right, that someone would come. I didn’t have enough money left for another cab.
But … the station itself seemed closed, its curtains shut, its windows dark. That by itself wasn’t too surprising; in London the streetlamps were extinguished at six and windows were papered in black to block any little leaks of light. No one wanted to guide the Germans’ nighttime bombs. Yet the train station’s windows weren’t papered. There was simply no one left inside to turn on the lights.
I did hear music playing from somewhere, lovely and haunting, muted. Perhaps the stationmaster had left on a phonograph in his office.
The platform was virtually empty. There was no one at all to my left, toward the end of the train, and only a pair of porters unloading a stack of luggage far up by the front, near the first-class compartments, threading in and out of a single pool of light cast from a lamppost nearby.
The stationmaster had aimed their way. After a few more minutes of glancing nervously around the deserted platform, I did the same.
Before I’d gotten far, a new cluster of people approached the growing wall of trunks. There were four of them plus the stationmaster, their hats and shoulders stroked with gold from above. One of the newcomers was a man of about forty in a long taupe coat. The other three were younger people more my age, two boys and a girl.
Or not quite my age, I amended to myself, as the nearest of the boys noticed my approach. They were all taller, probably a few years older. And much, much better dressed than I.
The boy who’d seen me had sandy hair and heavy-lidded hazel eyes; they looked me up and down without interest before he turned his attention back to his companions.
“… to Idylling,” the second boy was saying to the long-coated man. “Is it really just you, George? I mean, look at all this. Chloe alone brought enough trunks to fill three autos.”
“Armand!” protested the girl, with a sort of trilling little laugh. “Honestly!”
“Not to mention Laurence’s and mine,” the boy went on, speaking over her. “No, there’s no hope for it. There’s not room for all of us. We’ll have to motor there without you.”
“My lord, I don’t believe His Grace will—”
“Right, well, what Reginald doesn’t know won’t hurt the rest of us, will it, old chap? I’ll send Thomas back for you with the auto as soon as I can. You can wait here with the baggage.”
“Sir,” broke in the stationmaster from behind them, just outside their ring of light. The other four angled as one to see him, still brushed in buttery gold. The stationmaster rocked back on his heels. “We closed for the night five minutes past, sir.”
“Ah,” said the second boy. He had longish chestnut hair that touched the top of his starched collar; much of his face was obscured by the brim of his hat, but I saw him tug at his lower lip in thought. Even to me, it looked utterly contrived. “I see. Perhaps, though, you might make an exception tonight? For the duke?”
“The duke, sir?”
“Well, the duke’s son,” said the hazel-eyed boy, sounding impatient. “Lord Armand, of course.”
“Station closes at ten sharp,” said the stationmaster. “Rules, sir.”
“Now, really,” began the boy named Laurence, and in his clipped voice he was speaking very quickly, but curiously enough I no longer heard what he was saying, because just then the other one—the Duke of Idylling’s son himself, I supposed—had caught sight of me hanging back in the shadows.
He had been reaching into his inner coat pocket for something. I saw dimly and without surprise that it was a wallet, and while still holding it he pushed up his hat, staring at me intently. His skin was pale as ivory, his eyes were blue and heavily lashed, quite as striking as a girl’s.
The line of his lips began to flatten into an expression that might have been pain or irritation or perhaps pure distaste.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
Laurence and the stationmaster, who had been working themselves into an actual argument, fell silent. The trilling girl leaned past the duke’s son to get a better look at me, the lace wrap around her neck and shoulders prickled with light. She was as stunning as I’d expected, dark hair, dark eyes, a rosebud mouth puffed into a pout. An overripe scent of jasmine and sugar surrounded her like a cloud.