KELLY HARTE

was born in Northern Ireland but grew up in England. She has brought up two children, been married twice and now lives in Yorkshire with her extremely verbal Oriental cat. She has an M.A. in creative writing, has written stories for the BBC and is currently writing a TV series and her next book.

Spitting Feathers
Kelly Harte

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

A big THANK-YOU to all those people

who matter to me; you know who you are….

To Joanna, Christian and Martin Harris

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

1

It could be said that I owe everything that’s happened to me in recent months to a mouldering, putrefied watermelon. I was coming to the end of my photographic course when my mother bought two for the price of one at her local market, and because she couldn’t fit both into her fridge she hauled the spare one all the way across town and gave it to me. I’d never had one before, and didn’t much fancy it either. I prefer my food with a few more calories, so I placed it on my ugly bed-sit windowsill and there it stayed until it finally began to collapse in on itself.

It was obviously decomposing from the inside, and it was as I was lying on my bed, noting the still glossy greenness of its skin set against the grey, disused gasometer that had been the view from my window for the past year, that I got my brilliant idea.

I’d been racking my brains for inspiration that would sneak me the end-of-year exhibition prize. I hadn’t been a particularly good student, I am sorry to say. In fact, I’d only just managed to scrape a pass on the course, and my future did not look especially rosy. The best I could hope for was a job in a second-rate studio, taking photos of uncooperative kids and perhaps the odd wedding, if I was lucky. And the only thing that could rescue me now was to win that prize.

It was a very long shot, but one thing I had over the others on my course was a tip-off from a sympathetic tutor about the judge. I’d been told she was one of those arty types, with a penchant for bleak social realism and pretentious titles. And, with this in mind, I set to at once, carefully cutting an artistic slice out of the gourd to expose the festering red flesh inside. Then, with the aid of some carefully positioned lights, I contrasted it sharply against the dreary monochrome background. My masterstroke, though, was the title of the composition. I called it Urban Decay, and the judge loved it.

It got me the prize—a place on the books of a well-known photographic agency—and a whole new future in the Capital. And so there I was, two weeks later, crashing on the sofa at Sophie’s Shoreditch flat while I waited for the expected deluge of offers.

Partly because my prize-wining photo had been of something vaguely edible—before it went off, that was— I’d decided to register myself as a specialist in food photography. It seemed a sensible move to me, what with the many images of food that surround us daily, not to mention that fact that I like the particular subject so much. Another thing that hadn’t escaped me was the possibility of an opening for a Celebrity in that particular area. There are Celebrity everything else, after all—Celebrity chefs, interior designers, hairdressers, gardeners… There are even Celebrity photographers, of course, but none, so far, that I knew about, that specialised in food. None, anyway, famous enough to have their ‘sumptuous homes’ featured in Hello! magazine, and that’s what I mean by Celebrity.

Except that my plans weren’t going too well at that particular moment. To date, in fact, there hadn’t even been a trickle of offers, let alone a flood. Which was why I dived at my mobile phone when it let out its little frog croak that sunny late-September afternoon.

‘Tao Tandy,’ I said eagerly into the mouthpiece, ever hopeful it was the agency calling.

‘It’s me,’ Sophie said, and I tried not to show my disappointment. She’d been ringing me daily from her place of gainful employment to check on my progress—or, more accurately, lack of it. ‘I might have some good news for you,’ she added chirpily.

‘A job?’

‘Better than that.’

‘What could be better than a job?’

‘I sent an internal e-mail memo to all departments of the bank today,’ she pressed on regardless.

‘What kind of memo?’ I asked her with caution.

‘Asking if anyone knew of any affordable accommodation going, of course.’

Of course. Getting rid of me seemed to be her main priority at the moment, and to be honest I couldn’t blame her. She was getting a lot of grief from her snooty flatmates about me staying there in the flat. ‘And?’

‘I think we might have hit the jackpot.’

‘What’s the catch?’ I said.

‘Don’t be a cynic all your life, Tao. I reckon we could be really on to something here. A once-in-a-lifetime offer.’

Which sounded very fishy to me indeed. ‘Where?’ I asked, picturing some bed-sitter-land dive in a run-down part of the city, much like the one I’d left behind in Manchester.

‘Hampstead…’

Now even I, with my limited knowledge, had a good idea that Hampstead wasn’t a run-down part of the city. ‘I thought you said that it was affordable.’

‘But that’s the best bit,’ Sophie said with glee. ‘It’s free. Gratis. Buckshee.’

‘Free as in in exchange for my body?’

‘Free as in in exchange for looking after a pet while the owner’s away.’

‘So there is a catch.’

‘God, Tao. Listen to yourself! You get the chance to live in the most sought-after part of London, for nothing, and you’re still complaining.’

‘I’m not complaining if this is for real, but it just seems too good to be true. You can’t blame me for being a teeny bit sceptical.’

‘Well, it’s certainly not a foregone conclusion. You’ll have to go for an interview—see if the pet owner likes you, trusts you, whatever.’

‘How long is this person planning on being away?’

‘Two months, which would be brilliant. It would give you loads of time to get established before looking for somewhere more permanent to live.’

It would indeed be brilliant, but then something else occurred to me. ‘Who told you about this amazing opportunity anyway?’

‘Someone in Foreign Investments e-mailed me back and we had a chat during our lunch break.’

Foreign Investments… I couldn’t help feeling a tiny bit jealous of Sophie at that moment. We’d both started out at the bank together in Manchester, but it had always been clear that she was the smart one, and so when she was duly promoted to the bank’s head office in London I’d decided to go back to college and study photography. It was the push I had needed to get me out of a rut and into something that appeared from the outside a lot more glamorous and exciting.

‘Male or female?’ I wanted to know.

‘Male,’ she said, suspiciously coy. ‘A very nice male, as a matter of fact, and it’s his great-aunt who owns the house in Hampstead.’

‘Why doesn’t he look after her pet while she’s away?’

There was a slight hesitation. ‘He’s not very good with animals, apparently, and he has his own place to think of. He can’t just drop everything to help Auntie out.’

‘He doesn’t sound all that nice to me. Hates animals, and unhelpful to old ladies. What’s his name, anyway?’

‘Jerome Audesley, and if he moved in you wouldn’t be able to, so you should be grateful.’

‘But what makes you think this aunt of his will like me?’

‘I’m not saying she will. But she’s a bit eccentric, apparently, so you’ve got a better chance than most, I suppose.’

It wasn’t a particularly encouraging response, but I didn’t have anything to lose so I asked for the woman’s name and number. ‘And what sort of pet are we talking about?’ I said when I’d finished jotting it down.

Another slight pause. ‘It’s a parrot,’ she said. ‘And the old lady is extremely fond of him.’

I got the impression she was holding something back, but since I was beginning to like the idea of spending some time in a smart part of town I let it pass. ‘I’ll give her a ring straight away,’ I said.

Mrs Adrienne Audesley had at least three plums in her mouth, and possibly a citrus fruit as well. She sounded posher than the Queen on the phone, and as formidable as Margaret Thatcher. I thought it would be helpful to mention the name of her great-nephew, but it nearly blew my chances there and then.

‘Are you a friend of his?’ Mrs Audesley demanded to know.

‘No,’ I said quickly, guessing the lie of the land by her tone. ‘He just works with a friend of mine.’

There was a slightly suspicious pause, then: ‘Can you come over immediately?’

I could, but, having no idea how long it would take, I said I’d be there within the hour.

‘That will have to do, I suppose,’ she growled at me. ‘Only don’t be any longer or I might have gone out.’

She gave me the address and, worried I might not get there in time via public transport, I decided to take a taxi. I couldn’t believe it when the driver announced that we had arrived, on two different counts: one, because he proceeded to charge me the equivalent of a small ransom demand, and two, because the house that we were parked outside was frankly amazing.

I’d already taken a fancy to Hampstead, which looked more like a large village to me than a part of London—and a very nice one at that. The house itself was just off the main drag, a mellow-bricked Georgian end of terrace with three elegant storeys, plus basement, and a run of steps leading up to a shiny black-painted door. And as I grudgingly parted with my money to the driver, who could not be persuaded that I deserved a discount on account of the fact that I was out of work, I set to wondering which part of the house Mrs Audesley lived in. She hadn’t mentioned a flat number during our phone conversation, but I assumed that her name would be listed along with the other occupants at the main door.

On my way up the tiled steps, I glanced over the wrought-iron railing to the basement, which had its own separate entrance, and guessed that this was where the old lady lived with her parrot. By now I could already see that there was only one buzzer at the front door, which seemed to suggest that the upper part of the house had not been turned into flats after all. And, because I was sort of curious to see who my rich neighbours might be, I pressed it anyway.

The voice went so well with her appearance that I knew it was Mrs Audesley the moment she opened the door. She was tall and well built, and there was nothing about her that suggested frailty despite the obvious advancement of her years. I took a quick guess that she was in her mid-seventies, which would roughly be the same age as my gran, but unlike my gran, with her perm and blue rinse, Mrs Audesley’s silvery hair had been fashioned into an elegant, upper crust, cottage loaf bun.

‘Miss Tandy?’ the woman said, peering at me with alarming scrutiny. I was glad I’d slipped into something smart—well, smart for me, anyway—but I did feel a bit lower-end-of-the-High-Street next to someone who was dressed like a dowager duchess. I’d been living as a student again for the past year, and as money had been very tight, the budget cream trousers and jacket I wore looked a bit shoddy beside her pale blue cashmere twin-set and matching linen skirt.

‘Tao,’ I said, thrusting my hand firmly towards her in pretence of a confident manner. ‘That’s T-A-O,’ I spelled out, ‘pronounced like towel without the E and L on the end.’ I was talking fast, like I always do when I’m nervous. ‘My parents were sort of hippies,’ I offered by way of explanation. ‘Well, my mother mostly. Still is, as a matter of fact. She’s into all that Eastern stuff. And Tao—well, it’s—’

‘It’s from Taoism,’ Mrs Audesley interrupted me, letting go of my sticky hand. ‘A system of religion and philosophy based on the teachings of the sixth-century Chinese philosopher Lao Zi. Come inside, Miss Tandy.’

‘I’m impressed,’ I said, following her into the wide hallway. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who wasn’t one of my mother’s friends whose heard of all that stuff.’

‘I studied eastern religions in my youth,’ Mrs Audesley replied. ‘But I remain a committed atheist,’ she added almost cheerfully.

I just had time to glance at myself in the gilt hall mirror before we moved on, and I squirmed at the state that my hair was in. I’d pulled it into an elastic band before leaving Sophie’s flat, but being fine, and having a mind of its own, a considerable amount had already managed to disengage itself from the fastening. I was desperately trying to tuck it back as I was shown into a spectacular sitting room, complete with stunning chandelier, that overlooked the quiet street at the front of the house. It was decorated in pale blues and creams, with which we, in our current outfits, blended nicely. I sat down when she waved her hand at a brocade-upholstered chair and watched as she moved elegantly towards the black marble fireplace. Above it was what I imagined to be a family portrait—a painting of a good-looking man in military uniform.

‘My husband Larry,’ she said, following my eyes. ‘He died twenty years ago, and although he was handsome he was also very annoying at times, and quite honestly I don’t miss him one jot.’

