School of Fortune

by Amanda Brown

  In most respects, Rosimund thought, Lance could not have chosen a better wife than Pippa Walker. She was his social equal, not some gold-digging tart. Pippa would produce gorgeous children. She was loyal to a fault: look at her devotion to Thayne. Rosimund only wished that Pippa had finished college and had some sort of career that she could give up for Lance. He was not terribly forthcoming about why she had not graduated from SMU. The rumor mill hinted that Pippa had followed some sort of Marxist auteur to Prague; Lance assured his mother that this sordid episode in his fiancee’s life was over and not as bad as she had been led to believe. He had even gone on to suggest that he, too, had had a few episodes in his life that Rosimund would not be thrilled to hear about. She had dropped the subject there and then.

  Upon reflection Rosimund had to admit that she had no problem with Pippa. It was Pippa’s mother who seriously threatened her peace of mind. Furthermore, no amount of money in the bank could erase the blot Dallas from the Walker pedigree. It was always, and would forever remain, downscale to Houston. Although the Walkers had struck oil a mere twenty years after the Hendersons, Rosimund considered Thayne nouveau riche. In fact, Rosimund had detected symptoms of lowerclassitis as soon as Lance had announced his engagement last Christmas. She had phoned a discreet inquiry to Dallas’s finest hotel, the Mansion on Turtle Creek, only to be informed that Thayne had booked the upper four floors of the hotel just an hour before! Rosimund had immediately summoned Lance to her chambers and asked if he absolutely wanted to go through with this marriage. Truth be told, he had proposed to Pippa not one month after the girl had returned in disgrace from Prague. For a moment Rosimund thought she saw a flash of terror in her son’s eyes. Then he had said, “Mother, it’s what I want more than anything in the world.”

  For the next six months Rosimund could only watch helplessly as Thayne created an extravaganza meant to delude people from Houston into thinking that people from Dallas were their equals. For Lance’s sake Rosimund maintained icily cordial relations with her co-grandmother-to-be. However, she missed no opportunity to discreetly obstruct or trump Thayne whenever possible.

  Like her idol Nancy Reagan, Rosimund wore nothing but red. She was also fond of astrology. After realizing with a shock that once Lance married Pippa he would be lost to her forever, Rosimund had sought the consolation of numerology. As luck would have it, not one week after her seer instructed her to avoid anything to do with the number ten, Thayne announced that there would be ten bridesmaids at the wedding. She hoped Rosimund would be able to produce ten groomsmen. Still smarting from the theft of all those hotel rooms, Rosimund had flatly refused. Her son would be attended by nine groomsmen and two pageboys. Little Arabella would be a flower girl. Thus war was declared.

  Six months later Rosimund still had no intention of attending a luncheon for ten bridesmaids. That would be like asking lightning to strike her in the head. She planned to call in sick at the last minute and was even practicing a demure cough when Thayne called to say that she’d be late.

  “Exactly how late?”

  Thayne could not answer with any degree of certainty: diarrhea was an affliction with its own timetable. “Hopefully not more than fifteen minutes. It depends on traffic.”

  Rosimund had let a damning silence elapse. “Please arrive as close to the scheduled hour as possible. As you may recall, I have a ball to oversee this evening.”

  “You never hired a planner?” Thayne crowed. “Good Lord! You’re doing all that grunt work yourself, Rosimund?”

  “My dear woman, an event as vital to me as my son’s rehearsal dinner is not something I would ever entrust to outside help. By the way, did you read the newspaper this morning?” There had been a lengthy article purporting that Rosimund’s rehearsal dinner cost as much as Thayne’s entire wedding.

  “No. Robert told me there was nothing of interest.” Thayne hung up.

  Annoyed that she had not been able to edge in the last word, Rosimund returned to the bed in her parlor suite, the largest room available to her after Thayne’s usurpation of the presidential, terrace, master, and executive suites. Across the bedspread Rosimund had arranged forty disks the size of dinner plates, each representing a table for tonight’s rehearsal dinner. She was attempting to distribute four hundred one-inch Velcro tabs, each inscribed with a guest’s name, ten to a table. Red tabs represented her friends, blue were Thayne’s, green were Pippa’s and Lance’s. Rosimund had been working on the seating plan for months and had yet to feel secure that the red tabs were arranged in slightly superior position to the blue tabs. Engrossed in place setting, she barely noticed an hour slip by. Her phone rang again.

