A Perfect Heritage (35 page)

She felt better in the morning, having set her tough, determined mind to work, and telling herself that what was done was done, and that there was little point in doing it if she was now to waste emotion on grieving over it.

She returned to work after a week – she had pleaded flu – her charming, confident self, full of plans for the Christmas she was to spend with Duncan’s family who adored her. But the first time she saw Cornelius after the termination, she had the strongest urge to attack him physically, to bite him, scratch him, generally inflict upon him any pain she could; no one would ever know, she thought, the cost of the sweet, fleeting smile she gave him as he walked into the shop with Athina and wished her Happy Christmas; and when she attended the Christmas crib service she broke down in spite of all her intentions and wept quietly into her handkerchief as the shepherds and the kings knelt before the Baby Jesus and offered him their gifts and their love.

He had called, after two long, hopeful, hopeless days, when she had known he wouldn’t, of course he wouldn’t, while thinking he might, just might, if only to say – don’t be ridiculous Susie, what can he say? He’s spoken for, taken, by a woman of unarguable achievement and considerable beauty. Just grow up and regard it as what it was, a fun evening, a little bit of happiness and get on with your life. And stop checking your phone, every five minutes . . .

And then it rang; or rather rippled. With a text. Which she had so determinedly assumed must be from Henk that she refused to look at it for at least thirty – well, all right, maybe twenty seconds, since she was really so extremely busy in writing her speech for the conference and absolutely wasn’t going to interrupt her train of thought.

Only, it might be from Bianca; or dear old Bertie who had asked her for a kind of bio of herself, for his speech at the conference, and she hadn’t done it yet; so she picked it up from where it lay face downward on her desk, and she was so sure it was from one of those people that she had to read it several times over. Because the name on it was Jonjo Bartlett.

And then it said
Are u free for a drink tonite?

And feeling extremely light-headed she went to the loo, taking her phone with her and sat staring at it for quite a long time. And after a bit she went for a walk down the corridor and bumped into Bertie, who said, ‘Hello, Susie, I wondered if you’d got a minute?’ And she said, ‘Bertie, any number of minutes for you.’ Because really, looking at his no doubt incredibly pedestrian speech would be pure, sheer joy at this moment, and he said, ‘Maybe in thirty, then?’ And then she passed Lara’s office, and Lara saw her and called out that she would really love to discuss the running order of the conference again, if Susie had a minute, and Susie said, ‘Whenever you like, Lara.’ Because that too would be so, so wonderful, debating at great length whether Lara should come on before Jonathan Tucker or after, which was her current preoccupation, and Lara said, ‘Maybe in fifteen, then.’ And Susie said fine, but she was seeing Bertie in half an hour, so possibly after that might be better, and Lara said OK, and then she went and sat at her desk and felt another and even stronger great rush of happiness, and thought that perhaps a decent interval had now passed in between receiving the text and replying and settled down to the hugely important task.

She had reeled home that first evening, filled with the sense of him, thinking that it had been a lovely evening, a lovely happening in her life, a life rather drained of lovely happenings recently, and that he would now go back to Guinevere who had him so clearly and absolutely possessed.

And she must go back to Henk, who had abased himself, telling her how much he loved her, how desperately he missed her, how he was going to see a shrink, how he was determined to prove to her that he had changed, that he would not expect her to believe him without that proof, but if she would only give him the chance, he would. And struggled to tell herself that the heaviness in her heart, the doubt in her head, was merely the natural result of so much disappointment and disillusion and even fear. If only she had waited just a little bit longer . . .

So what, exactly, should she say now? How should she respond to this amazingly beautiful invitation? She started saying
Yes, cool
only that sounded a bit corny and then changed it to
Yes, great
, only that sounded a bit keen and changed that to
Yes, think so
, only that sounded a bit too unkeen and changed that to
Sounds good, when?
and was just going to change it again when Bertie walked in, looking nervous and said was it a good moment because she looked a bit distracted and she said, ‘No, no, Bertie, it’s fine.’ And pinged the text off.

