A Perfect Heritage

by Penny Vincenzi

  ‘Now look,’ hissed Carey after Nicky Mapleton had outlined the plans for the day, and then dived into the water for a swim, ‘once supper’s over and Daisy’s disappeared, you disappear as well, OK? And take Toby with you. Ad and I want a bit of peace to listen to some music together, maybe have a smoke.’

  ‘A smoke?’ said Milly.

  ‘Yeah, a smoke. Weed, hash, a spliff, you know. Ad has some amazing stuff and he says it’s time I discovered how good it is.’

  ‘OK, cool,’ said Milly. She had learned not to remonstrate with Carey, whatever she said she was going to do, but she couldn’t stop herself when, later that afternoon, Carey suddenly removed her bikini top.

  ‘Carey!’ said Milly.

  ‘Now what?’

  ‘Ad might see. Or Antoine.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be such a dork. This is two thousand and eleven, Mills, not the nineteenth century. I’m not going to have white boobs.’

  ‘OK,’ said Milly and shrugged.

  ‘Oh God, here comes Mummy! Mills, take your top off as well. Back me up, OK?’

  ‘No, Carey, I don’t want—’

  ‘Mills! God, I wish I hadn’t brought you. You are such a baby. Come on, take it off!’

  She reached out and grabbed Milly’s top hard which gave way and fell off. Milly, mortified, turned over on her tummy as Nicky Mapleton walked up to them.

  ‘Getting rid of your strap marks, girls? Good idea. Make sure Ad isn’t around though. Listen, we’re off now. Have a great time, see you tomorrow. Oh, and Milly, I had a text from your mum. About meeting you next week. We’ve sorted out a flight from Athens for you. She sends her love, says she hopes you won’t find a family holiday too dull after this!’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Milly. The villa holiday with her parents and Fergie and Ruby suddenly looked rather wonderful.

  Nicky was gone; Carey looked thoughtfully at Milly, then said, ‘Take a picture of me will you?’ She passed Milly her phone.

  ‘What, without your top?’

  ‘Without my top, Miss Modesty. Go on!’

  ‘OK,’ said Milly reluctantly. She took a few pictures of Carey, then handed her the phone back.

  ‘Right, now let’s have some of you.’

  ‘Carey, no!’

  ‘Mills, yes. Come on, don’t be boring. I’ll do one of us together too, if you like.’

  ‘We-ell . . .’ She knew she’d have to give in. Carey would just nag and nag if she didn’t. ‘OK.’

  She sat there, hating every minute, horribly aware that her breasts were only half the size of Carey’s and very white. Carey had obviously been working with the fake tan. Carey pouted at the camera, pushing her tits about like a porn star.

  ‘Cool,’ she said, studying the pictures, ‘really cool. Right, I’d better put lots of stuff on or they’ll burn. Red tits, not a good look. God, I can’t wait for tonight.’

  ‘So, what happened?’

  ‘Oh . . . nothing.’

  ‘Darling, yes it did. I can tell.’

  ‘Mummy, nothing happened.’

  ‘All right,’ Bianca sighed. ‘Well, if you change your mind—’

  ‘I won’t! I mean, there’s nothing to change it about. Hey, Ruby, want another diving lesson? Come on, Fergie, don’t you dare start bombing her. Just don’t!’

  ‘She seems all right,’ said Patrick, watching Milly disappear into the pool very neatly, head first, long legs pointed behind her, followed by a rather untidy plunge from Ruby, rather shorter plump legs wide apart.

  ‘She’s not all right. I told you, she was crying last night, and when I asked her why, she said she’d tell me today, so there was something. She’s – Patrick, please.’

  ‘Sorry. Won’t be a minute.’

  He grabbed his phone, walked away quickly into the pool house, listening intently. Saul. Bloody Saul. He was hanging over this holiday, calling endlessly, quite late at night sometimes. She was quite shocked at Patrick; when she was on holiday she would check her phone three times a day and then switch it off. It was an unbreakable rule. Well, almost unbreakable.

  ‘What this time?’ she asked Patrick, as he came back looking sheepish.

  ‘Oh – just questions. Will I look at this, did I look at that. I – don’t mind though,’ he added in an attempt at bravado.

