Gilded Age Page 10

  “Are you registering for the wedding?” I asked.

  “I’m trying,” Viola said with a wan smile. “I’m having a hard time getting into the spirit of it. P. G. and I are such practical people. I don’t know when we’d ever use half this stuff.”

  Thinking of all the brides who’d be thrilled to be in Viola’s place—immense wedding and the lavish present fallout from it—I said, “This is your chance. People want to give you things. Think of family Thanksgivings and Christmases, stuff to pass down to a daughter.”

  “Yes,” she said distractedly. An avalanche of family china and silver probably overflowed Jefferson Gryce’s house; as a widower he’d give P. G. and Viola everything they’d need to entertain twenty-four generously. But to my surprise Viola said, “I think today was a particularly bad day for me to do this. I’ve just come from a Dress for Success board meeting, and they’re having a hard time meeting this year’s fund-raising goals. They might have to actually close it down. Can you believe it? They do such good work. The stories you hear from the women they help …”

  “I have some suits from my accounting days,” I said. “I can bring them by.”

  She smiled sweetly. “That would be nice, and they’d appreciate it, but what they really need is money. There’s so much more to it than outfitting—there’s training and résumé writing and interviewing skills, general operating costs, and the economy’s so bad right now …”

  To my utter shock, Ellie said, “I’ll help.” She took a slim lizard wallet out of her skirt pocket and started writing a check right there. I didn’t see the amount but noticed a generous number of zeros.

  Viola turned to me while Ellie was writing.

  “And Cinco Van Alstyne’s wife is helping too.” She smiled. “Corrine. Do you know her?” I felt a pang then. Perhaps Cinco’s wife wasn’t a complete social idiot. Cleveland smiled on anyone who helped Viola.

  “Not well,” I said. Corrine was her name; I’d forgotten.

  Viola had been there in Ellicottville when we’d all heard the story about the Van Alstyne dinner party. It didn’t surprise me she had roped in Cinco’s wife. The story had probably jogged her memory. Viola could round up help from anyone, and she wasn’t squeamish about pressure. I wondered how long it’d be before P. G. and the entire Gryce family were opening their wallets. It made me smile to think of it. In this one area, as far as changing a man, Viola might have had even Ellie beat.

  Ellie gave Viola the check, and after Viola quickly glanced at the amount, she tried to keep the surprise out of her voice. “Ellie, this is so nice of you! You must come to the next board meeting and let us thank you. Or, I know, you should come … Well, you should come meet some of the women.” Viola continued to gush. “Not to push my luck because you’ve just been so generous, but I know they would love to meet you. A lot of them aspire to the fashion world. And of course you’re so glamorous. It’d be a thrill for them, an inspiration.”

  Ellie blushed. I couldn’t help but think that Viola’s response was all the most ardent moralist would have wanted. Ellie promised to come meet some of the women, and we left the store.

  “That was nice of you,” I said as we drove back to my car.

  “I’m a sucker for a cause like that. Helping people get back on their feet.” She looked at me quickly sideways. “And doing it all through clothes—what could be closer to my heart?”

  I smiled and she continued.

  “But for the grace of God that might be me,” she said. “Putting on someone’s old suit and trying to type a million words a minute. I know how it feels to be in that spot. Everyone needs someone to take care of them.”

  I nodded, but such retro musings out of Ellie surprised me. We pulled up next to my car.

  “Not buying that jewel and giving Viola some money—it actually made me feel for a moment that things were going to be okay, you know.” She leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. “Tell your lovely husband I said hi.”

  I got out of the car and watched her drive off toward the Terminal Tower, which proudly rose at the end of the street like a Gotham lighthouse. It was then I realized she was driving in the opposite direction from her job.

