Dolores Read online

  Dolores had gone with Jimmy almost a year when Nita arrived with the children and Lord BranrJey for a Christmas visit. She had two nurses and was buried deep in sable when Dolores and her mother met them at the airport. Lord Bramley had borrowed a friend's plane, and Nita and the Lord were whisked through Customs. Once again

  Dolores felt oversized and unattractive. The next day they had a quiet chat over a private luncheon at Orsini's (while the newspapermen and cameramen were waiting outside for Nita) and Dolores was conscious that every woman in the room was staring at Nita's twenty-carat diamond and her new mink sport coat. She tried to conceal the envy that was welling up inside of her. She had thought it was gone. She made proper small talk and tried to like Nita as she watched her sister light up one cigarette after another. It wasn't imtil after the espresso was served that Nita leaned over and whispered, "Dolo, I'm pregnant again."

  "How marvelous. This time it will be a girl/'

  "I haven't told Nelson."

  "Why not?"

  "Because I want to get rid of it. You must know places ... or the proper doctor."

  Dolores stared at her sister. "How would I know?"

  "Well, Dolo ... you're almost twenty-two . . < you must have had a few accidents. Personally, I'm afraid of the 'ring' . . . and the diaphragm never seems to work with me. Dolo, you've got to help me."

  Dolores had stared at her napkin. She was ashamed to admit she had no concern about a diaphragm ... or a ring (she didn't even know what the ring was). She had been dating Jimmy in the most casual way for a year. It had been her work

  that occupied her time. She had mastered Russian and was now studying Greek. She was silent for a moment and then said quietly, "I don't know of any such doctors . . . and besides, why should you want to get rid of it? You know that's a mortal sm.

  "Oh Lord, don't tell me you're still steeped in the Church."

  "Not steeped . . . but I believe in it and go to Mass every Sunday. We were raised as Catholics . . . I'm not strict and I must admit it's been ages since I've gone to confession . . . but I couldn't knowingly commit a mortal sin."

  "Well, dammit ... I can't be saddled down with more than two children . . . I've got to be free."

  "What about Nelson?"

  Nita laughed. "Oh Dolo ... he had a mistress when we got married. Everyone in Europe knew about it except me. But he needed the proper wife . . . and it seems he studied me as if I were a horse for breeding. He came right out and told me, after the honeymoon. He even told me the name of his mistress . . . Angelina ... an Italian-Swiss girl. She's a journalist . . . and he's set her up in Paris and spends every weekend with her."

  Dolores reached out and pressed her sister's hand. "Oh Nita, I'm so sorry."

  "Don't be," Nita snapped. "And don't look sorry for me. Half the room is staring at us. I am

  Lady Bramley . . . and he is very generous. Of course, the jewelry belongs in the family . . . but I've got everything ... a beautiful flat in Belgravia , . . thirty rooms and seven in help ... a huge country place . . . almost palatial. He's not the richest man in Europe ... I mean we don't have yachts or a string of horses . . . but we are rich. And he is Catholic, so divorce is out. But I'm not going to be like Mother ... I told him we'd put up a marvelous front . . . but I intend to have my affairs too. That's why I've got to get rid of this child."

  Nita had found a "proper doctor" on her own and rid herself of the child. Then she returned to London and once again began appearing in Vogue and Women's Wear and all the Europecin magazines v^th Nelson smiling at her side. But in her quick notes to Dolores, she hinted at a brief love affair with an Italian movie star ... a swift and tumultuous romance with a croupier in a London gambling club . . . and was currently swooning over Baron Erick de Savonne, one of the richest men in the world. Dolores couldn't understand this current affair. She had met the Baron once when she went to London to visit Nita. It had become a familiar pattern . . . she always dashed off to London when Jimmy had a new "girl." The papers always wrote it up as a "visit" to her sister, followed with paragraphs on how close the sisters were. (Jimmy never made any permanent liaison . . . not

  after Tanya, and when Dolores would take off he always broke with the girl of the moment and bombarded Dolores with pleas to return.) On one of these visits Dolores had met the Baron briefly. He had "accidentally" run into them at Mirabelle (this time the reporters outside were waiting for Dolores. She wasn't just another English title . . . she was the wife of the President of the United States).

