Rules of Civility

by Amor Towles

  —I need to see Tate.

  —Yes. I spoke with your assistant. You’re on his schedule for Tuesday.

  —At 5:45. Was that some kind of joke?

  —No, sir.

  —I’ll see him now.

  —I’m afraid that’s impossible.

  Mr. Weiser points through the glass to where Mr. Tate is gingerly dipping a chocolate square in the remnants of his coffee.

  —I’ll see him now, thank you.

  Mr. Weiser advances. It is plain that he would give his life to correct an imbalance in the company’s accounts. But when he takes a step around my desk, I have no choice but to block his way. His face grows as red as a radish.

  —Look here missy, he says, trying to constrain his temper, unsuccessfully.

  —What’s this all about?

  Mr. Tate is suddenly standing between us, directing his question tome.

  —Mr. Weiser would like to see you, I explain.

  —I thought I was seeing him on Tuesday.

  —You are scheduled to do so.

  —What’s the problem then?

  Mr. Weiser pipes up:

  —I’ve just received the most recent expense report on your staffing. You’re thirty percent over budget!

  Mr. Tate turns slowly on Mr. Weiser.

  —As Miss Kontent has apparently made clear—Jake—I am not available right now. Come to think of it, I’m not available on Tuesday either. Miss Kontent, please meet with Mr. Weiser in my stead. Take note of his concerns and let him know that we will get back to him shortly.

  Mr. Tate returned to his chocolate and Mr. Weiser to his adding machine somewhere in the recesses of the third floor.

  Most executives expect their secretaries to show an appropriate level of deference; they expect them to be courteous and even-tempered to whomever they’re talking. But not Mr. Tate. He encouraged Alley and me to be as imperious and impatient as he was. At first I thought this was an irrational extension of Tate’s aristocratic belligerence and his Sun King self-importance. But over time, I began to see the genius of it. By making the two of us as rude and demanding as he, Tate was solidifying our positions as his proxy.

  —Hey, Alley says, sidling up to my desk. Get a load of this.

  At reception there’s a teenage messenger lugging a ten-pound edition of Webster’s Dictionary. It’s finished off in a pretty pink bow. The receptionist points to the middle of the bullpen.

  Each of the journalists eyes the messenger coolly as he approaches their desk and smiles wryly once he’s passed. Some of them stand to watch the show. At long last, he comes to a stop in front of Nicholas Fesindorf. When Fesindorf sees the dictionary, he goes more crimson than his BVDs. To make matters worse, the messenger begins to sing. It’s a little ditty set to the tune of a Broadway love song. Though octavely unsure, the kid puts his heart into it:

  Alas, ’tis true that words are queer

  And yet my son, you need not fear.

  For in this volume can be seen

  All English words and what they mean.

  Tate had directed Alley to get the dictionary and had written the verse. But the singing telegram and pink ribbon, those were Alley’s personal touches.

  At six o’clock, Mr. Tate left the office to catch a train to the Hamptons. At 6:15 I caught Alley’s eye. We covered our typewriters and put on our coats.

  —Come on, she said as we walked toward the elevators. Let’s cake it up.

  My first day at Gotham, when I went to the washroom, Alley had followed me. Leaning over the sink was a girl from graphics. Alley told her to beat it. For a second I thought she was going to cut off my bangs and toss my purse in the toilet like the welcoming committee at my old high school. Alley squinted through her cat’s-eye glasses and got right to the point.

  She said that the two of us were like gladiators in a coliseum and Tate was the lion. When he came out of the cage, we could either circle him, or scatter and wait to be eaten. If we played our cards right, Tate wouldn’t be able to tell which one of us he depended upon more. So she wanted to establish a few ground rules: When Tate asked where one of us was, the answer (day or night) was the ladies’ room. When he asked us to double-check each other’s work, we were allowed to spot one mistake. When we received a compliment on a project, we answered that we couldn’t have done it without the help of the other. And when Tate left at night, we’d give him fifteen minutes to clear the building, then we’d take the elevator to the lobby arm in arm.