  • 11 •

  The Ritz

  Ellie was driving downtown to meet Randall Leforte for a drink. He’d asked her to meet him at three o’clock. An absurd time, but she figured it ensured she’d see no one she knew. She walked into the empty bar at the Ritz, sat on the leather stool, and ordered a glass of champagne. If she were going to have a rendezvous with Randy Leforte, she might as well go all the way and order the champagne. They’d had a few dinners, attended that benefit where he’d been obsessed with getting their picture taken. She was initially repulsed by his slick appearance: she was pretty sure he went to one of those spray-on tan places, he’d had his teeth whitened, his watch flashed with diamonds, and he wore too much gel in his dark curly hair. Despite this, after a few lunches she’d decided he was sexy. He was tall, and under his sharply cut suits she detected evidence of daily workouts. By now she saw his grooming as a desire to please that might translate nicely in bed, or a healthy dose of vanity, which hinted he’d be concerned with his performance. Really he was quite handsome, and a fling with a tall, dark, handsome lawyer with a Maserati might be just what she needed. Perhaps Steven was right. Perhaps this was the woman she would be now, taking pleasure where she found it, yet independent and on her own. Men did this sort of thing all the time—slept with unsuitable women.

  He walked in wearing a ridiculous suit—navy blue with a heavy chalk stripe, and tight, in a Cleveland tailor’s parody of a Savile Row. But it made his broad shoulders look larger and his waist narrower. His white teeth almost glowed in the dim bar, and he kissed her on the cheek, sat down, and ordered a Macallan rocks.

  “No clothes from the attic this time, or was this Granny’s?” he asked, nodding at her fur.

  “New, actually. I’ve come into a bit of money.”

  He smiled.

  “You’re in a good mood,” she said.

  “I’m always in a good mood when I see you.” His BlackBerry vibrated, and he glanced at it, then set it aside. “I have a little question to ask you.”

  Leforte slid a hundred-dollar bill on the bar without acknowledging the bartender. “Look, I’m not good at this. But I like you.” And here he swung on the bar stool to face her. “A lot.” He drank his scotch down. “I didn’t think I’d be nervous, but you make me nervous, you know? You’re about the only one who ever has.” His BlackBerry vibrated again, and he checked it with a shaking hand, then set it back on the bar.

  Ellie didn’t mind the interruptions. Leforte’s career intrigued her; it was true. She remembered as a girl telling her mother that one day she’d make her own money.

  “That’s right, dear,” her mother said distractedly, putting her tennis racket away in the front closet and heading toward the kitchen to make lunch.

  “Maybe I’ll be a lawyer.”

  Her mother washed her hands at the kitchen sink and then leveled her gaze at Ellie. “With your face, I think it’d be easier to get one man to take care of you than to get a courtroom full of men to think you’re smart.”

  She’d felt slapped and embarrassed.

  When Ellie didn’t say anything, her mother continued. “Maybe you’ll marry a lawyer.”

  But her mother’s comments made Ellie feel oddly powerful too. Her face was pretty enough to get someone to take care of her? And looking back, she supposed that was where it all started.

  “I’ve been bored as hell in Cleveland for a while,” Leforte was saying. “It’s a hick town when you get right down to it. Everyone here is so provincial. Old Cleveland is a stuffy, prehistoric group of geriatrics.”

  Ellie thought this herself sometimes, but it jarred hearing it from him.

  “Anyway, I was bored until I saw you at the orchestra that night. I thought, There is a woman with real class.”

  Ellie winced at the word,
though Leforte didn’t notice.

  “And these past few weeks, I just know that you’re the type of woman I could be with, that I want to be with.”

  Alarm bells started sounding in Ellie’s ears. This was not the sort of talk she expected from her afternoon tryst.

  “And because I’ve never done this and never thought I would do this, I’m going to be really bad at it. I have to just get what I’m thinking out on the table.”

  He leaned forward then, took her face in his hands, and kissed her. It was a fine kiss; technically it was quite accomplished. There was nothing wrong with it. The scotch after-burn covered a faint taste of stale coffee in his mouth. But Ellie felt nothing in her stomach; it didn’t flip. When he was finished he said, “I want to marry you.”

  “What?!” Ellie gasped.

