Wishful Thinking (42 page)

We migrated into the sitting room for digestifs. I made up my mind to try and talk to Todd – I was his editor, so it would be perfectly natural, indeed rude not to do so – but Helen went to his side and latched on to his arm like a parasitic fungus, and I was left with bilharzia. They formed part of the bright centre of the room, and as usual, I was on the outer rim, feeling it would be mean to abandon Enoch, and knowing I wouldn't be able to relax with Todd in front of Helen.

Then, as the evening dragged to a close, she went to the loo, and he came over to me.

‘Am I interrupting?' he said, glancing at my companion.

‘Not at all,' I gasped. ‘Enoch here was just – was just—'

‘Sleeping sickness,' he declaimed. ‘Swamp fever. Beriberi.' Standard phrases flowed over us: ‘. . . has been partially eradicated . . . mutations . . . new strains . . . resistant to antibiotics . . . poor medical facilities . . . eradicated . . . strain . . . antibiotics . . .'

Todd listened with the respect we always accord to scientific knowledge, even when it's pissed. Presently, he murmured to me: ‘Have you had this all through dinner?' I nodded. ‘I'm surprised you managed to eat anything. I thought what Laura calls her timbales were a little peculiar anyway.'

‘
I
thought a timbale was a kind of drum.'

He raised one eyebrow and one corner of his mouth.

‘I know it's a bad joke,' I said, ‘but it's late, and I've had far too much to drink.'

Enoch was winding down and hadn't seemed to register that he no longer held his audience. We saw him lurch slightly, and assisted him into a chair. ‘I'm sorry we didn't get more time to talk,' Todd said.

‘Me too.'

And then, just as things were looking up, Helen came back, sweeping him away – ‘Darling, we must go. Lovely party, Laura. Adored the timbales . . .' – and he was gone. I wondered how many dinner parties I would have to attend before I ran into him again.

The PR meeting in Jerry Beauman's flat was something of a disappointment. We colonised an area of the living room where I hadn't been before, sitting on a nest of sofas with coffee on a table in the middle while Georgie did her stuff. She'd brought her briefcase (the kind on a shoulder-strap) which she said, for all practical purposes, was quite unnecessary, but she carried it to meetings like this because it always made a good impression. She produced busy-looking files and expounded on the essential ingredients in a large-scale marketing and publicity push: poster campaigns on the Underground and mainline train stations, advertising in magazines and colour supplements, display space in bookshops and point-of-sales promotion. ‘We've got a big budget,' she said, ‘but we need to make sure it's targeted on the important things.' Targeting is a favourite term in publishing PR, generally used to convince lesser writers that money is being spent on them when it isn't. We don't have the cash for a full-page spread in
The
Times
, because we're
targeting
other areas. Georgie was so used to flourishing the word it slipped in even when she didn't really need it. The budget for Jerry Beauman was substantial – but of course, she was trying to avoid paying for the party.

Launch parties, though fun, contribute little to writers' sales. (And if nobody turns up, it's embarrassing.) There are only two reasons for having one: a) if the writer is so well known or well connected you can guarantee wall-to-wall celebs, and diary and literary hacks who will all do puff pieces the next day, or b) if you are pushing the writer more than the book, usually a first timer, like Vijay Ramsingh. Jerry Beauman, of course, came into category a), but fraud and prison had rather damaged his party cred, and former celebrity mates might be unwilling to risk their reputation being seen drinking his champagne. However, Alistair's main reason for not wanting to finance the launch was much simpler. He was as tight as a duck's backside.

‘We're up for one of those book-of-the-month things in Smith's,' Georgie was saying. ‘Recommended Thriller for Christmas, something like that. It'll give us plenty of poster and shelf space instore.' Most people don't realise this, but although booksellers ‘choose' titles for those promotions, publishers then have to pay them, so the chances of someone getting picked out of the pile on literary merit alone are zilch. ‘Then we're going to have signing sessions in—'

‘What about the party?' Jerry interrupted. ‘I'm famous for my launch parties. Bollinger and toad-in-the-hole: it's my trademark.'

