Searching for Grace Kelly (9 page)

He smiled, shook his head. “Not very.”

“Perfect. Flowers are personal, but not overly so. You can't send a woman you've just met jewelry—it's too much. Dropping a note is too impersonal and also implies he's tight with a buck, which no woman wants to know, trust me.”

“Roses, then?”

“No. Roses are too unimaginative. If a man wants to be truly noticed, truly send a message to a woman that he has noticed
her
, he needs to send something more original. Something novel. Like gardenias.”

“Gardenias,” he repeated. He scribbled it on a piece of paper.

“Classic, beautiful, slightly exotic, original. All the things she wants to believe about herself.”

“So if a man sent you a bouquet of gardenias, what would you do?”

Her smile, pleasant and restrained, blossomed into a toothsome grin. “I guess I'll have to see when he does. But I guarantee you, it would be the reaction he hoped for.”

He leaned forward, laced his fingers together on the desk. “Well, thank you very much, Miss Hickey. It's been an education.”

She rose, sliding the steno pad on top of the papers. “I'll have these typed by the end of the day.”

He looked slightly amused. “What about the hieroglyphics?” he asked.

“Don't worry,” she said, backing toward the door. “I'm a quick study.”

 

Don't panic
, Laura told herself.
Play it cool
.

She had left the coffee shop and found her way to the offices of
Mademoiselle
, located in a nondescript prewar building on Lexington Avenue. She had come over with several other girls, part of the cadre of thirteen lucky “college editors” who had been selected from hundreds of applicants (or so they were all told) to put out the magazine's annual college issue in August. Walking in, she recognized several other girls from the recital yesterday.

Herded into a conference room, they had all taken seats around a long mahogany table polished to a lustrous shine, each handed a packet outlining the duties and expectations of the college editors and spelling out each one's individual assignments. Laura felt her heart sink when she saw she had been relegated to the fashion department. A month of cataloging dresses, shoes, and handbags and mollifying difficult models was hardly going to do much for her writing career.

Standing in front of the conference room was a stern-looking young woman who couldn't have been much older than the collegians, but her demeanor was that of a strict librarian just waiting to shush the next chatty offender. Seated in the rear of the room, Laura had missed her name—Miss Kyle? Heil? Lyle?—but it was clear that whoever she was, she was going to be the Lady in Charge for the month they were here. She wore a fitted white blouse with brocaded trim on the sleeves and collar, a skirt without a single wrinkle, and efficient two-inch heels. Her hair was pulled back into a severe chignon, and she wore a pair of black-rimmed cat-eye glasses that made her appear perennially angry, even on the rare occasions when she was attempting to express gracious commentary on life “at the premier magazine for the young American woman as interested in her mind as her makeup.”

“More like interested in how to land a rich husband,” a girl two seats down from Laura had muttered, causing a minor flutter.

“Is there a problem in the rear of the room? Because if there is, please do let me know,” Cat Eyes had announced, craning her neck to ID the offender. There was quick silence and she continued, explaining the various duties expected, the deadlines and editorial procedures for getting the college issue produced, and, most of all, the strict rules of conduct. “
Mademoiselle
is a magazine that represents refinement, poise, grace, and intelligence,” she said, “and as such, we expect all of our editors, whether they be full-time or our college apprentices, to carry themselves with the utmost decorum and respect at all times, both inside the office and out. Upon being accepted, each of you was mailed a list of rules for your employment with the magazine, and if you haven't already, I strongly urge you to familiarize yourself with these. Any violation of the morals code will result in immediate termination.”

Laura had read the rules more than once and found that while they covered the expected territory—basically, a girl was expected to dress well, show up on time, know how to tell a soup spoon from a shrimp fork, and avoid going too heavy on the makeup—they were firmest on one point: No boys. While they could not prohibit dating, obviously, it was made very clear that there were to be no dates at magazine outings, no cancellations of such outings due to said dates, and absolutely no dates coming into the office, ever. While this was a given at the Barbizon—despite the seeming prowess of both Grace Kelly and Vivian, it was difficult to sneak a man past Mrs. Mayhew and the matrons—the
Mademoiselle
editors seemed positively apoplectic at the thought of a “bad girl” infiltrating their lily-scented midst. Not unlike the Barbizon manual, the briefing materials had entire sections devoted to “appropriate” social conduct. Reading it over in Laura and Dolly's room, Vivian had remarked, with suitable British pathos, “Oh, blimey. Why don't they just hand you each a chastity belt and be done with it?”

