‘No,’ said Nanny Ag. She had to raise her voice over the furious wailing now emanating from the baby, who had also turned himself cherry-red in protest at being plucked from the bosom of his grandfather.
Daddy smiled smugly.
‘Here you go, Mummy!’ said Nanny Ag, depositing the squirming, screeching infant in Emery’s unwilling arms. ‘Now then,’ she said, addressing us, ‘Mummy will see you in the dining room for her own supper in half an hour, before getting a nice early night.’ She turned her fierce gaze on the dogs, whistled once, and, to my astonishment, both trailed towards the door, tails between their legs. Jenkins looked so contrite his ears dragged along the floor.
Gosh, I thought. No wonder Emery had phoned me. It was just surprising she hadn’t asked for a file in a cake as well.
Looking on the bright side, supper was a marked improvement on recent fare. A security chain had been installed on the fridge, and until Braveheart learned how to crack combination locks, Mrs Lloyd’s comestibles were safe.
Granny returned from her ‘day in town’ just as we were about to sit, and then Emery appeared at the same time as the salmon terrine and toast corners. She looked stunned.
‘Fresh from the milking parlour!’ observed Allegra. ‘Our very own little Buttercup.’
‘Do shut up, Allegra,’ said Emery, wafting towards her seat. ‘Better a milk cow than a drugs mule.’
I looked up in surprise, as did Allegra. Motherhood seemed to be taking some of the vague off Emery.
‘Well, darlings, now we’re all together, maybe this is a good time to discuss the christening, I mean . . . naming ceremony.’ Mummy sent a nervous glance my way.
‘I don’t see what’s to discuss,’ said Emery calmly, helping herself to some toast.
‘You can’t have my first grandson named in some hippy woodland frolic!’ roared Daddy. ‘I won’t have it!’
‘No one’s asking you to frolic,’ she said. ‘Just wear a garland.’
‘A garland!’ said Granny. ‘How chic!’
‘What about names, first?’ I asked hastily.
‘Martin,’ said Daddy at once. ‘Family name.’
‘No, it isn’t, darling,’ said Mummy, ‘it’s your name. Anthony has the family name, since he’s the oldest.’
Daddy was the youngest of four sons. His eldest brother, Anthony, had got the nominal titles, Uncle Gilbert had got the brains, Uncle Tybalt had moved to Australia to farm, and through some family skulduggery so complex even Daddy hadn’t seen through it at the time, he’d been landed with the house no one wanted on account of its leaky roof, uncertain foundations, and threadbare furniture. This had powered his all-consuming ambition to become an MP and somehow revenge himself on the lot of them.
‘Anthony is an effeminate name,’ huffed Daddy. ‘Fit for hairdressers and tennis coaches.’
‘I have a list,’ said Emery to me. ‘And so does William. He emailed me his third version this morning. What do you think?’
She passed me a piece of paper and I read aloud. ‘Tanguy, Parsifal, Basil, Gascoigne, Ptolomy and . . . Jasper.’
I looked up.
Mummy, Daddy, Granny and Allegra were looking green. Emery carried on eating her terrine.
‘Right,’ I said. ‘I take it those are your choices? OK. William has picked Austin, Alonzo, Drake, Becker, Lyle and Jimmy.’
‘Now, Drake I like,’ said Daddy, jabbing his butter knife in my direction. ‘Add Churchill, Winston, Bannister, Redgrave, Isambard, Kingdom and Brunel . . .’
‘What are you leaning towards, Emery?’ I asked.
‘I like Parsifal,’ she said. ‘After Grandad Blennerhesket. Percy, for short.’
‘That’s nice,’ said Mummy. ‘Isn’t it, Mummy? Remembering Daddy like that.’
‘Um, yes,’ said Granny, ‘but it’s not a very little-boy name, is it? Percy.’
‘I rather think he has a look of Daddy,’ said Mummy fondly. ‘Don’t you, Martin?’
‘Oh, absolutely. The red face?’ suggested my own father. ‘The red nose? The fixation with eating and sleeping?’
‘Do you have any more suggestions?’ asked Granny pointedly.
‘I don’t mind Austin,’ said Emery.
‘After the good old British motor manufacturer?’ beamed Daddy.
‘No,’ said Emery. ‘After the American city where William and I had a nice mini break. I’d be happy with Parsifal Austin.’