‘We don't do parties much nowadays,' Georgie said. ‘The climate has changed in recent years.' (i.e. while Jerry was inside). ‘They don't generate sales and the press can be hostile to anything they see as pretentious.' She was improvising furiously here: the press are never hostile to free drink.

‘Nonsense,' Jerry said. ‘The press have always hung on my every word—' though
what
they hung on his every word was another matter ‘– I'll be in every diary, every gossip column, I always am. Good God, do I have to spell it out for you? I'm high-profile, I'm
glamorous
. My dear girl—'

‘We
can
see that,' Georgie assured him sycophantically, bringing a sexy smile into play. ‘But this is a sensitive issue. You're an ex-con – the ultimate comeback kid – and some people will be itching to put a spoke in your wheel. There'll be jealousy – you've met it before. The British press hate success: they're famous for it. They're
really
going to hate the idea that after all you've been through you can come back fighting and top the bestseller lists again. A party gives them a focus, somewhere to put the boot in. I knew you'd be up for it, but Alistair's nervous. He wants to protect you from the envy of small-minded hacks who won't miss the chance to stab a genuine star in the back.'

Georgie really earned her keep, I reflected. I'd never heard so much bullshit condensed into such a short speech.

‘I'll pay for it myself,' Jerry declared. ‘Nice of Garnett to worry, but if his nerve's failed, mine hasn't. I've
always
had a party; I'm not going to stop now.' He might have been setting up a beachhead in a war. ‘I hope I'll have your support?'

‘Of course,' Georgie said instantly.

Lin and I found we too were being fixed with a demanding stare.

‘Absolutely,' I said.

‘Um – yes,' said Lin.

‘All for one and one for all!' Georgie said, getting carried away.

‘That's the spirit!' Jerry said. ‘We'll drink to that. I'll open a bottle now.' He went off to the kitchen, where he had once told me there was always champagne in the fridge.

‘All for one and one for all?' I repeated. ‘I thought that was
our
motto?'

‘Sorry,' said Georgie. ‘He's so ham, it brings out the worst in me.'

‘Will anyone come to the party?' I asked.

‘Put it like this,' Georgie said. ‘If we ask half London, the other half will be pissed off they've been overlooked. Big stars will give it a miss – they'll be too anxious about their public image – but the rent-a-celebs will show up for anything, and the press'll fight to be there. The important thing is, we're not picking up the tab.' With Jerry's return, she switched the smile back on. ‘Champers! How lovely.'

We talked more business, drank the champagne, and waited in vain for an opportunity to check out the bathroom. At one point Jerry went into his study to answer a telephone call, but we couldn't rely on his being gone long enough for us to take a look around. ‘You'll have to distract him,' Georgie said, ‘while I make some excuse to go to his room.'

‘Why me?'

‘You're his editor. He's got a fancy for you. Didn't he encourage you to sunbathe nude on the roof?'

‘Not
nude
. You distract him. He's much keener on you, especially after all that buttering up. I've seen the glint in his eye.'

‘You're the new sex goddess.'

(God, I was getting to hate that phrase.) ‘Well . . . you're the
old
sex goddess. You've got far more experience. I can't do that vamp stuff.'

‘Who are you calling old?'

When Jerry re-emerged Georgie, choosing her moment, asked for the loo. ‘I hope you won't think it awfully cheeky,' she said, ‘but could I use
your
bathroom? Cookie – Emma – tells me it's amazing. Jacuzzi bath and everything. I'd adore to have a look.'

‘Of course,' Jerry said, expansively. ‘Another time, I must show you around. I've got this flat the way I want it now: simple, but not minimalist. I believe in the optimum amount of comfort. Comfort
and
quality – those are my watchwords. This rug's a Bokhara, naturally, and that sideboard was originally made for Brighton Pavilion . . .'

