The house’s reception rooms had been transformed, their furniture rearranged against the walls so guests might stand and circulate freely. On every table and mantel there were huge arrangements of orchids, lilies, and tuberose, and though the flowers were very pretty their scent, in the rising warmth of the rooms, was quite overpowering.
All told, there were thirty invited guests at dinner that evening. As Helena led her friends from room to room, she made introductions and, if guests were already engaged in conversation, supplied their names sotto voce to her friends.
She introduced them to Natalie Barney and Lily Gramont, then to Djuna Barnes and Thelma Wood; others received a smile and wave as they passed by. “That’s Mina Loy, just there, and Nancy Cunard . . . and Peggy Guggenheim is standing at the doorway. And there’s Romaine Brooks, the painter; you’ll have heard of her, I think. She’s the one wearing a man’s frock coat.”
“Who is that very handsome young man by the window?” étienne asked. “Fair, not too tall, standing with the dark-haired girl.”
Helena stood on tiptoe; it was difficult to see, as there was rather a crush of people in the library now. “Oh, that’s George Antheil and his—I suppose she’s his girlfriend. He’s a composer, and quite a radical one, from what I’ve heard. They live above Shakespeare and Company, the English bookstore on the rue de l’Odéon.”
“Where is Sam?” Daisy asked. “I thought you said he would be here.”
“He will. He was working earlier and thought he might be a bit late. But he’ll be here.”
Sara and Gerald were there, too, and though they had been at their house in St.-Cloud for some weeks it was the first time she’d seen them since the summer.
“When are you going to visit us?” Sara asked. “You must all come out and have lunch one day. The children are forever asking when their Ellie is going to visit.”
“We will, I promise. Let me finish showing my friends around, and then we’ll talk some more.”
“We must. You look beautiful tonight. Is that a Vionnet gown?”
“It is. Does it suit me?”
“Admirably.”
Helena had led her friends through the petit salon, the library, and the breakfast room, and she’d just finished her first glass of champagne, when she caught sight of Sam.
His dinner jacket was so perfectly tailored that it must have been made for him, and he was so very handsome and unfamiliar that her heart skipped a beat. He advanced across the room, his eyes never leaving hers, his gaze keen and appreciative. Normally his appearance was rather disheveled, to put it mildly, but tonight he was the very epitome of aristocratic elegance. If she didn’t know better, she’d have assumed he was to the manor born.
He stopped when he was an arm’s length away, not seeming to notice their friends. And then he smiled, a slow and easy smile that made her knees feel like jelly and her heart race in her chest.
“Good evening, everyone,” he said, and he shook hands with étienne and kissed cheeks with her and Mathilde and Daisy, and the moment between them, when it seemed as if they’d been the only two people in the room, evaporated.
“Where is your aunt?” he asked. “I didn’t see her when I came in.”
“I’ve no idea—making the rounds, I expect. We’re seated near her at dinner.”
A footman came forward with glasses of champagne on a silver tray, and they all accepted one, even Sam. She sipped at hers slowly, savoring the way it fizzed against her tongue, and was startled when he bent his head to whisper against her ear.
“Do you think I should ask for a beer? How would that go down in this crowd, d’you think?”
“Not well,” she said, and giggled helplessly. It was the champagne, of course; giggling was for schoolgirls. “They probably drink champagne with their petit déjeuner every morning.”
“Attention, s’il vous pla?t!” Vincent, looking very distinguished in a corded silk tailcoat, had appeared at the threshold to the dining room, and was clapping his hands to gain the guests’ attention. “Mesdames, messieurs, le d?ner est prêt.”
THE DINING TABLE, which normally accommodated ten or twelve diners, had been fitted with enough leaves to bring it to a good thirty feet, and it now stretched the entire length of the chamber. Elaborate flower arrangements, ornate Georgian candelabra, and epergnes brimming with out-of-season fruit ran down the center of the table, which had been set with her aunt’s sterling silver flatware, bleu celeste Sèvres porcelain, and Baccarat crystal.
Agnes was seated at the head of the table and had honored Helena and her friends by placing them nearby: Sam was at her right, with Mathilde and Daisy occupying the next two spaces. On the opposite side of the table, étienne sat next to Agnes, with Helena at his left.