  “I’m on my way.” Thayne felt no need to apologize.

  “Take your time. I’ve made other arrangements for lunch.” Rosimund hung up. Touché!

  After two hours of hell, she settled on the final seating configuration for the Henderson Ball, as she liked to call tonight’s rehearsal dinner. She phoned her majordomo, whom she had brought from Houston along with her entire household staff. “Harry? Is everything all right over there?”

  “Totally under control, madam.”

  In keeping with her numerologist’s reading of four as her lucky number, Rosimund’s ball would take place in four sumptuous climate-controlled tents that had been erected in Texas Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys. The Hendersons considered Texas Stadium “family” since Lance would be working there come September. “Send someone to my room for the seating chart. I’ve finally finished it.”

  “Right away, madam.”

  After carefully stacking the disks and their Velcro tabs on her desk, Rosimund ordered jumbo shrimp with dandelion greens from room service. She was famished and a bit exhausted. Her personal attendant would arrive at four to help her bathe and dress. Until then, she needed to rest. As she was wrapping herself in a red silk robe, Rosimund heard a soft knock on her door. “Pippa!” She had been expecting room service or, even better, her peerless son. “Please come in.”

  “Are you feeling better, ma’am? I brought some hot and sour soup.” While at the mall, Ginny had forced Pippa to consume a second lunch to replace the one she had just barfed.

  “How kind of you.” Robe fluttering about her long, slim legs, Rosimund took the tray into the living room. She moved with the grace of a purebred stallion; from certain angles her face even looked equine. No question Lance had inherited his athletic prowess from his mother. “I’m sorry to have missed the luncheon, Pippa. Perhaps in Dallas it is customary to make a respectable woman wait over an hour. In Houston it would be scandalous for me to keep the appointment after such an indelicacy.”

  “I see.” Pippa tucked yet another rule of Houston etiquette into her memory bank. “I’m afraid my mother was suffering a touch of jitters herself.”

  “Thayne may have bitten off more than she can chew, poor dear.” Rosimund opened the white carton. “This smells divine. Tell me about the luncheon.”

  Pippa related a few innocent highlights as Rosimund tucked into her soup. “The girls are so excited at meeting all those eligible bachelors.”

  Dallas hussies! “I do hope they will concentrate tonight. I fear this rehearsal will be extremely difficult to coordinate.”

  Pippa’s wedding was to take place in Meyerson Symphony Center. Workmen had constructed a marble-covered extension to the stage in order to accommodate the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and chorus, a bell choir, two brass quintets, the bridal parties, and last but not least, Pippa’s bridal train, a confection embossed with what Thayne claimed to be her family crest. When fully extended, the train occupied its own zip code. In an attempt to work out the complex logistics before the wedding rehearsal, Thayne and Wyeth had twice rented Meyerson, musicians, thirty-one actors, and tried a few dry runs. Wyeth had reached a peak of frustration when, even on the fifth go, the small army of attendants was still receding from the hall when the Hallelujah Chorus ran out of notes. He finally calculated that everyone had to walk at a pace of tw
enty-two inches per second in order to evacuate the auditorium by the time the brass quintets opened fire.

  “The bridesmaids have been practicing their paces for months,” Pippa said. “They should be able to march up and down that aisle in their sleep.”

  Rosimund smiled thinly. She had been young once herself. She knew that the moment the bridesmaids set their eyes on Lance’s retinue, all training would go out the window. “We shall see.”

  Room service appeared bearing Rosimund’s shrimp and dandelions. She ate that, too, with gusto: it would be eons before dinner and she had played two sets of tennis with Lance this morning. “Did the bridesmaids like my gift?” she asked, refilling her glass with Evian.

  “They loved the barrettes. Thank you so much.”

  “And Thayne’s gift? I hope they didn’t notice her pearls were smaller than mine.”

  “I didn’t see any calipers at the table.” Pippa waited until Rosimund finished her shrimp before asking, “How’s Lance holding up?” She and Ginny had never located him.

  “We had breakfast followed by tennis. I believe he’s off playing rugby now. I hope you will forgive me for taking him away from you today, Pippa. It was my last chance to have him all to myself.”

  “That’s perfectly all right.” Actually it was perfectly infuriating, but Pippa tried to put herself in Rosimund’s satin mules with the little red pompoms. “I’m sure I would only bore him with my tempests in a teapot.” She stood to leave. “I’ll be so glad when this wedding is all over.”

