American Duchess

by Karen Harper

  Mama had seemed so engrossed in her opinions and observations that she turned to Win for the first time.

  “It is the Hindu practice of secluding women,” he said. “They wrap them in clothing head to foot or keep them behind high walls. It has just been outlawed here, but that does not mean the customs will change.”

  “Dreadful,” Papa said.

  Mama chimed in with “Despicable, primitive, and quite unfair!”

  I bit my tongue to keep from blurting out something like “But isn’t that how you have treated me?”

  I shuddered at the thought and was grateful once again I was an American, though Mama and I had both agreed that women at home should be able to vote, else it was another, more civilized, kind of purdah, I supposed.

  I saw that Mama studied and frowned at Win and me.

  “Consuelo,” she said, “let us leave the men to their brandy. Come with me. You looked peaked and need your rest before your first coming out event in Paris, and none too soon. You and I both need a change of scene.”

  Win made a move to help me rise, but she took my arm, pulled me up, and subtly elbowed him away.

  Chapter Two

  Mama and I, our maids, Miss Harper, and our nearly one hundred pieces of luggage disembarked in Nice so we could then travel on to Paris. Papa journeyed on with the yacht, taking along Oliver Belmont and my dear Win, but we planned to travel through the countryside and would see them soon.

  Yet barely were we off the Valiant that Mama took me aside and told me quickly and curtly that my parents’ marriage was definitely over. She explained she would seek a divorce when we returned to America. She said Papa agreed that she would tell me, but I vow, it was so I would not throw a scene and cling to him. With the others, I tried to keep my chin up. I had seen it coming, but it still cut deep. I could only tell myself that perhaps Papa would be better off.

  Though I was devastated, Mama forbid my moping about. We moved into a lovely hotel overlooking the Tuileries Gardens. At least the beautiful City of Light, as they called Paris, was balm to my soul. Mama and I walked and walked, talked and talked. I blamed her and was angry at first, but she seemed to cater to me, taking me to museums and churches and lectures at the Sorbonne. We visited the Paris Opera and the Comédie-Française. I loved speaking French, and I loved the French people, so elegant and gay. The spring of 1894 helped to heal my heart and perhaps Mama’s, too.

  I was excited to have my portrait painted by the artist Carolus-Duran, whom Mama assured me was famous for his portraits of aristocratic women. So was I now, at age seventeen, an aristocratic woman? At least I trusted that the portrait would make me look that way.

  “No, no, not red velvet behind her. Too heavy-looking!” Mama told the bearded artist in French when he tried to pose me before huge swags of tasseled draperies in his studio. “I want a classical look, a portrait to hang in Marble House, our Newport estate, for a while and then who knows, perhaps in an English palace.”

  My head snapped around. Whatever was she talking about?

  “But the Prince of Wales in England, he is already married, madam, and his son the Duke of York last year, too,” the artist protested with a roll of his eyes and a little smile that peeked through his mustache.

  “Ah, but,” she said, tugging me over to another backdrop, a realistic rendering of a classical landscape with an Ionic column, “don’t you know there is one palace in Great Britain not owned by the royals? Its name is Blenheim Palace, and it belongs to the Duke of Marlborough. I have it on the best authority—Lady Lansdowne, an English aristocrat herself and the duke’s aunt.”

  Why, I wondered, would Mama have been discussing that when she was spending time in a palace in India? I had briefly met Lady Lansdowne, too. How she had looked me over, a bit rudely, I thought, but that was almost all I recalled about her.

  But I did love the painted backdrop Mama had chosen here and, later, the portrait itself. In it I stand as if I were indeed mistress of a grand house or palace, draped in white with the most calm, confident look on my face. One foot peeks from my gown, as if I were stepping forward into my future.

  How I tried to emulate that feeling and look the night Mama brought me out into French society at the all-white ball for unmarried jeune filles at the palatial home of the Duc de Gramont. Yet however elegantly gowned in one of the many dresses Mama had bought for me from Monsieur Jean Worth’s fabulous displays, I was frightened to death.

