Even if it had all been a lie.

She crossed her arms over her chest and watched a maid put candles in tall glass hurricane lamps on each of the tables. Sydney listened distantly as Claire told Joanne where the roses and the fuchsia and the gladioli should be placed on the tables. “Gladioli here,” she said, “where the nutmeg stuffing in the squash blossoms and the fennel chicken will be. Roses here, where the rose-petal scones will go.” It was all so intricate, a manipulative plan to make the guests feel something they might not feel otherwise. It didn’t seem at all like Mrs. Matteson. Yet Claire had spent the better part of the evening on Monday discussing the menu on the phone with her. Sydney had made up an excuse to be in the kitchen and could hear Claire in the storeroom saying things like, “If it’s love you want to portray, then roses.” And, “Cinnamon and nutmeg mean prosperity.”

After Claire had taken care of the nonedible-flower placement with Joanne, she started to walk back into the house but stopped when she realized Sydney wasn’t following her.

“Are you all right?” Claire asked.

Sydney turned. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she said, as if proud of it, as if it belonged to her. It did, for a while.

“It’s very…” Claire hesitated a moment. “Deliberate. Come on, we don’t want to get behind schedule.”

A few hours later, in the kitchen, Sydney said, “I see what you mean by deliberate. Why does everything have to be placed clockwise on the trays? We didn’t have to do this at the botanists’ luncheon.”

“Those ladies only cared about the food, not what it meant.”

“And what does this all mean?” Sydney asked.

“It means they want people to see them as madly in love and fabulously wealthy.”

“That doesn’t make any sense; everyone already knows that. Are Mr. and Mrs. Matteson having problems? They seemed so happy when I knew them.”

“I don’t question the motives. I just give people what they want. Are you ready?” Claire asked, carrying two trays to the swinging kitchen door. They’d set out the food before the guests arrived, but Joanne had just informed them that the trays needed refreshing.

Sydney wondered if she would recognize anyone out there. She’d tried to make out voices, sometimes stopping to crane her neck when she heard laughter, wondering if she’d heard that laugh before. Would Hunter John be out there? Did it matter? “As ready as I’ll ever be,” she said as she picked up her trays.

Parties made Emma feel enchanted, like she was a little girl playing dress up and this was a world all of her own making. Her mother had been the same way. “Leave the magic to the Waverleys,” she used to say when Emma was little and she would watch her mother try on dress after dress before parties. “We have something better. We have fantasy.”

Emma was standing by the bar because that’s where Hunter John was, but it gave her an excellent view of everyone enjoying themselves. She loved parties, but she’d never had a party feel quite like this one, when every other sentence out of everyone’s mouth was a compliment to her or an envious remark. It was wonderful.