While Georgie allowed herself to be pointed in the direction of the master bedroom and ensuite, I encouraged Jerry to talk more about furniture. He held forth on occasional tables, gilded mirrors, Chippendale chairs and his collection of paintings, while Lin, nudged urgently by me, expressed appreciation at random. I couldn't help wondering how many of his claims about the provenance of his pieces were exaggerated. I resisted the temptation to inquire the pedigree of the sofas, which looked as if they had been made originally by the furniture department in Liberty's, or somewhere similar. When Georgie failed to reappear promptly Jerry became slightly twitchy; his Antiques-Roadshow exposition ran down. I was cudgelling my brains to come up with more diversionary tactics when he said abruptly: ‘Do you think Georgie's all right?'

‘I'll go and see,' I said, clutching at the straw of opportunity.

I found her in the master bathroom (if that's the term) with the door unlocked, on her knees beside the Jacuzzi examining the surround. She didn't even hear me come in.

‘Hi,' I said.

Georgie jumped so violently she dropped the nail file which she had been inserting into the crack in the faux-marble. It was metal, and clinked loudly on the ceramic floor. ‘Cookie!' she gasped, pressing a hand to her bosom. ‘God, you scared me! I thought—'

‘I know. I could've been Jerry Beauman, too. He's getting restless. We have to go back. Any luck?'

‘No,' she sighed. ‘But there's got to be something here. There's no other reason for this section to be in two pieces. Just give me another minute . . .' She retrieved the file and reapplied it to the crack.

‘We haven't
got
another minute. If we all disappear into the bathroom and don't come back he's really going to smell a rat. Remember, he'll be thinking about the money he's hidden here – if it
is
here – and that'll make him seriously paranoid. I'm surprised he ever agreed to your seeing the room alone.'

‘He could hardly keep me company in the loo,' Georgie said as I dragged her to her feet. ‘The money's here: I can smell it.' There was a familiar glint in her eye. ‘All we have to do is get it out.'

‘Look, I don't know what you're planning but we're not crooks, right? Don't go all
Shallow Grave
on me.'

‘It isn't drug money. There are no gangsters on its trail. It's just fraud money, greed money.'

‘And you're greedy!'

‘I'm
desperate
.'

Back in the living room, she erased the frown from Jerry's face with a gush of enthusiasm. Sorry she'd been so long, but she was admiring the gorgeous bedroom (she managed without too much difficulty to charge the phrase with sexual undertones), and then there was that amazing bath! She'd been speculating on what all the different buttons were for, and which jet targeted which part of your anatomy (more undertones). She simply adored Jacuzzis, but she'd never seen one as good as that. Perhaps – one day – would it be an awful nerve . . . ?

‘We'll see,' Jerry said, flicking on a smile.

Faintly stunned by Georgie's audacity – and the fact that she seemed to be getting away with it – I heard her return to the subject of the party. One of the dangers of spending too much time with Jerry Beauman was that, if you lost concentration, you would start to pick up his world view. He had been wrongly maligned, and we had to fight the good fight to expunge the stain from his honour. There were nameless powers out there, trying to do him down. The tabloids were obsessed with scandal and would print any insinuations to pander to the blood lust of the uneducated masses. And so on. Throwing the party (if only to see what it hit) would be a gesture of defiance, a gauntlet in the face of canting hypocrisy, the gutter press, and the aforementioned nameless powers. It would be his way of saying: ‘I'm still the same Jerry Beauman – gallant, unrepentant, triumphant. I'm still king of the heap!' And inevitably we found ourselves compelled to jump on the tail of his wagon and hang on like grim death for the ride.

‘All for one and one for all!' Georgie said yet again, raising her glass in a toast.

But she directed the ghost of a wink at me, and I suspected darkly that it wasn't Jerry's success she was toasting.

Friday brought no respite from our troubles. The weekend brought Andy Pearmain and Catriona to town.

Chapter 12

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

(Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.)

Remember me to one who lives there.

He once was a true love of mine.

ANON