‘Really?’ I asked. ‘You’re sure?’ It just wasn’t like Emery to be so definite.
A more familiar consternation muddled her expression. ‘Well . . . I quite like Ptolomy too. Or Ulysses.’
‘No, darling,’ said Mummy. ‘He’d have to be awfully handsome to carry that off. You have to choose a proper name.’
‘If you’d only thought of that when you were choosing a name for me,’ said Emery crossly, ‘I might not have spent fifteen years of my life being called Board.’
We all tried to muffle giggles. Poor Emery, not being the sharpest tool in the box, had assumed Board was some reference to her flat chest, and had stuffed her bras furiously until someone explained the joke to her. By then she was seventeen, and had started to be called Socks instead.
‘Well,’ said Mummy with a pointed look down the table, ‘if your father had been sober enough to make himself clear to the vicar, you would have been called Emily Jane, as I specifically requested.’
‘And if your mother hadn’t been so out of it at the christening, she might have noticed the silly arse of a vicar getting it wrong,’ he retorted.
‘I had thirty-one stitches!’ she snapped. ‘And you had a crate of Dom Perignon!’
This was news to me. I’d just assumed Daddy had assumed she’d be a boy, then refused to budge on his weird name choice.
‘What?’ demanded Emery, flicking her gaze between the two of them. ‘You mean I wasn’t even meant to be called Emery?’
‘Not really,’ said Daddy, helping himself to the last bit of toast. ‘Still, hasn’t done you any lasting damage.’
‘I wouldn’t take it personally,’ said Allegra. ‘Apparently, he wasn’t even in the country for my christening. Marlin-fishing in Iceland, wasn’t it?’
‘That was a parliamentary trip,’ replied Daddy. ‘For the good of the constituents. Anyway, why not call the little chap Percy – I’ll be reminded of Wasdalemere’s dreadful poetry, and that ridiculous table tennis he used to make us all play after dinner. God, I can just hear him now . . . “Your serve, Dilly?”’
Granny threw her napkin on the table. ‘He is not going to be called Parsifal, and that’s an end to it!’
I was surprised to see just how upset she seemed. Since Grandad died, she’d had quite a merry widowhood, but maybe this was stirring up sad memories for her.
‘I know!’ I said, as a genius idea struck me. ‘If you want to call him in memory of someone we all loved, I can think of the perfect name!’
Five faces turned to me, baffled.
‘Emery! Your first pet!’ All our dogs were buried in their own special graveyard in the woods, with proper headstones and everything. Mummy planted dogrose bushes on each one.
‘Bodger?’ Emery wrinkled her nose. ‘I can’t call him Bodger, Mel. Nice idea but that would be weird.’
‘Bodger was a cat, darling, he doesn’t count,’ said Mummy, then she turned to me, her eyes sparkling with tears and love. ‘She means Cuthbert!’
‘Cuthbert!’ we cried with a wash of affection, even Daddy. Bertie had been our first basset hound, and his appetite was matched only by his smelly ability to process all the food he stole within a matter of hours. When he died, we all wore black for a week and buried him with his basket, blanket and half a pound of mature Cheddar.
‘Wonderful idea!’ cried Granny. ‘Bertie McDonald! I’m in love with him already!’
‘I’ll let William choose the rest,’ decided Emery graciously.
The next morning, I had to get up at some unholy hour to get back to Lond
on before the rush hour started, long, long before anyone else managed to drag themselves from their pit.
But to my surprise, as I crept downstairs to make myself a quick cup of coffee to brace me for the M25 ahead, I caught a flash of black and white movement in the kitchen and, for a moment, almost believed Mummy’s ludicrous stories of the violated cavalier maid her psychic advisor insisted lurked around the servants’ quarters.
On closer inspection, however, I realised it was nothing of the sort: it was Nanny Ag.
‘You’re up early,’ I whispered, putting on the kettle.
‘Routine!’ she bellowed, with scant regard for the others still sleeping. ‘Mummy needs to be woken to express milk at six forty-five, then Baby has his first feed at seven!’
‘Six forty-five?’ I said incredulously. ‘But Emery’s knackered!’
Nanny Ag gave me a reproving look. ‘We don’t like words like that. The Queen would say “fatigued”.’
