“Tell me what is then.”
“Elias has developed a great fondness for Rubens and El Greco,” said Maisie.
“I can’t bear all those martyrs with blood coming out of their wounds hanging on my living room walls,” said Ruby.
“I think the Impressionists, or the Post-Impressionists will be more to your liking,” said Maisie. She was used to dealing with wives of rich men who needed pictures to hang on their walls. “You liked the Monet, remember.”
“I liked the pink in the Monet. I’d rather put the money into jewelry myself,” said Ruby.
“But people don’t come to your house for dinner to see your jewelry. They see your jewelry when you go out. People come to your house for dinner to see your pictures, though,” said Maisie. It was an argument she often used to explain to the wives of great financiers the social advantages of collecting art.
“Ah ha,” answered Ruby, understanding immediately. More than anything, Elias wanted to be made a member of the board of directors of the museum and was anxious to develop a great collection as soon as possible. “No wonder everyone says you’re the best at what you do, Maisie. Let’s give some more thought to the Impressionists, or the Post-Impressionists.”
12
Cora Mandell, the fashionable decorator, knew everything about everyone in society and gossiped on to Ruby Renthal, who never got sick of hearing her stories, especially her stories about Loelia Manchester, whom Ruby admired more than any other woman, and whose friend she yearned to be. Ruby now knew, from Cora, that Loelia Manchester’s brothers and their wives had sided with Ned Manchester and not Loelia in the approaching divorce, and that Fernanda Somerset, Loelia’s mother, did not speak to Matilda Clarke, and had not for years, although Ruby did not yet know the reason. She felt a connection to the last bit of news, as Ruby was herself now the owner of Matilda Clarke’s apartment, although she wished fervently that people would stop referring to it as the old Sweetzer Clarke apartment and begin to refer to it as the Elias Renthal apartment.
Ruby and Cora were seated facing each other in Elias Renthal’s company jet. Between them the stewardess had set up a table for them to go over the revised floor plans for the new apartment. In tote bags on the floor beside Ruby were four Fabergé eggs that she had just bought at an estate sale in New Orleans, and a gold tea service that had once been given to the Empress Josephine as a wedding gift by the island of Martinique. Cora had said it was much too expensive when they saw it at an antiques shop on Bourbon Street, but Ruby had insisted it would be a perfect wedding present for Justine Altemus.
“Oh, are you going to the Altemus wedding?” asked Cora, hoping that the surprise she felt did not show in her voice.
“Yes,” said Ruby.
“I didn’t know you knew Lil Altemus.”
“I don’t.”
“Justine, then.”
“Not even Justine. I sat next to Bernie Slatkin at my first New York party, at Maisie Verdurin’s.”
“Oh, I see,” said Cora, as if the problem was solved. “You’re a friend of Bernie Slatkin’s.” That made more sense to Cora, who knew that Lil Altemus abhorred all the New People, and the Renthals could not be classified as anything other than New People.
“No, I’m not,” answered Ruby. “I never saw him again after that night.”
“Oh,” said Cora, dying of curiosity, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask Ruby how she had received an invitation.
“Elias and Laurance Van Degan do a great deal of business together,” said Ruby, understanding what Cora was thinking.
“I see,” said Cora. She did not say that Laurance Van Degan did business with a lot of people who would certainly not be getting an invitation.
“Go on with your story, Cora,” said Ruby.
“Where was I?” asked Cora.
“Bitsy and Brassy,” prompted Ruby.
“Oh, yes. Bitsy inherited all the money,” said Cora. “She’s gone off somewhere, I don’t remember where. Antibes, I think. Someplace like that. The other sister is called Brassy. Actually she’s a half-sister. She married Harry Kingswood, but they were divorced years ago. Her son by Harry died of a heroin overdose. Did I tell you that story? Awful. Brassy didn’t marry again. They say she’s a lesbian with one of the English duchesses, but I don’t believe it. They both love horses. That’s all. People are so quick these days to say that women are lesbians when they’re just great friends.”