  Pippa burst into tears, surprising herself as much as her mother-in-law-to-be. Rosimund gathered her in her arms. “There there, dear. Courage!” Rosimund cursed Thayne for making Pippa’s nuptials a nightmare instead of a fairy tale. “Would you like me to call my nu-merologist? She’s excellent at jing luo massage.”

  “That’s okay,” Pippa sniffled. She needed Lance, not a massage. “I’m sorry to be bawling like this.”

  “I was exactly the same the day before my wedding.” Rosimund’s husband and his groomsmen had spent the day at the racetrack. “But I did what I had to do. And tomorrow so will you.”

  “I haven’t heard from Lance in days.”

  “My dear, that is completely normal. Between you and me, all men view marriage as half prison, half death sentence. You must not be simpering now. You must wait for Lance to come to you. Do not appear weak or he will despise you forever.”

  That sounded pretty asinine. “Who’s this groomsman Woody?”

  “My son’s physical therapist. He has a large clientele on Fifth Avenue. Why do you ask?”

  “He and Lance were shopping for cummerbunds this afternoon. That’s rather bizarre, seeing as the groomsmen already have them.”

  Rosimund’s eyes flared then went quickly still. “I asked them to purchase one for Harry, my majordomo,” she lied.

  “That’s such a relief. I was thinking much darker thoughts.”

  “Shame on you, dear.” Rosimund rose to her full six-foot-two height. “Now go make yourself beautiful for my boy. Thank you for the soup.”

  Pippa took the elevator upstairs. Stress was making her paranoid. Of course Rosimund would want her majordomo’s cummerbund to match the groomsmen’s. Of course Lance would want someone to go shopping with him. Of course Woody, a New Yorker, would have the most fashion sense.

  Her calm was momentary. As she opened the door of the presidential suite, Pippa heard Brent shriek, “You slut! How am I supposed to make that gopher fur into a French twist? How how HOW?”

  Pippa rushed inside. There stood Ginny, arms folded, calm as a Cheshire.cat while Brent ranted at her pixie. The hairdresser had had a trying afternoon. Repairing Kimberly’s split ends had put him an hour behind schedule. He had never imagined that she would be followed by six bridesmaids with long blond hair the texture of last winter’s hay. What was it with Texas girls and big blond hair? Farrah Fawcett and Linda Evans had been on the trash heap of hairdo history for almost two decades. And what was the attraction of having breasts as large as their heads? Physically and mentally these women were just one step away from mooing. He had been out of his mind to come to Dallas. To think that tomorrow he’d have to comb out the French twists and start over again!

  “Is this some sort of joke?” he shouted at Pippa. “Your mother’s going to pulverize me if I don’t get ten twists on that runway tonight.”

  The door swung open. In strode Thayne, dressed in a light blue cashmere suit with midnight-blue mink cuffs. Her sapphires sparkled. Her hair and makeup were perfect. Despite the maniacal glint in her eyes, she looked very attractive. “Are you ready for my comb-out, Brent?” Then she saw Ginny. “What in God’s name is that?”

  “I didn’t do it!” the frazzled hairdresser shrieked.

  Thayne sighed; the gods were lobbing nonstop catastrophe at her today. “You would have had plenty of attention as you were, Ginny. That hair will look ridiculous with a large barrette.” No one even tried to refute that. “You’re fired.”

  “No!” Pippa cried, grabbing the cell phone out of Thayne’s hands before she could call a replacement. “You can’t do that!”

  “I certainly can. We will not have a neo-Nazi in our entourage.”

  “Ginny goes, I go!” Pippa screamed. “This is my wedding, not yours!”

  Thayne stared at her daughter, mystified by the outburst. “Honey, are you having a bad day?”

  “Yes, I am having a Very. Bad. Day.” Pippa collapsed onto a presidential couch. “I should have stayed in Prague and become a ménage a quatre.”

  Brent rushed over with a box of chocolate kirsch bonbons. “Take three, sweetheart.” Last thing he needed was the bride going up in smoke: Thayne had only paid him fifty percent of his fee. “I have wigs,” he announced, pulling one from a trunk. “We’ll fix her in no time.”

  Ginny was not enthusiastic. “Sounds like I’m getting spayed.”

  “Humor us,” Thayne hissed.

