No Mistress of Mine

Chapter 6

Lola hadn’t been required to formally audition for a part in years, and as she lingered in the reception room backstage with her fellow actors, waiting to hear the final casting call, it came home to her just how nerve-racking the process was.

The success of her show in New York had ended the need for auditions, and the only readings she’d done had been for tutors or for Henry in the sitting room of her New York apartment, and any assessments they gave of her work, while keenly critical, had always been offered with suggestions how to improve.

Reading for Jacob Roth, with Denys beside him and dozens of curious peers watching from the wings, was a whole different matter, and she didn’t have a clue as to the caliber of her audition.

Thankfully, she hadn’t forgotten her lines or tripped over her skirt, or stuttered over Shakespeare’s tricky dialogue. But now, surrounded by actors probably far more experienced than she, those facts did not seem very reassuring.

Voices swirled around her, engaged in the usual self-deprecating conversation punctuated by nervous laughter, as actors greeted each other and speculated about their chances, but Lola did not attempt to join in.

After her disastrous performance in A Doll’s House, spiteful things had been said behind her back, lurid accounts of her affair with Denys had hit the scandal sheets, and within days, London’s theater coterie was treating her like a plague contagion, sure she was only in the play because it had been financed by her lover. And why shouldn’t they have thought it? It was the truth.

Don’t worry, Denys had said. I’ll take care of you.

He’d meant to console and reassure her, but Lola could still remember lying in bed with him at the house he’d leased for her in St. John’s Wood, those words echoing through her brain and a sick feeling knotting her guts as she realized just what she had become.

I’ll take care of you.

She’d never wanted that, but that was where she’d ended up, becoming a kept woman without even realizing it. Little by little, with every gift he’d given her that she couldn’t bear to give back and every offer to help her that she couldn’t seem to refuse, with every touch of his hand and kiss of his mouth, she’d belonged a bit less to herself and a bit more to him. And with her acting career over before it had really begun, she’d lain in his arms that last afternoon in London and wondered if being a kept woman was the inevitable path for a girl like her.

She had fought so hard to avoid that fate. Men had been pursuing her from the time she was old enough for a corset, and though her mother had gone back to her high-society set in Baltimore long before then, leaving Lola and her father far behind, Lola hadn’t needed a mother to explain the facts of life, not about men. Somehow, she’d always known that the sort of pursuit most men had in mind didn’t involve a church, a vow, and love everlasting.

Before Denys, she’d given in only once, back in New York the winter she was seventeen, and the result of her very brief, very stupid liaison with handsome man-about-town Robert Delacourt had been a hard, humiliating confirmation of the first lesson every girl on the boards had to learn: stage-door johnnies don’t marry dancing girls.

After Robert, she’d taken what little cash she had and moved to Paris, where she’d been quite happy to keep the stage-door johnnies at arm’s length. It had been easy as pie to refuse the dinners, the champagne, and the jewels, for she knew all those gifts came at a price.

But then, Denys had come along, with his affable charm, his dark good looks, and—most of all—his deep, genuine tenderness. Tenderness was something she’d had little of in her life, and her parched soul had taken it in the way a wilting plant took up water, and eighteen months later, she had somehow become what she’d promised herself she would never be: a kept woman.

She had also become a danger to Denys’s future. Earl Conyers had called at the house in St. John’s Wood, waved his checkbook in her face, and suggested with thinly veiled contempt that she should leave London before he was forced to disinherit his son.

She’d torn up the draft of a thousand pounds Conyers had written and thrown the shreds in his face, but she’d also known she could not allow Denys to keep supporting her. She’d returned to Paris, secured a position at yet another Montmartre establishment, and tried to accept the brutal reality that she’d be singing and dancing in the cabarets until her looks went and her legs gave out and the smoke of men’s cigars destroyed her voice.

And then Henry had come, arriving at her dressing-room door with champagne—not, he’d assured her at once, as any sort of romantic overture, but in celebration. Denys, he explained, was coming from England to make her an offer of marriage.

She could still remember what she’d felt in that moment—the burst of keen, clear joy at the prospect of marrying Denys, and the cold, harsh reality that had at once overshadowed it.

“So you’re here to congratulate me?” she’d asked, shoving down girlish idiocies. “That’s a bit premature, isn’t it?”

