Guilty Pleasures

by Tasmina Perry

  She had hardly seen him in the last ten years but she had heard about his rise through the ranks of Milford to become head of merchandise. She knew he was well thought of and in the last two years he had been given a position on the board. He was still sexy, she thought with a smile. Dark wavy hair curled round the top of his white shirt. He had colouring that whispered of pirate ancestry; deep brown eyes, lightly-tanned skin and a strong mouth.

  She dismissed the thought, feeling herself flush – she hoped it was the heat from the Aga. Today she was just grateful for his reassurance rather than his good looks. Ruan had been a tower of strength since the day she had arrived at Milford and he was about her only friend out here in the middle of nowhere.

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m fine. It was just a bit of silly graffiti,’ she lied.

  Ruan had uncorked a bottle of wine and handed her a glass.

  ‘I feel as if I’m stumbling around in the dark here,’ she smiled. ‘Tell me if you think we’re wasting our time.’

  ‘With the revamp?’

  She nodded.

  ‘A revamp is exactly what Milford needs,’ said Ruan with such confidence it instantly buoyed Emma. ‘Our manufacturing is good. Our leather is even better than what they use at Connolly or Valextra. We just need a break.’

  She leant into him just a fraction.

  ‘You could always cancel the meetings with the bank until we get a designer,’ said Ruan.

  ‘And prolong the agony?’ said Emma, shaking her head. ‘The longer the downward spiral continues the more difficult it’s going to be to climb out of it.’ She didn’t want to tell him the whole truth, that suppliers hadn’t been paid in three months, that unless something decisive was done, the company would be bankrupt within twelve months. Milford was Ruan’s life and home and there was little other work in the area beyond agriculture, which in any case wasn’t terribly healthy either after a series of environmental and political disasters. Theoretically, Ruan could find similar work elsewhere, but the reality was that Britain’s manufacturing industry was on its knees. Whatever you needed, it could be made cheaper and faster in the Third World. It would be even worse for Milford’s two hundred or so employees and Emma felt she had to protect them from such dire news until she was sure it was inevitable. But who could she share the burden with? She could hardly tell Roger – he probably hadn’t ever looked at the company accounts in twenty years – and besides, he would feel vindicated if the ship went down with Emma at the helm. ‘Oh, if I’d been in charge, I could have done something,’ he would tell his cronies. ‘But what hope did old Saul’s legacy have with some young floozy playing shop?’ Or her mother? She’d only care about Emma’s problems as they impacted on her, specifically her shareholding and any awkwardness it would cause at dinner parties. Her Aunt Julia? It was reasonable to assume she would believe that the company should have gone to her own daughter. No, the bottom line was that Emma was all alone in this and would have to face it by herself. She was grateful when she heard the doorbell chime.

  ‘Is that the food already?’ said Ruan. ‘They usually take hours.’

  Along with Milford, Emma had inherited Morton, Saul’s septuagenarian butler whom she could ill afford to keep on but who was a Cordon Bleu standard chef. As it was his night off and as the only things in the fridge were duck and lamb shanks, (none of which were right for Emma’s single signature dish of spaghetti bolognaise,) she’d done the decent thing and ordered Chinese food from the village takeaway. ‘I’ll go and see.’

  Emma had to yank hard on the brass doorknob to open the door and cold night air rushed in. There was an old man standing there, not a delivery boy. At first she didn’t recognize him as his face was lined and creased.

  ‘Uncle Christopher?’ she said flatteringly. ‘Is that you?’

  Christopher Chase was not a real uncle, rather one of Saul’s oldest friends, often appearing at family gatherings and at Saul’s villa. He was also one of the country’s most famous sculptors; one of the few surviving members of the St Ives movement. As far as Emma could remember, he still lived in Cornwall, in fact she always thought of Uncle Chris in terms of the old nursery rhyme: ‘As I was going to St Ives/I met a man with seven wives …’. Christopher was on his fourth wife and had three children aged from 24 to 50.

  ‘It is indeed,’ said the old man, taking off his hat with a dramatic gesture. He was still a debonair man now. His face was wrinkled, but his eyes were still bright blue and twinkly, and he was wearing a rakish maroon cravat at his neck.

  ‘Gosh, well, you must come in,’ said Emma, moving aside. ‘It’s been a long time.’