  “MAMA, I LIKE this gown, but why should my hair be piled so high with curls?” I asked as my maid prepared me for the evening while Mama watched. “My hair isn’t curly and it takes so long to get it that way. The height of the hair makes my neck look even longer. And everyone will have a necklace of some sort, so why only a simple white ribbon around my throat? You know my neck is too long, you have said so.”

  “Less is more with you tonight. We do not want people looking at your jewelry, but at you. My girl, your elegant, swanlike neck is part of your allure.”

  “Swanlike? Allure? But—”

  “Consuelo, you have no taste!” she exploded, rising and pointing a finger nearly in my face. “I buy the gowns; you wear them. I decide the look; you display it. Believe me, I know what I am doing.”

  Still, that did not calm my nervous demeanor. The ballroom was vast. This was called a white ball because all the guests were unwed. It would have been deemed a pink or rose ball if married women were guests of honor. The men—and it looked to me as if there were an army of them—sat on one side of the room while we, with our chaperones, sat on the other quite on display. The men came across to ask for dances, and my card was soon filled, my evening a busy whirl. Yet wasn’t this all a sham? I was certain Win would propose when I returned to New York, but I suppose I must go through this pantomime until both of us could present our plans. I tried to enjoy it despite my upset stomach and trembling hands.

  Still, it was fun to whirl around the floor to a lilting waltz. I began to confuse names and, in some cases, the French titles of my dance partners. Mama was in her element, conversing with each would-be beau before and after dances or when one of them went to fetch us punch. I had strict orders not to go near the drink tables myself because, she said, that is where stains splashed on gloves and gowns.

  And then, near the last dance, a handsome, dark-haired, blue-eyed man bowed before us to present himself. He had no title, and introduced himself as Jacques Balsan. Something about him, his assurance, his poise—his intent look—made me blurt out before Mama could give her yea or nay. “Yes, I would enjoy a dance,” as if I had been a wallflower all night and was desperate. For the first time this evening I was happy not to be overdressed or glittering with jewels like many of the other maidens.

  “Oh, yes, Balsan,” Mama said after he made further introductions to both of us. “From the industrial family with the textile empire—the heir.”

  “I have traveled the world, Madam Vanderbilt, but, I admit, mostly to buy wool for our Balsan mills.”

  I thought Mama might not like such a plebian concern, but she said, “Actually, my family dealt in cotton before our dreadful War Between the States. But as for the Balsans, of course, any family that is friends with the Gramonts is surely well respected.”

  He hastily signed my dance card, and we were off onto the floor. It was strange, but, as his gloved hand took mine, it was as if we really touched. He was not as tall as Win, just my height, so our eyes met and matched. He seemed to smile with his eyes as well as his mouth, which flaunted white, even teeth.

  “Mama may be American and I too,” I told him in French, “but she seems to know of your family.”

  “The Balsans’ businesses are all earthbound, but I love to take to the skies. My passion—one of them,” he added, smiling at me again. “My favorite pastime is ballooning aloft in the clouds.”

  “Oh, but is that not dangerous?”

  “A bit, but worth it. To see the earth which mankind has tried to divide into fenced fields and
roads and city blocks gives one a whole new vision for life. If our earthbound paths cross again, and I pray they shall, Mademoiselle Consuelo, I shall propose that I take you up into the heavens with me.”

  What an amazing conversation we had, when all evening I had heard little but comments on how beautiful I looked, questions as to whether I liked Paris and what were the Vanderbilt homes and businesses like, as if everyone did not already know railroads and more railroads had made my family’s fortune. Of course, I should tell this Jacques Balsan that I could promise nothing in the future. That my mother would never let me go up in a balloon in a basket—oh, yes, I told him I had seen a newspaper drawing of such a daring deed.

  I sighed and not from the exertion of the waltz. For the first time tonight, I did not wish that my dance partner was my dear Win.

  “It sounds wonderful,” I told him and felt quite let down to earth when he returned me to my mother with a smile and a quick squeeze of my hand before he bowed and left us.

