5

I couldn’t tell Philippe now, of course. Not like this.

My limbs tangled with my layered skirts as I struggled to rise from the floor with at least a scrap of dignity.

He came bounding across the stage, horror streaking his face. “Are you hurt?” He helped me sit, and I shook my head, wriggling free of the harness and ropes. “I suppose I ought to learn what the lever does before I operate it. My humblest apologies—I only meant to help you.”

I offered a smile. “Quite all right. Better down than up.”

His smile was generous. Relieved. “Quite right. Here, let me help you, and we’ll fetch your things.” He took my hand and pulled me up in one smooth move, and I stumbled onto my feet, balancing so I didn’t fall into him. Our faces close at last, mine looking up into his, he studied me, then looked again. The pull of recognition showed in his features, but he said nothing. Yet.

His hand went protectively behind me as he guided me toward the back room for my cloak. “Won’t you tell me what adventures drove you up there?”

I blew the hair off my face, but it fell right back. “The mistaken leap into a new friendship.”

“Ah. You’ve angered one of them. Welcome to the world of ballet.”

I sighed, wishing I dared limp to accommodate a throbbing spot on my hip. “Are they always this way?”

He shrugged. “I suppose they sleep at times.”

I laughed, then smothered it with my hand. What a child he must think me. But somehow this man had momentarily lightened the secret burden I carried of “not enough.”

“They’re not horrible. Most are quite helpful and supportive of one another, but a few at the top—they’re desperate. Scared.” He helped me on with my cloak, then turned me to face him again, those fathomless dark eyes snapping in the chilly air of the empty theater, and once again the butterflies danced in my belly. It was almost more than I could bear. “Where exactly did you come from?”

I blew out a breath, all my secrets piling up behind my lips, and one word escaped as I pulled on my gloves. “Paris.”

“I should have known,” he mused. “A vibrant city produces a vibrant dancer.” He laughed, slipping his fingers around the back of his neck. “Forgive me. What I should ask is, where are you staying?” He lifted my hat down from the hook and held out his arm. After I grabbed my carpetbag, we walked down the short flight of steps and out the stage door into the cold, quiet alley. “Would you allow me to carry your bag?”

Embarrassed at the broken handle, the very shabbiness of it, I held the old thing close. “Thank you, I can manage. It really isn’t heavy.”

“I assume you haven’t far to go, then. You still haven’t told me where you stay.”

“Soho, just off Haymarket.” I pulled my carpetbag into the folds of my wrap and tried not to cringe at the notion of him seeing my dirty little rooming house with its single soot-stained upper window. I hadn’t even unpacked my meager trunk yet.

He hesitated as we reached Craven Street, out in front of the theater. Raucous laughter and music from the pub across the way drifted past us. “So far? You’ll grow weary of such a journey, on top of dancing all day.”

“Decent rooms are not plentiful in Covent Garden. Not for a beginning dancer.”

Traps of all sorts rattled by, crunching over rocks and broken bricks. He spoke above the din of London, the passing voices louder and oiled with drink. I didn’t relish the late walks home, now that I was standing out here at night.

“There’s a place a few streets away that houses dancers. It’s safe and clean. Shared rooms, but only five shillings a week. Would that suit?”

“Oh yes, quite.” My face heated as my words gushed out, like a desperate woman accepting his invitation to dance.

He merely offered a bow with a most gentlemanly smile and led me along under the gaslights, allowing the snow to gather on his broad shoulders and felt hat.

Icy flakes whipped against my cheeks. “How is it so . . .”

“Modestly priced? It’s owned by the theater. The Great Fournier, as he’s called around here, likes to manage his ballerinas on and off the stage.”

Fournier. Craven’s owner, if I remembered right. I’d seen that name in a flourish of signatures on all the pages of my contract. “What makes him ‘great’?”

He stopped in the snow. “Haven’t you met him? You’d certainly know the answer if you had.”

“Is he quite terrible?” I dreaded meeting him, dancing before him.

“Don’t let him scare you. The secret is to look just past him, never directly in the eyes. That’s where his power lies.”

I shivered.

He pointed to the east. “Come, I’ll deliver you to Mama Jo at the dormitory. She’s far more agreeable than those dancers. And Fournier, for that matter.”

We crossed onto Bleaker, and I doubled my pace to keep up, neatly dodging a horse and carriage clopping over the cobbled road as my carpetbag bounced against my shins. The odd mix of aromas—beached sewage and rotting food crossed with fine leather and horses—merely demonstrated what a blend of classes London was. The poor living separately, yet so near the rich to better serve them, launder their clothing, and drive their carriages.

