Bonnie lets out a leaden sigh as she leans the slight distance across the carriage to reaffix the bonnet onto Iris’s goose headdress. “You couldn’t have chosen something simpler?”
“Like a fairy queen, such as you?” Iris snorts derisively. “There will be ten Titanias there tonight, not that you two care if you’re absorbed by the crowd.”
Beau’s too busy picking at his gums with a toothpick to bother looking affronted.
“Bad enough to endure yet another costume ball.” Iris sighs. “I don’t suppose we can expect the likes of the Parvenu Family to innovate.”
“The Ameses?” Bonnie corrects.
“That’s what I said.” Iris sneers. “TheParvenus.”
The carriage stops before a stately manse on Sixtieth Street.
“Still don’t understand why we’re collecting Peyton,” Beau moans. “To protect his maidenly virtue?”
Bonnie slaps her brother with her clutched fan, but she’s smirking right along.
“We’re bringing him with us for the fun of it,” Iris declares.
“Here she goes,” Bonnie mutters.
“The monotony of this social sphere, the endless cycle of one predictable setting after another; it’s enough to drive one to an early grave. The same people, the same conversation, with nothing novel to break it up. You’re both too young and frankly too boring to know the agony I’m in,” Iris cries. “Comfort, wealth, it is a pernicious trap. At least the poor have work to pour themselves into, and surely the fight against starvation affords a certain level of novelty to each day.”
“Go on, Mamma, try out poverty, see if you like it,” Beau snickers.
Iris lifts her chin. “Perhaps I will. Perhaps—”
She gasps. Clutches at Bonnie, who recoils as far as the carriage will allow.
“Oh yes, we’ll throw a poverty party. That will be quite a distraction. Haven’t been to one of those in ages—now, smiles in place, children, here comes the young shut-in himself. Harry! My goodness, what a costume, and... what’s that you’re holding? Now, now. This will be an interesting evening after all!”
“So the others will want an emerald valuation as well?” Cora stands in the middle of the parlor, adjusting her Egyptian headdress. “Do we have the funds for another emerald, even a smaller one?”
No one pays her any mind, a sensation she is growing alarmingly accustomed to. She might as well be here as atableau vivant—meant to be looked at, certainly not listened to.
Cora truly doesn’t understand: Has she not done whatever Alice has asked of her since coming aboard—day after day playing the demure heiress, doing her part to conquer Harry and, through him, ruin his father? Has she not proven herself through tedious training, study, countless social engagements, keeping reporters in the dark, literally spinning the news in their favor? And still, Alice refuses to see her as an equal... or even as someone capable of adding value. Someone who deserves respect.
Alice continues pacing, running rivulets into her parlor floorboards, while Ward sits at the window, frowning down at the bustling avenue below, his hand absently screwing his cane into the rug. He’s supposed to be Henry VIII for tonight’s costume ball but looks rather more like a sad clown in his chosen attire—cockeyed velvet cap, a slightly too-snug burgundy doublet, puffy brocade breeches.
“We need to find a solution before Thursday,” he murmurs. “We’re set to dine with the Ogdens and—”
“Thursday?” Alice spits out the word like venom. “Far too soon. Even assuming this forgery idea would work—abigassumption, mind you—we’ll absolutely need to delay.”
Ward grimaces. “Time is of the essence in general, is it not, my dear?”
“A forged emerald, you mean?” Cora cuts in, now desperatewith confusion. “For me to, what? Wear to dinner with the Ogdens? Surely you aren’t going to risk someone wanting to buy a bracelet off me too—”
“Surelynothing. This isn’t a two-bit production, Cora. Your advice is neither relevant nor helpful.” Alice turns on her, blue eyes frosty. “These people are serious players with deep pockets and aren’t going to just accept green glass and say thank you. As to your earlier question, yes, each of them may want the stones evaluated, which would be more than understandable. Now, pray be silent and let the adultstalk.”
Cora reels back as if she’s been slapped.
“Don’t cry,ma puce,” Béatrice murmurs kindly, hovering near the entry. “Think of the makeup.”
Alice sighs, turning toward the window, dismissing Cora with a wave of her hand. Somehow the feathers of her hoopoe-themed gown lend extra hauteur to the gesture.
“Cinderella’s carriage has just arrived, anyway,” she mutters. “Go be useful. Ward, do buy me more time if you can. Even a week would...”
White-capped rage—or is it hurt?—crests between Cora’s temples, drowning out the sound of Alice and Ward’s further plotting. She hurries past them all, blinking back hot tears. Past Dagmar too, who has chosen to remain in the kitchen, polishing pots, agnostically silent on the subject as always.