  ‘Well, you should.’

  ‘I don’t think you understand. Saul’s not like anyone. Or hardly anyone. He’s absolutely obsessed. That’s how he does what he does. He’s a bit – well, I hesitate to say it, but a bit unhinged. In a way. Maybe that’s rather harsh, but he is distinctly odd, sort of random. As a person, that is.’

  ‘Really?’ She was reluctantly intrigued.

  ‘Yes. You couldn’t get to where he is unless you were. You need to have no emotions, basically.’

  ‘Oh, really?’ That hadn’t been quite how she’d read Saul. ‘He’s quite emotional about Dickon, I’d have said.’

  ‘He is, but it’s obsessive emotion, lacks judgment. Dickon is the most important, indeed the only, person in his life. He doesn’t see him as part of a whole, part of a family.’

  ‘He doesn’t have a family, poor little boy.’

  ‘Well, he has a mother. Although Saul does treat her like some sort of staff member. She only exists in so far as what she does for Dickon.’

  ‘No wonder they’re divorced.’

  ‘Jonjo says she really struggled to be a good wife to Saul.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Well, no one could be. He just wants people who do what he thinks they should. Thing is, he only really cares about the money he makes. Not so that he can have it, but as some kind of abstract thing. It’s so hard to explain. He doesn’t care about anything else, doesn’t think, am I offending this person, am I going to upset that one? Ninety per cent of the time that’s how he is.’

  ‘Goodness. Well, don’t you get like that, darling. And do remind him you’re on holiday. Otherwise I might.’

  ‘Bianca . . .’ Suddenly Patrick’s voice was very serious, his expression intense. ‘Please don’t. This is my job, remember, and he’s my boss. I’ll deal with it as I think best.’

  ‘I was only joking,’ she said, half startled.

  It wasn’t quite true; but she suddenly saw what Saul represented to Patrick: not just success, but self-respect and a chance to achieve on his own account, rather than by the endowment of his father. She would intrude on that at her peril.

  ‘So good of you to come.’ Henk’s voice was at its most dangerous. Susie spun round. Against the background of the crowded bar, the noise, the heat, his face, white and taut, was the only thing in focus, frightening her.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you’d still be at home. Was – was everything all right? Happy birthday,’ she added belatedly, reaching up to kiss him; he pulled away.

  ‘I suppose so. A load of crap food and not enough booze; it was a pretty poor attempt at a birthday party.’

  ‘Henk, I’m sorry.’ She had to shout above the din, aware that even now there was a row building. ‘I – I did tell you I’d be late.’

  ‘Did you? You tell me so often I suppose I didn’t notice.’

  ‘And . . . did you find the present I left?’

  As if he couldn’t have: placed on the kitchen table as she crept out, tied up with a huge red bow, the new, vastly expensive lens he had been longing for.

  ‘Yeah, I did.’

  ‘And was it OK? The right one?’

  ‘Yeah, it was. The presentation lacked the personal touch, but yeah. Yeah, thanks.’

  ‘Well . . . good.’ Even now, she’d have expected something a bit more fulsome; maybe he was embarrassed to show his gratitude in front of these strangers.

  ‘Aren’t you going to buy me a drink?’

  ‘There’s a tab at the bar.’ He turned away, started talking to someone; stung to tears she made for the loo. And then came back, smiling, apparently ready for anything.

  Which was rather more than even she had e
xpected: inside the flat, several hours later, he turned as she followed him in, pushed the door behind her and raised his hand and hit her, straight across the face. He was very, very drunk.

  ‘You’re such a bitch,’ he said, ‘such a selfish, up yourself cow. All you care about is that fucking job, even on my birthday you put it first.’

  She didn’t dare antagonise him, or stand up for herself.

  ‘Henk, I’m sorry, so sorry, I told you, I couldn’t help it, that’s why I organised the food and everything—’

  ‘Yeah, well, this is what I think of the food,’ he said and he picked up a half-empty plate of canapés and hurled it at the wall. It smashed, the contents splattering everywhere. A bowl of fruit salad followed, trickling down the wall, the glass smashing as it caught the fireplace.

