Little Lady Agency and The Prince

by Hester Browne

  When I came back on the Eurostar on Monday I brought with me some fresh Poilane bread for Nelson, fabulous weather and an excellent mood, which was further improved when I called in at the newsagent’s on the corner to get the new week’s magazines. I discovered, on picking up the new OK! and Hello! that Nicky’s appearance at the Sail Away dinner had made the back pages, albeit tucked away in a corner.

  ‘Someone you know, love?’ enquired the newsagent, as I squeaked with delight at the sentence: ‘Prince Nicolas of Hollenberg revealed his boyhood enthusiasm for the delights of the ocean wave, while generously donating a cruise on the family yacht as the star prize in the raffle.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, beaming. ‘Me!’

  I showed him the page: it was just a tiny picture, but you could clearly see me standing next to Nicky, with Nelson and Leonie in the background. We all looked glassy-eyed and shiny of forehead, but Nicky looked perfect, staring into the camera with a practised smile.

  ‘Ooh, dear,’ said the newsagent, looking at the magazine, then looking at me. ‘It’s true what they say about the camera piling on the pounds, eh?’

  ‘It’s the way I’m standing,’ I said stiffly, then realised he thought I was Leonie, the only dark-haired girl in the picture.

  ‘Who’s that blonde bird?’ he went on in more approving tones. ‘What a cracker! You don’t get many of them to the pound, eh? Eh?’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘you don’t,’ and hastily swept up the magazines, grabbed the new Tatler and a packet of chocolate digestives, paid and left.

  Once I got in and changed into my work clothes, I checked the messages, then settled down with a coffee to peruse the magazines properly. One of the perks of my office was that my accountant (Nelson) encouraged me to spend lavishly on glossy mags to write off against tax as ‘research’. Obviously, I then had to devote time to reading them too, also for ‘research’.

  There was a little shot of Roger and Zara too, probably because, apart from Nicky, she was the only one of us who looked sufficiently glamorous enough to belong there. Her cheekbones stood out a mile. So did Roger’s horrible hand-me-down dinner jacket, although I had to admit his new clean-shaven look was making him seem almost eligible. Chunder and Piglet were also featured under their real, betitled names, positively snoring with ennui, alongside some cricketers and a couple of friends of my mother’s.

  As I was turning the page round to see if I recognised one of the chinless men lurking in the background, the office phone rang.

  ‘Hello?’ I said, hoping it would be Jonathan.

  It wasn’t.

  ‘The Little Lady Agency?’ I said. ‘Good morning!’

  There was a long pause at the other end.

  ‘Hello?’ I said, again. This wasn’t unusual. Clients called me in states of high agitation. Sometimes they were hiding from their not-quite-ex-girlfriends, or trapped by the tie in their washing machines, or paralysed with indecision in Rigby & Peller.

  ‘Hello?’ I said, one more time.

  ‘Melissa?’ said a surprised voice.

  I put the pen down. ‘Hello, Emery,’ I said heavily.

  Emery’s phone manner was enraging. She always managed to sound surprised when someone answered, and quite often appeared to have forgotten who she’d rung up to begin with.

  ‘I can’t speak for long,’ she said, in a more focused way than normal. ‘I’m in the garden and I’ve got a leak issue.’

  ‘I didn’t know you were growing vegetables, Em,’ I said, confused. ‘Organic?’

  ‘No, a leak issue, I mean, with my . . . you know. Anyway, Mel, you’ve got to come home.’

  This was the way things used to be in the Old Days. Before I started my agency and got some self-respect and a backbone, I was forever being plagued by imperious Romney-Jones demands to ‘pop home’ to run up some curtains or deal with a furious journalist. But gone were the days when my family could summon me like a dog.

  I didn’t mind listening to Emery from afar, though. I could file simultaneously. ‘What’s happened now?’

  ‘Daddy’s playing up about what to call the baby, and he and Nanny Ag are at daggers drawn over the nursery, and Mummy’s knitting weird matinee jackets instead of Allegra’s animals. Yesterday I found her using Braveheart as a model.’

  ‘Em, come on, that’s just normal,’ I said. ‘Can’t you get Nanny Ag on side? She likes you.’

  Emery’s patented sigh gusted down the line.

  I wasn’t falling for that.

  ‘Well, what about William?’ I asked. ‘Isn’t he home to back you up?’

