The Swans of Fifth Avenue

by Melanie Benjamin

  There had been no summit, however, when Babe decided to marry Bill.

  Tea, too, was a constant from the sisters’ youth; back in the big Cushing house in Brookline, their mother, Gogs, had introduced the ritual of afternoon tea, ostensibly for the family, but before long it became a salon of a sort, a place where the best and most socially desirable of the medical and academic communities could “drop in.” Every afternoon, a tempting assortment of tea and punch and finger sandwiches and pastries would be spread in the drawing room and a crush of people would arrive; the Cushing sisters grew up watching their mother preside over the tea table and flit among her guests, seeing to their every wish and comfort. Their father, however, rarely attended; he was always in surgery.

  The girls watched—and it wasn’t for amusement; Gogs insisted on their being involved in the preparations long before they were old enough to take part in these elegant soirees. They observed their mother see to every detail, no matter how small: the spotlessness of the aprons worn by the Irish servant girls, the ritualistic polishing of the silver, the placement of the cherries atop the pink-iced tea cakes.

  There would often be music, a harpist or a pianist, some Cambridge student hired for the day. Other homes, even in Boston during those playful years of the 1920s, early ’30s, might have also served cocktails in silver shakers accompanied by cheese biscuits, but not Gogs. She stuck to tradition: to bone china, English tea, lemon and sugar, clotted cream for the scones.

  Betsey Whitney, Minnie Fosburgh, and Babe Paley, then, were more than capable of hosting elaborate spreads in their own homes, and they often did, but why hide themselves away all the time? It was time for a sister summit, so naturally, they went to the Plaza, for their mother had raised them to be seen and admired.

  “I don’t believe Mother ever had tea outside her own drawing room, did she?” Betsey, who was not the eldest but acted it, inquired as she removed her gloves. She was a shorter version of Babe, with the same cheekbones, but her coloring was less vivid; her hair a lighter shade, her eyes not quite as dark, her skin not quite as creamy. But Betsey had the more regal air; she could manage to look down her nose at anyone, even if she were the smallest person in the room.

  Minnie, the eldest—and kindest, Babe always insisted—sister, shook her head. Minnie was the tallest, the most down-to-earth; she didn’t have Betsey’s imperiousness nor Babe’s uncertainty. She didn’t have their deep-set brown eyes, either, although she was the thinnest. She would have been gawky had she been anyone else’s daughter but Gogs’s.

  Babe smiled fondly. “No, Mama never did like to dine in public, did she? She always felt the best hospitality could be found at home.”

  A waiter handed Betsey—how did he know she was the leader? He simply did—a beautifully lettered menu, but she waved it away. “Champagne, and Darjeeling. An assortment of sandwiches and pastries, but no sponge cake—I can’t abide sponge cake. No onions on the sandwiches.” Then she turned back to her sisters as the waiter bowed and hurried away.

  “I like onions,” Minnie protested. Her cheeks flamed as she resumed an argument that had begun when she was ten and Betsey eight. “Just because you don’t doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t have them.”

  “Onions aren’t proper for ladies. Do you want your breath to offend? Didn’t Mama teach you anything?” Betsey shook her head and turned to Babe for backup.

  Babe wrinkled her nose. “I don’t like them, personally, but I don’t see why Minnie can’t have onions if she wants them.”

  “I didn’t see why Minnie had to divorce Vincent, either, but she did.” Betsey didn’t even look at her elder sister; it was as if she weren’t there.

  “Betsey, don’t start. I never wanted to marry Vincent in the first place. I don’t think he wanted to marry me. Gogs wanted it, and so, of course, it came off. I put up with him as long as I could, then I found him Brooke, who needed his money and name more than I did. And then he died, and so what? Who cares? Why did you divorce James, if we’re playing that game? Wasn’t a Roosevelt good enough for you?”

  “James didn’t want to be a father to his daughters. I was looking out for my girls, just as Mama always looked out for us. I’m a good mother, Minnie. Not that you’d know anything about that.” Betsey narrowed her eyes at her sister.

  “Oh, please!” Babe anxiously looked from sister to sister. “Girls, please! Not here! Mama would be distraught!”

