by Susan Moody
‘Very,’ Kate said keenly. The job might end up being as boring as working in the bar, but at least she’d get to sit down from time to time, and the hours were sociable.
‘Hmm.’ Janine, only a couple of years older than Kate, hitched her clearly unnecessary glasses back up on to her nose and looked down at the paper in front of her. ‘Well, I can’t say it’s a very convincing CV.’
‘I know. First of all I got married, and my husband wanted me to work with him in his various . . . businesses. And since we – um – split up, I’ve been waiting for the right kind of job to come along, the sort of job I know I could do well.’
‘And you think this could be it?’
‘I do.’ Kate was very definite about it, very dynamic.
Janine looked briskly at her watch. ‘Well, we’ll let you know no later than the end of the week.’ She stood up, smoothed out her skirt, adjusted the turquoise cravat thing which she wore in the neck of her white blouse, and held out her hand. Her face softened slightly. ‘I shouldn’t say this, but I agree with you: I think this is a job you’d be good at.’
‘Oh . . .’ Kate was taken aback. ‘Why, exactly?’
‘You can handle a computer, which is essential, of course. You have secretarial skills and a good telephone manner. You speak fluent Spanish and French, always useful. But more importantly, you have a confident approach, which is absolutely key in reassuring our customers. They come in here to spend a lot of money on a holiday they’ve probably been discussing and saving up for all year, and they need to feel certain that we know what we’re doing.’ Janine raised her eyebrows. ‘When it comes right down to it, we’re peddling dreams, Kate, and it’s our job to make those dreams come true.’
We’re peddling dreams . . . Kate liked that. It had a curiously old-fashioned ring to it, like a poem she might have learned years ago at school, or an old song heard in another life, and she remembered Dad seated on the piano stool, Mum with her hand on his shoulder, the E-key sticking every time it was hit, causing a tiny hiatus in the music, the two of them singing If there were dreams to sell, what would you buy? The recollection was so vivid that it made her eyes sting.
The four girls were sitting in the window of Fabers restaurant. Across the road was a canal and beyond it a park. Despite earlier rain, the evening was now relatively dry, though the air was still full of moisture, creating a mophead glow around the street lamps, and the bare soaked branches of the plane trees lining one side of the street dribbled freezing water on the unwary pedestrians below.
They’d spent some time catching up. Finally Peta clapped her hands. ‘Quiet, ladies! We want to hear what the big news is. Come on, Jenny: spill the beans!’
Jenny looked round the table, her eyes bright. ‘Guess what: Don and I are moving to Australia!’
‘Australia? Wow!’
‘Fabulous!’ Peta and Lucy seemed almost as excited as Jenny. ‘When are you off?’
‘In about two months. Don has to work out his notice, and there’s dozens of arrangements to make, and all the packing and putting stuff into storage, you know how it goes.’ Jenny looked over at her closest friend. ‘You’re very quiet, Katie – what are you thinking?’
‘I’m thinking that I’ll miss you,’ Kate said. She hoped she didn’t sound as quavery as she felt. Why was it that the people you loved and relied on, the people you married, ended up either being snatched away from you, leaving you or dying? ‘But obviously I’m thrilled for both of you. How long will you be gone for?’
‘Rest of our lives, I think. I mean, we’re emigrating, not just going for a holiday.’
‘Wonderful,’ Peta said. ‘Can I come and visit?’
‘I’m expecting all three of you, soon as we’re settled.’
‘Just think: I might meet a nice Aussie bloke and settle down next door, Jen.’
‘I’ll try and line a few up for you.’
‘Where are you going to live?’ someone asked. ‘Perth, Sydney, Adelaide?’
‘Melbourne, Don’s whole family’s there.’
‘Once you married an Aussie,’ Lucy said, ‘it was always on the cards that you’d leave us.’
‘When we got engaged, I promised we’d go out for at least three years, see how I’d like living there,’ Jenny said. ‘And of course I’m dying to go. But it’ll be hard to leave my family behind. And you three.’
‘Good thing Don’s loaded,’ said Peta. ‘You’ll be able to come home at least once a year.’
‘With any luck.’
