Sugar Mummy (38 page)

'Nothing for me, thank you. Andrew, I know you're not accustomed
to servants and that if you're not brought up with them like I was they can take
a bit of getting used to, but please don't treat them like that.'

'I wasn't. I'm sorry, I just lost my temper.'

Marion looks at the kitchen door and drops down to a whisper.

'I know Anna Maria isn't very bright. Believe me, a clever servant
is a real liability - but you must be patient with her.'

'I am - normally. Anyway, she's in a really bad mood. You, er,
you haven't mentioned to her about this marriage thing, have you?'

Marion is quiet for a moment. 'Well, she knows that I'm looking
for someone to help her out ... I haven't mentioned you in particular but ...'

'But what?'

'Well, she knows that you would be an ideal candidate so she
must be wondering why you don't help her.'

'Why I don't break the law for her?'

'It's not breaking the law, Andrew, I told you, there is nothing
illegal about this. People do it all the time.'

'Oh, I don't want to get into that again.'

'Well, just look at it from Anna Maria's point of view. From
Knightsbridge to Nowhere in twenty-four hours.'

'I spoke to your lawyer today.'

'Oh, yes?' Marion brightens slightly.

 
'He wasn't very helpful
- he gave me a really hard time.'

'Lawyers always treat you like that until they know you. I've
known Gerald for ten years so now he treats me properly. He was the one who suggested
this in the first place.'

'Really? He sounded appalled to me.'

'Only because he doesn't know you.' I look at her for a moment,
wondering why she always has an answer to everything.

Then I say 'I'm going to get some tea.'

'Don't go out. I've got some tea here. It helps make the whites
of your eyes whiter. Look.' She pulls down her bottom lid and stares at me like
a bug-eyed loony.

'Yes, but it tastes like a hamster crapped in the box,' I explain.

'Have you thought any more about Anna Maria?' says Marion over
a glass of champagne flat evening before we go out.

'Oh, God, Marion. I'm not sure. I'm sorry, I'll just have to
think about it.'

'Fifteen thousand pounds. I can make it cash if you want,' she
says, fishing some imaginary speak out of her champagne glass. I think about it
for a moment. Christ, it gets more tempting every time she says it.

'Marion, I just can't. I'm sorry. Can't someone else do it?'

She takes a sip of champagne and stares thoughtfully across the
room for a moment.

'Oh, I'm sure I can find someone. I just wanted to give you first
refusal.'

'Well, thank you.' For what, I'm not quite sure.

'Don't mention it,' she says.

She takes another sip of champagne and I have to ask her, 'Don't
you feel funny about me marrying another woman?'

She looks surprised and then says brightly, 'So are you going
to marry her?'

'Well, I don't know yet, but don't you feel odd about your ...
lover ... marrying another woman?'

'But it's not a proper marriage. It's just a piece of paper,
just a technical arrangement to get over this little difficulty.' She allows her
words to sink in and then, pouring me more champagne, adds, 'It doesn't mean anything.
As soon as the paperwork is done you can start the divorce proceedings. I'd do it
myself if I could, but being a woman and an American citizen I kind of fall down
on two counts.'

The gratuitous sarcasm actually undermines her appeal slightly
by making it obvious that she thinks she is talking to an idiot. Obviously realizing
this, she adds, 'I'm sure Mark could find me someone else and I'd pay them - not
as much, of course - but I wanted to help you out financially.'

'I suppose so,' I say, taking a sip of champagne thoughtfully.

'Look, I've been thinking,' she says, leaning over and pushing
my hair away from my forehead. 'I would still very much like for you do this marriage
thing. It is, as I said, a great opportunity but I've got something else which might
help you earn a bit of money. I know that boys from Reading who sell space don't
often get the chance to make something of themselves but after our conversation
over dinner with Charles and Victoria the other evening, Charles told me today that
he's got a friend who's starting some businesses and he could really use some help.'

