July 8, 1932

Clara Ralston peeled her eyelids apart and groaned. She considered throwing up, made a few attempts at a burp, and found that her stomach was sound. This was a mid-level hangover at best. It was 7:26, according to her bedside clock. She ejected herself from bed, splashed water on her face and under her arms, then tugged on a pair of long white shorts and a white short-sleeved collared shirt with a large gold R embroidered on the front.

Clara was a dancer—one with a quick step and exceptional balance. She ran down the stairs at speed, taking three at a time, sliding across the slick herringbone of the great hall floor and into the breakfast room, where her family sat in front of their yogurts. She threw herself into her chair just as the clock ticked over to 7:31.

"You're late," her father said with a smile. He was firm in his routines, but this was part of the routine. Clara was always the last one to arrive. Usually she made it right before the minute hand moved. Her arrival was the sign that breakfast could begin.

Waiting for her at her place always was a dish of fresh yogurt with some kind of fruit—in this case, cooked black raspberries. The yogurt was a nonnegotiable item, served at every meal. People in the natural food movement were obsessed with digestion, and yogurt was considered necessary for life. When she was small, Clara thought she would actually die if she didn't eat it every day. She had been shocked when she went to boarding school for the first time and looked around at her classmates' plates, filled with bacon and sausage and pancakes covered in syrup. Not a yogurt in sight, except for the ones in front of her, Victory, and Unity. She realized for the first time that her family was a bit odd in its habits, and that this would not endear her to the other children. After one week, Clara switched to pancakes and sausage—tasting meat and sugar for the first time. She became a devotee of all things sweet and meaty.

Clara managed to get the yogurt down without signs of violence from her body. In fact, it seemed to have an improving effect. She was slightly more alert than she had been upon arrival. She stared at the lace curtains billowing softly in the breakfast room windows. Her head began to throb in time. She watched Faye going through her mail. She had been a singer before marrying their father, and she got correspondence every day from her friends in the city, filling her in on all the Broadway gossip. Clara always felt a pang of jealousy. She didn't get a pile of letters from actors and dancers every day and she never would if she didn't get back to the city and study dance properly. Every day she wasn't in New York was another day wasted, another opportunity gone.

"All right," her father said. "I received a telephone call from the reporter and the photographer from Life magazine. Their boat is leaving Clayton at eight, so we'll meet them by the dock. They want to take photographs of our morning exercises. So let's finish up here a minute or two early."

Of course. The Life magazine thing. She had managed to block that out.

"What do they want to know about us?" Unity asked.

Unity. All aglow in the morning. She'd never had a hangover. She believed whatever Father said. She was a good girl who liked being on the island, away from everyone else. It was easier for her. It was easier for all of them. Most of them, anyway. Not William, who sat across from Clara now, glancing at her through his long blond lashes. She gave him a half smile and made a subtle heaving gesture. He rolled his eyes and stifled a laugh.

"Our routines," Father said. "Our family structure. The benefits of healthy foods and exercise, things like that. Eat up!"

He was antsy. Father was excited to be in the magazine, apparently. Faye looked less so, but she had been in magazines before. On their covers as well. Faye had given up so much, and for what? Responsibility for six kids, pulled away from the glamour of her life to sit here on this island eating yogurt and talking about breeding and digestion all day. Clara couldn't think about this for too long or she would become furious; how dare Faye walk away from Broadway. Clara wouldn't, that was for sure. She would claw her nails into the stage and they'd never get her off.

When the bowls were empty, Phillip gestured that they had permission to leave the table. Clara took a last, long drink of water and pushed herself up, walking out with Edward.

"I guess we're show ponies today," she said to him. "They're coming to watch us run around."

"Because we're exceptional," Unity said, coming up behind them.

"Because we're freaks," Edward countered.

Clara smirked. Thank god someone else was thinking it.

The six older Ralston children, plus Phillip and Faye, stood by the grand receiving dock that rarely received anyone. While they had the occasional guest, they didn't socialize like anyone else here in the islands, on Millionaires' Row. All day long, boats came and went from their neighbors' houses, full of people laughing, singing, playing music. You could hear orchestras playing at night on other islands. You could hear laughter.

