Anonymous
The Romances Of Blanche La Mare
PART I
CHAPTER ONE
This is an important occasion, this beginning of another volume of a remarkable Memoir; and Gladys seems to appreciate its full significance. She has a new dress, or rather costume, for the draped confection that dots not at all conceal the exquisite curves of her body, undresses rather than dresses her- You must understand what I mean. She would rather have been far less indelicate stark naked, than in this mazy, fluffy cloud which by its half hearted attempt to conceal anything, accentuates the charm of everything.
Delicious arms and legs has Gladys, and the rosy flesh gleams through the transparent drapery; nipples as carmine as her lips, and a waist rounded cleanly as her throat. The gauze ceases at her knees; thence is a dress of black silk stockings and natty patent leather shoes.
Her little fingers, bedecked with costly rings, (we have had more than one wealthy visitor since the beginning of the book) — hover over the keys of the machine. A brimming glass of champagne stands at the elbow of each of us, cigarettes are to hand; in fact, it only needs the word for “Blanche La Mare” to start the second lap of her redoubtable career.
I never expected George Reynolds to come back. I knew I was done, and my chances of seeing him again about as remote as the likelihood of recovering the two five pounds notes he had borrowed. As a matter of fact, I minded losing my husband less than the money; his conduct and letter had shown him up a bit too much. I could only damn my own folly in trusting him at all. I was cold and tired there, and the grey dawn accentuated my loneliness. I had hungered for man's society and protection, a man's arms round inc. and a man's breast to nestle against; also I had been more than a bit curious to discover what the absolute act of love really was. Many girls in my position would have done the same. That I should have wished to get married puzzled me, for the thought of a life-long bondage had always terrified me. I suppose in the depths of every woman's heart there is an elemental store of puritan-ism that leads her at times to covet the plain gold ring that can cover such a multitude of sins. Also there is undoubtedly a fascination in the term of husband; to be able to introduce my husband to a yet unwed friend is a privilege for which I am quite sure many a girl has taken the plunge and risked the cares of a household and the misery of children. Well, I had taken the plunge, and had soused myself beyond any possibility of ever getting dry again. Here I was, wedded and yet unwedded, with the world ahead of me, a big black mark against my name for a start, and no maidenhead.
Meanwhile breakfast made its appearance, and with the warm tea and ham and eggs, confidence came to me, and I began to seriously consider the future and the career I was to adopt. There were very few open to me. I scanned the “Situations Vacant” columns in the Daily Telegraph, but there wasn't a thing that could possibly suit. That first haven of the homeless girl, governessing, was effectually closed to me.
To begin with I had no references, and secondly I should have undoubtedly succumbed to the amatory advances of one or other of the male members of whatever family I found myself in, and so taken the mistress's shameful order and the push out. I canvassed the idea of a lady typewriter, but the probable drudgery terrified me; also I should have to learn to type, and very likely buy a machine, which wouldn't have left much of my 25 pounds. Besides I had heard a typewriter's position in this great metropolis entailed a good deal of sitting on the knees of elderly employers, what time the trousers of the said employers were not at all in their proper decorum. If I was going to lead an immoral career I judged it better to do it on the stage. I had all the advantages of youth and health and one of the best figures in London, so I presumed there ought not be to much difficulty in obtaining a living wage, and so, by the time I had finished a really excellent breakfast, I had decided for the dramatic profession; there were agents I knew who arranged these matters, and these agents I determined to seek out and impress.
My first business was to get my check cashed, and then find a room. I couldn't stay in this hotel as a married lady whose husband had brought her at seven o'clock on a winter's morning and deserted her before the day was five hours older. George had settled the bill, an act of generosity at which, now, I rather wondered. Luckily I had a few shillings in my pocket with which to pay the necessary tips. That done, I put on my hat and set out without further delay for the bank on which Sir Thomas Lothmere had drawn his check. It was pretty close by, in the Piccadilly District, and I walked.
The presentation of that check was really, I think, one of the most trying moments of my life. The cashier, a vulgar bourgeois man, looked me over with the most insulting deliberation, and I was made to feel at once that he supposed I had come by the check in no respectable fashion. I think old Sir Thomas was fairly good and proper; and even if, in former days, he had had occasion to make money presents to young ladies, I don't suppose he was fool enough to do it by check; so, perhaps, the worthy cashier had never before been called upon to hand over a sum of money to a very pretty girl in a smart hat, who presented a check signed by a widely respectable and elderly scientist. At last I got it; three crisp rivers and ten bright jingling sovereigns; and feeling much happier, and on a sounder footing with the world, I set out on quest number two-lodgings.
Theatrical folk, one of whom I now proposed to be, inhabited principally, I had heard, strange and unknown lands across the water, called Kennington and Camberwell and Brixton. I had never been on the Surrey side of the Thames in my life, and had no intention of going there now. So possibly very extravagantly, I determined to set myself up in the West End. My little costumiere, Eloise's friend, who had so kindly given me credit, lived close by in Jermyn Street, and it occurred to me that I might get a room over her shop.
Madame Karl lived in an old fashioned house in Jermyn Street. On the ground floor was her shop, a tiny magasin de robes, and the rest of the house was used for her own living rooms, and one or two sets of apartments, generally let out to bachelors. I found her in the shop, bowing out a plump lady of important mien.
She was genuinely glad to see me, and laughingly enquired how I had managed to get my bill settled so soon. I made belief a few kisses had been all the price paid by me for the check, but I could see she thought I lied. With a laugh she pinched my cheek. “Well, I wish all my customers were pretty girls,” she said. “Then I should get my accounts settled more regularly.” The lady that just went out owes me over 1000 pounds and on the top of that she's just left an order to execute which I shall have to set aside all other work, and spend goodness knows how much on material. Yet I dare not offend her, for she is the Countess of Alminister, and brings many American ladies here-who do pay. But it is a heavy commission,” and the little woman sighed and shrugged her shoulders.
Madame Karl was not exactly a beauty, but she had a figure that sets off to its best advantage by her perfect gowns, set many a man coveting the charms within. And the charms were worth “having, as I discovered the first night I slept in the Jermyn Street House. She must have been thirty-eight or nine, but her flesh was firm and white and unwrinkled. I helped to rub her down with a soft towel before bed, and when I noticed how she wriggled under my fingers, I knew there was still a volcano of love in that pretty little body.
Our pact was soon sealed. I was to have one of the rooms upstairs, and Madame was very objectionable about my paying rent at present. “That can begin when you get an engagement,” she said.
In the meantime I was to make myself generally useful to her, and I soon gathered that many ways of making useful existed in that establishment.
“I let my chambers very easily to gentlemen,” she told me. “It is so convenient, you know, should a lady call, for there to be a dressmaker's establishment on the ground floor; one may suspect a lady who enters a house let in gentlemen's apartments in Jermyn Street, but who shall question the right of a lady, married or single, to visit her dressmaker.”
So it came to pass that I was to be a sort of generally discreet chaperone. Madame used to give her lady clients tea in the upstairs sitting room. When the lady showed signs of being at all timid, I used to be present at the beginning of the tea, and then be suddenly called away, what time the gentleman accomplished his desire. More than a dozen times my errand did not take me further than the keyhole, and from that point of vantage I witnessed some quite amusing performances. I must say that some of Ma-dame's aristocratic lady clients made no bones