  The Most Beautiful Woman in the World

  The Baron had joined them for a coffee. He had a scar over one eye, "a saber scar" he had told them. In reality, he had gotten it when he single-handedly broke up a dock strike. He owned a larger fleet of tankers than Onassis ... he had vast holdings in the Near and Middle East. Baron Erick de Savonne was built like a prizefighter and was known to have been in many a brawl on the docks. Yet he also owned many luxury hotels throughout the world and an art collection worth billions.

  He lived lavishly and kept a ballerina who was past her prime for many years. She was inscrutably beautiful, but it didn't seem to bother Nita. "I have to give some of my time to Nelson

  . . . and go to certain social affairs . . . and I'd rather know Erick was with a woman he'd had for yecirs than flirting with someone else. When the times comes, I'll marry him."

  In the beginning, Dolores had been shocked at the idea of divorce. But Nita made no bones about her break with the Church. And gradually Dolores had shrugged it off. After all, it was Nita's life. Her own life now seemed far more glamorous. She was on movie magazine covers ... on Life . . . Look . . . Time . . . Newsweek . . . and when Nita came to visit her, Nita was now the sister of the First Lady . . . sister of the most beautiful woman in the world.

  Most beautiful woman in the world!

  Dolores adored that title. She wasn't tiny or pencil-thin like a model. She weighed one hundred and twenty-five . . . but Donald Brooks designed clothes for her that made her appear regal and slim. Her hair was augmented with hairpieces and she wore it like a lion's mane. Her posture was perfect cmd she kept a perpetual tan and managed to stride into a room with a walk that was all her own. Pcirt panther . . . part athlete. And beside her, Nita now looked small and unimportant.

  But Nita rarely came to the States, and with her own fame on the rise, Dolores grew closer to her sister. There was no one else she could really trust. It hadn't all been beautiful and romantic with Jinuny. Their mcirriage had been recorded in

  the society columns because of the Cortez name and the Ryan millions. And in all the interviews it bothered her because Old Man Ryan—^Timothy Ryan—never let anyone forget his humble beginnings. Bridget had not come from a humble back-groxmd. Her family were upper-middle-class Irish Catholic and her father had been a respected lawyer in Cleveland. But she subjected herself to Timothy's bombastic tirades about the American Dream ^ . that he had started as a bricklayer, yet his son might one day be President of the United States. No one took the "President" part seriously. Least of all Jimmy. His father had poured money into his campaign to get him and his brother, Michael, their Senate seats, and both Jimmy and Michael were quite content to stay there.

  And this was the family Dolores had married into. Their great wealth was the intricate lure. She liked Jimmy, but socially it had been a big step down. Nita had sent her money for a trousseau and a wedding. When Dolores tried to refuse, Nita said, "Darling, I'm crawling with money . . . from my husband .. . and from the Baron. Ten thousand is just pocket money."

  It had been a lovely wedding and Jimmy had taken her on a quiet European honeymoon. It had been fim wearing her new pretty clothes. She and her mother had really bargain-hunted in New York. But she knew after the marriage that all would be different. When she was Mrs. James T.

  Ryan, she'd have all the money she needed. And she'd pay back Nita.

  During their honeymoon abroad, Nita had entertained them. Everyone had liked Jimmy.
It was after the honeymoon that the disappointing realities set in. She had stared in horror at the small house in Georgetown that Jimmy had bought without consulting her. She hid her imhappiness as he carried her over the threshold with pride. And there were Bridget and Timothy and Michael and his wife, Joyce, and the three sisters all squealing and hugging her. And through it all she saw the ordinary furniture ... the imitation Queen Anne chairs. And there was Betsy Minton ... his housekeeper . . . eager to "do" for her.

  Dolores couldn't believe it. Timothy Ryan's worth was often estimated at forty million . . . and Jim, his brother and sisters were the sole heirs. She had expected Jimmy to give her a free hand, to pick a house of her own choosing, decorate it, hire a staff of servants, give brilliant dinner parties. But instead she foimd he was almost penurious. "Dolo, we have a huge estate in Virginia. It's the family place and we all go there for weekends. There's also a family place in Newport . . . large enough for the whole brood ... so anytime you want sun, it's there waiting. And when you want the country, it's also there."

