More Than You Know (12 page)

“I’m fine,” said Rex, looking at Eliza slightly awkwardly, “yeah. Good, really good. I’m doing photography.”

“Fantastic! You must come and see us at the agency.”

“Love to. Which one’s that, then?”

“KPD.”

“That’d be great.”

His accent was changing already, admitting its true origins. Eliza looked at him.

“Secondary modern!” she said. “Honestly, Rex.”

“Well, Eton is a secondary school,” said Rex.

“And we did sometimes call it Slough Secondary,” said Jeremy. “It’s great to see you, Reggie. Shall we get some more champagne? Ah, and here’s Emma. Hi, Emma, darling.”

Emma
, thought Eliza,
who, for heaven’s sake, was Emma?

“Everybody, this is my sister, Emma.”

Eliza felt dizzy with relief.

Emma, it turned out, was an editor at a publishing house, very tall and rather beautiful, and great fun. Just like her brother, Eliza thought. She sat down at their table.

“They used the spotlight yet?” she asked, taking a slurp out of Jeremy’s champagne.

“The what?” said Juliet.

“Oh, they have a wonderful thing here, idea of Peter Cook’s—he owns the place, you know—a spotlight they can turn on any table, usually during the cabaret, if they think anyone specially interesting’s here.”

“How scary!” said Juliet. “Not on me, I hope.”

“Pretty unlikely, I’d say,” said Rex.

“Rex!” said Eliza warningly. He winked at her.

“Sorry.”

He didn’t seem too impressed by Juliet; it was another point in his favor.

They did have fun; even Juliet, bowled over by Jeremy’s charm, giggled and fluttered her way through the next hour. Charles sat beaming at her, occasionally leaning forward to kiss her on the cheek; he did seem to be a man in love, Eliza thought, fighting off her resistance to the notion.

The crowd was very what would once have been called bohemian, very nonestablishment, actually, Eliza thought, which was the whole point of the place, of course, lots of arty-looking men, and rather serious-looking girls with heavy black eye makeup.

“There are the Ormsby-Gores,” said Emma. “Look, Jeremy, you know them, don’t you?”

Two girls sat together at a table; they were both dressed in long lace dresses and wore a mass of necklaces and rings and large, elaborate hats over their wild dark, curly hair.

“Amazing clothes, aren’t they?” said Emma. “They always dress like that, genuine vintage. They’re huge fun; ever met them, Eliza?”

Eliza shook her head.

“No, but I’ve heard about them, of course. They own Granny Takes a Trip, don’t they? You know, that shop at World’s End.”

“It seems a bit of a funny idea to me,” said Juliet, “wearing someone else’s old clothes. Is it to save money or something?”

Emma gave her a cool, rather gracious smile.

“I wouldn’t imagine so. They are both hugely rich.”

“Even odder,” said Juliet, “don’t you think so, Charles?”

Eliza watched Charles struggling between loyalty and embarrassment; loyalty won.

“Possibly,” he said finally.

The music was wonderful, Eliza thought, provided by the Dudley Moore trio; he was her favourite from the Beyond the Fringe quartet. “He’s so so sexy, and so sweet,” she said to Emma; Emma smiled.

“Totally,” she said, “complete nympho, though. Or so they say. Wish I could speak from more experience, but one lives in hope.”

And then the cabaret began, dark and sharp and at times very crude; the Establishment being a club, there was no censorship of any
of the material. Nothing was sacred, no word unspoken; even to Eliza, determined to be totally sophisticated, there was a shock element. Even Jeremy, she noticed, occasionally didn’t laugh.

After a while, she became aware that Charles was looking anxiously at Juliet and that she was certainly not laughing. Silly girl. Well, it served her right. Eliza wasn’t sure why it served her right, but she was enjoying her discomfort.

She didn’t enjoy it for long, for Juliet suddenly stood up and made her way rather ostentatiously away from the table, towards the cloakrooms. Charles kept craning his neck looking for her, but she didn’t return.

“Eliza! Would you mind just checking on Juliet, see if she’s all right.”

Reluctantly, she went and found Juliet, flushed, standing alone in front of the mirror.

“Oh, Eliza, there you are. Isn’t it awful, so disgusting? I’m simply hating it. I can’t stay in there, but I don’t want to seem rude.”

“No, of course not.”

“Maybe … maybe you could just tell Charles I really would quite like to leave. It just makes me feel so uncomfortable. I’m just a bit old-fashioned, I suppose. Silly, I’m sure. Would you mind, Eliza?”

And so it was that by the time the cabaret had ended, Charles and Juliet had gone, Rex had joined his model, Emma’s friends had arrived and she was chatting to them, and Jeremy had suggested a foray to the Saddle Room.

“If you don’t mind it being just the two of us.”

Eliza said she didn’t mind at all.

“Engaged! But that’s … well, it’s … it’s … wonderful. Of course. Congratulations. When … How … That is—”

“Oh—only just happened. Last night. Just couldn’t wait to tell you. You are pleased, aren’t you?”

“Yes. Yes, of course I am. It’s … like I said, wonderful.”

