Clanging the gate behind her, she almost collided with the young couple who lived in the ground floor flat above her. Bill Randall was carefully helping his pregnant wife Gemma into their car.
‘So sorry,’ Ellie hastily apologized. ‘Late for a meeting,’ and with a wave she half ran, half walked towards the main road, impatiently knotting the belt of her cotton mac as she went, a bulky leather bag slung over her shoulder.
Skirting parked cars lining both sides of the narrow street, she crossed through the nearest gap, pulling the collar of her raincoat up around her neck in an attempt to shield herself from the worst excesses of the rain, now a steady downpour driven by a brisk wind which was whipping the soft fall of beige hair against her face. Overnight the weather had changed. A storm in the early hours had still not cleared bringing with it unseasonal grey skies and the first hint of cooler days.
She didn’t want to be late; no-one did just now. This meeting was no surprise. The rumours were, as rumours always are, high on content and low on facts. Someone had to say something, and Roland had chosen nine o’clock to say whatever had to be said to his uneasy staff.
As she careered around the corner with Brompton Road, the sight of the congested traffic pushing its way slowly along the rain-soaked streets gave her thoughts a more urgent direction. She glanced anxiously at her watch and then at the long straggling queue of people crammed under the inadequate shelter at the bus stop with the overspill packed into nearby shop doorways. A bus was now out of the question. Squaring her shoulders, she prepared to outwit anyone for the first sign of a vacant taxi.
Suddenly a cab, which had seconds before cruised slowly past with its light out, pulled into the kerb about twenty yards further up the road.
Expecting someone to alight, she started to sprint towards it when the passenger window was pushed down. A blond head ducked out, yelling her name and waving to her.
‘Ellie, Ellie. Buck up. Get in.’
‘Jed!’ she exclaimed delightedly as the door swung open. Scrambling in, she flopped down on to the leather seat beside the lean-faced young man whose considerable physical charms were only marginally more impressive than his choice of tailor.
‘Honestly, Carter,’ he grumbled indignantly, swiftly pulling an expensive-looking navy cotton raincoat away from Ellie’s drenched figure. ‘If I had known you were going to shake water all over me, ruining my clothes, I would most certainly have had second thoughts about rescuing you.’
Ellie just grinned. ‘I was getting a bit desperate out there. Not that it’s anything to do with me,’ she said, raising an eyebrow at him as he helped her to slip off her wet raincoat. ‘But do you ever go on public transport anymore?’
‘Unlike you,’ he said loftily, ‘I do not subject my clothes to unnecessary stress like the rush hour, unless forced. Anyway, why are you late? Lambton’s revels went on a bit, did they?’
Ellie counted on her fingers. ‘Let’s see now. Warren dozed off in the middle of Polly’s set piece, Anne Copley was drunk, Liz Smedley was high as a kite, I had my thigh squeezed by a slimeball and Beth Wickham behaved like a — no, correction, is — an airhead.’
‘So you had a good time then?’
Ellie laughed. Jed was good for her.
‘Absolutely, I took your advice about enjoying myself and went home. Which reminds me, what on earth are you doing at this end of town at this time of the morning?’
‘Ah, the most irresistible piece of gossip,’ said Jed with, a contented sigh slicking back the long lock of hair that had fallen over his dark tortoise-shell glasses. ‘Only the knowledge that my lead piece in the next issue is going to be unrivalled would have lured me from Hampstead overnight.’
‘Good heavens, Jed,’ said Ellie, her eyes alight with amusement. ‘Am I going to be let in on it, or have I got to buy a copy of my own magazine to find out?’
Jed gave her a withering look, at the same time leaning forward to slide shut the window separating the driver from his passengers.
‘Oh, very witty,’ he said sarcastically. ‘Seriously though, I was going to buttonhole you this morning, because you may be able to help. Are you still going to stay with Oliver this weekend?’
Ellie looked startled. ‘Oliver? Well, I was but I may take a couple of days and go down next week instead. But as a matter of fact,’ she continued carefully. ‘I’m not sure he needs visitors right now, not even me.’
