Never Too Rich

by Judith Gould

  “Ah, but wait. It gets betterer and betterer. Here are the real lulus—at least for me. First, Antonio de Riscal himself is going to have to introduce my collection. He agreed to that long—very long—in advance.”

  “You’re kidding!” He was openmouthed now.

  “Of course, that was before he knew it would be me he’d be introducing. You mark my words, he won’t dare back out, not for this charitable cause. And second, although she doesn’t know it yet, Anouk, as chairperson, is going to have to wear one of the designer-in-question’s very own creations—in other words, mine! And she can’t very well refuse either. It’s the tradition of the show.”

  He roared laughter. “You’re something else, Eds!”

  “Oh, I try,” she said with a delighted expression, “I try.” “And I’d say you succeed.” He was still laughing as he picked up a tekka maki with his chopsticks. “Now, here. Before you forget to eat.” He held it out to her.

  Dutifully she opened her mouth, took it with her teeth, and chewed it slowly.

  “Like it?” he asked.

  “Love it.” She nodded enthusiastically.

  “Good.” He smiled. “I made these just for you.”

  “All by yourself?” She looked at him askance. “Or did you cheat and order out?”

  “They were made by my very own talented two hands.”

  She poised her chopsticks over the platter, trying to decide what to try next. She smiled over at him. “You know, you’ll make some lucky woman a wonderful husband someday.”

  Something flickered deep in his eyes. “Would that make her lucky,” he asked in a peculiar voice, “or me?”

  “Oh, her,” Edwina said at once. “Most definitely her.”

  He held her gaze. “Then you do consider yourself lucky?” he asked quietly.

  She was in the middle of reaching for a sea urchin. “I . . . I don’t think I understand.” She was sober, all her laughter suddenly gone.

  “Marry me, Eds,” he said quietly. “Make us both lucky.”

  Her arm jerked and her chopsticks dropped the urchin. “Don’t make jokes like that!” she scolded in a whisper.

  He stared at her for a long moment. “I’m not joking.”

  “Leo . . .” She cleared her throat and put the chopsticks down. “I really like you. In fact, I like you a lot. You know I do. But. . . but I hardly even know you. Everything about you seems to be . . . well, shrouded in mystery.”

  He shrugged. “There’s really not very much to know.”

  She smiled. “On the contrary. I’m sure there are layers and layers of mysteries to unravel.”

  “Does that mean you’re turning me down?”

  She held his gaze. “No,” she said with a thoughtful frown. “I’m not turning you down. Nor am I trying to kill a romantic evening. It’s just far too early in our relationship to consider taking such a plunge. I got married much too quickly once. If I go to the altar again, I want to be sure it’s for keeps.”

  “I love you,” he whispered. “And I love you for keeps.”

  Suddenly she needed a jolt of reality. Too much was happening, and much too fast. She needed time to think.

  “Why don’t you take me up to see the sculpture garden now?” she suggested.

  “All right. But let me get your coat. It’ll be very cold out, this high up. And you’d better take your shoes off. The stairs are treacherous.”

  She nodded and kicked off her heels.

  The see-through spiral stairs weren’t only treacherous—they were downright frightening. And it wasn’t just cold out—it was ice cold. And the wind was savage. It tore at her.

  She pulled her fur tightly around her.

  The sculpture garden was enormous—the entire roof of the building. Underfoot, it was a sea of smooth, water-rounded pebbles. And, dotted all around, were the sculptures.

  Maillots and Rodins and Henry Moores and Arps, each carefully lit so that they appeared to be floating mysteriously above the darkness. And beyond, the glittering towers of Manhattan rose up into the velvety night, the bridges over the East River strung with swagged necklaces of light.

  “It’s beautiful, Leo!” she breathed. “My God! You’ve got a museum up here! And the view! Oh, my God!” Suddenly she clutched him for dear life.

  “What is it?”

  She pointed. They were standing near the edge of the roof, and she’d suddenly realized that there was no brick wall or metal railing. There was . . . nothing! The roof just dropped off.

  “Leo . . .” she said weakly.