  —If we don’t fuck this up, she said, come Christmas we’ll be running this circus. What do you say, Kate?

  In a state of nature some animals, like the leopard, hunt alone; others, like hyena, hunt in packs. I wasn’t one hundred percent convinced that Alley was a hyena. But I was pretty sure that she wasn’t going to wind up as prey.

  —I say all for one, and one for all.

  On Friday night, some girls liked to go to the Oyster Bar in Grand Central and let the boys riding the express train to Greenwich buy them drinks. Alley liked to go to the automat, where she could sit by herself and eat two desserts and a bowl of soup—in that order. She loved the indifference of it all: the indifference of the staff; the indifference of the customers; the indifference of the food.

  As Alley ate her frosting and then proceeded to eat mine, we had a good laugh over the dictionary gag, then we talked about Mason Tate and his hatred of all things purple (royalty, plums, fancy prose). When it was time to go, like an alcoholic Alley stood up and walked straight to the door without showing the slightest signs of having overdone it. In the street at 7:30, we congratulated each other on another Friday night without a date. But as soon as she had turned the corner, I went back inside the automat, found the bathroom and changed into the nicest dress I owned. . . .

  b.)

  —Isn’t that a hedge?

  That was Helen’s query two hours later, as five of us picked our way through a flower bed in the dark.

  After a quick round at the King Cole bar, Dicky Vanderwhile had driven us out to Oyster Bay on the promise of a wingding at Whileaway—the summer house of a childhood friend. When Roberto asked how Schuyler was doing, Dicky, always so quick to bring one up-to-date on the antics of another, was uncharacteristically vague. And when we saw a couple in their midthirties greeting guests at the door, Dicky suggested we not get bogged down in the lobby. He referenced a lovely garden gate and steered us toward the side of the house, where we quickly found ourselves ankle deep in chrysanthemums.

  Stiletto heels sank in the soil at every step. I stopped to pull off my shoes. From the vantage point of the garden, the night seemed surprisingly still. There wasn’t a trace of music or laughter. But through the well-lit windows of the kitchen, you could see a staff of ten arranging cold and hot hors d’oeuvres on platters destined to be whisked through swinging doors.

  The privet that Helen had observed in the shadows now towered before us. Dicky ran his hands along it like one looking for the latch to the hidden door in a bookcase. In a neighboring yard a rocket whistled and popped.

  Roberto, a little slow on the uptake, came to a congenial realization:

  —Why Dicky, you old crasher. I’ll wager you don’t even know whose house this is.

  Dicky stopped and pointed a finger in the air.

  —It is more important to know when and where than whom or why.

  Then, like a tropical explorer, he parted the hedge and poked his head through.

  —Eureka.

  The rest of us followed Dicky through the branches, emerging surprisingly unscathed onto the back lawn of the Hollingsworth mansion where the party was in full swing. It was unlike anything I had ever seen.

  The back of the house stretched before us like an American Versailles. Through the gentle grid work of the French doors, chandeliers and candelabra cast a warm yellow glow. On a slate terrace that floated like a dock over a manicured lawn, a few hundred people mingled gracefully. They paused in their conversations just long enough to
pluck a cocktail or a canapé from the circulating trays as music from a twenty-piece orchestra, invisible to the naked eye, drifted aimlessly toward the Sound.

  Our little crew climbed over the terrace wall and followed Dicky to the bar. It was as large as what you’d find in a nightclub with all manner of whiskey and gin and brightly colored liqueurs. Lit from below, the bottles looked like the pipes of a supernatural organ.

  When the bartender turned, Dicky smiled:

  —Five juniper and tonics, my good man.

  Then he leaned his back against the bar and took in the festivities with all the satisfaction of a host.

  I saw now that Dicky had plucked a small bouquet of flowers from the cutting garden and stuffed them into the breast pocket of his tuxedo. Like Dicky himself, the corsage looked bright and reckless and a little out of place. Most of the men on the terrace had already lost their boyish attributes—the rosiness of their cheeks, the wispiness of their hair, the Puckish glint in their eye. The women, draped in sleeveless dresses that fell to the ground, had jewels and wore them with taste. All were engaged in conversations that looked effortless and intimate.