  ‘Provence, I think, maybe fifteen years ago?’ smiled Christopher as he took off his coat. ‘As I remember, you told me off for not reading and you gave me a book. What was it? The one set in the South of France.’

  ‘Tender Is the Night.’

  ‘That was it!’ he exclaimed, snapping his fingers. ‘It was excellent.’

  ‘I was so pompous,’ laughed Emma, her earlier gloominess melting away. ‘Anyway, have a seat and I’ll nip through to the kitchen, I have some friends round for supper.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t want to intrude. I’ll only be a few minutes.’

  ‘No, it’s fine,’ she said waving her hand. ‘Let me go and tell them to entertain themselves for a while.’

  By the time she returned Christopher had wandered into the library.

  ‘I see you’ve added a few feminine touches.’

  She smiled. There hadn’t been a great deal of time to do anything with the house, but she had removed a few of Saul’s slightly more masculine decorations: the dented blunderbuss on the mantelpiece, the antique pistols, the buffalo skin Zulu shields, the rather severe-looking stuffed stag’s head which looked down from the eaves.

  ‘I tried to tell myself that poor stag had been dead for twenty years, but his eyes still seemed to be following me around, giving me evil looks,’ she smiled.

  Christopher laughed. ‘I was there when Saul shot it. Perhaps I should have taken it myself and pickled it; I could have appealed to a whole new generation of art lovers.’

  They both found themselves looking at the grand portrait of Saul above the fireplace. ‘I do miss that old rogue …’ said Christopher quietly. ‘I didn’t see him enough over the last few years. I regret that.’

  ‘We all do,’ said Emma.

  Christopher nodded, then shivered, shaking his shoulders like a dog.

  ‘Anyway, sorry for dropping by unannounced. I was on my way to London and thought I’d take a detour into Chilcot. I’ve just been to the church to pay my respects to Saul. I couldn’t make the funeral; Chessie my wife was in hospital.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry. Nothing serious I hope?’

  Christopher shook his head.

  ‘Everything’s fine.’

  He wandered over to the mantelpiece and picked up a silver frame containing a black and white photograph of Saul and himself in Egypt, and another of them arm-in-arm at the top of Mount Cook.

  ‘Look at him,’ said Christopher with affection, ‘he always was a big showman.’

  ‘You noticed he has the biggest gravestone in the church grounds?’ smiled Emma.

  ‘Of course he has,’ laughed Christopher. ‘He should have been an entertainer, not a businessman. I know he wouldn’t mind me saying that. But he was shrewd enough to give the company to you. That news filtered down as far as St Ives.’

  ‘Shrewd? Not everybody sees it that way.’

  Christopher looked at her, rubbing his chin with his hand. Emma was startled to see that his artistic fingers were now twisted and gnarled by arthritis.

  ‘I wanted to drop by and see if you were OK,’ he said with a note of concern. ‘How is it going so far?’

  ‘Difficult,’ she said honestly.

  ‘Roger?’

  Emma caught the co-conspirator’s smile.

  She grinned back and nodded.

  ‘Roger always had a high
opinion of himself. Always been the failing of this company in my opinion. Saul allowed him to get away with far too much, indulged Roger’s ego. Actually, I think he was a little afraid of him. As I’m sure you know, Roger can be very charming, but he’s also very manipulative. Saul made him creative director at 25 because, well, because that’s what Roger wanted. And the company has been going downhill ever since.’

  ‘Well, he isn’t creative director of Milford any longer.’

  ‘You fired him?’ said Christopher, surprised.

  ‘Not exactly. Moved him along.’

  ‘Well, good for you,’ said Christopher. ‘But watch out for that one. You know what a rat will do when it’s cornered.’

  Emma frowned. A rat? It was obvious Christopher didn’t think much of Saul’s younger brother, but that last comment was laced with venom.

  ‘Sorry, Emma,’ interrupted Christopher, glancing at the clock on the wall, then at his own wristwatch, ‘I really must be going. Chessie is at the Feathers. We’re staying there tonight and then we’re off to London.’

  ‘Oh. OK, if you must,’ said Emma, following him out of the library towards the door. ‘It’s always lovely to see you. How are the children, by the way?’

