Perfect Strangers

by Tasmina Perry

  ‘Come on, Fran, show us the ring.’

  Sophie spun around to see Megan and Sarah, her housemates from her flat in Chelsea. Francesca had just become engaged to Charles, a friend of Sophie’s ex-boyfriend Will, and her friends were anxious to hear about it.

  Francesca held up her hand to display the rock. Her happiness and self-confidence were quite dazzling, thought Sophie, feeling herself shrink into the shadows. Megan and Sarah squealed.

  ‘It’s enormous, Fran. What is it, five carats?’

  Sarah reverently stretched out one finger to touch it as if it were magic.

  ‘Six, I think,’ said Fran thoughtfully. ‘Flawless. Pear-cut. He got it just right, although God knows I dropped enough hints.’

  ‘Don’t they say that men have to spend two months’ wages on their fiancée’s engagement ring?’ Sarah looked up, her eyes wide. ‘He must be earning a fortune.’

  ‘Charlie’s doing okay,’ Francesca smiled.

  ‘Although I’ve heard that the bonuses have been cut this year,’ added Sarah. ‘Bloody Americans, they had to get greedy and screw it up for the rest of us, didn’t they?’

  Sophie didn’t want to get into a discussion about finance or greed at her father’s wake.

  ‘So where did he propose, Fran?’ she asked, trying to change the subject.

  Her friend launched into an expansive description of her ‘super-romantic’ weekend at an exclusive country-house hotel: two days of spa, sex and Michelin-starred dinners. It sounded very much like the weekends Sophie used to spend with Will, all except the six-carat ring at the end of it. Not that she wanted to think about him today, either.

  ‘When he took me out into the rose garden at midnight,’ continued Francesca, ‘then produced a Cartier box, I couldn’t believe it.’

  ‘I’m really happy for you,’ said Sophie honestly.

  ‘Well, obviously you’re all invited,’ said Francesca. ‘We were thinking a winter wedding in the sun.’

  ‘Where did you have in mind?’ asked Megan.

  ‘I want the Turks and Caicos. I’m not bothered about a church wedding and I never wanted to wear a big puffy meringue dress.’

  ‘The Aman resort out there would be just perfect,’ said Sarah.

  ‘I know, I’ve already made enquiries,’ smiled Francesca.

  ‘Then I’d better start saving,’ said Sophie, making a quick mental note of how much it was all going to cost her. The hen night – or more likely weekend – was bound to be somewhere splashy, the wedding gift list registered at Harrods or Thomas Goode.

  ‘Soph, Charlie is paying for all the accommodation, so you’ll only have to find the air fare.’ There was a slight air of superiority mixed in with the familiar pitying tone but Sophie chose to ignore it. Francesca had her faults, but at least she was here, and she appreciated the gesture.

  ‘And if that’s a problem, I’m sure we can sort something out. Someone must be flying private. I’ll ask around, see if you could cadge a lift . . .’

  Sophie raised her hand to stop her. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll manage. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’

  And she meant it. She didn’t care how much it was going to cost her. She didn’t care if Will was going to be there with a new pedigree girlfriend. She didn’t care if she had to go without food for a week, if that was what it took. For one weekend she was going to get her old life back, no matter what it cost her.

  It wasn’t until three o’clock that the last of the mourners left. The catering staff bustled about clearing away the half-empty wine glasses and stiffening sandwiches. Sophie found her mother standing alone in the conservatory at the back of the house, staring out into the garden. Julia Ellis had always been what people called a handsome woman; not beautiful, exactly, but striking, with high cheekbones and a long, elegant frame. She had certainly been the one to turn heads at the black tie dinners over the years. But today she looked ten years older, the lines around her mouth seemed more pinched and her eyes were rimmed pink.

  She turned around to give her daughter the slightest of smiles.

  ‘It went as well as could be expected,’ she said coolly.

  ‘I think so,’ said Sophie reassuringly. ‘People weren’t exactly here to enjoy themselves. But it was a decent turnout.’

  Julia snorted. ‘I see the Derricks, the Smyths, even the bloody Fosters stayed away – Annabel Foster has never had a migraine in her life and yet she develops one this morning, I don’t think so.’

