You Think You Know Me

by Clare Chase

  ‘That doesn’t make any sense.’ I tried to keep the hostility out of my tone.

  ‘I know. I think it’s as odd as you do. And in many ways I’d rather not have had to tell you. But given that your safety might be in question, I hope you can see I had no choice.’

  I sighed. ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘You moved your head and I think he thought you’d seen him. It was only then that he spoke to you.’

  ‘You can’t hear what everyone’s saying from your control room as well, can you?’ I said.

  Radley shook her head. ‘But what I saw was enough to make Seb think I ought to intervene.’

  ‘I was actually having quite a nice time.’ I was finding it hard to match Radley’s version of Max Conran with the one I thought I’d experienced. I looked over her shoulder, wondering if he might come back onto the landing if I didn’t appear.

  ‘I sent one of the marketing guys off to talk to him,’ she said, spotting the direction of my gaze. ‘You don’t need to worry. He won’t bother you again.’ She looked at me, her expression intense. ‘He’s after something, Anna. I don’t know what but, well, there’s a bit more to it than I’ve told you.’

  ‘Go on,’ I said.

  ‘When I saw him acting oddly I was particularly disturbed because of who he is. Or rather, who he isn’t.’

  She wasn’t making any sense. ‘I know who he is,’ I said. ‘He introduced himself. He’s Max Conran; he said he came in place of his brother.’

  ‘Lawrence Conran, the art dealer?’

  I nodded.

  She looked back at me, her gaze steady. ‘Yes, that’s the information he gave when he arrived too. We have cameras recording everyone coming through the doors.’

  ‘You are well organised,’ I said. It was slightly hard to take.

  ‘We have to be tight on security.’ She sighed and then went on: ‘And it’s handy for Jane too. She’s a consultant, working on sales and marketing for us at the moment. She was watching as people came in, so she could see who to target.’

  She glanced at me for a second and I’m sure she guessed I disapproved. I found it hard to stop my mouth from taking on a thin, lemon-sucking appearance.

  Radley paused for a moment before she said: ‘When Jane saw Max Conran’s name come up against that guy you were just talking to, she knew at once we’d got an imposter.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘He’s not Max Conran, Anna. Jane dated Max at the tail end of last year and she was quite positive about it. Whoever he is, he’s lied to us. And to you.’

  ‘But you let him stay,’ I said eventually.

  She nodded. ‘There was some question over whether Lawrence Conran was in on the deception. He’s very valuable to the gallery; he spends a lot of money with us. You can imagine Seb didn’t want to create a scene unnecessarily. But at the same time, you’ll understand why I was monitoring the situation.’

  The silence seemed to expand between us. At that point I suppose I ought to have been unnerved, but in fact I mainly felt humiliated. She must have seen how I was behaving around Max, taking his approach at face value.

  ‘I don’t know what his game is,’ Radley said at last, ‘but I’d be inclined to take a cab home tonight, rather than the tube.’

  Chapter Two

  Ten pounds poorer, I slammed the taxi door shut after me and let myself into Alicia’s place. It was one of a row of large town houses in a wide, leafy road. Goodness knows what it would be worth if she ever decided to sell it. It was much too big for her alone, but it had belonged to her parents and I suppose it must have felt too familiar for her to want to leave it. Instead she installed a series of lodgers, or paying guests as she called us, to help fill it up. My quarters were up in the attic and a girl called Sally was occupying the basement.

  I paused momentarily to switch on the upstairs landing light and unzip my boots, which were killing me, as anticipated.

  ‘It’s not James bloody Bond,’ I said aloud, still thinking of the man who wasn’t Max and the photograph.

  I don’t normally talk out loud to myself in public, but I was confident I was alone. Alicia wouldn’t be done with the gallery catering for hours, I knew. And as for Sally, well, I’d hardly seen her since I’d moved in, but she definitely didn’t seem the sort to be in on a Friday night, least of all on Halloween.

  Consequently, I jumped out of my skin when a voice said: ‘What’s not James Bond?’