  “If you look closer, you’ll see that there is a railing.”

  She looked. So there was—not that it helped much. The waist-high clear glass wall gave the impression that there was no barrier at all.

  “Don’t worry,” he told her. “It’s quite safe. They used a specially processed glass. See?” He shook it, and it didn’t so much as quiver.

  She leaned forward, found herself swaying, and jerked abruptly back.

  He caught her. “Are you all right?” he asked with immediate concern.

  She threw her arms around his neck. “I’m getting sick!” she whispered. “I hate heights!”

  It was as if he hadn’t heard. He was staring transfixed out at the city. “Look at all the lights, Eds!” He gestured with his hand at the jewel box of buildings spread out on all sides. “Do you know what all that is?”

  “Yes,” she croaked, burying her face in the safety and warmth of his chest. She didn’t want to look, couldn’t look.

  “It’s Manhattan, Eds! The center of the universe!”

  She nodded.

  “Just stick with me, Eds, and all that can be yours.”

  Despite her dizziness, she opened her eyes and stared up at him. “You sound as if you’re the devil tempting me!”

  He threw back his head and roared laughter into the wind.

  “Can we . . . can we go back in now? It’s awfully cold out.”

  “Sure. I didn’t realize you were frightened of heights.” He embraced her gently and kissed her.

  Suddenly she no longer felt cold. It was as if the icy wind had turned deliciously warm.

  “Let’s make love, Leo!” she said huskily. “Let’s go downstairs and celebrate life!”

  Slowly he pulled away from her. “No,” he said quietly, shaking his head. “Not yet. You see, I’m a great believer in sex after marriage.”

  Chapter 60

  “The bitches!” Anouk de Riscal screamed. She flung the copy of Women’s Wear Daily across the breakfast room in an uncharacteristic fit of rage. “The ungrateful, miserable, plague-ridden bitches! Of all the low-down, dirty stabs in the back—and to have to learn about it by reading it in Women’s Wear Daily They couldn’t tell me! Oh, the humiliation, Antonio! And to think that I’m the chairperson of the Showhouse Committee and they voted on this behind my back!”

  “Calm down, darling, what is done is done,” Antonio said soothingly, sipping his morning coffee while running his eyes down the stock-market quotations in his folded-over Wall Street Journal. “If you hadn’t gone to Switzerland for those sheep-cell injections, you would have had a say in the matter. Anyway, it really is not worth getting so worked up over.”

  “Not worth . . .” Anouk nearly choked. She leaned across the table, her eyes huge and black and furious. “They’ve humiliated us, Antonio! They’ve humiliated you! Not only have we lost hundreds of thousands in free advertising ...” She slammed her palm down on the table with such force that the crockery and cutlery jumped. “But think of the lost prestige! I really do not know how I can face anyone after this, I really truly do not.”

  “Anouk, you know you can. You are not so easily defeated, not by anything.”

  “May I remind you, dear heart, that the Southampton Showhouse is not just anything?” She sat there fuming. “To think that those twits on the committee actually chose that painted monkey Edwina over you for the opening-night fashion show! That is the last, the very last straw.
” She sat back and glowered. “I have a good mind to resign my chairmanship—after wringing the scrawny necks of those mummified committee members!”

  “And languish in some lesbian-infested prison?” Antonio laughed. “Darling, that’s as close to heaven as you’d ever get.”

  “This is not a joking matter!” She drummed her magenta nails on the tabletop. “I tell you, Antonio, I shall not go to that opening, and neither will you. We’ll refuse. Yes! In fact, I’ll tell everyone we know to boycott it!”

  “I’m afraid they won’t listen to you, darling. You know the showhouse opening is always the social event of the Southampton season. Besides, even we can’t refuse to go. Every woman who will be there buys tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of my gowns and dresses every year. You know as well as I that we can’t afford to make enemies of them.”

  “As if they were friends!” Anouk snapped. “I am telling you, Antonio, we will never be able to live this down. Make no mistake about it: those hags on the committee have done this quite intentionally to embarrass us.”

