The Dress (7 page)

Joy became as ruthlessly stylish as her home. She believed it was essential that she be seen to dress perfectly in order to build Frank's profile as a man of affluence and substance. She attended the shows, commissioning couture each season and was rarely seen publicly in the same outfit twice. Frank too underwent a makeover. Joy had new suits made by a Savile Row tailor sent over from London. She insisted that his shirts were all American cotton and laundered daily. His old ties were given away and new ones bought, all in French silk. His comfortable, worn shoes were replaced with Italian leather brogues.

Frank did everything Joy asked of him. He built up his businesses so he could be seen as a wealthy, worthy husband for her. He fraternized with her ‘set', enduring endless cocktail parties where he was flirted with and teased by godless, bony socialites. As time went on, he even spent dinners in the company of Joy's parents, although they never bothered to disguise their snobbish loathing for him. Frank loved Joy so much that he was willing to lay everything on the line for her, even his pride. All his life Frank had been hungry to fall in love and now that it had happened it was not only with the most beautiful woman in all of America, but she also loved him back. The glory of his good fortune was all he needed to sustain him.

Privately, however, Frank continued to feel something of an outsider. He wondered at his wife's driven perfectionism. He himself did not really believe in the necessity of being seen to be better than the next man. (Certainly his own business empire had been built on the opposite premise – on an ability to gain the trust and support of every man.) Frank knew Joy had their best interests at heart. The socializing and the decorating and the endless buying of clothes gave her something to focus on. Frank could see that, far from being a shallow socialite, his wife was using all this frivolity to fill the gap in her life. He did it by making money, she did it by spending it. Until the children came along, it was important for her to feel she had a purpose. Even if that purpose was simply making them look like the Big Shots they were. When the children came, everything would change.

Joy had her own idea about extending their family, and when the decorating was complete she set about employing staff. Frank came home from work to his somewhat stark new home and found a tall man in the spotless kitchen preparing an elaborate meal of lobster, steak and French fries.

‘Good evening, sir,' he said. ‘May I fix you a cocktail before dinner?'

Frank scowled and went in search of his wife. He found her in the bedroom.

‘Hurry up and get dressed, darling – the Balforts will be here in an hour.'

‘Who the hell is that in our kitchen?'

‘Our new butler,' she said, ‘and before you complain he is perfectly charming. He's called Jones and comes with a personal recommendation from the Wilsons in Boston.'

‘Well, I won't have it, Joy. This is too much. It's not natural, another man living in my house.'

Truthfully, Frank was uncomfortable with the notion of having servants. He had always paid various women to clean and cook for him as necessary, but the idea of somebody living in the house with them was unacceptable.

‘He needs to live somewhere, Frank, he's come all the way from Boston.'

‘We don't need anyone else. We can get a woman in to clean, send the laundry out, eat in restaurants...'

But Joy was adamant. She had grown up with staff, many of whom had been kinder to her than her own parents, and it was a rite of passage that she employ staff of her own.

They compromised and Frank found Jones a fully functioning separate servants' apartment, with three rooms and a kitchen and bathroom, in their building.

Jones quickly grew fond of Joy. She had a sense of taste and style way beyond her years. She had created a home of such modern elegance that it was a delight to manage, and while her husband was almost embarrassed to give him instruction, Jones' discretion and loyalty soon won him over and Jones learned to respect the honest, charismatic Irishman.

The same could not be said for his in-laws. Ruth Rogerson remained sceptical about her only daughter's choice of partner. It wasn't just that Frank was ‘new money' and that he appeared to have no family, rich or poor. Her lack of approval was instinctive, based on a mother's mistrust. Finding herself widowed, less than a year into her daughter's marriage, Ruth transferred her assets into jewellery and gems, which she put in the bank, to be released only to Joy on her death. It was not a moment too soon, for a heart attack claimed her, too, within months.

