“Includes tiny curry buns, choux pastry with a four-cheese custard, miniature crepes rolled on caviar and sour cream, crab cakes with a sweet dipping sauce, lobster vol-au-vents, big shrimps deep-fried in sponge batter —”
“Excellent!” cried Davina, cutting her off. “How many have accepted, especially the important ones?”
“All the important ones are coming. Nineteen.”
“What about Lily?”
“Lily will be here, but helping me and the barman.”
“Excellent! Tell her to leave her diamonds at home.”
TUESDAY, APRIL 1, 1969
That it was April Fools’ Day was of no moment to the Savoviches, whose superstitions ran more to evil eyes and curses, and the nineteen guests forebore to mention the fact, correctly deducing that Davina’s party was no prank.
Angela M.M. arrived with Betty Howard and Gloria Silvestri; when all twenty women were assembled, everyone agreed that the palm for best-dressed had, as always, to go to Gloria, wearing a plain purple wool dress, the exact color of Chubb’s purple. A seething Pamela Devane, also in purple, had to admit that hers was the wrong shade, the wrong cut, the wrong everything. What did that woman do, to create her magic? It all hinged, Pamela decided resentfully, on a huge brooch of haphazard amethyst crystals artfully positioned on her left hip just to one side of an enviably flat tummy. To rub it in, Gloria had clipped a matching amethyst earring just to one side of the middle of each purple kid shoe.
“The Duchess of Windsor would eat her heart out,” Delia said to Millie, chuckling.
“Who?” asked Millie, no follower of fashion.
“Reputedly the world’s best-dressed woman. My vote goes to Aunt Gloria, who doesn’t even spend a fortune on her clothes. She makes them herself. Just sees something in a fashion paper or magazine, and copies it perfectly.”
“Isn’t that stealing?”
“Not after it’s out in the public arena, dear. You steal designs before they’re shown,” said Delia. “Speaking of clothes, you look wonderful yourself.”
“I went to Fifth Avenue,” Millie confessed, “and spent what I would have deemed a fortune a month ago.” She gazed around, frowning. “Why are we here, exactly?”
“Davina’s way of checking the temperature of the water after the revelations that came out at Uda’s trial. Invite a goodly representation of Holloman and Chubb’s important women to a girls-only shindig, and see how many accept. If they all do — and I see they have! — then her social position is not only safe, but subtly exalted. The town’s women have decided that Davina and Uda are unsung heroines.”
“Even if one of them committed murder?”
“There’s not an atom of proof of that, dear. Not according to twelve good souls and true. They’re safe and they’re in.”
“I thought Desdemona was coming.”
“Two boys under the age of three can ruin any mother’s plans. She’s having sitter troubles.”
Lily Tunbull appeared bearing a tray; Millie and Delia helped themselves to little china plates — no cardboard crap for Davina! Thin, delicate china too. Matching.
“You should be a guest,” Delia said to Lily.
Who blushed. “No, no, I couldn’t stand that! I like to keep busy, I don’t know anyone here, and I’m learning all Uda’s best recipes. Take the tiny crepes, they’re divine. And the four-cheese puffs. The lobster vol-au-vents are heaven, the pastry is made from scratch — on butter!”
Plates loaded, they found two chairs and sat. Hester Grey and Fulvia Friedkin from C.U.P. joined them.
“Davina is a wonder,” Hester said.
Delia was biting into a crepe. “Caviar!” she exclaimed. “Delicious! Millie, eat up. Then we can be unashamed piggies and stack our plates again. And yes,” she said to Hester, “Davina is a wonder. I’m memorizing the food to tell Desdemona.”
“Desdemona?”
“Delmonico. A friend, and a formidable cook.”
“What prompted Davina to give this party?” Fulvia asked.
Hester tittered. “One in the eye for Jim’s publicist, Pamela Devane. That’s her, in the wrong purple dress. Very snooty to us provincials — as if New York City wasn’t a mere commute away. I’m not fond of Davina, but compared to Pamela, she’s heaven. She also has Uda.”
“I guess no one expects to be poisoned today,” said Millie.
“Absolutely not,” mumbled Delia, eating deliriously. She looked at Hester. “Why aren’t you fond of Davina?”
“Too pushy.” Hester sighed. “I did my training in textbook design under Head Scholar Walter Bingham — the one before Don Carter. His ideas were extremely conservative, and we didn’t publish scientific work then. I’ve kept to his tenets, whereas Davina’s ideas are modern. I admit she’s right about things like explanatory illustrations and clearer layout, but I can’t do it!”