  ‘All fine. Well, I think they’re fine. I don’t see as much of them as I’d like. My two eldest live in Scotland. Stella, my youngest, lives in the States now. She’s a fashion designer. I tried to get her to follow in her old man’s footsteps – she studied sculpture at the Slade, but it seems she prefers working with cloth rather than clay.’

  Emma’s ears had pricked up.

  ‘She’s a designer. Really? Who does she work for?’

  ‘Oh, some trendy American company in LA. Can’t even remember the name,’ he laughed.

  ‘LA?’

  ‘“La-la-land”, I know, but her mother lives on the West Coast. Stella went over there after college and never came back.’

  ‘Is she a good designer?’ asked Emma cautiously.

  He laughed heartily. ‘How could she fail with my genes? Hey, maybe you should give her Roger’s old job? I’d be glad to have her back in the country.’

  Emma smiled weakly. ‘Maybe it’s not such a crazy idea,’ she said under her breath.

  ‘Really?’ said Christopher, pulling a black leather diary from his inside pocket.

  ‘Then maybe you should give her a ring,’ he said, writing something down. ‘She doesn’t call me much, but the last time I heard she seemed to be quite happy out there – takes all sorts, I suppose. Here’s her number, anyway. You’ll get her answer machine, she’s never there. But if you leave a message she usually calls you back.’

  Christopher hugged Emma then stepped back, holding her by the shoulders.

  ‘You stay strong, young lady,’ he said. ‘Saul gave you the company for a reason. Saul was many things, but he wasn’t a fool and he chose you to carry on his legacy – not any of those vultures in your family. I, for one, think he made a splendid choice and I know you’ll make him proud.’

  He pulled down his hat and tipped a salute back inside the house, then he was away into the darkness and gone.

  Emma stood there on the doorstep, feeling a distant wave of hope.

  ‘Who was that?’ asked Ruan, coming behind her with a glass of wine.

  ‘Milford’s lifeline,’ said Emma.

  9

  ‘She is such a bitch!’ said Stella Chase indignantly. ‘Have you seen this shit?’ She thrust a copy of US Rive towards her friend Tash, stabbing a finger at the page. Moments earlier, the two girls had been sitting quietly in Venice Beach’s Fig-tree Café, eating frozen yoghurt and idly leafing through the latest fashion magazines. Then Stella had come across a twelve-page photo story on handbag designer Cate Glazer. Alongside a series of sumptuous photos of her palatial Hamptons home, the article gushed about Glazer’s life: how she had started as a bit-part soap actress, fallen in love with and married Hollywood producer Lance Glazer, then launched her must-have range of bags and purses. The cherry on the cake, said the article, was Glazer’s recent triumph, being crowned CFDA Accessories Designer of the Year.

  ‘Which bit are we referring to?’ asked Tash, taking a lick of double-berry yoghurt while she scanned the feature. ‘The photo of their new forty-million dollar home in Sag Harbor or the roll-call of her former boyfriends? There’s some pretty cute guys in that list, you know.’

  ‘This bit,’ said Stella, pointing at the page so hard her fingernail almost went through the paper. ‘That entire section boasting about the “Beverly” bag. How the design came to her in a dream. A dream!’

  Stella jumped up, grabbed her things and barged out from the air-conditioned cool of the café into the bright heat of early spring afternoon in Los Angeles. She dumped the paper sack bulging with groceries she had bought from Whole Foods that morning into the basket of her bicycle as Tash tagged along behind her, the magazine fluttering in her hand.

  ‘Are you going to bring it up with her?’ asked her friend.

  ‘I won’t even be seeing her until Wednesday. You know it’s the Oscars tomorrow; she always takes the next two days off to recover.’

  ‘Cate loves to party,’ said Tash weakly.

  Stella stopped dead on the boardwalk, causing a muscled in-line skater in only shorts and headphones to swerve dangerously to avoid her.

  ‘Three years!’ she said. ‘Three bloody years I’ve been working for that company! And what thanks do I get?’ she continued, determined to get it off her chest. ‘I work fourteen-hour days. I design every purse, dress and shoe for that company and she tells the world the idea for her latest It-bag came to her “in a dream”.’

