by Nicole Kelby
The buttons themselves were also a surprise. They looked manufactured but were actually made by hand. Each was an ornate metal cap set in a fabric-lined ring. Each had to be tacked in with stitches so fine, they would be invisible to the naked eye.
And, finally, the fabrics were always difficult, at best. The blouse was to be made of a very particular silk charmeuse that was too delicate to be made into a shirt, and impossible to sew without damaging, but would feel wonderful next to the skin. For the suit itself, the bouclé was so loosely woven and very fragile—too fragile to wear often. But the softness of the cloth was incomparable, so it must be stitched together with magic and hope. When photographed, Kate knew the suit would appear practical and durable. It would appear conservative. But in reality, it was incredibly fragile and decadent. Everything about it was luxurious and sensuous—and that was its secret.
Copy or not, to make it one time was impossible. To make it twice was unimaginable. Wonderfully unimaginable.
Chapter Nine
“The planning was constant, the logistical invasion of every country she visited, every party she attended—the cloth, the weather, the sensitivity of the people and what they wanted to see her in.”
—Oleg Cassini
When the Wife finally arrived, only two hours late for her fitting, Mr. Charles told Kate that she did not look like a Thoroughbred at all. Her fingernails were bitten down to the quick. Her thumb was ragged and bleeding. Barefoot, she fidgeted in the loosely basted toile. But as soon as she stood at the three-way mirror, everything changed. The elegance. The bearing.
“There must be royal blood somewhere,” he said.
Cork, Kate thought. In ancient times, it was a place overrun with kings. High kings, they called themselves. There were so many of them, and so few commoners, that King Niall of the Nine Hostages traveled to Wales to kidnap some people to rule over—including St. Patrick himself.
What kind of place has to steal its own saints?
“Cork,” Kate said.
“Cork?”
“Very royal.”
Mr. Charles laughed for a long time.
The Secret Service, pigeon gray from head to toe, arrived first. The Holy Dead of St. Patrick’s catacombs had been forsaken that day. The Wife stood at the front door, wrapped in the silk air of Chanel No. 5 eau de parfum. The scent of ylang-ylang and may rose made Kate long for spring. The press was waiting in the hallway, of course.
The back-room girls were hovering by the dressing rooms. “Clever,” Maeve said. “Putting on a public show about buying American.”
“I need all of you to get back to work,” one of the agents said.
It could have been the same man from The Carlyle. Kate wasn’t sure. They all looked alike. How could the Wife tell them apart?
“Girls. Now. Back to work,” he said, and clapped his hands as if corralling children.
“Give it a rest,” Maeve said. “What are we going to do? Hem her?”
In the showroom, the Ladies were holding the front doors open for the Wife’s grand entrance. Miss Nona was shouting at the press, “Shoo! Shoo!” Miss Sophie was laughing. Behind her was Mrs. Molly Tackaberry McAdoo, the Wife’s saleswoman and Miss Nona’s niece. Miss Molly was blowing kisses in the air at the press while her tiny black-and-white fluffy dog, Fred, circled the crowd, looking for treats. Such a circus, Kate thought, but the Wife seemed quite calm about it all. She looked like she always did in the photographs: the hair, the eyes, and the smile. She rarely changed. Everyone was gawking. Kate didn’t know why she was gawking at her, too. She knew the Wife’s face as well as she knew her own. Didn’t everybody? Although, truthfully, Kate preferred the photos with the husband in them, too. They always seemed to be on the verge of telling each other a secret, leaning toward each other as if in orbit, one drawn in by the other’s gravity.
The Wife stopped in the doorway for a moment. She moved her right foot slightly forward. Straightened her back. A quick tug adjusted the line of her camel coat. Chin down. Eyes up. A tilt of the head. And then she smiled. She turned her head slowly, panning from left to right, like a cat following the sun. Cameras flashed. And the world had another twenty pictures exactly like the previous twenty.
“Show’s over, girls,” the agent said.
