Bobby's Girl (8 page)

‘It must be marvellous to travel as much as you, Mr Powell,' Kate said enviously.

‘Not really. Have you ever thought how much time I spend alone in hotel rooms or talking to strangers? And two days out of the three I've been here I've been working, filming a TV special. But Vegas won't be too bad. Poppy hates hotels even more than me, especially with Maud. They're never geared for kids. But when I've finished in Vegas, I've a short season in the West End followed by a couple of months filming just outside London. So your mother can brace herself for our
long-threatened
visit. But she'd better put away her best china. Maud's at the terrible-two marauding age. She put one of my golf clubs through the window of the Californian house last week.'

‘I can't wait to see her again,' Penny enthused. ‘She couldn't talk when I last saw her.'

‘And you'll be wishing she couldn't the next time you see her. Maud's never quiet, not even when she's sleeping. Here we are, home sweet home.'

‘Home sweet home' was the Savoy.

Penny knew her uncle kept a permanent suite in the hotel. He'd written to her mother years ago inviting the family to make free use of it whenever they were in London; as if they made a habit of visiting the city. The only times she could recall the entire family travelling there was to see Haydn onstage and, more often than not, even then they all returned home to Pontypridd on the milk train rather than stay overnight.

Haydn greeted the doorman who opened the car door. Kate took one look at the man's grey morning suit and top hat and froze. ‘I can't go in there.'

‘Why ever not?' Haydn asked.

‘Not like this, in jeans and a tatty coat.'

He laughed. ‘Some people may be better dressed than you two in there but they're only people, Kate. They
have two arms, two legs and, in view of what you did for Pen today, a lot less brains.'

‘But they look like millionaires,' Kate whispered as a glamorous blonde girl about her age strolled into the foyer of the garden entrance as if she owned the place. She was dressed in a silver chain-and-plate miniskirt and vest that left little to the imagination. White tights that showed off her long – very long – slim legs, a silver
diamante-studded
feather boa and silver leather boots that skirted the top of her thighs completed the ensemble.

Kate coveted those boots. She'd priced similar black ones in David Evans in Swansea but they'd been way out of her budget at three quarters of her annual grant.

‘If you're thinking of her, she's not a millionaire. She's out to catch one. What do you say, Brian?' Haydn offered the doorman his cigar case.

‘Whatever you say, Mr Powell, sir.' The doorman took a cigar and slipped it into his top pocket.

‘Brian, meet my niece and her friend.'

‘Pleased to meet you, ladies.'

She thought the doorman looked sceptical, then realised how the situation could be reported in the tabloid newspapers.

‘
Star picks up girls young enough to be his daughters from police station and takes them to his private suite in the Savoy
.'

‘Ask Anna or one of the girls on duty to go up to my suite, will you please, Brian. The girls will be staying the night, so they'll need some things. Tell Anna to buy whatever they want and put it on my account. And ask the bellboy to collect my cases.' He turned to his
chauffeur. ‘You've an hour before you have to take me to the airport, Phil. Grab a meal and a cup of coffee and put it on my bill.'

‘Thank you, Mr Powell.' Unlike the doorman, the chauffeur smiled at her and Kate.

‘Don't forget to be here at nine tomorrow to take the girls shopping. Their train leaves Paddington at two o'clock. See them on to it, please.'

‘You can rely on me, sir.'

‘We'll make our own way back to college.' Feeling like a stray dog, she walked at her uncle's heels when he strode into the hotel.

‘Your own way is hitch-hiking out of London because although your parents give you the money to buy train tickets you'd prefer to spend it on other things?' he guessed.

‘We got here by hitch-hiking,' she replied defensively.

‘The next thing you'll be telling me is that your mother approved.'

‘Kate and I've never had any trouble.'

‘I don't have many nieces, so I'd rather not lose one. The train tickets should have been delivered to the suite by now. You can sleep and breakfast here, do some shopping in Carnaby Street, where I'm told all bright young things shop, and catch the early afternoon train back to Swansea. First class, on me.' He lifted his eyebrows at Kate. ‘And don't say you can't accept the ticket, young woman. Not after rescuing Penny. I may not see my nieces and nephews often but I'm fond of them. I wouldn't have known she was in a cell if it hadn't been for you.'

They followed him into the lift. When they reached the top floor he pulled a key from his pocket and unlocked a door.