It wasn’t what I’d expected to hear, but I was beginning to quite like Mrs Audesley’s blunt honesty. ‘I understand that you’re going away for a couple of months,’ I said, deciding to cut to the chase, ‘and that you need someone to look after your parrot.’

‘He’s not a mere parrot,’ Mrs Audesley responded severely. ‘He’s an African Grey. A Congo African Grey, to be precise, and he is very choosy about the company he keeps.’

She gave me a quick up and down again, and I got the distinct impression she didn’t hold out very much hope for me.

‘He’s already turned down several applicants, and if we don’t find somebody soon I may have to cancel my trip.’ She told me that she’d been invited to spend some time with her son and his family in Portugal, and would have taken Sir Galahad—the name of the Congo African Grey—but he’d never been a very good traveller. I got the feeling that she didn’t much care if the trip did have to be cancelled, and that there was an element of simply going through the motions so that she could truthfully tell her son that no suitable parrot-sitter could be found.

We discussed my current situation, which seemed to satisfy her. She didn’t want anyone with regular working hours. It was important, she said, that Sir Galahad wasn’t left alone for more than an hour at a time.

‘My gardener lives in the basement, and he has agreed to step in where possible during absences beyond an hour, but he is often away himself, so close consultation with him will be a necessary part of the sitter’s responsibilities.’

I had no complaints about that, so I showed her copies of my references—from the bank in Manchester and two previous landlords—and she seemed happy enough with them—subject to confirmation by telephone.

‘And when do I get to meet Sir…er…um…Galahad?’ I eventually asked. May as well get it over and done with, I thought, because, despite her tentative approval of my situation, Mrs Audesley had made it perfectly clear that the real test was still to come.

‘He’s waiting for you in the adjoining room,’ the woman said, and it seemed to me that there was a sinister edge to her tone, as if she was getting some morbid pleasure from what was about to take place.

I stood up and, frowning now, made my way towards the door that she indicated by a queenly nod of her head.

‘I’ll leave you alone together for five minutes,’ she said, ‘and we’ll see how the two of you get along.’

One of the joys of ignorance is that you don’t have any preconceived ideas, and I had none whatsoever about African Greys, Congo or otherwise. I was a bit apprehensive, certainly. If it was true that the parrot had already rejected several would-be sitters, then there was a very good chance that he wouldn’t like me either. But I hadn’t lost hope entirely yet, and, most importantly, I didn’t at that stage have any idea what these particular birds are capable of if they take a serious dislike to someone. Had I done so I would probably never have set foot in the same room as him.

I closed the door behind me, because if I was going to make a fool of myself I preferred not to be overheard doing it. I entered what appeared to be some sort of anteroom—not large, like the one I’d just left, but huge by the standards of Sophie’s Shoreditch flat. It was tastefully furnished, with a couple of squashy armchairs and its own blocked-off white marble fireplace, but apart from a couple of landscapes on the walls it was void of any kind of ornamentation. The cage was enormous and hung from a solid-looking brass stand in the far corner of the room. And Sir Galahad was perched on the top of it with his back to me.

I walked up to him slowly and quietly, instinctively aware that this was not the time for my usual slightly-too-loud and sometimes over-the-top friendly approach. I stood watching his back for some time. He wasn’t the most beautiful bird I’d ever seen, but he was certainly handsome, with his dark grey feathers and red-tipped tail.

‘How do, Sirg?’ I eventually said. I couldn’t quite bring myself to use his name in full, because it sounded so daft, and when he manoeuvred his stringy feet around on the bars of the cage to face me I thought I detected a look of puzzlement in his dark eyes. They were surrounded by a circle of white naked skin that I found slightly revolting, but I did my level best not to show it.

He stared back at me hard for some time, and then shuffled a little closer. I lifted my hand to him tentatively and he took one of my fingers gently in his black beak. Or at least it seemed gentle enough until I tried removing it, at which point it turned into a vice-like grip. And as he hung on his eyes never left mine. This lasted for at least a minute, when I decided on two possible options.

One: panic and call for Mrs Audesley.

Or two: show the little varmint just who was the boss.

And, since Option One would guarantee failure, I stared back at him hard, giving him my best evil eye, and then in a low and harsh voice said, ‘Let go of my fricking finger…’

Like Ali Baba and his cave, the bird’s beak sprang open immediately and his head jerked back in surprise. He twisted it away from me sulkily and then slowly turned it back again, and although I must have been imagining it, I could have sworn that he actually winked at me.

Then he waddled to the edge of the cage, hopped onto my shoulder and proceeded to nibble my ear for a moment or two. When I was happy it wasn’t some sneaky trick before taking a piece out of my lobe, I reached up and scratched the feathers on his throat, and he responded by doing a very good impersonation of a vacuum cleaner.

By this time, my five minutes must have been up, because Mrs Audesley entered the room. She seemed rather shocked by the scene of her precious African Grey whispering his version of sweet nothings into my ear, and for a moment, her mouth very slightly agape, she couldn’t say anything.

‘Do I pass the test?’ I wanted to know, and she and the African Grey nodded their heads in unison.

2

The two Cs—Miss Cordial and Miss Congenial—were in the flat by the time I got back to Shoreditch. They were a couple of Home Counties fee-paying-girls-only-school types, who thought it was ‘a lark’ to live in a part of the city famed for its artists, Asian restaurants, and Jack the Ripper—although strictly speaking the fame of the latter is mostly associated with neighbouring Whitechapel. At least that was what they said, but my guess is that they’d far sooner have been within strolling distance of a branch of Waitrose and an exclusive little frock shop if their Daddies’ allowances had only run to it. They were budding would-be It Girls who worked in advertising and marketing respectively, read Tatler avidly, and who both had ambitions of marrying some wealthy, possibly polo-playing chinless wonder who would take them away from the stresses and strains of earning their own living.

Apart from their usual conspicuous consumption, their favourite occupation was making fun of my northern accent. Sophie, my fellow Mancunian, had been in London long enough to soften the edges of hers slightly. Besides which she is very good-looking, wears a thirty-four Double-D cup bra, and has a habit of dating the sort of men the two Cs could only dream about. Which had earned her a certain amount of grudging respect.

How she came to be sharing a flat with two such unlikely females was down to an overheard conversation between what had then been a couple of strangers. In a pub not far from where she worked, Sophie had listened to Jemima and Fiona—as they are known to each other—cattily discussing the recent departure of their former flat-sharer. She’d been swept off her kitten-heel-shod feet by a Brazilian backpacker, apparently, who’d whisked her off to Buenos Aires, and Sophie, desperate for accommodation and never one to miss an opportunity, stepped into the breach.

She told me she could put up with them because the flat was not only handy for work it was also surprisingly comfortable. It was a council flat, as a matter of fact, sublet by the official tenant—which was strictly against the council rules but, since the rent was cheap by London standards, the Cs hadn’t asked any awkward questions when they took over the place. It was a scam, basically, but as I’d seen their landlord—a big burly bloke with a tattoo of a spider’s web on his cheek and a serious attitude—I didn’t blame Sophie for not asking questions either.

They stopped talking when I entered the sitting room and I knew they’d been having one of their bitches about me. Another favourite occupation was pretending to trip over the tools of what I hoped would soon be my trade in order to make a point about clutter.

‘Good news,’ I announced as I slumped on the couch opposite them. They were still in their work clothes, almost matching black suits, and sipping Chardonnay from glasses that were almost as frosted as the atmosphere. They looked at each other and then back at me with narrow-eyed suspicion.

‘I’m moving out at the weekend.’

‘Well, that is good news,’ Jemima said with a smirk.

‘Never mind, dear,’ Fiona piped in pityingly, ‘you tried your best.’

‘I’m not moving back to Manchester, if that’s what you mean,’ I said, in no rush to get to the good bit.

‘Oh dear, you’re not moving into a hostel, are you?’ Jemima sneered. ‘You’ll have to be careful with that equipment of yours. Those places are full of undesirables.’

‘Try again,’ I suggested, and I pulled the elastic band out of my hair and shook it loose. It was well over my shoulders now, and in need of a trim, but that was another thing that would have to wait until I’d earned some money. The two Cs both had expensive hairdos: one short and spiky, one bobbed—both bottled blonde.

‘A cardboard box?’ Jemima quipped.

‘Hampstead,’ I said with a lazy sigh as I heeled my shoes off my aching feet.

They glanced at each other, then glared at me.

‘Hampstead!’ they repeated as one.

‘’Fraid so,’ said I with a sigh. ‘But someone’s got to live there, I suppose.’

They naturally assumed that this was an example of northern humour.

‘Where are you really going?’ Fiona wanted to know, trying to smile now.

‘Hampstead,’ I repeated patiently, crossing my budget-trouser-covered legs. ‘That place with the Heath—surely you know it?’

They did another quick exchange of glances, and then seemed to lose the use of their tongues for a while. Except as an aid to swallow large gulps of wine. I watched as they fumbled for something to say, and was glad I was me and neither of them. They might have nice clothes and well-paid jobs, but they were essentially soulless. And my hair might need a trim, but at least I didn’t have to touch up the roots every three weeks. At least my almost-though-not-quite blonde hair was natural.

‘I expect there are bad parts even in Hampstead,’ Jemima eventually said, but she didn’t sound quite so cocksure now.

‘I expect there are,’ I agreed as I stretched my arms over my head. ‘But where I’m going isn’t one of them.’

It was getting on for six o’clock now. I was later back than I should have been, due to the fact that I’d spent a couple of hours mooching around what was to be my new stomping ground. Before that Mrs Audesley had shown me over the house and assured me that I was welcome to use as much or as little of it as I liked. I think she was a bit hurt at first, to discover that her one-woman African Grey had taken a shine to another. She kept glancing at me curiously, as if trying to work out what it was about me that had captured Sir Galahad’s heart. She told me he’d only taken to one other person in his thirty-nine years. This was her gardener, whom she’d said she would contact later in order to fix up a time for us to discuss our shared parrot-sitting duties.

And then she said something about her great-nephew, the one who worked at the bank with Sophie. And I’m not sure why but it was still bothering me even now.

‘So when exactly are you going?’ Jemima asked, interrupting my thoughts.

‘Saturday morning. You could give me a lift over in your car, if you like.’

Normally there would have been a stock reply to such a wild suggestion that included words like ‘dreams’ and ‘in your’, but I could see she was battling between her natural inclination to be rude and unhelpful and desperate curiosity about my apparent turn of fortune. She skilfully managed to overcome the dilemma with her eventual reply.

‘Well, if it will get you and your junk out from under our feet any quicker I don’t see why not.’

Fiona, who didn’t have a car and was a little less sharp than her partner in malice, looked and sounded appalled. ‘You’re not really going to help move her awful stuff in your car?’ she demanded of Jemima.

‘That way she gets to see my new gaff,’ I answered for her. ‘But it’s okay, Fiona, you don’t have to come.’

She got it at last, and twittered a bit before insisting on helping with the move, at which point Sophie got back and, shocked at this display of co-operation, asked what was going on.

