The Girl in White Gloves

by Kerri Maher

  Don’t be silly, she told herself, using a tissue to dab her eyes and nose, taking care not to disturb the powder and mascara. Then Oliver trotted up to her and barked for attention, and she was glad to laugh as she crouched down to pet him as he wagged his tail, though he tried to jump on her when she wouldn’t let him lick her face as she usually did. She was in this state of affectionate struggle with her dog when Rainier put his head around the door, which was ajar.

  “May I come in?” he asked.

  “Please do,” she said. “And would you close the door?”

  He whistled for Oliver and led him out before shutting the door and muffling the noise of the house. Then he crossed to her and took her hands in his, and when she glanced down, she saw the remarkable diamond ring he’d given her the night before. It was so large and sparkly she wanted to spend all day gazing at it, and yet she felt a simultaneous embarrassment at its size. With all her other jewelry, Grace had taken such care to wear only what was large and beautiful enough to convey taste, avoiding ostentation at all costs. But then, she’d always been single, and in her mind, single girls wore pearls. Married women wore diamonds, whatever Marilyn’s hit song might have said. Still, she wondered what Edith would say when she saw this Cartier diamond ring. Her mother had said, “It’s a good thing you’re tall enough to carry off something like that,” the jealousy in her tone crystal clear.

  “My darling,” Rainier said, “I want nothing more than to kiss you, but I fear I will be beaten by the woman who applied the color to your lips.”

  Grace laughed. “I think you’re probably right.”

  “Are you ready?” he asked.

  Grace heaved a great breath in and out. “As I’ll ever be. I’m much more excited to leave this circus behind and go with you to California.” Where I can work, and forget about some of this madness.

  “But surely another circus awaits us there?”

  “Yes and no. We’ll be photographed, of course, but there’s no harm in that because our engagement is public. And this is our main press conference, as everyone’s been told,” she said, gesturing down the stairs, where they’d soon be answering a score of the public’s most pressing questions, “so I hope everyone will be satisfied for a while.”

  “I hope so, too,” he said, “though I miss Monaco, where I can put more controls on this . . . this insanity.”

  “That sounds heavenly,” she agreed. To live in the palace—where they had agreed to live, officially, “as grown-ups at last,” Rainier had joked to Grace—was nothing short of a dream come true. She couldn’t wait for those thick fortress walls to insulate her and this man she loved from the hoopla that had plagued her since her film career had taken off.

  “You will make the most wonderful Princess,” he said, kissing her cheek lightly enough not to disturb her makeup; still, the heat of his breath and the scent of his fine cologne sent a shiver of longing right through her. “Girls everywhere will look up to you.”

  “I just hope our own daughters will,” she said, blushing at his suggestion. It really was a marvel that nothing he’d said had been less than perfect, almost as though he were reading from a script.

  He’d just opened his mouth to reply when someone from downstairs shouted “Showtime!” and someone else rapped purposefully on her bedroom door. “Gracie! It’s time!” Peggy. Even though her older sister wasn’t going to be part of the press conference, she was there to help direct traffic, and if necessary divert their father.

  Grace and Rainier gave each other Let’s get this over with looks, and sighed at precisely the same moment and in the same rhythm, and they both laughed. “Already we are growing alike,” Rainier commented, and the truth of this warmed Grace in her core. Hand in hand, they descended the stairs and let the cameraman tell them where to sit, nestled on a couch surrounded by Grace’s parents and Father Tucker. Then the reporters who’d been waiting outside came filing in and stood clustered around the lights and cameras, holding their pens and notepads at the ready.

  Soon the camera was rolling, and the list of vetted and rehearsed questions and answers rolled off everyone’s tongue, even her father’s. “Miss Kelly, what will be your first act as Princess?” I’m sure there won’t be a single first act, but that my duties will be many. I’ll discuss them with Prince Rainier, and we’ll decide together what will take priority. “Prince Rainier, aside from your beautiful bride here, what has been your favorite thing about America so far?” I appreciate how open the people of this country are. I have felt so welcome in the Kelly home, and in the home of their good friends the Austins. Even in New York, I found people in shops and on the street to be helpful and kind. “Mr. Kelly, how does it feel to have a son-in-law who’s a prince?” It’s a relief to know Grace is finally marrying a prince of a guy!

  Then one of the reporters asked a question that was off script: “Miss Kelly, when will you return to Hollywood? Your contract with MGM is only half-complete. Am I right?” Grace felt the blood rush from her cheeks into her toes. When she’d received the list of possible questions, she and Rainier had both crossed out every single one that had to do with her career, though they’d never discussed their reasons. She couldn’t imagine that discussing it now would do any good. After she produced an heir and a spare—she’d laughed to herself that she was in such a position at all—it would be an entirely different conversation. Silence was once again her best weapon.

  Now that the question had been posed, she felt Rainier tense next to her, saw him narrow his eyes and put his lower lip out very slightly, not in a pout but in an expression of determination. She laughed as if someone had just given her the nicest compliment, and she opened her mouth to say something polite but evasive, How kind of you to ask about my acting, but of course my wedding is foremost on my mind at the moment.

