Darling Sweetheart (26 page)

‘Fine, thanks… but the press didn’t take long to catch up.’

‘Lucky Bernstein was there, huh?’

‘Harry, are you going to have me shadowed for the rest of my life?’

He grinned and took her arm. ‘I said you ain’t seen the best bit.’ He led her off. ‘These sets are fantastic, very authentic. They’d goddamn need to be, the money they cost.’ He walked her past a two-storey hallway and staircase; galleried, almost like a wooden version, it seemed to her, of the hallway at Whin Abbey. They passed replica corridors and the inside of a stable. Finally, they stopped at the far end of the studio, before a mockup of a panelled bedroom with mullioned windows, tapestries and a four-poster bed. Emerson flung himself onto it.

‘This is it! This is where you and me are gonna
do
it!’

Her mouth went dry.

‘Woosh!’ He waved an arm. ‘Set that screen on fire! Scarlett and Brett, baby! Scarlett and Brett!’ He patted the bed, indicating that she should sit with him, but she stood rooted to the spot.

‘It’s Rhett…’ she whispered.

Suddenly, all the spotlights came on at once, bathing Emerson in a bright white version of the fire he craved.

‘Hello, Harry.’ The voice came from above. ‘You want to rehearse your big sex scene, yes?’

Emerson shielded his face. ‘Peter. Come down from there. And kill those goddamn lights, will ya?’

The director’s laugh was echoing and sardonic. Slowly, the blinding brightness dimmed to a more tolerable level then foot-seps tapped on metal. A few metres away, Tress stepped off a ladder. He looked tired and spaced-out; however, even more pointedly than Frost, he did not acknowledge her.

‘As you can see,’ he addressed Emerson, ‘we are still setting the lights. We flew in from Bordeaux this morning. But if you
have an hour to spare,’ and now he smiled at Annalise, but it was a mocking smile, ‘what a delight for us to be able to run a few checks on the real thing.’ He bowed, inviting Annalise towards the bed, but still she did not move. He leered. ‘Belle Annalise! Why so shy? I am expecting to see great things on this set!’ He patted a bedpost, as if testing it for strength. Her stomach turned cold. She had known for many months that she would have to film a big sex scene with Harry Emerson; she had known for months that other people would watch her do so on set initially and then on cinema and television screens all around the world for years afterwards. But, suddenly, confronted with the venue, she felt like a prisoner on death row. Which is utterly ridiculous, she told herself; you’ve done this before, you can do it again – what’s so different about now? You did it in
Popular Delusions
, you did it in
La Belle Joanna
, you did it with Jimmy; it’s a woman’s lot, part of the job, so what’s all this about prisoners on death row: this is your hottest scene in your biggest movie yet! Bug-face! Hello-o! The smart play here is to set Harry-boy’s screen on fire then marry the jerk and grab what you can! Even if you have to screw him for real, so what? It’s all a big act so get your sweet young arse onto that mother-lovin’ set and do what you’re fecking well being paid to–

‘Shut up!’ she screamed. ‘SHUT UP!’

Silence.

No one spoke, but everyone looked at her for what seemed like a very long time. Eventually Emerson asked, ‘Err… who should shut up, Annalise?’

‘P-pardon?’

‘You just yelled, “Shut up”, but no one was talkin’ to ya.’

‘Sorry. Sorry. I… I think I need a cup of tea or something.’ She walked quickly away.

‘Annalise!’ he called after her, but she pressed on, weaving around sets, crew and piles of equipment. She thought she might faint again before she made it to the exit but she burst
outside, gulping lungfuls of cold, Middlesex air. She looked around. The canteen was only a minute’s walk away down the canyon-like street between the massive studios; maybe a cup of tea might not be such a bad idea, given that she hadn’t eaten any breakfast or anything the night before. She set off, but the studio door opened behind her and she heard the clack of heels. It was Frost. For a moment, Annalise expected an imperious command to get back inside and apologise to the great H.E., but Frost was smiling.