  “You will not believe this,” Mama said.

  “I know—oh, believe what?”

  “You, my dear, have had five proposals of marriage this evening, brought directly to me, two of them in writing.”

  “Oh, no. I—from one dance?”

  “From your beauty I—we—have showcased tonight, and your name, of course.”

  “Papa’s money, you mean.”

  “The place I have made for us and you with it. But any French noble will not do, so do not fret.”

  I exhaled in relief, still a bit out of breath from dancing with Jacques. But there was something about the way she had worded that. Hopefully, she meant an American would be better for me, and I would convince her that Win, after all, from a respected and well-to-do family, would be quite perfect.

  “Would you believe,” she said as the evening ended, “that we have an invitation to meet His Serene Highness Prince Francis Joseph of Battenberg tomorrow? The great nephew of Tsar Alexander III, no less. He was not here tonight but an emissary of his family was.”

  My heart flip-flopped then sank. I could only hope there was no connection between Mama’s European husband-hunting for me and that name and title. I didn’t want a title and I didn’t want to be linked with anyone serene and high. As much as I loved Europe, I wanted to marry in America to an American. And where was Battenberg anyway?

  I searched the crowded room for another glimpse of Jacques but did not see him again. Not for many years.

  MY DREAMY DAYS in France collapsed like a stuck balloon when I entered the evening salon of the grande dame Madame de Pourtalès to be presented to Francis Joseph of Battenberg. I had learned he was a German princeling, but I did not care a flip if he were a king or a saint. Mama had not exactly said so, but was she actually dangling me as a possible princess to an alien, distant, and no doubt backward Balkan state called Serbia?

  The man I was to meet had a long, serious face and was attired in a military uniform heavy with medals and ribbons. He spoke French sharply and swiftly, and his quick smile did not reach his cold gaze as he assessed me. Was Mama mad? Even I was now onto the game of men who knew me not at all—and did not think that mattered—because they were mostly interested in being bankrolled by the Vanderbilt fortune.

  It was a painful night as I sat next to him at dinner. Thank the Lord, Mama sat on his other side and kept him greatly occupied with her questions. I was so upset and so angry that I could barely eat the delicacies set before me. At least there was no dancing. Why, I would have taken any of my dance partners, especially that Jacques Balsan, and lived in a scow anchored on the Seine rather than live in any sort of palace with this man.

  “Mama, I can only hope you did not intend him for me!” I insisted when we were back alone in our rooms at the hotel. “He is cold of heart and—”

  “And not what I had in mind, though he is a prince, so do not fret and save your passion for England, where we are going next. I discerned tonight that the man is not really going to remain royal despite his title. His family has no palaces of their own, and his German arrogance toward women—oh, yes, I could tell—is despicable.”

  “Oh. Good. I thought—”

  “I am sure the next titled man you meet will be of the true nobility—in character and heritage.”

  I was coming to grasp her game. She intended to marry me to nobility, even royalty. So Win and I must get Papa on our side, however much my parents were estranged now, then present our plans to her. That is, if Win would just propose when we get home, before some other catastrophe occurred.

  BUT IT DID not take me long in London to feel I was on the marriage mart again. Instead of a conniving French grande dame this time, the liaison was Mama’s distant acquaintance, the American Minnie Stevens, now Lady Paget, a friend of the Prince of Wales set, no less. Well, I told myself, I survived the maidens-for-sale ball and that dreadful German princeling, so I can survive here long enough to get home to Win. His letters, which were delivered to my maid so that Mama would not find them, were passionate and endearing. Mine were harder to sneak out, but with Miss Harper’s willingness to look the other way, we managed to correspond.

  But I was appalled anew when Mama and I had a meeting with Mrs. Paget. At least nothing was kept secret from me. Oh, no, they discussed my flaws openly, which they hoped to “work around” as if I had no ears or feelings.

  “I know she brings a fortune trailing her skirts,” Lady Paget told Mama, “but you will still have to dress her a bit more daringly. More bare flesh, lower necklines. The retroussé nose and long neck, not to mention her gangly height will be the drawbacks, not for the untitled, of course, but to win a coronet. She is not in the ugly duckling stage, but an awkward one, I am afraid.”

