Baroness Read online

  Summerside Press™

  Minneapolis 55337

  www.summersidepress.com

  Baroness

  © 2012 by Susan May Warren

  ISBN 978-1-60936-631-5

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Scripture references are from the following source: The Holy Bible, King James Version (KJV).

  All characters are fictional. Any resemblances to actual people are purely coincidental.

  Cover design by Peter Gloege/Lookout Design, Inc.

  www.Lookoutdesign.com

  Interior design by Müllerhaus Publishing Group

  www.mullerhaus.net

  Summerside Press™ is an inspirational publisher offering fresh, irresistible books to uplift the heart and engage the mind.

  Printed in USA.

  For your glory, Lord

  Acknowledgments

  I am deeply grateful for the help of so many on this story! Thank you to my writing partner Rachel Hauck, who helped me sort out every chapter with her wisdom and patience. And Susan Downs, my fabulous editor, who cheers me on and partners with me in writing these stories. Thank you to Ellen Tarver, for her amazing attention to story flow and detail, and for knowing just how to advise me without making me want to jump from a tall building. And Rachel Meisel and the rest of the Summerside/Guideposts editing team who go above and beyond to read every word, over and over, until we get it as right as we can. Finally, thank you to my family for their support and willingness to put up with cereal for supper (and every other meal), especially my daughter, Sarah, who challenged me to write a 1920s book—“Not just about flappers, Mom.” May you always know who you are, and where you belong.

  S’ENVOLE

  PARIS, FRANCE. 1923

  Chapter 1

  She no longer recognized herself in the mirror. Gone was the girl whose long black braids twisted in the prairie wind as she galloped her father’s black Arabian across the Montana prairie.

  Lilly Joy Hoyt Stewart stared at herself. She’d become a flapper—no, worse, a charity girl. Oxblood-red lips, kohl-black eyes, and rouged cheeks…she looked like she might be inviting danger.

  She’d never be Parisian, no matter how her cousin Rosie dressed her up. And, if she bobbed her hair, she just might lose herself completely.

  Maybe she simply didn’t know who she was anymore, but she knew she hated the woman she had become since leaving Montana. The woman she couldn’t seem to escape.

  How could she hope to find her place in a world where she knew she didn’t belong?

  “No, Rosie. I’m not cutting my hair.” Lilly stepped away from Rosie’s hands, her dark hair falling free from where her cousin held it, just below her ears, as if seeing herself hairless might cajole Lilly into lopping off her braid, and taking the last step toward turning herself into one of the wild Parisian girls Rosie couldn’t stop idolizing.

  Apparently Lilly had become Rosie’s pet project since arriving in Paris a month ago.

  “Paris will be too sweltering in the summer to leave your hair long, Lils. Besides, short is all the rage.”

  Lilly took a cloth and began to wipe the dark lipstick from her mouth.

  Rosie shook her head, sinking onto a gold velvet chaise, her own dark, bobbed hair shiny under the morning sunlight streaming in from the grand paladin windows of Lilly’s boudoir. Dressed in a loose silk robe, knotted at her slender waist, all Rosie needed was an ebony cigarette holder to complete the portrait of a woman of leisure. If anyone could play the role, it was Rosie Worth, daughter of the infamous Jinx Worth, the widow of slain shipping baron Foster Worth. She had a certain je ne sais quoi about her that lured the attention of men and women alike. No one did tragic, misunderstood, and coquette quite like Rosie.

  Except, few knew that Rosie was tragic and misunderstood. Since her brother disappeared in the war four years ago after her father was murdered and her mother publicly shamed, Rosie seemed to be the recipient of every morsel of scandalous reporting that appeared on Page Six of the Chronicle. No one truly understood that under that glamorous smile, Rosie was mere bits and pieces, one broken heart away from disintegrating. Except, of course, Lilly.

  Although recently, even she didn’t recognize Rosie, the way she threw herself into the bright, too-chaotic world of Paris. As if she were trying to forget the grief she’d left back in Manhattan. Maybe even recasting herself into a society girl who’d broken free of her family’s scandal.