  ‘He’s had to fly back to Chicago for work. Anyway, he and Daddy fell out about . . . oh, I don’t know, he shot something he shouldn’t have.’

  Poor William. Reduced to stalking the estate in search of fresh food. I felt my resolve waver in a rush of sympathy, but I stiffened. It was a slippery slope down to organising the whole darn shooting match, and what with Nicky and swotting up on tailors and manicurists in Paris for Jonathan, I just didn’t have time.

  ‘Look, Em, you’re a mother now,’ I said. ‘You’ve got every right to put your foot down about things. Just tell them! Try shouting.’

  ‘I tried shouting . . .’ Emery’s voice wobbled and I knew her limpid blue eyes would be welling with glassy tears. ‘It was too weird. I was nearly sick. I knew it would be like this. Just come back for the evening? Please, Mel? We’re meant to be talking about the christening, and Daddy’s stressing us all out about the guest list already.’

  I looked at the diary. Now I wasn’t going to have to break it to Sebastian Ogilvy that red jeans hadn’t been in fashion since the late eighties, I could leave the office at 3 p.m. And I supposed Gabi could come over and talk about her catering plans over lunch, rather than after work . . .

  ‘You could pretend you were coming home to see Braveheart,’ said Emery, a little too quickly for the one Romney-Jones supposed to be too ethereal for machinations. ‘I can say I rang you because he was off his food, or something? Please? You could set off really early in the morning and be back at work by ten. And,’ she added as the coup de grâce, ‘I need you, Melissa. I need my sister here. I mean, Allegra keeps popping up to yell at Mummy, but she’s not the same as you. She scares the hell out of poor baby.’

  There was a pause while I imagined Allegra flitting malevolently around the nursery like something out of Snow White.

  ‘Please?’ she added, wobbling her voice.

  ‘Oh, God,’ I said, caving in like a sandcastle. ‘Fine. Just make sure Mrs Lloyd makes something nice for supper, because I’m not driving all that way to argue over a bowl of mulligatawny soup.’

  ‘Fab!’ Emery said, sounding better at once, and rang off.

  Hating myself for being such a pushover, I made another pot of coffee and helped myself to the box of magnificently rich French chocolates I kept in the top drawer of my desk, to be doled out as daily rewards. It was a diet trick personally recommended by Solange. (‘Just have a little of the best, Melissa.’ Disapproving stare at my stomach. ‘That is the trouble with the English. You stuff yourself with rrrrubbish.’) I could see where she was coming from, but due to the stressful nature of my work, I’d already scoffed nearly the whole top layer.

  Picking up the phone again, I rang Nelson at work, to let him know I wouldn’t be in for dinner.

  ‘But I’ve got line-caught scallops!’ he said, sounding disappointed. ‘I was going to cook them tonight. Can’t you just ring home, have them put you on loudspeaker, and tell them off from the comfort of your own kitchen?’

  ‘No,’ I said glumly. ‘They’d all just shout at once. Anyway, I thought if I went now and offered some advice, it would save time later.’

  ‘The only thing that would save time with your family would be to put them on television and let the public vote them into space, week by week,’ said Nelson.

  ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ I said, thinking with dread of the horrors in store at the christening. Da
ddy was bound to invite every relative he wanted to show off to. It could run into hundreds. ‘Anyway, I’ll be back tomorrow morning, so rather than waste it, can’t you—’

  ‘It won’t go to waste,’ he said airily. ‘Leonie’s coming round.’

  ‘Leonie?’ I felt an odd twinge in my stomach. ‘You didn’t say she was coming for dinner.’

  ‘Didn’t think I had to,’ said Nelson.

  ‘Oh. Of course not.’ I said. ‘Um. I didn’t realise you two had reached the dinner-at-home stage.’

  ‘Scallops don’t keep,’ said Nelson. ‘I thought it might be nice to get to know Leonie a little better, before we have to go off sailing for a weekend. For someone who was doing a good impression of Cupid last week, you don’t sound very pleased.’

  ‘Oh, I am. If there’s going to be lots, why not invite Roger too?’ I said quickly.

  ‘I might,’ said Nelson, sounding a bit odd. He paused. ‘There isn’t a reason you don’t want me to invite Leonie, is there? You’re not . . . jealous, are you?’

