Envy: A Luxe Novel Part 9

"Well, give it to my maid, then," she replied brusquely, as if she were in the habit of receiving late-night telegrams, before moving back toward Leland. He waited for her beside the white latticework on the far side of the dance floor, which protected the guests from the view of the inner workings of the kitchen. There was a real grapevine climbing up it-Carolina had surrept.i.tiously checked earlier in the evening.

"I did." The man paused, and there was something terrible in the way he hesitated over his next words. "She said that you should be summoned at once. She said you would want to respond immediately. Our correspondence room, where you may want to avail yourself of our telegraph, is on the first floor, just past the-"

A thousand harsh words for this man brimmed in her throat, but somehow none rose off her tongue. Carolina knew that the disappointment of being taken away from the center of things was humiliatingly obvious in her face, although when she looked at Leland she did attempt a brave smile. "I'm sure it's nothing," she managed.

"I hope so." Leland's features were so full of kindness that she could not look at them. "Do you want me to accompany you?" he offered.

Whatever the news, some instinct told her that Leland must not hear it. She shook her head and turned to the man with the bow tie, who led her away from the dance floor, where everyone worth knowing and everything worth seeing would continue to go on without her. As she stepped back into the main lobby of the hotel, she looked at the elaborate pattern of the carpet and felt the horrible tightness of her high-heeled slippers with the little gold crests on the toe.

The correspondence room was all polished oak and gadgetry edged in gold. It was well, almost harshly, lit, and Carolina felt ungainly again beside the fastidious little man. He handed her the telegram, and for a moment she wished that she could hand it back and make it untrue. She wished she could return to the ballroom and go on dancing with Leland forever. But there was nothing that could undo the finality of what she read: THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

TO: Carolina Broad ARRIVED AT: 25 The Royal Poinciana,

Palm Beach, Florida

2:00 a.m., Sunday, February 18, 1900

Carey Lewis Longhorn dead this evening after a short illness. His final request was your presence at his funeral-You must return to New York posthaste-I have purchased tickets for you and maid on the train 12 p.m. tomorrow-Upon arrival, discontinue her services.

Yours, Morris James, Esq.

Chief Executor of the Longhorn Estate

Carolina closed her eyes and folded the telegram. A long, cold shudder pa.s.sed through her body. The events of the day, in all its illuminated perfection, seemed very far away now, but she couldn't help but realize what awfulness had pa.s.sed while she was thinking highly of herself and das.h.i.+ng around in horseless carriages. Her memory was overwhelmed by the image of him, on the docks that day, and how very much he had wanted her to stay.

Then, just as quickly, her sadness gave way to another emotion. It seemed impossible that Longhorn could have expired so quickly, and for a moment she was angry that no one warned her of the possibility. But there was no one to blame, and no matter how her heart yearned for it, nothing Leland could do to save her from this. She tried to look as high and mighty as before, and told the man in the bow tie that she would need tea in her room, as there would be much packing to do.

Twenty Five Men talk themselves into all kinds of trouble at the card table-that is the true reason that real ladies do not go to such places, ever.

-MRS. L. A. M. BRECKINRIDGE, THE LAWS OF BEING IN WELL-MANNERED CIRCLES T HE MUSIC OF THE ORCHESTRA COULD STILL BE heard in the little casino that was adjacent to the ballroom, and though the decorations were all of cheery, sporting green and white, the dark-suited men who crowded the tables gave it quite a different effect. They all had at least one thing in common, which was that they had had enough of dancing. Though for Henry, who bent to slap away some of the sand that still clung to his trousers, dancing was the least of the reasons he wanted to escape.

"Brother!"

Henry's eyebrows lifted, and the rest of him followed shortly thereafter. Grayson Hayes was sitting at a card table, and at some point in the last two hours his bow tie had come undone and his jacket had disappeared. There had been several hours that afternoon when Henry had hated nothing in the world as he hated Grayson, for he'd been flirting with Diana endlessly-Henry's Diana-and she had at times seemed to return his attentions. But he liked the man a little better as he was now-far from any women, his heart racing over a game instead of a fine figure.

