Fast Friends (43 page)

‘
Don’t be such an old
lech,’ she protested, neatly side-stepping
his arms. ‘We’re in
Paris,
Matt. Let’s go and
explore
it.’

But eventually, of course, late that evening following a
stupendous dinner, they had returned to their
suite, and to the
vast, velvet-canopied bed which awaited them.

All Camilla’s shyness, all her doubts
and fears were swept
away in the
slow, exquisite hours that followed as time and time again they made love,
learning the secrets of each other’s bodies
and
giving each other more pleasure than they had ever
imagined possible.

‘Alone together,’ she whispered at last into the soft,
wonder
fully scented hair of his chest. ‘I’m
so glad you brought me to
Paris, Matt.’

‘
Not half as glad as I
am,’ he murmured, dropping a kiss on
to
the back of her neck. ‘But you didn’t honestly think I was
going to give
up, did you? I’m just about the most persistent old bastard on this earth. And
now that I’ve finally succeeded in
persuading
you into my bed I have only one other thing to say
to you.’

‘
Oh yes?’ Camilla lifted her head and grinned
at him. ‘What’s that?’

‘
I hope,’ said Matt, slowly, ‘I really and truly
hope . . . that
you haven’t got me pregnant.’

Lorenzo’s at lunchtime was crowded
and noisy, but everyone still noticed Loulou when she made her entrance. Her
trademark silvery blonde hair
cascading in ringlets down
her back, her scarlet taffeta dress bearing the unmistakable
Emanuel hallmark, she glided between
the tables like a small
but very
stately galleon, smiling at people she recognized and waving at Camilla when
she finally spotted her. Clasped incongruously in one hand was a very
businesslike black leather
briefcase which
she placed with great care beside her chair
before sitting down.

Camilla waited until the
maitre d’
had
finished making a
fuss
of her before saying, ‘You’re looking fantastic. It must be
love.’

Loulou
smiled. ‘I’ve given it up for Lent.’

‘Still
seeing Mac?’

‘
He dropped
by this morning, brought me two dozen white roses and a copy of
Baby and
Child
by someone called Penelope Leach.’

‘
It
must
be love. Why the briefcase?’

‘
Business.
This afternoon I have to spend two hours being
grilled by my accountant.’ Loulou waved the inconvenience
away
with a dismissive gesture. ‘But listen, I heard some terrible news this
morning. Roz phoned me.’

‘
Oh yes?’
Automatically, Camilla stiffened, her tone becom
ⁱ
ng guarded. She would never, she
thought, be able to associate any news relating to Roz as good.

Loulou’s
smile had dropped away and the expression in her eyes was bleak as she leant
forward across the table.

‘
It’s awful,
Cami. Her baby died last night. A cot death, apparently.’

‘Oh no.’ Camilla felt sick, and deeply ashamed. Poor Roz.
What an appalling thing to happen. ‘She phoned you.
Is she
OK?’

Loulou shook her head. ‘I don’t know.
I think she’s still in
shock. When I offered to go down to see her she refused, said
that her mother would be arriving
later today. I felt guilty
because I
was so relieved. I just don’t think I could cope with something like that right
now.’

‘Of course you couldn’t. Poor, poor Roz. That little baby
. . Camilla’s voice trailed off as she recalled how, shortly after Charlotte’s
birth, she had watched a TV programme about cot deaths. For weeks afterwards
she had woken six or seven times
each night
to check that her daughter was still breathing. Jack
had irritably
accused her of over-reacting and, exhausted from
lack of sleep, she had burst into tears and screamed back at
him.
The icy, ensuing silence had lasted several days.

But Charlotte had thrived and gradually the worrying had
receded.

Roz hadn’t been so lucky.

‘She told me something else,’ said Loulou, twisting a
napkin between her fingers and indicating to the hovering head waiter that they
would not be ordering just yet. ‘Apparently Nicolette
hadn’t been all that well for weeks and the hospital ran a series
of
tests. Last week they told Roz that Nicolette sustained some
kind of brain damage when she was born.’ Loulou
paused,
frowning as she struggled to
understand the tragic unfairness of
it all. ‘Apparently Nicolette would
never have been . . . well,normal. Roz didn’t contact me when she found out
because she thought it would be too distressing for me. She said she was so
upset she didn’t want to see anyone. And now, just as she was
beginning to come to terms with the idea, this
happens. Her
baby, poor little
Nicolette, is dead. And Roz is absolutely
distraught.’

‘Of course she is,’ said Camilla, taking Loulou’s hand and
choosing her words with care in deference to
her friend’s
vulnerable condition. ‘But maybe it was Nature’s way. Lou.
If
Nicolette was badly brain damaged, perhaps
it was the best
thing that could have
happened. Some parents cope brilliantly
in that situation, but others
just can’t. And if we’re honest, we’ll
both
admit that Roz would have found it more difficult than
most. It’s been awful for her, and she’ll need time
to get over it,
of course, but in the
long run it’s probably going to be less painful for her than if Nicolette had
lived. But you mustn’t
worry about it happening to
you,’
she
urged, meeting Loulou’s
troubled gaze. ‘Only
a tiny,
tiny
percentage of babies don’t
grow up to be perfectly normal. And you’ve taken such good care of
yourself the odds are even more in your favour. Your
baby will be fine,
Lou. Just fine.’

