Alice-Miranda In New York 5 (9 page)

Alice-Miranda and her parents rode the elevator to the Top of the Rock just as they had planned. While queuing for the lift, they had their photograph taken sitting on a steel girder, to replicate a famous picture of the workmen who built the Rockefeller Center back in the 1930s. The men were on a beam high over the city just eating their lunch as if they were sitting on a park bench. Alice-Miranda could hardly believe how brave they must have been, building skyscrapers with no safety
harnesses at all. Her mother said that it made her feel queasy just looking at it.

A light breeze had blown the sky clear and in the afternoon sun, it was a dazzling blue. Even on a Monday there were plenty of people about, taking in the views of Manhattan and beyond.

‘Ooh, look!' Alice-Miranda called to her parents, who were staring out towards the East River. ‘I can see the store.'

‘Stand there darling and I'll get a picture of you and Mummy with Highton's in the background.' Hugh zoomed in with his wife and daughter in focus. Through a gap between two skyscrapers he could see Highton's on Fifth opposite the park. Something moving on the rooftop garden caught his eye and he adjusted the zoom to see if he could make it out more clearly.

Hugh laughed when he realised what it was.

‘What's the matter, Daddy?' Alice-Miranda asked.

‘Surely we don't look that bad,' said Cecelia, with a quizzical frown.

‘No, darling, it's not you two. Come and look at this,' he handed Cecelia the camera and she stared through the lens, stifling a laugh.

‘Well, come on, Mummy, share,' Alice-Miranda instructed.

Her father grabbed Alice-Miranda around her waist and held her up so she could get the right angle on the camera. Her mother held the bulky equipment for her.

‘Oh Daddy, its Mrs Oliver. And I think she's dancing,' Alice-Miranda giggled. ‘We shouldn't be spying on her.'

‘Sweetheart, she must realise that she's not doing it in private,' her father replied. ‘I think she caught the Bollywood bug before your aunt's wedding. Wasn't she going to come out with us this afternoon?'

‘Yes, but she said that she had some other things to do,' Cecelia smiled. ‘I hadn't realised that dancing on the rooftop was one of them.'

‘Well, I think she's gorgeous,' Alice-Miranda replied.

Hugh took several more photographs of his ‘girls' standing at various points around the deck. A kindly old man, impeccably dressed in a suit and stylish trilby hat, asked if Hugh would like to stand in with Cecelia and Alice-Miranda and he would take a photograph. The trio lined up in front
of the Empire State Building and grinned for the camera.

‘I don't know about you two but I have to be getting back,' said Hugh. He was itching to spend some more time alone with Nanny Bedford's memories.

‘Really, darling? We said that we'd have all of our work done by three pm each day so we could spend time with Alice-Miranda,' Cecelia reminded her husband.

‘I know, but something unexpected has come up and I really should deal with it,' Hugh explained. ‘Why don't I catch a cab uptown and you and Alice-Miranda can take a walk and Seamus will pick you up later.'

‘All right.' Cecelia gave her husband a curious look. ‘Is it anything I should be worried about?'

‘No, no, of course not. Just some Kennington's business,' Hugh reassured her.

‘Well, miss, where would you like to go?' Cecelia asked.

Alice-Miranda pulled her miniature map of the city from her blazer pocket and unfolded it in front of her. ‘Looking at this –' She ran her finger along the streets – ‘it's only a few blocks down and two across
to get to Times Square,' she informed her parents. ‘It will be dark in a little while and I'd love to see the lights.'

‘That's do-able, darling,' her mother smiled.

In the gift shop, Hugh Kennington-Jones purchased their ‘men on a beam photograph' and Alice-Miranda asked if she could buy some postcards, which she intended to send to everyone back at Winchesterfield-Downsfordvale.

The family rode the lift down to street level and Hugh bade his wife and daughter farewell, heading off to hail a cab on Madison Avenue. Alice-Miranda and her mother set off down Sixth Avenue turning right into West 45th Street, onto Broadway and towards the famous lights of Times Square.

'M
ama, do we have to go to the salon on Saturday afternoon?' Lucinda Finkelstein was sitting under the covers in the middle of her enormous bed, her knees drawn up in front of her.

‘I don't understand what you mean, Lucinda.' Gerda Finkelstein sat on the edge of the bed and looked at her daughter.

‘Couldn't we do something else? Something different?' Lucinda had no idea how her mother would react, but meeting Alice-Miranda today had inspired her to at least ask the question.

‘But we go every Saturday. Afternoon tea at the
salon is part of life, Lucinda, like death and taxes,' Gerda replied.

‘But that's just the point, Mama. Aren't you bored with the salon? I mean, we meet up with the same people every week and they talk about the same things and then afterwards you always seem uptight about something that someone has said. Like last week when Mrs Schwarzkopf was going on about her daughter Emily and coming home in the car you were cross, and said that Rita Schwarzkopf never has anything to talk about unless it's her own children who have apparently done something amazing each and every day of their lives.'

‘Well.' Gerda looked at Lucinda. ‘Rita Schwarzkopf is a pain in the neck. And I don't believe for one minute that Emily is going to be her school valedictorian. The girl is as dumb as a rock.'