  “Look, just listen to me. I suspected this might take a little convincing. You are the type of woman I want, and I’m sick of being a big fish in a small pond. I’m ready to go to New York.”

  Ellie furrowed her brow.

  “Don’t you miss it? You can’t tell me you don’t miss it. I have more money than I know what to do with. Something tells me you’d know what to do with it in New York.” He leaned in and kissed her again. “Don’t you want to go back and show them all?”

  Ellie was stunned. She sipped her champagne. She’d been expecting a proposition and ended up with a proposal.

  Leforte smiled at her and leaned in close. “I reserved a room upstairs. I’m all checked in. Come up with me. Let me convince you how right we are for one another.”

  She remembered someone telling her that his nickname was the Persuader. It was, quite literally, his job. Some lawyers advised, some mediated, some resolved, but Leforte’s specialty was big-time litigation when the case was certain for trial. It was then you called the Persuader. She’d thought it implied a slippery finesse, but now she realized it referenced the surprise of a blunt instrument, a sledgehammer of directness, and a complete lack of pretense. No wonder he did so well.

  Her head was reeling. “You’ve kind of caught me off guard here,” she said. “You’re going to have to give me a minute.”

  Leforte leaned back and glanced quickly at his BlackBerry. Ellie got up and straightened her skirt. “Be right back.”

  In the bathroom she dabbed water on her temples, swilled a little Ritz mouthwash and spat it out. A handsome, rich lawyer was offering to marry her, take her back to New York, and let her spend his money situating them in society. If possible it was an even less romantic proposal than that from her first husband, who’d been drunk and panic-sweating.

  Yet there was something about Leforte. He was ambitious and hungry for the limelight, and when she thought about it, those things actually appealed to her. He knew what he wanted out of life; he had passion, and he wasn’t afraid to go balls-out to get what he wanted.

  But she didn’t love him, and she’d been down that aisle with her first husband. She’d learned that she wanted love, the at-first-sight, toe-curling, can’t-live-without-him—or something closely approximating it—love if she was going to marry again. She wanted that and the money, because Ellie didn’t think she could live in a hovel on toe curls alone.

  She actually did want to go upstairs with Leforte. She hadn’t gotten laid in months, and she was curious about what he’d be like in bed. She’d been looking forward to a blissful afternoon, but it came with strings. How did men do this? How did they sleep with someone who had expectations and then blow them off? Could she do it too?

  She sat down next to him again at the bar. He’d had her drink topped off.

  “Take your glass,” he said into her ear. “And come upstairs with me.”

  She kissed him this time—a long kiss, a searching kiss. She was glad they were the only ones in the bar. And as they parted she smelled his overpowering cologne and detected just a whiff of a stale corn chip smell—the smell of self-tanning lotion.

  As she resettled on her seat, out of the corner of her eye she saw two gray-haired women enter the end of the lobby used for afternoon tea. Sparkles flashed in Ellie’s eye as she recognized Betsy Dorset and her diamonds from across the room. Betsy smiled a minute in recognition and sat down with her back to Ellie. Betsy Dorset was no gossip. Ellie could be pretty sure she hadn’t seen the kiss and wouldn’t run around town telling people she’d seen Ellie Hart and Randy Leforte having drinks. I mean, frankly, no one would care. But if Ellie took her champagne and got in an elevator going upstairs with Randy Leforte? Well, even Betsy Dorset would talk about that.

  “I can’t today,” Ellie said to Leforte.

  “Come on,” he said, leaning in close and running his hand down her arm. “I’m dying for it.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You knew why I asked you down here in the middle of the day. What did you expect?” he said, testy.

  “I didn’t expect a marriage proposal.”

  “Don’t be so serious. We’d be great together. And if we’re not …” He shrugged.

  “Let me think,” Ellie said.

  “You can’t think properly unless I take you upstairs. You won’t have all the information.” He had a wicked gleam in his eye that would have appealed to her a minute ago, but now the lasciviousness looked more like acquisitiveness, and he suddenly became less attractive.

