by Jill Mansell
Hard work and so poorly paid they made the wages of a Victorian chimney sweeper’s boy look good.
Still, it wasn’t the end of the world.
Millie ran herself a bath while Hester tried ringing Nat in Glasgow. Within seconds she was barging into the bathroom.
‘Hmm. According to his flatmate, Nat’s in the shower.’
Kicking off her knickers and wrapping a towel around herself, Millie said, ‘It’s this new-fangled thing called keeping clean. All the best people are doing it these days.’
‘Okay, but what if it isn’t true?’ Hester looked fretful. ‘What if I’m having a miserable time being faithful to Nat and in return he’s out shagging his way round every waitress in Glasgow? How do I know he isn’t making a fool of me?’
Exasperated, Millie poured half a bottle of Body Shop banana bath foam under the thundering taps.
‘Because Nat would never do that. He just wouldn’t, trust me.’
‘Trust you? Ha, that’s a good one. You’re the shameless trollop who spends her days making cow’s eyes at her ancient married boss.’
‘Sheep’s eyes,’ Millie corrected her, testing the water with one toe. ‘And stop getting your knickers in a twist about Nat. He’ll ring back in a minute and everything’ll be fine.’
‘You’ve got your agony-aunt voice on,’ Hester complained. ‘All melty and soothing like a New Berry Fruit. Anyway, that’s the other thing I came up to tell you. I’m just off out, so if Nat does bother to ring back, tell him I’ve gone to the gym.’
‘The gym?’ Millie, about to submerge herself in the bath, was astonished. ‘But you haven’t been to the gym for months!’
‘All the more reason to go now, tone myself up a bit.’ Hester patted her flat stomach with the faintly smug air of someone who knows she doesn’t need toning up. ‘Can’t let myself go to seed just because Nat isn’t here, can I?’
It didn’t take a genius to work out that this was excuse-speak for, ‘Can’t let myself go to seed now Lucas is back in town.’ Plus, Millie recalled, he’d always been a bit of a gym fiend himself. Hester was probably hoping to bump into him there, completely by chance of course, their eyes suddenly meeting across a ferocious-looking abdominal cruncher…
‘Right, don’t want to be late,’ Hester chirruped, before Millie had a chance to open her mouth. ‘See you when I get back!’
Nat phoned twenty minutes later. Millie, patting her wet hair with the towel slung around her neck, explained where Hester had gone.
‘This is the opposite of a dirty phone call,’ she told Nat. ‘I’ve just had a bath; we couldn’t be cleaner if we tried.’
‘I can’t believe she’s gone to the gym,’ Nat marveled. ‘I thought she’d given up on all that.’
‘Ah well, you haven’t seen the state of her. In the last three weeks she’s put on about six stone,’ said Millie. ‘Her boobs have dropped, her bum’s like a sack of turnips. It’s a horrible sight.’
‘But she looked like that before. Why else d’you suppose I left?’ Then Nat grew serious. ‘How is she really?’
‘Fine,’ Millie assured him. ‘Not fat at all.’
‘You know what I mean.’ Nat hesitated. ‘I miss her, Millie. Being apart from Hess is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.’ Another pause, then half laughing he said, ‘God, listen to me. Cue the violins. I suppose I’m just asking if Hester misses me too.’
Millie’s freakish ability to cross her toes had always caused howls of revulsion. Luckily there was no one around to witness the display as she crossed them now.
‘Of course she does. She never stops talking about you. You’re the best boyfriend she’s ever had.’
‘You always know the right thing to say.’ Nat sounded as if he were smiling. ‘Look, tell Hester I rang and give her my love, will you?’
‘In a non-physical way,’ Millie assured him as the doorbell rang. ‘Ooh, have to go, someone’s at the door.’
‘And I need to get back to work. I’ll try phoning again tomorrow night. Off you go,’ said Nat. ‘Speak to you again soon.’
‘Bye.’ Millie wondered if Hester realized how lucky she was. Why couldn’t everyone in the world be as lovely as Nat?
Chapter 6
Orla Hart was shivering on the doorstep in a hopelessly impractical pink lace shirt, long floaty skirt, and silver sandals. The weather had taken an abrupt turn for the worse and raindrops were spitting ill-temperedly from a slate grey sky.
