Bad Heir Day (6 page)

And to do that, she simply
had
to sort out a new nanny. The only
slight
hitch
was her usual agency’s flat refusal to supply her with any more staff. Cassandra twisted her glossy red lips as she recalled that morning’s conversation with the head of Spong’s Domestics.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Knight,” Mrs. Spong had told Cassandra. “I’m afraid we’re unable to recommend you to our clients as employers anymore.”

“What the hell do you mean?” Cassandra had raged, embarrassed as well as furious. Spong’s was the smartest staff agency in the area. To be treated like this by them was humiliation of the first order, or rather it would be if anyone found out. She’d heard of
employees
being struck from agency books, but never
employers
.
Really, this Spong woman had the most ludicrous airs. “Do you know who I
am
?”

There had been a polite silence before the agency head had, downright insolently, Cassandra considered, informed her that yes, she knew exactly who she was. “So what’s the problem?” Cassandra had demanded.

“The problem, Mrs. Knight, is that we have supplied five nannies to you in the last twelve months, none of whom have managed to stay with you—or, more to the point, your son—for a period any longer than two months. It would seem that, ahem”—Mrs. Spong cleared her throat—“perhaps we are unable to supply quite the, um,
calibre
of staff you are looking for.”

“Well, do you have any suggestions as to who might?” Cassandra had demanded. “I suppose it’s back to trawling through
The Lady
,”
she had added furiously.

“I think, Mrs. Knight,” Mrs. Spong had replied, utterly deadpan, “that you might have more luck with
Soldier of Fortune
magazine.” Cassandra had never heard of it, but she liked the sound of it. It must be for rich military types. Another good reason for going to the library. She could save money by helping herself to their copy.

Cassandra swept into Kensington Library and sailed straight for the shelf with her works on it. She was horrified to see that the whole fat-spined four of them were in residence. Furious, she pulled out
Impossible Lust
,
marched purposefully towards the display cabinet at the back of the room, and replaced
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin
with it. Who wanted to read about a bloody
mandolin
anyway? Feeling better, Cassandra returned to her shelf and flicked to the front of
The Sins of the Father
,
the book that had gone through the five hundred thousand barrier and netted her the Schnabel. She felt comforted by the date stamps tattooing the first and second pages—there had obviously been no shortage of borrowers. Then, absently, she flicked to the back, whose last page, she was disgusted to see, was covered in shaky initials in pale blue Biro; put there, she knew, by old women who couldn’t remember what they’d read. Realising that the initials at the back tallied roughly with the number of date stamps at the front, anger coursed through Cassandra. If only the old bags would leave her books on the shelf for more than
five seconds
,
perhaps some
fashionable
people would have a chance to borrow them.

Her mood did not improve as a stooping old woman with a slack, trembling jaw, thin grey hair, and skin like a raisin came shuffling into the room and made the sort of line a shaky, ancient bee might manage in the direction of Cassandra’s shelf. Cassandra shrank against the Sidney Sheldons—at least they weren’t all out either—and watched in disgust as the woman took
Impossible Lust
between her liver-spotted fingers and turned to the back page. Apparently unable to decipher her initials, the old woman grunted with satisfaction and shuffled off with the volume towards the librarians’ counter. Cassandra’s hand flew up to her skinny throat. She felt violated. Seeing that old woman’s filthy old hands over her precious words was, she shuddered to herself, like being
raped
.
Bile welled up within her. Cassandra hated most of her readers—the pitiful, pathetic,
poor
masses who bought her books in their hundreds of thousands. But even more despicable were the readers who got her books free from the libraries.

As best she could in her crippling heels, Cassandra rushed dramatically out of the room and into the library foyer, where she paused to catch her breath against the noticeboard. As her hammering heart calmed down, her eyes wandered across the many ruled and drawing-pinned pieces of card offering everything from Opera Camp for musical fives-and-up to wine appreciation courses for under-eights. There was hardly time for a panicked Cassandra to wonder whether she should be sending Zak on the latter before her eye fell upon the bright pink card pinned next to it. English Graduate Seeks…Cassandra did a double take. Her eyes narrowed. She read it, then read it again. Finally, she snatched it off the board, slipped it into her plastic zebraskin pocket, and left. It was only when she was halfway up Kensington Church Street that she realised she had forgotten to look for
Soldier of Fortune
.
But hopefully she wouldn’t be needing that now.