  ‘What you need is a good night out,’ replied Tasha, putting a reassuring hand on her friend’s shoulder. ‘Apparently there’s this great party in the Hills tonight. Like an unofficial pre-Oscars party. I hear Brad’s gonna be there and …’

  ‘You know Lance is gay, don’t you?’

  Tash threw her frozen yoghurt in the trash.

  ‘Stella, honey! Let it go! It’s bad for your karma.’

  Stella didn’t seem to hear her, starting to push her bicycle along the beach again. Across the wide expanse of sand, the sea twinkled in the distance.

  ‘Maybe I’ll go to that good tarot reader on the boardwalk on the way home,’ mused Stella vaguely, ‘I think I need some psychic intervention to tell me what to do.’

  ‘What you need to do is come out tonight,’ said Tash firmly. ‘Go home and get ready.’

  Stella shook her head. ‘I’d love to, but I can’t.’

  ‘What’s more important than a party on Oscars weekend?’ asked Tash seriously.

  ‘Oh, a friend of the family is in town,’ she said.

  ‘So bring her to the party.’

  Stella grimaced. ‘I really don’t think she’s the partying kind.’

  ‘Orlando is going to be there,’ persisted Tash.

  ‘Well, I’ll think about it,’ said Stella already on her bike, ‘call you later.’

  ‘Brad! Orlando!’ called Tash after her, ‘that guy out of the OC?’

  Stella just turned back and waved, knowing that not even the cutest boys in Hollywood could lift the black cloud surrounding her today.

  The two-mile cycle ride back to Santa Monica did little to clear Stella’s head. The Santa Ana winds were blowing making it artificially warm for an early spring day. To her left the Pacific Ocean sparkled silver while in the distance, as if to welcome her home, the pier jutted out into the sea looking every bit as magical as it had the first time she had seen it almost four years earlier. And look how far I’ve come, she thought, with just a hint of irony. She had come to California six months after she had graduated, ostensibly to be nearer her mother who had moved from Cornwall to Montecito to ‘reinvent’ herself as an aromatherapist. But within weeks Stella had drifted down to LA, got a flat in Santa Monica and a job in a boutique on Melrose. Her wage was a pittance; the trade-off for them turning a blind eye to h
er lack of a green card. The boutique was hip and Stella was pretty which meant that she was often invited to parties. She went along for the free food and drink, but even at the most chic Hollywood Hills soiree, Stella was always the most stylish person there in the little dresses she customized from thrift shop finds or rolls of spare fabric from the shop. It was at one of those parties that Stella had met Cate Glazer, wife of the famous movie producer Lance, who had ambitions to be LA’s answer to Kate Spade. Cate Glazer had been knocked out by the beautiful blonde Brit, but was more knocked out by the white jersey T-shirt dress she said she had run up that afternoon. It was simple but chic, cleverly using the material to show her figure off to best advantage. The kid clearly had talent.

  ‘Can you design handbags?’ Cate Glazer had asked her.

  ‘I’ll try anything once,’ smiled Stella. What the hell, why not? She shrugged. And it was that easy: the next Monday Stella began work as ‘design executive’ for fledgling LA fashion house Cate Glazer. She hadn’t realized when she signed on, however, that it was a workforce of two: Stella designed the bags which were produced by a company in Mexico, Cate handled the PR. Their first venture involved Stella making 100 totes from white sail canvas. Cate gave them to a selection of Lance’s actress friends each of whom had been photographed carrying them. The photos ran in every magazine from US Weekly to Vogue and suddenly Cate Glazer was on the map. The orders poured in so fast that within six months they had to open a factory in Mexico. Three years later, Cate Glazer was one of America’s hottest lifestyle labels, a multi-million-dollar business, branching out from accessories into fashion and interiors, while Stella was in pretty much the same place. Sure, she had an office with ‘Design Executive’ on the door, but despite her talent, she had never received a single job offer because everyone believed Cate Glazer was the talent behind the stylish Cate Glazer merchandise.

  The sky was beginning to darken by the time Stella pushed her bicycle through her apartment door. What a mess, she thought, leaving the bike against the wall and stepping over the piles of laundry in the kitchen and books on the carpet. She opened the shutters to let the warm, salty scent of the Pacific fill the room. She had just put on a pot of coffee and was just contemplating transferring the huge mountain of plates into the dishwasher when her intercom buzzed.