My father-in-law stood under the chandeliers at our fifth anniversary gala, called me a charity case with a grease-monkey father in front of 550 investors, and watched my husband grin like humiliating me was part of the entertainment

I still remembered that first dinner in the family’s Rittenhouse Square townhouse. The place looked like a catalog for old money insecurity, oil paintings, bronze sculptures, carpets too rare to step on, and enough dark wood to make the room feel like a mausoleum. Adeline, Prescott’s sister, had inspected me like she was evaluating a secondhand piece of furniture. Prescott had held my hand too loosely, already embarrassed by my lack of performance. And Randolph, seated at the head of that long table, had spent most of the evening asking questions that were not really questions at all.

Where did I grow up? Did my parents still live there? What did my father do with his hands all day? What kind of schools had I attended? Did I understand what kind of social obligations came with marrying into a family like theirs?