  Sophie kept silent.

  ‘Look, this place is a mess,’ said Julia, turning to face the kitchen. She began collecting glasses of warm white wine and taking them to the sink. Growing up, Sophie had never known Julia to lift a finger around Wade House, their eight-bedroom Arts and Crafts house in one of the most fragrant parts of Surrey. But since the army of home help had disappeared, she had grudgingly taken on the role of housewife. Not that her efforts had stopped the house from falling into slow disrepair. Without the cleaners, the decorators, the interior designers and landscape gardeners, Wade House was wilting. Damp patches had appeared in dark corners, once white walls looked smeared and grey. The lawns were limp and untidy, while the pond, once a clear sheet of turquoise water, was covered in a thick crust of moss. It was a high-maintenance house that needed money to be spent on it – and money was one thing they didn’t have.

  Yet Julia had refused to sell it. Even when the golf club memberships had to be sacrificed, the weekly shop switched from Waitrose to the closest branch of Lidl. Sophie knew that by holding on to the house, Julia Ellis was holding on to the past, but the time had come to let go.

  ‘Mum, don’t you think we should talk about what we’re going to do now?’ she asked as she helped to clear up.

  Julia didn’t appear to hear her, thrusting the glasses into the soapy water, oblivious to the white suds that were spilling up the front of her good black dress.

  ‘I hear Francesca is getting married,’ she said. ‘To a friend of Will’s, I believe.’

  ‘Charlie Watson. They met at Will’s birthday party last year.’

  ‘I’d thought Will might have come along today,’ said Julia casually.

  ‘Why would he?’

  ‘Because you went out with him for long enough. He always got on with your father.’

  ‘Mum, I haven’t spoken to Will in six months.’

  Julia gave a small, hard laugh. ‘I suppose you’re right. Why should he be any different to anyone else?’

  When the Ellis family had received the news that Peter’s investments had gone seriously wrong, Will Lewis hadn’t ended his relationship with Sophie immediately. No, instead he had taken her out for a slap-up meal at Hakkasan. Afterwards, in bed, he had held her, stroked her hair, reassured her that nothing would change. For a short time she had believed him. But over the weeks he began to see her less and less. Like the fallout from the scandal, the repossession of the cars, the fading of Wade House, it took time to crumble.

  When he finally told her, three weeks after her twenty-sixth birthday, that he was too busy to sustain a committed relationship, Sophie had accepted it as an inevitability. No one wanted anything to do with the Ellises any more. It was as if their poverty was catching.

  Julia put the glass she was holding down on the counter-top and turned to look at her daughter.

  ‘Isn’t it about time you got yourself a nice man?’

  By nice, she meant rich. Julia had always judged Sophie’s boyfriends by their jobs, their prospects, their backgrounds, and had always impressed on her daughter the importance of a good marriage. Will had been a particularly great catch in her eyes. An Eton-educated investment banker who had bought a duplex in Chelsea with his bonus, he had been perfect husband material and she had been more devastated than Sophie when their relationship had ended.

  Looking back, Sophie could see that Will’s success and desirability hadn’t made her especially happy; in fact, it had fed her insecurities and made her quite neurotic. For the enti
re duration of their relationship she had spent a fortune on buttery blonde highlights and lived on little more than miso soup and salad, thinking that being blonder and slimmer than everyone else was the way to hold on to her man. If nothing else, she was glad that tyranny was now over and had no desire to jump back into it.

  ‘Mum . . . we’ve been through this,’ she pleaded.

  ‘What? You’re still young, you’re pretty enough. And you’re not exactly going to get your old life back any other way, are you? Don’t expect there to be any money in the pot, Sophie. There’s no life insurance. Your father left us with nothing.’

  The way she spat out the word ‘nothing’ made Sophie’s stomach turn over. Growing up, she had wondered if her parents had ever really been in love. Once or twice she had suspected her mother of having affairs, but Peter and Julia stayed together and the danger had passed.

  ‘Mum, please. Can’t you leave him alone on today of all days? He made one bad investment, that’s all. There’s no need to hold it against him in life and death.’