‘I know it will.’ Loulou smiled and shook back her long
hair,
clearing the tension from the air
around them. The restaurant
noises
which had seemed to fade away earlier now resumed their former level. She
signalled to the waiter to bring their
menus and ordered the drinks,
peach juice for herself and a gin and tonic for Camilla.

‘
I know my baby will be
OK,’ she added when they were
alone
once more, ‘but a cot death is such a tragedy, we really
ought to try
and do something to help. I don’t have anything definite planned just yet, but
I’m thinking of holding a charity
night at
Vampires to raise money for research into it. Will you
and Matt come
along, when I do?’

‘
Of course we will,’
said Camilla with enthusiasm. ‘Just say
the word. Wild horses couldn’t
drag me away.’

Loulou grinned and raised her glass
in salute. ‘Good,’ she
said, a teasing note in her voice. ‘Just so long as a wild American
doesn’t drag you away before the big event.’

Sitting curled up on the settee at home, Camilla tore yet
another
sheet of paper from the pad on her
lap and threw it past the
waste bin
to nestle with the others. Her last letter to Roz had
been difficult
enough, and that had been the one she had written shortly before bumping into
her in Harrods.

This one was proving to be far worse. Yet something within
her drove her on. She didn’t like Roz, but
felt that sending a
short note of condolence was the least she could do.
The letters she had received from friends and relatives had helped her so
much when her own parents had died within a year
of each
other; she had read and reread them, gaining an amazing amount
of comfort from the knowledge that people thought
enough of
both her and her parents
to make the effort to write such difficult
words. Roz deserved that much from her at least, she told
herself
as she sucked the top of her pen and struggled to choose her own words of
sympathy.

But that
didn’t mean it wasn’t bloody hard.

In the end, after over two hours of
false starts, she wrote
straight from the heart. What had been intended to be a few
short lines became a three-page
letter from one mother to
another,
with no mention of the difficulties which had estranged them. Tears welled in
her eyes as the grief which Roz must be enduring was shared by Camilla. When
she reached the end shefolded the pages and pushed them into an already stamped
and
addressed envelope without even
rereading them for fear that
the spontaneity of the deeply felt
sentiments would be lost.

Chapter 34

November 5th. Firework night. Or more appropriately,
thought
Loulou with satisfaction and mounting
excitement as she
hugged the secret to herself, bridge-burning night.
All systems were go and she could hardly wait for the fire to be lit.

With professional pleasure she gazed around at the prepara
tions. Christo and the girls had worked so hard.
The now-
imminent approach of her baby’s birth had prevented her from
helping them as much as she would have liked but she had done her bit,
organizing everything and delegating like mad wherever possible. Until midnight
last night she had issued instructions
from
the comfort of the Number One settee, ensuring that no
detail, however
tiny, was forgotten and Daisy, Lena and Christo
had cheerfully carried out all the physical work of which she
was no longer capable. Feeling like Cleopatra and
enjoying herself immensely, Loulou had not even stopped to wonder
what would happen after tomorrow night. It simply
hadn’t
concerned her.

It still didn’t. It was, after all, such a
right
thing
to be doing.

And now Vampires was transformed. Hugging her trusty
briefcase to her enormous stomach she allowed herself a smug smile. It was
going to be a truly spectacular night.

’Loulou certainly knows the right
people,’ Camilla whispered
to Matt as they found themselves a small table beyond the bar.
‘If this doesn’t put Vampires back on the map, nothing
will.’

The whole place was buzzing, alive
with laughter and
excitement.
The pop of champagne corks and the clink of
glasses mingled with the erratic
clatter of the bouncing silver
balls at the two roulette tables set up in the centre of the
room. Around them, less noisy but engendering just as much
interest were the smaller tables where
croupiers in scarlet
satin deftly
dealt out the cards for
chemin-de-fer,
blackjack
and poker.

Clutching the small stack of chips with which she had been
presented upon arrival, Camilla watched with
admiration as
Loulou, good humouredly
insulting everyone who approached
her, sold further bags for £20 each.
Anyone could buy as many
chips as they
liked. At midnight, the player who had amassed the most number of chips won a
holiday for two in Barbados,
paid for by Loulou herself.

‘Come on, you miserable old sod,’ she heard Loulou cry as
a well-known actor pulled a handful of notes from his wallet. ‘If
Patrick Lichfield can buy two hundred chips you can
afford
twice that amount. Bloody hell, he’s only an impoverished
photographer — you’re rich beyond his wildest
dreams! Let’s see
your gold card, sweetie. Sign over all your dosh.’

And of course he did. Everyone was
doing the same.
When
Camilla made her way over to Loulou’s table, her
friend flashed her a wicked grin and
waved her bucket of
money
at her with glee. ‘Cami, we’re doing so
well!
I thought
that by inviting two hundred of the
richest people I know,
I’d end up making twenty grand. If this carries on I’m going
to double or triple that amount.
Everyone’s spending an
absolute
fortune.’