Free The Formula for Murder by Carol McCleary Page A

leaning toward the pillar to hide. The couture is formal, men are in white tie, the women in evening gowns, some sleeveless with long gloves, most with feathered hats and almost every woman has either a pearl necklace, dazzling diamonds—or both.
    Not many months ago I completed a seventy-two-day trip around the world with only one change of clothes that I carried in a small valise, yet managed to attend shipboard dinner parties without shame. I came to London with the same valise and the same one change of clothes and the same lack of embarrassment. I work hard and travel fast and light and refuse to load myself down with trunks in order to look fashionable.
    If the other women in the world believe they are seeing an ugly duckling crossing the room, they are probably right, but I’d like to tell each of them that I earn my own duck food.
    I hear a stir and murmuring among the diners and look toward the door.
    There he is, in all his glory, pausing as he enters. I shake my head and sigh. Incognito?
    Oscar is wearing a green velvet suit with wide lapels, a white silk shirt with a Lord Byron collar, and an oversized red tie that is loosely tied and as wide as a scarf. His cape is purple and reaches nearly down to the heels of his brilliantly polished black patent leather shoes. His hat is black and would have gone nicely on the head of one of the Three Musketeers.
    Besides the clothing that would have raised eyebrows at a showing of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , much less at a posh restaurant-hotel in the heart of London’s West End, everything about Oscar is big—six-foot-three, soft and flabby with a low mezzo voice that people concentrated to hear yet reaches across a room. His mind is big, too, encyclopedic; his tongue a guillotine that cuts through hypocrisy and affronts with a razor-edged blade.
    He excitedly waves his hand as he weaves around a sea of tables, coming toward me with as much subtlety as Sherman’s march on Atlanta—no, make that Moses crossing the Red Sea: Oscar is carrying a white pooch dressed much the same way he is.

     
    O SCAR W ILDE
     

 
     
    I think that God in creating Man somewhat overestimated his ability.
—O SCAR W ILDE

 
     
    15
     
    “Nellie!”
    The pooch barks. It’s a small white poodle wearing a duplicate hat and a purple cape that matches Oscar’s. If Oscar’s flamboyant entrance had not already captured every eye in the room, the barking of the provocatively dressed dog for sure brought stares from everyone.
    I should have known that it’s simply not in Oscar’s makeup to isolate himself from the world. Lost on a desert island, he’d recruit the monkeys and the fish as a social circle.
    There is no “rose” big enough for him to hide himself or his secrets under. Obviously, everyone’s eyes are upon him, which is understandable since this man is like no other on the entire planet. Oscar Wilde is one of a kind—and God broke the mold after He created the man.
    And I wouldn’t change a hair on his head.
    I get up to hug him. “Oh, Oscar! I’ve missed you!”
    He gives me this huge smile and then immediately puts his hands to his mouth to cover his bad teeth as he giggles, “I’ve so missed you, too, Nellie-girl.”
    As we hug one more time before sitting down, the doggie he’s carrying gets squished between us, again.
    “Oh, you poor thing … what’s your name?” As I pet the little fellow, he paws me and licks my fingers. “Oscar, he isn’t wearing purple nail polish?”
    “Of course! It must match his cape. Nellie, meet Lord Dudley.”
    “Lord Dudley … okay, I suppose that fits.”
    “Isn’t this place magnificent? Look at all its beauty!” Oscar surveys the place as if he’s admiring his kingdom. He’s always been attracted to beauty. “This place is a tour de force. There is no other like it in the world.”
    “I know. It’s the first to have hydraulically powered lifts, air-conditioning, and its own steam-pumped artesian well.