Noon at Tiffany's (52 page)

June 14, 1905

Still inside the remnants of a dream, Clara raised her arms and slipped them around the man’s neck to return his gentle kiss.

“Would you like to ride away with me today to parts unknown?”

The whisper was all too real, each puff of breath tickling her nose. She opened her eyes to find Philip’s face above hers. Confused, she lay still, trying to decide whether or not she was still dreaming.

The sharp rap at her door was real enough. She made a mad dash across the room and threw her weight against the door. “Yes, what is it?”

“It’s Bernice, Miss Clara. Miss Owens sent me up to tell you and Miss Alice that breakfast will be served in the small dining room this morning ’cause there ain’t hardly nobody here.”

Clara glanced at the mantle clock and groaned. She’d overslept and would have to hurry to make it to Tiffany’s on time. She wheeled on Philip, who was sitting on her bed, grinning like a fool. Instead of his city suit, he was wearing his bicycle clothes.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered. “Have you gone mad? What if Alice or someone else comes in and finds you here? They’ll think we … we …”

“Let them,” Philip said, gathering himself up. “Did you know that I love the way you look when you sleep?”

She pushed him toward the door. “You have to leave! I’ve got to get ready for work.”

He caught her by the waist. “It’s the perfect morning for an adventure. Take the day off. Ring up Tiffany’s and tell them you have the grippe. We’ll ask Miss Owens to pack a lunch, and then we can ride out of the city and have a picnic in the hills.”

She wiggled out of his grip and brushed past him, seeking the safety of her dressing screen. “I can’t. I have a meeting with Mr. Tiffany and his cronies first thing this morning about how to get around the Union contract and hire on more people. I have to be there.”

“But it’s my only day off for weeks,” he complained. “We aren’t going to have another chance for ages.”

She paused over the buttons on her skirt. It wasn’t as if Mr. Tiffany and his board couldn’t figure it out for themselves. She opened her mouth to tell him yes, but snapped it shut. With their minds always on schemes to save money, there was the danger the Tiffany Powers That Be might come up with a plan that would put her department at a disadvantage. Her input would be essential. If things fell apart because she’d shirked her responsibility, she wouldn’t be able to live with herself.

“The temptation is great,” she said, pinning up her hair, “but go I must. They expect me, and if I’m not there, they’ll find a way to muck it up, and then my girls and I will have to live with whatever cockamamie plan they come up with.”

She emerged from behind the screen and held the door open for him. “I can’t be late.”

“All right,” he teased, “but you’ll be sorry.”

She sighed. “Believe me, I already am.”

For the better part of two hours, the three of them waited in Mr. Platt’s office for the tardy Mr. Tiffany. Glad to have brought her sketchbook along, Clara worked out several designs, while Mr. Thomas and Mr. Platt could talk of nothing else except Christy Mathewson pitching a no-hitter the day before, giving the Giants a victory over the Cubs.

Simpkins telephoned several times to report on Mr. Tiffany’s progress. In the first call, the valet explained in his understated monotone that Mr. Tiffany was on his way and they were to stay put. A half-hour later, Simpkins reported there was car trouble. In his third call, Simpkins
announced that Mr. Tiffany had returned to the house for his notes. The last time he called, he reverted to his original message.

When the phone on Louis’s desk rang a fifth time, no one moved to answer it, for the simple reason that they were too stunned by the sight of Louis Tiffany weaving in the doorway, his tie askew and his collar open.

“Ahhh, look who’s here—my loyal guard.” Louis reached over to hang up his walking stick, missed the hook, and stumbled into the wall. He kicked at the cane and missed.

Before Mr. Thomas or Mr. Platt could react, Clara was on her feet. She leaned in to help him and stopped short. The smell of whiskey that exuded from him was overpowering. “Why Mr. Tiffany, you’ve been drinking!”

He faced her, his eyes red and wandering uncontrollably in their sockets. “Tho? What do you propose to do about that, Mrs. Driscoll? Call the polith?”

“You can’t even stand up straight.”

“I motht thertainly can. I’ll show you.”

In a move that reminded her of a performing circus clown, Louis shoved his toe under the fallen cane and tried to flip it into the air. Teetering backward, he landed on his hindquarters so hard the floor shook beneath their feet.

Mr. Thomas rapidly hoisted him off the floor. “I’ll take you home, Mr. Tiffany. You shouldn’t be here in this condition.”

Louis shook him off. “Get away! I want Clara to take me home. She’s prettier than you.”

A brief smile flitted across Bond Thomas’s face. “I agree with you about that, Louis. However, I’m guessing she doesn’t drive nearly as well.”