Lucinda was shocked to hear her mother say such a thing. ‘But she's meant to be your friend, Mama.'

‘Of course Rita's my friend,' Gerda said, frowning. ‘We've been friends since we were six years old.'

‘But I thought friends were people that you actually liked and you enjoyed spending time with.' Lucinda was fiddling with a stray curl as she spoke.

‘Lucinda, that's just life. Sometimes your friends
drive you crazy, but they're still your friends.' Gerda was beginning to lose patience. She wasn't used to Lucinda questioning anything about their lives, let alone Saturday afternoons at the salon. ‘Anyway, your father would be devastated if he heard you talking like this. You know that he had the whole place specially remodelled based on that photograph of the salon at the Palace of Versailles that you showed him. Sweetheart, he did it all for you.'

‘I'd much rather see the real thing.' Lucinda knew she was pushing her luck.

‘Well, that's just not possible,' her mother snapped. ‘You know your father doesn't like to travel.'

‘But we could go to France, Mama. Just you and me, and we could visit Paris and the Palace of Versailles.' Lucinda's eyes lit up.

Gerda tilted her head to one side and looked at Lucinda carefully.

The sixth floor at Finkelstein's had played host to a tea salon for years but recently Morrie had set about renovating the whole floor, relocating the menswear section and installing a massive ballroom which he had named The Grand Salon. The official opening was in a couple of weeks, the same day as the reopen
ing of Highton's on Fifth.

‘What has got into you, young lady?' Gerda reached over and stroked Lucinda's brow.

‘I just want to have some adventures, Mama, that's all. Even in New York, if you'd let me,' Lucinda pouted.

‘What are you talking about? You have plenty of adventures. Isn't your teacher taking you to the Met for your art classes? I can't imagine many girls get to do that every week.' Gerda Finkelstein leaned down and kissed her daughter's cheek.

‘What about Sunday? Couldn't we go to the zoo?'

‘You know your father is allergic to animals,' her mother replied.

‘But that doesn't mean
we
can't do something,' Lucinda protested.

‘Sundays are family days, Lucinda, at home. Why would we need to go anywhere else – you and your brothers have everything you could possibly want right here.' Gerda didn't understand her daughter's outburst at all. ‘Goodnight Lucinda.' She walked towards to door.

Lucinda's room was more like her very own apartment than a child's bedroom. As well as an
ensuite bathroom, she had her own playroom and study. And what Gerda had said was true: the Finkelstein mansion had its own swimming pool and there was even a bowling alley in the basement. There was everything a person could ever want.

Gerda hesitated. ‘Lucinda, is there someone you'd like to invite to the salon on Saturday?'

‘Oh, Mama, yes.' Lucinda's mind was racing.

‘I know we haven't had the McAlisters for a while and you and little Lilli always seem to get on so well,' Gerda suggested.

‘It's not Lilli McAlister,' Lucinda said with a frown. ‘Can I invite a new friend?'

‘Well, you know that will take more than a few days to arrange. It wouldn't be for this week. Your father will have to make sure that they're suitable and then we can send an invitation.'

‘I don't understand why father has to approve my friends, Mama. Why can't he trust me?'

Gerda Finkelstein drew in a sharp breath.

‘What's the matter?' Lucinda asked.

‘Lucinda, don't be too hard on your father. He just wants the best for you.' Gerda's eyes shone and she felt the sting of tears threatening.

‘What's wrong, Mama?' Lucinda demanded.

‘Nothing, Lucinda. Nothing at all. Goodnight.'
She flicked off the light and beat a hasty retreat from the room.

Lucinda's face fell. How could she invite the one person she really wanted to? Her father would never allow it.

Hugh Kennington-Jones had returned to the penthouse to find Mrs Oliver shimmying her way around the dining room, cutlery in hand as she set the table. He could just make out the tinny sound of sitars coming from the earphones jammed into both her ears. She twirled and shrugged her way around the table, laying place settings in time with the music, an enormous smile plastered across her face.

Off-loading the final knife and fork, Dolly raised her arms to the ceiling and engaged in some rather
fancy hand movements and then spun around mid-shoulder shrug to see Hugh grinning at her from the doorway.

‘Oh, sir.' Dolly grimaced, and then rolled her eyes. She pulled the earphones out and snapped off her player.

‘Please don't stop on my account, Dolly,' Hugh chuckled.

‘You could have given an old woman a heart attack,' Dolly admonished. ‘Sneaking up on me like that.'

‘I didn't sneak up at all,' Hugh protested. ‘You couldn't hear a thing with that music in your ears. And did you know there's a direct line of sight from the Top of the Rock to the rooftop garden here at Highton's?' he teased.

‘Really?' Dolly Oliver asked. ‘I can't imagine there's anything interesting to see up there.'

‘I don't know, Dolly. I think you might have been entertaining half the city this afternoon. Well, at least anyone on a floor higher than the rooftop – and perhaps a few pilots and passengers en route to JFK.'