  But Rainier spoke first, his tone firm and annoyed: “The Princess of Monaco will have more important duties than moviemaking.”

  Grace kept her smile plastered on, though a terse reply rose into her throat: Wasn’t it moviemaking that brought me to you? But she swallowed it down like a too-big bite of holiday stuffing. Silence, Grace, she told herself. Arguing will get you nowhere. Glancing down at her lap, away from Rainier and the reporters and everything else, she saw her ring glittering up at her, an enormous kaleidoscope of light and promise.

  In the back of her mind, she made a note to pack up all her dolls and have them shipped to her new home in Monaco. She had a feeling she might need their stalwart company from time to time.

  * * *

  She let a day pass before she brought it up. How could she not, when every single friend who’d read the article had called to demand answers from her, none more vehemently than Rita, who said, “Grace, you’ve worked too hard to give up acting for any man.”

  “I don’t think of it as giving it up for a man,” said Grace, feeling she was making excuses just as she had her whole life about her father. It’s nothing! I’m fine. . . . “I think of it as prioritizing family. And anyway, he can’t be serious.”

  “You might want to consider the possibility that he is,” Rita warned.

  To tell the truth, what bothered her most of all was the memory of how her father had clapped Rainier on the back as soon as the director said, “That’s a wrap!”

  “Nice work, Rainier,” her father had said to her future husband. “Welcome to the family.”

  And her mother had said nothing at all about what had transpired during the interview.

  “Rainier,” Grace began hesitantly. They were in his room at the Waldorf Astoria, where he was packing a few things to take to Los Angeles.

  “Yes, my love,” he said distractedly, frowning down at his overfull briefcase. It was very like the Mark Cross bag from Rear Window, she thought piningly.

  “I haven’t wanted to mention this, but I feel . . . I must.” She’d hoped this would get his attention, bu
t he continued frowning into his case.

  “I wasn’t altogether happy with our answer to the question about my career yesterday.” Our answer, rather than the accusatory your.

  Rainier closed his eyes briefly as he sighed, then shut the case and came over to the bed, where she was reclining as casually as she could on her elbow. “My darling,” he said, sinking down next to her, “I was dissatisfied as well. Of course, they never should have asked the question to begin with, and they must have known that to do so would only cause trouble.”

  “It doesn’t need to cause trouble,” Grace said hopefully. She sat up on the bed and crossed her legs, because she was wearing trousers on this chilly January day.

  “The way I see it,” he said, picking up her fingers gently in his, “is that we ought to both come to this marriage clean. Our subjects do not need to be burdened by either of our pasts. We are making something new, you and I. We want different lives and families from the ones we came from. What better way to do that than to wipe our slates clean?”

  So many of these ideas appealed to her, and even echoed the very thoughts she’d been having about the pureness of her affection for him. And yet . . . she had the sense that the way he was using these ideas did not follow the same logic that she did. She felt suddenly befuddled, unsure what to say next.

  “I agree,” she said. Because after all, didn’t she? “Except I don’t want to make moviemaking sound completely unimportant. To do so would insult many people I hold dear.”

  “I would never want to insult those you love,” he said earnestly. “You must know that.”

  “I’m sure you wouldn’t but . . .” Good Lord, what was she trying to say? She felt she couldn’t say the essential thing, which was that she wanted to continue making movies because she knew he would not be able to agree to that now. She knew in her bones that she had to bide her time. He loved her so much, how could he ever stand in the way of her doing the very thing that made her who she was? She had to trust that love.

  She did trust it.

  She leaned over and kissed him on the lips and said, “Can you please just let me handle the answers to those questions from now on, should they come up? I’ll know how to deliver the message in a way my colleagues and friends will understand.”

  He kissed her back, then pulled away. “Be my guest,” he said. “I am more than happy to cede the floor to my beautiful bride.”

  They began kissing more deeply, and though she wasn’t entirely reassured by their conversation, his trust in her was enough. For now. Was there ever anything else than now anyway? She let herself be pulled back down to the bed and into his arms, where she felt loved and admired, and full of a purring anticipation about his every next move.

  * * *

  The holidays over, the weather in the northeast turned the iron gray and cold of midwinter. It was such a relief to wake up in her Hollywood hotel suite, and open her curtains to a blue sky that promised sunshine and warmth. Rainier had a room down the hall, for show. They had breakfast sent up every morning, and ate in companionable silence, buttering toast, pouring coffee, and trading newspaper sections until she had to prepare to leave for the studio. She felt positively bubbly with happiness, and couldn’t wait to get started on High Society, couldn’t wait to see Edith and Bing and Frank.

  All was hugs and kisses when she stepped onto the set—everyone from Bing to the makeup artists and seamstresses. Congratulations filled the air, and Bing even produced a bottle of Veuve Cliquot and popped the cork to a round of excited murmurs. He poured the fizz into flutes and topped each one off with orange juice, and when everyone had a glass, he raised his and said in his smooth crooner’s voice, “To Grace Kelly, the future Princess of Monaco. I hope you know you’ve never been anything less than a princess to us.”