Henry signaled to a pa.s.sing waiter for a drink, and then pulled up a chair.

"Could you lend me twenty?" Grayson asked.

Henry couldn't help the droll smile that played at the edges of his mouth. He waited a moment before nodding to the dealer. "Charge it to my room," he said, and then fresh chips were produced. There was some fatigue beginning to show under Grayson's eyes, but the attentive hunch of his shoulders suggested he was many hours from bedtime yet. Henry crossed his legs and lit a cigarette.

"Where's Penny?" Grayson asked presently.

"I don't know." Henry had left her on the dance floor, but he was too consumed with the image of Diana half-drenched, her clavicles exposed in the moonlight, the silk sleeves of her dress clinging to the arms that had once hung around his neck so joyously. Henry's characteristic pose was one of stylish indifference, and he doubtless still looked like that now as he exhaled contemplatively. But he was, in truth, full of fire.

"She's smiling and explaining away your absence now, but she'll have your head later," Grayson said. "Oh, boy, drink up. I wouldn't want to be you tomorrow."

Henry's drink had arrived, and-knowing this last bit to be true-he took a healthy sip. "Who cares?" he muttered.

To his surprise, Grayson chuckled. "And she used to be such a sweet girl."

"Oh, I only meant-"

"Don't worry, Schoonmaker. And don't think I don't know she sometimes likes to pull the strings like some puppet master from h.e.l.l." The hand ended, but Grayson's eyes had lost none of their animal quality. "Could you lend me another twenty?"

Henry waved his cigarette at the dealer in confirmation and finished his drink. He tried to discern the waiter, out there amongst all the other men in black and white, in order to request another drink. But the waiter had already seen him and was on his way, and after Henry had taken a sip of the fresh Scotch he felt loose enough to prod a bit.

"You seem awfully fond of Diana Holland."

Grayson was distracted by his hand, and Henry experienced a terrible moment when his words hung in the air without hope of a response. Eventually his brother-in-law looked over, revealing a sparkle in his eye. "She embodies all varieties of feminine beauty," he said, taking a cigarette from the box that Henry had left on the edge of the table and placing it for a moment between his broad front teeth. "She is perfection in a woman."

Henry's mind's eye filled, briefly, with the chaos that would ensue if he struck his brother-in-law across the jaw.

But then Grayson continued: "Her mother must have been strenuous in raising her, though. There's a door no man can crack. She's quite young, quite naive, more protected even than her sister. I can't get so much as a kiss on the cheek out of her."

Henry's shoulders relaxed, and in celebration of this news he drained the contents of his st.u.r.dy gla.s.s. He circled his finger in the general direction of the waiter, indicating that he wanted drinks for his friend and himself as well. He knew that he should abandon the conversation there and then, but Diana was everywhere in his thoughts and on his tongue. "She is lovely..." he continued, almost to himself.

"Ah!" Grayson looked up at the ceiling fans and smiled to himself. "That pink skin. Those dreamy lashes."

Henry closed his eyes, and imagined the sweet, petulant woundedness with which she had stared at him on the beach. He felt a little proud that she could love him. "And she moves so gorgeously."

"I tell you, Schoonmaker, she doesn't know what she has. That's the heart of it. She's like some wild creature who hasn't a clue the worth of its coat." Grayson paused to up his bet and then a.s.sumed a philosophical tone. "Whoever wins her in the end will be a lucky man indeed."

More drinks arrived, and the colors in the room grew both brighter and less distinct for Henry. Grayson became engrossed in cards again, and asked to borrow more money, but the last thing he'd said about Diana had lodged itself in Henry's head and begun to put down roots. He lit another cigarette and thought on it, and also on his promise to her, and how he would keep it.

The arrangement of the furniture in the best suite in the Royal Poinciana had never seemed so treacherous. It was all blurry, low-lying forms, although the moonlight did glaze the tiled floor. Henry's eye followed the glittering reflection to the French doors, which were thrown open onto the terrace. The silvery trail ended in a fluted skirt of white chiffon dotted with black that was cinched at the waist and then spread over the bust and up to the shoulders dramatically, where the fabric was gathered with black ribbons. His wife was still wearing her long black gloves, although they had slipped somewhat at the elbows, and she had put all the weight of her long body against the voluptuous carved wood bal.u.s.trade.