  ‘One bad investment? He gave every penny we had, everything we had worked for, our entire life savings to that man.’

  Her mouth twisted into a snarl. Julia Ellis still couldn’t say his name.

  ‘He was only trying to do his best for us.’

  Julia was unrepentant. ‘He was foolish, he was greedy, he was reckless and now he has ruined my life.’

  Sophie felt her temper flare. ‘Greedy? You were the one who wanted the big house, the exotic holidays. Dad would have been happy with a little house by the river so long as he had his boat and he had us.’

  Her mother rounded on her, her small, even teeth bared. ‘Don’t pretend that you didn’t enjoy the high life,’ she snapped, her voice quivering with anger. ‘Would you have preferred to go to the local comprehensive rather than Marlborough? To go to Margate on holiday rather than Mustique? You had the best education, the money, the lifestyle. We spoilt you, and you were every bit as angry as I was when it was all gone, so don’t throw this back at me and blame my so-called greed.’

  Sophie closed her eyes and for a moment she was somewhere else. On the Thames on her dad’s boat. A tinny radio drowning out the noise of the engine, the air sticky with summer heat and dragonflies. They had got as far as Old Windsor when Peter Ellis had told her that his safe investment hadn’t been as safe as he’d thought. Along with thousands of others across America and Europe, he was the victim of a $30 billion Ponzi scheme, and he was unlikely to get a penny of his money back.

  ‘You’re kidding?’

  She could hear her voice now, bristling with annoyance and panic.

  ‘How could you let this happen?’

  ‘But none of it matters, Sophie. So long as we have each other.’

  Back then, she hadn’t believed him. Daddy, I’m so, so sorry, she thought, feeling ashamed of how she had behaved, how she had thought that money was the only thing that mattered.

  There was the crashing sound of a glass smashing, and Sophie opened her eyes. Her mother was leaning against the Smallbone kitchen units, her face creased. For a moment, Sophie didn’t know what to do; she couldn’t remember Julia Ellis ever giving in to emotion. Even at the graveside she had been composed and upright.

  ‘He’s left me, Sophie,’ sobbed Julia, her voice barely audible, sliding down to the floor. ‘He’s left me.’

  Sophie knew what she meant. He’s left me to this.

  Julia hadn’t coped with the fallout of the scandal at all well. At one point she’d even left Wade House, packing a small suitcase and telling her husband that she couldn’t take it any more. She’d returned within forty-eight hours, presumably realising there was no hope of a big divorce settlement, and retreated into a shell. Sophie hadn’t missed the bottle of antidepressants in the bathroom cabinet, the bottle of gin in the closet. What if her husband’s death pushed her over the edge?

  She knelt down beside her mother, feeling her own mood soften.

  ‘Money comes and goes. Nothing matters so long as we’ve got each other.’

  She meant every word she said. So many things had been put into perspective in the last couple of days. The importance of family above everything was one of them.

  ‘But the house,’ sobbed Julia. ‘There’s a mortgage on it. I’ll never keep up the payments.’

  ‘So we’ll sell it,’ said Sophie defiantly. ‘We’ll buy something just as lovely, just a little bit smaller.’

  Julia nodded without lifting her head from her knees.

  Outside, the sun emerged from behind a cloud, sending a shaft of late afternoon light into the kitchen. As it warmed her face, Sophie felt a strange, calm optimism.

  They’d had such a run of bad luck, things had to get better soon. Surely.

  2

  She was late again – she was always late. Ruth Boden peered out of the black cab’s window as the streets of Mayfair sped by. Come on, come on, she thought angrily as a white delivery van moved out in front of them. Not today, I can’t be late today of all days. She glanced down at her phone to check the time – it was only five past, not actually late, not really – and wondered if she should send him a text, say she was running behind. No, that would look unprofessional, and that was the last thing she needed.

  ‘Oh God, come on,’ she muttered to herself as they stopped at some temporary traffic lights. ‘Why are they always digging up the goddamn roads?’

  ‘Tell me about it, love,’ said the cabbie. ‘I tell you, since the bleeding recession, there’s more holes in London than they got in Calcutta.’

