Free The Body in the Boudoir by Katherine Hall Page Page A

pool, stables, croquet green, and acres of landscaped gardens. The house was one of the reasons she’d married Sky, and as soon as they returned from their honeymoon in France, she’d claimed this bedroom as her own retreat and started dialing decorators. The result was a place where Madame de Pompadour would have been at home, especially as much of the furniture was authentic Louis XV, or so the antiques dealers had sworn. Swathed in ruby-hued Scalamandré silks, the boudoir could easily have found a home as a period room in any museum. Tammy’s closets were another matter—twentieth century, from the fitted rows for her designer shoes to the custom racks for her couture clothes.
    Her bath was a sybaritic mix of old, as in the Baths of Caracalla, and new, as in a shower with built-in tanning panels. A door opened at the other end into Sky’s equally opulent suite, Prussian blue dominating the walls and draperies, baroque rather than rococo. Tammy smiled to herself thinking of the chilled bottle of Möet in her marble sunken tub’s Swarovski crystal champagne holder, which awaited her husband’s arrival along with the Rigaud Cypres votive candles—the same kind Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy had taken with her to the White House. Tammy loved all these manufacturers’ names, although calling them manufacturers sounded like they were churning out tires or something. When she looked at her possessions, she liked to say to herself, “There’s one of my Judith Lieber minaudières,” although she limited it to “one of my Judith Liebers” when she said it out loud, not altogether sure of her French or whatever language “minaudière” was.
    It was quite dark out now. Time to put on her face.
    She pulled her dressing gown’s marabou trim down, exposing the cleavage that had irresistibly drawn Sky’s eye years ago at a formal dinner each was attending in Louisville during the derby. It still drew his eye, but she gave the neckline an extra tug. It never hurt to direct a man’s attention to what you wanted him to see—and away from what you didn’t.
    The deep amethyst gown was long and she had similar ones, some even more be-feathered, in every color of the rainbow, with satin mules to match. She lined her lips carefully and reached for more mascara, waterproof mascara. With plenty of bubbles and the soft candlelight, it was possible to slip into the bath without revealing the depredations of age. Not that she was old.
    A soft knock and the door to the hall opened. She turned, expecting to see her husband. Her cosmetic smile turned into a single red slash. It was Mrs. Danforth, the housekeeper, who had been with Sky since Hector was a pup. The one immutable presence in her husband’s life was walking purposefully into the room. Tammy had made a joke about whether the housekeeper would be coming with them on the honeymoon and another about the nuptial bed not being for three before she learned to keep her mouth shut on the topic. Sky’s devotion to Mrs. Danforth, and vice versa, was not a laughing matter.
    â€œMaster Schuyler called to say he has been detained and will arrive within the hour.”
    Tammy knew for a fact that the woman had been born and raised in Hoboken, New Jersey, but to hear Danny, as Sky called her—and only he was allowed—you’d have thought the Danforths had been in service to Queen Victoria herself. The new Mrs. Wayfort’s initial attempts at friendship had been firmly rebuffed, and as she was wont to say, “You don’t have to tell me twice.” The two women didn’t have a truce; they didn’t have anything.
    Tammy had grown up with plenty of help and had even more later on as an adult. She’d never encountered anyone like Mrs. Danforth. (And whatever had happened to Mr. Danforth? Or was the “Mrs.” an assumed convention? Tammy had watched Masterpiece Theater . Once,