I hadn’t got round to ringing her yet, to telling her the outcome of my interview with Mrs Audesley, and she was clearly delighted when I told her my news. But I didn’t want to go into details with the two Cs around, so I suggested we went and had something to eat at Felix’s Place. ‘My treat,’ I insisted, ‘as a thank-you for tipping me off.’

The café is handily placed on the corner of the street. It’s a genuine old-fashioned greasy spoon, which Sophie and I loved a lot because there wasn’t a bagel or French stick in sight. Just proper bread baps, the size of a side plate, that we had filled with chips and washed down with huge mugs of tea. It’s a sort of endangered species really, Felix’s Place. Somewhere you can fill yourself up for around a quid and where no single item contains less than one thousand calories. It is heaven on earth.

Felix, who runs the place with his wife and whichever one of his seven children happens to be available at any given time, has been there for twenty-two years, ever since he arrived from County Donegal with his lovely wife Angie. They live in the flat over the café and it is not unusual to hear Angie bawling at the kids, which just kind of adds to the homely atmosphere of the place. It was John on duty with his father tonight, a fourteenish-year-old Arsenal fan who flaunted his allegiance with his red and white shirt.

‘You look as if you’ve lost a euro and found a fiver,’ Felix said to me as I rolled up to the counter. Sophie had grabbed the last available table, which happened to be our favourite, and waved to Felix as she slumped triumphantly into a seat. He is one of those men who will insist on living a lie as far as his hair is concerned. The central area of his head is completely bald, but he grows the remainder just long enough to draw it up over the bare patch and then he secures it with a dab of something that could well be chip fat, but I very much hope isn’t—for Angie’s sake. With their pale skin and curly rust-coloured locks, most of the children are clones of their father, and with John at his side it was easy to imagine how Felix must have looked before most of his own hair sadly forsook him.

‘I’ve found somewhere to live,’ I told him, then ordered two of our usual specials.

‘Around here?’ he wanted to know, and I said that it unfortunately wasn’t. He seemed a bit sorry for me when I filled him in, especially when I mentioned the parrot.

‘An ould aunt of mine had one of them fellers, and her life was never her own after he cem through the door. Ruled her with a rod of iron, he did, and he had the foullest mouth that side of the Shannon.’ He’d belonged to a sailor, according to Felix, and as he piled chips into heavily buttered baps, and poured steaming tea into horizontally striped blue mugs, he gave me some milder examples of the parrot’s revolting way with words. ‘T’would make a maiden blush, some of things that he said,’ Felix concluded, ‘so it was lucky, I suppose, that my aunt was as deaf as the hinge on a gatepost.’

Felix had a fine turn of phrase that was all part of the colour and charm of the place, and even though I’d only known him a couple of weeks I felt a bit sad that I would no longer be seeing him on a daily basis. I popped in every morning for a cup of tea, and although I could rarely face cooked food at the start of the day Felix had let me take the odd snap of his mega fry-ups by way of keeping my hand in.

‘But you’ll come back now and then,’ he said as he took my money, and it sounded more of a prediction than a question.

‘For someone with your particular ambitions, you’re not exactly a gastronome,’ Sophie said when I’d squeezed past tables and put the tray down on ours. It was positioned right next to the window, which was, as usual, misted over with condensation.

Her statement was a perfectly true one but I didn’t see why it mattered. ‘Food’s food,’ I told her blithely, ‘and I’m as happy to take pictures of the humble fish finger as I am of squid à la Up Yer Posh Bum.’

‘So,’ she said as she lifted the lid of her bap and squeezed brown sauce over the pile of golden glistening chips, ‘how did you manage it? I’ve heard that the parrot is a hard bird to please.’

‘Which I note that you failed to mention,’ I said sternly when I’d slipped into the seat opposite her.

She smiled at me slyly. ‘I thought if you knew in advance you’d have chickened out.’

‘I would have done if I’d known how vicious he can be if he takes a dislike to someone. Mrs Audesley said that three of the previous applicants are threatening to sue.’

‘So what is your secret?’ Sophie asked me curiously. ‘I didn’t know you had a way with parrots.’

‘African Greys,’ I corrected her as I, being a tomato sauce person myself, coated my chips accordingly. ‘Which his proud owner assures me are a cut above your average parrot.’ To be honest I was just as bewildered as Mrs Audesley had been as to why Sir Galahad had liked me so much. But there was no denying that he did from the way he’d clung to my shoulder and nuzzled into my neck as he made shockingly perfect imitations of all manner of sounds, from an old-fashioned telephone ringing to a toilet cistern being flushed. He also had a lot to say for himself, in Mrs Audesley’s own imperious tones. ‘Do take a seat,’ was one of his favourites, as was, ‘One lump or two?’

‘Maybe I was an African Grey in a previous life,’ I suggested wildly, at a loss for any more reasonable explanation. Then I remembered something—the something that had been bothering me. ‘Mrs Audesley said that he was being very polite today, but that he had a much wider vocabulary which, and I quote, “includes some very extreme vulgarities”, that she blames entirely on her great-nephew.’

‘Who? Jerome?’

I nodded as I pressed down on the butty to make it easier to put in my mouth.

‘She doesn’t seem to like him much,’ I said as I looked over at Sophie now. ‘In fact she was at pains to make sure I understood that he wasn’t to be admitted into the house while she was away.’

‘I can’t think why,’ Sophie replied indignantly. ‘He seems very pleasant to me.’ Which I happened to know was Sophie-speak for, I fancy the pants off him.

‘And she’s not alone in her opinion. As soon as his name came up Sir Galahad announced that he was a “ghastly young man”,’ I said, impersonating the bird’s impersonation of Mrs Audesley’s disapproving tones.

Sophie was munching now, and managing to look defiant at the same time. ‘You don’t expect me to accept that a parrot actually knows what he’s talking about?’ she eventually said. ‘He’s obviously been brainwashed.’

I shrugged as I swallowed. ‘You’re probably right,’ I said, even though she was plainly missing the point. But it didn’t seem wise to labour the point that Mrs Audesley might have had good reason for brainwashing her bird. ‘And if he’s so “ghastly,” why is he trying to be so helpful? Good point,’ I said, deciding to let the matter drop. ‘And you must really pass on my thanks to him.’

Sophie began to thaw a little now and promised she would. We ate in lip-smacking silence for a while then, until we got to the empty-plate, finger-licking stage.

‘I’m so glad you decided to change your life,’ Sophie said thoughtfully then. ‘For a while there I thought you would fade into suburban oblivion.’

‘Me too,’ I said, and for a while there this had indeed been a very distinct possibility.

For years I’d been trying so hard to rebel against the mantra-chanting, Zen-aspiring upbringing provided by my well-meaning but flaky mother that I’d gone too far the other way. This had not only involved seven years’ hard labour in the bank, but also a series of decent, hard-working boyfriends and, finally, the joint purchase of a semi-detached starter home in a respectable neighbourhood with an insurance salesman named Malcolm—Mal, to his friends and former fiancée. It lasted almost a year, until I suddenly came to my senses and told Mal it was over. He was bewildered and angry, of course, but I was determined, and with my share of the money we made from the sale of the semi—there had been a small property boom during our time together—I paid for the photography course and kept a bit back for emergencies.

I know that Sophie still worked in a bank, but it was different for her. Quite apart from her ample chest, she had Snow White looks, with milky skin and raven-black hair, and a game plan in which starter homes had never figured.

‘Oh, God,’ she said. ‘Don’t look now, but I think someone’s heading our way.’

He arrived before I had a chance to ignore her warning, shoving past me to get near to Sophie.

‘Room for a little one?’ her landlord said, briefly showing a set of teeth that would make an orthodontist twitchy. He had on trainers and a grubby grey jogging suit that I’d bet had seen little of the action intended.

‘We’re just finishing up,’ Sophie said, which was thankfully true. She was wearing her smart charcoal work suit, and I was still in my African Grey-beguiling garb, and I suddenly felt that we were a bit overdressed.

He squeezed himself into the space at our table with his rear end spread well over the sides of the chair. He didn’t have any food with him, and when I glanced up at Felix he gave me a wink of encouragement. ‘John will be bringing Mr Parker’s order when it’s ready,’ he called out.

‘Mr Parker?’ I queried with a frown, before I had time to engage caution and prudence. I knew that his first name was Peter, so was this the explanation for the spider’s web tattoo on his face? Did he think he was Spider-Man? I was about to laugh, but I felt a sharp kick on my leg from under the table, and when I glanced at Sophie I realised that pursuing this particular line of enquiry might be a mistake.

He dragged his attention away from Sophie’s Double-D chest and looked at me questioningly.

‘Oh,’ I fumbled, ‘it’s just that my mum’s name is Parker, but I don’t expect there’s a connection.’ It was completely untrue, and a very poor effort as cover-up stories go, but he seemed to swallow it whole. He had very thick, very black hair that I’d never been this close to before. Now that I was it seemed strangely unnatural, and I was finding it difficult to take my eyes off it as he turned his attention back on Sophie. If I distorted my focus by narrowing my eyes it looked exactly as if a fluffy black cat had curled up and gone to sleep on his head.

‘There’s Karaoke at the Peeler Saturday,’ he said to her now. ‘Coming?’

The Peeler was a local dive that you’d only dream of going into if you were especially drunk and happened you have in your company several prize-fighting escorts, and I was curious to see how Sophie would handle turning down such an attractive and beautifully extended invitation.

‘I’d love to,’ she answered sweetly, ‘but I’ll be helping Tao move into her new place, I’m afraid.’

He glanced at me dangerously, as if I was personally responsible for all the troubles of the world. I was tempted to say that I could manage without her help, but I could feel the daggers being aimed at me across the table.

‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘but I’m depending on her.’

There was an almost audible sigh of relief from Sophie, who stood up now and gave me the nod. ‘Another time, maybe,’ I heard her say, and after wishing Felix a fond farewell we left the place, trying not to giggle till we were well out of sight of the café.

‘Is that a wig he was wearing?’ I eventually asked, and it set her off all over again.

‘Of course it’s a bloody wig,’ she finally managed, ‘but the secret is to pretend not to notice. The way you were looking at it I was afraid you were about to give it a tug.’

We took a little diversion on the way back and bought a bottle of Château Cheapo from the local offy. And, because neither of us was in the mood for the Cs, we drank it in Sophie’s bedroom—her sprawled on the bed, me in the lotus position. (Some things die hard, I’m afraid.)

We talked for a while about my prospects, and I got the feeling that Sophie didn’t think all that much of them—at least not on the strength of my work.

‘But then you’ve always been a good bluffer,’ she said, trying to make amends now. ‘And in this town that’s far more important than actual talent.’

I thanked her a bunch, but didn’t take this vote of no-confidence to heart. I was hopeful and optimistic after today and I had a good feeling about the future.

And then, just as we were finishing off the wine, just as we were at that rosy, happy stage where nothing in life seems impossible, she went and spoilt everything by telling me that she might just have met the man she was going to spend the rest of her life with. The only crumb of comfort I was able to take from this alarming statement was the fact that she almost certainly wasn’t referring to someone who wore a dubious wig and had delusions of being an arachnified super-hero.