‘Hey! I have somethin’ of yours!’ She opened her purse and extracted Annalise’s passport. ‘I forgot to return it to you last night!’ Dazed, Annalise pocketed the document.

‘Thanks.’

‘Yeah… who knows when you might need it, huh?’ Frost seemed inordinately cheerful – the effect was even more unnerving than her usual ice-maiden act.

‘Look, uhh… please tell Harry I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

‘Sure! What’s the rush? He’s only makin’ an eighty-million-dollar movie here.’

‘I’m sorry, I just need to–’

‘Honey, lemme tell you somethin’ about Hollywood A-listers: they require total obedience twenty-four-seven, and they don’t like hangin’ around.’ She laughed. ‘But just you take your precious time.’

A realisation struck Annalise. ‘You love him, don’t you?’

The false good humour fell from Frost’s face. She looked as if she wanted to say more but instead spun on her heel and stalked off.

Annalise went to the canteen. The bump on her head ached more than ever. She served herself tea and looked around for the most isolated table. It was only then that she noticed a huddle, a mixture of runners and charge hands from
The Perfect Heresy.
They were all sat around a corner table, and they were
staring at her. A laptop was open in their midst. One of them stood up.

‘Hey, Annalise!’

It was Holly Spader, wearing a medieval costume that exposed more of her chest than it covered. ‘C’mere,’ she beckoned. ‘Have ya seen this?’ Spader trotted over, put an arm around her waist and pulled her towards the group. ‘Your ears must be burnin’, ’cos we was just talkin’ about you! You know this guy, right?’ She pointed at the laptop. ‘You told me he was, like, your boyfriend?’

The screen displayed YouTube. Spader clicked on it. Conscious of everyone watching her – they’d obviously been viewing the clip before she arrived – Annalise saw footage shot from amongst the crowd at a concert. The sound quality was awful and the camera shaky, but Lone Blue Planet finished a number and the audience cheered. Then, Jimmy dumped his guitar on the floor, clenched his microphone in his fist and strode to the side of the stage, where he proceeded to climb the speaker stack; somehow, he made it to the top, at least twenty feet up. Two roadies ran over but, like the rest of the band and the audience, there was little they could do except watch. He screamed, ‘This one’s for you, Annalise!’, then opened his arms, like Christ. He jumped off the stack. The crowd roared and the picture went black as the camera tried unsuccessfully to see where he had landed. The clip ended.

‘Says here it was filmed in some place called Shepherd’s Bush last night.’ Spader grinned, but her hard brown eyes searched Annalise’s. ‘That
was
your boyfriend, right?’

Jimmy. Bloody hell. Annalise backed away. Spader began to laugh, as did some of the others, although mostly they just stared. She dropped her cup, but didn’t notice it break, or the tea splash over her boots. ‘Oops!’ Spader sniggered. Annalise could hear Froggy saying, ‘I’ll kill her I’ll kill her I’ll fuckin’ kill her!’ She ran, with Spader’s nasty laughter in pursuit. She fled out
the front of the building. A black taxi was dropping off a fare; without asking for permission, she dived into it. Luckily, the driver was free to go to Greenwich, but she was shaking so much that, halfway there, he asked whether she was all right. When they reached her street, a press pack surrounded the car, pushing cameras against the windows and shouting questions. They jostled the door so much that she couldn’t open it. The driver jumped out and yelled, ‘Get off my cab! Get off my cab!’ and the pack fell back just far enough to allow her to squeeze through and stumble up her house steps, half-blinded by flashes. She slammed her front door, but now they hammered on it. The downstairs phone began to ring. Fighting for breath, she ran up to her office and stabbed at her computer. She sat with her head in her hands while it booted up.

‘Don’t look,’ Froggy said.

But she googled the words ‘Jimmy Lockhart’ and picked one of the many offerings at random:

‘I warned you.’

‘Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up!’

‘Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.’

Her head throbbed. The phone downstairs went on ringing, ringing, ringing, then the front doorbell chimed and the knocker rapped
rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat.

