The Sun Sister (The Seven Sisters)

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘Oh Cecily! You can’t sit here all on your lonesome. May I introduce Captain Tarquin Price? He’s a great friend of mine from Kenya.’

  ‘Delighted to make your acquaintance,’ said the man, giving Cecily a formal bow.

  ‘Now, I’ll leave you two young things to chat – I really do need to use the restroom.’

  As Tarquin sat down next to her and offered her another cigarette, which she refused, Cecily thought that her godmother must have a seriously weak bladder.

  ‘So, I hear you are Kiki’s goddaughter?’

  ‘Yes, I am. And you are her great friend?’

  ‘Oh, I wouldn’t go as far as that; we’ve met a couple of times at Muthaiga Club in Nairobi. I had some leave and Kiki invited me to stay in Manhattan with her for Christmas. Your godmother is the kind of woman who makes friends very easily. She is quite something, isn’t she?’

  ‘She sure is.’ Cecily only wished she could close her eyes and listen to his clipped English accent all night. ‘So, do you live in Kenya?’

  ‘For the moment, yes. I’m a captain in the British army and I was posted there a few months back when this whole thing with Hitler blew up.’

  ‘And do you like it there?’

  ‘It is undoubtedly one of the most stupendously beautiful countries I’ve ever seen. Rather different from Blighty.’ His handsome face, with its tanned skin that suited his brown eyes and thick dark hair, crinkled into a smile.

  ‘Have you seen lions and tigers since you’ve been there?’

  ‘Well now, I do hate to correct you, Miss . . .?’

  ‘Please, just call me Cecily.’

  ‘Cecily, it seems to be a common myth that there are tigers in Africa. However, there are none. But yes, I’ve certainly seen a few lions. Shot one only a few weeks ago out in the Bush.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes.’ Tarquin nodded. ‘The blighter came sniffing round our camp and the damned blacks had all been asleep and were caught on the hop. Good job I heard the commotion, grabbed my gun and killed it before it had us all for supper. There were ladies present too.’

  ‘There were ladies out camping with you?’

  ‘Yes, and some of them were far better shots than the men. One has to be clever with a gun if one lives in Africa, whatever sex one may be.’

  ‘I’ve never even held a gun, let alone fired one.’

  ‘I’m sure you’d soon learn – most people do. So, Cecily, what do you do here in New York?’

  ‘I help my mother with her charity work mostly. I’m on a number of committees . . .’

  Cecily’s voice trailed off. It sounded so completely feeble telling a man from the British army who had just shot a lion about her charity lunches.

  ‘I mean, I’d like to do so much more, but . . .’

  Come on, Cecily, at least try to make an effort to sound a little less like the sad little wallflower you are . . .

  ‘As a matter of fact, I’m very interested in economics.’

  ‘Are you now? Why don’t we take a turn around the dance floor and you can tell me exactly how and where I should invest my paltry army wages.’

  ‘I . . . okay,’ she agreed, thinking that at least her dancing had to be better than her small talk. With the music of Benny Goodman and his band blaring out, even if she’d thought of something clever and amusing to say, Tarquin wouldn’t have been able to hear it. She noted with pleasure that he was a far better dancer than Jack, and it gave her a kick when they almost collided with him and his silver-clad goddess of a fiancée. Midnight came and a host of balloons were released from their netting prison above the guests.

  ‘Happy New Year, Cecily.’ Tarquin reached down to kiss her on the cheek. ‘Here’s to old friends and new.’

  After ‘Auld Lang Syne’, the band struck up again and Tarquin didn’t seem inclined to leave her side, until Kiki appeared like the beautiful wraith she was and tugged on his arm.

  ‘Would you be a darling and escort me to my suite? I’ve been dancing the night away and my poor feet are killing me. I simply must get out of these shoes. I’ve invited some people to join me so we can continue the party upstairs. Of course you must come too, darling Cecily.’

  ‘Thank you, Kiki, but our driver will be waiting outside by now.’

  ‘Then tell the driver to wait a little longer,’ Kiki laughed.