3

There is always a price to pay for a chip butty, and I paid it next day by missing out on lunch as well as breakfast. Having been brought up on an apparently healthy but deadly boring macrobiotic diet, I am nowadays an enthusiastic eater of junk food, but I know that I have to be careful. Despite the faddiness of my mother’s former regime, she now weighs fifteen stone and, much as it suits her, I don’t want to end up the same way—not for a good few years yet anyway. But, rather than eat a sensible, balanced diet, I eat what I want with big gaps in between.

I took a call from Mrs Audesley first thing that morning, with instructions for me to go to the house at three o’clock ‘sharp’ in order to meet her gardener. Since that meant I had about six hours to kill, I decided to take the tube to Covent Garden, so that I could have several rolls of film developed at the photographic lab recommended by the agency. I knew how to process the stuff myself, of course—just about—but it was such a faff, and I didn’t think the Cs would appreciate me turning their bathroom into a makeshift chemical-filled darkroom.

The Linford Laboratory was in a fairly run-down-looking building in a side road off King Street, and for a moment I thought I must have the wrong address. I was used to labs on industrial estates, and although there aren’t too many of those in central London, I was still very surprised. I wasn’t really sure what I’d expected to find, but since many top professionals apparently used the place, I suppose I thought it would appear a little more on the up-market side. There was just a small, unimposing shop front, and inside a dizzy-looking chilli-pepper redhead behind an old-fashioned oak-topped counter. She greeted me with a hugely welcoming smile, however, and before I’d even opened my mouth asked me what kind of work I did.

‘Food,’ I said, and the smile immediately turned to an expression of disappointment. She was wearing a deep V-necked red sweater that revealed rather desperate-looking breasts that were squashed together by a ferocious up-lift bra. She was heavily made up, and it occurred to me that she was working there in the hope of being ‘discovered’.

‘Are you a model?’ I asked, in an effort to cheer her up.

‘If only,’ she said unhappily.

‘Have you tried the agents?’ I asked as I dug five rolls of film out of my bag.

‘A couple,’ she replied gloomily, ‘but they seem to think that my look is too strong.’

And they could have a point, I thought as I passed the film over the counter. But it was very possible that if she removed some of the slap, and maybe stopped using the chilli-pepper dye, she could look pretty good. She was the right height and weight, and her features looked fairly photogenic.

‘You should try toning things down and then go somewhere else.’

She gave me a What-the-hell-would-a-food-photographer-know? sort of look, and without any response to what was meant to be a helpful suggestion she asked me my name and address so she could write it down on a slip.

I supplied the information and asked how quickly I could have the prints back.

‘It’s usually a day, but you can pay extra, if you like, and we can have them ready in three hours.’

It was a curt response, and I wondered if it was time for some toning down myself. My plain speaking clearly wasn’t going down too well in this town. ‘I’ll pay the extra,’ I said, ‘and I’m sorry for being so blunt. It’s just that you really are very pretty, but it’s kind of hidden behind all the make-up.’

She softened visibly now, and I made a mental note to engage sensitivity before offering any further advice to strangers.

‘Standard E6 okay?’ she said, and I nodded that it was.

‘Do you do the processing here?’ I said curiously as she deposited my films in a large envelope.

She shook her head. ‘This is just the drop-off and collection point. A despatch rider picks up every hour and takes them on to the lab.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘He’s due any minute, so with a bit of luck these might be back in two hours, not three.’

I thanked her, and looked forward to picking up the prints. As well as Felix’s wonderful fry-ups, I’d taken quite a few shots of the Brick Lane Sunday market with my brand-new Hasselblad, and I was hoping they’d turned out well. They certainly should have if the price of the camera had anything to do with the quality of the finished product.

All through the photographic course I’d managed well enough with an old Pentax my father had given to me, but since it was pretty old I’d recently sacrificed an arm and a leg for a brand-new Hasselblad 201F. And that, plus a digital camera, a computer, and all the rest of the paraphernalia required by a present-day pro photographer, had just about cleared me out of what was left of the sale of the semi. But I kept telling myself that it was an investment, that it was necessary to speculate to accumulate, and, having now done a great deal of the former, it seemed high time I started to get some rewards. Which was why I headed straight for the Front Page Agency after dropping off my film.

Naff name, I know, but they seemed a pretty pukka sort of set-up—smart offices, cool-looking people working in them. A bit too cool, though, if you ask me. The receptionist, for example, wasn’t the most approachable person in the world. I’d tried being friendly with her when I first landed in London, in the hope that she’d keep me in mind if anything good came in, but it had been like trying to befriend a refrigerator. Poker-thin—and faced—I think she was afraid to smile for fear of disturbing her magnificently applied make-up. Either that or she’d had radical Botox treatment that had left her incapable of using her facial muscles.

‘Hi, Amber,’ I said. ‘Remember me?’

She cast me a vaguely hostile look and pursed her full, beautifully lipsticked lips disapprovingly. She was sitting behind a glass-topped desk which had on it just a phone, a slim-line computer screen and a cerise leather appointment book. She herself was dressed in matching cerise that, because she’d been wearing it before, I assumed was a uniform.

‘We haven’t got anything for you, if that’s why you’re here,’ Amber replied in an accent that was supposed to be posh but didn’t quite cut the mustard. There was a hint of twang there in her vowels that I think I recognised as Midland in origin.

‘Well, I think I’d like to see someone who’s a little more senior in the organisation, if you don’t mind.’ It wasn’t a comment designed to win favour, exactly, but I was getting fed up with nasty, bitchy women, and I was wondering what had happened to all that sisterhood stuff my mother still gamely talked about. I certainly hadn’t seen much evidence of it in the past fortnight.

She seemed taken aback by my remark, but soon recovered her icy equilibrium. ‘You’ll have to make an appointment,’ she said, opening the diary in front of her, ‘but I don’t have anything available for at least a month.’

‘A month!’

She seemed pleased by my dismay, and delighted with her own power. She might just be a receptionist, but she was God as far as appointments were concerned. I was debating whether to take the appointment or tell her what she could do with it, when a door to the left of the desk opened and two men appeared in the foyer.

They were clearly at the end of a meeting, and as they shook hands I recognised one of the men as Taylor Wiseman, the famous American chef. He had his own hit TV show and a legion of adoring female fans, and while I wouldn’t have counted myself amongst their number, I had to admit that he did look pretty good in the flesh. He was tall and dark and lean, and although I was used to seeing him in the sexy kitchen whites he wore so well to present his shows, the smart suit he’d donned for the meeting gave him a nice touch of the urbane that certainly did not go amiss.

‘We’ll contact a few of our best,’ the other man assured him, with a smile that was midway between charm and smarm.

‘It’s real important that we get along,’ Taylor Wiseman replied in the husky tones that added greatly to his small screen appeal. ‘We’ll be working together closely on this project, so I’m going to have to like the guy, as well as his ideas.’

The other man nodded sympathetically. ‘If I shortlist a few then you can meet them and make your decision.’

‘I’ll wait to hear from you,’ Taylor said, and turned to leave. At which point I moved sideways and blocked his path past the desk.

‘Mr Wiseman,’ I said, thrusting my hand out. I was wearing faded jeans and a good-quality tweed hacking jacket that I’d bought in a charity shop a few years ago. Not exactly how I’d choose to be dressed when meeting a celebrity, especially with my wayward hair and lack of any cosmetic enhancements, but I didn’t have a chance to think about all that. ‘Delighted to meet you.’

I’d taken this unusually bold step with Sophie’s words writ large in my mind. She was forever advising me to ‘get out there and network’, and although I had no real idea what was going on my hunger for work told me there might just be an opportunity here.

‘Likewise,’ he said in his friendly all-American way. I could see his teeth now, which looked even more perfect in real life than they did on the small screen. Their whiteness was exaggerated by his lightly tanned skin and his brown eyes were smiling at me. ‘And you are?’

‘Tao Tandy,’ I replied. ‘Food photographer extraordinare…’ I added with a cheeky wink and a grin, remembering what Sophie had said about my good bluffing skills.

By now the man with whom the meeting had just taken place was at Taylor’s side, an expression of surprised concern on his face. He was quite a pleasant-looking man, with thinning hair and pudgy plasticine features; in his mid-forties, I’d say. He plainly didn’t know me from the Boston Strangler, but I snatched the advantage.

‘I joined the agency a couple of weeks ago,’ I explained to them both, ‘and I thought it was time I introduced myself.’

I glanced at Amber behind her desk and saw that her face was frozen in impotent fury. ‘Amber here was helpfully arranging an appointment for me to meet someone,’ I added with a slight smile in her direction.

‘Jerry Marlin,’ the man said as he extended his hand warmly to me. I recognised the name as that of the agency’s top dog, and gave him flash of my own excellent teeth. They might not be as white as Taylor’s but I pride myself on their neatness.

‘You’re the prizewinner from Manchester, aren’t you?’ he added, and I nodded my head modestly.

‘Well, that’s great,’ Jerry said. ‘I’ve been wanting to meet you as well. Only we don’t seem to have a contact number.’

‘That’s strange,’ I said, glancing towards the reception desk. ‘I left it with Amber a fortnight ago.’

‘It was unfortunately mislaid,’ Amber said quickly, when Jerry looked at her questioningly.

He glanced at his watch. ‘Damn,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a lunch appointment in ten minutes, but I could meet up with you later.’

I was about to agree when I remembered my instructions from Mrs Audesley and offered him a little grimace of regret. ‘I’m afraid I have to be somewhere at three,’ I said, thinking now that it wouldn’t do any harm to appear a little less desperate than I actually felt. ‘But I could come back tomorrow.’

Jerry looked at Amber again, and she sniffed as she looked in the diary. ‘You have a window between ten and ten-thirty in the morning,’ she said glacially.

‘Ten it is, then,’ Jerry said, and with a final appraising glance at me and a sly wink in Taylor’s direction he took his leave of us.

‘And what are you doing for lunch?’ Taylor said when the two of us were left alone—apart from Amber, that is, whose eyes were boring a hole into the side of my face.

‘Missing it, I’m afraid. Making up for a bit of over-indulgence last night.’

He raised one of his thick dark eyebrows curiously, so that it seemed to form an unspoken question mark. ‘How about a coffee, then? There’s a place not far from here that does a great cappuccino.’

‘With cinnamon topping?’

‘You bet.’ He smiled captivatingly.

I slid a look at Amber as I hoisted my bag higher on my shoulder and fell into step with one of TV’s hottest properties. ‘See you tomorrow,’ I said, but failed to get so much as a grunt by way of response.

Things had happened quickly for Taylor since he’d arrived in London, I learnt. He’d been spotted by a TV producer almost straight away, and offered a show there and then. It had been an immediate hit, but clearly took everyone by surprise because no one had thought of a spin-off book to go with the series. So a big glossy had been planned this time, and was due to be launched with series two of the show.

‘Trouble is,’ he said, ‘most of the illustrations are stills from the show, and I just think it needs something else to make it different. Some additional shots to set it apart from the usual stuff. Which is why I went to the agency.’

I could feel my heart beginning to pound as the words BIG BREAK burst into my mind. ‘I might have some ideas,’ I said, without thinking first. He looked at me with interest and I tried not to panic. ‘Maybe we could meet again to discuss them,’ I said, because I didn’t actually have any ideas at that particular moment.

