“I don’t know,” Harte said, frowning at the piece. The Julien he knew hadn’t been involved with anything but the theater, and that medallion didn’t look or feel like a prop.
“There’s more,” Esta told him, carefully lifting out a piece of scarlet silk that had been neatly folded into a square. It was a sash of some kind, and it, too, was pinned with another medallion. At the bottom of the box lay a small silver tray, ornately wrought with more of the strange symbols around the edges of an even more elaborate rendering of the same two letters—VP.
The light over the dressing table dimmed for a moment before returning to its normal brightness. “Put it away,” he told Esta, handing back the medal. “That’s the signal for the next act. Julien will be back any second now.”
Esta worked to put the trunk back together and relocked it. She was just slipping the pin back into her hair when the dressing room door opened and the painted songstress from the stage entered the small confines of the dressing room.
It was always a shock to see Julien up close when he was dressed for his act. Even without the distance of the audience and the glare of the lights, he had mastered his art. His impersonation didn’t rely on any of the camp that other female impersonators used. His stage persona wasn’t a caricature of a woman. It wasn’t clownish or overdone to get laughs. No, Julien’s art—his true talent—was in his ability to become the thing itself. Had Harte passed Julien, dressed as he was now, on the streets, he wouldn’t have seen anything other than the woman standing before him.
Not seeming to realize that he wasn’t alone, Julien pulled off the perfectly coiffed blond wig and placed it on a wooden mannequin’s head. Then he walked over to sit in front of the mirrored dressing table. Before he bothered with the makeup or the dress, Julien took a thick black cigar from a small tabletop humidor and lit it. He took a deep drag, allowing the smoke to wreathe his head as he reached for the decanter next to the ashtray and poured himself two fingers. He took a long drink before he put the cigar back between his teeth and began removing the elbow-length gloves he was wearing.
“You know, Darrigan . . .” Julien looked up and caught Harte’s eye in the mirror. His deep, husky voice was completely at odds with the bright crimson paint on his mouth. “You’re looking damn good for a dead man.”
Harte gave a careless shrug. “I can’t say that I feel all that dead.”
Julien turned, a half smile curving at his mouth around the cigar as he shook his head. “I can’t believe you are standing here. I can’t believe you’re in my dressing room.”
“It’s good to see you, Jules,” Harte said, stepping forward to extend his hand in greeting.
Julien stood and took Harte’s outstretched hand. “It’s damn good to see you, too, Darrigan.”
“Glad to hear it,” Harte told him as he sent a small pulse of his affinity toward Julien.
Harte never saw thoughts clearly, just impressions and feelings. The most immediate of Julien’s memories came first—the glare of the lights, the roar of the applause Julien had just received, the hot, sharp satisfaction that Julien had felt. Harte ignored his own yearning for those lights and for the warm rush that applause had always given him and concentrated instead on his purpose—some hint of the stone’s fate. It came in an instant, the clear image of the necklace with its fantastical stone, and latching onto that image, Harte focused everything he was and sent another burst of magic toward Julien, transgressing the thin barrier between him and his friend and sending Julien a simple message. A single command.
Julien’s expression faltered, his eyes slightly dazed and his brows creasing together momentarily. But then Harte released him, and Julien’s expression cleared. Unaware of all that had just transpired, Julien turned back to his mirror and reached for his large jar of cold cream. He ignored Harte and Esta both as he spread the cream over one half of his face and then started wiping away the light base and bright rouge.
Esta had been watching all of this without saying a word, so Harte gestured for her to come forward. “Jules, I want you to meet someone,” Harte said.
Julien’s eyes lifted to Esta’s in the mirror, and Harte knew exactly what his old friend was seeing—the way the silk gown she wore clung to every curve and the way she’d painted her mouth a subtle pink and pinned her hair into a style that looked artful and careless all at once. She looked like she came from money, proper and polished. But with her height and her confidence, she also looked dangerous, like a debutante on the verge of something more exciting.
A look of appreciation flashed over Julien’s face as he examined Esta through the reflection of the mirror.
Mine, a voice inside Harte whispered in response, but he couldn’t tell if it came from his own thoughts or that other power. Not caring all that much at the moment, he took Esta by the hand, so there was no mistaking who she was with.
“This is—”
“Oh, I know exactly who this is,” Julien interrupted, turning Janus-faced to look at them both once again.
“You do?” Esta asked, glancing at Harte with a wary expression.
“Of course, Miss Filosik.” Julien picked up the stub of the cigar again and gestured toward them before raising one brow in their direction. “I knew who you were the moment I walked into this room. After all . . . you’re infamous.”
THE ANTIDOTE FOR GOSSIP
1902—New York
Jack could hear the commotion in his mother’s parlor long before he made it to the bottom of the staircase. By the time he reached the lower steps, a cold sweat had broken out on his forehead and he wanted nothing more than to sit down, but the rumble of his uncle’s voice told him that he should keep moving.
Thank god the mousy little maid had gotten over her initial fear of him. Without her mentioning his uncle’s sudden arrival, Jack might have slept through the visit, completely unaware of how his family was arranging his future. It didn’t matter if his head was swirling with the morphine he’d just taken or that his body still felt like . . . Well, it felt like he’d been hit by a train, didn’t it? He would walk into the parlor under his own power and take the reins of his own fate.
“. . . someone got to him,” his uncle was roaring, waving a crumpled handful of newsprint at his mother.
“No one has been here,” his mother said, her voice shaking as it often did when she was overwrought. “I think I would know if a newspaperman came into my home.”
“How else would they know any of this?” Morgan waved the paper at her again.
“Pierpont, dear—” His aunt Fanny was sitting next to Jack’s mother, and her tone had a warning in it, not that his uncle seemed to care.
Jack’s cousin was there as well, standing off to the side with his arms crossed and the same scowl on his face that he had worn the entire voyage back from Greece last year. It truly was a family affair, which always meant trouble for Jack.
It took a moment before any of them realized that he’d arrived. His mother saw him first, and she leaped to her feet at the sight of him. “Darling, what are you doing out of bed?” She wasn’t three steps toward him before his uncle stepped in her path and waved the newspaper he’d been brandishing in Jack’s face.