Kate wondered what it would feel like to abandon everything you’d ever known. Apart from the clichés – gum-trees, koalas, kangaroos, kookaburras – she knew almost nothing about Australia, nor could she envisage the underside of the earth, though of course she knew perfectly well that people in the antipodes didn’t walk upside-down, the way her childhood storybooks showed. ‘Sydney Opera House,’ she said.
‘What about it?’
‘It’s one of the few things I know about Australia, that’s all! Doesn’t the bathwater run out in the opposite direction from here?’
‘That’s what they say.’ Jenny laughed. ‘I keep meaning to check it when I’m there, but I can never remember which direction it runs out at home. Anyway, they’re more into showers than baths.’
Kate’s attention was caught by someone passing the window, someone she recognized. Surely it couldn’t be Stefan Thing, her regular from the wine bar? But it was. He stood outside, examining the menu, screwing up his mouth as though considering his options, then pushed open the door and came in. The shoulders of his well-cut navy-blue coat were wet, and raindrops sparkled on his dark hair.
Of all the irritating coincidences . . . Or was it? Could he be deliberately following her? While someone came forward to seat him, Kate turned her head away and stared out at the leafless trees, the railings separating the street from the canal, their crossbars trimmed with necklaces of raindrops. She prayed that he wouldn’t notice her. She didn’t want to have to speak to him; she hated the idea of her shitty job intruding on her ordinary life. Smiling at – even flirting with – a customer was quite a different matter from meeting him outside the boundaries of the wine bar.
‘Girls, I’ve got some news, too.’ Lucy smoothed her dark hair behind her ears and looked shyly down at the tablecloth. ‘Robbie and I are . . .’ She swallowed, then blew out a nervous breath. ‘We’re moving in together.’
‘At last!’ Kate put an arm round her friend’s shoulders. ‘I’m so happy for you, though I can’t imagine why it’s taken you both so long to get your act together.’ The saga of Lucy and Robbie had been a long and arduous one. For various reasons, both of them were unusually reluctant to commit, though it was obvious to their friends that prison officer Robbie and maternity nurse Lucy were an ideal match.
Jenny said, ‘Should we be ordering our wedding hats?’
‘Not just yet. But maybe . . .’ Lucy gulped. ‘Maybe soon. Like, maybe, this summer?’ She looked so apprehensive that Kate laughed aloud.
Too late, she saw Stefan Thing turn round. Then, to her horror, he was on his feet and coming over to their table.
‘Kate!’ he said. ‘What a surprise.’
She felt a surge of dislike. ‘Isn’t it just?’ She hoped she sounded surly enough for him to get the message.
He looked round at the others and held out his hand to Peta. ‘Hi, I’m Stefan Michaels.’
‘Hel-lo,’ Peta said.
‘And you are?’ He addressed Lucy.
‘Lucy’s just got engaged,’ Kate said quickly.
Peta said, ‘How do you and Kate know each other?’
‘We don’t,’ Kate said, hoping that Peta, now in full-blown flirtatious mode, wouldn’t ask him to join them. She looked at her watch. ‘We haven’t got much longer, ladies, I have to go and . . . and . . .’ She paused – what could she possibly be doing at this time of the evening? ‘Visit someone. I absolutely promised I’d drop in tonight, on my way home.’ To Stefan
, she added: ‘We’d ask you to sit down, but the four of us so seldom get a chance to meet that I’m sure you’ll understand if we don’t.’
‘Of course.’ His eyes rested on her thoughtfully. ‘I understand completely.’
When he’d returned to his table, Peta leaned over and hissed, ‘What’s the matter with you, Kate Fullerton? I think he fancied me.’
‘Go and join him, then,’ said Kate. She saw Stefan call over the waiter and say something to him.
‘Talk about a dog in the manger.’ Thin blonde Peta, always on the lookout for, if not Mr Right, then Mr Would-Do-At-A-Pinch, and always finding her relationships foundering, seemed really annoyed. ‘Just because you don’t go for him is no reason to block someone else’s chances.’
‘I’m not stopping you; I just didn’t want him sitting down with us.’
‘I agree,’ Jenny said. ‘Men always change the dynamics.’
‘And usually for the worse,’ said Kate.
