Chapter 10: Still on the Microphone

The Debutante Presentation filled the Municipal Auditorium with three hundred people and the smell of gardenias.

The stage had been built into a white staircase, with a gold throne at the top for the Queen and a podium of white roses at the side.

The Queen's table stood below it on the floor, set for twelve, with a spotlight on each place card.

Mine said Keeper of the Baby, in gilt, and it was set at the Queen's right hand.

Somebody had decided it was better to seat me properly than to be talked about.

The oldest queen sat on my other side.

"I have brought my own escort," she said, and held out her arm to the man standing behind her chair.

Gaspard, in a black tuxedo that made him look dangerous, took it.

"No plus-one for the help," I said under my breath.

"He is not your plus-one," said the oldest queen, loudly enough for the whole table.

"He is my driver's replacement."

"My driver has a cold."

"I'm told he's very good with a car."

At the far end of the table Hortense put down her fork.

Next to her, Auguste's sister was adjusting a headset microphone with a little pinch of annoyance.

She was thirty-six and handsome in a hard way, with Hortense's cheekbones and none of her patience, and she had not looked at me once.

She chaired the Presentation every year, and she was proud of it.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she said, stepping to the podium. "Friends of the Krewe of Thalassa. Welcome."

Applause.

The orchestra swelled.

The debutantes came out two by two in white, each on the arm of a father, and curtsied to the Queen on the throne.

They bent so low that the silk of their trains pooled around their knees like cream.

It was a lovely thing to see, and I had made the pleats on half those gowns.

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