Beautiful Wild - Anna Godbersen Page 0,89

event.

Vida drifted toward it, pulled on by the tide. Her mind thought only of Sal, of his breath and the words he had written to her and the way she felt when she was with him. But she could not figure out what do about that. There was no answer. So she allowed herself to be feted, to be dressed, to called upon and talked about.

Although the Farrars had sent one of their own carriages to fetch young Vida from the Waldorf-Astoria, she had observed from the hotel’s second-story drawing room how the curious crowd had noted the intricate F and L design painted on its shiny side. How they mobbed the carriage and would not yield their place! She was shocked, and a little frightened, by how determined these strangers were for a sighting of the young woman from a faraway land who they had been following in the columns, and who had already gone through all the trials necessary to be transformed into an American princess. Vida, a little afraid of them and what they wanted from her, had asked the concierge to take her out the back way and put her in a plain hansom.

Now, waiting in line with the other carriages to arrive at the lowest step of that mauve carpet, Vida peered out. She knew she would not disappoint the crowd. She was wearing a Doucet gown of sky blue chiffon that was embellished all over with tiny specks of coral, and a delicate little white gold tiara nestled in her hair, and an enormous ermine. She had rouged her cheeks and darkened her lashes and brightened her eyes with little drops.

Every minute detail of her appearance met the requirements of fairy tales. She could win their love, she knew; but this masterful social coup, which she would once have delighted in, felt overwhelming now, like a rich dessert after a ten-course supper.

“You’re not yourself,” Nora observed from the seat across.

“No.”

“Well, you look yourself.”

Vida’s eyes darted from the scene outside the carriage to Nora. “Not too suntanned?”

“Just the right amount to remind everyone of your exciting journey to this moment.”

When the door of the cab was pulled back by a Farrar footman and the crowd saw who it was, they roared. The chanting of Vida’s name startled a flock of birds perched on a nearby tree, and their dark silhouettes filled the violet sky. She was lifted by a footman, ferried in his arms over the slush and up the first few steps.

Upright and on her own two feet again, she felt the full brunt of the crowd’s adulation. She saw the beaming faces of children and young women gazing at her, illuminated with the hope that she who had everything would bestow a little good luck on them. To her their energy seemed a slow, gentle wave, and she was sorry for her hesitating. The sweet bath washed over her, and she lifted her hands, wanting to offer something back in return. They were still calling her name, cheering for her, when another footman appeared on the top step. The Farrar machinery kept on, too fast for her to resist, and as though she were another piece of luggage being moved along, she was borne through the grand doorway and into another realm.

The foyer was paneled in dark mahogany and dense with the smell of hundreds of white mums in ormolu vases. After the grand steps of the Farrar mansion, this place had an odd hush, although she could hear the murmurs and music of a party already underway in the next rooms. Her coat was removed from her shoulders. She glanced back for Nora, but Nora was already being led down an unobtrusive little staircase to wherever the servants waited for their masters to be in need of them, and Vida herself was proceeding along a Persian runner, between the liveried sentries who stood stoically waiting for her to pass as she moved onward to the brilliant center of things.

And somewhere, in all of this, was Sal. He had promised her. She would see him, and then she would finally know what she should do.

The Farrar ballroom was speckled with chandelier light and packed with black frock coats and swirling gowns and the flash of eyes wanting to know who else had arrived, and whether or not their appearance was especially eye-catching or just your average, everyday sort of decadence. Vida knew precisely what they were thinking, for she had thought in much