Anna heard the snap of the letterbox and wandered slowly down the long, white-painted corridor to the post lying on the mat. Not
more
wedding invitations for Seb, she thought in amazement, picking them up and almost buckling under the weight of the thick, cream envelopes.

Over the few weeks since she had moved into his flat, the wedding invitations on Seb’s solid Edwardian marble mantelpiece had grown from a mere spinney to a mighty forest. The rather hideous ormulu clock was now entirely obscured by folded cards in Palace script concealing lists from smart interiors stores and directions to receptions—including, once, instructions on how to arrive by helicopter or Gulfstream jet. None of them, however, bore Anna’s name. “And Guest” seemed as far as most of Seb’s friends were prepared to go. Given his track record with girls, it was probably a sensible policy; sometimes Anna wondered if he was only with her because he’d been out with everybody else.

Yet soon after they had met—at a wedding party, naturally—Seb had invited her to move in with him, which surely was an encouraging sign. Anna tried not to dwell on the fact that he had more or less had to. Having just lost the latest in the series of post-university, part-time dead end jobs she had taken while trying to get her writing off the ground, Anna could no longer afford to rent a flat of her own and was about to give up on London altogether and go back up north to her family.

It had seemed like a miracle, Seb’s offer of free flat space, yet in Anna’s more paranoid moments she wondered if he had merely calculated the cost to himself of losing not only her unquestioningly adoring company, but also a free laundress, cleaner, and cook. Anna performed these duties in lieu of rent and on the vague understanding that sooner or later she might move out. The feeling that she was living on borrowed time, both in the flat and in his affections, hung heavy. Yet, given that no one else was currently occupying either, squatter’s rights didn’t seem out of the question.

Anna came to the last of the envelopes. Another frightener. The steady stream of what Anna had come to think of as “frighteners”—routine rejection letters for the many jobs she applied for out of the Monday
Media Guardian—
continued their daily trickle through the front door. Anna swallowed as she bent to retrieve this one. Although it bore no corporate logo and was handwritten, the second-class stamp was a giveaway. Someone obviously thought she was not worth first. Anna slid her nail under the flap, wondering how they had phrased it this time. Overqualified? Underqualified? Overwhelmed by applications?

“I don’t believe it,” Anna muttered to herself. She stared at the white piece of paper in her shaking hand, heart thumping. “I don’t
believe
it.” She let out a whoop and rushed into the sitting room where Seb was crouched, fists clenched, in front of the lunchtime racing. Despite his marked and consistent inability to pick a winner, the delusion that he was a keen judge of horseflesh died hard. Perhaps, Anna thought nastily, this explained his attraction to the distinctly equine Brie de Benham. But this was no time to dwell on her, still less on the mysterious, anonymous click-burr answerphone messages that had appeared since the Scottish wedding. “It’s fantastic!” Anna shrieked, jumping up and down in front of the television. “A writer saw my ad in the library and wants to see me straightaway. I’ve got to ring immediately. I could go this afternoon.
Wonderful
,
isn’t it?”

“Not as wonderful as you getting out of the way of the television would be,” Seb drawled. “I’ve put a hundred on Friend of Dorothy at twelve to one. I could clean up.”

Anna stood aside and watched as Friend of Dorothy started last, reared at the first hedge, and finally threw her hapless rider into the water jump. Having rid herself of the unwelcome burden, the horse then galloped merrily down the course, passed the leaders, and crossed the finishing line. Seb looked on furiously. “Bloody useless nag,” he snarled. “That was the last of my sodding week’s allowance. Still, I suppose I can always ask Mummy for some more tonight.”

A 2000-volt electric charge went through Anna. “
Tonight
?”
she stammered, the momentous piece of paper in her hand quite forgotten. “
Mummy
?”
she croaked.

“Mm, Mummy’s coming tonight,” Seb yawned, his eyes
still glued to the Newmarket paddock. Swallowing, Anna faced the terrifying prospect of meeting Seb’s mother in the flesh. The only contact so far had been her tones, crisp and chill as an iceberg lettuce on the answerphone, barking out instructions for Seb to call her. “We’re having dinner,” Seb added.

