I nodded.
“Oh, but still. It’s impossible for us to ever be together. Mother will never allow it. She’d rather see me dead than give in.”
“No, darling, that isn’t true.”
She was inconsolable, so I held her and let her cry herself out while Muffy, who had become squished between us, crawled off her mistress’s lap with a grumbling meow and headed for the beribboned pillows propped against the headboard.
Some ten minutes later Consuelo’s tears showed signs of slowing, so I slid my hands to her shoulders and set her at arm’s length. “Listen to me, Consuelo. You are a beautiful, strong, intelligent young woman, and whatever happens, you will prevail.”
“I don’t know . . .”
“I’m positive of it. Now, you can go into this marriage with tears and regrets, or you can stride into it with your head held high and your shoulders squared. Do you know what my aunt Sadie would say to you?”
Consuelo shook her head and sniffed, but her chin inched higher than it had been.
“She’d say marry the damned duke if you have to,” I improvised, wondering if Aunt Sadie would have said anything of the sort. The twitching of my cousin’s lips when I swore encouraged me to continue. “She’d say marry him and be every inch a duchess. Let him and everyone else know you’re a force to be reckoned with. Map your battleground and determine a way to be happy in the life you must lead. Soldier on. That’s what Aunt Sadie would say.”
“I always liked your aunt Sadie,” Consuelo murmured with a weak chuckle, “no matter what Mother said about her.”
“I can only imagine what that was.” I grinned at her. “Come now. Let’s freshen you up and go downstairs. Let’s show everyone you’re not going to hide away in your room anymore. Let’s show them Consuelo Vanderbilt isn’t afraid of anything.”
She gave a decisive nod. “Let’s. Help me fix my hair, Emma. I’m going down.”
“As a duchess,” I said.
“As a duchess,” she repeated, then looked uncertainly into my eyes. “Is it all right if I’m still a little afraid?”
“I won’t tell if you won’t.”
Some forty minutes later my cousin and I descended Marble House’s Grand Staircase. When my help fell short we’d called in her maid to work her magic on Consuelo’s hair, choose a new frock, and pinch some color back into her cheeks. She’d emerged from her bedroom sanctuary in a silk sapphire-blue tea gown that made her eyes sparkle, indeed looking every inch the young duchess. Even I felt some awe of her, this beauty of the Vanderbilt family and the belle of every ball she’d attended since her coming-out a year ago.
It wasn’t that Consuelo took on airs. It was that, along with her lovely features and dark, lustrous hair, she’d been blessed with a natural grace that never seemed to fail her, that made her appear self-assured and elegant, at least to those who didn’t know her well. I, however, perceived the tension in her slender neck and the repeated balling of her hands into fists.
“Stop that,” I admonished gently. “Never let them see you doubt yourself.”
“Never let them see the whites of your eyes,” she countered.
“Exactly.”
“Soldier on,” she repeated from earlier.
“Always.”
Voices from the rear veranda echoed lightly in the main hall. We made our way outside, whereupon Aunt Alva hurried over to us issuing a delighted exclamation, as though we had just returned from an extended journey away.
“Consuelo, Emmaline—oh, how delightful that you’ve both decided to join us. Emmaline, I have guests I’m longing to introduce you to. And, Consuelo dear, I have a special surprise for you. Oh, how very lovely you look, my dear.” She ran her hands lightly over the billowing, elbow-length sleeves her daughter wore. She spared a cursory glance at me, then looked away, but not before I caught the “Well, what can one do?” assessment as for a second time that day she took in my simple coiled braid and Aunt Sadie’s hand-me-down carriage dress.
“Ladies, I’d like to introduce you to . . .”
As Consuelo and I approached the wrought-iron garden table where the guests sat, she whispered out of the corner of her mouth to me, “A surprise? Do you know anything about this?”
I had all but forgotten about Aunt Alva’s surprise to coax Consuelo from her room. But we’d reached earshot of the four ladies sitting round the table, so I only shrugged and pasted on a smile.
They were quite varied, those houseguests. Two of them looked to be about Aunt Alva’s age and from similar circumstances, as each sported the latest summer fashions of leg-of-mutton sleeves, knife-pleated underskirts peeking out from lace-edged overdresses, and curving, wide-brimmed hats trimmed with a colorful array of silk flowers. Like Aunt Alva, these women were on the stout side, the kind of figure that comes from childbearing and an unlimited supply of rich food, and their hair, though meticulously dressed, bore a faded sheen where gray had encroached on the natural brown. Their names were Miss Edwina Spooner and Miss Roberta Spooner, sisters, as it turned out. Which explained how immediately after learning their names, I couldn’t have said which was which. I found them pleasant but rather interchangeable.