Mating Rituals of the North American WASP (12 page)

She scanned a smaller pile: opened envelopes, bits of wrinkled scratch paper, the corner of what looked like a photograph
at the bottom. It was typical of a man. He’d have a lot more space if he’d throw away his trash instead of arranging it in
piles. Why, for example, did he need the opened Connecticut Light and Power envelope? She started to set it aside, then saw
penciled on it:

staid genes worked hot

from your electric charms

Peggy sat in Luke’s desk chair and read the lines again and then again. Could Luke have written them?

It didn’t seem possible, yet all of the bits of paper in this stack had things written on them: sometimes one line, sometimes
several. On the back of a credit card receipt was a single word: “enchantment.” The receipt, she saw, was from a restaurant
in a place called South Norwalk. It was dated nine days earlier.

A hard knot formed in her chest. She slipped the receipt back into its place, but as she did so, all of the papers moved an
inch, revealing more of the photograph. Peggy slid it out.

The woman in the snapshot was leaning against the interior wall of what could have been a Manhattan loft—except it wasn’t
Manhattan; there were elevated train tracks behind it Peggy didn’t recognize. The woman’s lips were parted, and her face and
upper chest were thick with freckles, like a Norman Rockwell character. But there was nothing cuddly about this woman, the
feral waves of auburn hair, the cigarette dangling loosely from her long fingers. She was sexy. Treacherously sexy. The kind
of woman you hoped never decided to go after your boyfriend.

Enchantment indeed.

Peggy thought of Brock, of the incident in Florida.

She glared at the woman. What was Luke doing with her?
Stay away from my husband,
she thought irrationally.

The anxiety expanded inside her chest, pressing on her lungs and gripping her windpipe. She studied the snapshot. Luke would
study it, too, for inspiration, as he spun lines like—she shuffled through more scrap paper—“aching for your embrace; us turned
to one…”

They had to be sleeping together. What man could see this woman and not want to—

She was being watched.

Peggy was sure of it. The house was observing her, reading her thoughts.

A low moan sounded from the far corner of the room.

Peggy turned toward the disturbance and gasped at another flash of motion. The moan was coming from behind the mirror resting
on the floor. Miss Abigail’s cat, or a poltergeist? Peggy didn’t want to stay and find out. She caught sight, momentarily,
of her fearful reflection before racing for her bedroom.

For heaven’s sake, it was seven minutes to four; where was she? Punctuality was part of Luke’s social code. It meant you cared
enough about your fellow citizens to respect their time.

Abigail had been tsking and clucking, increasingly loudly, for twenty minutes. Now she came to Luke in the foyer. “Go upstairs
and fetch her. They’ll be here any minute.”

There was no chance Luke was going to risk coming across Peggy in a state of undress. He took his great-aunt’s elbow. “Let’s
get you a sherry.”

Just then the staircase began to tremble, signaling the imminent arrival of someone descending it, and Peggy appeared. Her
mouth drew into a shiny pink circle at the sight of Luke and Abigail waiting for her in the foyer.
Creak,
went the third step from the bottom as she placed one high-heeled shoe on it.

“You look festive, dear.” Like any good Yankee hostess, Abigail revealed no trace of displeasure at her new great-niece-in-law’s
tardiness or choice of getup. Luke, who usually paid no more attention to fashion than he did to jewelry, was certain that
Peggy’s short skirt was wholly inappropriate for New Nineveh.

Though it looked pretty good.

“You’re late. People will be here any minute.”

“I thought the reception started at four.” Peggy turned to Abigail, who was rearranging fall branches in a vase on the foyer
table. “Won’t everybody be fashionably late?”

Luke suppressed a smile. “There’s no such thing as fashionably late in New Nineveh.”

Peggy was uneasy. He could see that. It was intimidating enough for him, having to put on this act for people he at least
knew accepted him. He couldn’t imagine being in her shoes—he glanced at her feet, then jerked his head away. Those high heels
were far too distracting.

“Well…” she hesitated. “I think the tub is broken. It took an hour to fill.”

He decided some levity was in order. “You were lucky. It usually takes two hours.”

Peggy didn’t laugh. She probably guessed, correctly, that he was telling the truth.

“Your wife might care for a cup of punch. Why don’t I get one for her.” Abby hurried off.