  I actually gasped at her blatant manner—or lack of manners—but Mama only nodded. “No more baby girl décolletage, I can see that,” Mama agreed, “especially if you can arrange a meeting at that dinner party.”

  “He is young, only twenty-two, and somewhat attached to a person, but he loves his palace above all else, if you know what I mean. Unfortunately—or perhaps fortunately for you—the place absolutely drinks money, and the two previous dukes spent much of the family treasure to keep it going.”

  His palace? What duke? Indeed, I was being sold but, hopefully, not bought. I absolutely panicked. I was almost sick upon the Aubusson carpet in front of my small, gilded chair. My mother was mad to try to trade me for some sort of title. How desperately I wanted my father’s help and to belong to my dear Win. I needed to go home! Of course, there were social classes and snobs there, but when I became my own woman, I could work around that, maybe change things. And had I just heard that this mystery man was also attached to someone he cared for, and that mattered not one whit?

  “We will be ready and be there in fine fettle the moment you can arrange it,” Mama told the woman and finally turned to look at me with a bright smile. I just stared back at her, quite distraught.

  Papa had told me once that my mother, Alva, the former Miss Smith, had saved her impoverished southern family after the Civil War by stealing his heart and his hand. Stealing? I believed that now. But must she steal my wishes, my plans, my very life?

  Chapter Three

  I felt like a lamb being led to the slaughter when Mama and I were invited to dine at Lady Paget’s beautiful house on Belgrave Square in London shortly thereafter. I was to be seated on the right side of the Duke of Marlborough—the ninth duke. He bore the intimidating name of Charles Richard John Spencer-Churchill.

  I was schooled repeatedly to the fact that he possessed the only palace in England that was not owned by royalty, and Mama—along with Miss Harper—lectured me thoroughly on the historical significance of Blenheim, a structure that held seven acres under its roof when completed. The palace was a gift from Queen Anne of England in 1704 to the first duke, a general, who had beaten the French and made them lose a great, famous battle.

  Miss Harper read me a poem by Robert Southey th
at included the lines Great praise the Duke of Marlbro’ won and ’Twas a famous victory. I rather liked the poem if not the import of it for me. Actually, its deep message was against war, and I was all for that, at least. I knew much of America’s so-called War Between the States, because Mother’s southern family had lost much during those dark days.

  Of course I would be kind to the duke, interested and polite and try not to blush at how much the bare flesh of my shoulders and the tops of my swelling breasts were on display. Then I would beg Mama to go home, though not tell her I wanted to see my father and ask his help to encourage Win, my beloved Rosenkavalier, to quickly tell my parents he wanted to marry me, ending all these on-the-market rehearsals and let’s-bait-a-hook chicanery.

  To my amazement, the duke indeed looked young—and, oh my, at least four inches shorter than I. I could tell that bothered Mama as she managed to get us seated quite quickly. He was slim with carefully combed brown hair and a wispy mustache. I found his face pleasant but nondescript, almost expressionless at times, as if he seemed to be somewhere else. He was fond of gesturing with his graceful hands. He did look me over carefully, mostly when he thought I was not watching him. In short—short was not a joke I told myself as I looked down on him—he was not a sighing maiden’s dream of a fairy-tale prince—or duke.

  “I understand your ancestral home is not only historical but beautiful,” I observed after our introductions and what Mama called small talk.

  His blue eyes lit at that. “Blenheim is a living entity, my heritage. It is my goal in life to see that she is taken care of, made more lovely yet,” he told me, riveting his gaze to mine for the first time.

  I could not help but think that Blenheim was his true love. At least he had a purpose in life, something to protect and cherish. And he had referred to the estate as a “she.”

  He went on to describe the grand rooms of the vast building, the grounds and gardens, the estate workers and antique villages in which they lived. His voice became animated, and his hands drew pictures in the air. But then he because more serious again.