A Perfect Heritage (58 page)

Mark Rawlins had expected his meeting with the trustees to be short and to the point, possibly unpleasant, but – manageable. In fact it was so shocking in its content, while being perfectly pleasant in its conduct, that he left feeling physically dizzy, and so appalled that he decided the only thing to do was go straight to Mike and Hugh, bypassing Bianca. He could sort out the niceties of breaking the report chain she was so bloody obsessed with later; this was too important, time was not on their side, as it wasn’t in any part of this insane venture that he had, against his better judgment, allowed himself to get involved in. And spent quite a lot of time now wishing that he hadn’t.

‘Look, aren’t they nice?’

She showed her mother the pictures on her phone.

‘Darling,
really
nice. Beautiful, in fact. You look gorgeous. And so different in each one. Lucy’s so clever.’

‘She is. She’s not quite there yet, she says, and then her grandmother has to approve them.’

‘Oh really? Did – did Lucy say anything about me approving them?’

‘Yes. She said she thought Lady Farrell would show them to you when she was absolutely satisfied.’

‘I shall look forward to that,’ said Bianca.

‘Anyway, Lucy wants to do some pictures of the make up being put on, step-by-steps, I think they’re called, and possibly a little film as well. And she said – well she’s going to ask you herself, of course, but I said I’d talk to you first, about using me as a model. Not for the final pictures, of course, that’ll be a proper model, but just about someone trying the looks out. Because she’s got this friend who does a beauty blog, quite a famous one, and she said she’d put them in the blog. She said it was a nice story, the relaunch, and she said she knew how important the timing was and everything and what it said about the relaunch.’

‘Right.’

‘And then she did one on Jayce.’

‘And?’

‘It was lovely, really lovely. Jayce’s face looked much thinner and her eyes much bigger. And of course, Lucy covered up her spots. And, something really exciting: she told Jayce she had an amazing look and if she improved her skin and lost a bit of weight, she could look really great. Jayce was well excited. She said no one had ever taken any notice of what she looked like before, except to tease her, so we’re going to work out a diet for her. Lucy chatted to her about what she ate and said if she cut out chips and burgers and doughnuts just for starters, her skin would improve as well as her figure. I mean, I’ve often thought that, but of course
I
couldn’t say it, she’d be upset, but coming from Lucy . . .’

‘Of course. And – and how was school today?’

‘Not too bad. They just ignore me now, no one speaks to me, but they’ve stopped sending me horrible texts and stuff.’

‘That’s a start. Oh, Milly, you’ve been so brave. Much braver than I could ever be. I really, really admire you.’

‘Thanks,’ said Milly, and smiled rather uncertainly at her mother.

She’d been a bit odd ever since she’d come back from her world tour, as she called it. Kind of over-excited, and whenever her father was around she talked a lot more than usual. And she was always rushing round the house, doing things, and she’d started doing ridiculous extra classes like kick boxing at the gym. Bit weird, because she had more than enough to do, really. Anyway, it was good she liked Lucy’s faces as she called them and seemed happy about the blog. Milly had been afraid she’d say no and start worrying about paedophiles or whatever. Parents were so obsessed with all that stuff . . .

‘Lucy, I need to talk to you. Quite urgently. Can you come in tomorrow?’

This had to be serious, Lucy thought, for Bianca Bailey to demand – for that was what it amounted to – to see her at twenty-four hours’ notice.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I’m free all day. Recovering from London Fashion Week,’ she added, lest Bianca might think she was out of work or – worse in Bianca’s book she was sure, plain old-fashioned idle. And you did need to recover from it; her two days had left her so shattered, so drained, so over-excited that she hadn’t gone to sleep until five in the morning. The sheer effort of keeping calm in all that chaos was utterly exhausting. Her head still ached, almost a week later.

And she had never been so frightened either: the vast backstage area, filled with models – of course – but designers and PRs and other make-up artists, and hairdressers, all milling about, eyeing one another up. There was huge competition between the hairdressers and the make-up artists, and no love lost between them; each considering their job the more important. And they took up so much space with their dryers and curlers and tongs; and quite often an assistant too, and it was enraging when quite often all they seemed to be doing was a scraggy ponytail. Then there were the racks and racks of clothes, with the models’ names on them, and carefully stacked shoes – and it was all actually as ordered as a military operation, disguised as chaos. She really felt she had no place there at all, almost bolted.