How could she be doing this? How could she be saying she was pleased when she just wanted to burst into tears and scream and kick the furniture and then go out and get terribly, terribly drunk, and then go
round to see him, and beg him not to do it; or just quite simply ask him why, why her, why mealymouthed, cliché-talking, old-fashioned, just not-up-to-his-standard, totally unsuitable Juliet …

“I’m so glad. I do know she’s not quite your sort of girl, but I know she’s right for me; she says she can’t wait to give up work and just look after me …”

Nice dig at me there
, thought Eliza. There’d be plenty more where that came from.

“And that’s what I need. Getting on a bit now, after all, time I settled down.”

“Of course. Of course. It’s—No, it’s lovely, Charles. It really is. Um … have you told Mummy and Daddy?”

“Not yet. We thought we’d go down on Friday, tell them then. Could you come too?”

“Of course.” She quailed at the thought, at having to smile and look pleased and watch her parents being pleased, seeing Juliet fluttering her eyelashes at her father … but: “Yes, of course I will.”

“Maybe she’s in the club,” said Maddy Brown. She had come into Eliza’s office with the clothes from her spring collection; later they were to present what they felt were the most suitable pieces to Lindy for her consideration.

“Juliet can’t possibly be in the club,” said Eliza. “She doesn’t believe in sex before marriage. She told me so.”

“Even so. She could have got carried away.”

“No. She says she wants at least a year to plan the wedding.”

“Ah. Well—maybe she’s after his money.”

“He hasn’t got any. I keep telling you.”

“Yes, I know you do, but I’ve also seen your parents’ house, and to someone who grew up like I did, it does kind of spell M-O-N-E-Y.”

“Maddy, we don’t
have
any money. The house is falling down. Anyway, that wouldn’t explain his wanting to marry her.”

“I s’pose not. And Charles’s not very sure of himself, is he? He told me how he envied me, doing something I loved and was good at. He said he wasn’t in the least good at his job; he’d only got it because someone your parents had known had put in a good word for him …”

“That’s true. But that applies to loads of people, doesn’t it?”

“Not loads of people where I come from,” said Maddy, just slightly tartly.

“Don’t start all that,” said Eliza. “You know it makes me cross. Well, whatever the reason, it’s awful. Oh, Maddy, I love him so much, and I’m going to lose him!”

Anyone would think she was interviewing
them
, Matt thought. It was a bit much, really. She sat there, all big dark eyes and thick fake lashes, her brown hair cut in a Vidal Sassoon–style bob, crossing and uncrossing her long legs, totally cool and in command of the situation.

He cleared his throat, looked down at the piece of paper in his hand to remind himself exactly who she was and what she had to offer. And to buy a little time, hoping against hope that Jimbo would appear.

“Right,” he said.

LOUISE MULLEN.

MARITAL STATUS: SINGLE.

BORN 1943. EDUCATION: EALING COUNTY GRAMMAR SCHOOL FOR GIRLS.

O-LEVELS: ENGLISH, MATHS, FRENCH, HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, BIOLOGY.

SECRETARIAL COURSE, EALING TECHNICAL COLLEGE.

TYPING 70 WPM, SHORTHAND 120 WPM, BOOKKEEPING.

PREVIOUS POSTS: SINCE SEPTEMBER 1962, SECRETARY BAKER AND HILLIARD, SOLICITORS.

INTERESTS: CINEMA, THEATRE, NETBALL—

“Netball!” he said. “Isn’t that more of a school game than an interest?”

“Not at all,” said Louise Mullen. “I play for the Ealing Ladies and also for a team that meets every Thursday in Lincoln’s Inn, legal secretaries. You can play netball to a very high level, Mr. Shaw. National championships at Wembley. Do you play any games?” she added.

“No. Not really. Well, a bit of soccer.”

“For?”

“Oh—just a local team. Just messing about, really.”

“Yes, I see.” She was obviously very unimpressed.

He wasn’t sure that he could work with her. She made him feel a bit of an idiot. But … she was rather perfect. Pretty. Clever. Well-spoken. Sexy. Very sexy, while being not in the least tarty. And, most important of all, she seemed to know exactly what Simmonds and Shaw were about and what was required of her.

“You’re just starting out on your own, aren’t you?” she said briskly. “So—first impressions, really, really important?”

“Really, really important.”

“In which case, you’ll never want the office left empty, or the phone unanswered?”

“We won’t, no.”

“So.” Pause. “So say it’s my lunch hour and neither of you are here—you won’t want me going out to get a sandwich or meet a friend?”

“Well … probably not. No.”

“And sometimes”—another pause—“you’ll want me to work late. It’s not a lot of money for all that, you know. Eight pounds a week.”

“Plus luncheon vouchers,” said Matt desperately.

“Which I won’t be able to spend half the time. And I’ll be taking on a lot of responsibility.”

God, she had a cheek. He had half a mind to tell her the position was actually filled. In fact—

The door burst open and Jimbo half ran in, parked his bowler hat on the hat stand, the only piece of furniture in what would be their reception area, apart from the chair on which Louise Mullen sat and the tea chest on which Matt was perched, and started pulling off his raincoat.

“Evening,” he said. “Sorry I’m late. Client meeting overran a bit. I—”

And then, almost farcically slowly, he looked at Louise Mullen, absorbed Louise Mullen, and registered rather visibly his approval of Louise Mullen.