Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson

Author:Kate Atkinson [Atkinson, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2022-09-27T00:00:00+00:00

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And thank goodness, really, as in the Warrender the bathroom was at the end of the hall and she would have had to spend what was left of the night scrubbing the bath of the blood she had sluiced off herself, never mind what Mrs. Bodley would have had to say about a guest drawing a bath in the middle of the night. The plumbing in the Warrender was alarmingly noisy and would probably have woken the Distressed, who, according to Mrs. Bodley, were very light sleepers. The alternative would have been an unappealing cold-water sponge bath in her room from the ewer and basin.

Her room in the Savoy, on the other hand, had the luxury of a warm en-suite bathroom with an endless supply of hot water, and if she did leave behind traces of a London gang member’s blood the chambermaid probably wouldn’t bat an eyelid. No doubt the large London hotels, unlike the Warrender, made allowances for indiscretions. After all, wasn’t that what people paid for?

Gwendolen assessed herself in the cheval mirror in her hotel bedroom. What a sight! The Trojan women after the sacking of their city probably looked in better order. Her beautiful new dress, in her possession for only a handful of hours (but what hours!), was ruined beyond rescue. The delicate blue silk—previously the colour of a summer sky—was now little more than a damp scarlet rag; her petticoat, too, as she had been soaked to the skin with the blood of that poor man. The lovely silver sandals that had been fit for an Arcadian princess were now only fit for the dustbin. She peeled off her soiled clothes and put them in a wicker laundry basket in the bathroom. Perhaps she should leave an extra tip for the maid. The clothes were followed by the sandals she had danced in half the night, ruined now beyond repair. Who were you dancing with?

What had happened to Constable Cobb? Your partner seemed to abandon you at the first sign of trouble. Niven was right, it was not the conduct of a gentleman. Gwendolen could only presume that Cobb had been frightened out of his wits, or—a more generous explanation—that he had thought it best not to have his “cover” lifted and had hurried to report back to Frobisher. Or perhaps he was just avoiding the bill at the end of the evening.

The man—Aldo—had, thank goodness, not died, at least not on her watch, but had been taken away in a car by his fellows. They were under the command of the short, well-dressed man who had seemed ambivalent about Aldo’s fate. Luca, she had heard Nellie Coker call him. Frobisher had told her that the Amethyst was crawling with criminals and Frazzini and his men certainly did seem to fit into that category, although they had behaved in a decent fashion towards Gwendolen. She had made them promise to take their comrade-in-arms to a hospital, even if it was only to drop him at the door before driving away.

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