‘Emery,’ I murmured as Mrs Lloyd floated in and out of the shadows, clearing away the plates. ‘Are you feeling all right? Is your lasagne OK?’
‘Oh, um . . .’ She glanced at her half-eaten lasagne as if she’d only just realised it was there. Emery normally ate like a horse, albeit in such a stealthy way that no one ever saw the food vanish from her plate.
‘Time for a spot of pudding, I think, don’t you?’ Mummy said, and before we even had time to wonder what it was, Mrs Lloyd had reappeared as if by magic at the door. She was holding a tray with my grandmother’s ‘priceless’ crystal trifle bowl on it.
Jonathan looked at me, clearly impressed. I’d have to tell him later about the doorbell under the table. The one my father overused so much with the last housekeeper, on account of the way his leg jiggled up and down whenever he became enraged, that she ended up throwing an entire dish of roast partridge over him.
Mrs Lloyd started to advance slowly towards the table. She seemed somewhat self-conscious.
‘So, what delight have you whisked up for us, Mrs Lloyd?’ asked Mummy, beaming.
Mrs Lloyd showed her the contents of the bowl and her smile froze a little. ‘Oh. This was all that was left after . . . ?’
Mrs Lloyd nodded.
Mummy recovered herself, as was her great skill in life. ‘Emery, darling! We made your favourite especially!’
‘What?’ Emery said doubtfully. ‘Bird’s Trifle? Seriously?’
‘Seriously?’ demanded my father. ‘You’re serving me Bird’s Trifle for dinner?’
‘Bird’s trifle?’ asked William, his brow creasing. ‘That’s got . . . birds in it?’
‘Lovely!’ I cried, before an argument could break out.
By the time the vast platters of cheese and biscuits began to circulate, I spotted my mother sending covert glances towards Daddy’s end of the table. Not that he noticed. He was now holding forth to both Jonathan and William about where the British had gone wrong in the War of Independence, using the silver cruet set as tactical demonstration – of what, it wasn’t clear. In the candlelight, his eyes and teeth were gleaming out of the darkness like those of a shark in formaldehyde.
I caught Jonathan’s eye, hoping he wasn’t too close to the end of his tether, but he smiled back at me and let the faint shadow of a private wink cross his face.
I think my mother saw, because she started to smile and fiddle girlishly with her diamond earrings.
‘Anyway,’ my father went on smoothly, banging his hands on the table and rising to his feet. ‘I’d like to say a few words at this juncture, if it’s all the same to everyone else.’
Emery, Allegra and I flinched. Allegra actually groaned aloud, which I thought was brave of her.
Daddy fired a quick glare in her direction, then beamed in an avuncular manner at Jonathan, William and Lars. I wasn’t taken in by that carefully honed ‘open body language’. I’d seen him through eight local and six national elections.
‘First of all,’ he oozed, with a generous spread of his hands, ‘may I say how wonderful it is, as the head of the family, to have not only my own wife and children, but my sons-in-law around me too.’
‘And me, darling,’ added Granny.
‘And my mother-in-law,’ snapped Daddy. ‘And of course Mrs Lloyd. And the dogs. Anyone else?’
‘No, I think mentioning the dogs would be twee,’ said Granny. ‘Do go on.’
‘Thank you, Dilys,’ he said sarcastically.
Blimey, I thought, Granny was in a feisty mood tonight. Baiting my father was one of her little treats in life, but this evening she had a special twinkle in her eye.
I loved Granny but in her own way she was as much of a loose cannon as anyone else in the family. More so, perhaps, because she had her own money and an address book that my father would have given both his new crowns for.
‘You all know how very happy your mother has made me over the years, so you can imagine how thrilled I was when Jonathan decided to make an honest woman out of our own little lady of the night.’
I gritted my teeth. Even though Jonathan and I had met at work – like loads of people do every day – Daddy, of course, persisted in misunderstanding the innocent nature of my agency, and of the way my relationship with Jonathan had begun.
He swung round towards me, nearly, but not quite, sloshing his wine in the huge goblet. ‘Jolly well done, Melissa. Thought I’d never see the day, but here we are. My three daughters, married off to successful men, all with beautiful homes in foreign cities. What more could a proud father ask for?’
