Dazzle The Complete Unabridged Trilogy (73 page)

Inge fell silent and looked thoughtfully down at her soup
bowl, where a large white dumpling floated in fatty yellow
chicken broth. Then she managed a smile. 'Why not? We find
you something nice to wear to your Mongol's.'

Tamara's eyes lit up. 'It's got to be something smart,
though,' she said slowly.

'Smart?' Inge asked. Her eyes flicked suspiciously sideways.
'How a dress can be smart? It thinks, huh?'

'It's an expression. You know, like chic. Elegant. Classy.'

Inge shook her head. 'Glassy clothes. Smart clothes. What
will they think of next?'

Tamara let the 'glassy' slide. All she had thought for was
her new dress with the strand of pearls shimmering around her
throat. She loved those pearls, and took every opportunity to
wear them. That they were inexpensive fakes from Wool
worth's didn't matter one iota. What did matter was that she'd
had her eyes on them ever since she'd seen a photograph of
Constance Bennett wearing pearls. That had done it. And the
Woolworth pearls made her feel right up there along with
Constance Bennett.

At two-thirty the next afternoon they entered Dorothy's Dress Shoppe, Inge looking out of place and older than her
thirty-seven years in her dowdy, shapeless grey coat, heavy,
sensible brown shoes, large frayed handbag, and the shapeless
little black hat she wore whenever she stepped out-of-doors.
Tamara set her magnificent chin firmly and refused to be intimidated by the elegant surroundings of the emporium she
had, until now, only been able to gaze longingly at from out
side. Dorothy's! she thought ecstatically, taking in its hushed,
almost ecclesiastic silence. What incredible luxury! She looked
around the shop in wonder. Why, there was even plush carpet
ing on the floor!

'Oh, Inge! Isn't everything too divine?' she breathed, danc
ing along an aisle, her fingertips rippling the glorious dresses
hanging from racks on either side. She paused, breathless, and
danced back toward Inge, rippling the dresses again. 'Isn't it
all to
die
for?'

Even Inge had to admit that while the clothes at Dorothy's
were certainly not worth the price of death, they were very
fine indeed.

A patrician saleslady in a well-tailored dove-grey dress and immaculately coiffed silver hair approached them, revealing
only for a fraction of an instant her unqualified disapproval of
Inge's hopelessly frayed outfit before a mask of inscrutable
professionalism slid smoothly over her features. 'Madame is looking for something?' she inquired with only a modicum of
disdain.

Inge shook her head and lowered her eyes shyly. 'Not for
me, sank you.' She touched Tamara's shoulders and pushed
her gently forward. 'Is for her,' she said proudly, lifting her
shiny eyes. 'She needs a glassy dress.'

The saleslady raised her eyebrows. 'A
glassy
dress?'

'She means elegant,' Tamara explained.

Inge nodded and lowered her voice confidentially. 'She is
invited to dinner at film Mongol's house in the Beverly Hills!
I want her to look nice, like she belong.'

'Here at Dorothy's we pride ourselves on helping our
customers look their best,' the saleslady sniffed. 'The finest
people in the city patronize us. What did you have in mind?'

Inge gave an expressive, helpless shrug. 'Tamara, she know.
She read all the magazines.'

The saleslady looked Tamara over to gauge her size. 'Is it
to be formal?'

'I
...
I don't know, ma'am.'

'I see.' The saleslady pursed her lips thoughtfully. 'I suggest
a dress, then, not a gown. You have a good figure and very
nice legs. There's no need to hide them. You'll also be able to
wear it both days and evenings.'

'That sounds goot,' Inge declared, nodding.

'And the, er, price range you have in mind?' The saleslady
looked at Inge.

Inge steeled herself. 'Ten dollar?' she ventured, naming
what was to her an astronomical sum.

'I see.' The saleslady sighed. 'That limits our selection, I'm afraid. However, we do have a few rather nice sale items left over from last year. One in particular should suit the young
lady quite nicely. I'll go get it and she can try it on.'

'It must be decent,' Inge warned. 'I want her to look a lady.'

'Of course,' the woman said, 'and she shall.' She strode off to find the dress, and when she returned, Tamara took one look at it and uttered a swift, fervent prayer that it would fit her. And it did. Standing in front of the three-way mirror, turning this way and that to catch her reflections, she could scarcely believe her eyes. It was a body-hugging sheath that
came up to the armpits and reached to mid-calf, was made of tightly gathered satin the colour of perfectly ripe raspberries,
and had thick black velvet straps which looped over her shoulders. It could be worn with the extravagantly gargantuan mat
ching satin bow pinned near the hem on one side for formal
wear or without it for a more casual look. Her face was flushed
with pink excitement at the anticipation of acquisition. She
looked, she knew, in a word, sensational.