‘Well, I'm glad to be of service – and what better place to trot out my new talents than New York,
New York. I wonder if there were any Broadway producers watching.' Dolly raised her eyebrows. ‘I might have a new calling. Cooking, inventing and Bollywood dancing. And you know I feel fitter than I have in years. I've been thinking about adding belly dancing to my repertoire, but Shilly's not so keen. I think she's afraid of the outfits – a little too revealing for her taste.'

Hugh laughed.

‘On a more serious note, sir, are you alone?' Dolly thought the apartment was much too quiet for Alice-Miranda to have returned with her father.

‘Yes, I left the girls heading towards Times Square. I've got some work to do,' Hugh replied.

‘Would you like me to bring you a drink?' Dolly enquired.

‘What I'd really love is a strong cup of tea if you wouldn't mind?' Hugh asked.

‘I'll get that now. Will you take it in the study?'

‘Yes, please.' Hugh Kennington-Jones exited the dining room and strode along the hallway to the study. He pushed open the door and walked over to the huge mahogany desk. There, he took the key from where he'd placed it under the lamp base and
opened the top drawer, removing Nanny Bedford's diary and laying it on the desktop.

Hugh opened the book and stared at the swirling script in front of him. Reading Nanny Bedford's diary was a little like being in possession of a time machine, he thought to himself.

It made him smile to read Nanny's account of his birth and how his mother just adored her newborn son. Hugh felt a twinge of sadness. She wasn't to know what lay ahead, that her life would be cut so unfairly short.

And then when Hugh was just eighteen, his father had suddenly died of a brain aneurysm while getting ready for work one morning at Pelham Park. Hugh was away at school in his final year. With no living siblings, Pelham Park had come to him, but it wasn't somewhere he wanted to live. He felt very little affection for the foreboding mansion with its hundred-plus rooms. Early on, he'd left it in the capable hands of their family butler and housekeeper but Hugh had had a gnawing feeling that a house like that, sitting idle, was extraordinarily wasteful. For a long time he simply didn't know what to do with it.

A lesser young man would have baulked at the thought of all that responsibility, not only for
the house but the company as well. But Hugh, having inherited his mother's commonsense as well as his father's business brain, worked alongside his father's trusted aide and confidant, the positively ancient Archibald Button, to ensure that the business would continue to function while he took time doing all the regular things young men his age did, including travelling and going to university. It was true that he spent most of the holiday periods working at Kennington's but he allowed himself the luxury of not taking over the business until the age of twenty-six. Henry Kennington-Jones had died at sixty-seven and Hugh vowed the same fate would not befall him. He wanted some balance in his life.

When he met and finally married Cecelia Highton-Smith after nearly eight years of courtship, he had happily moved into her family home, Highton Hall. Much prettier than Pelham Park, it had a warmth and liveliness he'd never before known in a house. Just looking at the place made him smile and together they forged a life full of happy memories there. It was his wife who suggested Pelham Park be turned into a nursing home for the disadvantaged. She reasoned that Kennington's could afford to run it as another arm of the business, subsidised
by the massive profits from the grocery stores. They certainly didn't need two monstrous family piles. With her new baby on her hip, Cecelia oversaw a massive renovation, removing the dark wallpapers and gloomy drapes. Over almost two years, new life was breathed into the Park's ancient walls. Cecelia was inordinately proud of the project and Pelham Park had been hailed as a model of philanthropic endeavour, and one of the loveliest aged-care facilities in the country. Cecelia's only regret was that they didn't get to visit more often. Alice-Miranda particularly loved her time there playing with the residents.

Hugh thought about what Hector had said to him earlier. Could it really be true that his brother was out there somewhere? Alive? Hector would be on his way home now, mid-flight, so there was no point telephoning him until the morning at the earliest.

Hugh found himself wondering how difficult it would be to have his brother's casket exhumed from the family crypt. He hadn't decided yet if he should pursue it. But if his brother wasn't dead, then where on earth was he, and why would Hugh have been allowed to believe for all these years that he was gone?

Hugh didn't hear Mrs Oliver come in.

‘Looks intriguing.' She placed the teacup down on the edge of the desk and stared at the open diary.

Hugh was jolted back to the present. ‘Oh! Dolly, thank you. ‘I'm not really sure I want to know. He stared at the yellowed pages. ‘It belonged to my Nanny.'

‘Goodness, sir, wherever did you get that from?' Dolly smiled. ‘Any deep dark family secrets?'

Hugh looked up at her. ‘That's just what I'm afraid of.'

‘Well, let's hope not, sir. Mr O'Leary telephoned to say that he was picking up Cecelia and Alice-Miranda in about half an hour. I'll serve dinner at 7.15 pm if that's all right with you?'

‘What was that?' Hugh was lost in his thoughts.

‘Dinner at 7.15 pm?' Dolly repeated.

‘Yes, of course. Thank you. Oh and Dolly, if you wouldn't mind, please don't tell Cecelia about this old thing.' He nodded at the diary. ‘It's nothing.'

But Dolly Oliver was unconvinced. She'd been with Hugh Kennington-Jones for long enough to see that something had him rattled.