  “I don’t understand you,” Rosie said, a pout in her tone. “We are in grand Paris! The home of Cartier and Boucheron and Maison Worth. Yesterday, during the showing of his new designs, you had your nose buried in a book. They served you canapés and champagne while the vendeuse tried to entice you, and there you sat, positively glum.”

  “I wanted to finish my novel. It’s the newest Zane Grey—To the Last Man. I purchased it just for the journey.”

  “You’ve already finished it twice, ma chérie. It’s time to take in the City of Light, to enjoy the freedom of jolie Paris.” Rosie intoned the last words with her crisp French accent, her brown eyes alight with mischief.

  Lilly refused to rise to her charms. Rosie and her coy enthusiasm had the power to coax Lilly into nearly anything—hence, her painted face, and even the shapeless new dresses that hung in her wardrobe. What she really longed for, however, was a pair of britches and her boots, her father’s old hat pulled low over her eyes as she rode Charity across their land. Sometimes she struggled to conjure up the aroma of the bitterroot flowers, the jack pines, the prairie grasses scenting the breeze. “I miss Montana.”

  Rosie’s smile vanished. “I’m so tired of hearing about Montana and your precious ranch. You haven’t been back for six years, Lilly. Your life is in New York. And Paris.”

  “I hate Paris.” Lilly applied cold crème to her towel, began work on her eyes. The chiffon curtains blew in the traffic clatter and the dusty, smoky haze of the busy Champs-Élysées, tempered only by the faintest hint of the new horse chestnut blossoms along the boulevard. The luster of la Belle Époque de Paris had vanished the moment Lilly stepped out onto the balcony of the Worth family’s Paris estate shortly after her arrival and discovered an encampment of hungry-eyed war orphans leering at her, yearning for crumbs of bread.

  The gendarmes chased them away, and Lilly had the sense of prairie dogs scattering at the sound of a .22. She could have sent down her tray of café au lait and brioche. She longed for American fare anyway—perhaps a boiled egg, or even a piece of bacon.

  The congestion of traffic outside her window—horses pulling carriages, buses belching out black exhaust, trolley cars and Citroens weaving in and out of foot traffic—reminded her too well of their view in New York City. It made her want to close her window, hide inside the safety of the brocade-papered walls, the crackle of the fire in the hearth.

  “It might help if you and Aunt Jinx didn’t insist on drilling French into my head. I cannot abide one more bonjour or au revoir. My tongue refuses the accent, and my ears curdle the moment I hear the word mademoiselle. Paris has made me mute, as well as illiterate.”

  Her eyes burned as she scrubbed. “I’d give my entire monthly allowance for an English bookstore, not to mention an English copy of the Chronicle. Must everything in this house be in French? Do you truly read the Petite Republique, and Figaro?”

  “Of course. How else do you expect me to stay informed about the theater showings?”

  “Please, Rosie. They’re no better than the gossip pages of the Chronicle.”

  There went that annoying smile again. “I will translate for you, but you really should learn at least a modicum of French,
mon petit chou. Otherwise, how will you understand the culture?”

  “If you mean to turn me into a French flapper, I don’t want to understand.”

  “Oh, Lilly. You are hardly in danger of dancing the night away with some lonely American doughboy. I’m just trying to help you fit in.”

  Fit in. Hardly. Lilly hadn’t fit in anywhere since the day her mother stole her from her legacy in Montana, fitted her in a Gibson girl shirtwaist and skirt, threw away her muddy boots, and made her sit up straight at the table. Six years in New York, and still Lilly stared out her window overlooking Central Park and saw the big sky of the West.

  It didn’t help that her mother had settled without a look over her shoulder into New York life, running the newspaper with her new husband, Oliver. And in six years, not once had her mother mentioned returning home.

  Lilly tried—really she did—not to feel betrayed.

  But it also didn’t help that her mother had packed her bags and sent her to Paris for the spring and summer with Aunt Jinx and Rosie. As if she didn’t want her around anymore.

  Just because Aunt Jinx pulled her aside and asked her to chaperone Rosie didn’t lessen the sting.

