A Well-Behaved Woman

by Therese Anne Fowler

“What?”

  “Nothing. Never mind. Here,” Alva said, lying down and tucking herself up against Armide. “Put your arm around me like you used to when I was a little girl. Don’t you miss having someone perfect and trustworthy and warm beside you every night?”

  “I can’t say I ever thought of you in quite that way.”

  Alva heard the smile in her voice. “Let’s pretend you did. Let’s pretend we’re children again, in our pretty Paris flat.”

  Armide put out the light and curled up behind Alva. Her hand stroked Alva’s hair. “You had all those dolls…”

  “Mes petits bébés.”

  “You were rather a tyrant to them.”

  “Shhh.”

  Armide said, “I’ll give you this: you get things done.”

  Tandragee, Aug. 19th, 1892

  Dearest Vanderbilts,

  As of late yesterday, I am now officially a Dowager Duchess. George Victor Drogo Montagu, Duke of Manchester, known as “Mandeville,” as “His Grace,” as “Father” (for however little he deserved it), is dead of tuberculosis. A little later than predicted, but no less dead for the waiting. I didn’t cable because I don’t want you to trouble yourselves to come for the funeral. I won’t have you undertaking a trip to “honour” an honourless man. Kim, Alice, and May are bearing up well enough; it’s not as if they saw much of him when he was alive.

  Love to you and yours,

  ~C.

  Newport, 31 August ’92

  My dear Lady C.,

  I offer our sincerest condolences, if not for Mandeville’s death then for the troubles he caused that led you to more difficulties. I pray you and the children will find peace and happiness in days to come.

  But for a small measure of luck, I might have been widowed recently myself. The Alva was hit and sunk with William aboard, and he and his friends escaped unharmed.

  As I write, he is en route to Liverpool to meet with new shipbuilders across the river in Birkenhead. I’ve cabled him your news and asked him to please pay you a visit if his schedule permits.

  We send our love—

  Alva

  IV

  “IS PAPA COMING with us?” Harold asked Alva on the morning of the annual Coaching Parade, held in Central Park on what usually was a mild spring day of sunshine and flowering trees and warm breezes. Today, though, was chilly and overcast. Harold’s mood matched the weather, as evidenced by the way he was dressing at a snail’s pace and scowling as he did it.

  Alva said, “He’s away, you know that.”

  “I thought he might have got home while I was asleep.”

  “Well, he didn’t. We’re going with Colonel Jay and Mrs. Jay and the girls.”

  Harold sat down on the floor and crossed his arms. “If Papa isn’t going, I don’t wish to go.”

  “The Jays are expecting us. Stand up. You’re too old for this nonsense. Your hair needs combed and Cook’s got your breakfast waiting.”

  He looked up at her. “Is Willie going?”

  “He has other plans. Get up now.”

  Reluctantly, Harold complied. “Papa always lets me ride. May I ride?”

  “No,” she said, herding him from the room. “We’ll be in the Jays’ coach.”

  “Why does Papa have to be away?”

  He didn’t have to be. Once again, he’d chosen to be. Alva didn’t say this. “The shipbuilder needed him to come back to oversee some things.” Things that were taking a very long time. He’d been there since February, and now it was May.

  “Will the new yacht be bigger than the Alva?”

  “She will.”

  “When will she be done?”

  “Soon.”

  In fact she was built already, though not outfitted. William’s most recent letter told what Alva had already seen reported in Town Topics and the World: the Valiant, as he had named this yacht, had been launched in a ceremony at which Alva’s namesake was given the christening honor. I asked Lady May Alva Montagu to do the honors in your stead, he wrote. “Valiant” is a nod to you, my dear.

  She would have been far more pleased about this had he at least given her the opportunity to decline an invitation to launch Valiant herself.

  Too, the papers regularly had reports that placed him in Cannes and Berlin and Geneva and Paris and Budapest, usually at gambling tables, sometimes on yachts. His name was ever amongst numerous others—playboys and noblewomen and the occasional minor prince. Alva didn’t wish to be among them; she was not seeking what thrilled that set. Yet each time she read that he was part of a group celebrating someone’s birthday or a substantial win at roulette, she felt resentful. Her days were full with the tediousness of household management and society luncheons. She’d had to do the round of opera balls and dinners unaccompanied. She had put off her annual trip to Paris, William having told her to wait until he returned with the new yacht. And then he had not returned with the new yacht.

