The Pink Suit: A Novel

by Nicole Kelby

  The Old Man was winded when he took the phone away. “What happened?” He sounded as if he’d aged twenty years since Kate left, instead of just a handful.

  Kate told him all she knew. The day was cold. The boiler was new but had not been inspected. “It smashed through the lunchroom like a rocket, bouncing off the ceiling and walls, maiming and killing everything in its path, one hundred and nineteen people in all—mostly phone operators and linesmen. Mike was hurt, but not that badly. He and some of the other linesmen helped the wounded out of the building. He’s fine. Although Maggie was out of her mind with worry.”

  The line went quiet. Kate thought she heard a seagull’s cry, but it was a cry of another sort. And so she told her father the other reason why she’d called—the reason that had become so very clear from the moment she opened the door to Maggie’s and saw Patrick Harris slumped against the sofa. It was time for the poor, bedraggled Jesus of Prague to come in. “We’re getting married.”

  All of the moral objections against Patrick and Kate were suddenly meaningless. The Irish butcher had run into the fire, and in a neighborhood like Inwood, that made him a hero.

  The great Father John, the most famed of all the Blood and Bandages of Cork, wept at the altar when, for the benefit of church and state, Patrick and Kate finally said, “I do.”

  Even though Kate had taken the time to sew the matching pink bouclé skirt by hand, just as Chanel required, and did place the scapular back in its hem, she did not wear the pink suit for her wedding. She wore her mother’s wedding dress, as Maggie had, instead.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Adornment, what a science! Beauty, what a weapon! Modesty, what elegance!”

  —Coco Chanel

  May 1963

  For the Blue Book set, maternity fashion began with Hermès. He’d designed the Kelly bag for Princess Grace of Monaco in 1955. The large, square purse was to be carried in the crook of the arm to hide pregnancy from photographers whose assignment was to “get one of the belly.” If so inclined, the owner of the bag could also pop the “paparazzi” in the head with it, La Dolce Vita–style. The purse was quite durable, and the gold hardware could leave a fairly impressive gash.

  For seven years, the Kelly bag was the only stylish thing about pregnancy. Then, in 1963, Her Elegance announced that there would be a third child, and it was suddenly fashionable to be pregnant, as long as you were wearing the “Young Arrogant Look,” as some of the press called it, of Maison Blanche. A-line dresses—even if you weren’t with child—were a “must-have.” And the chemise, which could be cut wide at the hips, was once again adored. Lane Bryant, who specialized in larger sizes and maternity clothes, designed an entire line of “First Lady maternity wear” and advertised it in every major magazine.

  Miss Nona and Miss Sophie could feel the money raining down on them both, a torrential flood of cash, but there was something about it all that made Kate uneasy. The Wife’s first pregnancy had ended in a miscarriage, and then there was a stillborn baby. Her boy and girl both had to be delivered by cesarean section. What if it goes wrong? Kate thought. Although she seemed to be the only person worried. The Ladies were working up dozens of drawings for a maternity collection for the Wife. The back room was filled with bolts of fabric flown in especially from Milan. From velvet to silk, each bolt was a shade of the rich vermilion red of Renaissance painters—the kind of red that Mrs. Vreeland, who was now the editor in chief of Vogue, adored.

  At the planning meeting, the back-room team sat around the table. Maeve had liberated a tin of Danish butter cookies and made tea. Some of the bolts were laid out across the worktable. Even with all her apprehensions, it was difficult for Kate not be excited.

  “I’ve never seen reds this beautiful. We’ve even ordered some ermine for trim. We’ll have Her Elegance on the cover of Vogue in all her maternal glory.”

  “If she’s not too busy heaving,” Maeve said.

  True. But that serene face, set against the deepest reds of the Renaissance, on the cover of Vogue—Kate could clearly imagine it. A short waistcoat beaded in pearls, and maybe pearls wrapped around her hair, too.