“It is a bit of a show, isn’t it?” Kate whispered to Maeve.
“It’s as if the Virgin Mary herself is shopping for a little splash-out.”
When the Wife finally made her way to the three-way mirror with Mr. Charles, Mrs. Molly Tackaberry McAdoo and the tiny black-and-white dog in tow, she told the Ladies how lucky they were that they weren’t in the gift-wrap business. She’d written an article about that once, back in her days as the Inquiring Camera Girl for the Washington Times-Herald.
“Do you know it takes three people to gift wrap a baby grand piano?”
“Fascinating.”
“Amazing.”
“True?”
“True.”
Kate suspected that it wasn’t true, but the Ladies loved the story so much that Miss Nona told it to the back-room girls several times before she and Miss Sophie left for the day. What was true was this—the Wife had been at Chez Ninon for about an hour, but that was the only thing anyone could agree on.
She seemed taller or much shorter than usual; she was more tired or well rested.
She whispered like Marilyn Monroe or growled like Katharine Hepburn.
She had clearly put on at least five pounds or had absolutely lost ten.
She flirted with Mr. Charles shamelessly or ignored him completely.
Even the color of her lipstick couldn’t be agreed upon. Pink? Red?
Chanel No. 5 eau de parfum—that was all Kate knew for sure. The toile, still warm from the heat of her body, reeked of it.
“Lucky toile,” Mr. Charles said.
The fitting had taken much longer than usual. Maeve’s marks were off. Mr. Charles was gracious about it, though. It really wasn’t Maeve’s fault, at least not the way she told the story.
“Like a wasp, she was. The sheer buzz of her—it was unnerving. Moving back and forth from one foot to another. My mouth was full of pins—you can’t chalk a Chanel, as you well know—so I’m pinning and basting and rebasting to get the marks right, and she never stops moving. And there’s ashes from those infernal cigarettes tumbling down my smock—it’s just like cinders rolling down your back, mind you—and I’ve got this needle in my hand, and she never thinks for one moment that just one bit of blood would ruin the entire thing, just one drop from a pinprick, and we’d all have to start over again. Does she think that?”
Maeve always provided her own answers, so this really wasn’t a question.
“Of course she doesn’t.”
Everyone nodded. It was always best to agree with Maeve.
After the Wife left, they sat around the long cutting table in the back, going over the details of the suit. The workroom was stuffed with dozens of dressmaker’s models; each one was the correct size and shape for a Chez Ninon client. Their names were written across the backs of the mannequins in huge block letters: PALEY, BRUCE—and all the rest. These Blue Book–society mannequins—silent, headless, and in one state of undress or another, with their sleeves hanging undone or their hems ripped away—lurked in the workroom, making the place feel crowded and small. But they were a necessary evil, the only way to get the clothes fitted properly and with minimum fuss. There was an entire storage room filled with them. Kate hated to go back there; it was like some sort of nightmarish cocktail party. Mannequins were grouped not alphabetically, but according to what page they appeared on in the Social Directory, which was exceedingly difficult, because the section called Married Maidens was cross listed by both married and maiden names, just in case of divorce.
The Ladies never worried about filing the Wife’s; it had been in perpetual use since the campaign days.
“Let’s get started,” Mr. Charles said, and cleaned off the cutting tab
le. Kate made tea. Maeve liberated, as she liked to say, another box of “Ladies’ chocolates” from Miss Nona’s office.
“Maeve, that’s the second box this week. If Miss Nona finds out—” Kate said.
“She won’t notice. How many times did she tell the same piano gift-wrap story? Four times? The old bird is slipping a bit. It’s bad for her diabetes, anyway.”
Schwinn unrolled the sketch the Wife had made of the suit. Kate laid out Chanel’s notes next to it.
Mr. Charles began. “Accessories, Schwinn?”
“No hat at first. Most women buy a suit and then find the hat. Not many can afford both a hat and a new suit. But a hat, later, is a must.”
“Halston?”
“Of course.”