For the first time Jed looked properly at the face of the girl beside him. It was hard to tell with Ellie. Friendship with her, as someone once said, was like climbing a ladder. You took one step and then waited to see if you were invited to climb another.
He had known her for five years since they had arrived at virtually the same time to work for Focus, when they had forged an instant bond, albeit more out of the rest of the staff’s hostility towards them than instant attraction. Fearful of any newcomers, alarmed by an influx of young, bright writers, the staff would have resented anyone.
Ellie, because she had an overpowering sense of justice, refused to be parted from a job that had been hard won and eventually they got bored with trying to dislodge her. Jed took a little longer since the mileage to be got from baiting him about his sexual preference was not to be easily surrendered.
Eventually, others became a target. Jed’s private life remained a source of speculation; Ellie was marked down as ruthlessly ambitious.
There was, however, something about Ellie that Jed could never quite reconcile with the outwardly cool elegance, and the undeniable sense of humour that rarely deserted her. A kind of integrity? Not quite. Loyalty? Yes, but she was that sort. It was something else. A fierceness, an anger.
More than once Jed thought he had detected a hint of confusion in the signals she gave about herself and he had yet to have his curiosity satisfied by knowing how, after a childhood being raised in what seemed to be genteel poverty by a charming but hopelessly irresponsible widowed father, she had acquired such a very stubborn streak.
Now, as he looked at her, he realized that someone who knew her less well might be deceived into believing that she simply had a dreadful headache. But not Jed.
‘Hey, what is this?’ he said, gently patting her hand. ‘What’s wrong, my flower? Paul playing up again?’
Ellie shrugged.
‘No more than usual.’ She hesitated. ‘Oh well, it’s just that Oliver phoned to say that strip of land he wanted next to the hotel might be sold off and redeveloped. Lousy for business. Bit worrying, that’s all.’
It wasn’t all but a London taxi, bowling precariously along in the morning rush hour, was hardly the appropriate venue to unload her problems. Even if she wanted to.
‘Well, who’s the bidder?’ asked the ever-practical Jed, who was deeply fond of Ellie’s family and a frequent visitor to the hotel. ‘Let’s find out what they’re offering and counter bid. I’ve got a couple of names that could see off the most serious buyers. They owe me too.’
Immediately Ellie regretted even that harmless admission. Too close to home. Too close. She turned instead to face him, giving him a reassuring smile.
‘Don’t worry, I’ll call Oliver after this conference. He’s very resourceful, and I can’t see him or Jill taking this lying down. Anyway, tell me this marvellous piece of gossip and what you will deign to let me do for you.’
Jed plucked an imaginary piece of fluff from his immaculate sleeve and tried to look haughty.
‘All my gossip is marvellous. This is particularly sensational.’
Ellie just grinned, relieved that she had steered the conversation off dangerous ground and began gently to push Jed back to the safer waters of his favourite subject which naturally, for a gossip columnist, was the indiscreet behaviour of the Good and the Great.
‘It concerns,’ said Jed, dropping his voice to a theatrically staged whisper, ‘Theo Stirling. You know? The property bloke.’
The taxi driver was hurtling through a maze of back streets avoiding the main rou
tes. Ellie felt sick.
Twice in the space of an hour she had heard a name she had learned since she was fifteen years old to put to the back of her mind. It had stayed there, not forgotten but undisturbed, waiting for something like this to bring back the pain and bewilderment of a period in her life that had left her forever connecting Theo Stirling’s name with hushed whispers, curious stares, bleak, oh God such bleak days, and an uncertain future.
She gazed blankly back at Jed. He was an intelligent man but not immune to vanity, and mistook her shocked look for astonishment.
‘Yes of course I know who you mean. What about him?’ Ellie asked, her eyes staring fixedly out of the window. The rain was sliding in misty rivulets down the pane but even if visibility had been possible, Ellie would have seen nothing.
In her head she saw only cold blue eyes, a hard, uncompromising mouth, the undisguised irritation of a man who had curtly ordered a fearful fourteen year-old Ellie Carter off his land.
