A Kiss From Mr Fitzgerald

by Natasha Lester

  ‘You’re forgetting I share an attic room in Greenwich Village. This is more than enough space for me.’ Evie looked out the window to the sea, suddenly unsure what to do now that she was alone again in a room with Tommy.

  ‘Let’s go for a walk,’ he said as if sensing her shyness. ‘The path along the cliff is worth seeing.’

  ‘Like everything here.’

  ‘Especially you.’

  How could she not kiss a man who said such things?

  ‘Give me a minute to change.’ Evie searched through her suitcase but her college and hospital clothes didn’t look right, and she’d never imagined needing an outfit for strolling around Newport. She opened the wardrobe and found some clothes, Tommy’s she presumed. She pulled on a pair of navy trousers that she tied at the waist with her scarf and rolled to mid-calf. She threw on a striped shirt and a boater hat that she found in the same wardrobe and, satisfied, made her way down the stairs.

  Tommy smiled when he saw her. ‘You’ll have to keep the trousers and the hat. They look better on you.’

  Evie slipped her arm through his and they walked along the top of a cliff that dropped steeply away to the waves below. The sun was warm but the breeze blew a little so it was neither too hot nor too cold, and the sea air carried away all the blood and death and anger that Evie had swallowed down over the past few months.

  As they walked, Tommy pointed out the house where he’d drunk too much champagne as a sixteen-year-old and fallen asleep, unnoticed, in someone’s carriage, waking to find himself being conveyed to Washington; and the particular rock that he and Charles had dared each other to jump from, into the roiling sea below, something he’d done only once, because his father had thrashed him when he found out about his ridiculous derring-do. They soon reached a point along the cliff where Evie could see the barest markings of a path down through the rocks to a strip of sandy beach below.

  ‘That’s the beach where we used to swim,’ said Tommy. ‘We’d scramble down the hill like a pair of mountain goats and splash around in the water for hours. We should go for a swim now.’

  ‘I don’t own a bathing costume. Visits to the seaside aren’t a regular thing for me.’

  ‘I dare you, Evelyn Lockhart, to go swimming with me in your underwear.’

  Evie laughed, for what must have been the hundredth time since they’d arrived, and she realised how serious she’d become in the last few years, how seldom she laughed any more, except when she was with Lil. She used to laugh all the time, so much so that her parents would complain about the noise, claiming it gave them a headache, which only made Evie do it all the more. Tommy had brought happiness back into her life.

  ‘I’ll race you,’ he said, and took off, scrabbling down the rocks, feet slipping here and there but somehow staying upright.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Evie followed, skidding to her bottom at one point but pulling herself up, determined to stay in sight of Tommy. He noticeably slowed before they reached the beach, allowing her to catch up to him, so they reached the sand together, flushed, out of breath and laughing some more. Once there, he wasted no time in shucking off his shirt. He hit the water first, diving in. Evie followed suit, remembering Concord summers spent at the pond until her skin was as red as a cherry. As she surfaced, both she and Tommy reached out at the same time, and drew each other as close as two separate bodies could ever be.

  Tommy pushed the wet hair away from her cheeks so that he could see all of her face and she could see all of his. ‘I love you, Evelyn Lockhart,’ he said.

  Evie reached up to kiss him, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck. She could taste the salt of the man and the salt of the sea, the very essence of Thomas Whitman, and she knew that what she felt for him was something she’d be blessed with just once in a lifetime.

  Their kiss deepened, mouths opening to one another, her breasts pressed against his chest with only the thin fabric of her brassiere coming between them. Evie felt the passion build as strong as the night before, and finally she breathed, ‘Perhaps we’d better go back before I do something indecent.’

  ‘Perhaps we should,’ Thomas murmured against her lips.

  They dressed quickly and hurried back to the cottage. She was shivering with cold when they reached the bedroom, so Thomas undressed her once more and wrapped her in an enormous soft towel. He lit the fire and sat her in front of it while he drew the bath. Then she lay in the warm water with her back against his chest, his arms around her waist. They talked of her studies and work – what she did and why – and of his, and when the water began to cool, he helped her out and dried all of her in front of the fire. He brushed her hair gently until the knots made by the sea were untangled, and when he was done, they went to bed.