I felt a bit stupid when he didn’t respond directly—when he completely changed the subject, in fact. ‘So,’ he said, when we were half way through cappuccino number one, ‘what kind of food do you like yourself?’

Slightly deflated, but not yet defeated, I lowered my eyes a little as we sat opposite one another in a two-seater booth near the café’s counter. The place looked new—not one of the chains of coffee shops that seemed to be on almost every street corner now, but an independent, run by what I took to be South Americans. I was trying to decide whether to lie and say Mediterranean, which covered a multitude and which, along with Pan Australasian, seemed to be what everyone seemed to be into these days. Or just be honest. I went for the honest option in the end, because by now, having already provided a quick rundown of my credentials, I was beginning to suffer from bluffing fatigue.

‘Being from the north,’ I began, ‘I have a particular partiality to anything which contains a lot of cholesterol—suet, pastry and chips being at the top of my list.’

He grinned uncertainly, not sure if I was serious or not. ‘But how come you manage to keep such a neat little figure?’ he said when he finally accepted I was telling the truth. His lovely dark eyes were constantly smiling, and from him it felt like a genuine compliment.

‘Long periods of abstinence between binges,’ I said, warming to him all the more. I explained why I wouldn’t be having lunch that day, and he seemed quite taken with my description of Felix’s place.

‘I’ve got some photos of it,’ I told him. ‘It’s got a great atmosphere—like something from a different time.’

‘I’d like to see them,’ he said, and I asked him when…

Which was how we came to make the arrangement for me to go to his restaurant the following day. And if he liked what he saw, he casually told me, he might well consider using me on his book. I was naturally cock-a-hoop about this, but since I hadn’t yet seen the results of my efforts I wasn’t exactly counting my chickens. It didn’t stop me indulging in a mental shopping binge, however, not to mention a few choice imaginings about being up close and personal with a popular TV chef. I’d be the envy of housewives everywhere.

I was a third of the way through the second delicious cinnamon-topped cappuccino when the conversation became a little more intimate. I was telling him about the problems I’d been having with certain females lately—no actual names mentioned—and he said it might have something to do with what he called my ‘refreshing openness’.

‘That’s not a euphemism for crass insensitivity, is it?’ I queried wryly, and then related the tale of Miss Chilli-Pepper.

‘Sounds like good advice to me,’ Taylor said with a shrug. ‘Anyway,’ he added after a moment’s thought, ‘why do you mind so much if people don’t like you?’

‘I don’t know, but I do,’ I said, surprised at my answer. I did know, really—but, nice as he was, I didn’t think it was time to tell Taylor the sad story of my early life.

‘Well, I like you,’ he declared, and the creases around his eyes deepened.

I felt my face colour slightly, and steered the focus back to him. It was obvious that things had worked out well for him professionally since he’d arrived in the city, so I threw in a few subtle questions about his social life.

‘I haven’t really had time for much relaxation,’ he said. ‘Sure, I know people, but there isn’t anyone—well, you know…special.’

I found myself frowning as it struck me as odd that a man who was lusted after by thousands of women didn’t have a girlfriend. Of course he could be gay, I supposed briefly, but it wasn’t the signal he was giving out. I couldn’t state with any certainty that he’d been flirting with me, that he was attracted in the fancying sense, but I did get the impression he was quite looking forward to meeting up with me again, and I couldn’t help but be flattered.

It was getting on for two o’clock when I took my leave, having reluctantly declined a third cup of coffee. Which was just as well, really, because three large cups of full-fat milk would have been getting on for the equivalent of another chip butty, and that would have meant forgoing yet another meal if I was to stand any chance of hanging on to my ‘neat little figure’. The reflection of which kept catching my eye in the windows of shops as I practically skipped down the road back to the tube station.

I was still on a high when I stepped off the train at Hampstead—still feeling hopeful about the future despite the uncomfortable proviso that I still had a few hurdles yet to overcome. I’d picked up the developed photographs on my way to the station, but I hadn’t dared look at them yet for fear of spoiling my excellent state of mind. A lot was now riding on the shots having turned out well, and I was anxious to delay any disappointments. However, having arrived at my destination early, and with half an hour’s heel-kicking time on my hands, temptation got the better of me.

Miss Chilli-Pepper had been nice enough, now that we’d got over our small misunderstanding, but for some reason dark thoughts had crept into my head. I began to imagine that I’d detected a hint of smirk on her face as I picked up the package, which I now felt certain had been directed at the quality of my work. I tried to adopt a What-does-a-would-be-model-know? sort of stance, but I didn’t have the confidence to sustain it, and eventually, at the end of the street where Mrs Audesley lived, I decided to put an end to all the suspense.

There was quite a strong breeze going on, but it was warmish and fine, so taking out the pictures seemed safe enough as I perched on a low brick garden wall and delved into my bag. I was starting to have serious doubts now, because without any special lighting I’d resorted to flash, and that can look a little bit amateurish. Still, I tried assuring myself as I lifted the flap of the first envelope, if all else failed I still had my famous watermelon pic to fall back on.

I took a deep breath and slid out the prints, and the photo on top cheered me a bit. It was of a plate of bacon and egg, set on one of the Formica tables and with one of Felix’s customers, knife and fork eagerly poised, grinning toothlessly at the camera. It wasn’t a great photograph, but it was good. Encouraged, I thumbed through the rest and my heartbeat gradually slowed to its regular pace. The market shots weren’t bad either, especially the ones of the French cheeses, which a genuine Frenchman brought over from France every week.

‘Brick Lane market,’ somebody said in my ear, and I jumped so much the photos nearly shot out of my hand. I looked up to see a youngish man leaning on the gatepost next to me. He wasn’t bad-looking, with rich brown, longish hair and a cute smile, but he had a damn nerve looking over my shoulder, so I gave him my best haughty expression.

‘Not bad,’ he said now. ‘Are you a professional?’

This warmed me slightly to him, I suppose—but, flattered or not, I still wasn’t about to engage in cheery banter with a rather scruffy, ill-mannered stranger. He was wearing old jeans with mud on the knees, and a red and white striped rugby-type shirt that was clean enough but raggy and frayed at the edges. I slipped the photos back in their envelopes and glanced at my watch. It was five to three. Time to be off. I stood up and to my surprise, but not yet alarm, the stranger fell into step beside me.

‘We seem to be going in the same direction,’ he said nonchalantly.

‘Not for long, I trust.’

‘You’re from the North, aren’t you?’ he said, not put off by my disdainful tone for a moment. ‘Me too. From Black-pool, originally, but I’ve been living down here for a few years now.’

I recognised the familiar accent now, and I almost dropped my guard for a moment—until he spoilt it with his next words.

‘I take it you’re new in town.’

I didn’t like him pointing out that it was so obvious, and since he was now following me down the path to Mrs Audesley’s house I was getting a bit nervous at his persistence.

‘I don’t think that’s any of your business,’ I said, and then I stopped and looked at him sharply. ‘Look, if this is how people do their pick-ups round here, forget it. I’ve come here for an important appointment and I’d like you leave now.’

‘Can’t do that, I’m afraid,’ he said with a shrug of his admittedly broad shoulders. ‘And, no, this isn’t the way that we “do our pick-ups”, as you so charmingly put it. It’s got the same name here as it has in the North. It’s called being friendly.’

But I was still stuck on the first bit of what he’d said. ‘What do you mean, you can’t leave?’

‘I can’t leave because I too have an important appointment with Mrs Audesley,’ he answered lightly.

I was so busy feeling defensive and foolish at the way he put so much emphasis on the word ‘important’, as if he was making fun of me, that my confusion didn’t kick in for a moment. Then, when he spoke again, it hit me big time.

‘And I also happen to live here.’

I felt a bit queasy then, as I glanced over the railing to the gardener’s flat in the basement.

‘Oh,’ I said, trying to make amends with a silly smile as the penny dropped, ‘you must be the gardener, then.’ He wasn’t what I’d imagined at all. I’d being expecting an elderly retainer type, with a cap and dentures.

He looked amused at my discomfort. ‘And I guessed who you were when I saw you sitting on the wall.’ He glanced at his wristwatch. ‘It’s precisely three o’clock,’ he added coolly now, ‘and our Mrs Audesley sets great store by punctuality.’

4

‘Ah,’ Mrs Audesley declared when she opened the door, ‘so the two of you have already met. Excellent.’

In fact we hadn’t actually got as far as exchanging names, but she’d referred to him as Chris the day before, and I assumed she’d mentioned my name to him. I was feeling uncomfortable because of our small misunderstanding, and it wasn’t helped by the ease Chris and his employer obviously felt in one another’s company. I also noted that Mrs A didn’t seem to mind in the least about his untidy appearance.

‘How are the travel plans going?’ he asked casually as we followed the lady of the house into the opulent sitting room.

‘Not bad,’ she replied. ‘Marcus has arranged most things. It’s just a matter of packing, really, though one needs so much for so many weeks away from home,’ she added with a wistful sigh. She indicated that we should take a seat and then turned her attention on me. ‘I’ve checked your references and everything seems to be in order.’

I nodded demurely and waited for her to continue. Chris had taken the seat next to me on the sofa and Mrs A remained on her feet, just as she had the day before. She was wearing an expensive-looking ensemble in beige today, with a single row of no doubt real pearls around her well-pre-served neck. I’d taken to looking at women’s necks of late. The last time I saw my mother I’d noticed that hers was looking rather scraggy, a bit turkeyfied, and if I took after her—as I already feared I might in the genes department—that was presumably another undesirable physical feature I had to look forward to in about twenty-five years.

‘I’m making a list of dos and don’ts regarding Sir Galahad,’ Mrs A went on, ‘which I’ll have ready for you on Saturday afternoon.’

‘Is that when you’re leaving?’ Chris wanted to know.

‘Yes. A taxi will be arriving for me at four p.m., by which time I trust that Tao will be settled in.’

‘I thought I’d get here around midday,’ I said. ‘If that’s okay with you.’

I didn’t hear Mrs A’s reply because at that moment an almighty squawk let rip from the adjoining room. Knowing looks were exchanged between the two other people in the room with me, and while I looked on blankly Chris got up.

‘Come on, old feller,’ I heard him say as he opened the door and went inside. When he reappeared Sir Galahad was perched importantly on his shoulder. Until he saw me, that is, at which point he squawked again, flapped his wings, and took off in my direction. He landed safely on the top of my head and immediately enquired whether I’d like ‘one lump or two.’

‘We haven’t even poured out the tea yet,’ said Chris, who was now standing next to a side table on which was arranged a formal looking tray of tea things. ‘Shall I pour, Adrienne?’ he asked his employer, and I was struck again by his easy familiarity with the dowager duchess, and the fact that he used her first name.

Mrs A nodded and finally sat in a chair at right angles to me.

‘He’s been very excited at the prospect of seeing you again,’ she told me, which seemed a little bit far-fetched, but I didn’t think it would be wise to say so.

‘That screech was his welcome cry when he heard you speak,’ Chris chimed in. ‘I used to get it, but he takes me for granted these days.’

He brought tea over for Mrs Audesley and me, served in fine bone china cups—with saucers, of course—and placed them between us on a wine table. Meanwhile, Sir Galahad was gently plucking my hair, and purring like a contented cat. I reached up and ruffled his throat feathers a little, and he announced in the fondest of terms that my mother was sired by a German shepherd.