At her mother's graveside, Joy gripped Frank's arm and wished she could crawl inside his cashmere coat and stay there forever, safe and warm in the shelter of her husband's love. At the reading of her will the lawyer revealed that the jewels were to be kept safe ‘in case my daughter ever needs them', which they both knew meant, if she decided to divorce Frank.

Joy did not stop to grieve for her parents. Instead she focused even more intensely on her marriage and Frank. For their first anniversary she booked a romantic trip to Ireland, hoping to learn more about her husband's background. But it ended up being a disaster. They stayed first at The Shelbourne in Dublin for two days. The hotel was nice enough but Joy found the weather inclement and the city frankly rather dull. Frank remained elusive about his family and Joy was left believing that he was ashamed of them. Joy herself was ashamed of how her parents had behaved towards him and of her own inability to protect him, so she did not push the point. With nobody to see and no social engagements to attend they had pointlessly wandered the dreary streets, with Frank becoming increasingly mournful and ill-tempered.

Eventually she whisked him over to London and then to her spiritual home. Paris, with all its galleries and ateliers and nightclubs, was where Joy felt truly at home. They drank champagne and ate oysters and together they went to Chanel's salon and bought her a magnificent gown with a marabou train. Frank allowed himself to get caught up in his young wife's joie de vivre but nonetheless, the miserable trip to Ireland had cast a small shadow. On the way home, as they ate dinner together in the first class lounge of the aeroplane, Joy was making plans to return to Paris for the following season's shows when Frank said, ‘I don't think you ought to travel for a while, Joy. I think perhaps it would be better if you rested.'

They both knew what he was trying to say, although it was not something either could openly express. Both had hoped that she would return from their holiday pregnant but she began to bleed on the plane. As she walked up the aisle from the ladies' room she gave Frank the almost imperceptible blink of disappointment that had become their shorthand for ‘no'.

She knew her husband was desperate for a child and Joy wanted to give him one. She knew their marriage would never be complete without that. Although, at twenty-two, Joy had no great maternal instincts herself, this did not temper her frustration and disappointment at her failure to conceive for her husband.

As each month passed into the second year of their marriage, Joy could see her husband's sadness building. She watched him nod politely as other men talked about their sons at business dinners, excusing himself when they asked about his progeny.

Joy always covered for him, saying, ‘Silly man married a much younger woman, and I am far too busy having fun with
you
lovely people.' Joy charmed her way through every awkward moment, but they could feel the pressure building with each passing month.

They went to see the Rogersons' family doctor who said, ‘These things can't be forced.' He added, ‘Joy is a healthy young woman.' Frank smarted at the inference and Joy saw, for the first time, that Frank believed this was his fault, his failing.

That night she initiated their lovemaking and afterwards lay across his chest and assured him she would get pregnant. This was her fault. There were things a woman could do, she said. It was all to do with timing. She would eat more, exercise less. She would look into drugs – there were drugs for everything these days. A woman's body was complex but she would sort things out. Soon, they would be a family.

Frank cheered up as she reassured him and they opened some good wine to celebrate their optimism. Frank got quite drunk and once they had drained the second bottle they started fantasizing about the children they were going to have. Frank had it all worked out. Molly and Jack Fitzpatrick. A pretty girl in a ballerina dress and a scruffy boy who he would teach to play Irish hurling. They would buy a house upstate and Joy could fill it with as many servants and as much fancy furniture as she liked, as long as there was one big bed where the children could come and jump them awake on a Sunday morning before church.

‘Church?' Joy cried.

‘Of course,' Frank said. ‘When we have kids we'll be quite the respectable family!'

Joy laughed, but she didn't know what to say. She was taken aback.

After he had talked out his dream, Frank fell into a deep, drunken sleep and Joy walked across to the bedroom window. She looked out at the city sky and wondered if Frank loved the idea of a family more than he loved her.

The thought that might be true made her feel empty inside; it was a cold, lonely feeling. As if there was a yawning black hole inside her that needed to be filled.

