Elin Hilderbrand - The Rumor

“Hey, everyone!” she said. “Hey, Brick!”

Brick made an eighth of a turn in his chair, then waved in her general direction. “Hey.”

It was strained-but did he know about Ian Coburn? No, Hope didn’t think so. Allegra had managed to keep her mouth shut about Ian. She hadn’t even told her sworn bestie, Hollis. Hollis doesn’t need to know, Allegra had said on one occasion. And then, on a second occasion, she said, If I told Hollis, the entire school would know before we finished saying the Pledge. I love that girl, but she cannot keep a secret. The only person she had told about Ian Coburn was Hope.

Ian Coburn was taking his final exams at BC. He would be back on Nantucket the following week.

“What are you going to do then?” Hope had asked her sister.

“What do you think I’m going to do?” Allegra said.

Hope had no idea. She could see Allegra breaking up with Brick, and she could also see Allegra breaking up with Ian Coburn. And, she could easily see Allegra having the ego to try to juggle both boys over the summer.

Hope had said, “You’re going to play it by ear? Wait and see how it goes?”

“Exactly,” Allegra said.

Of course this was her sister’s answer. Allegra believed in nothing so strongly as her own good fortune, and in things working out in her own best interest.

But she would blow it.

Allegra put a hand on Brick’s shoulder and then bent over and kissed the top of his head like she was his mother. Hope felt a pang for Brick. Was it not totally obvious that Allegra’s reservoir of sexy, romantic feelings for him had run dry and that she was preoccupied by her phone, which they could all hear vibrating away in her jacket pocket?

“Who’s texting you?” Brick asked.

“Texting me?” Allegra said. She smiled innocently, as though she couldn’t feel the persistent vibration of Ian Coburn’s messages against her left breast. She plucked her phone from her pocket and checked the display. “Oh, it’s Hollis. She’s asking about math.”

She was a born liar, Hope thought. It was incredible. She should skip the modeling career and go straight to politics.

“I don’t believe you,” Brick said. “Show me the text!” He reached out to grab Allegra’s phone, but in the process, he hit Madeline’s glass of red wine-which shattered and sent a Malbecian spray all over Allegra’s Italian leather jacket.

Allegra shrieked.

Madeline said, “Oh, Brick, no!”

Trevor said, “Honey, it was an accident.”

Madeline set about picking up pieces of the wineglass while Allegra whipped off her leather jacket, taking her phone out of her pocket first and setting it on the dry part of the table, right where both Hope and Brick could see it, when Ian Coburn texted yet again.

“Ian Coburn?” Brick said. “Since when do you get texts from Ian Coburn?”

“Jesus, Brick!” Allegra said. “This jacket cost me a fortune!”

Eddie cleared his throat. “Me a fortune,” he said. “Is it ruined?”

Allegra wiped at it with napkins, but the wine had left a shower of dark stains that looked like splattered blood.

“It’s an Italian jacket, right?” Hope said. “You’d think they would make them wine resistant.”

“I can’t believe this!” Allegra said.

Grace got a sponge for the wine, and Madeline threw the shards of glass into the trash. Grace said, “Do you want the sponge for your coat, honey?”

“You can’t put water on it, Mother,” Allegra said.

“Tone,” Eddie warned.

Allegra’s phone continued to buzz.

Her family was so predictable, Hope thought. Possibly they believed that she, too, was predictable-but nobody knew that in a month, maybe two, she would be dating Brick.

Brick said, “Ian Coburn sure has a lot to say to you.”

Allegra snatched up her phone. “It’s none of your business who texts me.”

“Really?” he said.

“I’m putting the shrimp on,” Eddie said.

“I think maybe we should go home,” Madeline said.

Grace handed Eddie a large platter of shrimp and jalapeño skewers. When he laid the first one on the hot grill, there was an angry hiss.

Grace said, “You should not go home. It’s just a glass and a little spill. But, Eddie, you need to apologize to Madeline for giving her a hard time about Rachel McMann.”

Rachel McMann, Hope thought. Ew.

Rachel was the mother of Hope’s sworn enemy, Calgary McMann. Hope had dated Calgary for four weeks before she finally allowed him to get to third base, but he broke up with her right after, making Hope feel like there was something wrong with her. When Calgary and his friends saw Hope in the hallway, they made a strange hand motion that Hope didn’t understand, and there was no one she could ask, but she knew it wasn’t good. In response, she flipped them off, which made them laugh. Calgary had left Hope without a date for the Christmas formal; the red velvet cocktail dress that she and Grace had bought at Hepburn went unworn. Calgary had asked Kylie Eckers to the formal, but Kylie got so drunk at the preparty that the principal and superintendent stopped her at the door and called her parents to come pick her up. When Hope heard that news from Allegra the next morning, she felt somewhat vindicated, but now, five months later, her hatred of both Kylie and Calgary had become indelible, like a fossil in rock.

“Rachel McMann wasn’t worthy of your commission,” Eddie said. “That was my only point.”

“I don’t think she took a commission,” Madeline said.

“Oh, believe me, she took a commission,” Eddie said.

Just the name Rachel McMann made Hope feel sick. She couldn’t stand another second of this conversation.

“Mom?” she said. “I’m not hungry.”

“I’m not hungry either,” Brick said. He looked at Madeline. “Can we go home, Mom, please?”

“Yes,” Madeline said. “I think we should.”

That was the last thing Hope heard before she marched upstairs, except for the buzzing of Allegra’s phone.

You can’t go!” Grace said. “We haven’t eaten yet! I made fresh pineapple salsa. I made mango panna cotta.”

“I don’t feel well,” Brick said.

“Can you hang on a little while longer, buddy?” Trevor asked. “We’ll eat and then we’ll go.”