‘Sir Galahad!’ Mrs Audesley bellowed severely, and the bird instantly flopped down onto my shoulder. He extended his head round to my face and tut-tutted at me, as if I was the one with the foul mouth.

‘I’m sorry about that, Tao,’ his owner said, ‘but I think I warned you that his language can be a little spicy at times. I think he does it for attention now. You’re a naughty little show-off,’ she said, wagging her finger at the bird indulgently.

‘Adrienne blames her wayward nephew,’ Chris said as he took his place next to me again. ‘But I’ve heard him say things that couldn’t possibly have come from Jerome.’ He looked accusingly in Mrs Audesley’s direction, and she gave in with the tiniest hint of a grin.

‘My husband was a little deaf, and I’m afraid I used to say things under my breath which Sir Galahad later repeated.’

‘Silly old fart!’ Sir Galahad piped in, as if he understood what she was saying all too well and was obliging us with a small demonstration.

Mrs Audesley chuckled fondly at this, and then glanced at the portrait of her husband. ‘He was a lot older than I was, and I’m afraid he could be very difficult at times. I was tempted to poison his pink gin on several occasions,’ she said lightly, ‘but I released my emotions with the occasional whispered insult.’

Just then the bird started making a noise that sounded as if he was imitating someone being strangled, and I glanced at Mrs Audesley questioningly. She was looking at the bird with surprise, as if this was a new one on her as well. I turned to Chris, and as he mirrored her expression the noise suddenly changed to a cough and I felt something land on my lap. A small ball of I wasn’t sure what. I picked it up and examined it more closely. It looked like a tightly compressed orb of seeds and vegetable matter, and a quick sniff confirmed my suspicions. The strange object had come from within the bird. Luckily I am not particularly squeamish, so I held it up to the bird and thanked him for the presentation.

At which point Mrs Audesley let out a sigh. ‘If there was any doubt about his affection for you,’ she began mysteriously, ‘then there is no longer.’

Still none the wiser, I frowned at Chris.

‘I should be offended,’ he said wryly. ‘It’s a regurgitation. They only do it for those that they love, and I’m afraid he’s never done it for me.’

‘That’s because you’re a man,’ Mrs Audesley said soothingly. ‘It’s clearly something he saves for the women in his life—although until now it’s only been me.’ She glanced at me sadly, but without resentment. ‘And I have to admit he hasn’t performed for me in quite a long time.’

The bird appeared to be listening intently, and whether or not he understood—and I was sure, of course, that he couldn’t—he lifted his wings and took off towards his mistress where, on the top of her perfectly coiffured head, he announced, ‘Here is the shipping forecast,’ in a perfectly enunciated BBC accent.

‘It’s no good trying to sweet-talk me now,’ his mistress said in feigned hurt tones, but she ruffled his feathers just the same. She might have looked faintly ridiculous, with a bird on her head like some bizarrely plumed hat, but somehow she got away with it. She looked over at me then.

‘Well, at least I won’t have to worry that my old friend will be pining while I’m away, I suppose.’

‘And I promise to take very good care of him,’ I said, because I thought that was what she wanted to hear and also because that was exactly what I intended to do. Apart from anything else, I was flattered that the bird liked me so much, and it’s hard not to like someone back when they make their feelings so clear. Not that he was exactly a ‘someone’, being a parrot and everything, but the way he spoke so well, and at times in just the right context, it was easy to fool yourself that he was really a miniature human in parrot costume. Quite spooky, really.

‘Amen!’ Sir Galahad said, and his mistress managed a chuckle.

When we’d finished tea, Mrs A suggested that Chris show me around the garden—which, I presume, was her way of providing an opportunity for us to get better acquainted. For obvious reasons it was important to her that we got along, and I didn’t at this stage see why we shouldn’t, despite our bad start. And it was obvious that Mrs A thought a lot of him, especially since she allowed him to live in part of her house.

‘How long have you been working for Mrs Audesley?’ I asked as we strolled slowly along the path which led from the terrace at the back of the house. The layout of the garden was fairly traditional. It was long and narrow, but broken up with areas of shrubs and beds crammed with old-fashioned flowers. I didn’t know much about gardens, but I could see that this one was very well kept.

‘Four years,’ he said. ‘Although I’ve only been in the flat for just over a year.’

It occurred to me that, although he was lucky to live somewhere as nice as this, he couldn’t earn very much. And neither would a garden this size take up the whole of his time, I wouldn’t have thought. ‘So, do you look after other gardens as well as this one?’ I asked him chattily.

He nodded absently as he took a penknife out of the back pocket of his jeans and deftly dead-headed a pale pink rose that was past its best. I don’t think he was really listening to me.

‘And what do you do for entertainment round here?’ I pressed on regardless.

He shrugged. ‘This and that, though I’m not really one for going out much. I work most evenings during summer.’ He moved ahead of me and began slicing the stems of some blowsy red flowers that I didn’t know the name of.

‘They don’t look dead,’ I said.

He turned and looked at me as if I was stupid. ‘They’re not. I’m cutting them for the house.’ He went back to what he was doing. ‘Adrienne likes fresh flowers in the house. It’s part of my job.’

It was beginning to feel like hard work, this getting acquainted with the gardener, and I wondered if this was his way of paying me back for being offhand with him earlier. Which would be a bit childish, but, since I obviously hadn’t made a very good first impression, I made a final effort to be friendly.

‘I could stick around for a while if you like. Till you finish up here. And then perhaps we could have a drink somewhere close by. Get to know each other better before I move in.’

He was kneeling on the grass now, and I realised how he came to have muddy jeans. When I finished speaking he looked up at me again briefly, and seemed to consider my suggestion.

‘Can’t, I’m afraid. I’ve got someone coming to see me at the flat shortly.’ He glanced at his wristwatch and, after muttering something under his breath, got quickly to his feet. He gathered the flowers he’d cut and, without speaking again, headed away from me back to the house.

With nothing else for it I followed him, feeling a bit of a fool. I found him in the kitchen, pouring water into a plastic bucket. I was about to say something else, some snidey remark about his attempts to be friendly being pretty short-lived, but I didn’t get the chance because Mrs A came in then, and made a big fuss of the flowers. They started talking about them, using the Latin name for the plant as they made favourable comparisons to last year’s crop, and I, who knew the English names of only about three garden flowers, felt distinctly out of it.

I saw Chris look at his watch again, and after turning off the tap and placing the flowers in the bucket he excused himself. ‘Gotta go, Adrienne, though I’ll see you before you leave, of course.’ Then he seemed to remember me. ‘Nice to meet you, Tao,’ he said, without much conviction. ‘Just give me a knock if you need any guidance on our mutual friend, and try and let me know in plenty if time if you’re going to be away from the house.’

He left then, and after a quick farewell to Sir Galahad, which involved him making the sound of a mournful trumpet that Mrs Audesley informed me was a burst of The Last Post, I left as well. Just in time to see a very striking, wealthy-looking woman in her early, possibly middle forties, hobbling down the steps in silly high heels towards the door of Chris’s basement flat.

I wandered down to the nearby shops and discovered a pricey little gift shop that I found hard to resist for two reasons. One, I wanted to get something nice as a thank-you to Sophie for everything, and two, I was feeling agitated after my brief encounter with Mrs Audesley’s gardener, and spending always calmed my nerves.

I mean, who did he think he was? Ordering me about like that, and worse—much worse—snubbing my invitation to go for a friendly drink. I tried comforting myself with the old ‘it’s his loss’ chestnut, but it didn’t ring all that true when I thought of the woman he’d turned me down for. Though what she saw in him was a mystery—unless she considered him her bit of rough, of course, I thought nastily. It is well known that some women get their kicks from dirtying their hands on the hunky hired help, and since he’d said he did gardening for other people, she might well have been one of his clients.

An unpleasant thought suddenly crossed my mind as I was examining a nice little crystal candlestick that seemed to absorb the colour of everything around it—an image of Mrs Audesley and Chris cosying up on her pale blue sofa. I ejected it with a shudder and told myself to behave. Just because the woman was on first-name terms with her gardener, just because she seemed very at ease with him about the place, that did not mean there was anything else going on between them. The woman was in her seventies, for goodness’ sake, and okay, so she might have a good neck, but a fifty-year age gap was just too revolting to contemplate.

The candlestick was one of a pair and as I tipped it over and saw the price ticket stuck to the base, it emptied my head of all other thoughts. I’d almost decided that they would be perfect for Sophie, but could I really afford sixty-five pounds? And besides, unless I left the price tag on she wouldn’t even appreciate the expense I’d gone to.

I was the only browser in the shop at that moment. Apart from me there was a smartly dressed brunette who was heavily involved in a book behind the counter. So I took the pair of candlesticks over to her and, after sucking in some air, asked if she could manage any discount.

From the look on her face it was clearly a question she hadn’t been asked before, but when her mouth finally closed she smiled at me warmly. She had strange pale grey eyes, and one of the smallest noses I’d ever seen. She reminded me of a fairytale wood creature, a nymph or a fairy, or something. Definitely on the supernatural side.

‘I’m afraid I don’t have the authority to do that,’ she said. ‘But I can show you some like them that don’t cost nearly so much.’ She got up and glided gracefully across the shop to a shelf in the corner that I’d overlooked. She was quite small, and very slender—the sort of person who makes me feel big and clumsy. She picked up a similar pair of candlesticks and held them up to the light. ‘You can hardly tell the difference,’ she said.

I looked at them closely and saw that she was right.

‘Apart from the price,’ she said with a grin. ‘These are just under twenty pounds.’

‘Do you giftwrap?’ I asked.

‘Beautifully,’ she said.

I rang Sophie when I got out of the shop half an hour later. During that time I’d become quite friendly with Alina, whom I discovered was just standing in for a couple of days while the shop’s owner was away at a gift trade event in North Wales. Alina herself was currently ‘between’ acting jobs—which was stretching the facts just a little, I’d thought, when I heard the details. Indeed, the last acting job she’d had was six months ago, when she’d played the part of a mugging victim in a Crimewatch reconstruction. But I liked her upbeat confidence, and her certainty that the right role was just around the corner. When she learned I was moving into the area, and where, she told me that was ‘completely amazing’, and promised to come round and see me. I’d left the shop feeling quite uplifted, encouraged to meet a female who wasn’t a bitch, and hopeful that I’d found a new friend.

By now it was getting on for six, and I wasn’t even sure if I’d catch Sophie before she left work, but I did. She was just on her way out of the building, as a matter of fact, and I asked if she’d meet me at a pub not far from her flat in about half an hour. I wanted to talk, tell her all about Taylor and my awkward new neighbour, and I wanted to give her the present. And I wanted to do it all beyond the prying eyes and ears of the two Cs.

But she sounded dubious, impatient almost. ‘I just wanted to get straight back to the flat and have a soak in the bath.’

‘Oh, go on,’ I wheedled, ‘just a quick one. It might be the last chance we get for ages.’

‘Okay,’ she said with a sigh. ‘But it really will have to be a quick one. I’m going out at eight.’

I didn’t get a chance to ask where she was going because she disconnected.