The sky was turning from purple to navy, and beyond Penelope the tops of the palms were just visible, like the unkempt heads of giants. The moon above her had grown hazy under the clouds, but still it glinted in her hair and on her bracelets. He hated her then, not just for having cost him so much, not just for all the hypocrisy and vanity and stupid greed she embodied, but because he had returned to her, even now, when all his being wanted to be elsewhere. He looked at her back-for she showed no signs of turning toward him-and imagined all the ways he might tell her he would leave. But his tongue was as useless as some mud-bound carriage.

Out on the terrace, Penelope remained still, except that she bent her ear toward her shoulder-it seemed to him that no gesture had ever contained such malicious self-possession. His mouth did open once or twice, but his anger had grown and sat in the way of words.

Now his feet were carrying him across the floor, his conscious mind trailing a few beats behind his heavy, drunken footsteps. He had seen how easy it would be. Without any words he could sidestep all the messy legal entanglements, all the cutting judgments of society. His wife was leaning carelessly there, four stories above the gravel walk, and if she leaned too far-trying to catch a glimpse of Lady Dagmall-Lister's bejeweled coiffure, say, or the flight of a parrot from one low branch to another-then she might stumble, lose balance, and fall to her death. Her neck would snap in painless seconds, and then she would have no way of preventing her husband from finally being with the girl he truly loved. The girl who was somewhere in those hundreds of rooms, believing his promise...

Henry had traveled across the room with forceful speed, removing his jacket as he did and dropping it on the tiles, but something stopped him at the threshold of the terrace. The warm outside air met him like a thick, damp curtain, and Penelope twisted to look at him. Her bottom lip quivered and the corners of her eyes turned down in sorrow. She watched him, and he watched her, and then he knew that the danger had pa.s.sed. She had seen the idea in him, and now he recognized the full horror of it reflected in her eyes.

Henry gripped the doorframe, unsteady and panting a little, shocked by what he had discovered himself to be nearly capable of. The rich fabric of her dress was contorted around her long body, and even in the darkness she had the appearance of a woman who had seen too much.

Time pa.s.sed, and then she said, "I don't blame you for wanting to kill me."

Her head swayed away, as heavy on her long neck as overripe fruit. A few of the short dark hairs on the back of her neck floated down, away from her coiffure and toward the clasp of the diamond and onyx necklace that she had had to buy for herself as a wedding present. Below them women in evening wear and festooned hairpieces were teetering through the Coconut Grove, a little worse for drinking, laughing just slightly too loud in response to the sweet lies of suitors who were growing generous with the waxing of the moon. Her shoulders slumped, and she gave him an imploring look, as though she would rather he'd just go ahead and do it.

"Penelope"-his voice broke over the name-"I could never-"

"Oh, Henry," she sighed. "No one would blame you."

A few moments ago he would have agreed, but he'd climbed some great summit and descended into an unfamiliar valley since then. "It would be...I'm sorry."

But she did not seem to hear him. She put her hand farther back on the bal.u.s.trade, and leaned on it as though she were trying to better hear the faint music of the orchestra. Her position looked precarious, and he worried briefly that she might push herself over. He decided that he was close enough to stop her, but then he took a woozy step toward her and felt the floor wobble under his feet, and in the end nothing dramatic happened. She stood and gazed at Henry with those same aged eyes, and then she took a shaky breath and tried to smile bravely, once or twice, without ever quite succeeding.

"Well then," she said quietly. She moved back into the suite with woeful grace, leaving Henry alone on the terrace. He closed his eyes and allowed the relief of having not acted on that awful impulse to soften in him. His blood was still agitated about it, but he knew suddenly that he was very drunk, and that his already unreliable memory would soon subsume the incident into the realm of the forgotten.

He followed Penelope, although his pace was slower and less sure this time, all sorts of pathetic explanations sputtering in his head. Her hip rested on the edge of the bed, and her back was to him and bent forward in a poignant arch. He shuffled closer and sat down beside her, and when she still gave no acknowledgment of his presence, he put an awkward hand on her back. That was when he realized she was crying, for her body was just slightly racked by silent tears. He found he wanted nothing so much at that moment as to look into her face.