Then there was the issue of Mrs. Blackwell.

Betsy Blackwell had briefly greeted the new girls when they had first come in, like a hostess at a grand lawn party, then quickly turned the meeting over to Cat Eyes and floated away. A trim, stylish woman in a tailored suit and delicate jewelry, she boasted a magnificent bouffant of jet-black hair that fell in soft waves to frame her delicate face, and her skin was as snowy and unlined as a Greek statue. She had been the editor in chief of
Mademoiselle
since 1937 and was known for being both gracious and as tough as Churchill. Her office was strictly off-limits unless you were specifically asked by a senior editor to take something to it or retrieve something from it. If you saw Mrs. Blackwell in the hallway, you were to politely smile and nod, then keep walking. Perhaps she would acknowledge you, but most likely she would not. She was extremely busy and was not to be bothered. Ever.

There had been just one more order of business. The one that had now left Laura with an alarm bell clanging in her ears.

“Today, to celebrate the beginning of your journey here at
Mademoiselle
, I am pleased to say that there will be a welcome luncheon at the Barnes & Foster department store on Fifth Avenue,” Cat Eyes declared, “hosted by none other than Benjamin Barnes.”

Laura fought to keep her face expressionless, even as the girls around her quickly devolved into babbling wonder at this first step on the road to heady cosmopolitan travels. How had she not known who he was? Everyone else sure seemed to. And now she would have to face him again, just days after the disastrous night at the Stork.

The briefing lasted another ten minutes, and then the girls were again rounded up and led down the corridor toward the main editorial offices, walking in lockstep like a bunch of WACs on their way to the barracks, the sound of their collective heels reverberating through the halls. Laura fell in line and tried to stay calm. She hadn't acknowledged Box's flowers, a social faux pas that no doubt would have sent Marmy reaching for the smelling salts. But she had been unsure of just how to do it. Send a note to the store, thanking him? For what? Calling a florist? Trying to rehabilitate his playboy image? The one thing she knew she
couldn't
do was tell any of her fellow college editors about what had happened. All she needed was to become the object of idle office gossip on her first day, hauled into Cat Eyes' office, and sent back to Greenwich on the evening train.

There are thirteen of us
, Laura told herself.
There will probably be more people there
.
He'll never even notice me
.

God, she was a terrible liar.

Barnes & Foster stood on the corner of Fifty-Third and Fifth Avenue, a Corinthian building that when lit up at night conjured images of something very stately and serious, like the Parthenon or the Supreme Court. On its north side it spelled out, in huge backlit wrought-iron Edwardian script,
BARNES & FOSTER
, while on the other three sides a simple
B&F
asserted its stature as a temple of Gotham style and good taste. Its elongated paned casement windows on the ground floor each sat above an English garden flower box overflowing with seasonal selections: hydrangeas in spring, tea roses in summer, holly, ivy, and tiny white lights at Christmas. Unlike Saks and Macy's, whose holiday window displays attracted a multitude of passersby at the yuletide, Barnes & Foster eschewed the theatrical, instead beckoning the curious not to stroll by, but to be piqued enough to enter a rarefied world of refined retail enchantment inside.

At noon Laura was walking toward the rear of the pack of girls up Fifth Avenue when she caught a glimpse of herself in a shop window. She wished she had dressed differently for her first day. She had selected a navy Anne Klein suit, which, while succeeding in telegraphing “up-and-coming career girl,” came up rather short in telegraphing “polished and sophisticated siren you mistreated at the Stork Club who is not simply mollified with flowers.”
You're being ridiculous
, she told herself as she and the flock of girls crossed the street.
It's ludicrous to think he's not going to say something. There may be some sort of receiving line! You need to be prepared. He says, “Well, hello there. Nice to see you again.” And you say . 
.
 . What? “Thank you for having us.” Idiotic. Okay, how about, “Your store is lovely.”