  Evie had been kissed and petted by men before Tommy. Being a Ziegfeld Girl guaranteed a steady supply of eager supplicants. At first she’d wanted to satisfy her curiosity but what she discovered was disappointing. None of those men seemed to realise that she might also seek pleasure in being touched until she felt like taking out her copy of Gray’s Anatomy and showing them a diagram of the key points of interest.

  Tommy knew. He understood that he could bring every inch of her skin to arousal, from her fingertips down to the soles of her feet.

  And so his mouth moved down her neck and along her collarbone, his tongue swirled over her nipple before taking the whole of it inside his mouth. His hand moved at the same time, from her knee to her thigh, and grazed so lightly between her legs that, in the end, it was Evie saying, ‘I can’t wait any longer,’ and Tommy grinning at her and saying, ‘Neither can I.’

  Evie sat astride Tommy, moving with him in perfect time. He reached up to take her breasts in his hands, fingers gently pulling on her nipples, then his thumb found the place between her legs that made her cry out and her whole body throb with want for him. They took a last breath together, cheek pressed to cheek, her arms stretched up over his head, hands clasped in his. Then an inhalation and a kiss, long and deep, which neither wished to break, because they knew that what they’d just shared was flawless.

  On Sunday evening, after another day spent sleeping and kissing and making love, they decided to have an early dinner in the upstairs sitting room before heading back to the city, regardless of Higgins’s insistence that they’d be more comfortable in the dining room. Tommy had said the sitting room was his mother’s favourite, and Evie could see why. It had a wall of glass overlooking the sea, and the sky streaked with bronze. The cream and gold sofa made for two was turned towards the view, its back to the room, as if acknowledging that to be truly happy one needed only a lover and a house by the sea.

  They were about to sit down to eat when there was a knock and Higgins appeared again. ‘Sir.’ He held something out for Tommy. ‘Package from your mother.’

  Tommy glanced at it, blushed slightly and tossed it onto the chiffonier. ‘Thank you,’ he said as Higgins nodded and stalked out.

  ‘What is it?’ Evie asked, curious to know what had made him look so bashful. She walked over to the chiffonier and saw that it was The New Yorker and that Tommy’s face was on the cover. He looked handsome and serious, and Evie wanted to hug the magazine she was so proud. ‘It’s you!’ she said and flipped open the pages.

  ‘You don’t need to look at it now,’ he said, coming over and trying to take the magazine off her.

  Evie batted his hands away. ‘Of course I do! You should be showing everybody, not blushing and trying to hide it.’

  She found the article and eagerly started reading. The opening paragraphs only made her prouder. They spoke of his business acumen, his tenacity, his place as one of America’s rising stars in the world of business. That was Tommy they were talking about. Her Tommy!

  But as she continued to read, her elation faded. Because she began to note other words: unblemished reputation, conservative, trustworthy, impeccable credentials. And then, in a paragraph near the end: Rumours of a liaison with a
Ziegfeld Girl have followed Mr Whitman, and also, ludicrously, rumours of an entanglement with a female medical student. But Mr Whitman has long been known as one of the city’s most eligible bachelors, and now that he is set to double the family fortune overnight, it’s likely that his return to Manhattan from London later in the year will see him looking to settle down, perhaps with some English blue blood.

  She tried to make light of it. ‘English blue blood? Is that what you prefer?’ She put on a smile as she said it, so he would know she was teasing.

  ‘Newspapers love to make up stories where none exist.’

  ‘I doubt that your English lords will be happy to read about your liaison with a Ziegfeld Girl and a ludicrous medical student.’ Her tone was sober now.

  Tommy stroked her face. ‘I won’t lie to you and say they’ll be thrilled to see that. But it’s one sentence. If I can’t talk them around that, then I don’t deserve their business.’