“Most women would be chomping at the bit to marry a lord. You don’t seem quite so eager.” He gave her a shrewd glance she feared saw far too much. “But then, you’re an unusual woman.”

“What is your real reason for coming here?”

Henry smiled, the knowing smile of a man of the world. “I’m here to give you an alternative to saying yes.”

“What makes you think I’d want an alternative?”

“Call it a guess. You’ve always impressed me as a sensible girl, tough, practical, and hardheaded.”

“I’m flattered.”

“Conyers knows I’m here. He also knows Denys’s intention to make an honest woman of you. They had quite the epic battle about it yesterday. It was especially lurid, I understand, since Conyers had just discovered how Denys financed A Doll’s House.”

Lola frowned, uncomprehending. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t you know? He mortgaged his estate, Arcady, the one his father bequeathed to him when he came of age.”

Oh, Denys, she thought, heartsick, what have you done?

“Needless to say,” Henry went on, “the earl doesn’t much fancy the idea of you as his daughter-in-law.”

“So you’re here to try bribing me on his behalf?” She made a sound of derision. “When will he accept that I won’t take his money to give Denys up?”

“He already has, which is why I’m not here to offer it. And forgive me for pointing out the obvious, but it seems that you already have given Denys up. Otherwise . . .” He glanced around the dressing room. “You wouldn’t be working here.”

She didn’t much like being so transparent to a man she barely knew, but she gave a nonchalant shrug. “When I left London, I didn’t know a ring was in the offing.”

“If you had known, would you have stayed?”

“I don’t know,” she said truthfully.

“And if you were to marry Denys, could you make him happy?”

She felt cold suddenly, fear brushing over her the same way the chill winds of autumn brushed aside the languid, sultry days of summer. She didn’t reply to Henry’s question, but she didn’t have to. They both knew the answer.

Viscount Somerton, the son and heir of Earl Conyers, being happily married to a cabaret dancer was a glorious and impossible fantasy, akin to a sailor marrying a mermaid, or a butcher from Kansas City marrying a society girl from Baltimore by mail-order proxy. The chance of happiness for such unions was precisely nil. And yet . . . and yet . . .

Yearning welled up within her.

“I have to change,” she said, and started to close the door, but Henry flattened a palm against the door to stop her.

“May I wait?”

A man didn’t come into a girl’s dressing room, especially with champagne, unless he was an intimate acquaintance or she wanted him to become one. On the other hand, Henry Latham was a powerful man in theater circles, not one to be snubbed lightly.

“I’m not here to seduce you,” he said as she hesitated, “or to throw Conyers’s money in your face. I have an entirely different sort of offer to make. We can talk about it while you change.”

She wanted out of her costume. She was tired and sweaty, and her ribs ached, as they always did after dancing in a tight corset. Abruptly, she turned away. “Do as you like.”

Leaving him in the doorway, she crossed the room and stepped behind the dressing screen. Henry’s voice floated to her over the top as she slipped out of her dancing shoes.

“Shall I tell you what I have in mind?”

She was skeptical, but it never did any harm to listen. “Sure,” she answered, bending down to untie her garters and roll off the flesh-colored stockings that had helped make Lola Valentine so wickedly notorious. “Why not?”

“I want you to come with me to New York. As I said, this isn’t a romantic offer. I think you have enormous talent, and I can make you a star.”

She laughed, a cynical sound forged from years on the boards. How many times had men said those exact words to her? Still, Henry Latham at least had the bona fides to make such a claim credible. “Don’t you live in London?” she asked as she unhooked the bodice of her costume and slid the dress down. It landed in a pouf at her feet.

“Yes, but I’ve decided to return home. Come with me, and I’ll give you your own show and make you famous. And I’ll pay you a generous percentage, far more than you’re getting here.”

Lola peeked around the side of the dressing screen. “I’m not sure I want to go back to New York. I’ve . . . danced there already.”

“What do you want?”

She ducked back behind the screen and hung her dress on one of the pegs on the wall and didn’t answer.

“You don’t have to tell me,” he said, as she began loosening her corset laces. “I can guess. You want to be an actress.”

Lola paused, her arms falling to her sides.

“You want to thrill audiences, hold them spellbound. You want to hear them gasp and sigh, and you want to know they’ll be talking about you long after show is over and the lights are out. You want what all performers want. You want to be loved.”