  ‘I can’t, I must go home.’ After several sleepless nights, Cecily felt as though she might actually fall asleep in Tarquin’s arms.

  ‘Well, if you must, but I’ll see you again before I leave for Kenya. I was saying to Cecily how she should come stay with me.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Tarquin agreed, looking down fondly at Cecily. ‘Well now, it’s been a delight to meet you.’ He reached for her hand and brought it up to his lips. ‘It would be a pleasure to show you around if you make the trip. I hope we meet again soon. Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight.’

  As Cecily watched Tarquin escort Kiki through the crowd, then searched the room for her mother and father, she thought that even if she never laid eyes on Captain Tarquin Price again, tonight he really had been her knight in shining armour.

  Like the rest of New York, Cecily had never enjoyed January, but this particular one felt more miserable than any other she had lived through. Usually, the view of a snow-covered Central Park from her bedroom window cheered her up, but this year it rained a lot too, and the pavements were covered in grey sludge that coordinated with the murky skies.

  Before Jack’s abrupt departure from her life, she had filled her days with plans for the wedding and the numerous charities that her mother and her friends worked tirelessly to run. Which, in Cecily’s view, meant wasting endless hours deciding on a venue for the latest fundraiser, then further time choosing the menus. The guest list would come next – totally dependent on how many dollars the recipient of the invitation might have to spare. Dorothea relied on her eldest daughter to let her know who her debutante friends were marrying; if the fiancé or new husband was wealthy enough, Cecily would invite them along.

  Even though she knew that her mother and her cronies worked hard for their good causes, Cecily had never yet seen any of them get their immaculate silk gloves dirty by actually visiting one of the charities they raised funds for. When Cecily had suggested that she went to Harlem to visit the orphanage for which a charity dinner had raised over a thousand dollars, Dorothea had looked at her as if she was crazy.

  ‘Cecily, honey, what can you be thinking?! You’d be robbed by those Negroes before you’d had a chance to get out of the car. Everything you’re doing for the charities is providing funds for those poor little coloured babies. Be happy with that.’

  Since the Harlem Riot of 1935, which had happened when she’d been a sophomore at Vassar, Cecily had been aware of the tension. On so many occasions she’d been tempted to ask Evelyn, the household’s black maid of the past twenty years, what her life was like, but the golden rule was that one never exchanged personal details with one’s staff. Evelyn lived in the attic with the other kitchen staff, only leaving the house on a Sunday to go to ‘my church,’ as she called it. Archer, the chauffeur, and Mary, the housekeeper, were married and lived uptown in Harlem. At Vassar, there had been a few outspoken women who were demanding social change. Her friend Theodora often left campus at weekends to go to a civil rights rally in the notorious 19th Ward. She’d slip back in through the dormitory window just before midnight on Sunday, reeking of smoke and brimming with rage.

  ‘The world needs to change,’ she’d whisper angrily as she put on her nightgown. ‘Slavery might be over, but we’re still treating a whole race of people as if they’re less than human – segregating them, keeping them down. I’m goddamned sick of it, Cecily . . .’

  January was also a very quiet time on the charity committee circuit, so Cecily was mostly stuck in the house with her thoughts. Even the radio provided little light relief as Hitler continued to make incendiary speeches, attacking British an
d Jewish ‘warmongers’.

  ‘The winter of 1939 sure is a miserable time to be alive,’ Celia muttered to herself as she took a walk through a fog-swathed Central Park, just to get out of the house.

  Dorothea was away visiting her mother in Chicago. As Cecily sat down with her father at the vast table in the dining room that faced onto the snowy garden, she wondered if she would ever pluck up the courage to suggest they ate supper on such occasions at the small table in the far cosier morning room.

  ‘Do you like the new-style decor?’ Walter asked her, taking a sip of wine and gesturing vaguely at the sleek, modish furniture. The Fifth Avenue house, with its imposing stone facade facing Central Park, had been recently decorated by Dorothea in the fashionable art deco style – a style which had disoriented Cecily when she’d first seen the renovations. It seemed as though she met her own reflection at every turn in the endless mirrored surfaces and she actually missed the heavy mahogany furniture that she’d known since childhood. The only remnant of her original bedroom was Horace, her ancient teddy bear.