  ‘No! No!’ I exclaimed. ‘No! I just thought she was a bit . . . dull. That’s all. But anyway, it’s absolutely up to you who you have for dinner. I’ll be back tomorrow, so save me any leftovers!’ I said a bit too cheerfully, and rang off.

  When Gabi came round for her lunchtime chat about canapés, she was more robust in her opinion.

  ‘Leoneezer Scrooge is coming for dinner?’ she exclaimed. ‘Oh, God help Nelson. They’ll spend all evening comparing credit card rates, then haggle with the minicab firm.’

  ‘You didn’t take her advice about putting a little away each week for your pension, then?’

  ‘No,’ said Gabi, opening her copy of Brides. ‘And you can tell Nelson to tell Leoneezer that I won’t be taking her advice about going to the Isle of Man for my honeymoon instead of Barbados, either. It isn’t “just as romantic”. I’m not going anywhere Aaron can watch Sky Sports.’

  ‘Hmm.’ On paper, Leonie was just the girl for Nelson: financially responsible, good job, attractive, not prone to Sloaney shrieking or watching reality TV. Everything I’d wish for him. So what was wrong?

  Gabi looked up when I didn’t respond. ‘Don’t worry, Mel,’ she said. ‘She’ll start telling Nelson to cut back on his organic olive oil and that expensive deli habit he has, and he’ll give her the Spanish archer soon enough.’

  ‘I’m not worried,’ I said. ‘I . . . just want him to date more people till he finds, you know, just the right girl.’

  ‘The right girl. You’re waiting for him to find the right girl?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ I said. ‘He deserves someone really fantastic.’

  Gabi’s brown eyes widened. ‘Yeah, right, Melissa,’ she said mysteriously, and went back to making notes on mini Yorkshire puddings.

  I drove home to find a strange silence filling the house. I don’t think I’d ever come home to silence, other than the time Mummy had a sushi evening and everyone had to be kept in at the cottage hospital overnight.

  ‘Hello?’ I called, letting myself in.

  My voice echoed in the empty hall as I looked through the post lying on the table. Normally everyone leaped on the post the moment it hit the mat, but today’s post was still lying there. Mummy’s subscription copy of Harpers, some letters from the bank, circulars . . .

  I recognised the distinctive blue notepaper Jonathan’s accountant used, and picked up the letter. It was addressed to M. Romney-Jones.

  How odd, I thought. I wonder why they’ve sent it here, and not to our new address in Paris? Maybe it was some tax arrangement.

  ‘Melissa!’

  I spun round to find my father standing right behind me. Strapped to his chest in a suede papoose was Emery’s baby, opening and shutting his shiny round eyes in sync with my father’s rapid blinking. He seemed to be growing very quickly, and had already developed adorable little bracelets of fat around his wrists and knees. The cute effect, however, was almost completely counterbalanced by the sheer incongruity of his being attached to a middle-aged schemer in a tweed jacket.

  The fact that they shared identical squashed red noses was plain spooky. It was like Daddy had found a mini-me.

  ‘Daddy!’ I said. ‘Hello!’

  I spotted Emery peering over the banister at the top of the stairs. When she saw Daddy, a thwarted look crossed her face and she vanished.

  ‘Where is everyone?’ I asked. ‘I thought—’

  ‘Is that letter addressed to you?’ asked Daddy, wagging his finger.

  I looked down at it. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘it’s from Jonathan’s accountant, and it’s addressed to M. Romney-Jones, so I assume it . . .’

  ‘Esq,’ said Daddy, snatching it off me and tucking it into the papoose behind the baby. ‘M. Romney-Jones, Esq. And they should have put MP. Come this way,’ he went on before I could ask what on earth Jonathan’s accountants were doing writing to him. ‘I expect you’ll need a cup of tea after your long drive. You look worn out.’

  I ignored the insult and let myself be shepherded towards the drawing room. This display of pleasantness could only mean Daddy wanted a favour, and that meant I needed my wits about me.

  ‘I thought I’d come over to check Braveheart’s shots were up-to-date,’ I explained. ‘I’m not staying . . .’

  ‘You can stay as long as you like,’ said Daddy, making himself comfortable in his armchair. The baby’s fat little legs stuck out cutely but any desire to nuzzle them vanished as Daddy leaned forward and said, ‘Now, there’s something I need to discuss with you.’