Even worse
.

She saw the outline of the store, its front flags whipping in the summer breeze, come into view.
Come on! What are you going to say?

She needed something with a little more snap. Hadn't she just channeled Hepburn with the bartender at the San Remo? She would show Box Barnes that she was cool, confident. She was living in the former home of Grace Kelly. Now she needed, for at least one afternoon, to
be
Grace Kelly, trading pithy bons mots with Jimmy Stewart as they watched Raymond Burr murder his wife.

“Are you coming, or are your deep thoughts simply far too compelling to abandon?” Cat Eyes was saying, holding open the door to the entrance. The others had already walked inside.

“Sorry,” Laura said, scurrying past.

The entrance led into an atrium that felt more like a cathedral than a store, with baronial white support columns that soared up to a rounded ceiling painted with frescoes of cherubs, clouds, suns, and moons. The marble floors shimmered. In the center of the store, there was a huge Grecian vase overflowing with wildflowers. Dueling white marble staircases swept up on either side, leading to a mezzanine that surrounded the entire floor, so you could stand by the stone railing and look down on the shoppers bustling below, like the girls inside the Barbizon peering down at their prospective dates. To the far left was a bank of elevators coated in gold leaf, which opened to expose men in tailored red uniforms and box hats declaring, “Going up,” using their white-gloved hands to throw the lever and gently close the doors.

Founded by British cousins who had come to America in 1840, the store had begun as a small-scale emporium selling housewares, candy, and coffee. There was a silver-framed black-and-white photograph hanging inside the entrance that showed the store's centennial celebration in 1940, and Laura had instantly recognized Box, a handsome nine-year-old in a white tie who even then had exuded a certain mischievous charm.

Laura followed her fellow editors up the marble staircase and down the mezzanine, until they entered a small room with ornate double doors. The room was anchored by a three-tiered crystal chandelier hanging in its center, its soft glow a flattering compliment to the sunlight streaming in from the windows. Five tables of eight had been set with starched white tablecloths and fine bone china, an indication that there would be many guests at the luncheon other than the girls from
Mademoiselle
. Indeed, there were several businessman types engaged in conversation around the room, along with the occasional society matron sipping a glass of white Bordeaux. Mrs. Blackwell, having come separately by car, was already present, in the same cornflower-blue skirt suit and gold jewelry she had worn for the meet-and-greet this morning, her gloves in her right hand, her purse dangling daintily from her forearm. She was animatedly chatting with Box Barnes.

It had only been three days, but Laura had forgotten how commanding his presence was. He wore a khaki summer suit that hinted at a kind of relaxed refinement, like a Scottish land baron just back from a hunt on the moors, and a pair of brown-and-white spectators. When he moved, his cuff links caught the light from the chandelier, twinkling around his wrists like diamonds.

It wasn't more than three minutes—though it felt like years—before he spotted her. She kept her chin up and her gaze neutral, and to her surprise so did he, glancing at her for a few seconds, then just as quickly turning back to Mrs. Blackwell, who was now in animated discussion, her purse swinging slightly as she gestured for emphasis. Everyone was soon directed to take their seats, which had been marked by calligraphic place cards. Laura found herself next to a buyer from the store on one side and one of her fellow college editors on the other. Box was two tables away. Throughout the lunch, he never looked at her once.

Perhaps all of her self-remonstration had been for nothing. Maybe he didn't even recognize her. Was he angry she'd ignored his flowers? Oh, what did it matter, anyway? She took a deep breath, scooped a spoon into her fruit cup, and began lobbing a series of banal questions to the buyer about how he selected the garments sold at a department store.

As the coffee was being served, there was a gentle
tap-tap-tap
on a water glass. Box Barnes rose from his seat at the center table, where he had been seated to the left of Mrs. Blackwell.