Was he mocking her? She couldn’t tell. “That’s not it,” she answered as she unhooked her corset busk. “I already have all that. Men love watching Lola Valentine strut around, kicking off hats with her foot and singing bawdy songs.” She could hear the tinge of bitterness in her voice as she spoke. “Men love seeing Lola pout her lips and show off her legs and shimmy her bosom. They adore Lola. Were you in the audience tonight? Three curtain calls. Lola’s famous here in Montmartre. Or, maybe I should say she’s notorious.”

“Ah, now we’re getting the truth,” he murmured. “You want to act because you want to be taken seriously. You want respect.”

She gave a harsh laugh. “Well, if that’s what I want, I’m doomed to disappointment.”

“Not necessarily.”

“Did you read the reviews for A Doll’s House?” she asked as she hung her corset over the top of the screen and began stripping out of her sweaty underclothes. “According to the Times, my performance was ‘reminiscent of a drunken butterfly, brilliantly colorful, but also awkward, graceless, and infinitely pathetic.’ ”

“You don’t have to quote your reviews, honey. I read them. I also saw the play.” He paused. “Denys thought you could act.”

“Denys is . . .” She paused and swallowed painfully. “Blinded by passion.”

“I’m not, and I agree with him.”

The words were like lighting a match to a stick of dynamite. “Don’t,” she ordered fiercely, peeking around the screen again to glare at him through narrowed eyes. “Don’t butter me up, Mr. Latham, and tell me what you think I want to hear. It won’t get me to come to New York with you.”

“What about training? Would that persuade you?”

“Training?” Intrigued, she started to step out from behind the screen but stopped just in time, remembering she was naked. “What do you mean? What kind of training?”

“Truly good acting isn’t something where you just step out onto a stage and start giving brilliant performances. It takes rigorous training. It takes practice and criticism and direction. You, I assume, haven’t had much of that.”

“I haven’t had any of that. Well, not until I started rehearsals for A Doll’s House.”

“So I’ll train you. I’ll pay for lessons. You can perform for me, and I’ll critique you, offer direction. I was quite an actor in my day, you know. I’ll see you learn your craft the right way. And when I think you’re ready to give drama another try, I’ll back a serious play for you. I’ll even make it Shakespeare. As far as serious acting goes, he’s the top of the tree. And if you’re good, I’ll back your career. Maybe we’ll even open our own theater in New York, and you can put on your own plays.”

“This is all really nice of you.” She paused, tilting her head as she looked at him. “And what do you get?”

“At least three years of Lola Valentine performing her one-woman show in Madison Square.”

Her eyes narrowed with suspicion. “And that’s all?”

“I don’t want to sleep with you, honey,” he said bluntly. “I’m getting too old for girls like you. I’ve got a mistress already, one my own age who suits me just fine. I met her here, but she lives in New York. That’s why I’m going back.”

Lola ducked back behind the screen, excitement rising inside her like fireworks. To learn the craft, to do it properly, to perform Shakespeare. To be more than just a great pair of legs and a sultry voice. To be respected for her work rather than ogled for her body.

She wanted that. Lola took a deep breath. She wanted it so badly, she ached. And yet . . .

What about Denys?

Agonized, Lola stifled a groan and lifted her head to stare at the garments on hooks before her: the austere dress of plum velvet she preferred to wear for supper after shows, the spangled silver dance costume she’d don tomorrow night, the delicate, luxurious peignoir of white silk chiffon that she liked to wear here in her dressing room while applying and removing her cosmetics. These gowns were the tight compartments of her dancer’s life. But she couldn’t dance forever. Eight years, maybe ten, and her body would start to give out. What would happen to her then? If she didn’t take Latham up on his offer, what other choices would she have?

Denys, a little voice whispered. If you married him, he’d take care of you.

But at what cost? He’d already alienated his family because of her. Hell, he’d mortgaged his estate. And those were nothing compared to the sacrifices he’d have to make if he married her.

His family would never accept the match. The earl was the only one who had ever met her, but she was aware that all of them loathed her to the core and thought her a gold-digging tramp. If Denys married her, Conyers would surely follow through with his threat and disown his son.