Standing next to Orla on the step was a stone statue of a young girl clutching a bowl.
Temporarily lost for words, Millie said, ‘I didn’t even know it was raining.’
‘Well you do now. Okay if I come in?’
Millie stepped to one side and Orla staggered past her into the narrow hallway with the statue in her arms. Panting slightly, she lowered it to the ground, before turning to face Millie.
‘Okay. Now last time I gave you a lift back to Newquay, you wouldn’t tell me where you lived.’
‘That’s because you kept insisting you wanted to buy me something as a way of saying thank you,’ Millie reminded her.
‘But you saved my life!’
‘All I did was sit and talk to you for a bit. I didn’t want a reward.’
‘Well, too bad.’ Orla’s smile was unrepentant as she patted the carved stone head of the statue. ‘I saw her this afternoon and knew at once I had to buy her for you. Isn’t she heavenly? Think how gorgeous she’ll look in your garden!’
She probably would, thought Millie, if only we had one.
‘She’s great.’ Praying she could bluff her way through this— maybe by some miracle Orla Hart wouldn’t notice that all they possessed was a tiny backyard—Millie said, ‘But you didn’t need to do this.’
Orla shook her wet hair out of her greeny-gold eyes and fixed her with an earnest gaze.
‘Remember on that cliff top, you said you couldn’t walk away because your conscience wouldn’t let you? You told me you’d end up a basket case if you left me there to jump.’
‘Sort of.’ Tightening the belt of her dressing gown around her waist, Millie wondered if she had post-bath panda eyes from where her mascara had run. She hoped Orla wouldn’t think she’d been crying.
‘Well, now it’s my turn to have you on my conscience. Shall we go through?’ Tilting her head, Orla indicated the living room, which Millie knew for a fact was in a mess.
Luckily Orla didn’t appear to mind. Her bright eyes darted around the room, taking everything in. But in a nice rather than a critical way, Millie was relieved to note.
Unlike her own mother.
‘You’ve been sacked,’ Orla told Millie, perching on the arm of their old bottle green chesterfield sofa.
‘Actually, I resigned.’
‘Really?’ Orla didn’t sound convinced. ‘I went back there this afternoon and that owner-woman said they’d had to let you go.’
‘I definitely resigned,’ Millie assured her.
‘Oh. Well, good. I think.’ Orla paused, looked anguished for a few seconds, then blurted out, ‘Okay, but you have to be completely honest now, did it have anything to do with me?’
‘Nooo!’ Millie exclaimed, so dramatically that they both knew at once that it had. If you wanted to sound believable, Millie remembered—too late, as usual—you had to sound normal, verging on the deadpan. Never ever overdo it.
Except, of course, she always did.
‘It wasn’t really to do with you,’ Millie rushed to explain, ‘I promise. You just somehow ended up getting dragged into it.’
‘I knew it.’ Orla sounded distraught. ‘That awful woman with the huge wart on her nose. She was behaving really oddly with me.’
Millie frowned. ‘Sylvia? Sylvia doesn’t have a wart on her nose.’
‘She’s mean, like an old witch,’ Orla declared impatiently. ‘She looks as if she should have a wart on her nose. And I practically had to twist both her arms off before she’d give me your address. So go on
then, why did you leave?’
Since Orla had now slid off the threadbare arm of the chesterfield and was making herself comfortable on the sofa itself, Millie fetched a bottle of red wine from the kitchen, unearthed two glasses that actually matched, and told her.
‘You’re allowed to smoke,’ she added, detecting the signals of nicotine deprivation as Orla fiddled frantically with her many bangles.
‘Are you sure? I could always go and stand in the garden.’
The clothes-airer was currently up in the yard, which meant there wouldn’t be room for Orla too. Lord, that carved stone statue was going to look as out of place there as Victoria Beckham in a betting shop.
Millie said generously, ‘It’s raining. Anyway, I don’t mind. Just flick your ash in that plant thingy behind you.’
Hugely relieved, Orla kicked off her flat silver sandals and lit up. Her toes actually curled with pleasure, Millie noticed, when she inhaled.