She was frowning and looking at her watch when I got to the pub forty minutes later. I was very apologetic, of course, but she refused another drink when I offered her one.

‘I’m sorry, Tao, but I can only stay another ten minutes. As it is I’m going to miss out on my bath.’

I passed over the gift, which had indeed been beautifully giftwrapped in lime-green paper and purple ribbon by Alina, and hoped it would soften her up while I went to the bar. It was fairly quiet, thankfully, and the barman, a middle-aged man with a sad expression and sandy-coloured ponytail, nodded in silent, morose recognition when I ordered a glass of red wine.

Sophie seemed pleased enough when I got back, but there was still a look of elsewhereness in her eyes. She held up one of the candlesticks and smiled. ‘They’re fabulous, Tao, but you shouldn’t have. I know how tight money is at the moment, and these must have cost a bomb.’

I didn’t deny it, but I pooh-poohed her objections. ‘I just wanted you to know how grateful I am for everything.’

‘I know you are,’ she said.

‘I met Taylor Wiseman today,’ I told her quickly. ‘You know—the TV chef. And guess what?’

But I’d lost her again. She was putting the candlesticks back in their gift box and transferring them to her bag. She looked up at me blankly.

‘He’s asked me to go to his place tomorrow to talk about a possible job.’

‘That’s nice,’ she said.

‘It’s more than nice! It’s brilliant. It could be the start of something really big.’

She nodded. ‘I’ll keep my fingers crossed, then, shall I?’

I was beginning to get annoyed with her. She should have been gushing with excitement by now, not offering to keep her damn fingers crossed.

‘What about the house?’ she asked, sounding a bit more enthusiastic now. ‘Everything still okay there?’

‘Fine. I’ll be moving in on Saturday, at twelve-ish, I told Mrs Audesley. Is that still okay for you?’

‘Great,’ she said. ‘I’m looking forward to seeing the place.’ She was slipping her bag onto her shoulder and there was a look of apology forming on her face. ‘I’m sorry, Tao, but I really will have to leave now.’

‘But where are you going?’ I said. What could be more important than my exciting news? I was actually thinking, but managed not to say.

‘I’ve got a hot date,’ she said, getting up.

‘Not with Mrs Audesley’s prodigal nephew, by any chance?’

‘As a matter of fact, yes,’ she answered defensively. ‘And I wish you wouldn’t make it sound as if there’s something dubious about his character. The only thing you know for certain about him is that he’s done you an enormous favour.’

She was right, and I couldn’t deny it. For all I knew, Mrs Audesley’s reasons for disliking her nephew were quite unreasonable. And, come to think of it, Chris had as good as defended him when he’d said that Jerome wasn’t responsible for all of Sir Galahad’s bad language. ‘Sorry,’ I said, giving in to the inevitable of being left on my own to drink my wine. ‘Have a great time.’

She gave me a grateful nod and then looked a bit coy. ‘You can have my bed tonight, if you like. I might be late so I’ll sleep on the sofa.’

Which was Sophie-speak for, In all probability I won’t be coming home tonight.

Because I didn’t want to get in the way while Sophie was preparing for her big date, I hung around the pub for a while. I had another glass of red wine, and a packet of pork scratchings, and when they were gone I dawdled home through the narrow, busy streets. I picked up a couple of cream cheese and smoked salmon bagels from the twenty-four-hour bagel shop, and found the flat empty when I got in. For once I was a bit disappointed. It would have been fun to tell the two Cs about Taylor, to rub their noses once more in my move to Hampstead. They went out a lot during the week, though I had no idea where they went or how they managed to fund their outings. As far as I knew neither one of them had a current boyfriend, so they must have been spending their own money.

I could have phoned my parents and told them my news, but I knew they wouldn’t be all that impressed. Never having owned a TV, they wouldn’t have heard of Taylor Wiseman, and besides, I wanted to be a little more sure of my ground first. I hadn’t even told them about my move yet, so if anything definite came from my meeting with Taylor tomorrow I could tell them the whole lot together.

I spent part of the evening watching TV—a ghoulish hospital drama that involved close-ups of open wounds made wonderfully real by the make-up department. Then, although I still had another day to go, I made a feeble attempt at some packing before planning to use the hot water that I had deprived Sophie of. I was also planning to ‘borrow’ some of Fiona’s expensive bubble bath, then rub out the marker line the suspicious cow had made on the bottle and create a new one. In fact I was just checking her make-up drawer for the right colour eyeliner when the front doorbell rang.

Luckily I hadn’t got as far as stripping off yet, because when I answered the intercom I got a nasty shock. It was Peter Parker, the landlord, asking if he could come in.

‘What for?’ I asked cautiously.

‘I had a message from one of those posh birds. She said there was a problem with the light fitting in her room.’

No one had told me that. And what was he doing, coming around here at this time of night? ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘but there’s only me here at the moment. Can’t you come back tomorrow?’

‘No, I can’t. Now, open the door like a good girl, or I’ll just use my own key anyway.’

I sighed and pressed the buzzer to open the street door, alarmed for Sophie’s sake to learn that he had such easy access to the flat, and alarmed for my own sake that I was about to be alone with him. I could hear him dragging his feet over the uncarpeted stairs, and I opened the door before he reached it. I left it open, just in case I needed to make a fast getaway.

He was dressed in two shades of denim tonight—black jeans, blue jacket—and he was carrying a metal box that I assumed contained his tools. I managed a smile as it didn’t seem sensible to appear unfriendly.

‘I’ll leave you to it, then, shall I?’ I said.

‘I wouldn’t mind a drink,’ he said as he gave me the once-over.

I hesitated. I didn’t want him hanging around, and yet I didn’t want to antagonise him either. ‘Tea okay?’ I asked as I uttered a silent groan.

‘Tea’s good,’ he said.

He followed me into the kitchen and I switched on the already fullish kettle. ‘Better wait till it’s boiled ’cause I may have to switch the electricity off.’

I shrugged, and then busied myself with teabags and things as he plonked himself down at the kitchen table.

‘Had a helluva day,’ he said with a heavy sigh.

Unfortunately I felt some response was necessary. ‘Oh, yes?’ I said, glancing around at him. ‘What have you been up to?’

The kitchen was poky, with hardly room for a table, and his presence was overpowering. He smelt of very stale BO and I wondered if I could get away with spraying some air freshener without offending him. I decided I probably couldn’t.

‘Having a row with the Social. They’re threatening to stop my benefits. Seem to think I might have some undisclosed income.’

I turned and looked at him properly. Like rent from a sublet council flat, I thought, but wisely didn’t say. His eyes were narrowed to a slit.

‘I’d be really upset if I thought someone had grassed me up,’ he said meaningfully.

‘Why would anyone do that?’ I asked as casually as I could manage. Luckily the kettle clicked off at that moment and I could get on with making the tea.

‘All sorts of reasons,’ I heard him say, ‘but none worth the trouble they’d come up against if I found out who it was.’

I put some milk in the tea, removed the teabag, and turned to ask if he’d like some sugar. When I’d added the requested three spoonfuls, I decided it was high time to change the subject. ‘So where do you live yourself?’ I asked chattily.

‘Not far,’ he said, in a way that sounded to me like an additional threat.

‘With anyone?’ I pressed blithely on.

He looked a little bit embarrassed now. ‘With my mum,’ he murmured quietly.

Suddenly he didn’t seem nearly so scary, this thirty-odd-year-old man with his big talk and his silly tattoo…who still lived with his mother.

‘Does she give you a hard time?’ I said, on a hunch.

‘Does the Pope say his prayers?’ Peter said dismally. ‘She’ll kill me if the Social carry out their threats. She’s forever nagging me to get a job.’

‘Why don’t you, then?’

‘Easy for you to say,’ he said huffily. ‘It’s hard when you ain’t got no qualifications.’

And I didn’t suppose that his appearance helped much either. He could be smartened up if someone tried very hard, and made to smell a lot better, but it would be difficult to hide that thing on his face.

‘Well, I haven’t worked for over a year,’ I said, to make him feel better, conveniently forgetting to mention that I’d been learning a trade for most of that time. ‘But I’m hoping my luck’s about to change.’ He wasn’t exactly first choice to share my news with, but I did it anyway. And to my surprise he seemed quite excited for me.

‘My mum’s a big fan,’ he said, shaking his head with the sort of indulgence that made me realise how fond of his mother he was, despite everything. ‘I’m not allowed to open my mouth when that American’s on.’ He looked at me slyly. ‘If you get the job, I’ll tell her you’ll bring him round for a chat. That should keep her off my back for a while.’

I didn’t dispel his hopes there and then, not when he seemed in such a good mood, but as he downed the last of his tea I reminded him why he’d come here. ‘Whose room did you think has the lighting problem?’ I said pointedly.

He got up reluctantly and went to Jemima’s room. Two minutes later he reappeared. ‘Got any lightbulbs?’ he wanted to know.

I didn’t have a clue, but guessed if we had that they’d be in the cupboard next to the sink. I was right, and I handed him one.

He was back again in less than a minute. ‘Thought so,’ he said with a slow shake of his bison-like head. ‘Silly bitch probably doesn’t know that you have to change them occasionally.’

And, don’t ask me why, but there and then I decided that I quite liked Peter Parker.

5

Sophie must have gone straight to work from Jerome’s place the following morning, and I couldn’t help feeling a little prude-like disapproval. That’s another thing I’ve reacted against. My mother remains so stuck in a Woodstock mind-set—all that free love and everything—that she insisted in putting me on the Pill on my fifteenth birthday, as if it was an accepted coming-of-age tradition. I was appalled, and deeply embarrassed, but for a quiet life I’d pretended to take the contraceptive while actually flushing it down the toilet. I would have been the envy of all my friends at school if I’d told them, for having such an enlightened parent, but I kept it to myself and secretly longed for the sort of mother who would lecture me on the folly of teenage sex.

I didn’t get around to actually doing the deed until I was eighteen—much later than most of my friends—but I still wouldn’t call myself particularly experienced by the time I moved in with Mal. As it turned out that was part of the problem for me. I kept wondering what it would be like with someone else, and it wouldn’t have been fair to cheat on him. It’s hard to know whether he’d have felt any better if I’d just told him the truth, but my guess is that it wouldn’t have made much difference. It added up to rejection, whatever the reason, even the one I gave him about feeling too young for settling down.

I made up for my shortfall a little during my year at photography school, but I’d guess I was still way down on the scoring average of most twenty-five-year-olds.

I arrived at the Front Page with ten minutes to spare, and had to endure being glared at by Amber as I waited in the reception area. I’d have liked to ask her exactly what her problem was, in the manner I’d expect Peter Parker to use, but I didn’t want to get into a slanging match in earshot of the boss’s office. Besides, I knew the answer to the question anyway. At least I knew what her current problem was where I was concerned. Not only had I wangled an appointment with Jerry Marlin, but I had also been last seen leaving the building with one of the hottest TV properties around at the moment.

I could tell she was bursting to say something, but I tried to ignore her by closing my eyes and concentrating on the spiel I’d prepared to dazzle Jerry Marlin with. However, I got only as far as the firm, confident handshake in my imagination, when I heard her speak. It sounded more like a hiss, actually, and a decidedly venomous one.