  Schwinn was also inspired. “Just a thin line of ermine around the neck. And one of her dogs at her feet. She has a spaniel, doesn’t she? Titian, Botticelli—they all loved spaniels.”

  “But is it too Italian? She’s always been so...”

  “French fried?” Maeve said.

  “Court of Versailles,” said Schwinn. “French revolution with a modern evolution. Modern and simple.”

  “I’m not sure she’ll go Italian,” Kate said.

  “She went Indian.”

  “Not really.”

  “The Italians practically trademarked la bella figura, the good impression, with their fine designs,” Schwinn said. “The Wife will surely embrace the Renaissance for her last pregnancy. It’s very noble.”

  “Her last pregnancy?” Kate said. “How do you know that?”

  Everyone at the table began to laugh, even Schwinn. “Cookie, do you know how old she is?”

  “My age,” Kate said, which sounded more defensive than she wanted it to.

  “Dream on,” Maeve said. “She’s had some practice. You—they’d put you in the Guinness World Records.”

  They had talked about having children—two or three, at least. But the problem was not Kate’s age; it was Patrick. She’d become afraid to even touch him. It was as if he could shatter. His limp was profound. His skin was pale. He barely spoke. Hardly ate. In his dreams, the walls of the telephone company would come crashing down around him over and over again. Sometimes, he’d cry out. Sometimes she’d wake up in the middle of the night and find him looking out at the rubble of the building across the street.

  What had happened was impossible to forget, even if you tried. Even now, months later, Patrick and Kate were still finding fragments from the blast in the neighborhood, such as purses and shoes that had ended up on rooftops. There was a small leather diary in the alley behind the shop that was still locked but had had most of its pages burned away. Everything was a constant reminder.

  Kate had written her father, asking for advice. He was the only parent she and Patrick had left between them.

  “The sea has a way of healing,” the Old Man wrote her. “It’s time to come home.”

  Home.

  The deep calm of the harbor and the soft silence of the countryside—Kate still longed for it all. The Island, with all its mystical ways, made her feel part of something primal and grand—part of life, perhaps. And without the operators from the telephone company, the butcher shop was failing. Some from the parish had recently decided that they couldn’t live any longer without black pudding and bacon that was not smoked but fish that was. It still wasn’t enough. The shop would close within the year. Patrick and Kate both knew it.

  After the meeting at Chez Ninon, and after all that talk about babies, that night, Kate told Patrick about the Old Man’s letter. He said nothing for a long time; he was thinking. And then it was Yeats. Always Yeats.

  And now we stare astonished at the sea.

  “Home, then?”

  “Home.”

  There was moonlight, yes, but it was unnecessary. The cadence of their heartbeats was enough. Each kiss was like their last. But then there was one more and one more and more, until gravity felt as if it had been shattered and they were falling through the dark sea themselves, naked—innocent and not—lost in the tangle of sheets, tasting of sorrow and salt. Finally, healed, Kate thought and hoped it was true. They were going home.

  The next week, there was an announcement that the Wife was canceling all her engagements until after the birth of her third child. No press requests would be honored. No further statements would be made.

  The press release was clearly a bad sign. In the past, the Wife never completely ignored reporters. During her previous pregnancy, even though she was confined to her bed, she put on a brave face, rolled out from underneath t
he covers, and hosted a debate-watching party in Hyannis Port, wearing a single strand of pearls and a coral silk maternity dress. Technically, she was still following the doctor’s orders: with her feet up, she didn’t stray from her bright-yellow couch all night.

  She looked radiant.

  It was a brilliant strategy. Despite the fact that her husband had won the debate against Nixon, and that Nixon’s mother had called her son shortly after the televised event to ask if he was ill, because Nixon did look ill, the Wife’s perfect health was all the press wanted to talk about.

  That was why this press release was disturbing. Her Elegance, always the tactician, had never strayed from the limelight before. The Ladies agreed and put the maternity line on hold. The bolts of beautiful red fabric were shelved in the remnant room. Not even Maeve dared to liberate them.