“In any case,” Peggy said with a sigh once they were alone, “perhaps I could shower in your bathroom from now on.”

Luke laughed. “That
is
my bathroom.”

“There’s only one bathroom on the entire third floor?”

“There are only two in the house. Abigail’s doesn’t have a shower, either. But there isn’t time for this.” He checked his
watch again. “We need to get our story absolutely straight. Now, a lot of the people coming today have known my family for
generations. There’s a group I went to prep school with—that’s Phillips Academy Andover, but just call it Andover—and a few
neighbors, and friends of Abby’s and my late parents’. They’ll all want to know about you. You moved around a lot as a child,
didn’t you?”

“Who told you that?”

He was perplexed. How
had
he known? “We must have talked about it…”
that night.
He hoped his discomfort wasn’t as obvious as hers. “Did you live at any time in Palo Alto?”

“San Jose.”

“I don’t suppose you went to Stanford?”

“NYU.”

“Art history?”

“English.”

“Really?” It was the first thing aside from their shared blunder in Las Vegas that he and Peggy had in common. Luke had majored
in English and economics at Yale.

“Yes.” Her words were clipped. “Really.”

He wondered if he’d said something to insult her. “How did an English major end up selling soap?”

“I needed the money,” she said.

He considered telling her he could relate, but time was wasting. “Just say you’re from Palo Alto and have an art history degree
from Stanford.”

“What’s wrong with San Jose and NYU?”

“I just already told a few people the first story.” He had the distinct impression he was digging himself into a hole. “It’s
more, well, authentic.”

“You mean your friends wouldn’t live in San Jose or go to NYU.”

“Luke, what was I supposed to be getting for you?” Abigail’s question came from the dining room.

The distraction couldn’t have come at a better time. “Punch, but we’ll get our own, thank you.” Luke lowered his voice. “All
right, Peggy, quickly: After our private wedding in New York, we drove up to the Colonial Inn for the night, and—what?”

Peggy had raised her hand—a little facetiously, Luke thought. “When?”

“When what?”

“When was our wedding—the date? You remember, right? People will ask. And what is the Colonial Inn?”

“It’s a bed-and-breakfast about ten miles from here.” He shrugged. “People think it’s romantic.”

“Have you been there?”

“Sure.” He’d taken Nicki to the Colonial’s restaurant for dinner a couple of times.

Peggy was quiet for a few seconds. Then she repeated, “And when was our wedding?” She sounded offended. Luke couldn’t imagine
why. Before he could take a guess, she went on, “September twenty-sixth. I can’t believe you, Luke.”

“Of course.” Luke couldn’t imagine how he’d forgotten. “My mistake. September twenty-sixth. The day our year is over.”

“I’m going to put the bruschetta in the oven.” She started to leave, but Luke blocked her.

“This is important. Gossip gets around fast. If even one person suspects our marriage is anything but genuine, that it’s a
business arrangement, it’ll get back to Abby, and she’ll march straight back to Lowell and rip up the will so fast it’ll make
your head spin.…
What?”

Peggy’s forehead was furrowed, and an emotion he didn’t understand radiated from her eyes, which were, he’d forgotten, the
soft, complicated gray of a stormy autumn sky.

Eyes like skies that never cease to deepen—

The phrase came to him as if dictated.

Drown at twilight in them—drink their glow

“Do you remember anything at all about our”—she swallowed—“about that night?”

And then he did.

He hadn’t noticed her, another face in the crowd, as he’d crossed the casino on the way to his room after the final seminar
of the Family Asset Management Conference. He’d simply seen a figure crumple to the floor, and had rushed to help, and had
found this unreal, ethereal creature. He could still picture the casino light gilding her forehead. She’d worn a wedding veil.
A bride brought into being just for him.

“Rise, resty Muse,” he’d quoted, taking her small, soft hand in his and helping her to her feet, breathing in, as he did so,
the delicate scent of her skin, as if she were made of a thousand mysterious flowers and spices and fragrant fruits.

“Shakespeare.” She’d smiled up at him and continued the line. “Rise, resty Muse, my love’s sweet face survey…”

Immediately, viscerally, he had understood there was such a thing as love at first sight. Which had made his finding himself
alone the next morning all the more bittersweet.