Madeline was all for trying to set things right. She felt awful that Brick had broken another one of the five-hundred-dollar wine goblets, but this led to annoyance that Grace insisted on using such expensive crystal for casual family dinners in the first place. Madeline felt like she should offer to pay for the glass, or for Allegra’s jacket, even though she didn’t have the money. Although clearly she did have the money, because she was blowing two grand a month on the rent for a room of her own!

Madeline collapsed in a rattan chair, defeated. Then she popped back up. She wanted more wine; she would drink it from a juice glass.

Grace followed her into the kitchen. “I don’t want you to leave until you and I have a chance to talk in private. We’ll go upstairs after dinner. This isn’t something I can discuss on the phone.”

“Oh,” Madeline said. “Okay.”

“Dinner’s ready!” Eddie called.

Conversation at dinner was interrupted by the insistent buzzing of Allegra’s phone.

Eddie finally said, “Allegra, turn it off or take it inside.”

“Ian Coburn must really want to talk to you,” Brick said.

Allegra said, “We’re friends, okay? Is that not allowed?”

Trevor said, “The salsa is delicious.”

“Thank you,” Grace said.

Eddie, Madeline noticed, hadn’t touched his food. He was still picking Bremner wafers off the appetizer plate.

“It’s allowed,” Brick said. “Of course it’s allowed. As long as you’re only friends. As long as that’s all it is.”

“Of course that’s all it is,” Allegra said. She threw her embroidered napkin on top of her taco mess. Grace, Madeline knew, laundered and ironed each napkin before these dinners. “How dare you suggest otherwise!”

Otherwise, Madeline thought. Something was going on between Allegra and Ian Coburn. She felt a hot, pulsing anger. Then she remembered her vow with Grace. We won’t get involved.

“Allegra-” Brick said.

But Allegra was up and out of her chair, her phone tucked into the pocket of her ruined jacket.

She said, “Save it, Brick.” And disappeared into the kitchen.

Brick looked like he wanted to chase after her, but he stayed put.

Madeline finished her glass of wine. She stood up to refill her glass, but Grace said, “It’s gone. Do you want Eddie to grab another bottle from the cellar?”

No, Madeline thought. They should go. Poor Brick had been humiliated enough for one night. But Grace had something to tell her that couldn’t be discussed over the phone, and Madeline was intrigued.

“Yes,” she said.

Eddie brought up two bottles of Screaming Eagle cabernet, and Madeline blinked. Was she seeing things? He’d always said he was saving those bottles for his deathbed.

Madeline said, “Edward, what are you doing?”

He said, “I want to pour this tonight. I’m not sure why-it’s just a gut feeling.”

“That’s as good a reason as any,” Trevor said. “I can’t wait to taste it.”

Grace went into the kitchen to bring everyone a fresh Baccarat wine goblet.

Brick said, “You’re having more wine? I thought you said we could go. Dad?”

Trevor said, “This is the best wine any of us are likely to taste. Eddie spent… how long on the wait list?”

“Eight years and seven months,” Eddie said proudly.

“I don’t care,” Brick said. “Sorry, Mr. Pancik. I just want to go.”

They should go, Madeline thought. Brick never complained. They should save the Screaming Eagle for a night when there was something to celebrate. Such as the spec houses selling and a major return on her and Trevor’s investment coming in.

But Eddie pulled the cork and started pouring the adults wine. They all touched glasses in a moment of peace.

Allegra poked her head out of her bedroom window and called down to the deck. “Brick, would you come up here, please?”

Madeline watched indecision cross her son’s face.

“Please, Brick?” Allegra said.

Brick stood up and went inside.

“Good,” Grace whispered. “They’ll work things out.”

Ian Coburn, Madeline thought. He was a very good-looking kid who had graduated from Nantucket High School the year before. His father was a private-equity guy who commuted back and forth to New York City. His mother was shrill and oblivious to everything but her son’s charms. Ian Coburn had been one of the kids who had been allowed to have parties and serve alcohol with his parents’ blessing. He was, Madeline thought, bad news.

We won’t get involved.

“Keep the door open!” Eddie called out.

Grace refilled her and Madeline’s glasses while Eddie watched how much of his precious wine left the bottle. Grace said, “I have something I want to show Madeline upstairs. Will you boys be all right out here by yourselves?”

“Cigars,” Eddie said to Trevor.

“I hear ya,” Trevor said.

“Oh, look,” Eddie said. “I have two Cohibas right here in my pocket.”

Madeline followed Grace inside, through the kitchen, and up the grand, sweeping staircase. One could fit three or four of the Llewellyns’ house inside the Pancik house, but Madeline had given up on envy long ago. It was fruitless.

They entered Grace’s study, which was a near-exact replica of her grandmother Sabine’s study at the estate in Wayland. The room was too dark and formal for Madeline’s sunny tastes, although it was elegant. There were hunting prints on the taupe walls, built-in walnut bookshelves, and thick brocade drapes. Grace had inherited the enormous, ornately carved mahogany desk from Sabine, along with the thick Persian rug-hundreds of thousands of silk knots in burgundy and navy and cream. Madeline inhaled. She did love the way the room smelled-like sandalwood and old books. Grace had been a French-literature major at Mount Holyoke, so her shelves were lined with Victor Hugo and Voltaire, Colette and Proust, Émile Zola, Dumas, Camus. She had a collection of twenty-four Ted Muehling candlesticks, which held an assortment of slender white, ivory, and dove-gray candles. She had an antique ink pot and a quill pen that actually worked. A banjo clock ticked on the wall and announced the passing of every fifteen minutes in a brassy tenor.

Grace shut and locked the heavy door and dimmed the lights on the huge pewter chandelier that hung from the ceiling. If Madeline had a study with a door that locked, she thought, then she wouldn’t have needed to spend twelve thousand dollars on the apartment.