* * *
—
And there we assembled on a cold morning in early December, me at the top of the aisle of the historic church, its pews filled with members of the Four Hundred, along with my stolid mother and my simpering stepmother, the two women doing their best to avoid any eye contact.
I pulled my thoughts away from both of them, turning my focus down to inspect my gown one final time. Even if I lacked the pedigree of Edward’s set, I had the wealth to make up for it, and so I’d dressed the part that day. My gown was a custom-made confection of creamy satin, hand-stitched with point d’angleterre detail and glistening with delicate beadwork of pearls and crystals. My new diamond earrings were a wedding gift from Papa, and my diamond choker was a wedding gift from Eddie.
The music began, first Bach and then Keble. The chapel smelled of fresh orange blossoms and countless expensive colognes and perfumes. Papa stood at my side, looking dapper in his coat and tails, a spray of fresh-cut white roses on his lapel. When he saw me studying him, he flashed me a quick sideways smile, and then winked once. As soon as I’d told him of my official engagement, he’d ceased all warnings and efforts to dissuade me from marrying Ed. And now, as he looked me in the eye, I could see in his intense, blue-eyed stare that he was holding back a deep well of feelings.
“Budgie,” he whispered, as the string melody at the front signified it was time for us to begin our walk up the aisle. “My girl, I am with you in anything that brings you happiness.”
“Thank you, Papa.”
The music grew louder; it was our time. As I glided up the aisle, my dress unfurling in radiant reams of satin behind me, I kept my chin raised and my shoulders squared, a posture that would have garnered the approval of even the staunchest of the Mount Vernon Seminary etiquette teachers. As we neared the front of the church, my eyes fell on my future mother-in-law, Emma Close. I smiled at her, but just at that moment she was turning to the young woman who stood whispering at her side—a second cousin of Ed’s, I remembered, even if I could not recall her name. I heard the lady speak to my groom’s mother as I passed: “Well, she’s a cute enough kitten, I suppose. Considering who she is and where she comes from.”
My frame stiffened. Did Papa feel it beside me? I wondered. I knew what some in my groom’s family might think. What members of their patrician set might believe: That I was new money, securing Eddie with my cereal millions even though his social station was so far above my own. That we Posts were provincial and unrefined, lacking the high pedigree of the Close clan.
I pulled my gaze away from Emma and her chattering companion and stared forward, fixing a determined smile to my face, my focus landing on my bridesmaid, Helen, standing at the front of the church. And then my eyes slid and rested on my groom, who stood with a calm, self-assured smile as he watched my approach. Eddie. He waited there in his long coat and tails, a spray of white petals bursting from his lapel, his smiling blue eyes fixed only on me. The man who had chosen me. Eddie, who was not only lovely and well educated and impossibly handsome, but also a gentleman, gracious and steady.
Eddie had never made me feel simple. He had chosen me; he loved me. What had he said? You have enchanted me, Marjorie Merriweather Post. There it was. I would be worthy of him. I’d make him happy that he’d picked me, and I’d prove to everyone in this packed church that Ed Close had been brilliant—and damned fortunate—in his choice of Marjorie Merriweather Post.
Chapter 10
Hot Springs, Virginia
December 1905
Eddie and I stepped off the train in the posh spa town of Hot Springs, where we arrived at our hotel to find a pile of waiting packages that bore Papa’s familiar handwriting.
“Mr. Close, Mrs. Close, welcome to the Homestead Hotel. These packages have arrived for you.” It took me just a startled instant to realize that the hotel concierge was speaking to me. The concierge raised an eyebrow, staring with an amused expression. “Mrs. Close?”
“Mrs. Close,” Eddie said, sidling up behind me, his arm weaving around my waist as his breath skittered over my ear and neck. “I rather like the sound of that, my dear.”
The concierge smiled indulgently and looked away as Eddie’s long, lean frame curled around mine, this well-trained man no doubt familiar with the halcyon glow that enveloped so many of the honeymooners who frequented his luxurious establishment.
“Wonderful,” I said, shrugging my husband off with a playful smirk and nodding toward the front desk, accepting my packages. “Yes, I am Mrs. Close. Thank you.” I patted down the skirts of my fashionable crimson traveling dress—custom ordered from Paris’s House of Worth, like so much of my trousseau—and squared my shoulders, determined that I would look every inch the part of Mrs. Edward Close, even if it was taking me a bit of time to feel like the part was indeed mine.