But of course that was fanciful, and why M. Lazard was the executive and she just a hostess.
“Madame, enchanted,” Lazard said. He came forward from behind the mahogany desk and bowed over her hand, pressing it to his lips in a courtly gesture. Then he pressed his own on top of it. “I am so tremendously sorry for your loss. M. Massot, or if I may say, Pierre, was a good boss and a good friend. We have all missed him these long years.”
Sophie felt her eyes prickle at the warmth of the greeting. This stranger was kinder to her than her own family.
“Thank you,” she said. “You know, I do speak French, if you would be more comfortable.”
“Certainly not; I have instructed all the staff to change to English. Please, Madame, sit down.”
The chair in front of his desk seemed awfully formal, so Sophie gingerly perched herself on a chaise longue covered in a gorgeous ice blue silk.
“I am sure you will not want to be bothered with House Massot’s affairs for too long.”
“I hope not.”
“But while you are here, you must read various documents, and you will need to ask questions, to satisfy yourself about the state of affairs. It is hard enough in one’s own language at times without having to use a second one. We only employ bilingual staff anyway—we do a large amount of business with London and New York, and of course there’s De Beers in South Africa to consider. It is good for everybody to brush up their English.”
She relaxed. Well, he wasn’t hostile at all, and didn’t seem disposed to think her interfering.
“You’re very kind.”
“Not at all, Madame. You are in charge now, you know.”
He smiled at her and his eyes twinkled. “So where would you like to start?”
A good question, Sophie thought. She had no idea.
“I’ve read the company report, but . . .”
“Legal jargon, I know. Impossible to understand. May I suggest something?” he asked, deferentially.
“Of course.”
“Perhaps you would like to meet the department heads, the staff. We could call a meeting, or I could walk you around the place, and you could see everybody working as normal.”
Sophie brightened. “That sounds perfect.”
“And then, if you have the time, perhaps I could take you out to lunch, and give you an overview of the company and where we stand. It is important for you to judge our stewardship of Pierre’s legacy.”
Sophie smiled. “Thank you, yes. I should like that very much.” He was very kind and not in the least intimidating, despite being so tall.
“Me too. It’s so nice to really talk to you, Madame. I wish it could be on a more auspicious occasion.”
“Please call me Sophie,” she said.
“Then, Gregoire.”
Gregoire took her around the building, steering her slight body with his huge one. He was very protective and chivalrous, opening every door, summoning the staff with a snap of his fingers. There were many of them to remember, but that was one thing Sophie felt confident about; painful years of being forcibly turned into the perfect hostess, for Pierre, had trained her, given her an almost perfect recall of names and faces. They were mostly men: Jean-Paul Roubin, wiry, fifties, the head of sales; Richard Roget, a bulldog of a man, acquisitions; Felix Petot, also squat, and a nose flushed from wine, an unlikely head of designers. The head of public relations was a M. Keroualle, in New York today apparently, but his deputy was an attractive, rather hard-looking woman called Judy Dean. She was the easiest to remember of all the vice presidents; the only American and the only woman.
“Glad to meet you,” Judy said, shaking Sophie’s hand with a firm grip.
Sophie inventoried her: an elegant suit in raspberry wool, rather a bold colour choice, and very small, but flawless diamond studs. Her hair was a touch too short for real beauty, but she was very striking, no doubt. It was a short-sleeved suit and Sophie couldn’t help but note the marvellously toned arms.
She felt slightly inadequate. She was a member of four of five of Paris’s most exclusive health clubs, but hadn’t darkened their doors for months. Sophie thought she would feel foolish, taking up free weights and jogging shoes in her late thirties, but this girl did it, and she couldn’t be that much younger, and she looked fantastic.
“Delighted. Thank you for all the hard work you do for us,” Sophie said.
“Well, thank you for my salary.” The younger woman smiled, to show it was a joke.
“There aren’t that many women working at House Massot,” Sophie remarked.