What she had to do, she knew, was find a model. It was as random as that. Not one of the really big names, that was all done and dusted, but one of the others; some were already stars, or nearly, and had a look that was different, that had caught on; the make-up girls practically fought over them. The models were exhausted, had been hustled around from location to location, show to show; the young ones were bewildered, some of them hardly able to speak English, and Lucy made for a very young one, who was lovely but so far unspoken for; she appeared near to tears.

‘Hi,’ she said, ‘I’m Lucy, and I’m going to do your make up. That OK?’

The girl nodded feebly.

‘Would you like to go to the toilet before I start?’

Another nod, this time a grateful smile as well. Very few people thought of that, apparently, they’d been told at FaceIt. It was almost barbaric. And the end result was tantrums and a lack of cooperation, all for want of a little thoughtfulness.

Sometimes there was a demo by the head make-up artist, of the look that was wanted, but not that morning; there was a face chart, that was all. She would just have to busk it. She studied the chart; it wasn’t the natural look, that was for sure, orange eyeshadow, absurd green eyelashes, painted on to the skin, white lipstick – not easy, she thought, praying the girl wouldn’t have any make up on, that her skin would be cool. A hairdresser arrived, his assistant (damn) set down his enormous bag and the girl came back, smiled gratefully again at Lucy, and accepted the bottle of water she gave her. The hairdresser started yanking her head about as he brushed her hair through.

‘I can’t work while you do that,’ said Lucy.

‘Has to be done, darling.’

They struck a deal; he could get the rollers in, then Lucy could have the girl to herself.

‘But we haven’t got long,’ he said, ‘really up against it.’

He was back in five minutes, claiming it was ten; Lucy struggled with the eyeshadow as he pulled rollers out, then had to order him off when one of the painted eyelashes smudged and he had a tantrum, complained to the dresser.

And then it was done and the dresser claimed the girl, and they disappeared into the throng and Lucy grabbed the next make-up chart and it all started again. No wonder she was exhausted.

‘Well, how about twelve thirty?’ Bianca was saying now. ‘I’ve got a lunch, but a late one, so that’ll give us half an hour. Which is all we need I think.’

Oh God. Was she going to tell her she didn’t want her working for Farrell’s any more? Or – and this would be as bad in a way – did she want the sessions with Milly to stop?

At twelve thirty precisely, Jemima called her up from reception.

‘Go in,’ she said. ‘Don’t look so frightened.’

Lucy went in.

Bianca smiled at her, briefly, then said, ‘I’m very worried about this business with Milly, Lucy. It’s not the make-up sessions; Milly loves them and it’s clearly making her feel altogether better. No, I’m worried about your friend the blogger and what she might write. I don’t need to tell you how powerful these things are. I appreciate it would be marvellous publicity, but Milly is only thirteen, and hardly representative of Farrell’s customers; or rather, the Farrell customer we want to attract. Had you considered that?’

‘Honestly, no,’ Lucy said, ‘but I can see your point. Well – we don’t have to do the blog. I can just tell her we don’t want to.’

‘That seems a shame. I hate to seem ungrateful. And of course Milly will be very disappointed. But . . .’

‘It’s a shame all round,’ said Lucy, and she felt very sad suddenly: more for Milly than herself. ‘But yes, obviously getting the image of the brand across is vital, I do understand. But I tell you what we could do: turn it into a sort of feature story. Fay Banks will do whatever we want – it’s a bit of a scoop for her anyway. We can play the Farrell card, and me being Lady Farrell’s granddaughter, and say something along the lines of how I kept running out of models and Milly and Jayce said they’d like to do it if it would help, and even though they are much too young, they’ve still got faces, something like that. That way we could still plug the Farrell name, get some nice publicity, and not disappoint Milly. What do you think?’

‘I think,’ said Bianca, smiling at her, ‘that’s a genius idea, Lucy. Really clever. Thank you. Thank you so much. Now I must go.’