  —I don’t see anyone I know, said Helen.

  Dicky nodded while nibbling on a celery stalk.

  —That we are at the wrong party is not exactly out of the question.

  —Well, where do you think we are? said Roberto.

  —I had it on good authority that one of the Hollingsworth boys was throwing a fandango. I’m fairly certain that this is the Hollingsworths’ and it is definitely a fandango.

  —But?

  —. . . Perhaps I should have asked which of the Hollingsworth boys was fandangoing.

  —Schuyler is in Europe, isn’t he? asked Helen, who without ever trusting in her own intelligence always seemed to have something sensible to say.

  —So there you are, said Dicky. It’s settled. The reason Sky neglected to invite us is that he is presently abroad.

  He handed the gin and tonics around.

  —Now then. Let’s to the band.

  From the neighbor’s lawn another rocket whistled and then burst overhead in a small spray of sparks. I let the group get a few paces ahead. Then I veered off through the crowd.

  Since first meeting Dicky at the King Cole bar, I had tagged along with his traveling circus a few nights. For a group freshly spilled from the country’s finest schools, they were surprisingly aimless, but that didn’t make them bad company. They didn’t have much spending money or social status, but they were on the verge of having both. All they had to do was make it through the next five years without drowning at sea or being sentenced to jail and the mountain would come to Muhammad: dividend-paying shares and membership at the Racquet Club; a box at the opera and time to make use of it. Where for so many, New York was ultimately the sum of what they would never attain, for this crew New York was a city where the improbable would be made probable, the implausible plausible and the impossible possible. So if you wanted to keep your head on straight, you had to be willing to establish a little distance, now and then.

  As a waiter passed, I traded in my gin for a glass of champagne.

  All the French doors to the Hollingsworths’ great room were open and guests were flowing in and out, instinctively maintaining a constant equilibrium between the terrace and the house. I wandered inside trying to size up the invited as Mason Tate would have. On the edge of a couch, four blondes sat in a row comparing notes like a conspiracy of crows on a telephone wire. By a table crowned with two cloved hams, a broad-shouldered young man ignored his date. While before a pyramid of oranges, lemons and limes a girl in full flamenco was making two men spill their gin with laughter. To the unpracticed eye they all looked of a piece—exhibiting a poise secured by the alchemy of wealth and station. But aspiration and envy, disloyalty and lust—these too were presumably on display, if only one knew where to look.

  In the ballroom, the band was beginning to pick up the tempo. A few feet from the trumpet, Dicky was doing a jitterbug with an older woman at pace and a half. He had taken off his jacket and his shirttails were loose. One of the flowers that had been in his breast pocket was now cocked behind an ear. As I watched, I became aware of someone standing quietly beside me, in the manner of a well-trained servant. I emptied my glass and turned with my arm extended.

  —. . . Katey?

  Pause.

  —Wallace!

  He looked relieved that I had recognized him. Though given his preoccupied demeanor at the Beresford, I was surprised that he had recognized me.

  —How have . . . you been? he asked.

  —All right, I guess. In a no-news-good-news sort of way.

  —I’m so glad to . . . bump into you like this. I’ve been . . . meaning to call.

  The song was winding to a close and I could see Dicky preparing for a big finish. He was going to tip the old lady like a teapot.

  —It’s a little loud in here, I said. Why don’t we go outside.

  On the patio, Wallace secured two glasses of champagne and handed me one. There was an awkward silence as we watched the goings-on.

  —It’s one heck of a shindig, I said at last.

  —Oh, this is . . . nothing. The Hollingsworths have four boys. Over the course of the summer, each . . . gets to throw his own party. But Labor Day weekend, it’s an all-out where . . . everyone is invited.

  —I’m not sure I’m in that everyone group. I’m more in the no one group.

  Wallace offered a smile that gave no credence to my claim.

  —Let me know if you ever want to . . . trade places.