“No. So many still prefer to stay home,” Judy said coolly.
Sophie paused. Was the younger woman attacking her? But she was smiling, with those very American, brilliantly white teeth.
“I suppose so. But I’m glad you’re here; it will be good to have another woman’s opinion while I’m looking over the firm.”
“Any way I can assist you, Mrs. Massot. Just let me know.”
“Judy is one of our rising stars,” Gregoire chimed in.
“I’m sure,” Sophie said. “Nice to meet you, Judy.”
“Have a nice day,” the younger woman said, turning back to her computer.
“Why are there so few women here?” Sophie asked as Gregoire led her down the stairs. She would rather walk than take that tiny elevator; perhaps she would authorize a new, modern one, she thought. Quaintness was nice, but not when it came to lifts.
“They don’t apply,” he said. “Behind the glamour of the showrooms and the fashion shows, the actual business is rather dull. All euros and statistics. Ladies have much better things to do with their time, as I’m sure you know very well, Madame. Sophie,” he corrected himself. “Excuse my old-fashioned manners. It is just the force of habit.”
They reached the ground floor, where the receptionist looked at them nervously, but Sophie smiled, trying to put her at her ease. Gregoire opened the door for her; his car was ready, and he opened the back door so she could slide inside.
“Do you have any objections to La Couronne?”
She recognized the name; that was the new, extremely expensive restaurant that had recently been awarded a coveted third Michelin star for its classic French cooking. A Normandy menu, lots of cream and apples. Sophie found her mouth was watering.
“None.”
“Then we shall go there.” He leaned forward and gave the instructions to the driver. “I am so looking forward to this. It will be wonderful to have some interesting company.” Lazard looked at her, his blue, slightly slanted eyes dancing. “I remembered that you were beautiful, of course, but not that you were also intelligent.”
Sophie blushed scarlet. It had been a long time since anybody had paid her a personal compliment, and never about her mind. She looked at Lazard gratefully.
“Thank you,” she said, remembering Pierre’s instructions. A lady always receives a compliment gracefully, she doesn’t protest it.
“I will try to make this whole thing as painless for you as possible,” Gregoire said. And smiled.
Chapter 6
“Good morning, sir.”
“Good morning, Mrs. Percy.”
Hugh strode into his office and put his briefcase down on his desk, snapping it open and removing a few documents.
“Get me Louis Maitre on the phone, will you.”
“Certainly, sir.” Elizabeth Percy placed a cup of tea—black, no sugar, served in a wafer-thin bone china cup—in front of him, admiring him as she did every morning. She was twenty-eight and very happily married, but there was no harm in looking, was there? Today, like every day, he was beautifully dressed, with that effortless style—she was sure he never gave a thought to it. All his suits were bespoke, of course, and his shoes, and shirts; she thought the only thing he bought retail were his ties. Today, like every day, the tie was perfectly understated, a dark red and navy paisley. Hugh Montfort’s clothes were never allowed to get in the way of his body. Underneath that perfect fit you co
uld still perceive, in the way he walked, and held himself, the tight muscles, the sinewy strength of him.
She booked all his appointments, and so knew his workout routine: karate five times a week, boxing three, and daily sessions at the gym. He would have been there this morning, kicking a punch bag, lifting weights. And then back home for breakfast, which he would make himself: scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, and he might be the last man in England to still regularly add a kipper.
The tea she served him now would be the last caffeine he would have today. He would not have wine at lunch, and rarely more than one glass at supper. It was a heathy routine, very much so, but Elizabeth knew Hugh would scoff at any such description. He merely programmed himself for the best energy, to help him at work.
He treated his body like he treated everything: as a means to an end.
Hugh tossed the tea back, almost scaldingly hot, the way he liked it, and handed his assistant the empty cup and saucer.
“Thank you.”
She removed it silently, and in a few seconds his phone was lit up. He pressed the button.