‘Room service menus are on the table. Ring down and order whatever you want. You'll be more comfortable here than in the restaurant,' he suggested tactfully. ‘There's a well-stocked bar, but if you don't see anything you fancy, order something else, but no more than one bottle of wine between you or two pints of whatever young people drink these days each. Please don't get drunk. Your father I can cope with, but if your mother finds out she'll string me up. As for food, please, eat the kitchen empty. You could both do with fattening up. Door to guest bedroom and bathroom. There are twin beds and it's yours for the night.' He pointed to a door on the left. ‘If you'll excuse me, I have to change for the flight. Order smoked salmon sandwiches for me, please, Pen.' He disappeared into the bedroom.

Her parents had taken her to hotels, but she'd never seen anything as sumptuous as her uncle's suite in the Savoy. Not even in the upmarket hotels her father had insisted on splashing out on in France. And, although Kate was doing her best to conceal it, she could see she was overwhelmed.

She opened the door to the ‘guest bedroom'. It was enormous, far larger than the common room in college, and the en suite bathroom with its gold taps, sunken bath and Italian tiles wouldn't have looked out of place in a Hollywood film.

‘I can visualise Doris Day lying in that bath covered in suds.' Kate eyed a basket on the shelf. ‘Look at all those
toiletries. Soap, shampoo, bath oil, there's even body lotion.' She picked up the bottle, unscrewed the top and sniffed the contents. ‘It smells heavenly.'

‘I've never seen so many complimentary toiletries, or towels so thick and fluffy.' She fingered the flannels.

‘If one of us snores in the night the other can always sleep in the bath,' Kate joked.

‘And use the bath mat as an eiderdown.'

‘Talk about how the other half live.'

It was the first time she'd ever detected envy in Kate's voice.

‘We didn't have a bathroom until we were rehoused by the council when I was eleven.' Kate glanced at her watch. ‘As we're not expected back in Swansea tonight, I intend to make the most of this.'

‘Did you ring the college?' Penny asked.

‘Your father volunteered. He said he'd let them know that we've been delayed and won't get back until tomorrow.'

‘Delayed as in me being arrested?' She was alarmed by the thought.

‘Delayed as in we came here to get visas and had problems with transport. He did say he wouldn't tell the college any more than he had to.'

‘He's never met Fanny. I think she was an interrogator for the KGB in her youth.'

‘She's too true-blue British to be KGB. She could have worked for MI5 but I refuse to believe she was ever young,' Kate countered.

‘I'd better order Uncle Haydn's sandwiches.' Penny returned to the sitting room. ‘What do you want?'

‘Nothing, thank you,' Kate refused. ‘My stomach's in knots. When you were driven away in that bus I was terrified they wouldn't release you. I'm not sure what I was dreading the most, hitch-hiking back to Wales on my own, or facing Fanny and the principal when I arrived at college. As for your parents and my mother …'

‘What would you have said to them?'

‘I've no idea,' Kate admitted.

‘You have to eat,' she lectured. ‘I'm not hungry either but all we've had today is a couple of sausage rolls and a cup of coffee on the road. We'll be ill if we starve ourselves. How about cheese sandwiches and a bottle of wine?'

‘I couldn't. Not on your uncle's bill.'

‘Yes, you could.' Haydn left his bedroom. ‘It's not often I have the chance to treat my niece. I take it you haven't ordered yet?'

‘No. We were debating what to have.'

‘As I have to leave shortly let me make the decision for you.' He was dressed for travelling in a tailored
pale-grey
suit, blue shirt and grey and blue silk tie. He picked up the telephone and dialled. ‘Room service? This is Haydn Powell.' He laughed. ‘Thank you for your kind words but I never sing down the telephone. Send up smoked salmon sandwiches for one, please, and mixed sandwiches and a plate of cream cakes and coffee for two. Please note that my niece and her friend will be staying in the suite tonight. They'll be ordering supper and breakfast. Thank you.' He dropped the receiver back on the cradle. ‘It'll be here in ten minutes.'

‘That gives me time to bag first bath in that royal
bathroom.' Kate carried her haggis into the bedroom and closed the door.

‘Tactful friend you have there.' Haydn went to the bar and poured himself a whisky.

‘Kate's been my best friend since we started grammar school.'

‘And you went to the same college?'