Allegra, who’d frankly boggled at the ‘family man’ bit, now choked outright on her water biscuit.
‘Something the matter, Allegra?’ he enquired solicitously.
She shook her head, as William slapped her a little too enthusiastically on the back.
I looked at Jonathan and smiled. I’d never heard my father be so sweet about us! Even if he was putting it on for the benefit of the assembled husbands, it warmed my heart to hear he was proud of us. God knows we’d heard enough to the contrary over the years, sometimes actually in the newspapers. Daddy hadn’t exactly stood by Allegra during her CND phase.
‘So, please,’ said Daddy, refilling his glass from his own private decanter. ‘A toast, to Melissa and Jonathan! A perfect example of why it’s better to marry the cow instead of buying the milk!’
I glared at him. There was absolutely no need for that.
‘Melissa and Jonathan!’ echoed my grandmother. ‘May the milk never run dry!’
‘Melissa and Jonathan!’ mumbled everyone else.
I was relieved to see Jonathan seemed more amused than annoyed. He looked so sexy in the half-light, the shadows only making his cheekbones seem sharper and his jaw more square and manly. I hoped Mummy had put us in the four-poster room. Not only was it romantic, but it had the only central-heating pipe that actually worked.
‘Now, on to other matters,’ said Daddy. ‘You may be aware—’
‘We’re not at one of your insufferable Olympics meetings now, darling,’ said my mother distantly. ‘I don’t believe you circulated an agenda for this dinner, did you?’
‘It doesn’t matter, Mummy,’ I put in, still toasty at the edges from the unexpected display of paternal love. ‘While we’re all here, and so on?’ I turned back to Daddy and smiled.
He beamed back, with sparkly teeth. ‘Thank you, Melissa. Now – your mother’s little knitting thing. Believe it or not, in a few weeks’ time your mother is going to have a second exhibition in that godawful gallery in Whitechapel,’ he went on. ‘What is it this time, Belinda? Nightmares in wool?’
‘Nursery grotesques,’ said Allegra crossly. ‘And there’s a waiting list.’
While my mother was giving up smoking last year, she started to knit hideously malformed woolly toys – six-legged cats, dogs with two heads, hybrid donkey-pigs, that sort of thing. Not on purpose, just because she was too stressed to follow a pattern. Somehow, and this is the bit I’ve never quite understood, Allegra managed to turn them into the next big thing in New British Art, going from part-time useless gallery owner to hard-nosed art agent in one mohair swoop herself.
I know. Weird. Still . . . As Emery would say.
‘Yes, well, there has been a teeny hitch there,’ my mother began nervously, but Allegra turned a fierce look on her, and she stopped. ‘Although nothing we can’t fix,’ she added, not very convincingly.
‘Jolly good,’ said my father, before I could ask what the hitch was. ‘Amazing what idiots will spend their money on. Anyway, it’s up to you lot to spread the word around your dim friends and drum up some trade for your mother. It’s all going towards the roof, you know,’ he added, with a vicar-ish roll of the eyes towards the oak panelling. ‘Costs a fortune just to keep this place in Mr Sheen.’
‘Is that your new wine merchant, Martin?’ enquired Granny.
‘No, Dilys,’ said my father, gritting his teeth with supreme control. �
��It’s the name of a household cleaning product.’ He paused, and bestowed a sad smile on us. ‘And I just wanted to say, while you’re all together, how very important my family is to me . . .’
I beamed at my sisters, who were both regarding him with shameful cynicism. ‘See?’ I mouthed at Emery.
But Daddy hadn’t finished.
‘. . . at this crucial time for the main sales push for my Cheese Diet book,’ he went on seamlessly. ‘Very important for you lot to help me show how everyone from tiny tots to raddled old grannies can benefit from the magic of Red Leicester. You’ll be getting your personal appearance schedules in the post just as soon as little Katie at the publishers gets them finished.’ He winked. ‘I’ve managed to get hold of the list of bookshops whose sales count towards The Sunday Times bestseller lists, so I think I can rely on you all to stock up early on Christmas presents? Eh? Eh?’