  At first glance, Wallace had looked a little uncomfortable in his tuxedo, like one who’s dressed in borrowed clothes. But on closer inspection, you could tell the tuxedo was custom-made, and his black pearl shirt studs looked like they’d been handed down a generation or two.

  Another silence.

  —You were saying something about meaning to give me a call? I prompted.

  —Yes! Back in March I made you a promise. I’ve been meaning to . . . make good on it.

  —Wallace, if you want to make good on a promise that old, it had better be a doozy.

  —Wally Wolcott!

  The interruption came from a business school classmate of Wallace’s who was also in the paper business. When the conversation turned from mutual friends to the Anschluss and its effect on pulp prices, I figured it was a good opportunity to visit the powder room. I couldn’t have been inside more than ten minutes; but by the time I got back, the paper manufacturer was gone and one of the blondes from the couch had taken his place.

  This, I suppose, was to be expected. Wallace Wolcott had to be in the sights of every young socialite without a ring on her finger. Most of the able-bodied girls in town would know his net worth and the names of his sisters. The industrious ones knew the names of his hunting dogs too.

  The blonde, who looked like she’d been thrown a cotillion or two, was wearing white ermine a few months out of season and close-fitting gloves that climbed all the way to her elbows. Drawing closer, I could tell that her diction was almost as good as her figure, but that didn’t mean she was captive of a ladylike reserve. As Wallace was talking, she actually took a drink from his glass and then handed it back to him.

  She had also done her homework:

  —I’m told the cook on your plantation is the Hush Puppy Queen!

  —Yes, said Wallace with enthusiasm. Her recipe is a . . . closely guarded secret. Kept under . . . lock and key.

  Every time Wallace stalled midsentence, she scrunched her nose and gleamed, as if it was just so endearing. Well, it was endearing. But she didn’t have to make such a fuss about it. So I crashed her little tête-à-tête.

  —I hate to interrupt, I said while slipping an arm under Wallace’s, but weren’t you going to show me the library?

  She didn’t bat an eye.

  —The library is splendid, she said, exhibiting her superior familiarity with the Hollingsworths’
house. But you can’t go in just now. The fireworks are about to start.

  Before I could rebut, there was a general movement toward the water. By the time we got to the dock, there must have been a hundred people on it. A few drunken couples had climbed into the Hollingsworths’ catboats and set themselves adrift. More people came from behind and pushed us toward the diving board.

  There was a loud whistle as the first rocket shot from a raft offshore. It wasn’t the sort of pennywhistle that had accompanied the teenage rockets from the neighboring yard. This sounded more like a piece of artillery. It climbed a long ribbon of smoke, seemed to expire, and then exploded in a white distending sphere. Its sparks broke apart and fell slowly toward the earth like the seedlings blown from a dandelion. Everybody cheered. Four rockets followed in quick succession creating a chain of red stars concluding with a terrific clap. Even more people jostled onto the dock and, apparently, I shoved a little too closely to my neighbor’s hip. She tumbled into the drink, furs and all. Another rocket burst overhead. From the water came a thrash and a gasp as she resurfaced in the blue hydrangea light with entangled hair, looking like the Countess of Kelp.

  Dicky found me on the terrace as everyone was heading up from the fireworks. Naturally, he knew Wallace—though indirectly, through Wallace’s youngest sister. The differential in age seemed to temper Dicky. When Wallace asked him about his ambitions, Dicky lowered his voice an octave and mentioned some nonsense about applying to law school. Wallace excused himself politely and Dicky led me to the bar where the others were waiting. In Dicky’s absence, Roberto had apparently gotten sick in the bushes, prompting Helen to wonder if it wasn’t time to go home.

  Though we had taken the Williamsburg Bridge out of Manhattan, Dicky took the Triborough back. This would make it most practical for him to drop everyone off before me. So soon enough, it was just the two of us headed downtown.

  —Land ho, Dicky said as we approached the Plaza. How about a nightcap?

  —I’m done in, Dicky.

  Seeing his disappointment, I added that I had work tomorrow.