  "But it's not mine... ours."

  "It is ours," he said firmly. "The family's. We

  love the country place. In the summer, we love to water ski, to swim . . . and youll fit in just great. I picked the house in Georgetown because it has four bedrooms . . . enough for us and three or four children . . . even five if we double them up. I've got a lot of studying to do . . . this job in the Senate is way over my head. I'm not a political animal. I'd much rather have stayed with law."

  "Then why didn't you?"

  He had looked sheepish. "Dad has this crazy idea of me being President."

  "Why doesn't he groom Michael for it? He's a Senator, too. And he's three years older than you."

  "Michael had too tough a time passing law. He's even less of a politician than I. He's been married to Joyce for only six years and they have five kids and another on the way. He's a stay-at-homer ... so the load fell on me."

  Their first real argument Ccime when she bought ten pairs of shoes. Jimmy had stared at the bill with total disbelief. "How can you wear ten pairs of shoes at once?"

  "They match different clothes—clothes I intend to buy."

  "We've been married only two months. Dole."

  "Meaning what?"

  "Meaning a bride's trousseau should last at least a year. My mother bragged that hers lasted five years. Of course, she was in maternity clothes

  a lot . . . and you probably will be, too. So don't go on any buying sprees."

  It was almost too much for her to cope with. Obviously he had learned the value of a hard-earned dollar from his father. His mother cared little for clothes. She still played tennis every day, wore slacks, and her figure was firm and slim enough to pass for a girl's. Even now, at seventy-two, she took pride in her activities . . . her charities. Dolores was a complete sybarite. Her father had told her that when she was very yoimg. If he offered to buy her a lollipop, she wanted one in every color. Sometimes she never ate them . . . but she liked to know they were there. She had adored her father. That had been the first wrench . . . when he left her mother and she read about him with all those beautiful women. Nita took it all philosophically. "We were boimd to lose him one day . . . when we go off to our own husbands." But whenever Dolores saw her father, he always indulged her . . . tea at the Plaza . . . pretty dresses from an expensive place on Madison Avenue . . . and he never remarked as all the salesgirls did how much easier Nita was to fit than Dolores.

  Secret Service

  And even after the marriage when Mary Lou and the twins were bom . . . and the fantastic whirlwind of the Presidential nonnination and election ... he had still kept after her about the bills. Just a month ago he had sent Betsy Minton, now elevated to her personal secretary, to give her instructions that she must "cut down." Finally, after a heated battle he blurted out, "Dolo, we don't have all that money. My father always exaggerated our fortune. We are worth perhaps three or four million dollars in cash. Of course, that doesn't include our real estate holdings. And don't forget . . . my election cost a fortune. Of course, there are trusts set aside for the children . . . and a trust of a mil-

  30

  lion that well inherit when I'm sixty ... by that time we can both relax and enjoy life. But for the present, we must take things easy."

  And when Nita came to town and bought two dozen pairs of shoes, or three fur coats from Maximilian, Dolores merely smiled and said it didn't fit her image as First Lady. But oh God, how she longed to own all those beautiful furs and clothes. But she consoled herself with the fact that Nita was just her sister now. She was Dolores Ryan . . . and even Nita began to feel it. One night when they were going to the opening of an art show for charity, Nita said, "With all my jewels, Dolo ... it will be you who will be photographed." And it had been true.

  They went to Orsini's and she sat back and allowed Nita to pick up all their luncheon checks. Nita wasn't married to a "broke" millionaire. Nita also received insane gifts from the Barorv, who was now becoming an obsession with her. She had tried every lure but he was not talking marriage. Yet despite Nita's money, Nita seemed to trail behind her. Her camellia-like daintiness now looked vapid. Dolores was the trend setter . . . the lioness . . . who covered all the pages of Vogue and Harper's Bazaar. Dolores, who could "make" a designer if she "accepted" or wore his new creation. Dolores, the first lady of fashion. Dolores, the First Lady of the land!