His land? Land where she had been born, grown up, run wild with her brother and knew for certain would be there, at the end of every school term? The familiar rambling old house, the cracked, overgrown tennis court where she was champion of the world, and the apple orchard stretching down to the stream that held a thousand and one childhood memories that could never be taken away?
At least Theo Stirling with all his money and power couldn’t wipe out memories. Good memories. Important ones.
‘Er, are you still with me?’ Jed’s voice brought her back to the present.
‘Yes, of course. I was just wondering what on earth you could have found out about Mr Mega Bucks,’ lied Ellie, knowing that to Jed, the name of Theo Stirling was simply cannon fodder for the masses.
‘Well, he’s back in England,’ said Jed as the taxi halted at a red light. Ellie stayed silent. ‘I found out quite by chance last night when I went to Meg and Gavin’s bash — did you know Gavin’s looking after Debra Carlysle?’
Ellie didn’t, but she wasn’t surprised. The actress, who was currently so hot it was said her fee just to leave her house in the morning made nonsense of the Peruvian national debt, only ever had the best. And Gavin Bellingham, overpaid personal publicist, was certainly that.
Jed’s column, a mischievous concoction of real news and the spoils from his daily raids into the lives of high-profile media names, derived a certain dignity purely from being found in the pages of Focus. Ellie waited patiently. Jed was, she knew by now, incapable of recounting anything without a dramatic build up.
‘This is really exclusive stuff, Ellie,’ he said gleefully. ‘Carlysle hinting she’s going to marry Stirling. She’s besotted.’
‘What’s that got to do with me?’ asked Ellie, who privately hoped that the stunningly beautiful but dreadfully spoilt film star would break Theo Stirling’s cold heart and, with luck, his bank balance.
Jed peered through the misted-up windows as the cab began to slow, reaching into his pocket for his wallet.
‘Ah well, that’s simple. Stirling’s going to be based in Dorset and Carlysle is trying to wriggle out of her next film so she can stay with him and get the whole wedding thing sorted. Wants to be married in some village she’s taken a shine too.
‘Which brings me to you,’ Jed said, extracting some money as Ellie began to pull her mac back on. ‘I just thought if you were bored... while you were lazing around at Oliver’s, you could use some of your local knowledge to find out what he’s up to more easily than I could. I reckon I’ve got about two weeks before Carlysle starts blabbing about the marriage, but it would be better for us if we can find out why Stirling has suddenly cropped up in England at all. You know, the bigger picture. Roland will love it.’
Ellie busied herself rearranging the contents of her bag which were already in perfect order because it gave her time to think. She could have given Jed the best story he had all week, without leaving the office, come to that without leaving the taxi. She could have told him exactly what Theo Stirling was up to. She could have made Jed’s day. Roland’s too.
‘But if you’ve got family plans,’ Jed said hesitantly, perplexed by her silence, ‘I’ll wander down there myself and have a dig around.’
Oh, God, thought Ellie. That’s even worse than refusing to help him. Mentally she rapidly reviewed, and as swiftly discarded, a string of excuses that might sound plausible enough to dissuade Jed from taking off for Dorset. There was every chance no, she amended in her head, not even every, a near certainty that somewhere in that small and closely knit community of Willets Green might accidentally drag up the past if Jed started ferreting around.
She tried urging herself to stay calm. But all she kept thinking as she sat in the back of the taxi with an unsuspecting Jed was that the last time Theo Stirling visited Dorset her father had fallen victim to his selfish ambitions. This time there was every danger it was going to be her brother.
It was the nightmare again. The one where she was running distractedly from one empty room to another pulling open doors only to find each one led to a sheer drop over the cliffs.
She turned and smiled at Jed. ‘Let’s talk about it after Roland’s meeting. You know I’ll help if I can. This announcement he’s going to make, sounds ominous doesn’t it?’
The cab stopped outside the office. Jed was opening the door, handing the fare to the driver.
Ellie, head down against the still driving rain, walked quickly past him and ran lightly up the wide steps which ran the length of the building and led to the white marble reception hall.