Society wouldn’t accept the marriage, either. They’d freeze her out, and, eventually, Denys as well. His titled friends, pressured by their families, would turn on him, too. Nick, Jack, James, Stuart—they all liked her well enough when she was kicking up her legs and making them laugh, but surely not as Denys’s wife. Losing their friendship, losing his family, being ostracized and disgraced—these sacrifices would break him apart.

She wanted a secure future for herself, yes, but not by sacrificing Denys’s happiness. And he could never be happy with her—not as his wife, his countess, his helpmate for life. When his passion cooled, as it inevitably would, what sort of marriage would they have?

And what about herself? As much as she wanted to act, becoming Viscountess Somerton, the future Countess of Conyers, was a part she just wasn’t good enough to play. Not every waking moment for the rest of her life. A girl like her, married to a lord? It was ridiculous.

A tear slid down her cheek, and she squeezed her eyes shut. A sailor’s falling in love with a mermaid might make for a blissful fairy tale, but she knew, better than anyone, what happened when the fairy tale was over.

Her mind flashed back to the days of her childhood, with her mother gone, and her father, head in his hands, soaked in whiskey and sobbing like a child. It had taken him ten years of hard drinking to finally end his pain in the most permanent way possible.

She thought of her burlesque days in New York, when she’d taken the train down to Maryland and stood on the front steps of one of Baltimore’s most opulent houses, and a butler with haughty eyes had told her Mrs. Angus Hutchison had no daughter and had never had a daughter.

Behind her, the dressing-room door opened. “Lola?” Denys’s voice floated to her above the other sounds that came through the doorway—raucous piano, teeming voices, drunken laughter. “Lola, are you in here, or—”

His voice broke off, and she knew he’d just seen Henry.

Dismay jolted her as she realized what he would think, but then, a much more dismal realization struck her. She knew what he’d think, yes, but wasn’t that better?

She grabbed the peignoir and slipped it on before she could change her mind. Bracing herself to give the most convincing performance of her life, she stepped out from behind the screen. “Denys!” she gasped as if in horrified shock. “What are you doing here?”

His dark gaze lowered to the flimsy garment that covered her naked body, then moved to the champagne Henry had placed on her dressing table. “You—”

He broke off, and in the silence, she could see shock giving way to wariness and caution. “You left London.”

“The play closed.” She shrugged as if it was a matter of no consequence. “I had to find work.”

“Without even seeing me to say good-bye?”

“It seemed the best way.”

His gaze locked with hers. “Best for whom?”

Her courage began to flag, but she didn’t look away. “I told you, I had to find work, and no one in London seemed willing to hire me. So, I came back here. The Jardin de Paris was happy to offer me a place.”

“You didn’t have to do this. I told you . . .” He paused, his gaze sliding to Henry, then back again. “I’ll take care of you.”

She didn’t reply, and he took a step toward her, but then he stopped. “Henry,” he said, his gaze not leaving her face, “leave us, please.”

“That won’t be necessary,” she said before Henry could comply, and she knew she had to end this quickly, or she’d lose her nerve, and—God help them both—let him talk her into a different future. “I’d like Henry to stay.”

He set his jaw. “Why?”

“We’ve become . . . friends.” She sauntered over to where Henry sat on the settee and sank down beside him, watching Denys as an appreciation of all the implications dawned in his eyes. Pain followed—his pain—slicing into her like a knife, and she knew she had to get this over with before it annihilated her.

“I heard you’re thinking we might get married.” She laughed, a brittle sound that made him grimace. And although it took every scrap of willpower she had, and cost her more than anything she’d ever done on stage, she held his gaze. “I’m flattered, but Henry has made me a better offer.”

“A better offer?” He shook his head, refusing to believe, and she knew she had to hammer the point home.

“Yes. He’s going back to America and taking me with him. He’s giving me my own show in New York.”

Denys’s jaw tightened. “I see.”

He took a step back, and she felt as if her heart were ripping in half. “Yes,” he said, nodding, “I see.”

She could see, too—she could see him hurting, hardening, any love he might have for her withering right before her eyes. But it was better for him to hate her now, when he wasn’t stuck with her for life, when he could still find someone else, someone who wouldn’t be an embarrassment to him and a stain to his family name, someone suitable who understood his life and could share it. Better for him to look at her with loathing now than with regret and blame a few years from now. Better to end this affair before there was a marriage that could not be undone and children who would suffer for their mistake. But as his eyes raked over her, what was better didn’t seem much comfort.

