Page 1 of Lady Scandal
1
London, 1898
Icannot, Madame Comtesse. You ask the impossible.”
Declarations of that sort had never bothered Lady Delia Stratham. They rolled off of her like water off a duck’s back. “And that surprises you?” she replied, giving the man opposite her a wink. “But, Michel, you know the impossible is my favorite thing.”
The lithe young Frenchman on the other side of the worktable did not respond to that bit of raillery the way she’d hoped. Instead of a good-natured laugh, he heaved a sigh. “I tell you it cannot be done.”
Despite having heard those exact words from two other members of the hotel staff already this morning with similar results, Delia refused to be deterred. She gave the Savoy’s head florist her most winning smile, one that usually disarmed even the most intransigent opponent. “But, darling,” she began.
Michel cut her off with an outburst of French so rapid that even Delia, fluent in that language since the age of seven, had a hard time following it. Something about how he was not a miracle worker, nor was he a tennis ball to be batted about, and how he wished that the managers of the Savoy would make up their minds what they wanted. Concluding his tirade with a few choice curses, he seized a pair of pruning shears and a handful of red dogwood twigs from theworktable between them and began lopping off the ends with alarming savagery.
Delia studied him, at a loss on how to proceed. Charm and wit had always been her two greatest talents. They had not only captivated three husbands and garnered Delia an abundance of loyal friends, but had also inspired César Ritz, manager of London’s Savoy Hotel, to offer her a job. The famous hotelier’s unconventional decision had shocked society, but it had proven to be a godsend for Delia in the wake of her third husband’s death, and in the five years since, it had also been a shining success for the hotel.
Today, however, Delia wasn’t feeling like much of a success.
First, Escoffier, the hotel’s famous head chef, had gone into a flaming rage at her simple inquiry as to why the napkins in the restaurant were no longer being folded into swan shapes. He, too, had unleashed a torrent of angry French at her, rattling off a diatribe against the new regime and their spies—whatever that meant—and declared he could not work amid these constant interrogations. She should, Delia was told, talk to Ritz, and he had nothing more to say. He had then marched off to take the remainder of his anger out on his sous-chef, and a bewildered Delia had tactfully retreated, tabling any questions about the swans for another day.
Then had come Mrs. Bates. Having lost her lady’s maid to one of Paris’s most renowned houses of haute couture during her recent visit to that city, Delia had asked Mrs. Bates if the hotel could provide her with a maid from the hotel staff until she could hire a new one of her own. The Savoy’s head of housekeeping had responded to this seemingly innocuous inquiry by bursting into tears and declaring the “new way” (whatever that was) impossible. Then she had ducked into the nearest washroom and slammed the door in Delia’s bewildered face.
And now, here she was again, with another resentful employee onher hands. This time, however, was the most surprising of all. Escoffier, though cerebral and methodical by nature, had sometimes been known to fly off the handle, and Mrs. Bates had always been a dear old curmudgeon who often required a generous amount of buttering up to soothe her injured feelings. But Michel?
She stared at the lithe, mustachioed young man on the other side of the worktable, at a loss how to reply, wondering what on earth had happened during her month in Paris. Like Escoffier, Michel DuPont was brilliantly artistic and usually eager to embrace even Delia’s wildest flights of fancy. But also like his fellow Frenchman, Michel was proving uncharacteristically intractable this morning.
Delia took a deep breath and tried again.
“Dearest Michel, I don’t understand,” she said, also speaking in French, hoping that conversing in his native language would help calm him down a bit. “We went over our designs for the new bouquets before I left town. Early tulips, narcissi, and hyacinths from January to March, lilacs and peonies for April and May, and roses and hydrangeas through the summer. It was all quite fixed, I thought.”
The florist stopped attacking the dogwood stems and looked up with a scowl. “Oh, what a difference a few weeks can make.”
Delia repressed a sigh at this unhelpful response. “So I’m discovering,” she muttered. “Butwhy? What’s happened in my absence that has you making the new arrangements with all the same blooms we’ve been seeing since October?”
“They aren’t all the same,” he muttered, gesturing to the bouquets currently under discussion that were lined up on a shelf behind him, ready to be placed throughout the Savoy’s long, elegant foyer. “I put mahonia in with the bay leaves and dogwood. The yellow does make a difference, no?”
“Does it?” She studied the line of bouquets in last season’s milkglass vases without enthusiasm. “I’m inclined to doubt. Dearest, you know it’s important at this time of year to show our guests that spring is just around the corner, but when I look at these arrangements, I have the impulse to wrap myself in a blanket, sit by a fire, and roast some chestnuts. I know your creative mind, Michel,” she added as he groaned. “I know you would never do this if you didn’t have a good reason. What’s happened while I’ve been away? It must be something catastrophic,” she went on when he didn’t reply, “for you are not the only one out of sorts today. So tell me what is going on?”
He paused in his task, looking up. “I’m surprised you don’t already know. You usually know everything,Madame.”
Apparently not. “I arrived back from Paris very late last night,” she reminded. “Just what am I supposed to know?”
“No, no,” Michel replied at once, shaking his head. “If you do not know, I shall not be the one to inform you. Go to your office and read your correspondence, then you will see.”
“And have Madelaine herald my return with a stack of letters that need answering in one hand and her shorthand notebook in the other? I can’t, Michel,” she added as he opened his mouth to respond. “Truly, I can’t. Not before luncheon. And since I’m right here in front of you, why don’t you simply tell me why you’ve changed your mind about the flowers we chose?”
“Very well, if you must know.” He flung up his head, shaking back his hair like an angry young thoroughbred. “It is the expense.”
Delia blinked, so astonished she couldn’t think how to reply. In the five years since Ritz had hired her to work for him at the Savoy, never had she been expected to consider expenses. “I don’t understand.”
“Forced bulbs are very costly. And the new vases of cut crystal you wanted—they are expensive, too,Madame.”
Delia couldn’t help a laugh. “Well, of course they’re expensive, darling! This is the Savoy, after all. We don’t do anything on the cheap.”
“Not until now.”
Delia frowned, growing more confounded by the moment. “What on earth does that mean?”
“During your absence, every department was ordered to submit a budget for the year.”
