Read Online Splendor: A Luxe Novel by Anna Godbersen - Free Book Online
Authors: Anna Godbersen
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papers, when I first came to help your family, early last winter. Of course I did not then know who William Keller was.” Elizabeth’s eyes had become watery and her pale pink lips parted involuntarily. “He knew,” she whispered.
“That there was oil? He must have believed so; why else would a man like Edward Holland have been interested in land like that?”
“No…” She bit her lip and swallowed hard as she took in her father’s sanctioning of Will’s love for her, so long after both men had died. “Father knew that Will loved me. That I loved him.” Snowden looked away.
In her more gathered moments, Elizabeth would have thought to apologize, but it did not occur to her now. “Why did you not tell me?” she pursued.
“My dear Mrs. Cairns, you were in no state to receive this kind of news. But you needn’t have worried. I have been seeing to your interests. I’ve taken several trips to California to inspect the land, and it is in truth a rich oil field. Production has begun, and we’ve already seen returns on the property. How do you think I was able to secure funds for this house, my dear?” His hand swept through the air, and her eyes followed the arc it made, as though some detail in the molding would symbolize her father’s prescience.
“Of course, the natural treasure of the land will not be realized overnight, but very soon it will be paying us all—the Hollands, that is—quite handsomely.”
“Oh!” Elizabeth took a breath; she had never breathed so deeply. Her long, fine fingers fluttered over her chest and she tried valiantly not to cry again. So it was Will who was caring for them after all.
The fatigue she had been dodging all afternoon was suddenly overwhelming. She fixed her gaze on the short, blunt stubble of Snowden’s chin, which was a light color, and so caught the very last of the sun—
and she tried to smile a little in gratitude.
“Thank you.” She closed her eyes, and when she whispered it again, she was thinking of her father and the father of her unborn child, who were, perhaps, just at that moment, watching over her from heaven.
“Thank you.”
Eight
Now that Carolina Broad has shown all of society her splendid new abode, and all the wonderfully precious things she has managed to acquire for it, we suppose there will be no more doubting that she is at last one of us. Although the wardrobe that she ordered for her first summer season might have been taken as sufficient proof of this, or, for that matter, the fact that she retained her benefactor Carey Lewis Longhorn’s famed box at the opera, and is regularly seen entertaining there.
——FROM CITÉ CHATTER, SATURDAY, JULY 7, 1900
file://C:\Documents and Settings\nickunj\Desktop\book.html 10/28/2009
Page 26 of 128
ELITE NEW YORK WAS SITUATED IN A HIERARCHY of boxes, arranged around a grand horseshoe, high above a vibrant and melodramatic performance on a stage that few, if any, audience members were still paying attention to. The light of a giant chandelier played against their raised lorgnettes, which were adorned, like the hands that held them, with jewels of all varieties. There was plenty of drama to be witnessed, after all, by gazing through those ornamented lenses at the wearers of Doucet gowns, and at the gentlemen who had escorted them. Mrs. Henry Schoonmaker was out for the second night in a row, but nobody dared visit her box for fear of angering her father-in-law; Eleanor Wetmore, who was said to be desperate for a proposal since she had played maid of honor at her younger sister’s June wedding, was twittering again beside that known roué Amos Vreewold. It was less than a year ago that Carolina had first come, wide-eyed, to this very box. But tonight she was no longer interested in what might be glimpsed or overheard around her, for she was sitting next to her first love, or her first real one, anyway. He was one of the favorite sons of the tribe that filled the parterre boxes at the
“That there was oil? He must have believed so; why else would a man like Edward Holland have been interested in land like that?”
“No…” She bit her lip and swallowed hard as she took in her father’s sanctioning of Will’s love for her, so long after both men had died. “Father knew that Will loved me. That I loved him.” Snowden looked away.
In her more gathered moments, Elizabeth would have thought to apologize, but it did not occur to her now. “Why did you not tell me?” she pursued.
“My dear Mrs. Cairns, you were in no state to receive this kind of news. But you needn’t have worried. I have been seeing to your interests. I’ve taken several trips to California to inspect the land, and it is in truth a rich oil field. Production has begun, and we’ve already seen returns on the property. How do you think I was able to secure funds for this house, my dear?” His hand swept through the air, and her eyes followed the arc it made, as though some detail in the molding would symbolize her father’s prescience.
“Of course, the natural treasure of the land will not be realized overnight, but very soon it will be paying us all—the Hollands, that is—quite handsomely.”
“Oh!” Elizabeth took a breath; she had never breathed so deeply. Her long, fine fingers fluttered over her chest and she tried valiantly not to cry again. So it was Will who was caring for them after all.
The fatigue she had been dodging all afternoon was suddenly overwhelming. She fixed her gaze on the short, blunt stubble of Snowden’s chin, which was a light color, and so caught the very last of the sun—
and she tried to smile a little in gratitude.
“Thank you.” She closed her eyes, and when she whispered it again, she was thinking of her father and the father of her unborn child, who were, perhaps, just at that moment, watching over her from heaven.
“Thank you.”
Eight
Now that Carolina Broad has shown all of society her splendid new abode, and all the wonderfully precious things she has managed to acquire for it, we suppose there will be no more doubting that she is at last one of us. Although the wardrobe that she ordered for her first summer season might have been taken as sufficient proof of this, or, for that matter, the fact that she retained her benefactor Carey Lewis Longhorn’s famed box at the opera, and is regularly seen entertaining there.
——FROM CITÉ CHATTER, SATURDAY, JULY 7, 1900
file://C:\Documents and Settings\nickunj\Desktop\book.html 10/28/2009
Page 26 of 128
ELITE NEW YORK WAS SITUATED IN A HIERARCHY of boxes, arranged around a grand horseshoe, high above a vibrant and melodramatic performance on a stage that few, if any, audience members were still paying attention to. The light of a giant chandelier played against their raised lorgnettes, which were adorned, like the hands that held them, with jewels of all varieties. There was plenty of drama to be witnessed, after all, by gazing through those ornamented lenses at the wearers of Doucet gowns, and at the gentlemen who had escorted them. Mrs. Henry Schoonmaker was out for the second night in a row, but nobody dared visit her box for fear of angering her father-in-law; Eleanor Wetmore, who was said to be desperate for a proposal since she had played maid of honor at her younger sister’s June wedding, was twittering again beside that known roué Amos Vreewold. It was less than a year ago that Carolina had first come, wide-eyed, to this very box. But tonight she was no longer interested in what might be glimpsed or overheard around her, for she was sitting next to her first love, or her first real one, anyway. He was one of the favorite sons of the tribe that filled the parterre boxes at the
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