  I turned to see a glamorous witch with slightly damp hair at the top of the basement stairs. She held a towel in one hand and was wearing the traditional black dress, together with fishnets and purple nail varnish. Sally.

  It now occurred to me that it was too early for her to have left to start her evening. Mine had been such a washout that I’d made it home before ten.

  I wished I’d kept quiet and got safely back to my room.

  ‘D’you fancy a drink?’ she said, with a smile that suddenly made her seem very young and not at all witch-like. ‘I’m having one – just to get into the party spirit. It’s always a bit freaky going into a room full of monsters and ghosts without a drink inside you.’

  I paused for just a second.

  ‘I’ve got gin,’ she added, as though I might make up my mind according to the quality of refreshments on offer.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, putting my boots back on again and feeling all grown-up and un-Halloweeny.

  It was the first time I’d been into her room. In terms of mess, it was spectacular. I pushed two or three pairs of tights, a pair of knickers, a paperback and a packet of cotton wool to one side so I could perch on her sofa. It was only when I took the drink she held out that I realised I’d sat on an open tube of foundation.

  ‘Oh God,’ I said, leaping up again. My green dress was safe, but the make-up was oozing out onto a red cotton cushion.

  ‘Oh don’t worry about that!’ Sally said, rubbing at it with a tissue, making the smear thinner, but more widely spread. ‘I get that stuff half-price anyway.’

  ‘Really?’

  She nodded. ‘I work at Farquharson’s. I’m a pedicurist.’

  That explained it. Farquharson’s: the most exclusive health and beauty spa in London. It was the kind of place where you could spend three hundred pounds to have someone place pebbles down your spine for an afternoon whilst you lay on a couch. Each to their own.

  I hoped the cushion belonged to Sally and not Alicia. I reckoned my cousin couldn’t have been down to Sally’s room, at least, not when I’d been in the house. I’d have definitely heard the screech if she had.

  Sally looked at me for a moment, her head on one side. ‘I’ve got a colleague who could sort you out with some great make-up,’ she said. ‘I love your colouring; auburn hair and honey-coloured freckles are to die for at the moment.’

  I was pleased that she thought this, as someone in the know, although, from what she said, they were only enjoying temporary popularity, which meant I couldn’t relax.

  ‘How do you find it, living here?’ I asked.

  She grinned. ‘I thought you might be after the low-down, given that you’ve only just moved in. Well, I’ve been here for six months. My uncle knows Alicia and he got it all arranged for me.’ She reached for some blusher and started applying it, facing the mirror as she spoke. ‘I mean it’s a great house, isn’t it? All those antiques! And I’ve never seen so many books … but I guess Alicia and me, we don’t quite see eye to eye.’

  I was willing to bet that was an understatement.

  ‘She does like everything to be just so, doesn’t she?’ Sally said.

  I nodded. ‘At least I was forewarned about that though. She’s my cousin, so I’ve known her since I was tiny. I can remember her coming upstairs to tidy my bedroom with me when I was about six. She must have been around sixteen. She was completely obsessive about order even then.’

  ‘Pretty weird,’ said Sally. She had reached the eyeshadow and mascara stage now. ‘Sorry – no offence – she
is your cousin after all. So where were you living before?’

  ‘With a friend just outside London,’ I said. ‘But I really needed to move down here for my work.’

  And that was how we got on to my so-called career, as well as my evening at the gallery. It was only after the second gin and tonic that she persuaded me to explain the James Bond comment. Once I had, she was delighted; I suppose to an onlooker it was like something out of a soap opera.

  ‘He took your photo?’ she said. ‘Wow!’

  ‘That’s what this woman, Radley Summers, reckons. I can’t help feeling she’s mistaken though. I mean, why would he?’

  ‘Freaky!’ said Sally, as though it was the highlight of her week. ‘And, I mean, who is this guy? Why would he be lying to everyone? It’s like something out of film or something.’

  ‘First really sexy bloke I’ve met in ages, and it looks as though he’s a stalker with criminal intent.’

  ‘You haven’t got a boyfriend then?’ said Sally, turning to the mirror to apply some scarlet lipstick. ‘It must be hard getting to meet many people when you’re older.’