“I’m glad we understand each other,” she said, and caught the quiver in her voice. She forced herself to steady it, to speak with quiet finality. “Good-bye, Denys.”

The silence was smothering. Her chest ached, and she couldn’t breathe, and she knew that if he stood there much longer, she was going to break down. But just when she thought she couldn’t take it anymore, he turned his back and walked out, slamming the door behind him.

“So,” Henry said beside her in the silence. “I guess that means you’ve decided to accept my offer.”

She was tough, she reminded herself. She was hardheaded and practical, and she’d done the right thing. “I guess I have,” she said, and burst into tears.

Henry had given her a handkerchief, a stiff drink, and a fresh start. With his backing and support, she’d taken Lola Valentine to Madison Square, and within a year, she’d climbed to the top of New York music-hall theater. With the training he’d promised, she slowly learned the craft and the discipline of serious acting, and Henry’s encouragement had given her hope that one day she’d be able to perform drama again. But now?

What am I doing here? she wondered wildly as she glanced at the actors all around her. She was in partnership with a man who had every reason to hate her and would like nothing but to see the back of her. He’d never let her be part of this company. And, she thought, taking another look at the people around her, why should he?

These were serious actors with established bona fides who performed Shakespearean drama and Greek tragedy, while she was known for a risqué song-and-dance routine. The only acting role on her resume had lasted a week. Most of these people had years of experience reciting the lines of Hamlet and Clytemnestra, while her most famous soliloquy was a bawdy rendition of You Should Go to France and See the Ladies Dance.

Self-doubt seized her like a fist, clenching and twisting her guts. Everyone already thought she’d slept her way to success, and being partners with Denys was only going to reinforce that. Even if she proved she could act, it’d take forever for people to respect her for it. And what if she didn’t prove herself? What then?

“Lola? Lola Valentine?”

She looked up to find a woman of about her own age standing by her seat, a woman whose round, china-doll face she recognized at once from her Paris days. “Kitty Carr,” she cried, jumping to her feet with a laugh of disbelief. “My goodness!”

Kitty’s big brown eyes crinkled at the corners as she offered an answering smile. “What’s it been? Seven years, now?”

“Since the Théâtre Latin? Closer to eight, I’m afraid.”

“Seven or eight, it’s long enough that I could hardly believe it when I saw you walk out on that stage.”

“You were watching?”

“Back row.” She bent to place the large, slim valise of black leather she was carrying on the floor beside her. “I had no idea you were in London.”

“I could say the same about you.”

“Well, I am a London girl,” Kitty reminded her. “A year after you left Paris, I decided to do the same. I tried to look you up, but you’d already gone to New York. When did you return?”

“Just a few days ago.” Lola gestured invitingly to the empty space beside her. “Are you auditioning, too?” she asked, as both of them sank down on the bench seat.

Kitty shook her head, tucking a loose lock of her straight blond hair behind one ear. “No. I’m here to see Mr. Roth about the backdrops for the play. I paint scenery nowadays.”

“You gave up the stage?”

“I did. It proved too much for my constitution.”

Lola pressed a hand to her stomach. “Right now, I know just what you mean.”

“You’ve no cause to worry. You did well.”

“Do you really think so?”

Kitty groaned, shaking her head as if in exasperation as she turned toward her and propped one shoulder against the wall behind them. “You’ve become a real actor, I can tell, what with all this blatant fishing for compliments.”

“I’m not! But this is my first Shakespeare audition.”

“Ever?” When Lola nodded, Kitty’s answering glance held complete understanding. “A bit intimidating, what?”

“More than a bit.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation to hear praise from an old friend, I think you were head and shoulders above the rest.”

As gratifying as it was to hear that, it did little to ease her apprehensions.

“Where are you staying?”

Lola drew a deep breath, grateful for the distraction of Kitty’s conversation. “The Savoy. At least for now.”

“Heavens, I knew you’d become quite the thing in New York, but really, Lola! Staying at the Savoy?” Kitty stuck her pert nose impudently up in the air. “My word and la-di-da. I’m not sure you ought to be seen with the likes of me.”