Then the anxiety came. Suppose she couldn't make good on her promise to give him a child. Would Frank leave her? Did he love her at all?

Unable to curb these dark thoughts, Joy went downstairs to the mirrored bar and poured herself a double scotch, just to help her sleep. Then she crawled in next to her husband's strong, warm body and told herself that tomorrow was the day when everything would be perfect in her world again.

New York, 1956

‘You will be nice to Minnie, won't you darling?'

It was a Saturday morning and the Fitzpatricks were entertaining that afternoon. Frank had asked his wife to introduce Minnie and T. J. Yewdell, a rich but homey Texan couple, into their New York social scene. Frank had done business with Ted, liked him, and was keen to help the couple settle in New York. Joy had arranged an intimate afternoon drinks gathering, there, at the apartment. Canapés and cocktails. She would even do the hostess thing and mix some of the drinks herself.

‘I am
always
nice to our guests, Frank.'

Joy was in bed with a breakfast tray on her lap tucking into her English tea and toast, her only proper meal of the day. Frank was sitting up, enjoying the novelty of watching her eat.

‘Yes, but sometimes you can be a bit snobbish...'

‘Only if people are vile.'

‘Well, Minnie and Ted are not vile. They are very nice but they are from Texas so they don't exactly fit your idea of...'

‘Stylish?'

‘Exactly.'

She stuffed a piece of toast into her mouth. ‘Don't worry,' she said, raising her eyes to heaven like a scolded child. ‘I'll be kind.'

He leaned over the bed and gave her a kiss. This was how he loved Joy. Wearing not a scrap of make-up she looked so sweet and innocent, like an ordinary girl. He felt close to her when she was relaxed like this. When she had finished eating, Joy would get up, shower, dress, then transform herself with clothes and make-up into ‘Joy Fitzpatrick', his impeccable, socialite wife. He preferred Joy natural but knew she couldn't go about her life looking, or indeed being, like that. That was not who she was. Frank was the only one allowed the privilege of knowing the real Joy, and so he cherished these early mornings alone with her.

While she was in the bathroom Frank drained his wife's teacup and grimaced at all the sugar.

Five years into their marriage he should know how his wife took her tea. After all, it was still just the two of them and that was a bitter blow for Frank.

Frank had never especially wanted, or intended, to become a rich man; he had certainly never sought the kind of glamorous limelight into which his wife had put him. Frank had been driven forward less by ambition and more by a fear of falling back into the poverty of his childhood, but he had always aspired to an ordinary home life. Children, more than wealth, had been a part of his dreams. The opportunity to make good on his own painful upbringing.

Frank had earned all the money he needed to live life as he wanted it, for the rest of his days, but the other aspect of ordinariness, the sense of family and security, had evaded him. Joy was wonderful in many ways but she was a woman to whom the word ‘ordinary' was anathema.

Frank's initial disappointment at not being a father had given way to a quiet resignation. He had a good life, plenty of money and a beautiful wife, and he tried to focus on that. If he was sad about not being a father, he hid it well from everyone. Even – indeed mostly – from himself.

However, he knew that Joy felt his disappointment as her own failing. Nobody blamed him for their childlessness. Joy was the one they were all looking at and talking about behind her back. That was why, he believed, his wife remained so caught up in proving herself with all the clothes and parties. It was also, Frank believed, why Joy drank too much sometimes. Motherhood had not come to soften the sharp-edged vanity of her youth. Only he knew the Joy that still lay beneath the couture and the make-up.

‘Oh, by the way, I ordered another piece of art yesterday, a perfectly ghastly abstract thing by Bauer.'

‘Why do you keep buying paintings you don't like?' Frank asked, calling down to Jones to bring them up coffee.

‘I know. The poor man's been dead three years but she
keeps
pushing his work on us. She's convinced he was brilliant, it's just that our plebeian tastes aren't refined enough to see it yet. She knows what's she's talking about I suppose. She
is
Guggenheim's eyes after all.'