“M. Maitre, sir,” said his secretary’s emotionless voice.
“Put him through, thanks.” She was working out well, Hugh thought with satisfaction. He would never hire another unmarried woman, not to work with him, anyway. He winced at the thought of the last two girls both breaking down and declaring their undying love. How bloody awful, all around, that had been. Of course he had transferred them elsewhere with a rise in pay, but he never wanted to go through such a scene again.
He had no interest in women—
“Hugh, mon brave.” Maitre’s voice pulled him back to the present. “Congratulations on the Oscars. What a triumph, we have been besieged.” Maitre was his eyes and ears in Paris, and ran Mayberry’s small, but always packed, boutique store on rue des Princes.
“Yes, so they tell me.” The new collection was flying off the shelves, so fast it presented a problem; they needed to source more stones or come up with something new. He couldn’t have his stores empty. “How is the report coming along?”
“It should be with you in a day or so.”
“Give me a preview now. Wait a second.” He put the Frenchman on hold and buzzed Mrs. Percy. “Hold all my calls—nothing must interrupt this.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Tell me everything.” He spoke to Maitre again, and pulled forward a yellow legal pad and his Montblanc pen.
“Well, I think the moment may have arrived. Enfin.”
Hugh smiled broadly. “Really.”
That was wonderful news, far better than the Oscar hoopla or the sales of the new collection. He wanted House Massot. The board wanted House Massot. Taking it over would end every problem associated with Mayberry’s rapid expansion. He thought covetously of the prime locations, the ancient stores, fusty and ripe for redevelopment, on Bond Street, Fifth Avenue, rue Faubourg St.-Honoré—they even had a presence in Tokyo, although that store was a giant money loser. And there were the contracts with the De Beers site holders, the artisans, the designers, the gold mines—everything.
He had been trying to buy House Massot for the last nine years. Nothing doing. They wouldn’t even talk to him. That popinjay Pierre Massot, so in love with his own name and the showgirls of the French Riviera, he couldn’t give a damn what was best for his shareholders. And then Gregoire Lazard insisting he must hold to Massot’s wishes, even though the man had disappeared off the face of the earth.
Mayberry, under his guidance, had had a clear vision, but not enough money or clout for a hostile bid. Although the balance of power had been shifting, every year, in his favour. And he had never given up.
This was it. This was the deal. The one that would make Mayberry into the new Tiffany. He had sold it that way to Pete Stockton and the board and to a man they agreed with him.
“They’re in trouble,” Maitre said. “The latest collection was a disaster.”
“Fashion or jewellery?”
“Fashion. It was practically booed off stage at the shows. The accessories line, worse. It was received with indifference. Same old, same old,” Maitre said, proud of his colloquialism.
“And the jewellery?”
“Continues steady, from what I can discern. But their company accounts are impenetrable. So many intangibles. They gave our auditors headaches.”
“But they verify the figures?”
“They can’t contradict them. Not enough information.”
“So their sales are lacklustre.”
“The fashion house must be bleeding money, Monsieur. It is a disaster. My wife would never shop there,” Maitre said earnestly.
Montfort smiled; such a French analysis. But he remembered Diane Maitre, a very stylish woman. If she wouldn’t shop there, he was inclined to trust her judgement.
“There is something else.”
“Go on.”
“The wife has had Pierre Massot declared dead.”
Hugh exhaled in surprise. “The wife?”
She had done nothing, said nothing, for as long as he had been following House Massot, even back when Pierre was around. A trophy wife, a cipher of a woman, the kind that is quite content to stay home and give tea parties while her husband cats around with every blonde in France. She’d had two blind eyes to it, from what he had heard. With her enormous château, which had, he believed, a very fine park indeed, perhaps she hadn’t cared.
“When did this happen?” He could hardly believe it. Such initiative.
“Just two days ago. A contact in the courthouse called me.”
“And that means . . .”