The waiter was approaching them, carrying a silver bucket in one hand, four glasses in the other and a collapsible side table under his arm. ‘The gentleman sent this over for the lady who’s just got engaged,’ he said. ‘Said he wanted to congratulate her.’
‘That’s changing the dynamics, all right,’ remarked Jen.
‘Gosh . . .’ Lucy looked overwhelmed. ‘How nice of him.’
‘Go over and thank him,’ said Peta. ‘Or do you want me to?’
‘You’re absolutely shameless, Peta.’ Jenny turned to Kate. ‘What’s the matter, Katie? You look a bit stressed.’
‘I am. I don’t want to get all lovey-dovey with some guy who comes into my workplace, someone whose only relationship with me – if you can call it that – is that he leaves me tips.’
‘Nobody’s asking you to get lovey-dovey.’
‘Yes, but with Peta slobbering all over him—’
‘I am not slobbering.’
‘All but,’ Kate said. ‘Thing is, I don’t want to get personal with the punters. I’m sure you can understand why.’
‘Of course we do,’ Jenny said. ‘Don’t we?’ She smiled at the others.
‘I wasn’t slobbering,’ said Peta. ‘Just getting in touch with my inner whore.’ She started laughing. ‘Honestly, Kate, I don’t know why you get so worked up about things.’
‘What about this bubbly?’ Jenny said. ‘Should we accept it?’
‘As long as Kate doesn’t object, on principle,’ Peta said.
‘He’d probably be mortally offended if we didn’t.’
Kate shrugged. ‘Who am I to turn down free champagne? Bring it on, I say! And while we’re swapping news, I’ve finally got my act together and given in my notice at Plan A – thanks for coming in so often, all of you – and I just heard this morning that I got the job.’
‘What is it?’
‘Working at that travel agency in the High Street, TaylorMade Travel.’
‘Don and I’ll come and get our tickets from you,’ Jenny said.
‘Yeah,’ said Lucy. ‘Robbie was talking about a week in the Canaries . . .’
Later, when they were leaving, Peta went over and leaned down beside Stefan, murmuring something into his ear. He nodded, smiled, nodded again. ‘There, you see,’ said Peta, as they stood outside on the pavement before their separate ways, ‘He was as nice as he could be.’
‘What did you say to him?’
‘Thanked him on behalf of all four of us.’
‘And gave him your phone number, I bet.’
‘I might have done. I don’t know why you’re so anti the guy, Kate.’
‘I’m not anti, I just don’t want to mix up my work life and my personal one.’
Peta touched her friend’s arm. ‘Sorry, Kate. I was out of order in there.’
‘That’s OK.’ Kate hugged her. ‘See ya.’ She waved as she went off to catch her bus home.
Magnus was reading in the sitting room when she got back. They sat peaceably together for half an hour while she told him about her evening, Jenny’s news, Lucy’s news, the irritation of Stefan Michaels appearing in the very same restaurant, plus her own news, which predictably he saw as a step in the right direction, mostly because of the reasonable hours. He told her about his Romanovs, the new information which had arrived that very morning from one of his sources in Russia, fresh stuff which even Plotnikov, in his monumental study of the subject, hadn’t stumbled across.
‘You sound very enthusiastic,’ Kate said.
‘I am. I can’t tell you how exciting it is when things like this finally come right. Getting up each morning and rushing to the keyboard – it’s fantastic!’
‘I wish I was that thrilled about something. Since Brad left, everything’s seemed kind of dull and grey. Whatever else it was, life with him was never boring.’
‘There are worse things than being bored.’
‘I suppose.’
‘Kate . . .’
‘What?’
‘Did it ever occur . . . I know it’s a long time since Dad died, but have you ever wondered how he came to have such a big estate, so much to leave us?’
‘If Annie and Luisa hadn’t died too, it wouldn’t have been so much.’
‘Even divided among them and us, it still seems like an awful lot of money.’
‘Does it?’
‘He and Uncle Blair didn’t inherit anything from their parents, so it didn’t come that way. And I know what his salary was – not a huge amount a year, more or less normal for an academic in an unfashionable field. Nothing like enough to have accumulated so much – even the house in Cricklewood, it was unencumbered, as they say, no mortgage. How did he manage that?’
‘Perhaps the money came from Luisa.’