The Focus offices were on the fifth floor and the lift was packed. Ellie and Jed squeezed in as the doors began to close and conversation was suspended until they reached their level.
It was just as well. On that rainy autumn morning, Ellie Carter, as familiar a name to Focus readers as the people she profiled each week, needed all the time she could get to figure out just how she was going to keep her family’s name and a very old scandal out of her own magazine’s gossip column.
Chapter Four
‘Mr Stirling never gives interviews,’ said the courteous but firm voice of Roger Nelson, Theo Stirling’s personal assistant. ‘I’m very sorry not to be able to help you.’
‘Would you at least ask?’ said Ellie. ‘It’s Focus magazine and most of the international names we feature feel very comfortable with the way we handle interviews.’
‘I’m sure they do,’ came the unflinchingly polite voice. ‘However, Mr Stirling prefers not to give interviews. He is, apart from anything else, an extremely busy man.’
‘I’m aware of that,’ said Ellie, rivalling his calm tone. Her mouth was dry. She battled to keep her voice steady. ‘But,’ she went on. ‘Even the busiest of men must eat. I would be happy to meet him for breakfast, lunch or dinner... or even a sandwich running alongside him,’ she concluded, hoping humour might move the mountain that was on the other end of the phone.
Even as she spoke she realized it was pointless. Although Roger Nelson finally agreed to put the request to the chief executive of Stirling Properties and get back to her, she knew it was simply a ploy to get rid of a persistent journalist.
She groaned softly to herself as she replaced the receiver, half relieved, half irritated that she had got nowhere.
Impatiently pushing her chair back, she stood up and walked over to the window. Wrapping her arms around herself, she leaned against the edge of the frame and gazed out over the grey and black skyline, the sharp sunlight of a cool June afternoon reflecting brilliantly on the wet rooftops glistening from the earlier rain.
Now what?
*
About the only thing Roland said to the staff gathered in his office that wasn’t news to them was that Belvedere was in trouble. Cost cutting, economies and the very real danger that the company would have to regretfully let some people go were cold, unpalatable facts of publishing life. Although they hated uncertainty and had pushed to be told the truth, most of the staff gathered in Roland’s carpeted
office — if asked to choose — would have happily decided to go back to living with rumours.
Ellie had felt shocked and more frightened than she would care to admit, even to herself, that events had moved more rapidly than any of them had expected. Her security was bound up in Belvedere. The mortgage for a start was already stretching her to the edge of safety.
‘At least you’re safe,’ Rosie had said as they filed out after hearing Roland’s unhappy assessment of their future. ‘You’re too valuable to them to let you go.
Ellie hoped, and after a bit decided, that she wasn’t being vain or losing touch with reality, but that Rosie was probably right. For the moment. It was just that Oliver’s phone call had had displaced the way in which her day was meant to run. There were still some things, some names that could do that, and Theo Stirling was one. She could feel change happening all around her. Not pleasant change. Ellie wanted to go forward, so why did everything seem to be pushing her back?
Roland was not to be blamed for thinking Theo Stirling would be an absolute coup. Just a hint that Stirling was on an extended visit to England would alert the City, the society columns would have every stringer crawling all over Dorset, to capture the smallest hint that he and the column-filling actress were an item. Theo Sterling was not in himself necessarily going to sell papers, but the assumed glamour of his life, the rumours of his womanising, the secrecy that surrounded him, and the story would be up for grabs and here they were in on the ground floor.
‘Or else I’ll interview him,’ Jed had said, thinking he was being helpful at the private meeting held in Roland’s after all the others had filed out. ‘But I do think Ellie has a better chance of getting to him.’
Ellie thought she had no chance at all, but after Roland’s bleak announcement, this was not the moment to appear unhelpful.
‘No. I think Ellie,’ Roland said. ‘She’s the best person to try. Ok? Let me know soonest. If he won’t be photographed, then some library shots. You know, ravishing blondes, getting on and off planes, premiers, that kind of thing.’
Another Way Page 4