“Do
you
remember anything?” he asked, testing her.

“Just waking up and wanting to die.” She was standing pigeon-toed in her high heels. “I obviously went temporarily insane
that night. I’m sorry. About everything.”

From the other side of the front door, the decisive clack of the knocker announced the party’s first arrival.

“No need to apologize,” Luke told Peggy, stung. “I don’t recall a thing.”

Nobody was eating the artichoke squares. They sat, cold and congealing, next to the untouched tuna-and-black-bean bruschetta.
Earlier, Peggy had tried moving both dishes and the roasted vegetables from their second-tier spot against the back wall of
the grand parlor. But they were faring no better here on the dining room table, next to Miss Abigail’s peanut butter and bacon
on Ritz crackers. Peggy felt somewhat vindicated that none of the food was getting much attention from the reception guests.
Not so the booze. Not even in college had she known people who could put away liquor—and not even good liquor—this fast. The
cheap Scotch and gin had been replenished a number of times; the crystal punch bowl, despite its oceanic proportions, had
already needed to be refilled twice with Miss Abigail’s whiskey-sour punch, by a uniformed, middle-aged maid named Erin whom
Miss Abigail had insisted on hiring—with the money she must have saved buying grocery store cheese and no-name spirits.

A dainty, withered guest drained her cup in three gulps and held it out for more. Erin could barely ladle fast enough. After
the woman shuffled back out into the grand parlor, Peggy caught the maid’s eye. “If you need a break, I’m happy to take over.”

Erin stopped midladle and smoothed her uniform. “You enjoy the party, ma’am.”

Peggy turned to see whom Erin was addressing. No one was there. She started to rearrange the artichoke squares one more time,
caught Erin’s disparaging look, and put down the silver serving tongs.

“That looks scrumptious!”

The speaker, a woman about Peggy’s age whom Peggy remembered having been introduced to in the foyer, had the delicate handles
of several empty punch cups hooked over her fingers.

“I can fix you a plate.” Peggy reached for a deviled egg.

“Lord spare me the Yankee food. One of those.” The woman nodded toward the artichoke squares. “It’s okay. I can get it.” She
let Erin take the cups and, while the maid was refilling them, picked up a plate. “Look at that roasted vegetable salad. And
bruschetta! Did you make all this?”

Peggy wanted to hug this person. She just wished she could remember her name. All the female guests at this party seemed to
have the same first name that sounded like a last name, or a borderline-parody nickname like Topsy, and they looked alike,
flat-chested and bony, with mousy hair and short-filed fingernails.

“Yes, I made it,” Peggy said, “with help from Martha Stewart.”

“It’s delicious.” The woman brushed a crumb from the neckline of her sweater. She was curvaceous and womanly, like a 1940s
pinup girl, a healthy five or six dress sizes bigger than the other women and an exception to the mousy rule. Everything about
her was gleaming and shiny and expensive-looking, from the prim angora crew neck she somehow made alluring, to the diamond-studded
baby-shoe charm glittering around her neck, to the pearls that were larger and whiter than anyone else’s. “Isn’t Martha a
doll? We lived near her in Westport when I was a kid, and once in a while she’d pop over with dahlias from her cutting garden.
Did you grow up around here?”

“In San Jos—Palo Alto.”

“Well, we’re all thrilled Luke picked a nice girl to settle down with, finally. Why are you hiding? Come.”

She set down her empty plate, thanked Erin, and gathered up three of the refilled cups by their spindly crystal handles. Peggy
balanced the other three between her palms, her elbows pointing out like wings, and followed carefully, wondering what this
woman had meant by “finally.” They passed through the grand parlor, where Miss Abigail, in a long skirt and a high-necked
blouse, was conversing with a hunched, elderly man in plaid slacks and a cashmere sweater in an eyeball-searing shade of ultraviolet.
Lowell Mayhew stood nearby with his wife, whose name had also slipped Peggy’s mind. Both smiled at Peggy, and she lifted her
right elbow in greeting. A wave of punch broke onto her wrist, but she kept going, her eyes on her new friend’s back. The
woman’s bouncy black hair curled at the ends like a model’s in an old shampoo commercial.

“Peggy, over here!” a voice sang out.