A Secret Life_ The Lies and Scandals of President Grover Cleveland - Charles Lachman [127]
Annie came from a distinguished Dutch family that had settled in America in the 1600s. She was a statuesque forty-year-old brunette with queenly shoulders and a commanding physical presence—a finished woman of the world, and just the right antidote to Rose’s taciturnity. At least she wasn’t conjugating Greek verbs in her head to pass the time on the tedious reception line, as was said of Rose. A few days after Annie moved into the White House, she assisted Rose in hosting an afternoon tea. Two days later, she attended Sunday services at Rose’s side at the First Presbyterian Church on Fourth Street—the house of worship where President Cleveland had just purchased a pew. No one knew what to make of Annie. Was she Rose’s companion? Or was this a cover and was President Cleveland courting her?
The following week, Annie Van Vechten had to take a backseat to another fetching visitor: Frances Folsom had been invited by President Cleveland to stay at the White House for her Easter break from Wells College. Frances may have missed the inauguration, but she was finally able to savor her first sweet taste of life in the Washington limelight. She was given a room in the family quarters on the second floor, overlooking the North Portico entrance. She could not believe she was actually here. It was like a storybook. Schoolgirl that she was, she opened her heart to her diary.
“I can’t realize it is Washington. I can’t realize it is the White House—or if it all is, I think I can’t be I, but must be some other body.”
That first night, dinner was served with all of President Cleveland’s favorite ladies at the table: Frances, her mother Emma, and Rose. Somehow he managed to lose the mother and his sister and invited Frances to accompany him on a private tour of the White House, where they could be alone. The time had come to take his courtship to the next level. Cleveland showed his former ward all the points of interest until they found themselves in the East Room, the site of most formal state dinners and other presidential ceremonies, and to this day, the largest room in the presidential mansion. Surely, Cleveland showed Frances a most treasured work of art—the Gilbert Stuart portrait of George Washington that, according to legend, had been saved by Dolly Madison when the British burned the White House to the ground in 1814. Romance was definitely in the air as Cleveland and Frances made tender small talk. He told her that he tried to come to the East Room every night and walk its length for exercise, and they playfully calculated how many times they had to walk from one end to the other to make a mile. It came to forty-eight. The president escorted Frances to the south window, and as lovers have always done, they gazed at the moon. Words danced from his lips, and they were “very romantic.” Cleveland had now crossed the line, and he had probably never felt more vulnerable.
The new few days were a whirlwind of activity for Frances. She was officially presented to Washington society on March 28 at an afternoon reception at the White House. Emma Folsom and Annie Van Vechten were also there, but it was Frances, her lush chestnut hair and charming sincerity free of affectation, who became a sensation—a “decided favorite,” according to the Washington Post, by far the “prettiest girl that Washington society has seen this winter.” Frances wore a simple short skirt of white silk and cascades of lace. Her tight-fitting collar covered her neck so entirely it seemed to bellow the essence of virginity. Her corsage of Jacqueminot roses matched the blush that graced her cheeks. Among the guests were an exceptional number of the capital’s most alluring debutantes, but the Wells College senior was “the belle of the assemblage.” When Cleveland sneaked a peak at the reception and saw Frances’s sparkling debut, he was said to have exclaimed, “She’ll do! She’ll do!