As we're driven to one of Marion's friends' houses for dinner
I begin to think, why not? I've been thinking about this business thing quite seriously.
With some capital from Marion and perhaps some of her friends plus Charles's contacts,
this might be a runner. After all, most of Marion's friends seem to make money more
easily than running it off a photocopier so there might be some trick I can learn
from Charles's colleague.

If I do the marriage thing, take my fifteen thousand and get
some sort of project going with Charles or one of his mates, then I'll be doing
OK.

It would make it easier for me and Marion to split up. I shoot
her a guilty glance. Sorry, Marion, but I can't do this much longer. With a tidy
sum in the bank and my own little business venture I won't be doing badly - even
Jane can't object to that.

Charles sounds slightly nonplussed when I call him the next day
and remind him of his conversation with Marion about a business colleague looking
for help.

'Oh, er, yes, of course. He's a young guy I know who is working
in property, at the moment. It's a growing market. I think he's looking for someone
to help raise finance,' he says in his mid-Atlantic, aristocratic drawl. 'Your experience
is in sales, isn't it?'

Flattered that he remembers my job, well my former employment,
I confirm this, click into sales mode and give him a quick spiel about my talents
and experience.

'Very good, very good indeed. I think you might be just what
... er ... my ... er business associate is looking for.'

Chapter
Nineteen

So the following Monday I am up early - well, ten-thirty, pacing
around the living room with a mug of tea in my hand, dividing my attention between
I Love Lucy on the telly and the front door. I am ready for business: smart suit,
new tie, shaved and groomed with free samples from some of Marion's magazines.

Charles's colleague is Ralph and he is going to introduce me
to the property business. I've been reading up on the sector in the newspapers and
the business magazines in the last day or so and I've reached the conclusion that
the market being what it is, provided you've got the capital, you can't really fail.
And Charles and Marion's friends sure have the capital.

Marion, who has gone out to have something plucked or massaged
or reshaped, stroked my cheek and wished me luck before she went.

I've decided against a briefcase because I'll look like a sales
rep and also because I don't want Ralph to think that I think that making money
in business is about writing your name and today's date neatly across the top of
a piece of paper.

Ralph finally arrives. An hour late. I get to the door before
Anna Maria does. At first I think there is no one there but then, when I look round,
I see him slouched against the side of the house. He is younger than I expected,
his face a gruesome patchwork of bum fluff and eczema. His mousy hair looks like
it has never been combed and he is wearing a pair of knackered old aviator sunglasses.
He is also sporting a very old, navy blue Crombie overcoat, an Oxford cotton shirt
and red corduroy jeans without a belt.

'Hi ...' he says. I realise he's forgotten my name.

'Andrew,' I say, holding out a hand.

'Yeah, hi, Ralph.' There is an awkward pause. 'Shall we go?'
I say.

'Go? Er, yeah, let's go. Er, can I just use your ... er ...'

'Sure, upstairs on the left.'

He stumbles into the house and upstairs. I wait an embarrassingly
long time. When he finally re-emerges I wonder whether to ask if everything is OK.

'Right,' he says, rubbing his hand together.

'OK,' I say enthusiastically. 'Shall we go?'

'What? Oh, yes. OK.'

He leads the way out of the house and sets off down the mews
and out into the street, then he turns round and walks back the other way. We stand
there for a moment. I'm just about to ask what his car, assuming that is what he
has lost, looks like.

Finally he spots a very old, dark blue Jag, which is actually
pretty conspicuous amongst the immaculate Meres and BMWs that litter the streets
around Marion's. As I sit down in the cracked maroon leather seat I can smell stale
cigarettes, body odour and pot. The car, something of a vintage, is a mess. Every
surface is covered with papers, business cards, pages of some fragmented A-Z, cigarette
packets and old Tango cans. I realise that by the time I get out, somehow, somewhere,
my suit will be permanently marked.

Ralph, meanwhile, is trying to start the car, easing out the
choke, tickling the accelerator and whispering, 'Come on, baby, come on.' Finally
the old crate, aroused by his efforts, groans and roars into life.

'Yeah,' gasps Ralph and we move off. We turn out into the main
road and a car we narrowly miss flashes its lights behind us. Ralph seems not to
notice.