  “Hear, hear!” everyone chimed in as they clinked their glasses together. The only thing missing from the moment was Edith. But maybe she wasn’t on set yet. Frank caught Grace’s left hand in his and gave the Cartier ring a long, hard look, then whistled. “Man alive, there’s nothing like seeing another man’s boulder on a woman’s finger to make a guy feel like a schmuck.”

  Grace laughed and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “You’re anything but a schmuck, Frank.”

  Not long after, Grace found Edith in her dressing room. “Edith!” she exclaimed, crossing the room to hug her friend. “You missed the champagne.”

  “It’s not my favorite before noon,” she said, unusually evasive, which put a hard lump into Grace’s chest.

  “Well,” Grace said with a gusty breath of excitement to show Edith there were no hard feelings—though she did sense that a fairy-godmother reference right now would be met with worse than the usual snarl. “What have you got for me to wear today?”

  All business, no bibbidi-bobbidi, Edith put Grace in a few possible outfits for Tracy Lord’s first scene in the movie, and decided on the camel pants and shirt. “Casual and rich. Very Newport cottage. And you should wear that,” she said, tapping a pencil on Grace’s ring.

  “You think?” The thought of wearing her engagement ring in the movie thrilled her.

  “I was going to borrow one from Tiffany’s, but they wouldn’t let us borrow anything even half that size. And Tracy’s supposed to be marrying something of a robber baron. Anyway, it will appear smaller on-screen.”

  The antipathy in her tone was unmistakable. Edith could get in a mood sometimes, like anyone else, but dressing her favorite actresses usually snapped her out of it. “Edith,” Grace said cautiously, “is everything all right?”

  Edith sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. She appeared to be mulling over her words carefully. The lump in Grace’s chest began to throb.

  “Is this really going to be your last movie, Grace?” Edith asked.

  “Of course not,” she replied.

  “Prince Rainier seemed quite sure that it would be. I read the interview.”

  Grace had been assiduously avoiding all newspapers and magazines just so she wouldn’t have to keep reading about that blasted interview. “Oh, come on, Edith. You know the papers make everything sound worse than it is.”

  “I believe the words that came out of his mouth were ‘The Princess of Monaco will have more important duties than moviemaking.’ How could anyone make that sound worse?”

  “He’ll change his mind, Edith.” How could he not? He fell in love with a movie star, not a hausfrau or a country club dilettante.

  Edith scrutinized her with more canniness than she had for any outfit. Then she said, “Grace, most men are used to getting what they want, without any argument from a woman. But Rainier was raised a prince. He is more conditioned than most to getting . . . full cooperation.”

  “He’s not like that, Edith, I promise. He listens to me. We want the same things.”

  “Does he listen to you when you want different things?”

  “Yes, of course,” Grace immediately replied, though once the words were out of her mouth, she realized how little they’d ever disagreed. Still . . . when they talked about the marriage contract, he’d listened to her. And he had said she could be the one to talk to the press about her career. And they wanted the same things, the important things, for the family they would make together, which was much more than she could say for the men in her past.

  “Good,” Edith replied. “So,” she said, her tone shifting into its more familiar firm but friendly notes, “let’s talk about your wedding dress. I already know it can’t be by me, because Dore’s going to order it for you and make MGM out to be the generous studio it’s anything but, so let me give you some tips for what to tell whomever they do hire. I’m putting in a word for Helen Rose.”

  Bibbidi-bobbidi.

  Everything felt right again. As Edith fussed over another batch of outfits, the strangest thought came to Grace’s mind: who would play Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin
Roof once the Broadway run was over, as Grace would no longer be available? If she had one regret in all this, it was that she wouldn’t be able to play Maggie in the movie; she’d wanted to play that role forever. I’ve wanted to be a wife and mother just as much, she told herself. And to a prince, at that! You’ve always wanted too much, she scolded herself. Be happy with what you have.

  Chapter 28

  If 1955 ended on the highest note possible, 1956 did not ring in well. In January, just as she was enjoying the making of her final film as Grace Kelly, and luxuriating in the warm sunshine and delicious West Coast meals with Rainier, her mother made the outrageous decision to give an exclusive five-part interview on “My Daughter Grace Kelly: Her Life and Romances” to the Hearst Corporation, which meant it would be printed in half the major newspapers in the country! Grace couldn’t remember ever being so angry.

  “Mother,” she screamed into the phone when the final installment came out, because she couldn’t contain her anger any longer, “you sound like an inexperienced psychologist! ‘Having achieved so much fame, Grace could not perhaps have found happiness with the boy around the corner,’” she read to her mother from the first article. “And you leave out the names of certain boyfriends out of respect for their privacy, but what about my privacy, Mother?!” She was practically choking on her own words now. Her entire body trembled with fury.