Very few people experienced the Ralstons' guest rooms papered in silk, their fine dining room, or sunny breakfast room. They might come for tennis or to consult with their father, but generally no one stayed the night at Morning House, not like they stayed at the other great houses of the river. Everyone aside from Phillip knew why—people hated the food. Visitors might be able to go without a cocktail, and they could privately get some coffee in their rooms at breakfast, but the family meals were intolerable. Perhaps they also disliked this house of seven children and rigid schedules and its obsession with exercise. Perhaps the Ralstons were simply too... exceptional, as Unity thought.

Too weird. They were too weird.

But they had all the things to impress people with, even if they didn't use them for that purpose. Clara watched the two newcomers take in the stone boathouse, the lagoon with its black swans, the fountain, and the massive house that towered over them all.

"What a magnificent sight," the reporter said. It was easy to tell who was the reporter and who was the photographer, as one helpfully carried two bags of equipment and had a camera around his neck. He was fully prepared to document the Ralstons.

"Yes, it's all right, isn't it?" Phillip Ralston turned to look at Morning House like it had snuck up behind him.

"It's more than all right, I'd say."

Introductions were made as the photographer took a few shots of the house from the dock, then they went to the lawn. There he got some shots of Faye looking elegant, which meant Faye looking like Faye, then they posed in a row in their matching white exercise outfits.

"You're all similar in height," he said, "so I think father and mother in the middle. Girls on one side, boys on the other."

They were photographed doing jumping jacks and short sprints. The workout was shorter than the usual hour due to the outsiders. The staff brought out cold ginger water and apple juice for the family, plus a pot of coffee for the visitors, and they all sat together on the massive veranda that aproned the house.

"So many people are moved by the story of how you got your children," the reporter said. "Could you tell me a little about that, in your own words?"

"Well," Phillip said, looking around at his children with affection. "My medical specialty is obstetrics. I went to England during the Great War to lend my assistance, both in terms of money and in medical services. I was able to help fund some clinics. And with so many men injured or killed in battle, and so many doctors having to help the wounded, I found my services were most useful helping deliver babies. My older children were born under conditions that were all too common—fathers off at war, possibly dead, the mothers with other children at home with no money or support. I delivered all six and adopted them with their mothers' blessings. Clara here came first. Then William, Victory, Unity, Edward, and Benjamin brought up the rear just six months later."

Clara forced a smile. The bile in her throat was sliding back down.

"To be a father six times over in that short space of time, with no mother for the children..."

"My sister Dagmar..."

Aunt Dagmar had appeared, as if on cue, dressed in a black sundress patterned in yellow birds, with a matching yellow belt. Aunt Dagmar had more severe features than Father—a sharper chin, tighter lips. She wore her hair elegantly finger-curled tight against her head. Despite the fact that smoking was forbidden for the rest of the family, she screwed a cigarette into her long holder and lit it with a silver lighter.

"... was an absolute godsend. She mothered the children until my wife, Faye, came along, and she remains a stabilizing influence."

Dagmar Ralston took a long inhale. It was unclear what she thought of being a stabilizing influence. Faye Ralston smoothed her exercise clothes self-consciously.

"That was very good of you," the reporter said.

"I love the children," Dagmar replied simply.

From inside, there was an ear-piercing scream and a patter of feet. Max Ralston came tearing out the front door riding a stick pony.

"My youngest son," Phillip said, rising. "Spirited. Excited for visitors."

So excited was Max that he continued right past the group, racing down the steps to the lawn, screaming the entire way. His nurse hurried behind him in a way that suggested she was trying not to run but really needed to.

"Toddlers," the reporter said with a smile. "It must have been a lot to handle when you had six at that age..." He nodded to the assembled. "... all at once. It must have been mayhem."

"Remarkably, no," Phillip said. "They were all very disciplined, even then. Why, they'd line up and recite their lessons and touch their toes and swim their laps."

"Still do, it appears."

"They still do." Phillip cast a quick eye in the direction of Max and his nurse. The chase had continued across the lower part of the lawn. "My daughter Clara is the strongest swimmer in the bunch. No one can beat her time. She can swim to the shore and back, through the St. Lawrence current. She's quite exceptional. We're working to get her into the next Olympics, though she would rather concentrate on her dancing. In fact, Clara, why don't you put on your suit? Or maybe a dance? Which would be better?"

"The dancing, I think," the photographer said.

"Then change for dancing. Everyone, let's go to the playhouse and show them what you can do."

Clara smiled stiffly, rose from her seat, and made it far enough before she vomited all over the ground, just out of sight of the reporter.

It was time to dance for the camera.