“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Anna was panic-stricken in the knowledge that the fridge and cupboards contained little beyond anchovy paste and Pop-Tarts.

“Forgot, I suppose,” Seb said, over-casually. “But you don’t have to meet her. Mummy will quite understand if you are out. I can take her to the Ivy or something.”

“But of
course
I want to meet her.” Anna gave Seb a puzzled smile. “And where else would I go? I
live
here, don’t I? There’s no need to take her out. I’ll cook.”

Dinner, it suddenly struck Anna, was a cast-iron if not a Le Creuset opportunity to impress Seb’s mother with her cooking skills. Or at least the ones she planned hastily to acquire with the help of a notebook and an hour’s browsing in the cookery section of W. H. Smith. “I’ll do the shopping on my way back.”

“Back from where?” asked Seb.

“From here.” Anna waved the letter at him. Surely he hadn’t forgotten about her interview already?

Seb looked at Anna blankly.

***

Anna had been up and down the smart Kensington street three times now. People were starting to appear at the corners of the windows to stare. Anna, however, had no option other than to continue squinting at their houses. For, among the figures painted neatly in black on the white pair of pillars framing each imposing doorway, number 54 did not seem to register.

Where 54 should, by process of elimination, have been, the letters Liv were painted. Liv. Odd name for a house, thought Anna. Then it hit her. LIV. Fifty-four in Roman numerals.
Of course
.
A
tad
pretentious for a house name, perhaps; she hoped Cassandra had a classically educated postman. But then, most of the postmen round here were probably out of work ex-students like herself. Post-graduates, in fact.

Despite its number—or was it its name?—the house looked just like the rest of the street. A tall, wide slice of West London real estate heaven, its stucco gleaming white in the sunshine, its shining black railings thick and bumpy with a century and a half of paint. An Upstairs Downstairs house with a basement kitchen and five floors above it, their windows decreasing in size and grandeur towards the top. Anna went slowly up the paved path, jumping as the gate clanged treacherously behind her, and, using one of the many pieces of brass door furniture on offer, knocked.

“Yars?” The black-painted door swung back to reveal an overalled woman with electric yellow hair and a suspicious expression. “Can I ewp you?” She shook her peacock-blue feather duster enquiringly.

“Er, I’ve come to see Cassandra Knight,” said Anna. “I’ve got an appointment.”

“Carm in. You’ll ’ave to wait in the kitchin. Mrs. Knoight’s busy at the mowment.”

In the kitchen, airforce-blue panelling coated every vertical surface including, Anna was interested to observe, the front of the dishwasher. A single lily stood atop the vast steel fridge. The black stone table was supported by skinny chrome legs fashioned into spirals; arranged in precisely-measured ranks beneath it were two rows of three tractor-seat stools in chrome. Anna heaved herself on to one, aware she had completely disrupted whatever visual concept prevailed.

The emphatic lack of any hint of food provoked a raging hunger in Anna’s stomach. But the disproportionately vast antique station clock on the wall was to measure out a further lonely, unrefreshed half hour before footsteps could be heard on the stairs. An extremely thin woman with white-blonde hair in a straight, short bob, vast black sunglasses, and a white waffle bathrobe wafted through the doorway into the kitchen.

“Cassandra Knight,” announced the apparition, sticking out a hand so thin it was practically transparent and as chill as if it had just come out of the freezer. Anna gazed at the bathrobe with admiration. So this was what real writers wore to work in.

She felt instantly disadvantaged by her own hot and sticky palm and not being able to see Cassandra’s eyes properly. She could sense them moving behind the sunglasses, cold and invisible as fish at the bottom of a pond. The lenses were as impenetrable as they were inexplicable. Perhaps, Anna concluded, they were intended to combat the glare of Cassandra’s computer screen.

“Yes, I recognise you from your book jacket photographs.” Anna smiled, hoping to ingratiate herself. Panic flared in her stomach when, instead of looking flattered, Cassandra frowned.

“Which one?” she demanded imperiously.

Anna’s mind whirled. She sensed something was at stake. One false move and all could be lost. “Er, the one on
Impossible Lust
,”
she hedged, plumping for the photograph which, when flicking through the volumes in the bookshop, had struck her as the softest lit, most touched up, and generally most flattering. She had guessed right. Cassandra preened.