I swallowed and tried to batten down the rising feeling that Nanny Ag, far from being the beacon of reliability I’d remembered, was actually something of a bossyboots. ‘Can’t she wait until half seven?’ I tried, with a persuasive smile. ‘She’s really awfully tired. And Bertie seems to have slept pretty well.’
‘Mummy and Baby need their routine. They both need waking for a feed. They’ll thank me for it later,’ she said, putting a couple of dry crackers on a plate.
‘That’s not for Emery, surely?’ I asked, peering at the crackers. ‘Doesn’t she need something a bit more . . . nutritious? Look, I can whip up a bit of French toast, if you like. I learned to do it when I was a chalet girl and I’m actually . . .’
Nanny Ag turned to me and gave me the Glare of Disapproval, not to be confused with the Glare of Disappointment or, worst of all, the Glare of Dismay. ‘Melissa. Nanny knows best. No one’s at home to Mrs Meddler. What this house is crying out for is some order!’ And she picked up her tray of dry crackers and sterilising equipment, and made for the stairs.
A terrible picture of poor Emery being wrenched from her warm bed flashed through my mind – not to say the idea of Bertie being woken after only just dropping off. He wasn’t going to like that.
I don’t quite know where it came from, but in a flash I was at the door, blocking her way. ‘Nanny Ag,’ I said, sweetly but firmly, ‘you will kill everyone in this house if you try to introduce order all at once. They can’t go cold turkey like that. Why not leave it until half seven?’
We glared at each other for a second or two.
Slowly, Nanny Ag put the tray down on the kitchen table. ‘You never used to be so headstrong, Melissa,’ she said, with a note of wounded disappointment.
‘No,’ I agreed, and picked up my car keys from the table.
11
I barely had time to notice spring blossoming into early summer, what with constant baby-related calls from home, French refresher CDs, and my appointments around London with Nicky. I’d set about implementing my list of improvements, starting with getting him fitted for a proper English suit. After a couple of strained meetings, he finally seemed to be bending to my will – or else imagining life without his allowance. Which is to say, he now answered my calls on the second attempt: I called that progress, of sorts.
Jonathan also seemed to be making progress with his new business, though he was still rather cagey about when he was leaving Dean & Daniels. He called my mobile one Wednesday morning, as I was walking down the tree-lined street to the office. I was still half-asleep but from his caffeine-buzzed tone, he’d obviously been at his desk for ages.
‘Hi, sweetie!’ he said, then before I could reply, breezed on. ‘You remember Farrah Scott? Dom’s wife?’
‘Oh, yes!’ I said. I’d found Kylie’s trainer, via a friend of a friend who worked in private catering: I owed serious favours as a result.
‘Well, she called me yesterday because she wants you to check out the right club to join in Paris. Somewhere she can hold client meetings?’
‘A members’ club?’ I asked, nervously. This was precisely what I was dreading about Jonathan’s business plan. I knew most London places pretty well, but that was after years and years of meeting different people who went to them. But I had no idea whatsoever about Parisian clubs – and not knowing many (any) Parisians meant it would take me ages to learn which were which, and who you could expect to bump into in the loos.
And as for queue-jumping Farrah onto the membership list of some trendy French place . . .
But Jonathan was speaking again. ‘Yeah, wherever the media people go in Paris. You know, like Soho House.’
‘Um, I’m not really sure I can—’ I began, but he interrupted.
‘I told her that was exactly the sort of thing you were so good at,’ he said, confidently. ‘Knowing the right places. You can look into that for me, can’t you? Ack, I’ve got a call on the other line – listen, we’ll talk later, OK?’
‘OK,’ I said, since there wasn’t really much else I could say.
Feeling ambushed, I climbed the stairs to the office, and let myself in. There was only one message on the answering machine, and I played it as I took off my jacket.
It was from one Poppy Lowther, squeaking, ‘Oh my God! It’s in today, Melissa!’
I’d barely absorbed that good news when the phone rang, and before I could even get my Little Lady office greeting out, I was cut short by a ferocious snarl.
‘What the hell are you doing getting me banned from Greens?’
‘Nicky!’ I said reproachfully. ‘Is that the way to greet a lady?’
Nicky replied with something that definitely wasn’t the way to speak to a lady, especially before ten o’clock.
