Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(21)

Susan wasn’t smiling anymore. “It’s not really about generosity as much as it’s about right and wrong. Having the Daschles here has been nothing but a pleasure and a joy.” The words rose and fell with cheery inflection and a warning edge.

Fanny smiled, lips together and curling at the corners. “Of course.”

“I think we could all use a drink. John!” Susan called over her shoulder a little too loudly. “Would you mind pouring us wine?”

He nodded.

“Good. That will be good,” she said as she settled back in.

The conversation momentarily lulled, something that never happened in Susan’s company. Mine either, but my quick tongue was too shocked to even gather up a response. This was probably a good thing. I doubted anything I had to say would be in any way acceptable.

The men joined us a moment later with wine for everyone but me and Meg, carrying the conversation back into familiar territory. Uncle John was happily in his element at his friend’s side, and when Susan looked up at him, her face touched in adoration and joy, I understood why she put up with Fanny; it made John happy.

Good manners are made of small sacrifices.

With that reminder, I resolved to keep my mouth shut.

A half hour later, I realized this might actually be impossible, though keeping my mouth full helped.

Fanny was sure to remark on dinner with an unwelcome abundance of deprecating compliments. The meal was quaint, she remarked, barely touching her steak which she noted was gamy, smiling while she cut off delicate slivers to slip past her thin lips. The wine was very stout, she was sure to say, and from a vineyard she hadn’t heard of, though she was certain she was familiar with all the good wineries in La Rioja.

All the while, I chewed my steak—which was delicious by the way and was one of the best meals I’d had in several years, Monte Cristo included—doing my very best to keep quiet.

Susan kept Fanny on the safest of topics, steering her around with the mastery of a lion tamer. That probably gave Fanny too much credit. As much as she wanted to be majestic, she was more like a cold, slick python. No, not even that. She wasn’t quiet or clever enough to be a snake. Maybe a rabid poodle, coiffed with a ridiculous haircut meant to make her look fancy. Because it was painfully clear that Fanny thought she was fancy. But it was hard to take her seriously when she was foaming at the mouth.

My only respite from Fanny was watching Elle and Ward.

It was almost imperceptible—the stolen glances, the inclination to look at each other when they laughed. I hoped beyond hope that something would come of it.

John and Frank took over the conversation, reminiscing about their college days and running the Valentin Fabre magazine empire.

The history of the magazine was largely unknown to me; we never spoke of this part of the family, and it wasn’t until I was a teenager that I’d ever even known the broad-stroke details of that side of my family. I listened, enraptured.

“My grandfather was the son of French aristocrats, a family that immigrated to New York a generation before. He grew up in Manhattan at the turn of the century. Harvard Medical wasn’t for him; what he adored was marketing. When he got his first job as an advertising executive for Ladies’ Weekly, he turned it around and enjoyed doing it so much, he bought his first magazine—Nouvelle—with the help of his parents’ fortune. And when he built that one up, he bought another. Then another. Twenty years in, he owned fifteen magazines, each of them still thriving today.

“My mother—your grandmother,” he said with a nod in our direction, “was his only child, and he groomed her to take over for him when he retired. It was where she met your grandfather.”

Mama sat silently, eating with her eyes down.

Meg launched into a string of questions, and everyone laughed.

“Too many questions for a full plate,” Elle said gently, redirecting the conversation to something safer, for Mama’s sake. “It must be very exciting, working in the magazine business,” she said to no one in particular.

“It’s long work and a great deal of stress,” John said, “but it helps to run it all with people I enjoy so much.”

Frank held up his glass, tipping it first to John, then to Ward. “Hear, hear.”

Fanny spoke while they were occupied drinking “It’s the legacy that I find so exciting. Having something to pass on, like Frank will pass on to Ward.”

Susan’s face betrayed her annoyance, but Fanny was too self-absorbed to notice. Neither of my cousins had gone into the magazine business, and the dig was heard all too clearly.

“Ward is our shining star,” she continued, beaming. It was the first genuine emotion I’d seen from her other than general discontent or condescension. “He’s currently the associate publisher at Nouvelle. We have grand plans for him, don’t we, Frank?”

“Hmm? Oh, yes,” Frank answered absently.

Ward gave Elle an apologetic look as Fanny rattled on.

“He’s just simply amazing at it. They say they’ve never seen anyone quite like him, and I’d have to agree. Wouldn’t you?” she asked no one as she speared a green bean, which she insisted on calling haricot verts, and forked it into her horrible mouth.

“Do you enjoy it?” Elle asked him once Fanny’s mouth was full.

Ward watched her with a light of surprise in his eyes, as if no one had ever asked him that so directly. “It…keeps me busy,” was his answer. “And what do you do?”