  As William was not here to represent the family today, she had initially refused the Jays’ invitation, until Lucy Jay reminded her that the parade was a good opportunity for Consuelo to be displayed. “All the best young men will be out, and as you know, it’s never too soon to encourage their hopes. Really, Alva, it’s your duty as her mother.”

  Whereas Consuelo’s father’s duty was only to pay for Consuelo’s silk organdy dress and plumed hat, and the embroidered gloves and shirtwaists Alva had ordered from Mary. After all, Consuelo’s father need do nothing more than exist, being that he was America’s second-wealthiest man. Short of him committing murder publicly, almost nothing would diminish his standing with the public or his peers. He had already done everything he was obliged to do, including marrying a woman who could and would do the rest.

  Following Harold to the kitchen, Alva resolved to let this go. She shouldn’t be so cross. William had named the yacht for her. She was valiant.

  The valiant woman was installing her son at the breakfast table with his organdy-clad sister when a maid came into the room. “Ma’am, Mr. Oliver Belmont is here to see you.”

  “Uncle Oliver!” Harold said, rising.

  Alva put her hand on his shoulder. “Stay here and have your eggs.”

  “I want to see him.”

  “That’s quite enough from you, unless you’d like to spend the day doing schoolwork.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he muttered, and took up his fork.

  Alva hadn’t meant to be so sharp with him. He was an enthusiastic, inquisitive child, much the way she had been. Valiant or not, she found William’s cavalier absence wearing. She told the maid, “Send Mr. Belmont in.”

  Seating herself, she poured coffee and took a piece of toast, though she’d had breakfast earlier. Best to have some occupation in hand when he was nearby.

  Oliver strode in, saying, “Greetings, Vanderbilts! Are you ready for today’s excellent promenade in the park?” He kissed Consuelo on the crown of her head on his way to shake hands with Harold.

  “You’re far sunnier than the day,” said Alva.

  He told Harold, “Don’t tell your mother, but I had candy for breakfast.”

  “That would make me cheerful,” Harold said.

  “A chocolate croissant, that’s what would cheer me,” said Consuelo, though she’d evinced no displeasure before his arrival.

  “And you?” Oliver said, looking at Alva.

  “Would you like coffee? Or I can ring for something with better nutrition than your previous meal.”

  He sat down opposite Harold. “I’m fixed for food, thank you. What I would like, however, is to accompany you to the parade. I had a cable from William suggesting I stand in.”

  “Are you riding?” said Harold. “I’d rather ride.”

  “I am. We should all ride. It’s good for anything that ails you.”

  Alva said, “Thank you, but the Jays have asked us to coach with them. It is a coaching parade. Besides, it might rain.”

  “Suppose it does?” said Oliver. “What would happen then?” />
  “We’d get wet,” Alva said.

  “And then?”

  “We might catch cold.”

  “Have you ever? Caught cold from being wet, I mean? Think of it. Every time you’ve had a bath, you’ve been wet.”

  Harold said, “Please, Mother? Please, please? Riding is so much better. It’s good for anything that ails you.”

  Consuelo said, “I’d far rather ride.”

  “The Jay girls will be disappointed,” said Alva.

  “I’ll make it up to them,” Consuelo said. “I’ll propose a picnic just for them in Newport next week. May I? We’re going Tuesday, yes? I’ll have the picnic on Friday.”

  Alva glanced at Oliver, who watched the exchange with a half-smile. He knew he was making trouble for her, and he liked it. She liked it, too, God help her. And the children were right: riding was so much better than sitting in a coach, even one as good as the German-made landau Colonel Jay had just acquired and was eager to show off today. Even when the sky threatened rain.

  Oliver said, “If it rains and you get wet and catch cold, I will personally make chicken soup for you.”

  “You can cook?”

  “I am a man of myriad abilities,” he said.

