Most of us have to try a little bit to get noticed, you know.”
“Well, to me you are the most beautiful girl on the Princess of the Pacific.”
“I am grateful you think so, but I don’t have time for your flattery—my hair is a disaster, and we are running out of time.”
“But cocktails aren’t for another hour, silly. It’s only four. We have plenty of time.”
Vida gasped in anguish. “Is it that late?” And though she knew that widows, and gullible children, and the sweet-hearted and capable, and all those who do good in the world rather than seeking after their own pleasures, deserve the patience of everybody else, she couldn’t help but feel a little irritated at Nora, whose hair went up quite easily into a bright, hazy pouf, for not understanding what a trial it was to have hair that waved and frizzed and could not at all be trusted with a change in the weather.
“Here,” said Nora. She poured a glass of champagne for Vida and assumed the place behind her at the vanity to see what needed to be done. The area was already overpopulated by divers hair tonics and perfumes, lash blackeners, lip tints, rouges, jewel boxes and hairpins, arrayed over a detailed map of all the levels and rooms, public and private, of the Princess, as well as an embossed card listing the evening entertainments for the first-class passengers.
“Lord, Nora, please don’t let me drink alone,” Vida said, and before Nora could begin her work, she had poured her maid a glass, and clinked it with her own.
“What are you up to, I wonder,” Nora mused, as she pinned and looped Vida’s hair—of a middling brown color, nothing special, and prone to unruliness without the taking of extreme civilizing measures—into a high, romantic pile.
“Oh, you’ll see,” Vida replied, and handed Nora the golden, pearl-dotted strand to pin into her coiffure.
Nora smiled vaguely and let it be. Then her skillful fingers went to work on the final touches.
There, Vida thought with satisfaction as she gazed at the girl in the vanity mirror—her eyes were bright, and the high line of her cheekbones were accented with shimmering powder so no one would notice her lack of a chin, or the wideness of her nose, or her total lack of a bust. It didn’t matter if she wasn’t the most beautiful—she had done it again, with a little makeup and some sparkly things, and the ray of confidence that shone through her when it was a big, important night, with crowds and parties and people to impress. Miss Vida Hazzard, the most remarkable girl onboard the Princess, beamed back at her. Then she remembered Nora, and took her hand. “I’m glad you came with me,” she whispered. She knew that Nora had wanted her to stay in San Francisco and marry Whit, for she had been pining after one of the footmen employed by his family. Vida knew this, but disapproved. The footman was almost thirty, and never smiled. He was not in the least good enough for her Nora.
“Well, now, how else would I see the world if you did not drag me along with you?” Nora asked with a little shimmer of melancholy in her eyes.
“Maybe you were meant to come on this journey,” Vida gushed. “Maybe you will meet your true love tonight!”
“Oh, come now.” Nora smoothed her hands over her skirt. “Do you need anything? What can I do?”
Nora’s nervous palaver was cut short by a rapping of knuckles on the door, and the sight of Vida’s father’s big head inclining inward from the hall. A little panic sped Vida’s pulse. She had a plan, and the plan was quite time-specific, and his interruption might scuttle the whole business. But, luckily, he was wearing exactly what he’d worn when he arrived on the pier. She saw an opportunity.
“Oh Papa, you aren’t dressed for an evening at all!”
“I thought this was some sort of adventure,” he replied good-naturedly. “And you mean to tell me that I have to be as dandified as ever?”
“Daddy,” she said in the exaggerated and girlish tone that he could never refuse, “have you read the first-class passenger list? It’s all kinds of fancy gentlemen and ladies who travel everywhere, from castle to villa to first-class cabin on their way to safari or grand tour or what have you; they are always on the move and always dressed correctly, and they don’t know who you are, or that they ought