I let my mouth drop open. So that was what the tan and the teeth and the family compliments were about!
The usual disappointment swept over me, causing me to blink rapidly. Just for once, it would be nice to come first, and hear how much I meant to him without . . .
‘We’re both very happy for you, darling,’ muttered my mother, spotting my distress and patting my hand. ‘And I for one am thrilled you’ve found a man who’ll stand up to your pig of a father.’
‘What was that, Belinda?’ enquired Daddy.
‘Just saying what a welcome addition Jonathan is to the family.’
‘Absolutely. Great to have an estate agent on board. Now,’ he said, snapping his fingers at Mrs Lloyd. ‘Time for port and cigars, I reckon.’
My mother pressed her napkin against her lips then dropped it on the plate. ‘Come on, girls. Let’s leave the men to their vile cigars and port, shall we?’ She lowered her voice, and added, ‘I’d like your opinions on a pair of shoes I bought the other day that your father doesn’t know about.’
‘The truth, Mummy,’ said Allegra, sternly.
Mummy paused and corrected herself, as recommended by her addiction counsellor. ‘Well, more than one pair, yes.’
‘Total?’
‘Three! Plus a bag!’
‘Em, are you sure you’re OK?’ I asked, as Emery swayed unsteadily to her feet. ‘Won’t you let me . . . ?’
‘I’m fine, Melissa,’ she insisted with unusual vigour, but I was stopped from enquiring further by a light hand on my elbow and a waft of Shalimar up my nose.
‘Can I have a word, Melissa?’ murmured Granny in my ear. ‘On your own? Hang back and follow me to the drawing room in two minutes.’
This sort of cloak-and-dagger routine didn’t necessarily mean a great deal when it came to my grandmother. She could just as easily need an extra bridge player. There was a very thick streak of melodrama running through both sides of my family.
I excused myself on the grounds of needing the loo, and scurried upstairs to put our overnight bags in the four-poster room. Despite the spring weather, the house was like an icebox. If I was going to wear the gorgeous new Parisian silk pyjamas I’d packed, the electric blanket would definitely need to go on now.
While I was hurrying back downstairs to deal with Granny, I heard an odd groan from the window seat on the landing.
I approached it with some caution, having had a bad experience with pulling back the curtains as a child: my parents threw some quite debauched parties in those days. In addition to the faint moaning, there was a pool of water trickling down the panelling and soaking into the carpet.
Gingerly, I pulled the curtain aside, to find Emery clutching her stomach and looking ashen.
‘Oh, my God,’ she said, widening her eyes. ‘I’ve, like, seriously wet myself. It’s so . . . embarrassing.’
‘Emery,’ I said, feeling the time had come to be frank. ‘Might you be a bit further on than you thought with the baby?’
‘Honestly, Mel, you know I don’t keep a diary!’ she snapped.
I gave her a searching look. Emery had spent most of her adolescence in a state of constant pregnancy scare, due to her inability to remember when her last period might have been. I distinctly recall visiting the doctor with her on one occasion, using my diary to jog her memory.
I didn’t think we had time to embark on a similar debate now. I’d seen Casualty. These things could happen very quickly, and Daddy would go berserk if it happened on the one good carpet in the house.
‘Emery, we need to get your jeans off,’ I said firmly.
‘Why? It took me half an hour to get them on.’ Her face suddenly contorted into a grimace of agony and she grabbed her stomach. ‘Oh, God, that’s like . . . Argh.’
I tried to unbutton the jeans, but I couldn’t even get my finger behind the button. Emery seemed to have poured herself into them by sheer force of will.
‘I’m going to have to cut you out,’ I announced, looking around for a suitable implement.
‘You’re not coming anywhere near me with scissors, Mel!’ wailed Emery. ‘These are Earnest Sewn! They’re limited edition!’
‘Trust me, I’m a dressmaker,’ I said grimly.
‘What’s going on?’
I spun round. Granny was standing on the stairs.
‘Phone for an ambulance,’ I said. ‘It’ll be quicker than arguing about who’s sober enough to drive her to A & E.’
At this point, Emery let out a loudish moan – about as loud as Allegra would make on discovering her toast was burned – and somehow I managed to yank her jeans open, to reveal a small, round bump, about the size of one large Christmas dinner.