Bitsy, Brassy, Harry, dykes. Ruby closed her eyes to store all this information. She always wanted to take notes when Cora told her stories, so she could repeat them all to Elias, who was as interested as she was, although he sometimes missed the point, the way he did when she told him about the marriage of Justine Altemus’s aunt, Grace Gardiner, who had had, according to Cora, “a mariage blanc, and a very happy mariage blanc,” until the death of Winkie Gardiner.
“What the hell is a mariage blanc?” Elias had asked Ruby, giving the words the exaggerated pronunciation he always gave to foreign words, which embarrassed him to speak.
“A marriage of companionship, friendship, that sort of thing,” Ruby had answered, in her explaining voice, giving Elias the same explanation Cora had given her when she asked the same question.
“You mean, no fucking? Is that what you’re trying to say?” Elias had said.
“Oh, Elias,” Ruby had replied in an exasperated voice.
All this time Ruby had been perusing the revised floor plans of her apartment on the table between them. She knew that if her apartment ever got finished, it would be the most discussed apartment in New York, but it drove her mad that everything took so long to complete, especially when she was willing to spend any amount of money to speed things along. She could never say to Cora, who had just told her that a fringe she had ordered from Paris for the window hangings in her persimmon drawing room would not arrive for another six weeks, that she felt her New York life could not begin until she was in her grand apartment, receiving all the people she was only hearing about and reading about and watching from afar.
“Where’s my bidet in this bathroom?” asked Ruby Renthal, changing the subject, as something caught her eye on the floor plans.
“Oh, there’s not going to be a bidet in that bathroom,” answered Cora Mandell.
“Who said there’s not going to be a bidet in that bathroom?” asked Ruby.
“Elias said he only wanted to spend thirty thousand doing over that bathroom, and it would cost an additional ten to remove the tiles to put the bidet in, so we decided to dispense with the bidet,” said Cora.
“Let me get this straight,” said Ruby, slowly and carefully, drumming her long red fingernails on the floor plan. “You made the decision that I wasn’t going to have a bidet. Is that correct?”
“No, Ruby, I didn’t make the decision,” replied Cora evenly. “It was Elias who said he didn’t want to spend—”
“Never mind about Elias,” snapped Ruby, who was really annoyed about the six-week delay of the French fringe. “The bottom line is that you made the decision that I wasn’t to have a bidet. Is that it?”
Cora Mandell began to finger her three strands of pearls as she stared back at the beautiful young woman with the beautiful jewelry who was behaving in a manner Cora would have described as ungracious. “It was not a decision I made by myself, Mrs. Renthal,” Cora said, aware that her shift from first name to formal address was not lost on Ruby. “It was after I showed the plans to your husband at his office that the decision was arrived at.”
“Fine,” said Ruby. She began folding the floor plans and then pushed them away from her to Cora for Cora to fold. “I don’t care how much it costs to remove the tiles, Mrs. Mandell. I want a bidet in that bathroom.
I’m going to have a bidet in that bathroom, and don’t bring up the matter to me again.”
If Ruby Renthal could have read the thoughts of the distinguished older woman, who had decorated all the Van Degan, Manchester, and Altemus houses, she would have
read, “I’ve seen these people come, and I’ve seen these people go,” but she could not read Cora Mandell’s thoughts, and Cora Mandell was not the type to make known such thoughts.
“Of course, Mrs. Renthal,” said Cora, folding the plans and putting them in the bag where she carried her needlework.
“One other thing,” said Ruby.
“No, there’s no one-other-thing, Mrs. Renthal,” said Cora, rising from her place and moving toward another seat in the back of the empty plane.
“And what is that supposed to mean?” asked Ruby. Looking after the retreating figure, she was instantly aware that she had offended her one precarious link to the world of Loelia Manchester and Lil Altemus.
“Your next decorator can deal with whatever your one-other-thing is,” said Cora, seating herself. She reached into her bag and brought forth a copy of Nestor Calder’s book, Judas Was a Redhead, and proceeded to read.