  But one sentence buried at the end of the article could so easily become a newspaper headline, Evie thought. Like the salacious stories in the papers about Peaches and Edward ‘Daddy’ Browning, just because he was a wealthy real-estate developer and she was a sixteen-year-old who, amongst many other misdemeanours, wore a one-piece bathing suit that showed off her thighs on a day trip to Atlantic City. Or the interest in Evelyn Nesbit, the chorus girl involved with Manhattan’s premier architect, Stanford White, whose life since his murder had been made into a story of illegitimate pregnancies and bawdy adventures on red velvet swings.

  ‘What if you can’t talk them round? And what about your father? What will he think when he reads this? He’s given the bank to you and you’re supposed to look after it, not –’ Evie stopped, unsure how to finish. Not get entangled? Not have liaisons?

  ‘I love you for being worried, but please don’t be.’ Tommy took her hand and led her to the sofa, pulling her down beside him. ‘Maybe it’s a good thing I’m going away. It’ll give talk like this a chance to disappear and nobody will remember anything about it by the time I’m back. And you can concentrate on studying, rather than worrying.’

  He smiled at her but she couldn’t bring herself to smile back. ‘Evie,’ he said. ‘Please? It’s our last night together.’

  ‘Shouldn’t you be more concerned?’

  ‘I love you. That’s all I want to think about tonight.’

  Tommy stood and drew her up. He touched her cheek with one hand and the other slid up her back. She moved closer so they were standing body to body and she felt a delicious tremor run through her.

  He started to kiss her, deeply, and she couldn’t help but respond. Soon she’d forgotten everything, because he was lifting her leg to wrap around him and her knickers were long gone, and she almost couldn’t believe it but they were making love in the sitting room before a glass wall and with the butler in the house. But there was no question that she could stop herself, and nor could he.

  ‘Hopefully nobody has a photograph of that for the newspaper,’ she teased when they’d finished and collapsed together onto the rug.

  Tommy laughed. ‘Now that would be a scandal.’ He kissed her again, both hands cupping her face. ‘The boat leaves at five in the morning, so this is really our goodbye. I won’t be able to kiss you like this when I drop you at the boarding house. How am I going to face each day knowing I can’t see you?’

  ‘I don’t know how I will either.’

  ‘I’ll write you a letter every day.’

  ‘Don’t promise too much and disappoint me. Promise me once a week and then I’ll be leaping for joy when there’s more.’

  ‘I won’t disappoint you, Evie.’

  ‘All the same, I prefer less extravagant vows.’

  ‘So what should I expect from you?’

  ‘I’ll scribble you a line on the back of the calling cards that the men leave for me at the theatre,’ she quipped, trying to push away the ache that was building inside. But when she looked at his face, she couldn’t keep up the act. ‘I’m quitting Ziegfeld’s when I get back.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s a week until study break. I have to do the best possible job in my exams. I’ll only do that if I’m not working every night at the Follies. Luckily, Brewer’s punishment of sending me out on the ambulance service has turned out to be the best thing I could have done. I’ve learned more there in a week than I would have in a year of studying my books. And I’ve saved enough money from Ziegfeld’s to get me through until I can take up an internship next year. If I get one.’

  She paused. She was so afraid he wouldn’t come back, that he might realise, once in London, that someone like Winnie would be much more suitable for him and so she almost didn’t tell him the real reason she wanted to stop working at the Follies. The thought of losing him made it difficult to breathe, as if it could literally cause her to choke to death on her sorrow. But he’d given her so much; he’d told her he loved her. She had to be as honest with him as he had been with her. She had to believe that he would come back to her; that if he didn’t, it would kill him too.

  ‘I’m quitting because I can’t bear the thought of performing for any man, not now that I have you,’ she said. ‘And because I love you.’

  And then he said something that almost made her cry, because it was beautiful and perfect and she realised that she wished with all her heart that it would come true. ‘I’ll marry you when I get back, Evie Lockhart,’ he said.

  ‘But –’

  He put a finger against her lips. ‘Don’t say anything now. Think about it while I’m away and you might come to realise it isn’t impossible.’

