Tom Bradby - The Master Of Rain

Penelope paused by a Chinese waiter in a white linen jacket holding a silver tray. She took one of the champagne glasses and drank its contents in one swift movement before placing it back in the same position, all the time keeping a firm grip on Field’s hand.

Then they were on the dance floor, and some-though not all-of the people around them were doing the Charleston. As he watched Penelope step back and begin to dance, he thought of the letter he had read in the North China Daily News at lunchtime exhorting Shanghai’s socialites to give up “this ridiculous dance that has young things who should know better flapping and kicking in a manner that shows no consideration for fellow dancers.”

Field did not know how to do the Charleston. It was not as simple as it looked and Penelope was laughing at him.

“Come on,” she said, leaning forward and putting a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve got to put your heart into it.”

She moved her arms and her legs and he tried to follow, slowly understanding its jerky ritual, before being bumped from behind by a corpulent man with slicked-back hair.

Penelope moved closer. “You’re getting the hang of it brilliantly.”

Ten yards away, Charles Lewis was looking at him and smiling. He was dancing with a Chinese girl not much more than half his size. She reminded Field of the prostitute he had almost slept with the other night and he could hear again the screams from the other end of the corridor.

The rich, he thought, could get away with anything here.

Field wanted to stop now. “I need a drink,” he said, smiling thinly and wiping the sweat from his forehead. He turned his back on Lewis.

“In a minute.”

Penelope danced more manically than ever, shutting her eyes, as if wishing to lose herself in the music and the movement of her own body. Her bangs swung across her forehead, like a pendulum, and her lips were pursed, as if offering a kiss. Her dress, like the one she’d worn last night, was loose, and with each movement, her small breasts thrust against the silk. Field found it hard to take his eyes off her and he wanted to stop dancing.

“All right,” she said, laughing. “All right.” She took his hand. Field felt uncomfortable again at the intimacy of this gesture and tried to free himself, but she would not let go, leading him to the big doors along the side of the room and out onto the balcony. “You know,” she said as they reached the rail and looked down over the track, “you’re too young and handsome to be a stick in the mud.”

“I don’t intend to be.”

“You could dance if you tried. You’re athletic enough.”

Field did not know how to respond.

Penelope clicked her fingers and a waiter he’d not seen appeared from the corner behind the door. Despite the throng inside, they were alone out here, save for a few small groups at the far end of the balcony, the racetrack illuminated like a frontier post beneath them.

Penelope took two glasses and filled them both with ice from the silver bucket on the edge of the tray. “Do you drink whiskey?” she asked, handing him one.

“Not often.”

“Do you have any vices?”

“A few.”

“Hold on,” she instructed the waiter before he could move away. “Your health, Mr. Field.” She upended her glass and, as she had with the champagne, drank it in one go. He hesitated for a moment and then, before she could reprimand him, followed suit. “That’s better,” she said.

Penelope replaced the glasses on the tray and took two more.

“How long does this go on?”

She shrugged. “As long as we feel like.”

“We?”

Her glass dropped a fraction. “You don’t like me, do you, Richard?”

“You’ve both been charming to me-more than I could have expected.”

“Why more than you could have expected?”

“I’m sure you know the answer to that.”

“Oh, all that stuff about your mother marrying beneath herself… it doesn’t mean a thing.”

“It matters at home.”

“Not to me it doesn’t.” She lifted her glass and again drained its contents.

He followed suit again. “Geoffrey said I should persuade you not to drink too much.”

“So you’re my keeper?”

“No, of course-”

“There could be worse keepers.”

He flushed. She took his glass, summoned the waiter back, and took two more. “So what are your vices, Richard?”

Field hadn’t eaten tonight and he was starting to feel the effects of the alcohol again. He sighed. “My vices?”

“You don’t have any.”

“I have vices.”

“So what are they?”

“Self-doubt. Is that a vice?”

“No. In moderation, it’s a virtue.”

“Well-”

“Hold on.” She raised her glass.

“You know-”

“No. You’ve got to keep me company, that’s your job.”

He frowned. “My job?”

“You’re my keeper.”

“Penelope…”

“Drink.” She tossed back another and Field did the same, shaking his head afterward. It was burning his stomach now. She gave the glasses back to the waiter and took two more.

“That’s enough.”

“Now, Dickie, you mustn’t-”

“I’ll-”

“No you won’t.”

“Just give me a few minutes. Can we slow down at least?”

She smiled, her face softening. “All right, Mr. Field. Let’s start with the traditional sins. Greed?”

He shrugged. “Would I like to be rich, never to have to worry, to afford…” He gestured with his hand at the men and women inside the ballroom. “If that is greed, then yes.”

“Envy?”

He hesitated. “Envy, yes. Sometimes, yes.”

“Sloth?”

“No.”

“Avarice?”

“I think I answered that with greed.”

She took a sip of her whiskey and looked at him, a hint of amusement at the corners of her mouth. “Lust?” she asked quietly.

Field didn’t answer, but she drained her glass and exhorted him to follow with her hand. “One more,” she said when he hesitated. He drank.

“I’ve never met a woman who drank whiskey.”

“How sheltered your life has been.”

“In some ways.”

“In what ways has it not been sheltered?”

Field smiled. “What about you?” he asked.

“Have I been sheltered?”

He shook his head. “Which of the sins do you fall prey to?”

“All of them, probably. Most people seem to think I’m wicked.”

“Greed?”

She sighed. “For happiness, yes.”

“That doesn’t count as greed.”

“Some people think it does.”

“Penelope…” A man stood at her shoulder. He wore thick glasses and had wavy hair and a neatly trimmed beard, both shot through with gray.

“Stirling,” she said, her voice starting to sound slurred. “Stirling Blackman, may I introduce Dickie Field, my… cousin, or…”

“Nephew,” Field corrected.

Blackman offered his hand and they shook. “Richard,” Field said.

“Stirling.”

“You two should talk. Stirling is a reporter for the New York Times. We were talking about you, Stirling, only last night, or was it the night before? I can’t remember.”

“Not taking my name in vain, I hope.”

“Oh, Geoffrey was, but you know how hard he finds it when people won’t see the big picture. Dickie is in the Special Branch.”

Blackman tilted his head to one side. “Always interested to-”

“You should talk, but not now. I need to go home. Come on, Dickie.”

“I’m not sure…”

“Please. Be a gentleman.”

Field nodded at the reporter and followed Penelope. “Perhaps we could have lunch,” Blackman said.

Field wanted to tell the reporter to back off, but Penelope had already gone through the doors into the ballroom and was weaving her way through the crowd inside.