  “Whether they did it deliberately or not, it is done,” he said pacifically, “so it’s water under the bridge. At any rate, I don’t have a monopoly on giving charity fashion shows. Who knows? Perhaps Edwina really does have talent.”

  “Edwina!” Anouk scoffed derisively. “Ha!”

  Antonio shrugged. “You have to admit she must be doing something right. Maybe it was a mistake not to give her Rubio’s job.”

  Anouk’s eyes narrowed to slits. “And whose fault was that, may I ask?” she hissed. “Did Doris Bucklin walk in on me getting screwed?”

  Blushing guiltily, Antonio quickly poked his nose back into the newspaper.

  Anouk reached for the sterling Georgian coffeepot and with quivering hands poured herself half a cup. “Maybe Ms. E. G. Robinson has scored a coup this time,” she said tightly, setting the pot back down with a decided bang, “but she’ll soon learn that no matter how much talent she thinks she has, in this city there was, is, and will be room for only one Antonio de Riscal!”

  Antonio lowered the newspaper and smiled across the table. “You always were my most loyal supporter, Anouk,” he said gently.

  It was as if she didn’t hear him. “It wouldn’t have been half so bad if they had chosen Adolfo or Pauline Trigère or Oscar de la Renta,” she went on, unable to drop the subject. “But Edwina! That hurts, Antonio. That hurts immensely. And to think that she probably learned all there is to know from you. That is the single worst blow of all. No, Antonio, I am adamant. We will not go to that showhouse opening.” She lifted the coffee cup to her lips.

  Banstead appeared at the door and cleared his throat discreetly. “Excuse me, madam,” he intoned gravely, looking carefully into space.

  Anouk put her cup down crossly. “What is it, Banstead?” she asked testily.

  “Mr. Leo Flood is on the telephone, madam.”

  Anouk froze into a statue of incredulous disbelief. Leo Flood was calling? Leo Flood, who was backing Edwina? The nerve! The unmitigated gall!

  Abruptly she came out of her state of suspended animation. Glowering, she jumped to her feet, grabbed the telephone off the sideboard, and snatched up the receiver. And suddenly, miraculously, her wrathful face smoothed. “Leo! Chéri,” she cooed sweetly. “How lovely to hear from you. To what do I owe the honor . . . Me—the master of ceremonies! But I thought surely you or Edwina . . . Oh, of course there’s no conflict of interest! Antonio’s and Edwina’s clothes are for entirely different markets! . . . I see. . . . Why, I’d love to, my sweet! I’d be truly honored! . . . Of course! And Antonio introducing her collection? He would adore it! I tell you what, darling! I promise to dress in my simplest— Wh-what? I’m to wear one of hers? . . . Y-yes . . . yes, I . . . I understand. You’re right, of course, the master of ceremonies should be an extension of the . . . the fashion show.” Anouk’s voice cracked on those last words. “No, I’m not upset, darling . . . yes, yes, Leo. . . . Ciao.” Anouk slammed the phone down and then stood there, her clenched fists blurring in the air.

  Antonio was alarmed. She looked as though she was going into a seizure. What escaped from her lips sounded very much like, “Rrrrrrrr . . .”

  “So I take it we are going to the showhouse opening after all,” he said calmly.

  “Oh darling!” Anouk moaned, dramatically knocking her clenched fists against her forehead. “What am I going to do?”

  “Darling! What’s wrong now?”

  “Insult’s been added to injury! Oh, Antonio, Antonio!” Anouk wailed. “I’m going to have to wear one of that bitch Edwina’s outfits! I’ll die, Antonio!”

  “Then refuse, darling.”

  She turned on him. “Refuse! Antonio, are you out of your mind? You know I can’t. Not with Leo Flood contributing tens of millions of dollars to charity every year. Charities on whose boards I sit. Charities for which I have to approach him for contributions. Oh, Antonio! I’ll die! I’ll simply die!”

  Chapter 61

  Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will.

  It did.

  In spades.

  The night before, April 14, the pipes on the floor above had burst, and the ceiling of Lydia Claussen Zehme’s Southampton Showhouse room was buckling—not to mention what the flood had done to the walls. The paint on the blue-painted paneling, completed just three days prior, was blistering and peeling.

