The Jane Austen Marriage Manual (10 page)

H
ow long is this press junket?” Ann asked as she stood watching me pack a second large suitcase to the brim. She was well versed in the last-minute travel whirlwind that had been my life as an acting beauty editor. But she was accustomed to my jetting off for three or four days with only a carry-on.

“It’s not just one press trip, it’s several,” I explained vaguely, wanting to avoid any details about putting my plan into action. “I’m not sure when I’m coming back.”

She nodded. “Kate, I’m sorry we argued. You and I just have different ideas on how to solve our problems. I love you and just want you to be happy.”

Her words made me feel lousy. Guilty, even. I could see from my sister’s face that she was hurt and I couldn’t do that to her.

“Remember what Nana used to say about finding the right man?” I paused and smiled. “It’s as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one.”

“Of course I do.” She smiled back.

“I’m going to Palm Beach to meet a man,” I admitted at last.

“Aaah, now I get why you’re taking your entire wardrobe. I’ll assume he’s rich, but who is he and how did you meet him?”

“I haven’t met him yet,” I said reluctantly. Ann looked at me blankly.

“Trust me, I know what I’m doing,” I said, although part of me was convincing myself as much as Ann.

“Will you be back in time to go to Chicago with me?” she asked. She was still holding out hope that the food fair in January would be the solution to everything.

“I’ll try,” I said gamely, although I think we both knew the real answer. “It will depend on who I meet.”

I smiled at this last bit, hoping Ann would smile, too. She didn’t. She simply nodded.

“Then you’d better take this,” she said and went to my closet and removed a garment bag. Folding it gingerly, she laid it on top of my suitcase. It was my Chanel dress.

“Thank you,” was all I could think to say. “I was leaving it for the end. But I’m done.”

“What time is your flight?”

“In a couple of hours,” I said. “The cab is coming for me.”

She shook her head. “Let me drive you.”

“That would be great. But I have one favor to ask. Don’t say anything to Iris about what I’m doing.”

“It will be between us,” she answered. “Now promise me one thing.”

“Anything.”

“Make sure your rich guy has an older brother.” She grinned.

“Is there any way I can switch my window seat to an aisle seat?” I asked the hostess manning the desk in the first-class lounge at La-Guardia.

With a sourpuss expression she snatched my ticket away. I’d never had any success getting an airline to change anything for me, not even peanuts for a cookie, but for some mysterious reason she suddenly stood straighter, smiled warmly, and began typing furiously at the computer.

“Yes, of course we can do that,” she said, overly polite. “If you’d like to make yourself comfortable in the lounge, I’ll page you when I have your new boarding pass.”

She handed my ticket back to me. I was dumbfounded.

“Thank you,” I said and picked up my carry-on.

“Thank you for choosing our airline, Lady Katharine,” she called after me.

I stopped dead. I’d completely forgotten about Brandon and Marianne’s little joke. Oh well, if it got me an aisle seat, I was happy. No one else had to know.

I found an empty sofa near the window and staked my claim. For a first-class lounge it was in dire need of a design overhaul. The tables were black lacquer with glass tabletops, each with a chrome lamp; the sofas and armchairs were black leather. All in all, it was very 1980s but without irony. It was also mostly deserted. There were only a handful of people and of all of them, less than half were men, and all of
them
appeared to be attached to wives.

Not a productive start to my mission. I sighed and began reading the newspaper when a flood of footsteps marched past me. I peeked over the top of my paper like a spy in an old movie, as a dozen new arrivals filed into the lounge and, to my delight, many of them were men. That’s more like it! A quick scan revealed that a least three of them appeared to be traveling alone. It was time to get to work.

Businessman Number One, fifty-something, had reddish hair with wisps of gray and gold wire-rim glasses. He wore a navy suit, no tie, his jacket unbuttoned so that his bloated girth was on display.

Businessman Number Two, mid-forties, was tall with a receding hairline. He, too, sported glasses but of the horn-rimmed variety. He was reading
The New Yorker
, always a good sign. He wore a charcoal suit with pink shirt and purple tie, very chic. But, big sigh, he also wore a wedding band.