After we have been driving for some minutes I try to make conversation
by asking, 'Where are we going, then?'

Ralph suddenly seems to notice my presence. 'Oh, right, yeah.
Where do you want to go?'

'Well, you know best. Erm, I thought we were going to look at
some property or something.'

'Er, OK. Let's do that.' He drives a bit more then says, 'Where
do you think?'

This is beginning to piss me off. 'I thought Charles had spoken
to you about this?'

'Charles?'

'Oh, Christ! Yes, Charles Montague thought you might know of
some properties that Marion and, er, I might want to invest in?'

'Oh, yeah. Of course, sorry, man. Got the picture.' He nods violently
and carries on saying 'yeah' until we come to some traffic lights at which point
he asks, 'I wonder which is the best way to get there?'

He lights a cigarette and begins grooving out to some imaginary
music, thumping on the steering wheel. The car behind us beeps and I realise that
the lights have changed.

'Er, Ralph.'

'Heh?'

The car beeps again. 'Lights,' I say, nodding up at them.

'Christ! God! Sorry!'

We lurch off and drive on a little further until he says, 'Yeah,
Notting Hill. That's the place to invest. I know some beautiful little places round
there.' At last we seem to be getting somewhere.

'Great,' I say enthusiastically. 'Let's go.'

We drive on in silence, me reminding him from time to time to
go when the lights change to green and once or twice to stop when they are red.
Ralph is still grooving out to the track going round in his brain or staring into
space. At one point his mobile rings and he grabs it from the section behind the
gear lever.

'Haello? Er, he's not here. No, I'm just looking after his phone.
No, I don't know where he is.' He doesn't wait for an answer, just switches off
the phone and throws it onto the back seat. I keep looking straight ahead.

Finally we arrive in a deserted street in WII - council blocks
on one side, white stucco terraced houses on the other. The houses have the tell-tale
signs of socio-economic decline Xpelairs at most windows and a line of doorbells
at every front door. Washing hangs despondently from lines on both sides of the
street. In the distance a radio plays reggae and a baby is screaming.

'Where exactly were you thinking of?' I'm hoping against hope
that he has something in mind.

'Erm.' At that moment we pass a For Sale sign and he breaks violently
and says, 'Well, that's something you could be thinking about.'

 
'You know it, do you?'
I say, knowing full well he doesn't but getting pretty pissed off by now.

'Er ... Oh, yeah. Er, look, let's stop and have a coffee, shall
we?' I agree. The smell of the car and Ralph's lastminute braking is beginning
to make me feel sick. We double park and go into a tiny cafe with sticky-back plastic
on the tables and a yellowed picture of some Italian seaside town on the wall next
to a sign written in felt tip offering, 'Gigs £3'.

We order cappuccinos, which I pay for. We take them to an empty
table near the window and Ralph pours sugar from the shaker into his coffee for
a few minutes.

He lights a cigarette and says, 'Yeah, Charles! Jesus!'

I take this to be an opening for some sort of conversation.

By now, I have completely given up on finding any property or
doing any business at all with this daft little turd but I decide that I might at
least find out something interesting and even useful about Charles and Victoria.

'How do you know him?'

'Who?'

'Charles,' I say. 'You fuckwit,' I think.

'Oh, we just move in the same circles. We've done some business
together.'

'Property?'

'All kinds of shit.'

'He seems quite an interesting guy.'

'Yeah. Wild,' says Ralph, blowing smoke out and shaking his head
gently.

'Why's he wild?' I ask, deciding, sod it, let's just go for the
third degree after all. If necessary I'll just put him up against the wall and hit
him a bit or hold his face over the chip pan. 'Oh, he just is. Wild man. Christ.'

'How does he make his money?'

Ralph stares at me for a moment. At last I seem to have engaged
him.

'He's got a number of, er, business interests.'

I nod, knowingly. Ralph sniffs, rubs his nose and mutters something
about paying a visit before we go. He gets up and then from behind me I hear him
being told that there isn't really a toilet but he can use the staff one out in
the yard. I finish my coffee. He hasn't touched his.