‘Miss Palatine!’ A voice called through her letterbox. ‘We only want a few words! How do you feel about Jimmy Lockhart? We can offer you a lot of money!’ The knocking resumed, forming a horrid backbeat to the downstairs telephone.

Suddenly, her office phone chirped, making her jump. She stared at it for a few seconds. Only one person in the world had that number. Still, when she lifted the receiver, she said nothing, just to be sure.

‘Annalise? Hello?’

‘Conrad,’ she whispered.

‘Annalise! What the
hell
is going on? Are you all right?’ Her agent’s accent had lost all its plummy pretence and reverted to an honest Reading whine. ‘Listen,’ he continued when she didn’t answer, ‘whatever’s happening, I’m behind you all the way, but I got the press ringing my phone off the hook and now Emerson’s people are looking for you. Why aren’t you at
Shepperton?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What’s wrong, Annalise – you sick or something?’ ‘Maybe.’

He paused. ‘So what do I tell Emerson’s pet dragon? You got a twenty-four-hour flu? Gastroenteritis? Bubonic flipping plague?’

‘Could you tell them that?’

‘I’ll do whatever you want me to, that’s my job, but I also got to warn you – apparently Emerson’s going mental.’

‘He’s not the only one.’

‘Pardon?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Should I ring a doctor?’

‘No. I can do that myself.’

‘Okay…’ Loach sounded doubtful, ‘I don’t want to add to your woes, but the evening papers… well, they’re a bit nasty, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the morning papers were worse. Your pop-star boyfriend, ex-boyfriend, whatever – he’s played the sympathy card like a pro and
The Star
are saying that your bodyguard assaulted their hacks. This is getting a bit out of control. Listen – I know most of the editors. Maybe I should make a few calls?’ She didn’t respond. ‘If I do, I’ll need to feed them something to sweeten them up, so what should I say?’

Froggy answered on her behalf. ‘Tell them that Jimmy Lockhart screws underage girls.’

‘Sorry? Who’s that? Is someone there with you? Hello? Hello?’

She slammed the phone down and attacked her office, pulling open drawers, scattering books off shelves and tossing scripts across the floor. Her whirlwind hunt widened to the spare room, with its cold, unused single bed. Then she tore at the drawers in her own bedroom, until she remembered a wicker box at the bottom of her wardrobe. She handled this a bit more
carefully: it contained a tatty old script from the first television show she’d ever appeared in; there were photographs, mostly of herself and Sylvia; a pair of leather pumps with holes worn in the soles; a dog-eared copy of
The Tempest…
Then, she found it: a little grey contacts book, crinkled at the corners, a memento of the days before mobile phones – or at least, the days before she could afford one. She ran back to her office. Through the window, she saw two photographers prowling her back garden. She ducked out of sight, fumbled through the little book then dialled a number in Devonshire Place, next to Harley Street, in west central London.

She had known that Darling Sweetheart would leave her again months before he finally did. She was almost nine when the beautiful world they had built at Whin Abbey started falling to pieces. He and her mother fought openly. Sometimes, Mrs Crombie would take Annalise from the house when the shouting started, but mostly the arguments flared at night, after the cleaner had left for the evening. Then, she would listen from the shadows of the upstairs gallery, hugging Froggy. If it got really bad and her parents started smashing things, she would hide behind the sofa in the library. The fights always ended with her mother crying in her bedroom and Darling Sweetheart locked in one of his sulky places. But worst of all was not the actual fighting, rather the way it became harder to draw him out again afterwards.

One morning, she was eating breakfast alone in the kitchen, when she felt someone watching her. It was her mother. She was standing in the doorway and wore nothing but a see-through negligee – no dressing gown, no slippers on her feet. Her eyes seemed larger than normal, her lips thin and colourless. It was an unusual sight, because her mother never got up in time for school.

‘This is all your fault.’

At first, Annalise had not understood. Had she spilled something? Had she disturbed her mother’s sleep?