The American Heiress Read Free Page A

have to wear something so perfectly hideous. Still, Martha Van Der Leyden told me that her mother is making her dress like a Puritan maid so I suppose it could be worse.’
    Cora’s dress had been copied from a Velázquez painting of a Spanish infanta that Mrs Cash had bought because she had heard Mrs Astor admire it.
    As Bertha took the elaborate hooped skirt from the closet, she wondered if the Madam had chosen her daughter’s costume as much for the way it restricted the wearer’s movement as for any artistic considerations. No gentleman would be able to get within three feet of Miss Cora. The kissing lesson would have been in vain.
    She helped Cora out of her tea gown and into the farthingale. Cora had to step into it and Bertha had to fasten the harness like shutting a gate. The silk brocade of the skirt and bodice had been specially woven in Lyons; the fabric was heavy and dense. Cora swayed slightly as the weight of it settled on the frame. It would only take the slightest pressure to make her lose her balance entirely. The dress was three feet wide so Cora would have to go through all doorways sideways. Waltzing in such a dress would be impossible.
    Bertha knelt and helped Cora into the brocade shoes with Louis heels and upturned toes. Cora began to wobble.
    ‘I can’t wear these, Bertha, I will fall over. Get the bronze slippers instead.’
    ‘If you’re sure, Miss Cora…’ Bertha said cautiously.
    ‘My mother is expecting eight hundred people tonight,’ Cora said. ‘I doubt she will have time to inspect my feet. Get the slippers.’
    But Cora’s words were braver than she felt; both girls knew that the Madam never missed anything.

    Mrs Cash was making one last survey of her costume. Her neck and ears were still bare, not through austerity on her part but because she knew that any minute her husband would come in with a ‘little something’ which would have to be put on and admired. Winthrop had been spending a lot of time in the city lately, which meant that a ‘little something’ was due. Some of her contemporaries had used their husband’s infidelities as a way of purchasing their freedom, but Mrs Cash, having spent the last five years shaking Cash’s Finest Flour from her skirts, had no desire to tarnish her hard-won reputation as the most elegant hostess in Newport and Fifth Avenue by something as shabby as divorce. So long as Winthrop was discreet, she was prepared to pretend that she knew nothing of his passion for the opera.
    There had been a time once, though, when she had not been so sanguine. In the early days of their marriage she could not bear to let him out of her sight, for fear that he would bestow that same confiding smile on someone else. In those days she would have thought jewels no substitute for Winthrop’s unclouded gaze. But now she had her daughter, her houses and she was the Mrs Cash. She hoped that Winthrop would bring her diamonds this time. They would go well with her costume.
    There was a tap at the door and Winthrop Rutherford II came in wearing the satin breeches, brocade waistcoat and powdered wig of Louis XV; the father might have started life as a stable boy but the son was a convincing Bourbon king. Mrs Cash thought with satisfaction that he looked quite distinguished in his costume, not many men could carry off silk stockings; they would be a handsome couple.
    Her husband cleared his throat a little nervously. ‘You look quite magnificent tonight, my dear, no one would think this was the last ball of the season. May I be permitted to add a little something to perfection?’
    Mrs Cash moved her head forward as if readying herself for the axe. Winthrop pulled the diamond collar from his pocket and fastened it round her neck.
    ‘You anticipate me, as always. It is indeed a necklace,’ he said.
    ‘Thank you, Winthrop. Always such taste. I shall wear the earrings you gave me last summer; I think they will make a perfect match.’ She reached without a