That left Businessman Number Three, who was short and stubby with light brown hair that swept across his forehead. It was the kind of hair that wouldn’t move in a hurricane. He had a bulbous nose that was red and shiny. He also had what my grandmother called “duck’s disease.” An ass that was close to the ground, perched on short legs with a round belly in front—a build that gave him a waddle when he walked. Even his protruding lips reminded me of a duck. His face was pale but glowing and he kept sweeping a tissue across his forehead to
remove beads of sweat. He was not a man I would normally look at twice. But that was then.

The new me, the me in search of a rich husband, would find out what he did, where he lived, and where he was going. I stood up, smoothed my hair, and was about to step forward when I heard myself being paged. Only it wasn’t exactly me.

“Lady Katharine Billington Shaw,” the hostess called over the loudspeaker. “Lady Katharine Billington Shaw, please come to the front desk.”

Eyes darted in all directions as everyone in the lounge tried to see who had the fancy title. My feet felt stuck to the floor.

“Lady Katharine Billington Shaw!” this time the girl shouted.

It couldn’t be helped; I had to get my boarding pass. I tossed my head, flicked my hair, and marched to the desk with all the self-confidence I could muster. The hostess smiled and handed me my new boarding pass.

“Thank you,” I practically whispered, hoping not to draw attention to myself.

“Thank
you
, Lady Katharine.”

I nodded, not wanting to draw more attention, but as I turned around I practically fell over a white-haired woman with a glaringly obvious fake tan.

“I’m so sorry!” I stammered and was about to step to the side when she put her hand on my arm.

“Oh, but it’s you I want to meet,” she purred. “My name is Orietta del Bianco.”

“Have we met before?” I asked. I had a bad memory and on more than one occasion had offended people by not remembering them. For all I knew, this woman worked for a cosmetics company and knew me in my former life.

“Oh no,” she cooed. “I’m on my way back home to Palm Beach. My husband and I were visiting his sister in England.”

I nodded and smiled, not sure where Orietta was going with this.

“We dined with others of your class,” she said a little smugly. “Even spent a weekend in a
stately
, as you like to call mansions over there.”

“How nice,” I said. “But I’m not English. I’m American.”

She frowned. “But you’re a lady,” she said as though I must be mistaken. Then she nodded as if she had an unspoken understanding of my situation. “You got your title from your husband.”

She grabbed my left hand, but seeing no wedding band added, “Your ex-husband? Oh, but I shouldn’t be so thoughtless, you could be a widow.”

I desperately wanted to escape Orietta. Clearly, she was some kind of aristocrat groupie.

“I’m afraid I’m neither,” I said forcefully. But I sensed she wasn’t going to give up so easily. All I wanted was to make a break for it and go back and find the duck man, but she had yet to let go of my arm. Trapped, I told a white lie. “I inherited an estate in Scotland.”

She clapped her hands together gleefully, like a child who had found the missing piece of the jigsaw. “How fabulous for you!”

I was relieved she was satisfied, although I wasn’t entirely comfortable with the white lie I had told. Who would have thought that a birthday gag could get so out of hand and that I could be mistaken for actual aristocracy? I attempted to walk away but Orietta, my new best friend, seemed hell-bent on sticking close by.

“I have to go sit by my carry-on,” I explained. Lame excuse, I know, and yet she didn’t take the hint. Despite my being five foot ten with a gangly stride, all five feet, two inches of Orietta, who had to be in her mid-sixties, kept pace.

“You have to meet my husband, Anthony,” she went on. “And you must come for dinner at our house in Palm Beach. There is a ton of people I’d like you to meet.”

That got my attention. One thing I couldn’t afford to do was turn down an invitation, especially not at a home in Palm Beach, and Orietta might have rich, single men friends.

“That would be lovely,” I said, now reasonably enthused. As we walked across the lounge, Orietta nipping at my heels, it occurred to me that my title could help me quite a bit. No one would know me in Palm Beach; I could be whoever I wanted to be, and it was certainly a good time for reinvention. Good-bye, acting beauty editor, hello, acting Lady Katharine.

We reached my carry-on and I sat down, hoping that now she’d secured me as a dinner guest she’d leave me in peace. But Orietta was one of those social butterfly types that lived to play hostess at every opportunity, even in airport VIP lounges.