  At that moment there was the sound of a text coming in. Sally lifted up layers of black skirt, rummaging amongst lace and velvet. ‘I had to sew in a pocket for my phone and cash. I mean, whoever heard of a witch carrying a handbag?’ She found the phone at last and checked the message. ‘Greg! He’s outside. I’d better shoot.’ She grabbed a set of keys and tucked them into the hidden pouch.

  As we walked up the stairs to the entrance hall she carried on chatting. ‘I can’t believe you were actually at Zachariah Shakespeare’s do!’

  ‘You know about him then?’

  ‘God! Who doesn’t? He’s as popular as a rock star. Everyone at Farquharson’s is talking about him.’

  So Seb had done his job well, I thought. Zachariah Shakespeare was hot property. And the people at Farquharson’s had lots of money.

  Before she let herself out, Sally glanced round at me. ‘You will tell me what happens next, won’t you?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘With the mystery man from the gallery!’

  ‘Oh!’ I paused for a second. ‘Yes.’

  But nothing would happen, I was quite sure of that. Either ‘Max’ had made a mistake about who I was, or Radley had got it wrong about the photo, or, or … well, something. Weird things didn’t happen to me.

  I watched as Sally closed the front door behind her and then pulled off my boots again, ready to climb the stairs.

  It was the smell of baking pastry that woke me on the morning of my interview with Zachariah Shakespeare. It had woven its way up two flights of stairs and was playing with my senses, so that hunger was my first conscious thought. This made a change from coming to with vague images in my head of the man who wasn’t Max.

  I’d successfully avoided Alicia all weekend. She’d headed off to give herself a break after the gallery do, but I could smell that she was back in work mode now.

  As I showered in the attic bathroom I thought there was a good chance I could give her the slip again if she was busy cooking. She had a separate kitchen on the ground floor where she prepared for her catering jobs: all gleaming hobs and granite. I’d only seen it once; it was definitely her own private domain, to be left well alone. Sally and I had the use of a smaller, communal kitchen instead, which was a very different affair.

  It turned out I was to be disappointed. The moment I’d opened the fridge to get the butter, Alicia’s cropped head poked round the kitchen door.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said. ‘I thought it be might Sally. I wanted a word.’

  Seeing the look in her sharp grey eyes I was immediately glad I wasn’t the one in the dog house. ‘Good weekend?’

  She put her head on one side. ‘So, so. I went to Bridget’s, you know? She took me to an awful restaurant on Saturday night. Horrible food, dirty cutlery and the waitress had a cold.’

  It must be such fun having Alicia to stay. Bridget would probably need a week in bed to get over it.

  She moved to leave the room, but then suddenly dashed my hopes by changing her mind and reaching for the kettle instead. ‘I’ll pause for a break.’

  She stood there, tapping her fingers on the work surface as she waited for the kettle to boil. She was wearing a black ribbed polo neck sweater and chocolate coloured trousers. If I’d been cooking in an outfit like that it would have been flecked with flour by now, but – Alicia being Alicia – there wasn’t a mark on it.

  ‘Smells as though you’ve been hard at work.’

  She nodded. ‘Food for a do at Number Eleven.’

  She meant number eleven Downing Street, I knew. It sounded intimidating to me but, of course, Alicia had had years of experience and, in any case, it wasn’t in her nature to get intimidated.

  She brought the cafetière and a couple of cups over and came to join me at the table where I’d settled myself down with a brown roll stuffed with thick-cut marmalade.

  ‘Don’t you ever eat properly?’ she said, peering at my breakfast and shuddering slightly.

  ‘There’s nothing more proper than marmalade.’

  ‘It’s what you do with it that worries me,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why you can’t have it on toast like anybody else.’

  She poured me a coffee and pushed it across the scrubbed oak. ‘You don’t look very together for someone who’s meant to be interviewing the biggest rising star in the art world this afternoon.’

  I instantly stopped feeling hungry.

  ‘You do have to make the effort you know,’ she went on.

  I tried to open my eyes wider so that I would look more alert and she would leave me alone. It wasn’t working.