“Oh, stop!” Lola protested, laughing. “I’m only there because it’s the most respectable hotel in the theater district, and I’m raising quite a few eyebrows by being there with only a maid. The staff thinks I’m quite depraved, I’m sure, and the maître d’hôtel looks down his nose whenever I go in the restaurant. I fear any moment, I’ll be deemed a shameless hussy and booted out because I’m giving the hotel a bad name. I’d welcome an alternative, but you know how London is.”

Kitty abandoned her impudent air and offered a sigh of commiseration in its place. “I know, I know, London’s awful. And it’s the season just now, which means even a garret comes dear. Only by a stroke of pure luck did I find rooms.”

“You’re living out? But what about your family?” She frowned in an effort of memory. “Don’t you have an aunt here?”

“Vile woman.” Kitty shuddered. “The sort who always has to remind you she did you a favor by taking you in. About a year ago, I decided I couldn’t stick it, so now I share a flat with another painter, Eloisa Montgomery, at a lodging house in Little Russell Street. A very respectable place, and just for women. No riffraff lounging about, and the omnibuses go right by. All meals in or not, as you like, and tea as well.”

Lola opened her mouth, but before she could ask if Kitty and her friend might be willing to rent her the use of the flat’s settee until she found lodgings of her own, the entire room went suddenly silent, and when she turned her head, she spied Denys standing in the doorway.

As he came in, anyone sitting immediately stood up, and anyone standing came to full attention, all rather as a well-trained regiment might do when the commanding officer arrived. Lola followed suit, though standing on ceremony with Denys seemed rather an alien concept to her.

I’ll take care of you.

That tender, well-intentioned reassurance of long ago shimmered through her consciousness like a whisper across the silent room. As if he’d heard it, too, Denys turned his head and looked at her, but there was nothing tender in his expression, and nothing the least bit encouraging. Lola’s stomach gave another nervous lurch.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, and looked away, glancing over the crowd as he moved out of the doorway to make room for Jacob Roth to enter. “We appreciate the time all of you have taken to audition today. We would like the following people to be here two weeks from today at nine o’clock for the table read of Othello. Rehearsals will begin the following Monday. As for the rest of you, thank you very much for coming, and we encourage you to try out again next season.” Pausing, he lifted a clipboard in his hand and began to read a list of names. “Breckenridge, John. Fulbright, Edward. Ross, Elizabeth. Lovell, William . . .”

Lola closed her eyes. This was it, everything she’d been training for.

“Whitman, George. Cowell, Blackie . . .”

It might not happen. She was still a partner, of course, but that seemed little consolation right now.

“Saunders, Jamie. Breville, Henry. Maclean, Hugh.”

Suddenly, Denys stopped reading names, and Lola felt the silence like a boxer might feel a knockout blow.

Her name had not been called. Evidently, despite all Henry’s instruction and training, she still wasn’t ready.

The admission was a bitter one, but what else was there to do but accept it? She bit down on her lip against the stinging disappointment and forced her eyes open, only to find Denys looking straight at her.

“And lastly,” he said with a sigh, “Valentine, Lola.”

Surprise and relief came over her in a rush, and she didn’t know whether to jump for joy or throw up. Dizzy, she sank down on the bench, doubling over until her forehead hit her knees and sucking in great gasps of air.

Kitty leaned down beside her. “Told you so,” she murmured, then straightened away and reached for her valise. “I’ll call on you at the Savoy. What about tomorrow evening? We’ll have supper and a long visit.”

Without lifting her head, Lola nodded. “That sounds lovely,” she said, her voice muffled by her skirts.

“Right. I’ll be off, then.” With a congratulatory pat on the back, Kitty departed, but Lola remained where she was, breathing deep and trying to assimilate the fact that she finally had the chance she’d worked so hard for.

Voices—some buoyant, some dejected—eddied and faded as the actors began to depart. Lola waited until the room was silent before she sat up, but when she did, she discovered she was not the only one who had remained behind. Denys was still standing by the door.

“You seem surprised,” he said, watching her.

“Not surprised.” She rose to her feet. “Stupefied is more like it.”

That made him smile a little. “So is Roth. You impressed him, and that’s no easy task.”

“And you?” she couldn’t help asking. “Were you impressed?”

He stirred, as if the question made him uneasy. “You said your lines at the end in the wrong order.”

She waved that aside. “But do you think I’m any good?”

“Does it matter what I think?”