“Yes, Tony—Snowdon—did quite a reasonable job on that one,” Cassandra purred. “And he did say I was one of the most
challenging
people he had ever photographed. Let’s get down to business, shall we?” she suddenly barked. “I haven’t got all day. You want this job, I take it?”

Anna swallowed. “I’d love to work for you. It would be a wonderful training for
any
writer…” She stopped as Cassandra held up a hand.

“I
am not
offering a writing course,” she snapped. “In my letter to you I said I wanted a
general assistant
.
To assist me, er, generally.”

“Of course,” Anna echoed. “A general assistant.”

“
Precisely
,”
said Cassandra, inhaling so hard on her cigarette her eyes
watered. “An, um,
general
assistant is exactly what I want. I take it you’re quite
versatile
?” Two plumes of smoke came flying out of her nostrils.

Anna jerked her head up and down eagerly. “Absolutely. I can type, research…even write,” she added anxiously.

Cassandra nodded curtly.

“How are you with children?” she demanded.

“
Children
?”
Anna vaguely recalled from the potted biographies on the book jackets that Cassandra had a son. Anyone working at close quarters with her would of course have to get along with her family. “Oh, fine,” she stammered, recalling the occasional bout of unenjoyable teenage baby-sitting.

“Good,” said Cassandra, grinding her cigarette out. “The job involves quite a lot of contact with Zak. He’s, um, between nannies at the moment. You—ahem, I mean, whoever did the job—would have to help with the school run, his supper, that sort of thing.”

“I see,” said Anna, the dimmer switch of her enthusiasm turning down a jot. “But most of the job would be helping
you
, wouldn’t it?”

Either Cassandra was nodding ferociously, Anna thought, or she was tossing that highly flammable-looking platinum bob out of the way as she ignited another Marlboro. “Absolutely,” Cassandra confirmed. “You’d be helping me an
enormous
amount.” She paused and pressed her lips together as the smoke poured out of her nostrils. “But of course if you feel it’s not quite right for you…”

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean…” stammered Anna, panicking. “I’m absolutely happy to do whatever…” One child, after all, surely couldn’t be too much trouble.

“
Good
,”
said Cassandra, satisfied. She stared at her hands, pushing an amethyst the size of a door handle slowly round her forefinger. “Well, you seem all right to me. You can start tomorrow, if you like. The sooner the better as far as I’m concerned.”

Anna felt a huge grin split her face. She was just about to stammer her thanks when Cassandra said, “We haven’t discussed pay.” She then named a weekly sum so ludicrously low that Anna gasped.

“I can’t possibly live on that.”

“You won’t have to. The job is, of course, live-in.”

Of course, thought Anna. That explained the awful money. Living in would be much cheaper for Cassandra. But surely it was unusual for assistants to live in? Nannies, of course, did it all the time. But she wasn’t a nanny.

“I didn’t realise.” She spoke slowly, but Anna’s heart started to slam against her chest like a moth trying to reach a lamp behind a windowpane.

“Well, obviously it’s live-in,” snapped Cassandra. “Children are a full-time job, you know. As is writing, of course,” she added hurriedly. “You never know when the muse will strike.”

***

Half an hour later, Anna found herself standing, confused, beside the ready-packed salads in Ken High Street Marks and Spencer. She could not concentrate. Her ears were still ringing from Cassandra’s furious reaction to being told she would think about the job.

“Most people would give anything to live for free in a house like this,” Cassandra had snapped. “I would, for a start,” she added acidly.

“Of course, it’s the most wonderful house and most fantastic opportunity…” Anna had stammered.

“So what’s stopping you?” Anna could feel Cassandra’s eyes, turning from cold fish to lasers, blazing through the sunglasses.

“I need to discuss it with my, um, boyfriend,” Anna had faltered.

“Your
boyfriend
? Can’t you make your own decisions? Christ, if I asked my husband what he thought
I
should do with my life, I’d be permanently making full English breakfasts in between giving him blow jobs.”

But Anna, albeit shakily, stood her ground. She would let Cassandra know in the morning. She was not sure she wanted to move out of Seb’s so soon. And anyway, there was always the possibility—admittedly remote—that the prospect of her leaving would make him finally lay his cards on the table as far as their relationship was concerned.