  Harold looked at Alva expectantly. She nodded, and he announced, “We accept!”

  “I’ll send Mrs. Jay a note,” she said, already knowing the note wouldn’t mention Oliver but would pin the change in plans on Harold’s desire to go on horseback—which would not be untrue. There was an art to these things. She hadn’t reached society’s apex by accident. William had named the yacht for her. Valiant.

  * * *

  As spring gave way to summer and long, languid days in Newport, Oliver made it easy for her to accept his offers to accompany them wherever William might have otherwise gone. He was sweet and relaxed and amusing, and if she felt in any way uncomfortable in his presence, well, that was a side effect she would bear.

  William, meanwhile, wrote to say the yacht was getting its carpets, its chandeliers, its carved paneling, its grand piano. Expect me in July.

  Alva wrote back, July is good. The children miss you. I do, too.

  She told herself this was true, and chose not to dwell on the fact that with Oliver as her escort to social events, she was enjoying them more than she’d done before. He was such good company. He treated her with the familiarity and affection he would give a sister. He spoke of William regularly and fondly, without criticism or envy. Every now and again, when Oliver wasn’t present—when she was, for example, lying in her bed at night waiting for sleep to come—she had the oddest sensation that he was thinking of her. Intimately. Yet he behaved so circumspectly! The contrast was maddening—or it would be if she allowed it to madden her, and so she refused to allow it.

  She did miss William—she told herself she did, insisted it, in fact. Said it out loud to anyone who mentioned that William had been away for a long time. Alva replied, Yes, we miss him. I miss him. The yacht is going to be truly incredible. We’ll have you on for a sail.

  No one said (to her, at least), My, you do spend a lot of time with Mr. Belmont! That observation was left to Town Topics, the small but powerful society gossip sheet run by an opportunist named Colonel Mann, who had a keen eye for rich men’s vulnerabilities and the temerity to exploit them unless he was sufficiently “encouraged” not to. In a relatively innocuous report, the paper remarked that—

  Since Oliver Belmont shaved his mustache away, he looks so much like Mr. W. K. Vanderbilt that when driving with Mrs. W.K., which he does frequently, one is easily led to believe that he is the lady’s husband.

  No one was led to believe any such thing. But then Mann had not intended his words to be taken at face value. And so Alva paid a call to the Town Topics offices with a message of her own.

  “Thank you for seeing me,” she told Mann as he offered her a chair.

  Known for his dapper suits, his silver hair, and the quality of his cigars, when seen at close range, he appeared worn and wary. He had small eyes in a saggy lined face. A thin scar stretched from his right jawline to his nose.

  “Ever a pleasure, Mrs. Vanderbilt. What can I do for you today?”

  With dead seriousness, Alva said, “Well, having read your latest, I was compelled to come help you recall who my husband is.”

  He smiled. “We were having a little joke, that’s all that was. You read us. You know we have a sense of humor and we expect—or we hope, anyway—that our readers do, too.”

  “You may recall that my husband—that is, William K. Vanderbilt—inherited some money from his father.”

  “Mrs. Vanderbilt, I see that you’re displeased—”

  “Do you recall the figure? Sixty-five million dollars. The value has increased since then, of course. How much money do you have, Colonel Mann?”

  “That’s my personal business, and not at all relevant to—”

  “How interesting that you mention ‘personal business’ and ‘not at all relevant.’ I feel precisely that way about my affairs, as I expect Mr. Belmont does, and certainly my husband feels that way as well.” She stood up. “Though I don’t know the particulars of your finances, I am confident that you would profit from thinking about how far my husband’s money would go if he were to pursue a libel suit against Town Topics.”

  Mann stood and escorted her to the door, saying, “We’ve got something in this country called free speech. I don’t need even a dollar for that. Good day, Mrs. Vanderbilt. Give your husband my best.”

  “Oh, I will,” Alva said, confident that despite his bravado, he had gotten her point.

  * * *

  As July neared, Richard Hunt and Oliver were well into the final stages of construction of Oliver’s house just down the road from hers, the project having been delayed after Oliver’s mother fell ill. Alva worried that Richard was overextending himself. In addition to Oliver’s and George’s homes, he was now simultaneously employed in building a replacement Breakers cottage for Corneil and Alice after the original had caught fire and burned to the ground.