And while Bertie was still rustling pages Jonjo’s text came back saying
Cool, 6.30, Ivy Club OK?
and she had to reply straight away with
Fine, see you there
and then devote herself to Bertie’s speech, which instead of being dreadfully dull as he had promised, was amusing and charming and warm and all about how he, too, was new to the company in a way, and certainly to the job, and enjoying it very much and he hoped everyone else was enjoying it too. And then moved on to introducing and welcoming each department and the new people therein, personally, one by one.

It was so good that Susie insisted on getting Lara in to listen to it, and when Lara had listened and admired the speech too, she said they might as well all look at the running order together with Bertie as well, if Susie didn’t mind, and Susie who wouldn’t have minded at that moment being asked to scrub out the lavatories with a toothbrush, said what a good idea, so they did that, and then Lara said crikey, which was one of her favourite words, it was five thirty already and what about a drink at the wine bar, and Susie said no, she couldn’t, she was meeting someone at the Ivy Club at six thirty and felt herself blushing, as if they could have known who that someone was, and fled to the loo to get ready, while noticing, albeit subliminally, that Lara said, ‘Just you and me then, Bertie, that OK?’ and that Bertie was smiling at her in a slightly goofy way and saying, ‘Of course.’ And noticing also that Bertie had most definitely lost a lot of weight and was wearing a very nice shirt and that Lara was smiling back at him, in a way that could only be described as enthusiastically, and that when she joined Susie in the ladies’ she started spraying herself with perfume and applying lip gloss to her already quite shiny mouth, while clearly not wishing to engage in any kind of girly chat. But it was only subliminal and Susie’s mind was far too occupied for anything to surface further.

She couldn’t see Jonjo at first, and feared a repeat of the Shoreditch House fiasco, but he suddenly appeared behind her as she stood at the desk and made her jump and said, ‘Hello . . .’ in that voice of his that sounded like well-chambré’d red wine.

‘Hi,’ she said, smiling at him, and he leaned forward and kissed her, only socially, of course . . .

‘Come on in. You look lovely. Great shoes.’

‘Thank you.’ God, she loved men who noticed shoes. It was really sexy . . .

He ushered her to a table, sat her down, asked her what she’d like to drink; she decided wine would be safer than cocktails, and he ordered a Pinot Grigio and a beer for him, and then sat smiling at her.

‘You look lovely,’ he said again.

‘Thank you,’ she said again.

‘Busy day?’

‘Oh – yes. Very. You?’

‘No, not really. The markets close down, more or less, this time of year. Lot of drinking though, so a really heavy lunch. Your life must be one long party too, I suppose.’

‘Well, I actually had lunch at my desk, today.’

‘Oh no, that’s a shame.’

‘I don’t mind. I’m not a great luncher. I’m just so pleased there’s this new thing for brunches and breakfast and things. Then you get into the office and there’s still a lot of day left.’

‘So where do you go for these power meals? I presume they are powered.’

‘Sometimes. Sometimes pretty powerless,’ said Susie, laughing. ‘Oh, the usual places like the Wolseley, Brown’s Hotel, Cecconi’s – they do a mean breakfast there. My totally favourite place at the moment is the Delaunay, have you been there?’

‘No, I haven’t. Is that a mistake?’

‘Huge. It’s gorgeous – very much the grand cafés of Middle Europe with really good eggs benedict, and even kippers.’

‘Kippers! Oh, my God, do I like kippers! How amazing. Well, I shall go there very soon in that case. Maybe even with you.’

‘That would be nice.’

There was a silence. Then ‘So – plans for Christmas?’

‘Oh, not very exciting. Home to my parents. You?’

‘Same. Well, with my mum.’ Not Guinevere then. That was – well, it was good. No, it was – great. ‘We do it every year,’ he went on, ‘and sometimes, if I’m lucky, my sister and her husband and kids join us, and they are this year. They’re divorced,’ he added, ‘my parents, I mean.’

‘And – is your mum married again?’

Was that too personal a question? She hoped not. It seemed relevant.

‘No, she never did. My dad did, unfortunately. To someone I can’t stand. But hey. That’s life. And Mum’s great.’

‘What does she do? Or doesn’t she?’

‘She’s in the home dec business.’

‘Oh cool,’ said Susie and promptly felt silly.