  “Babe, we’re not making a scene,” Betsey scolded her little sister. “Our voices are perfectly normal. You worry too much, as usual. But let’s do change the subject. Tomorrow’s Truman’s party. Of course, we all know what we’re going to wear?”

  It was another rhetorical question; Betsey was fond of asking them. The sisters had coordinated their wardrobes weeks ago, just as they always did prior to a party. From their childhood friends’ birthday parties to Truman’s fabulous Black and White Ball—the divine Cushing sisters knew how to dress for maximum trio advantage. Babe always got the first pick, which Betsey had always begrudged but had never been able to change; the one thing, perhaps, in her life that she had not been able to bend to her will. After Babe made her selection, the other two had to somehow dress in a complementary yet unique fashion, with certain colors deemed special to one or the other. Babe was an angel in blue; that was a truth universally acknowledged. Actually, all jewel tones were hers. Betsey was often in black. Minnie didn’t care and, in fact, often simply asked Babe to find something for her to wear, which was a task Babe took great pride in, happy to be of help.

  When it came to jewelry, however, it was every sister for herself; Betsey had Whitney money, Minnie had Astor heirlooms. Babe had the most modern jewelry, custom-designed by newer artistes: Fulco di Verdura, Jean Schlumberger.

  “Well, we’re all in white, this time—so there’s no coordinating to do,” Minnie said with obvious relief. “Designers?”

  “I’m in a Castillo,” Babe offered, even though Betsey knew very well who she was wearing.

  “Dior,” Betsey replied.

  “Balmain,” Minnie offered as all three sisters nodded in approval of their choices.

  “Masks? I asked Halston to do mine,” said Betsey.

  “Same here.” Minnie pointed to herself.

  “I asked Adolfo—actually, I asked him to make three different versions, just in case,” Babe admitted, lowering her eyes modestly. “I provided him with some paste versions of my jewels, and he made up three different designs, and then I picked the one I liked best, and he added the real stones.”

  “Oh, Babe!” Minnie was so open in her admiration, her thin face glowed. “Oh, that’s just like you, darling!”

  “Yes, that was very smart of you,” Betsey admitted through gritted teeth.

  “You know me.” Babe shrugged, even as she was enjoying Betsey’s obvious jealousy. “I don’t like to leave much to chance. Mama taught me that, anyway.” There was a lull while the waiter rolled a trolley up to their table filled with delicate sandwiches the size of silver dollars, luscious sugared cookies, and iced cakes. Each sister smiled in approval, allowed her tea to be poured in her cup, but when the waiter was gone, not one sandwich, cookie, or cake was selected. The onion argument had been moot, after all.

  “What about Truman?” Betsey asked, moving the agenda along. “Are we certain he’s done everything right? Babe?”

  Babe stirred her tea slowly. “This is Truman’s party, Betsey, dear. Not ours. I do think you might have forgotten that.”

  “Yes, yes, but, well—Truman! He didn’t have the upbringing we did. And he’s relied on us, all three of us, so much in matters of taste. That new apartment, for instance—you and Minnie practically decorated it for him, didn’t you?”

  “We did advise,” Minnie said, uncrossing then crossing her long legs, clad in silk hosiery, although she wore unbecomingly flat, rather plain shoes, something Betsey never did approve of. Even if Minnie was self-conscious about her height, couldn’t she at least wear someth
ing stylish, like Babe? “It was quite fun, wasn’t it, Babe, darling? But I do wonder at all the rattlesnakes he chose—so many stuffed specimens. Too much like the Museum of Natural History.” Minnie shuddered.

  “I would say that’s an apt metaphor.” Betsey pursed her lips.

  “What do you mean by that?” Babe shot back.

  “Babe, dear, I simply mean that little Truman has a bit of a sting to him, don’t you think? Somewhat of a barbed way of looking at the world. Heaven knows he’s been divine to you, to all of us. But he’s not always that way to others. This whole party, really—I can’t help but think that he could have managed it better. Without quite so much publicity. Why, the Herald leaked the guest list. Leaked? How? Who gave it to them? And now everyone who wasn’t invited can’t claim that they were and turned it down. The world knows who was invited and, more important, who was not. That’s rather—bourgeois, don’t you think?”