“We should have him make two hats. When she sweats her way through one of them, the backup will match. It would be nice if one had contrasting piping trim around the crown, but that’s my take on it. He’ll have his own.”
Maeve closed her eyes, as if about to nod off to sleep. It had been a long day for everyone. Kate warmed her tea. These meetings could go on for hours.
“She asked for three blouses,” Mr. Charles said. “Each one needs to be a different style, but all should be of the same fabric. She wondered what I thought about black instead of the blue that we ordered. What do I think about black?”
Schwinn looked at the sketch again. “I like the blue best.”
“But with her skin,” Mr. Charles said, “the black could work, too.”
“Agree.”
“But the blue is better.”
“Absolutely.”
“Softer.”
“Yes.”
“Kate?”
Kate liked it when Mr. Charles called her by her real name instead of “Kitty,” which was an alarming habit he’d recently picked up. “Black is for beatniks.”
“Unless you’re Chanel.”
“Kate has a point, though,” Schwinn said. “That photograph of the Wife reading Kerouac on the campaign trail raised enough eyebrows.”
“Agreed. Three blue blouses—all a slightly different cut. Kate, can you look into something you think will work? Thumb through the magazines—don’t limit yourself to Chanel. Keep in mind that she’s considering wearing the pink suit in India. We’ll need a blouse design that will stand up to the humidity.”
“Does she want to pick up the gold from the suit buttons? We could do a gold trim on a blue camisole. The women there wear camisoles under their saris, so no one would think it scandalous, and it would be more comfortable.”
“Camisole, yes. Not sure about the gold trim. She’s very concerned about how much embellishment one can wear in India.”
Schwinn took a chocolate from the box. “Gold brocade was invented in India. I think the sky is the limit.”
“True, but the photos of the Wife are for Americans.”
“Our Miss Molly told me they’d been discussing Mughal illustrations. Very primitive style. Vivid. Very bright.”
“Yes, the Wife is very keen on them,” Mr. Charles said. “I hear our dear First Lady has actually put Kama Sutra prints on the dining-room walls of their country home. How can guests even focus on the food?”
Kate had no idea what Mr. Charles and Schwinn were talking about, but it sounded like something untoward. They both rolled their eyes.
“Whatever we do,” Schwinn said, “we have to keep in mind that Indians love marigolds. Whatever color she chooses must match marigolds.”
Kate took the blue fountain pen from her desk and began to sketch. “Let’s say that the first blouse should be a chemise with a simple V-neck that will lie underneath the jacket and go unseen when it is buttoned up. That way, she can have a normal-to-long décolleté line when she wants to look youthful.”
Kate held her sketch so that everyone could see it. It was just a quick line drawing, but it was clear from the sketch that the V-neck would make her look even more swanlike.
“I like that,” Mr. Charles said.
Kate began to sketch again. “The second could be a basic jewel neck that her single strand of pearls would lie against, just as she sketched it for us.” Kate’s drawing was a close-up of the neck detail, with small dots for pearls.
“Of course. Always give what Her Elegance what she asks for.”
“Always. But for the third, why not do what Chanel asked for?”
Kate picked up the Life magazine clipping of the four women wearing Chanel, standing on the street corner. “This seems to be a modified cowl, doesn’t it? The silk collar is gathered high, so it drapes. Given how it’s gathered, it would probably drape no matter how high the humidity.” Kate quickly drew a blouse with fabric that appeared to be twisted around the neck.
“Very old crone,” Maeve said. “Even my mam wouldn’t want to be seen in that.”
“Exactly,” Kate said. “After being caught reading Kerouac, she now knows what doesn’t play in Wisconsin. If she loves the suit, she’ll want to wear it for all sorts of audiences—including the conservatives.”
Kate put her sketches next to the Wife’s. Mr. Charles leaned in to study them all. “Well, what do we think about our Kitty’s idea?”
Kate, she thought.
“Swell,” Schwinn said.
“Sure,” Maeve said.