‘By chance. Kate's main is English and she really wants to be a teacher.' She wrinkled her nose.

‘Your mother told me you want to be an artist and only went to teacher training college under sufferance because she nagged you to study for qualifications you could fall back on if you had to. But she's right. It's good to have something in reserve. And, before you tell me I didn't have anything other than my voice, you'd be right. But unlike you and your brothers and sisters, I never had the chance to go to grammar school.'

‘Mam told me you started work when you were fourteen.'

‘Ten,' he smiled. ‘She never found out I mitched off to work the markets and run errands. But your mother started work as a ward maid in the Graig Hospital before her thirteenth birthday. Heavens above, I'm beginning to sound like the old men who bored me witless when I was a kid. Let's settle for your mother and me grew up in different times.' He held up his glass. ‘Can I get you anything?'

‘No thanks, not on an empty stomach. I've never had much of a head for drink.'

‘Then you don't take after the Powell side of your family. Orange juice or water?'

‘Water please.'

Haydn poured her a glass of water and added ice and a slice of lemon. He carried the drinks from the bar and sat at the opposite end of the enormous sofa. ‘So, you're going to the States?'

‘How do you know?'

‘Kate told me. That
was
why you were getting visas from the American embassy?' he checked.

‘And work permits; we're hoping to find jobs over there.'

‘If you want to see the States, why don't you and Kate stay with Poppy and me in Vegas?'

‘That's kind of you …'

‘You wouldn't be playing gooseberry. Poppy and I are way past the honeymoon stage. Maud put paid to that. You and Kate would be doing me, or rather Poppy, a favour. I work long hours and she loves company. The house has a pool and stables. Last I heard, Poppy had bought two horses and a pony for Maud, and hired a man to take care of them, so you won't even have to muck out,' he coaxed.

‘It's not that, Uncle Haydn. I'm hoping to waitress or barmaid in New York so I can see the museums and art galleries. And Kate has already written to a few summer camps.'

‘If its jobs you want, I could ask around. I know people—'

‘Thank you,' she interrupted. ‘But—'

‘You want to stand on your own feet,' he guessed.

‘I try. But sometimes, like today, I don't always succeed.' She picked up her glass of water.

‘You're a stubborn creature, aren't you?' he mused. ‘I take back what I said earlier. You're a Powell after all.' He frowned. ‘You've never been to the States, have you?'

‘I've never been in a plane. The furthest I've travelled is Italy. And then only with Mam and Dad.'

‘Your father likes his culture, and driving around Europe. I've never acquired the taste. It's bad enough driving on the wrong side of the road in the States, and the roads there aren't as crowded as they are here. America's not like Europe, Pen, but you wouldn't be going there if it was.' He sipped his whisky thoughtfully. ‘Someone once told me it's a country best seen from the air. They're right.'

She was intrigued. ‘What do you mean?'

‘Have you seen
West Side Story
?'

‘The film, yes, I loved it.'

‘I'm glad you agree with the people who voted for the Oscars,' he commented dryly. ‘Do you remember the beginning?'

‘When the camera pans over New York? Yes. It looked beautiful.'

‘It did,' he concurred, ‘but they opened with the standard shot of the skyline of Manhattan they always use in movies whenever the producers want to glamorise the city.'

When her uncle said ‘movies' she realised how far he'd travelled from Pontypridd, where everyone referred to films as ‘pictures'.

‘The difference between
West Side Story
and most movies set in New York is the camera zoomed down
to street level so the audience could see a little of the reality of the city. The streets came as a shock to me after the skyline of tall, clean, grandiose skyscrapers I saw from the air when I first flew in to Idlewild in the late Forties. The sidewalks are dirtier and seedier than Europe. There's more litter and you're surrounded by tacky advertising, most of it on billboards that block out whatever's behind the sidewalk. Which is why even the country areas look better from a plane, because all you can see of a billboard from the air is the top. And the people …' Haydn hesitated.

She sensed he was choosing his words carefully.

‘Americans are the kindest most generous people on earth. But they don't have our sense of humour or understand sarcasm, Pen. A word of warning: never, ever, make jokes about their president, country or flag. Certainly, not in the way
That Was the Week That Was
does about our government and the royal family. Please, be careful what you say to them.'

‘Sounds like you're afraid I'll end up in an American police cell.'