  ‘Henk, stop it, stop it! You’re mad!’ And then, as he turned to look at her again, his eyes glittering, she said, terrified of what he would do, ‘I’m sorry, so sorry you’re so upset, I should have been here—’

  ‘Yes, you fucking should,’ he said and hit her again, on the other side of her face; she staggered, almost fell, managed to make the bathroom, slammed the door and locked it. After a bit she heard the front door open and then slam shut; and she went out nervously, afraid he was tricking her, but he had gone, and she locked the door and put the chain across it and started, for it seemed the only thing to do, to clear up the mess. Thinking that any amount of loneliness would be better than what she had been enduring over the past few weeks.

  She woke, exhausted, aching all over, and looked at her phone; she hadn’t set the alarm and it was after nine. Thank God she didn’t have any meetings. She could be in by ten, could spend the day quietly— Her phone rang; it was Henk. She ignored it. Then the landline rang, the machine picking it up and she heard his voice: ‘Babe, babe, I am so, so sorry. Forgive me, please please forgive me. I love you, I love you so much. I can’t live without you. It will never ever happen again, I swear. Please, please say I can come home.’

  She went into the bathroom, switched on the shower. And then caught sight of herself in the mirror. One black eye, one hideously swollen cheekbone, a bruise at the side of her mouth, a cut lip. She couldn’t go into work like that, she absolutely couldn’t! She’d call Jemima, tell her she was ill – thank God Bianca was away. She stood in the shower for a long time, trying to wash off the misery and the shame and the pain, forcing herself to confront the truth; and then she came out and wrapped herself in her bathrobe and sat on the sofa, her mobile switched off now, drinking coffee, ignoring Henk’s endless calls on the landline, telling her how much he loved her, how it was only because he was so hurt, because it was his birthday, thinking maybe if she persuaded him to stop drinking, guilt creeping into her now, guilt and shame. It had been his birthday, his thirtieth birthday, pretty important . . . No, Susie! You mustn’t give in, don’t do this, you mustn’t! He’s dangerous, awful . . .

  ‘I need you,’ Henk’s voice said, ‘I need you so much . . .’

  ‘Is she here?’ Athina’s voice was irritable.

  ‘Er, no,’ said Jemima, ‘I’m afraid not, Lady Farrell. But she will be – you’re a little early. Can I get you a cup of tea, or a cold drink perhaps, while you wait?’

  ‘I find the taste of the tea out of that machine most unpleasant. Perhaps a glass of water, that at least can’t be ruined.’

  ‘Of course, Lady Farrell,’ said Jemima, standing up as Athina swept past her into Bianca’s office.

  Bianca was sitting in a traffic jam in Piccadilly in a fury of impotence, thinking that the state of affairs at Farrell’s was rather similar. Everything at a standstill, an expensive engine ticking over relentlessly, using up fuel and doing little else, and Lady Farrell, the equivalent of the white van man, constantly raising two notional fingers at her and endeavouring to cut across her path whenever she made to move forward. The most recent manifestation of this was to have taken against Hattie and criticise every sample that came out of the lab, demanding it go back and be completely reformulated. Which Bianca then had to countermand – it was time-wasting and expensive.

  Mark Rawlins, the new financial director, had just completed a very thorough financial survey, up to and including the launch, and his own take on the financial health of the company as he found it. He was nice, sharp, and funny, but he did not mince his words and had already told Bianca that she had no hope of hitting her targets for the following year, even with an incredibly successful launch. ‘And if it isn’t incredibly successful, just modestly so, which is rather more likely, you’re looking at results a lot worse than these. And if it doesn’t work at all—’

  ‘Mark, can we not go there please? That just isn’t an option.’

  ‘Pleased to hear it,’ was all he said.

  Mark had sent her an email that morning summarising the whole situation; Jemima had printed it out and put it into a folder on Bianca’s desk, with other equally important matters, like a report from Hattie on the staff in the lab – Marge pretty good, Jackie frankly disappointing and extremely stroppy, she should be let go – and a reminder from Lara that she had promised to discuss the form and exact timing of the all-important pre-launch sales conference. It needs to be a humdinger Bianca, raise the morale of the troops, pretty low right now as you know.