“I don’t want another decorator, Cora. I want you. After all these months, we can’t stop now. Think of the delays, just trying to get to know someone else. And there’s the Orromeo auction coming up in London. You promised you’d go with me. Besides, you’re the best. The very best. Everyone says so. Forgive me if I appeared rude. I have the curse, you know, and every time I get my period, I don’t behave well. Just ask Elias. He’ll tell you. Please don’t go, Cora. Please. There’s the big party that Elias and I are giving, and we have to have the apartment finished by the party. Please.”
“You know, poor Ruby hates me to smoke cigars,” said Elias. “So she’s fixing up this room for me to smoke in to my heart’s content. I think it’s called a fumary, or some goddamn fancy name like that.”
Ruby had made a rule that no one would get in to see the new apartment until Cora Mandell had finished all the decorating, but Elias took advantage of Ruby’s being out of town on a shopping trip with Cora to bring a young man called Byron Macumber from the law firm of Weldon & Stinchfield up to the new place and give him a tour. It was, he thought, a safer place for a first meeting than a restaurant, or even a coffee shop, where he might run into someone he knew.
Byron Macumber, thirty-four, was dressed in a bankers’ gray suit, with a blue shirt and dark red tie. Looking around at the unfinished rooms, he was dazzled by the magnificence of the Renthal apartment.
“I’d love to bring my wife here sometime, after you all get moved in,” he said, showing the trace of a Georgia accent.
“I’m sure in time that could be arranged, Byron,” said Elias.
“She would drop dead seeing a place like this.”
“Do you have children?”
“Two little girls. Kimberly, three, and Sharon, one.”
“Where do you live, Byron?”
“We have a condominium in Bronxville, but one day, if I ever strike it rich, I’d like to build a house on the water in Fairfield, or Darien, or someplace like this,” said Byron.
“And have a tennis court and a swimming pool. Right?”
“Something like that,” said Byron, laughing.
“For the arrangement I have in mind, Byron, there would be nothing risky. All that you would have to do is identify certain companies that retain Weldon and Stinchfield for protection from the predators, not to mention guys like me.”
Byron Macumber, nervous at being in such an intimate conversation with a man of Elias Renthal’s wealth, took out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead, at the same time nodding an acknowledgment that he understood Elias’s request.
“Timing is everything, you see,” continued Elias, as if he were giving a lecture in finance. “I want to get into situations so early that my activities couldn’t possibly attract attention from,” he paused, and shrugged, and then finished his sentence, “whomever.”
In the room that would be Elias’s smoking room when the apartment was finished was an antique pool table that had recently arrived from England. Byron Macumber rubbed his hand across the mahogany of the table and the faded green felt.
“This is beautiful,” he said.
“Used to belong to Edward the Seventh,” said Elias. “That’s the original felt.”
“Beautiful,” repeated Byron.
“It’ll happen to you too,” said Elias, meaning possessions. “Whatever profit I make on a tip you give me, I will pay you five percent. Five percent, paid in cash, on, say, eighty thousand shares of Tennessee Natural Gas, is a very handsome amount of money. Enough to have a nanny for your kids and pay her for a year, and to take your wife on a nice vacation to Mustique, and maybe even buy her a mink coat for Christmas. And that’s only one tip.”
“Holy smoke,” said Byron Macumber.
13
As the wedding day approached, with the heightened activity that surrounded the coming event, Lil Altemus’s enthusiasm for Justine’s marriage increased, or, to be more exact, her enthusiasm for the wedding increased, while her enthusiasm for the marriage remained tepid, as she was of the school that firmly believed in what her own mother used to call marrying your own kind.
The nuptials were frequently mentioned in the social columns of Dolly De Longpre and Florian Gray, when friends of Justine’s gave dinners and cocktail parties, most of which, but not all, Lil attended. She chose to have a headache on the night of Violet Bastedo’s dinner, and did have a “nasty cold” on the night Bernie’s Aunt Hester and Uncle Sol entertained a small group of Bernie’s relations and friends from the television station in a favorite steak house of Bernie’s. She attended all the Van Degan family celebrations and most of the parties given by her friends, like Loelia Manchester’s dinner at the Rhinelander, and the old friends of Justine from school and debutante days.