  Lilly finished wiping the kohl from her eyes and doused her face with the water in the basin on her dressing table. “I do want to understand Paris, Rosie, but here we are in the middle of history—with l’Arc de Triomphe right outside our window, and you’d rather spend the day on the Rue de la Paix looking at ostrich feathers. That is hardly French culture.”

  “It is exactly French culture. I can see Napoleon’s masterpiece and the Eiffel tower from my window—what else is there? I suppose I can arrange for us to go yachting down the Seine, but as long as Mother and Bennett continue to pursue their fruitless, six-year search for Jack, I intend to throw myself into society, to take café at the bistros, to attend the theater and opera and to—”

  “Drink Pernod and come home with the stink of cigarettes on your skin? If Aunt Jinx knew—”

  “She won’t know, and if she did, she could not stop me.”

  Lilly turned on her settee. “She could cut off your allowance.”

  “She wouldn’t dare. Not after the scandal she put our family through. We would have never recovered if it weren’t for Bennett’s handling of Father’s fortune.”

  Lilly drew in a breath, hearing the rancor in Rosie’s voice. Clearly, her cousin still had to forgive her mother the sins that cost her a father, a brother.

  “When is your mother due home?” Lilly turned, parted her hair into two sections, and began to braid. Behind her, Rosie uncoiled herself from the chair, got up, and paraded to the window, staring out on the street.

  “I don’t know. They didn’t expect to be gone more than a day or two. But they cabled from Belgium, where many of the war records are kept, and said they might be a week, or even more. I fear that yet again, mother’s hopes are for naught.” Rosie drew in a long breath, one that shuddered out at the end.

  Lilly knew that kind of breath—the kind that rattled grief through your soul.

  “Jack always wanted to go to Paris. I wonder if he managed it,” Rosie said quietly.

  Lilly got up, slipped behind her, and circled her arms around her cousin’s waist, resting her chin on Rosie’s shoulder. Outside, a crowd gathered along the street, in anticipation of the day’s procession.

  Rosie cupped her hands over Lilly’s. “I am forgetting my brother’s smile, the sound of his voice when he teased me. He used to sneak into my room at night, after returning home from his outings, tell me about his adventures. He loved to read—like you do, Lilly—and he dreamed of being a hero. I shouldn’t have been surprised that Jack left. He only needed a reason. And Mother certainly gave him one.”

  “I’m sure he’s still alive, Rosie. Out there somewhere.”

  Rosie leaned her head back against Lilly’s. “I think he may have fabricated a name so Mother wouldn’t find him, otherwise, with the war over, he would have returned home. Unless…”

  Rosie’s fear hung in the crisp breezes of the morning. Her voice fell to nearly a whisper. “I’d do just about anything to find my brother and bring him home. I’ve written to the Department of War in America, and even London, nearly as often as Mother, and…I admit I look for his face as we walk the streets of Paris.”

  Lilly held her for a moment, wishing to shoulder her longings. No wonder Rosie insisted on going out on an excursion every day. “How about instead of attending the procession today, let’s go for a stroll in Tuileries Park? Or to the Louvre? The last thing you need is a funeral.”

  For a moment, Rosie curled her hands upon Lilly’s. Held them there. Then she detached Lilly’s hands from her waist and turned. “This isn’t a funeral.” She swept her hand toward the crowds. “It’s Sarah Bernhardt’s bon voyage. We can’t miss it.”

  “I don’t know why you’re so taken with this actress.” Lilly stepped away from her, picked up a playbill of Figaro with Sarah’s picture on the cover.

  Rosie stood at the window, and Lilly considered that her cousin might just be brazen enough to step out onto the balcony in her robe. “She spoke once, in Brooklyn. I went to hear her—it was just after you arrived in New York. Sarah was mesmerizing, even then. The crowd hung on her every word. Even now that she’s gone, look how they adore her.”

  On the street below, along the funeral parade route, Parisians held wreaths, some of them pressing handkerchiefs to their mouths, their eyes.

  “Imagine, being able to capture the hearts of so many?” Rosie’s voice fell to a whisper. “To be adored so completely.”