  Did she have a choice? Ginny slid into the salon chair. “I’m doing this for you, Pippa.”

  “Thank you,” her friend whimpered into the cushions.

  After Ginny left, bemused and bewigged, Thayne went to the couch. “What exactly is the problem, honey?”

  That was a complicated issue. “I think Lance visited a whorehouse today.”

  “That is ridiculous! He could have any woman he wanted simply by snapping his fingers.” Belatedly realizing that this was anything but reassuring, Thayne added, “And if he did, that’s nothing to get upset about. Believe me, in a year you’ll be begging him to go back whenever he has the urge.”

  Someone knocked. Arming himself with a can of mousse, Brent went to the door.

  “Mrs. Henderson sends an ornament for Pippa’s coiffure,” Harry the butler announced. “If she would wear it tonight we would be so pleased.”

  Brent returned with a little box. Inside was an heirloom hairclip encrusted with four carats of old mine-cut diamonds. “Pretty,” Pippa said, knowing full well the barrette was less a gift for her than ammo against her mother.

  “You’re not thrilled?” Brent cried.

  “Rectangles are so passe,” Thayne informed him. “I would have had the diamonds reset in a platinum oval. I suppose you’ll have to wear it or Rosimund will be crushed.” To her surprise Pippa barely moved. “Enough tantrums, baby. Please. People are depending on you.”

  That did the trick, as always. Pippa slid off the couch. As Brent swept her hair into a twist, she watched Thayne chain-smoking at the window. “Nervous about tonight, Mama?”

  “Not a bit.”

  Actually, Thayne was surprised she wasn’t lying on her back in the cardiac unit of Baylor University Medical Center. Wyeth had gotten her day off to a poor start by quitting. The bridesmaids were on the verge of caloric mutiny: chances of them gorging themselves at the Henderson Ball were great, and there would be no more gown fittings. Wyeth’s replacement Cedric was a terribly eccentric man. Thayne was anything but confident he
could handle the situation. Worst of all, Pippa was about to snap. Lance at a brothel? Rosimund had probably bought him an all-day pass out of pure spite. “Have you been crying, dear? Your eyes look red.”

  “I ate some hot and sour soup. It always makes my eyes water.”

  “I hope there wasn’t any MSG in it! It will keep you awake all night.” Thayne glanced at her gold Cartier Tank Franchise watch. “Go to your room and put a cucumber pack on your eyes. I want you looking perfect.”

  So did Rosimund. So did everyone. Pippa kissed Thayne’s cheek. “I’ll do my best, Mama.”

  Thayne was already dialing out on her cell phone. “Cedric? Call the bell choir. The large bells must be polished again. I saw fingerprints.” She hung up.

  Pippa paused at the door. “Who’s Cedric?”

  “Did I not mention I dismissed Wyeth this morning?”

  “No, you didn’t.” So that’s why Thayne had been an hour late for the luncheon. Why she had called Pippa from the airport. “Where’d you find his replacement?”

  “He was referred to me. Cedric is a veteran of three royal weddings. I should have hired him in the first place.”

  “What happened to Wyeth?”

  Thayne wasn’t about to tell her daughter that bad karma had caused Wyeth to tear up a check for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. “He couldn’t take the heat, honey. Run along now.”

  Pippa immediately called Wyeth, who didn’t answer. She phoned Lance, who didn’t answer, either. Room service delivered one perfectly chilled cucumber as she was fighting back tears of frustration and a growing fury. Pippa put a few slices on her eyes but got no beauty rest: every two minutes a bridesmaid flew in with some crisis regarding her dress or complexion. To make matters worse, word had just leaked to the press that Thayne’s wedding had an A list and a B list. Everyone on the A list had received a lacquer box filled with gilt-edged engraved invitations and response cards for a multitude of barbecues, receptions, and the wedding itself at Meyerson Symphony Center followed by dinner and dancing to six different bands at the Walker mansion. Those on the B list received only a plain invitation to the wedding followed by a buffet in a downstairs function room at Meyerson, where the wedding party would appear later in the evening. Needless to say, quite a few Dallas socialites went berserk when they realized they weren’t on the A list. After a dozen verbal confrontations, Pippa told the front desk to hold all incoming calls. She worked on a difficult sudoku puzzle and ate half the chocolates Kimberly had given her. When her migraine only intensified, Pippa ate the rest of the sliced cucumber as well.