The Decision (2 page)

Edward Harris provided further legal background, and some particularly brilliant ingenuity over the creation and workings of the Summercourt Trust and I would like to thank Ros Harris too, who provided a most valuable overview, steeped as she is in such matters. Sue Stapely was a fount of knowledge on all manner of things and as always provided me with pathways to all kinds of helpful people; the wedding in the book would not have been the same without the sparkly musical input of John Young of Country Church Wedding Music; Steve Gunnis provided a marvelously expert overview of the cars of the decade, and Lisa Lindsay Gale was a wonderful and witty consultant on gymkhanas and pony etiquette generally. And I am truly indebted to Nicholas Coleridge for generously giving me the run of the Tatler archives. Two dizzy afternoons indeed!

At Headline, I have been particularly well cared for by Jane Morpeth and Leah Woodburn, my editors, who between them have worked an incredible magic with an even-later-than-usual manuscript, remaining calm, patient and appreciative against every odd. It meant so much to me. Susan Opie is the most wonderfully thoughtful and perceptive copyeditor; and as always immense thanks to Kati Nicholl who works some kind of magic on a manuscript and cuts it so brilliantly that even I can’t spot what has gone! Jo Liddiard has not only put together the usual gorgeous marketing campaign, she was kind enough to sit with me through a long morning in my study and guide me through the technological intricacies (as I saw them!) of returning to my neglected blog. Louise Page has returned to handling my publicity with all the imaginative determination I remember so fondly; and the sales team, under Aslan Byrne, has been quite simply magnificent. And a special thank to Justinia Baird-Murray for designing the most gorgeous cover I have seen for a very long time.

Finally I would like to once again thank my family; the sons-in-law as well as the daughters, have been completely wonderful. And to welcome two new members, Grace and Niamh to the ever-growing clan.

In retrospect, as always, it looks like just the best fun.

Penny Vincenzi

August 2011

Eliza Fullerton-Clark, a debutante and subsequently a fashion editor

Sarah Fullerton-Clark, her mother

Adrian Fullerton-Clark, her father

Charles Fullerton-Clark, her brother, a stockbroker

Anna Marchant, her godmother

Piers Marchant, Anna’s husband

Sir Charles and Lady Cunninghame, Eliza’s grandparents

Matt Shaw, a property developer

Sandra Shaw, his mother

Pete Shaw, his father

Scarlett Shaw, his sister, an airhostess

Diana Forbes, Scarlett’s air hostess friend

Mr Barlow and Mr Stein, Matt’s first employers

Emmeline, Eliza and Matt’s daughter

Margaret Grant, her nanny

Jeremy Northcott, Eliza’s millionaire boyfriend and advertising supremo

Emma Northcott, his sister

Louise Mullan, secretary to Matt and subsequently a property tycoon in her own right

Jenny Cox, receptionist and secretary at Simmonds and Shaw

Jimbo Simmonds, Matt’s partner

Valerie Hill, a hugely successful businesswoman

Georgina Barker, Matt’s girlfriend

Barry Floyd, a successful builder

Roderick Brownlow, a property developer

Juliet Judd, Charles’s girlfriend

Geoffrey Judd, her father

Carol Judd, her mother

Lily Berenson, a rich widow from Charleston

David Berenson, her son

Gaby Berenson, her daughter-in-law

Lindy Freeman, Eliza’s boss at Woolfe’s department store

Maddy Brown, a knitwear designer and friend of Eliza’s

Esmond, her boyfriend and a hatter

Jerome Blake, a photographer

Rex Ingham, another photographer

Rob Brigstocke, Creative Director of KPD, advertising agency

Hugh Wallace, account director at KPD

Jack Beckham, editor of
Charisma
and later of the
Daily News

Fiona Marks, the fashion editor

Annunciata Woburn, the features editor

Johnny Barrett, Louise’s journalist friend on the
Daily News

Giovanni Crespi, wealthy businessman

Mariella Crespi, his wife and socialite

Anna-Maria, a maid

Bruno, Giovanni’s valet

Sebastiano, the Crespi’s butler

Timothy Fordyce, a friend of Mariella’s in Milan

Janey, his wife

Mark Frost, a distinguished travel writer

Persephone Frost, his mother

Heather Connell, a young mother and friend to Eliza

Coral, her daughter

Alan Connell, her husband

Mrs Munroe, Eliza’s gynaecologist

Mary Miller, her psychotherapist

Philip Gordon, Eliza’s solicitor

Toby Gilmour, Eliza’s barrister

Ivor Lewis, Matt’s solicitor

Sir Bruce Hayward QC, Matt’s barrister

Sir Tristram Selbourne, another QC

Mr Justice Rogers, a judge

Demetrios and Larissa, taverna owners on the Greek island of Trisos

It was nearly over then. By this time tomorrow it would be settled. By this time tomorrow she would know. Whether she would still be a mother, a proper mother, the sort that did the ordinary things, got her child up every morning and tucked her up in bed every night, took her to school and picked her up again, knew when she’d had a tummy ache or a bad dream, got cross with her, argued with her, decided when to get her hair cut, or that she needed new shoes, told her off for skimping on her homework or her ballet practice, insisted she made her bed and tidied her room and wrote thank-you letters and cleaned out the hamster’s cage … Or the other sort, the once-a-week sort, the provider of a perfect room and whatever-you-fancy food, who waited impatiently outside school, aware of the mild curiosity of the other mothers, the purveyor of treats and outings, and ultra-generosity to friends, surprised by a new dress, a fringe, a fad, always with time to give, over-indulgent, never cross, never critical, desperate to know about a school concert, a friend’s party, plans for a holiday, watchful for new loyalties, jealous of new traditions …

Which would she be?