‘I’d be careful if I were you,’ she began, and I opened my eyes cautiously. She had moved round the desk and was perched on the front edge of it now, her skinny arms folded tightly round her concave chest.

I smiled enquiringly. ‘How so?’ I said.

‘With that TV chef.’

‘Taylor?’ I said, just to remind her I was on first-name terms with him.

‘Rumour has it he’s shacking up with Mary Deacon—you know, the producer who made him famous.’

I shrugged. I was sure she was lying, following my conversation with Taylor yesterday, but I didn’t want her to think I gave a damn either way. ‘What’s that to me?’ I said. ‘My only interest in Mr Wiseman is the possibility that he might put some work my way.’

She didn’t look as if she believed me. ‘If you say so,’ she said snidely. ‘But he knows where his bread is buttered, and if it came to a contest my guess is that you’d lose hands down.’

Until then I hadn’t seriously considered Taylor in the way she was hinting at. At least I don’t think I had. I thought he was attractive, of course, and I’d been flattered by the attention he’d shown me. I also thought it might be fun to work with someone who was adored by so many women, but I hadn’t seen it going any further than that. He wasn’t really my type, for a start. There was something a bit obvious about his good looks for my particular tastes, but to tell Amber that would only invite her scorn. Of that I was certain. I was also annoyed with the suggestion that I was out of his league. While I could secretly acknowledge that it was true, I wasn’t about to admit it to her.

‘Thanks for the warning,’ I said with what was meant to be a mysterious smile that I hoped would annoy her more than any further denials. ‘I’ll bear it in mind.’

She was saved from responding by the sound of the intercom buzzing on her desk. She kept hostile eyes firmly on me as she circled back round and took the call, then she told me, as if nothing had happened, that I could go in and see Jerry now.

His office was a shrine to minimalism—a touch of light-coloured wood here, a bit of chrome there, and a great deal of glass in the form of a huge plate window looking down over the busy street below. I felt dangerously exposed, as if I was on show to the public, and Jerry must have seen the expression on my face.

‘It’s one way,’ he said as he took my limp hand. ‘We can see them, but they can’t see us.’

I nodded, remembering the building as it was from the outside. A modern glass and concrete infill between two elegant Georgian properties. The exterior was completely without architectural merit but it was definitely impressive on the inside, and he seemed pleased when I told him so.

I had my portfolio with me, carefully arranged the night before after Peter Parker left, and I put it down now on his virtually empty desk. I’d read somewhere that this was a good idea. I wasn’t feeling nearly so brave as I did yesterday, when I had nothing to lose, and claiming space in alien territory was supposed to empower the newcomer. And as this man could make or break my future, I needed all the empowerment I could get.

He looked amused, as if he knew what I was up to, but before I could blush he shook his head. ‘There’s no need to show me your work,’ he said as he waved me into the seat across from his own. ‘This is meant to be an informal meeting, and besides, you’ve already won our Mr Wiseman over and that’s good enough for me.’

It would not have been a shrewd move to bring up the fact that Taylor hadn’t seen any of my work as yet. ‘I’m meeting him later at his restaurant,’ I said, and he nodded as if he already knew.

‘I spoke to him yesterday afternoon,’ Jerry said. ‘He likes the idea of you being new and fresh. He thinks you’ll work well together.’

It couldn’t be that easy, surely! ‘Are you saying that I’ve got the job?’

Jerry smiled and produced several sheets of paper, as if by magic. I certainly didn’t see where they came from. He put them down on my leather folder and asked me to read it in my own time and, when it was signed, drop it off at Reception.

‘It’s a contract,’ he explained when I didn’t respond. ‘You’ve been booked for two weeks by Featherweight Productions, the company behind the book. Though you won’t be working flat out during that time, of course. It will be a matter of fitting in the shoots when Taylor Wiseman is available.’

I nodded stupidly, unable to open my mouth.

‘Basic agency rates will apply,’ he went on brightly. ‘But if you do a good job we might be able to upgrade you next time. There’s a buzz out already on this book. Big pre-orders in place. And if the show is taken up in the States you could well make a real name for yourself.’

The daze I was in deepened when I glanced at the fee. Basic rates or not, it was more than I’d ever imagined I would earn on my very first job. It just seemed too good to be true, only I couldn’t say what I was thinking, now, could I? It would only make him suspect I didn’t think I was worth what I was being offered. I was tempted to sign there and then, before he had time to change his mind, but I did what was expected of me, and with a great deal of effort I unzipped my folder and slipped the contract into it.

He looked at his wristwatch then, and let out a sigh. ‘I know we scheduled in half an hour,’ he said regretfully, ‘but something’s come up and I’m going to have to cut our meeting short, unfortunately.’

But I was relieved. I was beginning to feel distinctly unreal, and the quicker I got out of there the quicker I could pinch myself to make sure this was actually happening. So up I got up quickly, full of smiles now as I retrieved my portfolio. He got up too, and walked me to the door of his office. He held out his hand and this time I shook it firmly.

‘I’ve got the feeling this is just the start of a long and successful association, Tao,’ he said, and I must have been coming round a little now, because I found myself wishing he’d said it on the other side of the door, so that Amber could hear.

The Tulip, the restaurant where Taylor worked, was only a five-minute walk from the office, so I strolled around the old flower hall for a while, in order to kill some time. I didn’t take much notice of the shops and the stalls, but I paused for a while on the balcony, to listen to a young man playing a classical piece on a violin. Quite a crowd had gathered and for one crazy moment I was tempted to make a public announcement about my new job.

Fortunately I managed to resist the temptation and I arrived at the restaurant at precisely the appointed time. It turned out to be one of those swanky places with a bay tree on either side of the entrance, and I would normally have found it intimidating. But not today, not in my state, which by then was bordering on euphoric. It wasn’t due to open till twelve-thirty, and I had to ring on the outside bell and wait to be admitted.

A short and pleasant-looking young man eventually opened the door, and looked as if he was expecting me. Which was a relief, because despite all the excitement my concerns about it all being too easy had begun to haunt me. What if it was just some horrible practical joke? What if, at this very moment, Taylor Wiseman was splitting his sides as he laughed down the phone at my expense with Jerry Marlin?

My paranoia receded when the young man informed me that ‘Chef weel be weeth you soon,’ in a thick French accent. He was wearing black trousers and an open-neck white shirt at the moment, but I presumed he’d be adding a tie soon enough, and possibly one of those tablecloth aprons that waiters in smart and pretentious restaurants are often given to wear. I followed him into the dining room, which was simple and chic. A lot of white linen and pictures of, well…tulips—one the few garden flowers that I did recognise. They were the sort that you find in early bound books on botany, set off nicely in old gold frames. There were also fresh yellow tulips in an enormous glass vase on a Georgian-style mahogany sideboard, and all in all it was a lot more cosy and comfortable than I’d somehow expected it to be.

I was shown to a table at the back of the dining room and refused the waiter’s offer of coffee. I was already buzzing so much on adrenaline that caffeine would have had me climbing walls.

A few moments later Taylor appeared, dressed in the pristine kitchen whites that he wore on TV. I smiled as he sat down opposite me.

‘Shouldn’t they be all splattered in food by now?’ I said.

He looked down at his double-breasted jacket and grinned. ‘They will be later, I promise you. I’m the hands-on kind of chef, but we do everything to order.’ He looked at me for a moment without speaking. ‘Has Jerry told you?’

I hesitated briefly. ‘You do know this will be my first professional job ever, don’t you?’

‘Of course I do.’ He shrugged. ‘Like you know that this is my first cookery book ever. We’ve all got to start somewhere. Now,’ he said in a brisker tone, ‘down to business, I suppose. You said you might have some ideas…’

Ah, yes. So I had. And I’d been racking my brains ever since the words had slipped out. To not much avail. Or at least not until I was wandering around the old flower hall, imagining how it used to be before it became a tourist attraction. My imaginings were mixed with a scene from My Fair Lady, with Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Doolittle in all her new finery. The one where she goes back to the market to see the people who had once been her friends before Mr Higgins changed her so much she didn’t fit in any more. One thing had led to another in my head, and finally met up with something that Jerry had said about Taylor’s show.

‘Jerry said you were hoping the show would be taken up in the US,’ I said.

He nodded, but didn’t speak.

‘Well, I was thinking that it might be nice to take some shots of you in parts of London that tourists—American or British—wouldn’t normally see. With the sort of people they probably don’t know exist. Real places, real people.’

He still didn’t speak, and his eyes drifted off to a blank bit of wall on his left. It was impossible to guess what he was thinking, but he was clearly mulling something over. I opened my mouth to speak again, but he must have sensed it and he raised his hand as if to politely shut me up. Then, finally, when I was beginning to think my idea must be rubbish, he turned his eyes back on me.

‘I love it!’ he said. ‘It’s brilliant.’

‘I’ll show you the sort of thing I mean,’ I said, trying not to seem too excited as I unzipped my portfolio and took out the recently developed prints of Brick Lane market, and of Felix’s Place. I passed them to him and he nodded his head with enthusiasm as he flicked quickly through them.

‘They’re great,’ he said. ‘Just great.’ He looked over at me. ‘Can I borrow these? I’d like to show them to my producer, help sell the idea to her.’

‘So you need to get her approval?’ I said cautiously, remembering what Amber had said about Mary Deacon.

He shrugged again. ‘I guess so. She is my boss…’ He paused for a moment and I had the feeling that he wasn’t telling me something. I wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that he’d taken me on. Maybe his boss hadn’t liked the idea very much and had insisted he consult her about anything else to do with me. ‘But I just know that she’ll love it,’ he added more confidently. He took hold of my hand suddenly across the table, as if he was going to shake it, but just held it instead. ‘If we do get the go-ahead, when do you want to make a start?’

‘That’s up to you and your boss,’ I answered, more coolly now. He’d told me there was no one special in his life at the moment, and if he really did have something going with his producer then that made him a liar. Someone not to be trusted. But, then again, so long as it was only in personal matters it should not affect me, I assured myself. Which made me feel better.

He nodded and let go of my hand. ‘Let me have a contact number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.’

I took a pen out of my bag and looked vaguely around me for something to write on.

‘Here,’ he said, offering me his arm, ‘put it on there.’

‘On your sleeve?’

He smiled. ‘Sure, and don’t worry—I won’t lose it.’

So I wrote my mobile number on his jacket sleeve, and in doing so had to rest my other hand on his to gain some purchase. And I got a strange tingle in my fingers as a direct result. I think he might have been aware of the effect this bodily contact was having on me because he grinned when I went red and snatched my hand away from his. Then he got up and spoke as if nothing had happened.

‘It’s a pity we’re fully booked for lunch, or I’d ask you to stay and sample the menu. We don’t have any pies on today, but I think you’d enjoy it just the same.’

‘Another time, maybe,’ I said with a forced smile, still a bit shaky as I got up from the table. I wasn’t remotely disappointed. I probably wouldn’t have stayed if there had been a free table, because I just wanted to get out of there now and get some air.

I made a few calls when I got back to the flat, and left my parents till last. I’d already called five or six friends, three of whom had been on the photography course with me. In their case I tried not to sound too smug, especially when I learnt they were still out of work, but on the whole I think they were encouraged. If Tao Tandy could do it then surely they could as well…