  ‘Well, I liked what we had before, but Mama sure seems happy with the new look,’ she ventured.

  ‘Quite, and that is a good thing.’

  As her father lapsed into silence, Cecily decided to introduce the topic she’d been wondering about. ‘I’ve been keeping up with the news, Papa, and I wanted to ask you about it. Why is Hitler continuing to warmonger? He got what he wanted out of the Munich Agreement, didn’t he?’

  ‘Because, my dear,’ Walter began, rousing himself, ‘the man is a psychopath, in the truest sense of the word. In other words, he feels no guilt, nor shame, and it is unlikely he will adhere to any agreement he made.’

  ‘So might there be war in Europe?’

  ‘Who knows?’ Walter shrugged. ‘I guess it just depends which way Hitler’s psychological wind blows on any given day. You may have noticed that the German economy is booming. He turned the economy around, so they sure can afford a war if he wishes to have one.’

  ‘Everything comes down to money, doesn’t it?’ Cecily sighed as she toyed with her lamb cutlet.

  ‘Many things, yes, but not everything. So, what have you had on today?’

  ‘Nothing. Absolutely nothing,’ she replied.

  ‘No lunches with any of your friends?’

  ‘Papa, most of my friends are married, pregnant or already bringing up babies.’

  ‘I’m sure it won’t be long before you are in the same boat,’ he comforted her.

  ‘I’m not sure about that personally. Papa?’

  ‘Yes, Cecily?’

  ‘I . . . well, I was wondering whether, given the fact that marriage isn’t going to happen to me any day soon, you’d reconsider about me taking up some kind of’ – Cecily swallowed hard – ‘employment. Maybe there’s an opening at your bank?’

  Walter wiped his moustache with his napkin, folded it neatly and put it by the side of his plate.

  ‘Cecily, we have been down this road many times before. And the answer is no.’

  ‘But why? Women are taking jobs all over New York City! They’re not waiting for some man to come along and sweep them off their feet! I have a degree and I want to use it. Is there nothing I could do at your bank? Whenever I meet you for lunch, I see girls coming out the entrance, so they must be doing something inside . . .’

  ‘You’re right, they are. They’re working in the typing pool, spending their days typing up the directors’ letters, then licking envelopes, sticking on postage stamps and sending them off to the mailing department. Is that what you want?’

  ‘Yes! At least I’d be doing something useful.’

  ‘Cecily, you know as well as I do that any daughter of mine couldn’t work in the typing pool at the bank. You – and I – would be a laughing stock. These girls are from a completely different background—’

  ‘I know that, Papa, but I don’t care about “background”. I just want to . . . fill my time.’ Cecily could feel tears of frustration pricking at the back of her eyes.

  ‘My dear, I understand how Jack’s betrayal has hurt you and destabilised you, but I’m sure that someone else will come along soon.’

  ‘But what if I don’t want to get married?’

  ‘Then you will become a lonely old spinster with a heap of nieces and nephews.’ His eyes betrayed a flicker of kindly amusement. ‘Does that sound appealing?’

  ‘No . . . yes, I mean, right now, Papa, I really don’t care. But what was the point in allowing me a college education if I can never use it?’

  ‘Cecily, that education has broadened your mind, given you insights into subjects that will allow you to speak confidently at dinner parties . . .’

  ‘Jeez! You sound like Mama.’ Cecily put her head in her hands. ‘Why won’t you let me use my degree in a more productive way?’

  ‘Cecily, I do understand about not being able to follow a path you’ve set your heart on. I studied Economics at Harvard simply because my grandfather did and the Lord only knows how many “greats” before him. When I graduated, all I wanted to do was travel the world and make my living away from the world of blatant commerce. I think I fancied myself as a great white hunter or some such,’ he chuckled ruefully. ‘Of course, when I told my father what I was planning, he looked at me as if I’d gone crazy, and the answer was no. I subsequently had to follow him into the bank, then take my place on the board.’

  Cecily watched as her father paused to take a large gulp of his wine.