‘Me too. I’m having lunch with Grandy – she wants to know about London Fashion Week.’

She was very different from her grandmother, Bianca thought; very very different. Of course, she was also Bertie’s daughter . . .

Athina greeted Lucy effusively.

‘Lovely to see you, darling. You look marvellous. I like your hair. It makes your face look thinner.’

‘Thank you, Grandy. I wasn’t aware it was fat.’

‘Not fat exactly, darling, just rather plump!’

Lara had had two dates now with the conference organiser whose name was Chris Williams. There was much to be said for him. He was good-looking, a natty dresser, prided himself on being a man about town and had taken her to the rather smart One Aldwych and on the next date Sheekeys, which she had told him she had always wanted to go to; his remembering this had made it even better. He was very generous, was fun and funny and always admired what she was wearing and told her it suited her. And although he had kissed her on the second date there had been no suggestion that he might be asking anything more significant any time soon.

He was forty-five, divorced, but amicably so, and had two teenage children with whom he seemed to get along very well. He was altogether, as she remarked to Susie, too good to be true. But he had one great failing, which she didn’t remark upon to anyone: he wasn’t Bertie. Who might as well have decamped to Birmingham already for all the contact between them, and she missed him dreadfully; his fondness for chatting, his self-effacement. She still felt proud of giving him just a little more self-confidence, of improving his sartorial taste, and encouraging him on his diet. His resemblance to his absurdly handsome father was increasingly remarked upon. She was actually almost looking forward to his leaving; once he had gone, she could cut any remaining emotional ties easily. Or so she told herself as she stood at the mirror in the ladies’, putting on fresh make up, smoothing her newly highlighted hair, checking her manicured nails, in readiness for her third date with Chris Williams. And wishing she felt more excited about it.

‘Mrs Clements, good evening.’ It was Athina. She smiled at Lara, a rather distant smile to be sure, but still an improvement on the frozen expression with which she usually greeted her.

‘Good evening, Lady Farrell.’

Athina’s eyes swept across the array of make up on the shelf in front of Lara.

‘I hope you will forgive me, but I wonder why you are using that perfume, when it should be
Passionate
. We should all wear it at all times and get people’s reaction to it. Not that I would dream of altering so much as a note, but it would still be interesting.’

‘Indeed, Lady Farrell, and I was wearing it regularly but my supply has run out and the lab won’t let me have any more.’

‘Really? How odd. I shall speak to them. Mrs Bailey’s officious systems are to blame, no doubt. One seems to have to fill in a form in triplicate to get so much as a packet of envelopes from the stationery cupboard these days.’

This was grotesquely unfair, as Bianca kept any kind of regulation to a minimum, but Lara knew better than to argue with Athina.

‘Now, when you did wear it, did people admire it?’

‘Oh yes. Very much so.’

‘Men?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Did men admire it? That’s what we want. Given its name.’

‘Oh – yes. Yes, I think so.’

‘I would hope. Now, do you have a date this evening? With a man? You rather look as if you do.’

‘Well – yes.’ God, she was outrageous.

‘And what does he do? We really aren’t interested in the wrong sort of opinion. Is he a professional person?’

‘I think you could say that,’ said Lara, taking a deep breath. ‘He runs conferences. He ran ours, as a matter of fact.’

‘Oh, really? They were a slightly motley bunch I thought, but they did the job very efficiently. Clearly he knows what he’s doing. Now I shall go and get one of my bottles of
Passionate
, so that you can wear it. I was very pleased, incidentally, at that disgraceful presentation from the advertising people the other day, that you admired my own advertisement. Thank you. We should liaise regularly on that. I welcome your input and they are already late with any further kind of presentation. Do feel free to telephone or, indeed, visit my office at any time. It’s so agreeable to find a modern young woman with a modicum of taste.’

Lara thought she might faint.

‘Clever woman, Mrs Clements,’ said Athina, putting her head round Bertie’s office after delivering a small phial of
Passionate
to Lara. ‘A little tarty of course and that accent is not attractive, but she certainly knows her job and rather surprisingly has taste.’