The mother with custody? Or the mother without?

Eliza was in the middle of curtseying to the Queen when she decided it was time she lost her virginity.

She was rather shocked at herself; not for the nature of the decision, but for managing to make it at such a moment. She had had a lot of trouble getting her curtsey absolutely right (one foot lined up perfectly behind the other, both knees bent, head erect, arms at side), it was hardly comfortable and she was inclined to wobble. Concentration was essential. And it was a terribly important moment in her life; both her mother and her godmother (who was actually presenting her) had instilled into her endlessly how lucky she was, that had she been one year younger it would not have been possible, because this was positively the last year of court presentation, it had been declared an anachronism, not in keeping with the new Elizabethan age. And here she was, in her blue silk Belinda Belville cocktail dress, in the presence of the Queen – so much younger and prettier in the flesh than her photographs, and the Duke – so amazingly handsome, and she was thinking not about being part of a deeply important tradition that had lasted for generations, but about who of all the young men she was dancing and flirting with that wonderful summer she might achieve this new ambition with. It really was rather bad of her.

Concentrate, Eliza! What would her mother and godmother say if they knew that after all their organising and lunching and juggling with dates and guest lists and budgets for her Season, that her mind was fixed not on what to them was the almost sacred part of the whole thing, but on something very unsuitable indeed.

She straightened slowly (without a hint of wobble), and moved towards the side of the throne room, making way for the next wave of girls.

Eliza was attracting a lot of attention that summer. Indeed she had become a bit of a favourite with the popular press, had so far appeared in the
Express
three times and the
Mirror
four. Her mother had felt it rather lowered the tone of Eliza’s Season, but Eliza thought it was wonderful and a lot of the other girls had been really jealous. She wasn’t pretty; she could see it for herself: her features were too large, and her colouring too strong, with slightly olive skin, very dark hair combined with very dark blue eyes, and she had more than once heard her mother saying worriedly to her grandmother that she did hope no one would think there was foreign blood in the family. But she also knew that she was extremely attractive.

Boys had made passes at her from when she had been only fifteen, and she had always had an endless queue of would-be partners at pony-club dances. Indeed, she had first made the pages of
Tatler
the year before her Season, watching her brother Charles play cricket for the Old Etonians on Founders’ Day.

But this year was truly hers, and she was proving a star; she had already been granted the Big One, a full-page solo spot at the front of
Tatler
, taken by Tom Hustler, himself once a Debs’ Delight and now a society photographer.

‘Miss Eliza Fullerton-Clark,’ the caption said, ‘daughter of Mr and Mrs Adrian Fullerton-Clark. Eliza, a charming girl whose interests include skiing and the History of Art’ (I didn’t know that, thought Eliza, studying the photograph critically, grateful for Tom’s lighting which disguised her slightly too-long nose, and made her eyes look simply enormous) ‘will have her dance at the exquisite Fullerton-Clark home, Summercourt, Wellesley, later in the Season.’

The photograph had been granted its prominence by
Tatler
’s social editor, Betty Kenward, the redoubtable Jennifer of ‘Jennifer’s Diary’, the all-powerful goddess of High Society, whose word alone could promote a girl from being just, well, a girl, to a success, someone to be marked down as having a future. Which meant not a future in her own right, but as the wife of someone rich and powerful, at best heir to one of the great estates of rural England.

And Eliza’s future had been most carefully planned. Sarah Fullerton-Clark, together with her best friend (and Eliza’s godmother) Anna Marchant, or rather the Hon. Mrs Piers Marchant, had visited Mrs Kenward in her eyrie at the top of a small flight of stairs from the
Tatler
editorial floor. Mrs Kenward had given them the regulation small tomato juice and shared with them the almost mystical tools of her trade: her diary of the Season, with every girl’s dance and date so far, and a list of eligible young men, rich and well-connected, christened (by the tabloids) the ‘Debs’ Delights’. The Delights had a longer lifespan than the debs, and were summoned for several summers, at no cost to themselves, to attend dances and parties, Ascot and Henley, and whole weekends at fine country houses, where the only requirement upon them was to wear the right clothes, not to drink too much, to be polite to their hostess and to smile at and charm the prettier debs. (The plainer ones tended to go unsmiled at, and undanced with; Eliza knew more than one girl who regularly arrived on Friday evenings and went right through to Sunday midday totally ignored by everyone, and certainly not asked to dance.)

Charles was on the list of course; he was extremely good-looking, which meant if it was a toss-up between inviting Eliza to a cocktail party or dance or another girl without a brother, Eliza usually won. He was very tall and dark, and charmingly diffident, a favourite with the mothers; Sarah and Anna had left Mrs Kenward’s office with a recommendation for the date for Eliza’s dance and some starred names of young men on the list, denoting particularly impressive titles or fortunes.

Eliza was staying with the Marchants in London during the week that summer, since she was doing – as well as the Season – a course at one of London’s smarter secretarial colleges. Her mother had been anxious that the course would be too much for her and she’d look tired at all the important dances, but the principal assured her that girls doing their Season were permitted to come in at midday after an important party, so they could get their beauty sleep. And as Eliza had assured Sarah, typing along to the strains of Victor Silvester and his Ballroom Orchestra (this was to ensure the steady rhythm essential to a good typist) was hardly arduous.

Eliza was determined to work, and not in some feeble little job either; her allowance from her father was very small and anyway, she wanted a career. She knew what everyone including her mother said, that a job was just something to do until you got married and to earn you a bit of pocket money, but Eliza wanted more; she wanted a job that was interesting and absorbing, something she cared about ‘that will make me a person, in my own right,’ she said to Charles, ‘you know, not just as someone’s wife or whatever.’