Emery and I both stared at it in shock.
‘OK,’ she admitted, ‘I might be a bit further on.’ Then she gripped my hand so tight the bones cracked. ‘Don’t let Daddy take over! Please!’
‘Hello? Yes, hello. Good evening! I’d like an ambulance, if you’d be so kind,’ Granny was purring into the downstairs phone. ‘Well, right away, if you could do one. You see, my granddaughter appears to be having a baby . . . Oh, thank you! Yes, I suppose I am terribly excited . . . Well, no, not really . . . Goodness me, I absolutely do sound old enough to have a granddaughter, you awful flirt!’
‘Granny!’ I yelled. ‘Hurry up!’
A clattering of feet on the parquet and a gust of cigar smoke suggested that the men’s port and cigar break was now over, just in time for the main show to begin.
‘Good God!’ bellowed Daddy’s voice from the hall. ‘What the hell’s going on up there?’
‘Em?’ William bounded up the oak staircase three stairs at a time.
‘I’m feeling rather . . .’ murmured Emery, waving unspecifically at her kaftan.
‘She’s in labour,’ I explained. ‘We need lots of towels and some old blankets. William, help me get her into the drawing room. Lars, go and put the kettle on.’
Lars blinked owlishly. ‘For hot water?’
‘No,’ snapped Allegra, appearing behind him, ‘so the ambulance men can have a cup of tea when they get here. Hurry up, Lars!’
‘Have you done this before?’ demanded William, hoisting Emery into his arms as easily as if she were a bag of gym kit.
‘No, but Nelson did a First Aid course and he was always practising on me,’ I said. ‘Now come on, she needs to be somewhere more comfortable.’
‘The boot room,’ interjected Daddy quickly. ‘That sofa needs replacing in any case. Emery,’ he said, leaning over her and over-enunciating right into her face, ‘hang on until you get there. Don’t do anything on the main carpet.’
‘If you don’t get a move on, I don’t think there’ll be much choice where the baby’s born,’ I said.
Emery made a faint moan of horror.
‘I’ll get the brandy,’ said Daddy, as if this would solve everything.
As he strode off to his study, William set off down the hall with Emery in his arms and me and Allegra following at a safe distance.
‘Oh, it’s on the way? That’s wonderful.’ Granny was winding up her
conversation in the manner of someone discussing a weekend party invitation.
‘Anything I can do?’ asked Jonathan, leaning on the staircase.
‘Get everyone a stiff drink and keep Daddy out of the way until it’s all over – start him off on Scottish devolution or something,’ I said.
‘Shall I send your mother through?’
I considered.
‘Get her a couple of large gins first,’ I advised. ‘She’s pretty squeamish.’
‘Will do,’ he said. He started to walk away, then turned back with a huge grin on his face. ‘You know, I love it when you cope like this, Melissa.’
I smiled wryly. God knows I’d had enough practice over the years.
3
After helping to deliver my very first baby on Saturday night, then listening to the whole thing re-enacted down the phone by my father for the benefit of the local press, with himself in the new lead role of Modest But Capable First Aider, the rest of the weekend was naturally somewhat flat.
Or, looking at it more positively, nothing else happened.
Emery’s baby turned out to be a boy, much to Daddy and William’s delight. Daddy was actually more delighted than William, and went round saying he felt as if he finally had the heir he’d wanted for years, which made me, Emery and Allegra feel great, as you might imagine, especially when he said it six times to six different journalists.
Even so, we were all bowled over by the tiny, pink shrimp of a baby curled up in the drawer from a Chippendale chest, which was lined with Mummy’s spare pashminas and pillows.
But if his dark hair, balled-up fists and irked expression didn’t give away his Romney-Jones genes, his lungs confirmed them. When he wasn’t asleep, or plugged onto Emery, he screeched and screeched and screeched. Nothing would stop him. It was like being trapped in a house with the car alarms, the fire alarm and the burglar alarm all going off at once. In fact at one point, my car alarm did go off, and we only noticed when Mrs Lloyd came in and begged me to sort it out because the dogs were going crazy.
Little Lady Agency and The Prince Page 4