  Only she wasn't First Lady anymore. She was a widow and Lillian Lyons, in her beat-up Persian lamb coat, was First Lady. She stared over at the new "First Couple." Lillian, middle-aged, tall, a big woman . . . and Elwood, short and skinny. All the glamour she and Jimmy had given to the White House would vanish . . . and she would vanish with it. Suddenly she sat up straight. No, she wouldn't vanish. In the beginning, she had walked in Jimmy's shadow, came into her own after Paris, ignored the gossip about him with Hollywood stars, because deep down she couldn't blame him. She wasn't exactly a ball of fire in his arms . . . maybe it had been the nagging poverty and pretense of good living after her father's death; her mother's constant jibing . . . "If I hadn't been so insanely in love with your father, I could have married into great wealth." Yet when her mother died, she had mimbled . . . "I'm coming, Dannie!" Even in death, her mother had reached out for her father's arms. And it was then that she had remembered the tears her mother shed when her father had stayed out on his "poker" nights . . . and the tears when he wouldn't take her on "business trips" ... and the times when her mother had sobbed and said to the ten-year-old Dolores, "Oh Dolo, never fall in love. Once you do you never belong to yourself . . . you're just a slave . . . half a person without him."

  She had never "belonged" to Jimmy. She had

  flirted when they met because he was so handsome. Her mother had thought he was common-looking . . . but her mother had approved of the Ryan money . . . and thank God, it was there, because the cancer hit her mother two months after the wedding and it was the Ryan money that made the last six months of her life painless.

  Dolores had not gone to bed with Jimmy imtil they were married. If he was surprised to find her a virgin he said nothing. But from the very beginning sex was something she had submitted to. She liked being his wife . . . adored being First Lady . . . learned to grow accustomed to imlimited servants. Secret Service men . . . limousines . . . world acclaim . . . and finally open envy in Nita's eyes. Yet one bullet from an H. Ronald Preston . .. and all that was gone . . . and she'd probably go back to being the less attractive sister.

  No! She might not be the President's wife anymore, but she would hold on to her newly acquired fame. She loved seeing herself in the newspapers, she loved the crowds that followed her and the Secret Service men in attendance. Well, as Elwood had explained, she would still be entitled to Secret Service men for herself and the children.

  The Reigning Queen

  She knew the plane was circling for a landing. She had to get her thoughts together. She would keep Betsy Mi
nton on. She wondered what would happen to the trust fund. Jimmy was only forty-two. They had never discussed wills . . . they were both so young and healthy.

  But there had to be plenty of money. And the important thing was to keep her celebrity status alive. One of the aides was saying something. She listened again.

  "Mrs. Ryan, I've laid out a navy blue suit, and some white gloves. You can change in the bedroom area in the back of the plane. And you might want some help with your hair. One of the

  girls, Beatrice, says she can get it into a neat French twist like Dino sometimes does . . /'

  "No," Dolores said quietly. "I want the press to see the blood of my husband . . . the blood he shed for his country."

  "Oh, Mrs. Ryan, you can't," the aide said.

  "I can... and I will!"

  And then she stood at the ramp, a rumpled tigress with a wide-eyed lost little girl look. The cameras flashed, the newsreels ground, and she stood there dry-eyed. Not the shy young First Lady, but an angry panther bringing her slain mate to rest. Michael, Jimmy's brother, was waiting to escort her through the crowd.

  Elwood Jason Lyons and Mrs. Lyons followed her at a discreet distance. Mrs. Lyons was furious. Her husband was the President. He had been sworn in on the plane. Why was he walking behind this young girl, as if she was still the reigning Queen? And the press . . . they were taking more pictures of her and Michael than they were of the new First Lady and President. Look at the way Michael was taking over. He had never been close to Dolores, but now he was acting like the heir apparent. His wife hadn't even come with him ... he had his arm around Dolores. Good Lord, was he thinking of becoming the next President? His absentee record in the Senate was a joke. But these days anything was possible. He was even better-looking thsm Jirmny . . . the whole damn family was so