  The new Breakers was, of course, in every way better than the old—and twice the size of Marble House. Where Alva had two stories in stone, Alice had three. Alva had used gilt in her Gold Salon, and her Rose Dining Room had a good dose of it as well. Alice, though, was using it liberally in every public room. Alva, being married to William K. Vanderbilt, had as impressive a house as Newport had seen up to now. Alice, being Cornelius Vanderbilt II’s wife, was making certain hers was even more impressive. Indeed, she couldn’t have it otherwise, or what would people say?

  Oliver liked to be on site the way Alva always did, overseeing the overseer, catching the mistakes before the plaster could dry. He admired Alva’s Gothic Room and wanted advice on incorporating the style into Belcourt (as he was calling his house). He played polo with the other gentlemen, took the children and her to Grey Crag, persuaded Hermann Oelrichs to put Harold at the wheel of Hildegard for regular lessons, took Willie to the races at Sheepshead Bay. Consuelo and Oliver took turns reading aloud from The American Claimant by Mark Twain. He escorted Alva to balls and dinners and picnics, where often they would put themselves into a quiet spot and converse.

  At one such dinner party, Tessie Oelrichs took Alva aside and said, “I have to ask: What’s going on with you and Mr. Belmont?”

  “Conversation,” Alva said.

  “Oh? Do tell.”

  “Well, we were speaking about President Cleveland and the problems with having an administration that’s lent so much power to men in families like the Belmonts and Vanderbilts. An oligarchy is not a representational government.”

  “Alva, you’re so funny. What did you really talk about? He’s making love to you, isn’t he? Tell me—it’ll be our secret.”

  Oliver was definitely not making love to her. His attitude toward her, though affectionate, continued to be free of the sentiments he’d expressed in the past. This was a relief in that it allowed her to spend time
with him without awkwardness or guilt. If it was also a strange kind of disappointment—well, she had to live with that. I know it’s hard, but there you go, sometimes life is hard.

  Alva whispered in Tessie Oelrichs’s ear, “Free silver.”

  “What?”

  “Monetary policy. It’s true. Ask him yourself.”

  Tessie Oelrichs laughed. “All right, you’ve convinced me. There’s not even a hint of romance in that.”

  Alva didn’t tell her this, but she disagreed. Talking politics with Oliver was terribly romantic; what could be more endearing and stimulating than to have her intelligence and viewpoints taken seriously by an attractive, interesting man?

  Alva also didn’t tell Tessie, nor would she tell William, nor would she ever tell Oliver that, much as she had been trying to deny the portent and ridiculous as it seemed, Oliver’s proximity made her feel vivid and alive. It made her feel desire. By contrast, William had only ever inspired a mild warmth in her breast and nothing at all in the nether region. The situation was preposterous. Untoward. Wrong. Still, she wanted to see Oliver all the time, had basked in his company even knowing her feelings were unrequited.

  Mustache, no mustache, no matter: Alva could never mistake this man for the other.

  * * *

  Come late July, she sat on the broad Marble House veranda and stared out across the lawn at the ocean’s deepening blue. A pitcher of julep sat in an ice bucket near her elbow. William had cabled that he would be home “Thursday next,” and now, on this Thursday next, she was deciding not to think overmuch about the length of his absence nor the infrequency of his letters while he was away.

  From this well-padded chaise, with its setting and its view, one might find it easy to also not think about the country being once again in rather dire straits. To not notice the Treasury crisis. To fail to recall there’d been a run on banks that forced many to close. High unemployment. Low wages. A shortage in the cities of healthful housing. Increasing crime. From here on the veranda, a marriage, the country—indeed, the world—was bucolic and secure, peaceful, even bounteous if one considered the lobster and crab traps set not far offshore, the generous abundance of blackberries in the nearby shrubs, the lush garden Cook tended on the east side of the house, its rows fat with tomatoes and cucumbers and cabbages, herbs, peas, and the young trails of vines that would produce pumpkins later in the season.