“There’s someone I want you to meet,” she exclaimed with excitement. “I met him on the flight from London. He’s English,” she added unnecessarily. “Perhaps you know him, what with your being a Scottish landowner and everything.”

Before I could utter a single vowel of objection, she vanished. I considered abandoning the VIP lounge for the uncomfortable chairs at the gate when Orietta returned with the Englishman.

“Lady Katharine, I’d like you to meet …” Orietta began with the polished grin of someone who thinks she is giving you a coveted gift.

But introductions weren’t necessary, for I found myself standing face-to-face with Clive’s old school chum.

“Griffith Saunderson.” Orietta breathed his name like he was a prince. “This is Lady Katharine,” she erupted gleefully.

My mind raced back to that drunken slosh of a night when my worst problem was too much pinot grigio and a vow that I had made to Clive about his friend with the unusual name. What was it? I remembered how impossibly rude I’d been and vowed that the next time I saw him, and who thought there’d be a next time, I’d be polite, complimentary, and sweet.

“Lady, is it?” Griff said slyly and with a smirk that screamed revenge for my rudeness. “I had no idea.”

Skip polite, complimentary, and sweet, then.

“It’s just Kate,” I corrected her, desperate to end the charade then and there.

“Oops, my mistake,” Orietta chirped. “Griffith, this is Lady Kate.”

“Please call me Griff,” he suggested gently.

We stood in silence. The man hadn’t changed since the last time I’d seen him. Seriously, he looked as though he was wearing the same clothes, all with that slept-in look and messy hair. In other words, he was still sexy. I caught myself staring at him but got the feeling that he liked me staring at him, so I stared at the floor instead.
But dear old Griff Saunderson, clearly amused by my predicament, refused to budge. I was afraid he’d out me as a fake or find some witty English way to socially skewer me. What did he know about me anyway? For all he knew I was a lady. Though why I was so afraid to come off as an imposter to a badly dressed Englishman, I’ll never know.

“We’ve met,” I said politely.

“I thought you must have!” Orietta said, clearly pleased with herself.

“But I can’t remember where, it was so long ago,” I began.

“And you’d had quite a bit to drink, if I recall,” he finished snootily.

My face turned red.

Satisfied he’d embarrassed me enough, he bowed, “Have a safe flight, Your
Ladyship
.”

I heard him stifle a laugh as he turned and walked back to his lounge seat. Bloody Brits! Who did he think he was?

“Come with me, Lady Kate,” Orietta said and pulled me along. “I want you to meet the gang we have going down for the polo. Are you free Sunday? I’d love you to be our guest at the IPC.”

I hesitated at first. I had no idea what Orietta was talking about. Not that I wanted to appear ignorant, but I had to ask. “IPC?” I tossed off casually, making like I didn’t really care.

Orietta giggled as though I had said something witty. “Forgive me, I should have told you. IPC is the International Polo Club, very exclusive. I hope you can join us.”

“Of course it is,” I pretended. “I would love to come.”

I smiled as warmly as I could—this was going to be easier than I thought. My title was making entry into Palm Beach society positively seamless. Still, I couldn’t help feeling uneasy about Griff. A fear swept over me that Orietta had also invited him to polo. He was obviously still angry with me, not that I blamed him entirely, but it gave him a motive to embarrass me publicly, as well. I had to find out.

“How do you know Griff?” I asked, trying to sound nonchalant.

“Oh, I don’t know anything about him. I met him on the flight from London,” she said vaguely. “He’s coming down for some horse show, for the show jumping. He works with horses, or runs a stable.”

“I think he manages a bed and breakfast,” I corrected her.

“I’m not sure how he got into first class. These days you get all sorts, what with frequent-flyer miles and all that nonsense.”

I sighed with relief. That was that. He was out of my life forever.

“They let
anyone
in these days,” I agreed.

I
had been wrong to try to avoid Orietta. It turned out she was quite the respected hostess in Palm Beach. She took such a liking to me, and I felt so comfortable with her, that during the flight I made a subtle admission that I was single and looking for romance. This seemed to thrill her; she was obviously one of those older women who lived to matchmake—a must-have for Austenesque success—and she assured me that there would be a slew of eligible men at the polo tournament fit for a lady. She would pick me up at my hotel on Sunday in time for brunch.