  “I can imagine,” she said, getting up. “Let me mull.” She kissed his cheek and went to leave.

  “Okay,” he said, grabbing her hand and pulling her toward him. “But don’t make me wait too long.”

  • 12 •

  The Dinner Party

  A few weeks after my lunch with Ellie, I was invited to a dinner party at Julia Trenor’s massive 1920s faux-Tudor pile in town.

  It was the same night as Jim’s and my wedding anniversary. We’d agreed to go to Julia’s dinner and tell no one. Since moving back, I’d thought it best to accept all invitations as we established ourselves—especially Julia’s invitations. I didn’t want to miss out on anything.

  We’d celebrate together the next night at home with a cozy dinner and going to bed together early, I hoped.

  I was upstairs, trying yet again to find something to wear that fit me, when I heard Jim come through the back door.

  “Lovely wife,” he called from the kitchen. “Come down here. I’ve got a surprise for you, darlin’.”

  Now, I love surprises; I always have. But Jim was an awful gift giver. He knew it too, I think, which is why he’d taken me shopping for an engagement ring and let me pick out exactly what I wanted after he proposed.

  We’d agreed no gifts for our anniversary this year as the baby and the ensuing expenses were coming. But I’d figured it’d be okay if I made him a silly little box that I’d filled with folded notes, each one describing something I loved about him—from the valleys on either side of his hips, to the way he held doors for me, to the way he calmed me, to his agreeing to come live in Cleveland. I planned to give it to him tomorrow night—preferably while naked in bed.

  Despite Jim’s gifting track record, I cinched a robe around my ballooning waist and skipped down the stairs as gracefully as I could, hoping for a lovely present.

  In the kitchen Jim stood with a shiny red mountain bike with a huge green bow on it.

  I raised my eyebrows, shocked and unable to think of anything to say.

  “Happy four-year anniversary, shug,” he said.

  I felt myself flush, shock and disbelief clouding my thoughts.

  He smiled, wary and watching me. “For getting back in shape after the baby. You’ve been talking about that a lot recently.”

  I took a deep breath. Jim loved mountain biking. I’d never tried it. Not when we were dating or newlyweds, and not now when I was pregnant. It’d be a while, with a new baby, until I’d have time for anything like that. I’d never even expressed an interest in it.

  And the bike looked expensive—glinting and tricked out with shocks and gears—clearly violating the purpose
of our no-gift rule.

  And I hated that he seemed a little too eager for me to return to my previous size.

  I felt like he didn’t know me at all.

  And then he asked the question I was dreading, though I suspected he already knew the answer.

  “Do you like it?”

  I took a deep breath, went to him, and kissed his cheek. “Thank you, sweetheart,” I said.

  “I knew it,” he said. “You hate it.” It was more an accusation than a question.

  I felt a tremor of annoyance. If he’d known I would hate it, why did he buy it?

  “It can go back,” he said. “I made sure at the store.”

  “No,” I said. “Don’t take it back.”

  And so it started, as it had many times in the past—me begging for a gift I didn’t want so as not to hurt his feelings, him resentful that I didn’t like his offering. I’d long ago told myself that the gift may not be perfect, but since the gift giver was, I would be gracious. However, I was having a hard time holding on to my resolution now.

  “We said no gifts, remember?” I said.

  “Yes, but I wanted you to have this.”

  “Right, you wanted me to have it,” I said, picking at the hem of my sleeve, looking anywhere but at the red bike in the middle of the room.

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Nothing.”

  “It means you don’t want it. I want it,” he said flatly.

  “You want it for me.” I tried to sound kind.

  “Whatever.”

  “Oh, don’t be mad.” I sighed, exasperated, turning from him to the sink with the dirty lunch dishes in it.

  “I can’t help it if it hurts my feelings.”

  “Well, you’re basically telling me to get my fat ass in shape, so I’m not sure whose feelings should be hurt,” I said, turning on the water, picking up a dish.

  “Christ you’re sensitive. You’ve been talking about getting in shape afterward—”