Finding Monsieur Right (2010) (16 page)

'The Queen?' Karloff wondered aloud.

'Well, not
the
Queen, you know, obviously,' Legend said meditatively. 'She's a bit old for you, apart from anything else.'

'Perhaps it's metaphorical,' Belladonna said. 'The spirits often talk in riddles. Can we ask about
my
love life now?'

'In a minute, Bella darling,' Chrissie said. 'I think we should get to the bottom of this first.'

'Go on, Kazza,' said Ivy.

'All right. Er ... what Queen do you mean?'

The glass stood still for a moment, then began to move confidently, spelling out: 'T-H-E-Q-U-E-E-N-O-F-D-E-N-I-A-L'.

'What does that mean?'

'Dunno, really.'

'Well, there is one queen in the room,' Legend said, pointing at Chrissie.

'Who, me? Oh, come
off
it, Legend! Karloff darling, you know I find you
maddeningly
gorgeous, but you're really not my type. No, no, that's
not
it, I'm afraid. Let's see ... the Queen of denial. The
Queen
, you see?
Of. De. Nial
. Mmm ... It does remind me of something, something that is right under our noses ... Now what could it be? Any ideas, anyone?'

'I think we should ask about the future of the band,' Jules said severely, adjusting her golden headdress.

Having dispatched such enquiries as briefly and encouragingly as possible, the spirits returned to what they really wanted to talk about: 'T-H-E-Q-U-E-E-N-M-Y-G-O-O-D-N-E-S-S-W-A-K-E-U-P-W-H-A-T-S-W-R-O-N-G-W-I-T-H-U-I-T-S-S-O-O-B-V-I-O-U-S-T-H-I-N-K-U-F-O-O-L-T-H-I-N-K.'

They all looked at one another.

'Wow, this spirit really has a one-track mind,' said Ivy.

'Yeah, it's getting a bit dull,' said Belladonna, glancing at Tom Quince. 'Shall we put on some music? I feel like dancing.'

'There's no full moon tonight, Bella. Don't get overexcited,' Jules said drily.

'Yeah, let's play a game instead,' said Legend. 'How about Eek?'

'What is that?' asked Isabelle.

'Well,' Ivy replied, 'somebody hides, then the others all look for him or her, while saying "eek".'

'On all fours,' Jules interjected.

'That's right. When you find the hidden person, you stop saying "eek" and hide with them. At the end everyone is hiding together and the last one left has lost.'

Isabelle and Chrissie exchanged a smile. The game had distinct possibilities for generating greater intimacy between Jules and Karloff.

'Let's put all the lights out,' Belladonna said, enthusiastically blowing out the candles.

Leaving the darkened kitchen, they went upstairs and congregated in the hallway.

Hearing voices, Clothaire emerged from Chrissie's room. 'What are you doing?'

'Playing a silly game, Clo-Clo darling,' said Chrissie, earning himself a venomous glance from Clothaire. 'Sorry to disturb you.'

'It's a sort of
cache-cache
,' Isabelle explained.

Clothaire drew himself up to his full height. 'OK, and you were just going to ignore me, like I'm not there? Thank you very much, Isabelle. I am capable to play, you know.'

'Of course you can play,' Jules said tonelessly. 'Can't think of anything that would be more fun.'

While Isabelle briefly explained the rules, Chrissie said, 'Now who's going to hide? Perhaps it should be someone who doesn't know the house all that well. Like ... oh, I don't know, Karl ...'

'I'll hide,' Tom Quince said quite unexpectedly.

'Great,' said Belladonna.

'Everybody close their eyes and count to a hundred,' said Jules, putting out the light. 'Then start searching, and don't forget to go "eek". No talking.'

As a low chorus of 'eek, eek' rose in the darkness, broken up by a few high-pitched giggles, Isabelle carefully made for the stairs, trying to avoid collision with the other players, who were dispersing like a pack of puppies. Trying to spare her Dior tights by shuffling on hands and feet rather than on her knees, she reached the first floor and sat against the wall. Across the landing was Jules' bedroom. Hopefully there would be nobody in there and she could have a moment of peace and quiet. Inside, it smelled of chocolate incense. 'Eek?' Isabelle whispered as she padded carefully around Jules' bed.