  “It’s going to be fine,” Maeve told everyone, and checked the stock daily to make sure no one had walked off with a bolt or two. No one even tried.

  Kate understood how Maeve felt, and how everyone came to feel. The reams of vermilion fabric seemed sacred. Just the sight of them made her think that maybe, just maybe, having a baby when you were past the age of thirty wasn’t as dangerous as everyone thought it was.

  Maybe it was a very good idea, indeed.

  In June, however, when word leaked out about the acquisition of a new maternity evening dress, Kate had an awful feeling. The “leak” seemed like a desperate measure on the part of Maison Blanche. The evening dress that everyone was talking about was too extravagant—a deep-turquoise silk Empire gown embroidered with gold flowers and a matching upper coat. It was summer. “Where would you wear such a thing in summer?” Kate asked Maeve. “She’s living at the beach.”

  “Well, she’s not sitting home watching the telly in that,” Maeve said. She was clearly buoyed by the rumor, as was everyone else was.

  Maybe that was the point, Kate thought. A ball gown is for dancing. Dancing is what healthy women do. The Maison Blanche crowd was a very clever lot.

  But if the maternity evening gown was a sleight of hand, a distraction, a bit of smoke to cover the truth, the Ladies didn’t see that. The next morning, the back room was filled with pillows of all sizes, for all stages of pregnancy. The Wife’s model, Suze, spent the entire day with sofa cushions tied to her slender waist, and her arms in the air, while the Ladies spun around her, like fairy godmothers from a bedtime story, pinning, tucking, and cackling. They were relieved. There would be a third child. A baby. It gave everyone hope—and a potentially enormous source of revenue.

  “God bless the Wife,” Miss Nona said.

  “God bless every beautiful inch of her,” said Miss Sophie.

  And, even though she was leery of it all, Kate, who had begun to pray again, put a good word in to God herself.

  Within the week, Chez Ninon had a line of Maison Blanche maternity wear. The clothes, mostly dresses, were beautiful, and flexible enough to be modified for the non-pregnant. And red—they were every deep and vibrant shade of red.

  “Red is the new pink,” Miss Sophie said.

  Miss Nona called Mrs. Vreeland at Vogue to tell her so.

  The sheer number of orders was historic for the small shop. Hundreds of dresses had to be made by the end of summer to meet the demand. Kate quickly found herself knee-deep in elastic waistbands and expandable rubber panels.

  She hadn’t quite told the Ladies she was going home yet. She’d tried but couldn’t say the words. It didn’t quite seem true.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “The Public does not begrudge their goddesses their extravagances.”

  —Marylin Bender

  The farewell tour was Patrick’s idea. Before they left America, they would take a week and travel to California, Texas, Florida, and all parts in between. “See the whole place, all of the United States, do it up right,” he said.

  Kate thought that seeing the entire country would probably take a little longer than a week, but Patrick was so enthused, she hated to spoil it.

  It was difficult to believe, but they really were going back to Ireland. It was amazing how quickly the idea became a plan—and a very good plan for all involved. Patrick’s uncle still had a butcher shop in the English Market in Cork City. He had no sons, only daughters whose husbands did not care for the trade. Patrick could partner with him, build equity in the business, and within a couple of years the shop could be his.

  They would live with the Old Man at first. Train into the city and back. Kate would try her hand at design, maybe take a few dresses to some of the posh shops in Cork City for consignment. And she could still work for the Ladies when they went to the Paris shows. It was their idea: they didn’t want to let Kate go.

  “You’re one of us, my dear,” Miss Sophie told her.

  “We had such hopes,” Miss Nona said.

  It was crushing to leave them.

  Every moment together, Patrick and Kate plotted, planned, and schemed for happiness. Nearly every sentence was qualified with the phrase “But it will be better once we get to the Island.” Although neither Kate nor Patrick could quite believe that to be true, their lives had become about the promise of it all. Every Sunday, there would be a roast joint in the oven, crusty golden potatoes, peas with mint, and puddings topped with bitter fruit and rich yellow cream. And there’d be proper pots of tea with buttered oatcakes served on a lace tablecloth. And peat fires to ward off the winter’s chill.