  She kissed him as hard as she could then, wanting to make the memory of it last for all of the long months ahead.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Evie was lying awake in her bed at the boarding house at five in the morning when Thomas’s ship pulled out of the harbour. She’d been up until after midnight telling Lil all about her wonderful weekend, but she hadn’t mentioned Thomas’s proposal. It was too new and precious an idea to give voice to just yet. Because it was ridiculous to think of someone like Thomas marrying a woman like her, but Evie wanted to stay on the side of hope and believe that maybe it could happen.

  And while she felt like this, more optimistic than she had in a long time, she’d do two things. Report to Dr Brewer as requested and face the inevitable music about the craniotomy. Then she’d talk to Charles about Mary.

  When she arrived at the hospital promptly at nine, the first person she saw was Francis, walking downstairs towards the main doors. His tic had returned, his shirt was untucked and he was carrying a box.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Evie asked.

  Francis didn’t reply, just strode past her. Evie quickened her pace and ran up to the ward.

  ‘What happened to Dr Sumner?’ she asked a nurse.

  ‘He was asked to leave,’ the nurse whispered, her eyes wide.

  ‘And go where?’

  ‘Nowhere. He’s been fired.’

  Evie’s stomach dropped to the floor. She wanted to sit down. They’d fired Francis. They’d run her out of town.

  She knocked on the door of Dr Brewer’s office.

  ‘Miss Lockhart.’ The dean of the medical school opened the door. They really must be throwing her out if they’d called him in too. But he only said, ‘We hope you’re feeling better?’

  ‘What?’ Evie blurted. His demeanour was so at odds with the supercilious man she’d encountered at her admissions interview that she entirely forgot both her manners and that she was supposed to have been sick on the weekend. ‘Thank you, I’m fine.’ She eyed both men warily. Dr Brewer avoided her gaze and the dean’s face was impassive, giving nothing away. What was going on?

  Dr Brewer cleared his throat and the dean looked at him expectantly. ‘We apologise, Miss Lockhart, for Friday’s … situation,’ said Dr Brewer so coldly that Evie hoped his gums might freeze to his lips.

  ‘You apologise?’ she asked, stu
nned.

  ‘We understand that you might find an apology difficult to accept,’ the dean said. ‘The college rules list a set of procedures that no student is to perform. And Dr Sumner ordered you to perform one of those procedures, which was in clear violation of the rules. We hope an apology will ensure that you won’t feel the need to mention the situation again.’

  In her shock, Evie almost laughed. It seemed the hospital and the college were in as much trouble as a naked President snapped by a press hound while in the company of his mistress. If anyone found out that a student had been ordered to perform a procedure she wasn’t allowed to conduct, the college’s reputation, and the hospital’s, would be seriously harmed. The Sloane family, who funded the hospital and who were already baulking at requests to cover bigger and bigger deficits, would be horrified at any hint of impropriety.

  Evie could now guess what had happened. Francis must have rushed in to see Dr Brewer, gleeful with the news that Evie Lockhart had killed another patient by performing a craniotomy. Francis was too stupid to have thought about the college rules. And Evie had handed over her notes to the hospital with the mother, so Dr Brewer couldn’t pretend it had never happened. Evie would survive. Francis wouldn’t. Who’d have thought things would turn out like this?

  She could exult in this moment. But there was a certain strength in being magnanimous. In shutting her smart mouth. In making Dr Brewer see that there was another way to behave. ‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ was all she said.

  That stunned them both. But not for long. ‘I’m placing you on light duties,’ Dr Brewer added, barely able to hide his fury at having to apologise to her.

  ‘I’ll stay on the ambulance service until we break for exams,’ Evie replied.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I’m learning more out there than I’ve ever been allowed to learn in here. You’ve given me a wonderful opportunity to thoroughly prepare for my examinations. Maybe I’ll get top marks after all.’ Evie smiled at Dr Brewer as she spoke, as if she was grateful to him. He looked as if he’d like to hurl the heart-shaped paperweight at her, just as she’d wanted to toss it at his framed certificates not long ago. How things had changed.