  She leant towards me. ‘So, what was Shakespeare like when you met him on Friday?’

  I shook my head, swallowing my mouthful of coffee. ‘I didn’t get to meet him.’ I could see she was about to boil over with indignation, so I added quickly, ‘I couldn’t. He wasn’t there. Something about having beaten someone up earlier in the day. He was meant to be in a police cell or something.’ I could hear myself sounding incoherent. She always had this effect on me.

  ‘Or something? Really, Anna, you could at least have ascertained the precise facts. And anyway,’ she said, swigging more coffee, ‘I don’t believe a word of it. Clearly a publicity stunt. You really should use your connections. If Sebastian won’t let you see Shakespeare then who will? You should make it clear from the outset what you expect of him. After all, you’ll be providing the gallery with excellent publicity.’

  ‘Yes, Alicia,’ I said, sighing and leaning back in my chair in an attempt to distance myself, ‘and that’s all been arranged by Seb himself. He’s got a friend on The Enquirer, and that’s why they’re taking my article in the first place. It’s a great break for me. I’m not in a position to go haranguing Seb and having tantrums about the place.’

  ‘Tantrums!’ Alicia snorted.

  ‘Doesn’t any of your food need checking on, next door?’

  ‘No it doesn’t! I’m not suggesting you have a tantrum. You just need to be a bit more professional and assertive. Until it’s you that’s calling the shots you can’t steer where you’re going.’

  Like I didn’t know that. In a minute she would start on the well-worn tale of her humble beginnings in business.

  ‘It was the same for me you know, when I started out.’ Here it came. ‘And there have been obstacles along the way too. You may remember that Sebastian was very much against me taking on the gallery contract at first, for instance.’

  Yes, I remembered. It was very easy to recall things when someone kept repeating them every few days. And in any case, I had been involved. ‘I seem to remember I put that business your way, Alicia,’ I said.

  ‘You did. You used your contacts to help me and I’m grateful, but all the same, Sebastian didn’t want me to do the work. I had to take control of the situation. I went to Mel, because she was in charge of operations, and
I got her along to one of my soirées. It was my plan to get her hooked and I did.’ She looked at me and went on, ‘Because I was professional, and because I didn’t take no for an answer.’ She tapped the table each time she said “because” for emphasis.

  ‘It’s lucky that he kept you on, even when he and Mel split up,’ I said.

  She sat back in her chair at last, her hands wrapped round her coffee mug. ‘By that time he’d realised what an asset I was.’

  ‘Why didn’t Seb want you, anyway?’ I had the ungenerous urge to focus attention on her shortcomings. The opportunity rejuvenated me, and I got to work on the marmalade roll. I was sure I could feel its bittersweet flavour giving me a new strength of purpose.

  Alicia sighed. ‘Oh some stupid sentimental nonsense from what Mel said. I only remember because I thought it was so ridiculous. It was something to do with associations. Because I was your cousin he associated me, indirectly, with his university days and he couldn’t bear to be reminded. I mean, honestly, did you ever hear anything like it?’ She got up and took her coffee cup to the dishwasher. ‘It’s a wonder he’s made such a success of himself if that’s the kind of thing he gets bogged down with.’

  ‘He did have an awful time,’ I said, getting up to make myself a second roll.

  She looked at me over her shoulder as she took a cloth and wiped invisible marks off the working surface. ‘We’ve all had awful times, Anna. Both my parents were killed in a car crash the night before I did my first catering job at Lord Buckeridge’s place. That contract’s earned me tens of thousands of pounds since. Where would I be if I hadn’t kept my head together?’

  ‘More of a human being?’ I muttered under my breath.

  ‘What?’ But she didn’t wait for an answer. ‘What about Sebastian on Friday anyway? How was he?’

  I told her I hadn’t seen him either, but I didn’t say anything about the other goings-on that evening. I was in no mood to extend the conversation.

  As she left the room, Alicia said: ‘It seems to me that Sebastian’s avoiding you. And there have been a number of times, over the years, when he could have been more helpful than he has.’