‘Anything she had was her family’s. It had nothing to do with Dad. If she’d survived the crash, she’d have been pretty well off through his insurance policies and so on, I imagine.’
‘That’s probably all it is, insurance policies he took out on our behalf. Or maybe Mum had something. Does it matter?’
‘Not really. Just that I don’t like mysteries.’ He glanced at her over his half-moon reading glasses. ‘Plus the worry that he might have been involved in something . . . illegal.’
‘Illegal? Dad? Oh, Magnus, you always see the cloud, and never the silver lining. That’s impossible. What kind of illegal, anyway?’
Magnus shrugged, rubbed again at his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Drugs? I don’t know. I’m not even saying I think he was doing something on the wrong side of the law, just that the possibility bothers me.’
‘Can you seriously imagine Dad, our father, smuggling drugs, or anything else? And if so, where would he be smuggling them to, and how? And how would he have got involved with them in the first place? He was a scholar, an academic.’
‘You’re right, Katie. Absolutely right. It’s just that I . . . wondered.’
‘Perhaps he just made some good investments.’ She looked at him sharply. ‘Do you have any reason for thinking any of this?
‘I suppose not.’
She got up and crossed the room to kiss him goodnight. ‘I’m knackered, as usual.’ Too knackered to pursue the subject any further.
He grabbed her hand as she bent over him. ‘I’d give anything to make you happy again, carefree, the way you used to be.’
‘I will be again, darling. I’ve been through all the bad things so from now on it has to be good, doesn’t it?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Troubles never come singly, isn’t that what they say?’ Kate kept her tone light. ‘I’ve already had more than my share, what with Mum dying, Brad, The Accident – I reckon I’m in the clear, you can relax.’ She waved from the doorway. ‘Night . . .’
Janine
Four
‘. . . I agree with you: I think this is a job you’d be good at.’
Whatever had possessed her to say such a thing? Watching the girl – Kate Fullerton – walk away down the High
Street, Janine was amazed at herself. Never show your hand: it violated all known best practice to be so open with a job-seeker. She hadn’t even interviewed all the people who’d applied – and she had no idea whether Kate Fullerton would be good at the job, but on the other hand, as soon as she had opened her mouth, Janine had known that this was the candidate she would choose. Hopeless CV, of course, but that didn’t matter. She reminded Janine of her English mistress at school, that same attitude to the world, that same tacit assumption that she expected more than most people, and would get it. In other words, she had Class.
It was a slack moment, and she sat with a cup of coffee in her hand while Fran dealt with the only other customers in the shop, an elderly couple who’d come in wanting to go to India for a cataract operation. It was a holiday of sorts, Janine supposed, but not one she’d have chosen for herself, especially not with the BUPA plan she’d been paying a bomb for over the last three years.
She wondered idly whether the elderly couple would do their holidaying before or after their operations. She imagined them stumbling through the Indian jungle, tripping over creepers, pursued by tigers or hissed at by snakes, groping their way towards the white marble glory of the Taj Mahal, seeing it only through a dim blur, until their vision was fully restored. She’d never had any problem with her eyes, thank goodness; she’d bought the glasses round her neck in Boots, the same day she’d registered to change her name by Deed Poll.
She’d spent years trying to decide what would most fully express her personality, which one of the huge library of available names would resonate most, press the most buttons, and had eventually decided upon Miranda, as being both classy and feminine. And then, home from school one afternoon, she’d switched on Radio Four and heard some man on Poetry Please reading in an Irish voice which stirred the depths of her heart. Do you remember an inn, Miranda, do you remember an inn? he had asked and she decided it was meant, especially when she looked up the meaning of Miranda and discovered it had been invented by Shakespeare, meaning ‘worthy to be admired’.
Miranda it was going to be until, idly listening to a gardening programme, she heard one of the horticultural gurus talking about the yellow garden spider, ‘miranda aurantia’, and the first faint cracks began to appear. (A spider? She hated spiders.) Then she accidentally caught sight of herself in a shop window and realized that she really wasn’t a Miranda, no way, and in the end she’d gone for Janine, as being closer to her original name, and more possessed of the brisk businesslike air she wished to demonstrate in her dealings with the public, though she stayed with her chosen change of surname.