“She inherits a large sum, but most of it goes to the son. However, he will not take over the stock until his twenty-first birthday. So she votes Massot’s thirty percent, for now, and also takes his place as chairman of the board.”
Montfort felt his excitement rise. “She has no business background?”
“None at all; he married her when she was nineteen.They had a son; that’s what she’s been doing.”
“This is terrific!” he exclaimed.
Maitre’s voice reflected surprise at his emotion. “I’m glad you are pleased, M. Montfort.”
“Perhaps she will see reason. And if not, we shall go to the shareholders. They were always dazzled by Massot, but his wife . . . they won’t care to have their stock reduced by a chairman of the board without a shred of experience.”
“But I cannot imagine M. Lazard will encourage her to interfere. What if she just leaves him alone to get on with it?”
Montfort thought about it. “Yes, and I suppose she will, if she’s half a brain in her head. But we should be able to plant the fear that she will use Massot as her personal playground. Anyway, the best you can say of Lazard is that he’s trodden water.”
“He has not been an inspiring leader, Monsieur,” Maitre said respectfully. Unlike you hung in the air.
“Thirty percent is a problem, but there’s still a seventy percent float out there.” He grinned. “Pierre Massot is gone, and now House Massot will be too.”
“You can do a better job, Monsieur.”
Montfort nodded. “I certainly can.”
“I will send you the report.”
“Excellent. Well done. Goodbye, Maitre,” he said, hanging up. He pressed the buzzer.
“Yes, sir?”
“Mrs. Percy, clear my schedule for next week, would you?”
“Certainly, sir.” She knew better than to ask questions, but he heard the curiosity in her tone.
“I’m going to Paris,” he said. “Book me in at the George V. And Mrs. Percy?”
“Yes, sir?”
“You may take the rest of the day off.”
“What?” asked the normally unflappable Elizabeth. “I mean—excuse me—it’s only eight twenty in the morning.”
“I know. But I shall be working from home today. I need some time to think. Is there anything urgent, meetings that ought not to be rescheduled?”<
br />
She quickly checked the screen. “Just internal ones.”
“Then cancel them.”
“Very good, sir.”
“You do have something to do today?”
Elizabeth Percy smiled. How like Hugh Montfort to imagine that if somebody wasn’t working they were at a loose end. Of course she had something to do. She would go home, shower, call Jack at the bank, and they’d go at it like rabbits. Jack could get away for half an hour. And then afterwards maybe she’d go shopping. . . .
A day off. Montfort never gave her even five minutes off. This was like Christmas.
“Oh, yes, thank you, Mr. Montfort.”
He appeared in the outer office with his briefcase. “Well—have fun, then, I suppose.”
“Goodbye, sir,” said his astonished assistant.
What on earth could Louis Maitre have had to say to Mr. Montfort? It was as though he’d won the lottery, she thought, as her boss strode out with the same purposeful gait he’d walked in with. She admired the rear view. No, must have been better than the lottery; that was just money, and money would never keep him out of the office.
Oh well. Mustn’t look a gift horse in the mouth, and all that. She dialled Barclays in High Street Ken. Maybe she could catch Jack between meetings.
Hugh ignored the taxis. It was a fine day, and he preferred to walk. London, for all the choking exhaust fumes and crowds of badly dressed shoppers, was still a marvellous place in late spring. The sky was clear blue, with just a few white clouds scudding briskly across it. He felt a surge of something very rare, not quite happiness, as such, but more like satisfaction. Yes, it was finally coming together, and he felt satisfied with himself. It was the same feeling he got when playing chess at the club and he could look across the board and quite clearly see his checkmate, a mere five or six moves away.
The exercise would help calm him. Whenever he felt excesses of emotion, good or bad, he liked to go for a walk. When he was retired, in what, fifteen years or so, he would get a couple of dogs. He wasn’t in Ireland long enough to own dogs there, and you couldn’t keep dogs in London, it was too cruel.
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