The first months of Nick’s deployment were a learning curve whose slope rivaled the Alps we’d skied in Klosters. The business of renovating Bex into Duchess Rebecca had kicked into high gear, and the Palace made it clear that, like a puppy, I couldn’t be taken out in public until I was properly trained.
“Her Majesty knows that the Soane museum and Paint Britain value your contributions,” Marj had told me at my first private meeting with her without Nick by my side. “But perhaps the time has come for your positions to become opportunities for a person who does not have so many new responsibilities.”
Translation: resign, and begin the uphill journey to ladyhood that Eleanor clearly thought would be an even more demanding full-time job. Marj’s desk was stacked so high with binders and agendas, and revisions to the binders and agendas, that I once walked in to see her and walked right out again because I thought she wasn’t there. Everything had a painstaking timetable; I wouldn’t be surprised to learn Marj was charting my ovulation. She micromanaged my appearance and comportment, assessed the curve of my back in my natural stance, weighed and measured me weekly, drafted nutrition plans, and diagrammed what about my personal grooming needed to change and how fast. My eyebrows were filling in, and now it was my head’s turn: a nominal number of extensions were bonded to my insufficient hair, with more added every two or three weeks for maximum subtlety, until we reached the desired level of luxuriousness.
Most of that I’d known was coming, at least in the abstract, although I admit I’d assumed the contents of my stomach were my own business. But the raft of reading, tutoring, and tests, like some kind of High Society High School, were a surprise. I thought Lacey might get a kick out of helping—she was always better at making flash cards; she even color-coded them—but it was Cilla who pointed out that Bea, as the actual titled lady in our circle, was the perfect candidate: a ruthless taskmaster who never pulled a punch and loved dining out on her superior breeding.
I tried folding Lacey into Project Bex in other ways. I arranged best man and maid of honor confabs for her and Freddie, figuring she would appreciate a sanctioned excuse to be in his orbit, but each time he produced a reason to beg off, ranging from legitimate (a Navy search-and-rescue) to slender (planning a garden for the Chelsea Flower Show) to apocryphal.
“I can’t right now, Killer,” he’d told me on my last attempt. “I’m in the middle of the Master Cleanse.”
I had been unable to suppress a very loud snort.
“The Master Cleanse is no snorting matter,” Freddie said very seriously.
I knew Lacey was taking this personally, beyond her general disappointment at Freddie having given her tractor beam the slip—how could she not, when she’d allegedly been bumped below bloat and bowels on Freddie’s priority list. So I sought out the next best thing for her: shopping. Marj handed down an edict to spiff myself up even if I was just dashing out to the drugstore, along with a monthly wardrobe budget triple the size of my rent, and when I invited Lacey to help me spend it I got the first hug she’d initiated in months. But Marj had other ideas, assigning me a facilitator—Eleanor loathed the Hollywood air of stylist—and my own concierges at Harrods, Harvey Nichols, and Selfridges (the Queen also thought personal shopper sounded too spendthrift). That long-ago day trying on gowns in Harrods’s private utopia became my normal shopping experience, thanks to Donna, a smartly suited brunette who’d guided eight starlets into adulthood without once falling into a vortex of transparency and tube tops. She adeptly meted out the budget and had a knack for suggesting alterations that gave an expressive pop to something I’d never have glanced at twice. She knew to strategize sewing weights into any hem, if a dress inhibited the way I had to sit or stand, could weather a traffic jam, or would look discordant with any of Nick’s blue suits. And she didn’t need any help.
Lacey responded with that dog-with-a-bone mentality that helped her pass algebra when we were in middle school and got her to med school (if apparently not through it) and even into Freddie’s bed. As we slowly stockpiled outfits for any occasion that might arise, Donna bumped up against Lacey at every turn, pushing the boundaries, desperate to make her mark.
“I like this one for an evening event,” Lacey said, pulling out a sexy gold strapless dress.
Donna made a polite noise and put it back on the rack. Lacey turned to me and examined the suit I was trying on, for my eventual first meeting with the Archbishop of Canterbury.
“That skirt could be a bit shorter,” she said. “You’re not eighty.”
“The Palace prefers to abide by certain rules,” Donna said pleasantly. “Rebecca’s nice long legs make any length work.”
“But it’s so off-trend,” Lacey complained.
“The Palace prefers not to bow to trends,” Donna said. “Rebecca has to look timeless.”
“But look at this day dress,” Lacey said, pulling one off the rack. “It’s so mumsy. That neckline. Bex is flat-chested so she can wear something low-cut without it looking vulgar.”
“The Palace prefers not to involve a lady’s sternum,” Donna said, calm but firm. I wondered if Marj had handed her a list to memorize.
“Well, fortunately, I have some accessories that will help,” Lacey said.
“The Palace prefers a minimum of fuss,” Donna said.
“The Palace prefers a minimum of fun,” Lacey groused.