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my nostrils. All my packing was done. I left nothing to the
last minute.
    “What will you do?”
    “Once I get home?” I plucked a flake of
tobacco from my tongue and looked around. “Ashtray?”
    She laughed again. “In the top drawer.
That’s where Bart keeps it. There isn’t much room for anything, as
I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
    Sure enough, a battered metal ashtray,
souvenir of some seaside resort, was in the drawer, beside plain
white undershirts and underpants. The ashtray was spotlessly clean,
and I wondered briefly whose doing that was. According to Folana,
not the housekeeper’s.
    I took it out and crushed the cigarette in
it, and handed it to…to my friend. For while what we’d shared was
precious, I knew it would never go any further than this.
    “Are you not going to answer me now,
Portia?” She tapped the ash into the ashtray and brought the
cigarette back to her lips.
    I sat on the edge of the bed, gave her a
slight grin, and began to roll on my stockings. “Once I get home,
no doubt I will eventually find someone suitable to marry.”
    “Suitable to whom?”
    My family? My country? Me? I shrugged. There
was that legend passed down through generations of Sebrings, of the
men and women of my line loving once and only once. I’d enjoyed
hearing those lovely fairy tales when I was a girl, but I was a
woman now, and I knew that lovely fairy tales were all they
were.
    For a brief moment I thought of Tidewater,
the prestigious all-girl preparatory school the women in my
mother’s family attended, and the young man I’d dated my last year
there. Jason was good looking and smart, his touch was gentle, and
his breath was sweet when we kissed. We were considering becoming
engaged to be engaged after I graduated Tidewater—Father would
never permit me to marry any sooner than after I’d earned my
degree—until he was awarded a Rhodes scholarship. He promised to
write, and at first he did, but then his letters became fewer and
fewer until the last, informing me he’d met someone new.
    I’d considered the possibility that he might
be the one, but on reading that last letter, all I’d felt was the
mildest of regrets, and when Tau Zeta Epsilon invited me to tea my second semester at Wellesley, I did so heart
whole.
    Cressida St. James turned out to be a lovely
young woman—I met her and Jason at a ball a few weeks after I’d
arrived in London—and I bore neither of them any ill will.
    Folana blew out a stream of smoke. “Will you
tell him about us?”
    “Perhaps.” I made sure the seams of my
stockings were straight. “Men seem to be aroused by the idea of two
women together. Oh, I won’t mention you by name, never fear.”
    “I don’t fear, oddly enough. I have to thank
you for that.” She reached for the sky-blue tap pants and pulled
them on over her long legs. I watched, wishing there was time to
strip them off and take her back to bed. “I think Sebrings are very
good at keeping secrets.”
    I shrugged again and slid my arms into the
sleeves of my sweater, and tugged it down over my head.
    “You hair’s gotten untidy. Let me plait it
for you.” Folana took a brush from her bag and set to work on my
hair. Once it was smooth and untangled, she separated it into three
lengths.
    “You do that very well.” I closed my eyes,
relishing the feel of her fingers in my hair.
    “I learned how when I was a goat-herd.” She
left it at that, and I didn’t pursue it.
    I heard the door to the flat open, and
someone entered, whistling a jaunty tune. There was a pause, and
then a male voice sang out, “Oi, you lot decent in there?”
    “Yes, Bart. Sounds like he got lucky.” She
didn’t seem at all jealous.
    “Damn. Want me to fry you and your friend a
chop, Duchess?”
    “ No !” Folana turned to me, merriment
in her eyes. “Bart could burn water!” She grew serious. “He and I
are leaving tonight.”
    “Back to Tangier?”
    “Yes.”
    Tangier, not Crete, where she was reputed