‘So the old witch thought you were after her husband,’ Orla marveled when she’d heard the whole sorry story. ‘She must be one of those super-jealous types who imagines every female under the age of eighty is panting to get their hands on her man. I hope you told her you’d rather have sex with Jabba the Hut. Actually, it would jolly well serve her right if you did have an affair with that awful husband of hers, or gosh, better still, I could have an affair with him! Ha, that’d teach her a lesson, wouldn’t it?’
Heavens alive, Millie goggled in alarm, was this what all novelists were like? One teeny germ of an idea and they were off and running with it like a relay baton, getting more and more carried away?
Not to say it wasn’t an entertaining idea in theory…
‘Except Tim would never have an affair with anyone,’ she told Orla gloomily. ‘He and Sylvia do everything together. He probably goes along to the bathroom with her when she wakes up in the night needing the loo.’
‘I can’t bear those kind of couply couples!’ Orla exclaimed with passion.
‘They wear matching sweaters.’
‘Well that kind of behavior is just laughable.’
‘And they go to the same aerobics class.’
‘Pathetic. People like that,’ Orla declared, ‘make me want to be sick.’
‘They were never friendly towards me anyway, so it’s not as if I enjoyed working for them.’ Millie gave her a reassuring look. ‘Actually, walking out on that job has quite cheered me up.’
‘Oh, but I still feel horribly guilty.’ Having smoked her way down her cigarette at a rate of knots, Orla swiveled round and stubbed it out in Hester’s neglected azalea plant. ‘And I forgot to ask you this morning how it turned out with your boyfriend after he stormed off last week.’ She looked hopeful. ‘Did he forgive you for jumping out of his car and saving my life?’
‘Um… actually, no. But it doesn’t matter,’ Millie went on hurriedly. ‘I told you before, I didn’t even want to be with him. Really, it was all for the best.’
‘Oh Lord, this is terrible,’ wailed Orla, ‘I’m a complete walking disaster. Here’s you, a lovely, kind girl who’s never done anyone any harm. And now, you’re left without a job and a boyfriend—for pity’s sake, one way or another I’ve managed to single-handedly destroy your life.’
‘Will you stop this?’ Millie’s eyebrows shot up in disbelief. ‘You’re doing it again, getting carried away, making a drama out of a… blip. For a start, Neil wasn’t the love of my life. Secondly, I can find myself another job.’
‘But—’
‘And I’m not always a lovely, kind person either,’ Millie assured her. ‘Sometimes I can be completely vile.’
‘Well I’m sorry, but I don’t believe that for one moment. I mean, look at you,’ Orla declared, spreading her hands, ‘with your ripply blonde hair and those great big eyes… you’re an absolute angel! Yes, that’s exactly what you look like, an angel…’
Millie had always yearned to be tall and angular with sticky-out cheekbones, poker-straight black hair, and a haughty manner. Her ideal woman was Lily Munster. Desperate to convince Orla, she said, ‘But that doesn’t make me a nice person!’
‘I bet you are.’ It was no good, Orla’s mind was made up. ‘I bet you’ve never done anything thoughtless or mean in your life.’
So Millie was compelled to prove it, mentioning no names of course, by skimming through the story of Hugh Emerson’s wallet, the ensuing phone call, and the stomach-churning moment when she realized she’d committed one of the all-time great faux pas.
‘So you see,’ Millie concluded five minutes later with just a smidgen of triumph, ‘I can be as awful as the next person.’
‘Except you didn’t know this chap’s wife was dead. Sorry,’ said Orla briskly, ‘but that doesn’t count at all. Anyway,’ she went on, ‘you’ve gone bright red just telling me about it, which only goes to prove what a sweetheart you are.’
It was hopeless. For a fraction of a second Millie was tempted to announce to Orla that one of her hobbies was pulling the wings off butterflies and that she was also partial to a spot of kitten-drowning in her spare time.
But what with being so lovely, of course, she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Changing the subject instead, Millie said, ‘So how are things going with you and your husband?’
And promptly prayed that Orla wouldn’t burst into tears, rush up to the bathroom, and start glugging down the contents of a bottle of bleach.
She didn’t. Phew.
‘Giles? Oh, we’re fine, absolutely fine, it was all a mad, mad misunderstanding.’ Between lighting up another cigarette and dropping her heavy silver lighter back into her bag, Orla flashed her a dazzling smile. ‘I’m just so glad you were there on that cliff top to stop me killing myself.’