  “Truman has a secretary, who sent the invitations out,” Babe said primly. “He wasn’t the only one with access to it.”

  “Babe, dear, your loyalty, as always, is touching.” Betsey’s lips curled up. “Let’s hope tomorrow night isn’t a disaster, because of course, people will assume we all had something to do with it, even if we didn’t. Especially you, Babe, as close as the two of you are.”

  “I don’t think we have to worry. He’ll pull it off brilliantly, I know.” Babe felt her cheeks flush, heard her voice rising ever so little, and so she sipped some tea and smoothed the skirt of her Chanel day suit. “I can’t wait to see what you’re wearing, Betsey, dear.” Babe smiled serenely at her older sister. “I know you described it to me, but I can’t wait to see you in person. Is Jock wearing a mask? I can’t get Bill to wear one!”

  “No, Jock won’t, either.”

  “Jim is!” Minnie beamed. “He’s spent weeks designing it himself!”

  “Naturally,” Betsey murmured with a significant look at Babe. “I’m not at all surprised, dear, to hear that.”

  “What do you think Gogs would say about the party?” Minnie mused. She had been her mother’s “problem” daughter; the two had clashed often in private, although in public Minnie generally conformed to her mother’s ideals. Betsey was so exactly like her mother that they had always been in agreement. Babe was too insecure ever to question her mother’s decrees, except for when she married Bill—that had been quite the time! Minnie grinned, remembering her mother’s utter disbelief that Babe, of all her daughters, would marry a Jew! “I often wonder how Mama’d feel about Truman,” Minnie wondered.

  “I hope she’d like him as much as we do,” Babe said quietly.

  “No, she wouldn’t,” pronounced Betsey the wise. “She wouldn’t have trusted him one bit. I can’t say that I’d blame her, either. But he is quite amusing. In small doses.”

  “Well, I do know that Mama would never have approved of all this publicity—photographers at a party! She must be writhing in her grave!—but secretly, she’d cut out all our photos and paste them in a scrapbook. And she’d demand to be shown our gowns beforehand; heavens, the idea of us dressing ourselves, at our age!” Minnie laughed fondly; she did miss the force of nature that had been her mother. Gogs, for all her prickliness, still had been the compass, the rudder, the sail; the very wind driving her girls toward the safe harbor of wealth and privilege. And it was safe, Minnie had to admit with a sigh. And she was a coward; she knew she’d never have made a good poor man’s wife. None of them would have. Well, maybe Babe.

  The pop of a champagne cork caused all three sisters to shift expectantly in their seats; Cristal was poured into their glasses, and Betsey raised hers first, to give the customary toast.

  “To Gogs!”

  “To Gogs,” her sisters repeated, and the glasses clinked, causing everyone in the palm-filled room to look, and gape, once more.

  Three beautiful women—the three fabulous Cushing sisters. Gracing the Plaza with their presence; granting their subjects a glimpse, laughing together, careless, privileged, so exquisite that it was impossible even to envy them. They were simply unattainable.

  Then the sisters drifted away, blowing air kisses, bestowing smiles of recognition to a chosen few as they made their way to their waiting limousines.

  After all, they must see to their gowns; they must try them on one last time, in case there were any unexpected tears or loose sequins. They must remember the code to the vault, so that they could retrieve their jewels. They must make sure their husbands had a good dinner, a perfect cigar, so that they were in such good moods, they might actually be persuaded to dance tomorrow night—or at least not mind if the sisters danced with other men. And then, of course, the sisters must also go to bed early, with cucumber slices on their eyes, special facial masks hydrating their skin.

  For hadn’t their mother told them always to get a good ten hours’ sleep the night before a party?

  CHAPTER 14

  …..

  The morning of the party, Kay Graham went to have her hair done. Normally she just had a plain shampoo and set, but she was growing worried. Truman had told her of the elaborate preparations being undertaken by some of his friends, the really elegant ones, the swans, he called them—Marella Agnelli, Slim Keith, Gloria Guinness, Babe Paley. Kay had met them all—in fact, had been introduced to Truman by Babe, who was so elegant, so perfect, that Kay always felt dowdy next to her, no matter how nice a dress she was wearing. But Kay was simply missing that elegant, stylish gene, and she knew it, and besides, in Washington that didn’t matter so much.