I slipped my gloved hand farther into the crook of his arm and resisted the urge to lean into his warm wool coat, drinking in his nearness. The words between us that night were few and simple, but there was a weight to them that lingered, each dropped like a stone in a pond.

“You’ll have to send for your things, of course.”

“Yes, I’ll see to it.”

“I do hope you find the room comfortable.”

“If it has a roof and a bed, it’ll do.”

“A roof and a bed?” His quiet smile warmed right through the cold of the winter night.

I allowed the conversation to remain on the surface while I studied him. So handsome, so reserved, compared to what he’d once been. The theater had used him up, it seemed, but hadn’t Paris done the same to me? Change had settled on both of us these past years, but his both intrigued and worried me. There was a depth, a knowing sadness in his expression that made me want to ask him where he’d been and what he’d done. Or what had been done to him. Life had worn down that boyish enthusiasm, paling the sparkle and dimming his eyes considerably.

He caught me staring and smiled. “Feeling better now?”

“Yes.” My cheeks were surely pink—from the cold and other things. “Thank you for the rescue and for escorting me.”

He gave a gallant bow and stopped before a rough wooden door. “My pleasure. And I’ll repeat the gesture whenever you find yourself alone at the theater come nightfall.”

I sensed many late-night rehearsals in my future. “Thank you.”

“I’ve done it for many dancers over the years.”

My smile froze. He’d gone and cheapened the offer. No matter, he was still the finest gentleman anywhere in the theater world, and it validated my years of infatuation.

Which was quickly hardening into something rock-solid.

The door opened and a dark-haired woman with classic, gently aged beauty looked out from the shadows. “Why, Monsieur Rousseau. A pleasant surprise.” Her voice carried the gentle upward clip of a French upbringing.

“My apologies for dropping a boarder on you so late.” He flashed a quiet smile. “The girls gave her a bit of a rough time tonight, and she was held up.”

I choked on a laugh, scrambled for a smidge of dignity. “Ella Blythe.” I curtsied.

“Come in, Miss Blythe.” Her wide smile was warm and generous, her nature magnetic. “Thank you, Monsieur Rousseau, and don’t be troubled over the hour. I’d much rather a new dancer here safe with me than wandering through London alone.”

“Shall I send for your things then, Miss Blythe? I’d rather see to it than have you trying to find a boy on your own at this hour.”

I could hardly stand to look at his gentle face—it was so gracious and refined and everything I was not accustomed to. “How kind of you, sir. I would be in your debt.” I scribbled my address in Soho, then after a quick bow, Philippe Rousseau was gone from my side.

The woman ushered me into the darkness that was pleasantly warm with the scent of honeyed cinnamon and yeast. “My name is Josefina Herrera, but the dancers, they call me Mama Jo.” Her low voice came silky smooth in the dark, skipping over the j at times with a y sound. “It’s my task to keep you reasonably moral and your evenings exceptionally dull. Fournier hates for his dancers to be inflicted with . . . immorality.” She paused to light an oil lamp on a small table and turn up the wick.

With child is what she meant, of course.

“You’ve had a taste of life at the ballet tonight, I understand.” She led me up the tightly curling steps. “Which of them was it?”

I racked my mind for the name on the edge of my memory. “She has blonde hair and little earbobs, and she always looks as though she’s laughing inside at some little secret.”

“Oui, Minna Frank.”

“Yes, that’s her. I suppose I said something to offend her.”

“Or not.” Shadows leaped on either side of us in the narrow stairway. “It is the great paradox of art, ma petite. Ballet is all delicacy and grace, yet it brings out the barbaric side of every woman who dances it. They are like starving wild dogs, fighting over the few choice pieces of meat.” She turned and inserted a long gold key, the light she held flickering between us, and pushed open a door. “One only has to worry if she is any good.”

I shivered at the words, an echo from my past. The woman ushered me into my new home awash in blue-black dusk, her lamp heightening all the shadows hiding within.

It was a small, square room papered with a floral design and filled with two brass beds, twin wardrobes, and dressing tables. “Everyone wishes to be principal, Miss Blythe, or to lure the wealthiest abonné to sponsor her on the stage and . . . beyond. A sparkling position on the stage and a generous annuity is all they dream of in this life. How else will the dancer survive, once she outgrows her youthful bloom?”