She was enchanted, bewitched, in love with the dress.

Even Inge knew a sight for sore eyes when she saw it. She nodded her approval. '
Ja
, that looks goot. How much it will
cost?'

'It's a beautiful dress,' the saleslady praised lavishly. 'Hand
made, not mass-produced. Originally it was priced at twenty-
four dollars.'

'So much!' Inge looked horrified.

'It has been reduced to twelve.'

'Twelve dollar,' Inge muttered, the corners of her lips twit
ching.

Tamara was crestfallen. She knew that look of Inge's only
too well; equally well, she knew how far Inge could stretch
those twelve precious dollars.

After a thoughtful silence Inge asked, 'Do you have some
thing else nice for less money?'

Tamara silently offered up another, even more fervent
prayer. She had to have this dress, this extravagant fantasy
which made her look and feel beautiful. She couldn't bear the
thought of having to part with it.

The saleslady shook her head. 'I'm sorry, this is the least
expensive, I assure you.'

Tamara held her breath, staring at Inge's reflection in the
mirror. This was the moment of reckoning. She could see
Inge's fingers tightening on the handbag. Another bad sign.

'You like it, Tamara?' Inge softly asked at long last.

Tamara nodded swiftly, too shaky to speak.

'Then you shall have your glassy dress,' Inge announced under a sudden fusillade of happy hugs and noisy kisses.

'Damn!' Tamara wailed as the unmanageable stray curl
escaped her newly coiffed hair and spiralled down the middle
of her forehead. Disgusted, she tugged it back up with the
tortoiseshell comb. 'Why does it have to come undone now,
of all times?'

It was nearly six-thirty and she was still planted in front of the bathroom mirror, comb in one hand, bobby pins sticking
out from between her lips like a mouthful of spiky porcupine quills. She had draped herself with a bedsheet to protect her
precious new dress from water spots or stray hair, and longed,
not for the first time, that instead of this mottled, distorting,
cracked mirror she had an honest-to-goodness sit-down vanity
with a large, well-lit mirror. She would give her eyeteeth for
one.

She raked the comb through her hair again and then shook
her head. The shoulder-length waves bounced as easily and
naturally as springs. Aha! Triumph at last! The recalcitrant
curl had finally been tamed.

She put down the comb, spat out the bobby pins, and let
the bedsheet slide off her shoulders. She rumpled it into a ball and shoved it under the sink. Then she rubbed her bare arms
briskly while experimenting with various seductive poses in the mirror. Damn, it was chilly. No matter now cold it got,
Roland J. Paterson's bathroom in this apartment was never
heated; still, she was grateful to have it.

'He is here!' Inge burst excitedly into the bathroom. 'I never seen such a giant car!' Then she gasped, stepped back, clasped
her hands in front of her, and shook her head.
'Du bist so
schön!'
she marvelled admiringly in disbelief, reverting to her native German as she always did when something frightened,
shocked, or impressed her unduly. '
So schön.'

'You're sure I'm all right?' Tamara asked worriedly.
'You're not just saying that to please me?'

Inge smiled and tilted her head.
'Ja.
I'm sure,' she said
gently, her eyes glowing warmly with love. She placed the
palm of her hand on Tamara's cheek and held it there. She
shook her head sadly.
'
Mein Liebchen.
Already you go out into the world. Soon you have use no more for your Inge.'

'Of course I will!'

Before her emotions could overcome her, Inge drew back
and said gruffly, 'Leave everything be. Later I clean up here.'
She thrust a crocheted black stole into Tamara's hands. 'It is
cold out. Put around you.' She paused. 'Now, go. Go.'

Tamara turned to the mirror one last time, attacking her
cheeks with inspired pinches to bring out a healthy, rosy glow.

'Stop that.' Inge gently slapped her hands away. 'You want
red marks on your face? Enough is enough.'

Tamara hurried lightly down the steep stairs, one hand on
the banisters, the other dragging the crocheted stole behind
her.

Louis Ziolko was waiting just inside the front door, holding
a match to a thick Belinda cigar. The match flared and his
cheeks inflated and deflated like a bellows as he sucked on the
flame. Hearing her footsteps, he glanced up through the blue cloud of smoke. God Almighty! The match slipped from his fingers. He could feel the muscles contracting painfully in his
gut, as if he'd been punched. What was wrong with her? Didn't
she know better than to leave herself wide open for sexual
assault? Hadn't she given
any
thought to the way that horizontally gathered satin clung to her hips so
...
so
obscenely,
that
giant bow off to the side only inviting lecherous leers to follow
the shapely perfection of her magnificent legs? Didn't she real
ize that the very act of totally concealing her bosom just
begged one to rip it free? And those sedate pearls—a master
fully ladylike, demure touch if there ever was one, but one
which played havoc with her ribald sensuousness.