“I thought we were going to get out of the city,” Brooke said. “We didn’t fly in so we could spend the weekend in Manhattan.”
“Well, I thought a weekend here would be fun,” Camilla said coolly. “So you’re welcome to make your own plans if you disagree. For those of us who actually want to have a good time, we’ll have drinks at my place after dinner.”
Brooke exchanged a look with Will that Evelyn couldn’t decipher. “That sounds good,” Brooke said weakly.
“Good,” Camilla said. “Anyway, I told you the Realtor wants to get his beasts into the école, right? So guess who’s been recruited as a debutante supervisor for the Bal?”
Camilla should travel with a translator, Evelyn thought. “The Realtor,” aka Ari, was Souse Rutherford’s boyfriend, he of the BIGDEAL license plate. His company, AF Holdings, owned much of the important real estate in New York—the Pierre Hotel, the Lord & Taylor building. Camilla didn’t like him, hence “the Realtor.” Ari lived in a giant floor-through apartment on Fifth Avenue, having swooped in and gotten a lowball price of $21.5 million when a higher bid by a Bahraini prince was rejected by the co-op board over concerns that his diplomatic immunity would lead to weapons caching in their building. The “beasts” were Ari’s two small children, who were something like four and six, and “the école” was the école Internationale, a French-language school on East End Avenue that was notably hard to get into. And “the Bal”—Evelyn felt like she was completing a timed quiz—was the Bal Fran?ais, the debutante ball whose hostesses were largely école parents and board members.
“You as an example to young minds? What on earth are you going to do, lead waltzing lessons and slip them some whip-its?” Preston asked.
“And do the danse d’honneur,” Camilla said with a bow. “Where they have the deb from ages past skip around with the ambassador?”
“It’s so important,” said Brooke, with wide eyes. “Bill Cunningham always puts a photo of the danse d’honneur in his column, and Marchesa lent a dress last year to Sophie Gerond for it. Milla. That’s amazing.”
Camilla set a spoon spinning on the tablecloth. “Phoebe’s doing the Assembly and Infirmary, obviously, but my mother has signed her up for the Bal Fran?ais in June because Ari thinks it’ll help with his children getting into the école. Who knows?” Camilla said.
The Bal Fran?ais, Evelyn knew, ranked near the bottom of the New York balls, but was still important—those who succeeded at the Bal often got invitations for the wintertime balls that were the true society gatherings. However, being a deb at the Bal without following with the Assembly or the Infirmary was like being a Staten Island Yankee.
A waiter put down a bread basket. Charlotte was the only girl to reach for it.
“Does Ari even speak French?” Nick said.
“Ari speaks dollars,” Camilla said. She stood the spoon on its end, and Evelyn watched the light bounce off the metal. “Anyway, darling, it’s not about speaking French. It’s about the school. The école had, like, eleven kids accepted to Yale early this year. I’m sure the Realtor wouldn’t care if they were instructed in Tunisian with that acceptance rate.”
“Tunisian’s not a language,” said Charlotte. “They speak Arabic. And French.”
“Exactly,” said Camilla.
Brooke made a happy moan. “How fun for Phoebe. I did the International in college. I loved it.”
Camilla nodded. “You’re right. The Bal is at least oodles better than the International. Phoebe will have fun,” she said, so quickly that Evelyn wondered if Brooke had even sensed she’d been slighted. “Evelyn, when you debbed, was it a big party or a small one? I don’t even know how it’s done outside of the real cities.”
Evelyn glanced at Charlotte, who had a fat glob of butter on the side of her lip. Evelyn didn’t give her the dab-it-away signal; if Charlotte wanted to do her whole intellectually superior thing with “Tunisian’s not a language,” Evelyn wasn’t going to help her out.
“It’s a party in Baltimore,” Evelyn said. “Medium sized.”
Charlotte pushed her tongue at the spot of butter, but missed it. “You were a debutante, Ev? Why don’t I remember that?”
“Well, who’s going to brag about it, right?” Evelyn gave a high laugh.
“What the what? Why didn’t I get an invitation?” Preston said, adjusting his eyeglasses. “I was the best escort. At one of the balls, I got so smashed that a mother took me outside the Plaza in a snowstorm to try to sober me up. I think I tried to make out with her. I think, in confidence, she slipped me the tongue.”
“Ew!” Evelyn laughed.
“I smuggled in pot when I was an escort,” Nick said. “Trust me, that made the midnight breakfast really tasty.”
Camilla narrowed her eyes at Will. “And you, Will?”