She held his gaze steadily. “Whether you believe it or not, your opinion has always mattered to me, Denys.”

“If that’s true, you’ve demonstrated it rather poorly in the past. Still,” he added before she could reply, “you did well today. Very well.”

She caught the surprise in his voice. “You didn’t think I would,” she said, watching his face. “Did you?”

“No,” he admitted, and looked away. “I did not.”

She studied his profile, knowing full well what his thinking had been. “You let me audition, but you were sure I’d fail. What did you think? That losing one part would send me off with my tail tucked in defeat?”

“Something like that,” he muttered, and looked at her again, his expression rueful. “I should have known better. Defeat is a circumstance you don’t seem to accept.”

She grinned. “Not for long, anyway. I’m to play Bianca, then?”

“Yes. And you’ll understudy Desdemona, too. If you think you can manage both?”

“You watch me.” She laughed, jubilant, exhilarated, and so, so relieved. “Thank you, Denys.”

“Thank Roth. He wanted you. He was quite adamant about it.”

“Well, we both know how you feel about me, so the two of you must have had quite a row on the topic.”

“On the contrary, we were in complete agreement. You rather stole the show.”

“Oh.” Lola stared at him, and in his countenance she saw—or thought she saw—a trace of the Denys she used to know, but it was gone before she could be sure. “So,” she said, forcing herself to speak. “Who did you choose to play the lead?”

“Arabella Danvers.”

“Ugh.” Lola groaned, seizing on that diversion like a lifeline. “You must be joking.”

“I never joke about business.”

Lola frowned, not quite convinced. She’d been jumpy as a cat on a hot sidewalk this morning, true enough, but if Arabella had auditioned, she was sure she’d have noticed. That woman was the sort who, when she arrived anywhere, made sure everyone noticed. “But Arabella didn’t audition today, did she?”

“Mrs. Danvers needs no audition. I offered her the part without one.”

Lola made a wry face at him. “So exceptions to the rules can be made for her but not for your partner.”

“She’s played Shakespeare. You haven’t. And she’s one of London’s most successful and popular actresses. You’re not.”

“Ouch.” Lola grimaced. “You don’t have to rub it in,” she grumbled. “And Arabella may be popular with audiences, but not with anyone else. You must know her reputation? It’s legendary. She’s temperamental, difficult—”

“A case of the pot and the kettle if ever there was one.”

“I’m serious, Denys. If you take on Arabella, you and Roth will be regretting it in a week.”

He clearly did not appreciate her opinion on the subject. “Disparaging Arabella isn’t going to gain you the lead, so stop angling for it.”

“I’m not! I’m just warning you what you’re in for. I believe Arabella would stab her own grandmother if she thought it would get her anything.”

“I doubt Jacob and I are in any danger. We don’t have to like her to appreciate her popularity or her talent.”

“Talent?” Lola couldn’t help offering a derisive snort. “If you say so.”

“You’ve hardly room to talk,” he pointed out dryly. “And given your animosity for her, I am wondering if you should be her understudy.”

“That’s not your decision, remember?” She gave him a look of triumph. “It’s Roth’s, and I think he likes me. And I won’t make any trouble, I promise. After all, the peace of our partnership is at stake.”

“You’re too good.”

That rejoinder impelled Lola to stick out her tongue at him, but it was a wasted effort, for he had already turned away.

“Rehearsals begin at nine o’clock in the morning, and they run six days a week, Monday through Saturday,” he said as he walked toward the door. “Bring your lunch with you, and don’t ever be late. Jacob hates to be kept waiting, and trust me, you don’t want to lose his goodwill. And Lola?”

He paused in the doorway to look at her over his shoulder. “When the play opens, don’t even think of sending Arabella a telegram from a dying aunt.”

She stuck up her chin, adopting a dignified air. “I would never do such a thing.”

He expressed the trust he had in that assurance with a brief, skeptical, “Uh-huh,” as he began to pull the door shut.

Lola, however, wasn’t about to let him escape before she got in the last word. “I wouldn’t,” she insisted. “Arabella doesn’t have an aunt.”

The door closed, but not before she heard his shout of laughter.

Lola stared at the closed door, astonished. She’d made him laugh. Maybe he didn’t hate her as much as she’d feared. Maybe they really could work together. She grinned. Maybe there was hope for this crazy partnership after all.