  And it hadn’t been a two-coat paint job, either. It had required eight different layers of specially mixed colors, each one carefully sanded down before the next one had been applied.

  It had taken three weeks to complete.

  Now it was ruined.

  “I’ll have to get it stripped and make them do it all over again from scratch!” Lydia moaned. “This is the end! The last, the final straw!”

  “Calm down, darling,” Anouk said, sweeping in to survey the damage, cordless telephone in hand. “They have turned off the water, and the plumbers will be here mañana”

  “That’s not going to keep the paint on the walls!” Lydia wailed.

  Anouk turned her head and frowned. From out in the hall, heated voices were suddenly raised in anger.

  “Your people banged the hell out of my doorways!” a man was screeching. “Look at those chips! I think I’m going to faint!”

  “Stop!” another man replied.

  “I’ll kill you, you fruit! I’ll kill you with my goddamn bare hands!”

  “Oh, dear,” Anouk sighed. “Tempers are flaring.” She reached out and patted Lydia’s hand. “Excuse me a moment, darling. If I don’t intercede, our decorating friends will be stabbing one another with their curtain rods.”

  Boo Boo Lippincott came in just as Anouk went out. She made a face as a nearby marble saw screamed through stone. It really was enough to drive one crazy. Inside and out, workmen crawled all over the mansion like industrious ants on an anthill. The ear-splitting whirs of sanders, the screeches of saws, and the relentless pounding of hammers were unnerving. Worse were the noxious, nauseating smells of urethanes and oil paints.

  “Never again!” Lydia swore heatedly under her breath. “I’ve reached my limit! Boo Boo, the next time anyone mentions the words ‘designer showhouse,’ I’m taking off!” She tossed herself into a plastic-protected Regency chair and glowered. “For the hills!”

  “And I’ll be right behind you,” her partner said staunchly. “I’m through too. Who needs torture like this? Certainly not me.” She pulled up a chair beside Lydia’s.

  Lydia let out a shriek. “Will you put that chair right back where you found it?” She pointed a quivering finger toward the other side of the fireplace.

  “I’ll put it back,” Boo Boo said calmly. “But first, I’ve simply got to get off my feet. They’re positively killing me!”

  “Goddammit!” Lydia screamed, jumping to her feet. “Don’t you ever listen?”

  “Lighten up,” Boo Boo advised. “Why are you on my case? I didn’t cause the
leak.”

  “Put that chair back now!” Lydia ordered. “This is my room. Go rearrange things in your own!”

  Boo Boo looked at her silently. Then she got up and, without a word, pushed the chair back to where it had been.

  “Three inches to the right!” Lydia snapped, hands on her hips.

  Stoically Boo Boo placed the chair just so, and without a peep drew herself erect and left the room with dignity.

  A house painter lowering himself on tackles and pulleys floated into view outside one of the windows. Poking his head into the room, he saw Lydia and waved. “Hi, beautiful. Wanna date?” He mouthed an obscene kiss and waggled his tongue.

  Outraged, Lydia strode to the window and banged it shut.

  The painter retaliated by brushing a crude penis, complete with scrotum, on the glass.

  From outside one of the other windows, a shrill scream rent the air. “I quit!” a workman shouted. “You’re crazy, lady! You don’t like it, do it yourself!”

  “Bastard!” a woman’s voice shrieked. “Thieving bastard!”

  Lydia ground her teeth. The tense atmosphere of thirty-nine designers and their crews all working under the same roof was bringing out the worst in everybody.

  Never.

  Never again.

  The next time anybody whispered the word “showhouse,” she’d tell them just where to stick it.

  Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will.

  It did.

  In spades.

  For Edwina, it was like living inside a pressure cooker.

  Everything at Edwina G. was ultimately her responsibility—from the initial designs of each outfit, which had to fit within the overall mix-and-match concept of the Edwina G. “look,” to the finished products, which were contracted out to the manufacturers. Quality control, marketing, pricing, publicity, and guaranteeing the stores on-time delivery—all the balls were hers alone to juggle.