After a moment she realised that the darkness was not absolute in the room. The curtains were slightly parted, letting in a ray of moonlight, which illuminated the floor beneath the window. 'Eek?' said Isabelle, noticing a dark object sticking out from beneath the hem of the curtain: it was half of a shiny black brogue. Cautiously lifting a corner of material, she discovered Tom Quince sitting on Jules' cushioned window seat. Silently, he held a hand out to her and helped her up. They rearranged the curtain and sat side by side for a while.

Eventually, Isabelle turned to her guest. He was staring straight ahead and looked, oddly, rather cross.

'I'm sorry you and Clothaire didn't have more time to talk.'

'That's all right. You and I haven't had time to talk either. About Meredith.'

'No. This has turned out to be more of a children's party than a dinner for grown-ups. I hope you don't mind playing games.'

'Games? No.'

'It's just that ... you don't
look
like you're enjoying yourself,' Isabelle said worriedly.

'Actually, I was wondering if
you
were, Isabelle. Maybe I'm just being dim.'

'Dim?'

'Obtuse. Other people's relationships are always impossible to understand for an outsider.'

Isabelle turned this over in her mind, then slowly looked up at him. Suddenly, the curtains were parted theatrically:

'Eek-eek to you, my
chickens
!' Chrissie said in a loud stage whisper. 'Room for a little one?' he said, wedging himself in between them.

Before long, Jules and Belladonna joined them and squeezed in, too. When Karloff also turned up, things became rather crowded behind the curtain.

'Perhaps,' Belladonna said, 'we could sit in each other's laps? To save a bit of space?'

'Brilliant idea,' said Chrissie. 'Karloff, honey, why don't you take my place, and I'll sit in Bella's lap ...'

'No, I meant ...' Belladonna said, standing up.

'Shush! You'll give us away! Sit back down like a good girl and I'll sit on you. You know I weigh almost nothing. Now, Karloff,
you
'd better take someone else in your lap. Oh, I know, Isabelle, can you let Jules through? The poor thing is all squashed up against the window.'

Isabelle stood up.

'I'm fine,' Jules said, without moving.

The door creaked open. Hearing it, Chrissie had no choice but to push Isabelle hurriedly into Karloff's lap. They all held their breath. 'Eek?' said a voice in the dark. Then there was a loud bump.

'Ah, bloody hell!' said Legend. 'Who put that there?'

She appeared between the curtains, grinning as she surveyed the hidden group in their various constrained attitudes. 'You look like one of those phone booth challenges.'

At this point there was a metallic clanging sound outside the door.

'That'll be Ivy,' Legend whispered, perching on Tom Quince's knee.

A moment later, Ivy, who was the smallest player, had been hoisted up onto the pile and was lying lengthways across her friends' laps.

'That leaves only Clothaire,' Karloff whispered.

'Yeah,' said Ivy. 'How long shall we leave him to stew?'

'Well, I haven't got any plans for the rest of the night,' said Legend.

'That way he can really think things through in peace,' said Jules. 'Without interruptions from meddling females.'

Isabelle held up her hand to silence them. Coming down the stairs was the slow plodding sound of footsteps, punctuated with Clothaire's exasperated voice going 'Hic! Hic?' in the quiet house. He sounded so lonely that Isabelle could stand it no longer. She pulled the curtain open and ran to the door.

'Clothaire! We're all here!'

She opened the door and put her arms around his waist.

Jules put the light on, illuminating the rest of the group. They all blinked at one another.

'Mulled wine, anyone, to finish us off?' Chrissie suggested.

Walking down the stairs to the kitchen, Belladonna said to Isabelle in confidential tones, 'I
really
like your friend. He's adorable.'

Isabelle smiled at her. Thank goodness there were some perceptive people who could see through to Clothaire's qualities.

'Thank you. I think so too,' she said.

'Mmm, yes, he is quite attractive in a
surly
kind of way,' said Chrissie, who was right behind them.

'Not her boyfriend,' Belladonna said. 'The other one, Tom. He's so mysterious. Do you think he'd come to our next gig if I asked him?'

'Well, I don't know if it's his kind of ...' Isabelle began. 'I really don't know him very well.' Not at all, in fact, she thought crossly. She had made no progress at all in her enquiry. At least now the game was over she might get him on one side and question him.

But when they reached the hallway, Tom Quince stopped and turned to Jules and Isabelle. 'It's getting late. I should get home.'

'Oh no, don't go!' Belladonna said pleadingly before Isabelle had a chance to speak.