“It’s settled, then,” said Mr. Charles. “I’ll sketch these properly, and we’ll send them on to her for approval.”
“What about Mr. Cassini?” Kate asked. “Doesn’t he get final say?”
“Not this time. This is our suit. Cassini will have nothing to do with it.”
“He’ll come sniffing around, though,” Maeve said. “Mark my words.”
Kate was refining the lines in her sketches. “Will we be making all of these at once?”
“She wants three. She gets three,” Mr. Charles said. “The carpenters at Maison Blanche just enlarged her closet. It’s now twice the size of my apartment.”
Maeve reached across the sketches to take a few more chocolates, and put them in the pocket of her smock. “For the bus ride home,” she said, and put on her coat. “All I have to say is that this pink suit will be very pretty on her.”
“This isn’t about what’s pretty, Maeve,” Mr. Charles said. “It’s about perfection. The First Lady is the best of us. She’s who we all aspire to be. She must be perfect at all times.”
“Don’t let him fool you,” Maeve said to Kate. “She sweats like the rest of us too.”
“Perspires,” Mr. Charles said.
“Perspires, then,” Maeve said. “She perspires like a bloody racehorse.”
As soon as Maeve left, Mr. Charles started sketching—five quick lines for that long, thin frame, the hair in a flip, and freckles across the nose. A suit, very Pierre Cardin–like in design, was starting to take shape. “Miss Molly said that there was another order placed today,” he said. “The First Lady has requested that I create a piece especially for India. She wants me to do it personally.”
Mr. Charles kept on drawing; he didn’t look up. He’d waited until Maeve had left to tell Kate and Schwinn. Kate knew this would not turn out well. The last time this happened, it was the Paris trip. The final dress, which bore the Chez Ninon tag and no mention of Mr. Charles, was a navy-blue silk shantung suit with a matching overcoat. Its twin now hung in the sample room. Based on the clean lines of Givenchy, with a slightly flared skirt, the ensemble was a huge success. The First Lady adored it. As soon as she returned from Paris, she wrote Mrs. Molly Tackaberry McAdoo about how enchanted she was. “Practically a uniform—there is never a day, or an occasion, where I can resist wearing it.”
Stories about the navy-blue silk suit appeared in all the newspapers, not only in New York and Washington, but all over the country, in places where Kate didn’t think people even cared about fashion, like farm country and the high desert and the rugged coast. Mr. Charles’s drawing was often on the front page, usually in the lower left column. But his name was never mentioned. T
he credit line was Supplied by Chez Ninon. He was upset for weeks. And now he would be upset again.
“What color should we make this one?” he asked, but he didn’t sound entirely pleased.
Schwinn patted him on the back. “It can wait until tomorrow, Noel.” He never called Mr. Charles by his first name. No one did.
“I just want to get the ideas down,” he said. “She needs to see the sketches in a week.”
“How about white on white?” Kate said. “Like Norman Hartnell’s depiction of India on the Queen’s coronation gown. He did a single lotus flower inlaid with mother-of-pearl, seed pearls, and rhinestones. It looked like diamonds and pearls in an ocean of diamonds.”
Mr. Charles frowned. “But how would it photograph? White on white could get lost or flare in the light of flashbulbs.”
“Can’t some things just be beautiful?”
“Of course not. It’s just as I said to Maeve. The First Lady is our perfection.”
“I understand that, but everybody likes something beautiful—”
“This is not everybody,” Schwinn said. “This is the Wife.” He leaned over the table and added a few faint freckles to the forehead of Mr. Charles’s drawing. “Marta at Bergdorf once showed me one of her orders. It was a series of drawings with swatches for an entire wardrobe of hats—all of them were carefully designed to photograph perfectly. She even indicated camera angles. For a woman like that, beautiful is never enough.”
Schwinn took a chocolate-covered cherry from the box, popped it in his mouth, and smiled at Mr. Charles with that country-boy grin of his. “Let’s do this tomorrow.”