‘You wouldn’t have killed yourself,’ said Millie. ‘Not really.’
Orla shrugged.
‘I’ve wondered the same thing myself, lots of times. But I was pretty desperate.’ She paused, then added with a wry smile, ‘I’m still glad you happened to be around.’
‘What was the mad misunderstanding?’
Millie was amazed she dared ask such an outrageously personal question, but she had to know. Anyway, Orla had already dragged pretty much her entire life story out of her; a spot of counter-nosiness surely wouldn’t go amiss.
‘Oh, too silly for words! There was me thinking that Giles had installed Martine down here… and he didn’t have the faintest idea she was even in Cornwall! It was all her fault,’ Orla explained, wafting smoke in all directions. ‘Giles finished with her but she refused to accept it. Typical scorned-mistress scenario—she kept ringing him and begging him to take her back, but Giles was brilliant, he just kept saying no. So in the end, out of sheer desperation, the silly girl moved down to Cornwall and rented a little cottage completely off her own bat. Giles didn’t have anything to do with it. When I confronted him he was absolutely gobsmacked!’
‘Oh.’ Millie swallowed. ‘Well, um, good.’
‘So there we go, all that silly worrying for nothing,’ Orla declared. ‘Of course, we can’t physically evict her from the county, but she isn’t a problem anymore. She’s still there in her sad little cottage, but I can deal with that. I’ve got my husband back and I’m happy.’
Orla was telling the truth, Millie decided. She genuinely believed what she was saying. In which case…
‘That’s brilliant,’ she told Orla warmly. ‘I’m so pleased for you.’
‘Oh God,’ Orla let out a wail of dismay, ‘you really are. I’ve jack-booted my way into your life, crushed it to smithereens, and you’re still pleased for me!’
All this guilt, she had to be a Catholic.
‘I love that word,’ Millie sighed, tucking her bare legs under her and idly winding the belt of her dressing gown around one hand. ‘Actually, I really love it. Smithereens. I wonder if it’s Irish?’ Clutching an imaginary microphone, she announced with a flourish, ‘And now, ladies and gen’l’men, we are pro
ud to present on stage here tonight… the Smithereens!’
‘Can you sing?’ asked Orla abruptly.
‘Er… not really.’
‘What does that mean?’
Here she goes, off again, thought Millie, asking a load of questions that make no sense at all.
‘I’m not great and I’m not bad.’ She decided to humor Orla. ‘Just average.’
‘Dance?’
‘I’ve got legs, haven’t I?’ Millie wiggled her toes. ‘Anyone with legs can dance. After a fashion.’
‘And you’re not shy,’ Orla went on, slopping red wine over her skirt as she delved into her bag. ‘I may have just the thing for you… hang on, I know it’s down here somewhere… ah, here we are.’ She pulled out a business card and waved it triumphantly at Millie. ‘This fellow could be right up your street.’
‘Oh God, don’t tell me,’ Millie groaned, ‘it’s Andrew Lloyd Webber and he’s going to pester me to star in his next West End musical.’
‘No, no, I’m serious. We met briefly at a party the other night and he’s looking for girls just like you.’
‘Brilliant,’ said Millie. ‘He’s a pimp, desperate to recruit new hookers to replace all the ones who’ve been carted off to the cells.’
‘Will you pay attention?’ Orla scolded good-naturedly. ‘This fellow has just set up a kissogram service here in Cornwall.’
Oh for heaven’s sake.
‘A what?’
‘No need to look so shocked, there’s nothing sleazy about it. The whole thing’s completely above board,’ declared Orla. ‘It’s just a bit of fun… you can book Chippendale-types for hen parties, Granny-grams, roller-skating gorillagrams—oh, that would be a big plus, if you can roller-skate—even juggling clowns on uni-cycles…’
‘I don’t think it’s really my kind of thing,’ said Millie, feeling a bit mean when Orla was so clearly filled with enthusiasm.
‘Okay, I know it’s not exactly your run-of-the-mill office job, but according to this chap the pay’s not bad. I mean, why work for eight hours pushing a load of paperclips about when you could earn almost as much money in one and a half hours?’