  Jemima, mindful that Lady Farrell might not be entirely honourable in her behaviour given the run of Bianca’s office, had hurried in after her, suggested she sat in one of the low chairs by the coffee table and asked her if she would like to look at a magazine while she was waiting.

  ‘Not particularly,’ said Athina, ‘I find most magazines these days deeply depressing. But I would like my water. With some ice, if it isn’t too much trouble.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Jemima. ‘I’ll just . . .’ She let her voice drift off and had turned to the desk, ostensibly to tidy it, but actually to scoop up any files that Bianca might not wish Lady Farrell to see, when Lara popped her head in and said she really needed to see Bianca soonest and was there a window in the diary?

  ‘Sorry to rush you, Jemima, but I’ve got the Debenhams buyer on the phone.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Jemima, ‘let’s have a look at the diary, I think she might have a couple of hours in the afternoon. Excuse me, Lady Farrell, I’ll be back in a moment.’

  Athina, a masterly reader of body language, who had been watching Jemima closely, closed the door and made her own survey of the files on the desk. When Jemima came back, Athina was sitting by the coffee table as she had suggested, leafing through the latest Vogue.

  ‘I dread to think,’ she said, ‘what Diana Vreeland would have made of this.’

  Jemima smiled at her sweetly, picked up the files on the desk, and withdrew, then ten minutes later Bianca called to say she would be at least another quarter of an hour; this was relayed to Lady Farrell by a sweetly apologetic Jemima. She stood up and dropped the magazine on the coffee table.

  ‘I’m sorry, but I really can’t afford any more time. I’m surprised that Mrs Bailey cannot organise herself better.’

  Back in her own office, she asked Christine to check when the next board meeting had been arranged; and when she got home that night, having made herself a rather stronger gin and tonic than usual, called Caro.

  Chapter 28

  ‘I’ve got to go to Germany for a few days next week. I’m going to visit a company over there.’

  ‘What sort of company?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘Patrick,’ said Bianca, mildly exasperated, ‘I’m only taking a friendly interest.’

  ‘Oh, we’re a bit intrigued by a company over there and I need to go and meet some of the people.’

  ‘Oh, all right. You know I’m going to Paris the following week?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  He didn’t ask her why.

  ‘We won’t clash? Both being away I mean?’

  ‘No, of course not. Oh, excuse me . . .’

  He p
ulled his phone out of his pocket and Bianca glared at him. She could remember a time when his phone was often mislaid, frequently switched off; it had simply not played a very important part in his life. Now he had it with him constantly. He went out of the room, came back fifteen minutes later.

  ‘Don’t tell me. Saul.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Patrick, it’s nearly eleven o’clock. What’s he doing, ringing you at this time?’

  ‘He wanted to discuss this German company.’

  ‘Why can’t he discuss it in the office?’

  ‘Because usually in the office he’s absorbed in the markets. He only has time to think in the evenings. And weekends, of course.’

  ‘So he wrecks the evenings and weekends for everyone else.’

  ‘He doesn’t wreck them. For heaven’s sake, Bianca, I don’t mind. Why should you?’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, her voice unusually sarcastic, ‘oh, I can’t imagine. I mean, why should I want to sit and talk to you at the end of the day? Or play with you and the children for more than ten uninterrupted minutes at a time while we’re on our only holiday?’

  ‘Bianca,’ said Patrick, his voice rather quiet, ‘might I remind you about another holiday? A skiing holiday earlier this year. Which you pulled out of altogether.’

  ‘That was – different.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Yes. Time was against us, I had to do that.’

  ‘And time isn’t against me, I suppose?’

  ‘Patrick, please. It was exceptional, a one-off thing. You work for Saul and I know it’s all very demanding and everything, but there are lots of other people who work for him. It’s not all down to you and—’ She stopped, aware that she was on dangerous ground.

  ‘So you’re saying that you’re indispensable and I’m not? That I can’t cancel holidays, but you can? Well, just possibly you’re wrong there. I do happen to be the only research analyst working for Saul and he relies on me heavily. And I don’t want to let him down. Correction. I’m not going to let him down.’