Martinique is called
L’Ile des Revenants
—The Island of Those Who Return.”

“That’s lovely,” Kristen said eagerly.

Eileen said briskly, to all of them, “Well, shall we have coffee in the drawing room?”

There was a general movement as the guests rose.

Later, the young people danced, and the older people sat watching, sipping coffee and talking.

Marisa and Leon were dancing, and the others drew back, leaving the floor to them as they dipped and whirled. At the end, laughing, they faced the brisk applause of the others, and Marisa looked up at Leon.

“Oh, that was wonderful!” She glowed radiantly. “I do wish you could give me some lessons, Lee. I love to dance.”

Before Leon could answer, George said smoothly, “Now, darling, you mustn’t impose on Mr. Westerman. After all, we’ve really given him a ‘busman’s holiday’—expecting him to sing for his supper. And that wasn’t at all what we had in mind, was it? I’m sure he’s going to be much too busy to give dancing lessons. After all, he is an artist, not a dancing teacher.”

“Marisa is the kind of pupil, Mr. Newman, that even a really great artist would take pleasure in teaching,” said Leon. For a moment the two men eyed each other, and Kristen all but held her breath.

Later, they drove back to the hotel in silence and Leon gave her only a sullen nod as they separated in the lobby.

Opening night at the Riviera was all and more than the show’s cast had dared to hope. The big dining room, beyond the small circle of glassily smooth dance floor, was packed.

Sherry’s songs were received with applause that called for several encores, and she came off-stage flushed and starry-eyed, as Leon and Kristen waited for their music cue.

“Golly, what a night for burglars!” said Sherry happily.

“You mean we have to steal our bows?” mocked Leon.

“Heck, no! I meant I think every man, woman and adolescent on the island is out there, so there are a lot of homes unguarded,” said Sherry. “What an audience! This sort of reception should happen to me in New York! Never had it so good there!”

Leon looked down at Kristen beside him, delectable in her turquoise, star-sprinkled costume, and smiled.

“Butterflies?” he asked.

Kristen laughed and laid her hand for a moment on her snugly-fitted bodice.

“Hundreds of them, and as big as robins,” she told him extravagantly.

“Good! Mine, too. According to all the old theatrical superstitions about butterflies, we should be a sensational success,” he told her. And then their music cue came, and a small amber spotlight found them just off the dance floor, and they glided out into the light. It followed them throughout the intricate, carefully rehearsed dance that looked, thanks to their genuine ability, as if they were making up each step as they went along.

They finished to tumultuous applause and took three bows, then went off to change, while Casey and the band played for the diners to dance.

When Leon and Kristen had finished their last number, they came off the floor, applause ringing in their ears.

“They liked us! Oh, Leon, they
liked
us!”

Leon’s darkly handsome face was radiant.

“They did, didn’t they?” he agreed. “Well, and so they should! Because we’re good, baby.”

“I can see our name in lights—maybe on Broadway.”

“What do you mean, maybe? Certainly on Broadway—and a lot of other places all over the world,” Leon assured her joyously.

Mr. Belmont came up behind them, beaming.

“Congratulations, Leon and Miss Dillard! You’re a smash hit,” he told them. “Mr. Newman would like you to join him and his friends for a glass of champagne. He wants to offer his congratulations personally.”

As they threaded their way across the dance floor, the applause rang out again, and at each table, there were congratulatory words.

George greeted them exuberantly, introduced them to his friends, and in a little cheerful, happy hubbub of congratulatory speeches, Kristen and Leon sat down.

Marisa leaned across the table to say eagerly, “Oh, you two were simply wonderful! I’ve never seen anything so utterly beautiful as watching you sort of float across the floor with no effort at all.”

Leon could not but be gratified by such frank, wholehearted admiration, but he gave her a small, depreciating smile.

“I’m quite sure Kristy wouldn’t agree with the ‘no effort’ bit,” he answered. “It’s really the result of a great many hours and weeks of the most arduous practice and rehearsal, isn’t it, Kristy?”

“Oh, it’s hard work, of course,” Kristen answered. “But I suppose if you were born to dance, it’s not too hard. Anything you love as much as Leon and I love dancing is never work!”

Leon smiled at Marisa. “Spoken like a trouper.”

“I’ve got the most wonderful news, Leon,” Marisa told him eagerly, while the others at the table listened indulgently, as though to the pretty prattle of an artless child. “I’ve persuaded Dad to let me take dance lessons from you after all.”

“Really?” Leon looked a George.

“Of course, Westerman, if you’re quite sure you have the time,” George said smoothly.

Marisa cut in anxiously, “Oh, please, Leon!”

“If you’re going to open a dancing class, Mr. Westerman—” one of the younger women at the table began eagerly.

“I’m not,” Leon said shortly.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” stammered the woman, abashed. “I only meant that if you were, I’d love to join, and I’m sure some of my friends would.”

“I haven’t the time,” Leon cut in brusquely. “But of course, Mr. Newman, if you feel you’d like Marisa to have a few lessons, I’d make an exception in her case,” he said smoothly.

“I thought you might,” said George, and his tone was dry. “It’s very kind of you, I’m sure. Naturally, I’d be happy to offer suitable compensation for your time.”

“I’m sure you would,” Leon answered, his tone as dry and as biting as George’s had been. “But I can spare a couple of hours a week, just because dancing with Marisa will be a really delightful—event, shall we say?”

Marisa, completely blind and deaf to the undercurrents that were frighteningly apparent to Kristen, cried eagerly, “Oh, Leon, that’s wonderful! How soon can we start?”

Leon took his gaze from George and smiled his most charming smile.

“What’s wrong with tomorrow afternoon?”

“Immediately after lunch,” Marisa replied.

“Dancers eat after a performance, not before.”

Marisa laughed, “I’ll be here,” she promised.

“Then you’ll want to order dinner, you and Kristen—” George began.

Leon stood up and thrust back his chair.

“Thanks, no, Kristy and I have a date,” he said curtly. “Come along, Kristy; we don’t want to keep our host waiting.”

Puzzled but obedient, Kristen stood up, and slipped her hand into Leon’s.

Leon nodded his thanks for the congratulations, said a brief good night and once more escorted Kristen across the dance floor and into the wings.

“We’ve got a date, Leon?” she asked, puzzled.

In the dim light of the corridor before the dressing rooms, Leon’s face was hard and his eyes blazing with anger.

“You didn’t think I’d eat his food, did you? Of course we’ve got a date, with a nice big thick steak. Get into your street clothes and make it snappy. I’m hungry!”

Fifteen minutes later he guided her to the service entrance, dodging waiters with heavily laden trays, and out into the side drive. There was a taxi waiting, and as Leon put Kristen into it, he handed the driver a card, and the driver nodded and said,
“Qui, m’sieur.”