‘If you’re going to talk to me like that, I’m going to have to hang up on you,’ I said with some regret. Regret for myself mainly, because though I wouldn’t dream of letting on to Nicky, the office had taken on a more glamorous hue just from his call. ‘Don’t make me do that. I’ve only ever had to twice.’
‘You will not hang up on me,’ growled Nicky. ‘Tell me what you’re playing at – or have you just gone mad? I tried to get into Greens last night for a drink and the silly mare on the door wouldn’t let me in.’
‘Oh, that.’
‘Yes, that.’ He spoiled the effect of his growling by coughing with the effort. It was, after all, very early for him. ‘Do you realise I just about keep that place afloat? There are not one but two champagne cocktails named after me.’
‘Well, I haven’t seen the papers yet myself, but if you look in this morning’s Daily Mail,’ I said serenely, ‘you will see a story in the gossip column thing, all about how Prince Nicolas of Hollenberg has been banned from the notorious society—’
‘The Daily Mail?’ demanded Nicky. ‘Hang on, there’s a copy here.’
I heard scrabbling. ‘Where are you?’ I asked.
‘Up,’ he said. ‘And that’s all you need to know.’ I strained my ears and picked up the flicking of pages, and from the clinking in the background I guessed he was in a coffee shop somewhere. Or still in a bar. ‘Is there a photo?’ he added, unable to control his vanity.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I supplied one.’
There was a howl of horror as Nicky found the page in question. ‘Jesus and Mary! You’re kidding! I look like—’
‘You look like a jolly nice chap,’ I said. I’d sent them a photograph I’d snapped during one of his fittings at Huntsman for his new suit the previous week. Stripped of his open-necked shirt and Gucci shade combo, Nicky had actually looked rather sweet in a normal white shirt, especially since the wind had ruffled his hair up from its usual slicked-back look and revealed hitherto unsuspected curls.
‘I look like a total dork!’ he roared. ‘And . . . oh, my God! “Besotted fans of playboy Prince Nicolas of Hollenberg will have to seek him out elsewhere now he’s banned from his usual haunt, Chelsea private members’ club, Greens. Society doorgirl Poppy Lowther revealed that doe-eyed Nicky has
been banned for good behaviour.” Good behaviour? What the hell is that about?’
‘Well, if you read on, Poppy will explain,’ I said.
‘“Once known for his wild antics and drunken exploits, recently the eligible young aristo seems to have turned over a new leaf. ‘From what I’ve heard,’ says clipboard princess Poppy, ‘Nicky’s days of Nazi uniforms and pole-dancing with Olympic show-jumpers are over. He used to party all night then stay for our famous Brunch-of-the-Dog but now he’s into his early nights. I’ve even heard he’s started detoxing! And we can’t have that sort of behaviour here – we’ve got a reputation to maintain!’ Poppy says.”’ There was a pause, then Nicky continued, in a more suspicious tone, ‘“Rumours are circulating that this new leaf might have something to do with Nicky’s new flame – a mystery blonde who’s replaced ointment heiress Imogen ‘Piglet’ Leys as his regular party popper.”’
It was my turn to be outraged. ‘What?’
‘Oh, don’t play the innocent,’ said Nicky. ‘You told them to put that, didn’t you?’
‘I most certainly did not,’ I protested. Blood drained from my face, then rushed back into it.
Party popper? I’d been to one dinner with him! Well, and a couple of suit fittings. And a quick frogmarch round an art gallery, then a coffee afterwards that had sort of turned into lunch. Oh, and a cocktail reception at the Irish Embassy.
‘“Sources close to the prince are hinting that this curvy honey has got London’s most eligible bachelor abandoning strip clubs and police cells for golf clubs and wedding bells.” Curvy honey? Don’t tell me you didn’t plant that!’
‘But I didn’t! I mean, generally yes,’ I flustered, turning pink, ‘I admit I got Poppy Lowther to say that – she’s the younger sister of one of my old clients, and I did drop the story to a friend of mine who works with Richard Kay at the Mail, but I definitely didn’t—’
‘Thank God there’s no name,’ said Nicky. ‘Yours, I mean.’
‘Well, quite,’ I said.
‘You should be relieved,’ he went on. ‘You don’t want to see Piglet when she’s mad. I’ve seen her throw people.’
Little Lady Agency and The Prince Page 18