  “She was just an actress—”

  Rosie rounded on her. “Just an actress? Sarah Bernhardt embraced life and everything in it. Did you know she lost her leg? She broke it during a performance and they had to amputate. But she never stopped acting.” Rosie walked over to the balcony, gripping the curtains. “Never stopped living until the very end.”

  “Sarah’s life was an act, a performance, Rosie. It wasn’t real.”

  Rosie threw open the curtains. “That looks real to me.”

  A noise rose from the street below. Lilly watched as Rosie stepped out, garbed, yes, only in her chemise, although she tucked it tight around her. Lilly followed her, shaking her head at the things her cousin made her do. But the attention of the crowd settled, not on the two women in the third-story balcony, but on a decorated funeral cortege. A driver in full eighteenth-century livery drove a team of black horses pulling a floral-covered float, upon which lay Sarah’s coffin, draped in yet more flowers. Walking beside it, a row of young girls held palm leaves, shading the float as it proceeded down the boulevard. As they passed, the mass of mourners closed in behind them, following them through the streets of Paris.

  The drone could only be the mourning of Bernhardt’s thousands of admirers.

  “Quickly, Lilly, let’s dress and join them.” Rosie nearly pushed her back into the room. “I’m tired of grieving Jack. I want to live life big and bold. White hot and bright. Hurry, we don’t want to be left behind.”

  “Rosie—”

  “Don’t you want an adventure, Lils? To break out of this life?”

  Yes, actually, but—

  “C’mon, let’s join the crowd. It’s time to become Parisian.”

  * * * * *

  Rosie longed for the energy, the joie de vivre of Paris to sweep her up, to carry her down the Champs-Élysées, and into a different life. She might be attending a funeral, the mood more somber as she entered the surge of the crowd, but Paris never did anything without flourish. A band played as the spectacle of Sarah Bernhardt’s grand, final procession urged onto the street all manner of observers. Sailors, dressed for leave, and displaced soldiers still lingering after the war, as if searching for something they’d lost. Frenchmen in bow ties and straw hats, matrons in pearls and furs, despite the spring air, and everywhere Rosie looked, young women in low-waisted dresses and felt cloche hats, and men in baggy sui
ts all hustled behind the carriage.

  “Lilly! Stay with me.” Rosie turned, reached her hand back for Lilly’s as she flowed into the crowd.

  Rosie had rouged her cheeks, painted on lipstick, but haste demanded she forgo her black eyeliner and the pin curls. She’d return home before shopping this afternoon or venturing out this evening for dinner at the Ritz and dancing with Blanche and hopefully Dash. She heated all the way through with the memory of his hands on her waist.

  Dashielle Parks embodied the zeal of the expatriates who had escaped New York for the onset of the spring fashion season, perhaps even the sultry Paris summer, in hopes of abandoning the rules of prohibition sweeping the country. They’d also abandoned the mores tethering them to high society, thirsty for something bold and shocking to sever them from its stiff-collared etiquette.

  Her mother would keel over in a swoon if she knew Rosie had escaped their flat to join a throng of mourners.

  Or perhaps not. Her mother, after all, had marched on Washington with the suffragettes. However, Jinx still cinched on her corset every morning, still wore her gloves and her furs, her diamonds sparkling against her broad décolletage. Still planned dinner parties and watched for suitors with a keen, matchmaking eye.

  Rosie had no doubt that one of these days her mother might tote home some unfortunate chap she expected Rosie to marry.

  Maybe Rosie would never get married. Look how marriage had turned out for Mother.

  She wouldn’t look too far ahead. Not right now. Not today. Not when she, too, thirsted.

  She gripped Lilly’s hand, pulling her cousin along behind her.

  “Rosie, you’re hurting me.”

  “Mother will simply murder me if you are lost. You know she won’t allow us in the city without each other. Please, Lilly, keep up!” She glanced behind her. Lilly glared at her, her face unpainted, those annoying freckles thick on her crinkled nose. Lilly had barely had time to braid her long hair—why her renegade cousin insisted on looking like a savage from some Zane Grey novel…it was all Rosie could do to keep the gossips from inquiring about Lilly’s heritage. So Lilly was part Crow Indian. It didn’t mean she had to embrace it and ignore the privileges of being young and wealthy in Paris.