Read Shades of Fortune for Free Online Page A

home. It works as a home because so much of what it contains has a story like that of the Sèvres vase. Cole Porter, Noël Coward, and Richard Rodgers have all played that Bösendorfer piano in the living room, and when, in the middle of a particularly spirited arpeggio, Sir Noël managed to fracture the ivory of the highest C, Mimi refused to let him worry about the split key. “It will always remind us,” she told him, “that we had the fun of listening to you play in this room.” And when Andy Warhol’s cigarette rolled out of an ashtray and burned a hole in a faux marbre tabletop, and he offered to have the top refinished for her, Mimi said, “Never! That’s a Warhol burn.”
    And the apartment works as a showcase on nights like tonight when, dressed for a party, filled with off-season flowers, lit with recessed lighting behind cornices and within bookcases, glowing with candles that have been artfully placed to catch the return gleam of mirrors, the whole apartment, room after room, full of shimmer and shadows, seems to float on some powder-puff cloud high above the Central Park lake, a theatrical artifice on invisible wires.
    And of course, as a final touch of theatre, there is Mimi’s plan to surprise her family—and fellow stockholders—by introducing them not only to her new scent but also to the pretty young models, her stars, who will sell her product, and so the evening will have something of the quality of a backers’ audition. This in itself of course is a gamble, which is where we started off describing Mimi. This tactic may fall flat on its face. The young woman seems dull-witted, and the young man seems like a snot. But we shall see.
    â€œIs that a real oil painting?” Sherrill Shearson asks.
    â€œYes. That’s my grandfather, Adolph Myerson, who started the company.”
    â€œHe looks … ooh, sort of mean!”
    â€œHe does look a little, well, dour , doesn’t he? But he took this business very seriously. I was always terrified of him. I just can’t take the business quite that seriously. To me, it’s a business that’s all about fantasies—hopes, wishes, dreams. Dreams of looking better, younger, healthier, happier, richer—and perhaps even feeling better about yourself if you can dream that you look that way. Wouldn’t you agree?”
    â€œWell, I never really thought about it all that much, actually,” the girl says. And then, “Hey, isn’t that painting kind of … lopsided?”
    â€œYou mean the subject doesn’t occupy the center of the frame. Yes, and there’s a story behind that which I don’t have time to go into now.”
    Now Mimi must mingle with her other guests, and she moves away.
    â€œI didn’t appreciate that crack about Mexican restaurants,” the girl says. “If this is supposed to be polite society, I call that effing rude.”
    â€œYou’re about to lose an earring, love,” the young man says. “No, the other one.”
    â€œAll the books here are the same color . How do you tell which book is which?”
    â€œBy reading the titles , love. You can read, can’t you?”
    â€œAsshole.”

2
    As her other guests arrive, Mimi greets them one by one at the library door and leads them to be introduced to the Mireille Couple, who stand in front of the mirrored bookcases in an impromptu receiving line, rather like a bride and groom, smiling, now, their soon-to-be-famously-seductive Mireille smiles. No one would ever believe that the word asshole had been spat moments earlier from Sherrill’s carefully parted lips. These, of course, are tutored smiles, carefully practiced in front of mirrors and Polaroid cameras, improved upon by dentists and modeling coaches. A word should be inserted here about Mimi’s own smile, which is quite different. It, too, has evolved as a result of a certain amount of