  I swallowed, and thought of the letter. Had Jonathan got his solicitors to arrange a prenup? That would make sense, even if it wasn’t terribly romantic.

  ‘You’ll be aware that my book is about to go into its major second phase of promotion,’ he said as if it had been selected for the Booker Prize. ‘And I need the family to rally round with the publicity plans.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ I said quickly. ‘I got the rota, and I’m afraid that I’m going to be in Paris for the dates you suggested—’

  ‘I don’t want you, Melissa,’ Daddy interrupted. ‘I was after that prince you’re dating. If he could come along to the baby’s christening, it would help publicity no end. Emery and I are thinking of asking him to be a godfather.’

  ‘I’m not dating him,’ I protested. ‘You can’t just borrow him for publicity, Daddy. Besides, I don’t think Nicky is really the sort of person I’d trust anywhere near a baby.’

  I couldn’t see Nicky as a responsible godfather. A Godfather, maybe – in his own imagination.

  Daddy peered at me, and the baby leaned forward with him, its little forehead puckering. ‘I don’t expect him to do it for nothing,’ he said. ‘What sort of, ah, encouragement do you think he’d need?’

  I boggled. ‘Encouragement?’

  ‘Sweeteners, Melissa,’ said Daddy crossly. ‘Cash. Honestly, sometimes I do wonder where you sprang from.’

  Before I could reply, the door burst open and Mummy stormed in, with Allegra in hot pursuit. She paused for a second when she saw me, flashed a quick smile in my direction as she usually did for the press in moments of political embarrassment, then went back into rage mode.

  ‘If he’s trying to get you onside, then ignore him!’ she snapped, pointing an accusing finger at Daddy. ‘It’s Emery’s decision, not his!’

  She sat down on the chair opposite his, as if to prevent any further discussion. Allegra flung herself on the sofa. I noticed that she was carrying a ball of knitting wool and a pair of needles.

  ‘Cast on for you, Mummy?’ she enquired.

  ‘Yes,’ snarled Mummy. ‘It’ll stop me injuring your father with the needles.’

  ‘Do keep it down, Belinda,’ said Daddy in injured tones. ‘Think of his little ears.’ And he put his hands tenderly over the baby’s head.

  ‘Where’s Emery?’ I asked.

  ‘I’m not sure, darling.’ Mummy grabbed the needles off Allegra and started knitting a
ngrily, her fingers almost knotting in the wool. A self-satisfied smile spread across Allegra’s face. ‘She went for a lie-down after lunch, and we haven’t seen her since.’

  ‘And Nanny Ag?’

  ‘Annexing the nursery,’ said Allegra. ‘And, given half a chance, annexing Emery, then the kitchen, then the rest of us, the power-crazed old bag.’

  ‘I see.’ I clapped my hands on my knees. ‘So . . .’

  The clock ticked as everyone glared at each other.

  I tried to think of something easy and non- confrontational to talk about.

  ‘I can’t keep calling him Baby Macdonald,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Has Emery decided on when he’s going to be christened?’

  Like a mighty river bursting through a dam, it all kicked off, punctuated by the startled yapping of Braveheart and Jenkins, who had been sleeping behind the curtain on the forbidden window seat.

  ‘. . . really not up to you, Martin! If Emery wants a New Age ceremony it’s her decision . . .’

  ‘. . . ludicrous, irresponsible, just what I expected . . .’

  ‘. . . nothing wrong with Tiger as a name, for a dog . . .’

  ‘. . . Martin is a perfectly good name . . .’

  ‘. . . yeah, maybe for an old man . . .’

  ‘. . . bloody mutts under control then we wouldn’t need to Febreze the tapestries . . .’

  ‘. . . William’s feelings?’

  A short sharp clapping of hands brought everyone to an abrupt halt, dogs included. Standing at the door with her hands now on her hips was Nanny Ag. Standing next to her, hanging her head like a guilty schoolgirl, was Emery. Even the fact that she’d already managed to squeeze her boyish hips back into her precious Earnest Sewn jeans didn’t seem to be cheering her up. She looked as if she’d spent the past three days in a tumble dryer.

  ‘It’s time for Baby’s feed, Mummy!’ announced Nanny Ag, marching towards us with her arms outstretched. ‘So I’m going to have to take him off you, Grandad.’

  ‘I’m really not too keen on this grandad and grandma business,’ winced Mummy. ‘Can’t he just call him Martin?’