  ‘Do you think I actually enjoy what I do?’ he asked her.

  ‘I . . . well, I thought maybe you did, Papa. At least you’re working.’

  ‘If you could call it that. In reality, I meet and greet clients – take them out for lunches and dinners and make them feel loved – while it’s my big brother Victor who makes all the deals. I’m just the charming sidekick. And don’t forget, times have been harder since the Crash.’

  ‘I guess the bank survived, didn’t it? We still have enough money, don’t we?’

  ‘Yes, but you must understand that our household continues to run as it always has because of your mother’s inherited wealth, not mine. I understand your frustration, but nothing is perfect – life is a challenge to be faced, so we must simply make the best of it. And at least when you are married and run a household, you’ll be able to immediately spot any of your staff who are trying to pull the wool over your eyes,’ he smiled. ‘You are destined to be a wife, and I am destined to have to stand by Victor’s side and watch as he steers our family bank towards ruin. Now, if you’re finished, I shall send for Mary to bring in the dessert.’

  As one grey day passed into another, Cecily thought a lot about the unusually honest conversation she’d had with her father. She had subsequently realised that he felt emasculated by his far wealthier wife. Their grand house on Fifth Avenue had been inherited by Dorothea from Cecily’s maternal grandfather, after whom Cecily had been named. Cecil H. Homer had been one of the first to manufacture toothpaste on an industrial scale in America and had subsequently made a fortune. His wife, Jacqueline, had divorced Cecil when Dorothea was just a child, citing ‘desertion’ on the legal papers – which, her mother always chuckled, in reality meant her father had deserted Jacqueline for a long slim tube of minty white cream rather than another woman. Thirteen-year-old Dorothea had been the sole heir to her father’s fortune when he’d died of a heart attack at his desk, and at twenty-one, she had become the legal owner of the Fifth Avenue house, plus a large estate in the Hamptons and a raft of cash deposits and overseas investments.

  Marriage to Walter Huntley-Morgan had followed soon after – Walter had an excellent lineage, but it had fallen to his elder brother to run the family’s bank while her father came in ‘a good second’, as he wistfully put it.

  But however much she tried to reason with herself that her father was right, that life was a challenge to be faced, all she knew was that she didn’t have a challenge, and she thought she might go mad wit
h boredom. She was also aware of the fact that even in darkest January, there was always something going on in her New York circle, yet not a single invitation for a lunch or an afternoon tea had arrived on the silver plate in the hallway. And looking through the society section of the New York Times, she eventually surmised why: it was unthinkable that an ex-fiancée and a current one could be invited to the same gatherings, and Patricia Ogden-Forbes had superseded her in the circle’s affections. Even her closest friends seemed to have abandoned her.

  One afternoon, Cecily took a nip of bourbon from the decanter on the sideboard in the drawing room, then put a call through to her oldest and closest friend, Charlotte Amery. Having spoken to the housekeeper, who then went away to find Charlotte, she was informed that her friend was ‘otherwise engaged’.

  ‘But it’s urgent!’ she said. ‘Please tell her to return my call as soon as possible.’

  Another two hours passed before their housekeeper Mary told her that Charlotte was on the line for her.

  ‘Hi, Charlotte, how are you?’

  ‘I’m good, honey. How are you?’

  ‘Well, you know, dumped by my handsome fiancé, possible war in Europe,’ she chuckled.

  ‘Oh Cecily, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Jeez! I was only making a joke, Charlotte. I’m fine, really.’

  ‘Oh, I’m so glad. It must be hard for you with Jack and all.’

  ‘Well, it’s not the best situation, no, but hey, I still breathe. I was thinking I hadn’t heard from you in a while. How about we get together tomorrow? Treat ourselves to high tea at the Plaza. The scones there are the best in town.’

  ‘Oh, I’m afraid I can’t. Rosemary is having a little get-together at her place. Apparently, her English friend is over to stay for a while, and we’re all going to learn how to play bridge!’

  Cecily swallowed hard. Rosemary Ellis was without a doubt the society queen of their generation, and up to now had been a friend of Cecily’s.