“How do I know you didn’t just make that up?”
“Mrs. Augusta Stuyvesant. No, not related to the land-rich Stuyvesants or the political Fishes, though she very much wished she were. The lady who was sitting two places away on your right at dinner? She was trying to engage your interest in her nephew? Mrs. Stuyvesant also has a daughter and a niece who had met this Mr. Dorsey and were much taken by him but then discovered that he was already walking out with one of the Fabens girls. They later heard a rumor that they were headed towards the altar, against the strenuous objections of her guardians, but if that was true, it appears the heiress’s guardians won the battle.”
“I don’t recall a Mrs. Stuyvesant divulging this over dessert.”
“She dropped it into conversation at tea. She was concern