  But in New York, it did, and tonight she was going to be on display—“Darling, you must look divine! All the newspapers will be sending photographers! Television networks, too! All eyes will be on you, my darling, precious Kay!”

  Truman meant to be kind, she knew. He was excited for her. But his words filled Kay with despair, that familiar self-doubt. Frankly, she wished she could just stay in her hotel suite at the Plaza and watch television or read a book.

  But she couldn’t, and so, taking a deep breath, she grabbed her purse and ran out of the Plaza in her plain clothes—a cotton dress, low-heeled pumps. She hadn’t put any makeup on, as she normally didn’t wear any. She did plan to wear something—mascara, lipstick—tonight.

  Grabbing a cab, she repeated the address given to her by Truman himself; in fact, he had set the appointment for her. “Kay, gorgeous lady, you have to see Kenneth. He’s the one, the only one.”

  And certainly Kay had heard of Kenneth; after all, she knew the Kennedys when they were in the White House, and Kenneth styled Jackie’s hair. So, of course, Kay guessed that Kenneth’s might be a little busy today, the day of her party.

  But nothing prepared her for the crush in front of the place. Nothing prepared her for the place at all, really; her salon in Washington was small, utilitarian, on the top floor of a retail building.

  “Is this it?” Kay asked the cabbie, who shrugged and thrust out his hand for the fare. She paid it, got out of the cab, and couldn’t prevent herself from simply stopping, and gaping, like the tourist she was.

  For in front of an enormous limestone townhouse, a stunning building with columns and pediments and majestic windows and a festive yellow-and-black awning in front, was a line of limousines, Town Cars, and cabs. She wondered if the president himself might be here, for in Washington, the only time you saw a crush like this was when the president or vice president was out and about, trailed by the Secret Service.

  There wasn’t a lot of honking; the drivers seemed patient enough, willing to wait. And emerging from the awning, popping out like BBs from a toy gun, were women. Gorgeous, stylish women far better dressed than she was, in designer dresses and furs; Kay immediately folded her arms across her chest, ashamed of her plain shift dress and cloth coat, acutely aware of her lack of jewelry and makeup. And on the heads of these women were concoctions worthy of Marie Antoinette: piles and piles of hair, most of it fake, bedecked with ribbons or feathers or jewels
or sometimes all three. Walking with their necks stiff, their coiffures somewhat protected from the wind and drizzle of a late-autumn morning by loose-fitting plastic scarves and hoods, nevertheless each woman hurried to her waiting car, and the parade moved on. And on, and on; the line of black cars was endless.

  Kay ducked her head and ran across the street, under the awning, and made her way through giant wrought-iron doors. Inside, she had to stop once more and take it all in, for she wasn’t in a hair salon at all and wondered if she’d gotten the address wrong. She was in a mansion; a candy fantasy of a mansion with a grand staircase, polished floors from another, more opulent era—but the walls were papered in bright contemporary patterns of flowers and trellis, and around every corner Kay could spy cozy little nooks with ornately tented ceilings providing privacy, Turkish stools on which little manicurists perched, antique chairs, chandeliers, endless halls and rooms.

  Climbing the stairs slowly, her hand on the railing, Kay tried not to be run over by manicurists and stylists charging up and down, their faces tense, perspiration on their brows, scissors and nail files bristling in their pockets. When she got to the top of the stairs, she gave her name to a frazzled-looking receptionist, who paged rapidly through a thick book.

  “Graham? Graham?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Katharine Graham.”

  “Right. We have you with Marco, one of our new stylists. May I take your coat?” And the young woman frowned at Kay’s worn tweed coat.

  “Thank you.” Kay handed it to her, and once again felt ashamed of her plainness. For even the receptionist was dressed better than she was, in a gorgeous pink dress, her hair done up in the new fashionable bubble style, pin curls tickling her etched cheekbones.

  “Come this way, please, Mrs. Graham.” Another, equally stylish young woman, with false eyelashes as thick as caterpillars, was beckoning Kay up another flight of stairs. “Are you going to the party tonight? Truman’s party? We’re so busy!”