"Don't cry," he said. He had always felt unnerved when anyone cried, and since he was a child had been known to promise anything just to make somebody stop. But then she twisted around to face him and he saw the wetness already catching against her lower lashes.

There was something unbearable to him about seeing Penelope brought low, and to stop her from any more self-abnegations he put his mouth-so fragrant with drink-against hers. Neither moved for a long moment, and then she took his lower lip, very gently, between her teeth. He felt dizzy and charged with emotion. Then he pulled her against him, just as he had the summer they had spent together. His hands fluttered along her face and shoulders and down her back, where they began to undo her corset.

He had watched several corsets being removed over the years, but had never done the work himself. All the hooks and ribbons presented a complicated puzzle, but despite his drunkenness-or perhaps because of it-he proceeded with great, plodding care. When, finally, the layers fell down around her waist she gave him a mysterious smile. Was it shyness, or grat.i.tude, or some quality he had never seen before? The room was full of stars and Henry wondered for a moment if it hadn't come unmoored from the hotel and gone spinning off into the night. Then he told himself to smile back at her-he did so, a little sloppily, as he batted a leaf of hair back from his face-and moved to push her down into the sheets.

Twenty Six MANY OF OUR GUESTS LIKE TO DANCE.

QUITE LATE, AND FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE.

WE NOW HAVE OUR COBBLER SET UP.

ALL NIGHT LONG. HE IS STATIONED IN THE.

LOBBY, JUST BEYOND THE NEWSSTAND,.

AND ALL LADIES ARE ENCOURAGED TO DROP.

THEIR SLIPPERS THERE BEFORE THEY GO TO BED.

-THE MANAGEMENT,

ROYAL POINCIANA, PALM BEACH.

T HE WAVES WERE STILL BREAKING AGAINST THE sh.o.r.e, and over on the other side of Lake Worth, in West Palm Beach-the town that Henry Flagler had built for the help-everything had gone dark. But light still poured from the dance floor of the Royal Poinciana onto its manicured lawns. The hotel's guests were eating second suppers or howling in laughter or dancing far closer than they would have dreamed of doing in New York or Philadelphia or Was.h.i.+ngton, with partners they might not have considered in their regular lives. The music grew faster and some of the husbands snuck off to play cards at the adjacent casino. Then their wives started strutting with the waiters, and more bottles of wine were ordered. The first lavender fingerprints of dawn were visible on the horizon when Diana Holland looked around to make sure that the man who owned her heart was nowhere in sight.

"Did Mrs. Schoonmaker leave?" she asked the waiter with the pretty face and ample lips with whom she had danced the last few dances. She was in too good a mood not to dance, for she had seen her and Henry's whole life laid out in front of her, and it was going to be so lovely and intricate and fine.

"Does it matter?" The waiter grabbed her hand and twirled her back around so that she was facing him.

She laughed aridly and let her smile fade. But perhaps this recalibration of her att.i.tude toward him was too subtle, because he c.o.c.ked an eyebrow and went on looking at her as though she were a G.o.ddess come down from heaven on a cloud for his own personal delectation.

"I think she left a little while ago, by herself, with a sour expression on her face..." the boy said, catching his breath. Then he winked shamelessly.

Diana saw his intentions in a flash, and moved just aside of his approaching kiss. Then she yawned theatrically and let go of his hand.

"I'm so tired all of a sudden," she lied. Many of the other dancers were now retreating to the shadows of the room, and only a few wild-eyed guests were still flailing their limbs for all to see. It was a little improper, a small voice within her cautioned, to be up so late without a chaperone, and though she was proud of these touches of rebellion in herself, she wondered if caution might be the right path at this particular moment. But she was wearing a new dress, her skin was fresh and her heart full, and even now she didn't want to go to bed.

"Don't go." As he gazed at her, she couldn't help but acknowledge that it had been fun-and she was grateful that he had celebrated with her for a few hours. But her smiles were all for someone else, so she offered him a wan look and then slipped away.