She rushed back to Irving Place, hoping to catch Philip. When he failed to answer his door, she went in search of Miss Owens.

“Let me see.” Miss Owens studied the ceiling while she formulated her answer. “Mr. Allen stayed quite a while at breakfast. He drank three cups of coffee while reading the
Times,
and then asked to use the telephone. I was helping with the dishes, so I didn’t pay him much mind, but I did overhear him say he was going to take his wheel up to …” Miss Owens
frowned and shook her head.

“Up to where?”

“I can’t remember. These days, my memory is less like a camel’s and more like an unhatched egg.”

“Please try, Miss Owens. I want to surprise him. It’s his first day off in such a long time, and I won’t have this opportunity again for ages.”

Miss Owens snapped her fingers. “Highbridge Park! Came to me just like that. Isn’t it funny how the mind plays tricks? Why, my grandmother could remember the name of every one of her schoolmates from the time she was six years old.”

“Miss Owens, please! Did he say which part of Highbridge?”

“No,” Miss Owens shook her head, “I don’t remember that, but I do recall that he asked one of the kitchen maids to pack him a nice lunch. I think she gave him the rest of the ham, with some of that dill mustard my sister made last year, two apples and the last part of that cheese from—”

Calling out her thanks over her shoulder, Clara took the stairs two at a time, already unfastening the buttons on her collar.

Highbridge Park, Manhattan

She found his bicycle amongst the ten or so parked along a low wall at the beginning of a wooded trail. Squeezing her bicycle in alongside his, she bounded up the rocky footpath in anticipation of his surprise at seeing her. He’d break into his slow, crooked smile and pull her behind a tree for a kiss. Later, they’d have dinner at Child’s and, if he wasn’t too tired, take in a play.

She was thinking of which play they might attend when she spotted his sporty green cap—the one she’d given him for his birthday. She ran a short distance into the woods and hid behind a tree. She’d call out something humorous, maybe something about Danderine and his hair, or maybe she’d just whistle and wait for him to find her.

The cap came closer, bobbing in rhythm with his loping gait. Next his forehead and eyes came into view, then his nose, and finally that sensuous mouth moving in animated speech. She craned forward to get a better view of his companion.
Even from a distance, she could see the woman possessed the delicate flawless beauty that belonged only to the young. Her bicycle suit was cut to show her exceptionally good figure to an advantage.

The woman stayed even with him, moving with a saucy swing, her back straight, and head high. Her voice was clear, the words ringing with a lively spirit. It was the sight of Philip’s arm about her waist and the familiarity with which they treated each other, bumping hips and laughing, that robbed her of breath.

For just an instant, she found solace in the thought that the woman might be one of his many cousins, but as they came even to her hiding place, Philip pulled the woman around and kissed her in a manner that could not be considered cousinly by any stretch of the imagination.

Time slowed and stopped. Blind with the pain of betrayal, she saw nothing other than the woman wrapped inside Philip’s arms, her mouth on the same lips she’d kissed only a few hours before. She picked her way to the trail, hurrying in the direction of her bicycle as fast as she could without breaking into a run. She hoped by some miracle he might not notice her—but it wasn’t a day for miracles.

He shouted her name, the panic in his voice echoing in her ears.

She was within yards of her bicycle, when he caught her by the arm and pulled her around. Over his shoulder she could see the other woman looking a little bewildered, but not threatened—as if she were completely sure of him.

Clara wrenched her arm free. Searching the handsome face that had held her captive for so long, she slapped him hard enough to knock him off balance.

She remembered nothing of her ride back to Irving Place, except a vague sense of surprise that she could function at all. The shock gave way to anger, anguish, and finally a deep, aching pain that seeped in and overtook her.

Within the hour he was there, nervous, contrite, begging her to listen.

She stood by the window, staring out, seeing nothing. Her hair hung loose in disarray, and she had not yet bothered to change out of her bicycle suit.

“Her name is Ferne Ryan,” he began. “We were classmates at the
University of Wisconsin. Our parents were good friends, so, of course, our mothers began plotting years ago—probably before we were born. Ferne and I never had a choice.”

The curtains billowed in on the breeze, catching on her Tiffany lamp. She pushed them off and lowered the window. “How long have you been betrothed?” she asked, amazed that she could speak at all, let alone be standing without assistance.

“Three years.” He turned her around to face him. “Listen to me. It’s true that Ferne and I are good friends—like you and Edward—but I’m no more in love with her than she is with me. When I first realized I loved you, I thought I might be able to break away from her, but I wanted to do it gradually, so as not to hurt anyone.”