‘Yeah, she’s very good at it. She lives in Cheltenham, so a lot of nice houses to work on. My dad’s in the property business, that’s how they met. But it didn’t last. She’s too nice for him,’ he added with a rather surprising candour. ‘What about yours?’

‘My dad’s a solicitor Not the sort that makes buckets of money out of divorces, just a family solicitor. They live in Bath, all rather cosy.’

‘Lucky you. And your mum?’

‘She teaches geography at a girls’ school.’

‘And you have sisters and brothers?’

‘One of each. Both married, both live in London, my sister’s about to have a baby.’

‘So you’re going to be an auntie. Cool.’

‘Yes, I’m looking forward to it.’

‘Guinevere’s an auntie,’ he said. It was the first time he had acknowledged her existence this evening. Susie braced herself. ‘Complete brat,’ he added. ‘Its mother’s a fashion designer, truly terrible clothes, and its dad’s a sound engineer. It had three nannies at the last count. How’s the wine? Want another?’

‘Lovely. Yes please.’

‘I was married,’ he said suddenly.

‘Oh. Really?’ What else could you say to that? She felt nervous suddenly.

‘Yeah. Terrible mistake. On her part, anyway.’ He grinned at her, his brown eyes crinkling at the corners in their Clooney-like way. ‘Lasted about a year. No kids, thank God.’ He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘And what about you? Is there a deeply significant other, Miss Harding?’

‘That French bike company you were interested in . . .’ Patrick’s voice was at its most diffident.

Saul’s was at its most impatient. ‘What about it?’

‘I’ve been looking at it for a bit now. I think it could be dodgy. Over and over again, they’re declaring money’s in the bank, when if you really look, and it’s very well hidden, down in note ninety-two, I think it is, you can work out it’s
owed
to them; they haven’t got it yet. Only a few days over, but of course it adds up. Anyway, their share price is going up all the time and they look like they’re flying, and bikes are huge. But . . .’

How could this be so fascinating, Patrick wondered, this apparently dry-as-dust information? But it was. That facet alone of his new job never ceased to amaze him.

‘OK. Look, I’ve got to go. Keep it up, Patrick.’

‘I will. See you at Kempton. George VI should be really good this year.’

‘I reckon so. Sorry Bianca won’t be there.’

‘Won’t she?’

‘She said not.’

Patrick went back to his office, frowning.

Milly was finding it very difficult to feel remotely interested in Christmas. The thought of going in for the usual careful, excited shopping she did left her feeling totally sick. She could just about manage presents for Ruby and Fergie, she decided, both of whom had tried to be kind, but her parents deserved nothing. They hadn’t recognised the depth of her misery, or the trouble she might be in – and she could be pregnant or doing drugs for all they knew; they hadn’t gone to school – however deep her misgivings, it would have shown they really seriously cared – and demanded an explanation.

The only person she wanted to give a proper present to now was Jayce who, in the two weeks since she had met her, had been her greatest comfort, her lynchpin, her confidante. And so she had bought her a beautiful friendship bracelet from Links, which Jayce would gaze at for hours every time they went shopping and say how gorgeous it was. It had cost her over a hundred pounds, more than two-thirds of the Christmas money her mother had put in her bank account, and every time she looked at it she felt, in some strange way, better.

She went to meet Jayce every day at the shopping centre and they would chat for hours, sitting in McDonald’s (Jayce’s favourite) or, if Milly could persuade her, which was difficult, for a walk outside and once, which had been very difficult indeed, but it was a lovely day, to catch the bus up to Primrose Hill and walk there.

Jayce puffed beside her as they walked to the top, then sank gratefully on to one of the benches, gazing at the view.

‘It is nice, I’ll say that,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been up here, but I can see on a nice day like this why people like it.’

‘I love it,’ said Milly. ‘Or used to. We came here for picnics when Fergie and I were little, rode our bikes round, that sort of thing.’

‘But you don’t no more?’

‘Well, no. Thing is, we’ve got the house in the country now—’ She stopped, aware she had been less than tactful; Jayce stared at her.

‘Thought you lived near here?’

‘Yes, well I do. But we’ve got this other place. Honestly, it’s really rubbish, sort of a cottage—’