'I'm afraid I must. Thanks so much for supper,' he said, smiling at Jules, who, astonishingly, smiled back. 'It was very nice to meet you all.'

'Good night, and
do
come again,' said Chrissie, shaking his hand coquettishly. 'Come on, sleepy chickens,' he said, addressing the other guests. 'Mulled wine awaits downstairs.'

'What's that you say? Mulled wine? That sounds completely
degueulasse
,' said Clothaire, starting up the stairs. 'Me, I am going to bed.
Tu viens
, Isabelle?'

'
Oui, tout de suite
,' she said, looking around at him with a smile. 'In a minute. I'm just saying goodbye to Tom.'

Isabelle frantically tried to think. How to engineer another meeting with him? She opened the door and stood aside to let him pass. 'Er, so ...' was all she could manage.

'It was very nice to see you again and meet your friends,' he said vaguely. 'Sorry we didn't get a chance to have that talk. Was it something important?'

'Yes! Important to me. For my thesis. Maybe we could talk some other time?'

'I have a lot of work on at the moment, Isabelle. Most of it is outside London. I'm afraid I'm not actually going to be around very much,' Tom Quince said slowly, looking at her in that unfocused way of his.

'Oh.'

'Well, good night,' he said, leaning over to kiss her on the cheek. His eyes, seen properly for the first time, were a dark slate blue.

Before Isabelle could answer, Clothaire's voice came booming down from the top of the house: 'Isabelle!
Non, mais qu'est-ce qu'elle fabrique
? Come on, come on! HURRY UP! I'm WAI-TING!'

At the sound of her boyfriend's voice, Isabelle turned away to look over her shoulder. Otherwise she might have noticed Tom Quince's nostrils flaring very slightly. He ran his hand through his ruffled hair and took one step back over the threshold and into the house.

'Actually, Isabelle, it just occurs to me that ... Those quinces - I take it you don't know how to prepare them?'

'No, I have no idea,' Isabelle said, shrugging and holding her palms out.

He smiled and gave her bare arm a friendly squeeze.

'Oh!' Isabelle said, laughing a little. 'Did you feel that? I got a small electric shock.'

'Did you really?' he said, flexing his fingers. 'OK, how about this: why don't you come and have something to eat at my house, bring a couple of them with you and I'll show you how.' He paused briefly, then added: 'And we can talk about the other thing as well.'

'Oh, that would be great!'

'Tuesday night? Eight o'clock-ish?'

'Yes! Thank you so much.'

Delighted, Isabelle closed the door and smiled to herself. She was one step closer to her prize - she was certain of it.

14 Daisy

Daisy stamped her green ticket in the machine and began to make her way down the aisle of the number 27 bus. It was late morning and there were quite a few passengers - a cocktail of slouching students, old ladies in fur coats and dazzled American tourists - but Daisy spotted a free seat, one of those single ones that come in pairs. The facing seat was empty. It suited her perfectly. She preferred to sit on her own.

The bus started and, right on cue, tears began to roll down her cheeks. Daisy found these days that almost any movement - reaching up, sitting down, running, breathing in, breathing out - triggered the tiresome crying. Public transport was the worst, obviously, what with all the stops and starts. She had become that dreadful stock character of urban life - Tragic Crying Girl. It didn't matter that people gave her strange looks. She didn't care because she couldn't help it. Perhaps one day the tiresome crying would stop, she thought, looking out of the window at the depressing parade of garish fast-food restaurants and cheap clothes shops on the Boulevard Saint-Michel.

These days most of her time, including at night, was spent first in devising ways of running into Octave accidentally on purpose, and afterwards in ringing Agathe, Jules or Marie-Laure so they could talk her out of her plans. Still, it gave her something to think about.

All the way down the boulevard, the small cargo of passengers on the bus ebbed and flowed, unnoticed by Daisy. She was busy picturing herself in an outfit that made her look stunning, but at the same time like she had just grabbed the first thing that came to hand - a denim miniskirt with black leggings and ankle boots, maybe, and her shocking-pink mohair jumper, the one with the cowl neck. And her cream leather Chloe handbag slung nonchalantly over her shoulder. Her hair would be up in a sexy twist and she would be striding along the street on her way to ... wherever, a very important meeting. She would be completely lost in thought. And then, out of the blue, a black scooter would pull up next to her and she would hear a voice say ...

'
C'est pas mal quand meme, non? Vous ne trouvez pas?
'