She took a particular interest in the wedding gifts as they began to pour in, judging each one accordingly. Grandfather Van Degan sent gold candlesticks, and Uncle Laurance and Aunt Janet Van Degan personally dropped off a tiny Renoir, “marvelously framed,” as Lil was the first to point out, from their own collection. Pearls came from Aunt Minnie Willoughby, who said she saw no point in waiting until she died to leave them to Justine, and Lil’s great friends the Todescos, with whom she always stayed in Rome, sent a Chinese export vase that Lil explained to Bernie was of museum quality. Pieces of silver in vast quantity, old and new, large and small, ornate and plain, came from cousins and friends, as well as from business associates of Bernie’s. From Justine’s father, whom Lil never saw again after her divorce and his unfortunate second marriage, came a vermeil clock that Lil recognized as having belonged to his mother. Hubie sent something frightfully modern, as Lil described it, from his art gallery in SoHo, which Lil asked Justine to pretend to like, and Lil herself, after much deliberation, decided to give Justine an Aubusson carpet that had been in storage since she gave up the house in Newport, after Hubie’s unfortunate incident with the lifeguard at Bailey’s Beach, as well as the diamond-and-sapphire bracelet with the clasp that never worked that Fulco de Verdura had made for her from her Granny B.B.’s old tiara.
Bridesmaids were something of a problem for a girl of Justine’s age. The friends of her school and debutante years were all long married and having their second and even third child by this time. The thought of all married bridesmaids only pointed out the lateness of Justine’s journey to the altar, and the notion of pregnant bridesmaids was abhorrent to Lil. On one thing both mother and daughter, who rarely agreed, agreed totally. No matter what pressure was brought by the family, Dodo Fitz Alyn, poor Dodo, the poor relation, would not, absolutely would not, waddle up the aisle in the bridal party. Of all people, Lourdes, Lil’s maid Lourdes, came up with the idea of having only children as attendants, and the idea thrilled Lil. There were several Van Degan nieces, she pointed out to Justine, and little Nina Willoughby, and Violet Bastedo’s daughter, and the Trefusis twins. “It will be divine, and so chic, little taffeta dresses, like shepherdesses,” said Lil. “They could even carry crooks, and Lorenza could do something marvelous with trailing ivy and rosebuds.” Lil
, who loved to organize, was in heaven.
“Justine,” she said, in a voice that Justine recognized as a prelude to a request.
“Yes, Mother,” replied Justine, who seemed to lose all the wedding decisions.
“I think Herkie Saybrook should be an usher,” said Lil.
“Herkie Saybrook, Mother? Bernie doesn’t even know Herkie Saybrook. A groom can’t have an usher he doesn’t even know.”
“There has to be someone from our side who knows who all our friends are. You can’t expect that Chinese weatherman, excuse me, Korean, to know where to seat Aunt Minnie Willoughby and the Todescos.”
“Hubie knows who all the family are, Mother,” said Justine.
“Hubie is not an usher. Hubie is going to take me down the aisle and sit with me. I am most certainly not going to sit with your father.”
“Hubie can take you down the aisle, sit with you, and still be an usher, Mother.”
“Will you please just talk to Bernie about Herkie? For me? For your mother, Justine?” asked Lil.
The tension between mother and daughter was broken when Lourdes walked into the room carrying another wedding present.
“Oh, heaven,” cried Lil, clapping her hands, which she did each time a new present arrived.
“Look how beautifully wrapped this box is, Mrs. Altemus,” said Lourdes. “Save me the paper and ribbons.”
“Who’s it from?” asked Lil, still in bed with a breakfast tray.
“Young Laurance and Laura Van Degan,” said Justine, reading the card.
“Good wrapping, cheap gift, wait and see,” said Lil, sipping her hot water and lemon juice.
“Oh, Mother,” said Justine, tearing apart the white satin ribbons and gold and white paper.
“They’re so tight. They sent Baba Timson a lucite paperweight, after Baba had lent them her house in Barbados for their honeymoon. Save all those ribbons and wrappings for Lourdes. God knows what she does with them. Where’s it from?”
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