  And, perhaps, a child. Or two.

  When the end of July arrived, a For Sale sign was placed in the window of the butcher shop, and Father John telephoned and spoke to Kate. “I can’t believe you’re really leaving,” he said.

  “Not right away. It will take a while to sell the shop.” And then she told him about Patrick’s plan for a “farewell tour.”

  “You’re going to drive across America in a week?” He sounded skeptical.

  “Patrick has great faith in his Rose, with her V-eight engine and remarkable Oldsmobility.”

  She thought she heard the priest chuckle. “I’ll see you both at the rectory at half past two,” Father John said. It didn’t sound as if they had a choice in the matter.

  At half past, they arrived, wrinkled and damp. The summer had been torrid. “I won’t miss this heat,” Kate said to Patrick.

  “Nor all this sun.”

  They sounded nearly wistful.

  Father John was in the garden in short sleeves, his collar, and old cotton pants. He’d been pulling dandelions all afternoon. His face was deeply red, as were his arms. He poured them each a glass of grape Kool-Aid, chugged his down, caught his breath, and said, “Really? You’re leaving? You know, they don’t have sun in Ireland.”

  “It’s not that we don’t love America,” Patrick said.

  “We really love it,” Kate said. She was surprised by how much she meant it. “But the business had fallen off—”

  “A man has to work,” Patrick said.

  And that was true. Father John could not deny it. “Well, let’s have a wee bit of a chat about your farewell tour, then.”

  The rectory office was dark and cool, a welcome relief. It was filled with the comfort of books. Father John turned on his desk lamp, went into his file cabinet, and took out three large manila envelopes filled with maps. He carefully laid the AAA TripTiks across the width of his desk.

  “This is America,” he said. “Been wanting to tour it myself. Do it up right, like in that television show Route 66, with the wind in my hair and the open road unfurling before me. Then I saw exactly how much unfurling would have to be done.”

  Just talking about the open road made Father John seem younger. But the open road was, indeed, daunting. His desk was quickly filled with maps and books.

  “How long?” Patrick asked.

  “If you drove straight through to Los Angeles using the freeways and not stopping to see any of the sights, and then turned around and drove back, it would take about ten days. If you didn’t sle
ep and you had a lead foot, and ate sandwiches in the car, you could make it in a week. It’s well over five thousand miles there and back.”

  Patrick picked up one of the maps. A thick yellow line with an arrow pointed downward on every page. “You’d need all of these?”

  “You would. And more. To see the entire country, including the things you’d want to see, like the Grand Canyon, it would take weeks. Months, even.”

  Kate had suspected as much, and probably so had Patrick, but the thought of one last trip with Rose and her Oldsmobility had gotten them through so many dark moments. The idea of a farewell tour was so lovely. Kate would miss that car, silly as that sounded.

  Patrick leaned over and held her hand. “Maybe we’ll just drive for three days, down the coast and back,” he said. “Just see what we can. Boston is nice, I hear.”

  “Or not. Either way,” Kate said. “It’s really fine.”

  “Or,” Father John said, “you can see it all anyway.” He opened his desk drawer and took out three tickets and held them like a fan. “Freedomland.”

  As soon as Kate saw the brightly colored tickets, the song from the ads ran through her head: “Mommy and Daddy, take my hand. Take me out to Freedomland.” It was the largest amusement park in America—and just a few blocks away.

  The priest handed the tickets to Patrick. “The park’s promoters donated them to the Gaelic football team, and we have extras.”

  On the radio and on television, in magazines and newspapers—it was even featured on the Ed Sullivan Show and in Life magazine—the amusement park was advertised everywhere. “Just a half an hour on the subway from Times Square!” The park was shaped like America because it was the entire country in miniature. They even had a futuristic Satellite City, where you could ride a spaceship around Earth. Not the real Earth, but close enough.