I shrugged, throwing a smile her way. “Become a Maman to the younger.”

She studied me in the flickering light, her knowing smile proving I’d pegged her accurately. “You will do well at Craven, Miss Blythe. You’ll not be in the corps for long.”

“Sujet, actually.” At her shock, I was struck by my mistake, but I was too late. “Lower tier, of course.” As if that fixed it.

Confusion shadowed her smooth face. “You are beginning in the sujet? How long have you trained?”

“Two years.”

More surprise, lifting her arched eyebrows. “And where are you from, Miss . . . Blythe, is it?”

“Ella Blythe. From London, ma’am.” I ducked from her gaze. “I’m here on scholarship.”

But that only deepened her frown, one eyebrow raising. “Scholarship?”

“Yes, through Craven. I’m contracted to dance for them exclusively in exchange for my training.”

Her stare seemed to last an eternity. Then it broke with a swish of her blue poplin skirt. “We’d best keep this to ourselves, no? You needn’t let the other girls know you’ve come here for free, for they’ll only despise you more.”

I laughed. “I’m certain that’s not possible.”

She turned, standing as a statue with that lamp accentuating her elegant features. “I assure you,” she said in measured tones. “It is quite possible.”

The air suddenly felt heavy under her stare. The distant clock chimed once, marking the quarter hour. I’d lost all sense of the time.

“You should know that Fournier operates a unique sort of theater.” She set the lamp on the table and opened the glass to light a smaller one to leave behind. “You’d best be excellent at memorizing combinations if you hope to stay.”

I cringed. Memorizing them was my weakest point as a dancer. Nothing caused me more stumbles and hesitations than forgetting what came next.

“Rather than going to the expense of traveling with his company, the Great Fournier holds all performances right here in the theater, with just weeks of preparation in between each one.”

I frowned. “How can the dancers possibly—”

“As I said, you must become exceptional at memorizing combinations. He is a master at rearranging a series of combinations into a completely new dance, telling a fresh story, over and over. That has become Craven’s model and it has worked well for many years.” Her gaze lingered.

“Thank you for explaining it to me.”

“Minna and the others, they shall make it their business to catch you off guard. It’s best to arm yourself with as much knowledge and experience as you can, and very quickly. Then . . . do what you can to make friends with them. They are terrible chums, but dangerous enemies.”

When Mama Jo left, I spent a few quiet moments shaking off a sense of doom and looking over the contents of my new roommate’s cosmetic table—the bold red lip grease, the pink tin of rice powder, the many stoppered bottles of different colors and sizes. What sort of woman was she? Perhaps she could be a confidante in the way Lily had been.

My curiosity shuddered to a firm halt when I heard a thump outside, then a scratch-scratch. It was nearby, somewhere just outside the window. I leaped into bed fully clothed, shucking my boots, and tried to ignore the noises. I had a third-floor room, and it was likely a feral cat or some such nonsense.

Then, a bang.

The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?

I was trembling by the time the window to my little sanctuary burst open and a pile of skirts and finery tumbled in. Then, a face appeared among the fabric. Minna Frank rose, a white porcelain pillar of disdain, and glared down at me. “What are you doing in my room?”

Her room? I groaned and shrank farther beneath the coverlet. Understanding wrapped its tentacles around me. Of all the devious, underhanded . . . There was no denying it—Mama Jo had once been a dancer.

Minna came toward me, heeled boots stabbing the floor with each step. “Where exactly did you come from?”

I harnessed all my poise. “The boardinghouse was recommended to me. Mama Jo placed me in this room.”

“Did she, now?” Her gaze lingered, but she turned, discarding her wrap and allowing me to breathe again.

“The choice was certainly not mine.” I caught sight of myself in the long mirror across from the bed as I heard those words leave my mouth, and suddenly I saw her. I saw Mama in the lift of my chin and the defensive way I spoke, and it horrified me, as if I’d spotted a ghost in the mirror. “We are so similar, you and I. Yet I want nothing more than for your story to be wonderfully different than mine.”

And it would be. It would. If I had to bend the future to my will, it would not take the same tragic turn as Delphine Bessette’s. I had complete control over what became of me, of my career and my life. Things would only happen that I let happen.

I rolled over on the bed with a creak of springs. I had to prove to them all that she couldn’t intimidate me. It was the worst turn of events since coming back to Craven, and in the moment, I couldn’t imagine anything more troubling.

Then I met Jack.