  Ruth smiled politely and willed the lights to change. She was due to meet Isaac Grey, the Washington Tribune’s editor-in-chief, and although she knew him well, it was still important to make a good impression, especially when there were rumours flying around that the Tribune’s London office was about to be restructured. It was, on paper at least, a huge opportunity for Ruth. She’d been the star London reporter for five years, and ever on the job, she’d been up since six chasing a lead. This morning the lead had come from a contact in the Met who had rung to say that some hotshot American lawyer had been found hanging in his million-pound flat; a sex game gone wrong, he’d said. It had sounded too juicy to ignore, so Ruth had shot over to Westbourne Grove, only to find that it was an overdose, the man had been revived by the paramedics – and to cap it all, he wasn’t even American, he was Canadian, for Chrissakes!

  Ruth shook her head at the memory. It was obviously useful having contacts within the police force and she was well aware that the detectives liked having her around – the sassy American journalist who always spelt their names right – but sometimes Scotland Yard’s efficiency left a lot to be desired. Ruth had been brought up on the stories of Sherlock Holmes, and she couldn’t help feeling disappointed that there seemed to be very few Inspector Lestrades left in the force. Even worse, this morning’s wild goose chase had made her late.

  The black cab’s tyres gave a little squeal as they pulled up outside the restaurant.

  ‘Thanks so much,’ said Ruth, pushing a twenty-pound note into the cabbie’s tray before slamming the door and running up the marble steps, her heels clacking on the stone.

  Isaac was waiting for her in a private booth, flicking through his BlackBerry, his trademark scowl on his face.

  ‘So sorry, Isaac,’ she said, leaning over to air-kiss him. ‘Got called out to a big story on the other side of London.’

  ‘I hope it was good,’ he said as she slid into the red leather seat beside him. Isaac Grey always seemed to be pissed off about something – Ruth remembered he’d had that same pained expression the day he’d interviewed her at the Tribune’s office twenty years before. His hair had taken on more silver and the lines around his mouth had got deeper, but time certainly hadn’t mellowed him. ‘Goddamn BlackBerry,’ he muttered. ‘Ten times a day I dream about smashing it with a hammer. And now they tell me I should be tweeting.’

  Isaac was as old-school as th
ey came, a battle-scarred newspaperman who rolled up his sleeves and had ink on his fingers. She knew he loathed the onset of digital media – she’d once heard him yell, ‘You can’t wipe your ass on a JPEG’ across the office – and he hated answering to younger, slicker Harvard grads who knew nothing about the editorial side of the business and were now questioning his methods about generating revenue for the business.

  ‘So,’ said Isaac, finally putting his phone down. ‘Can we expect another one of your world exclusives?’

  Ruth allowed herself a smile. Three months ago, she had scooped all of the other papers when she had broken the story of Kirk Bernard, a New York hedge-funder now based in London, who had been burgled at knifepoint in his Mayfair home. The level of violence and the fact that a rich foreigner had been targeted sent a twitter of anxiety around both sides of the Atlantic. Bernard’s valuable art collection – most notably, a Rubens and a Monet sketch – had been stolen, almost certainly to end up in the private collection of some super-rich Eastern European gangster – or so the tabloids had speculated. But Ruth had discovered that the paintings hadn’t been stolen at all. Bernard had simply hidden them in the attic for a few months, claimed the insurance, then hung them back on the wall, claiming they were clever reproductions. Unfortunately his wife liked to throw dinner parties, and a guest at one, a visiting professor from the Sorbonne, had noticed that the ‘replacement’ paintings were suspiciously accurate. When Ruth had interviewed Bernard in Pentonville pending his deportation, Bernard had simply snorted and said, ‘Who gives a shit if they were real or not? To me, they’re just cheques with faces.’

  On that occasion, Isaac Grey had sent her a magnum of champagne, but Ruth was hoping for something more substantial today.

  ‘You know me, always on the lookout for a scoop.’

  ‘Uh-huh. So how’s things?’

  ‘Great,’ she said breezily.

  He took a sip of the red wine that the sommelier had handed him.

  ‘You know we go back a long way.’

  She tried to keep her face as impassive as possible. They’d had a brief affair soon after she had begun at the Tribune, when Isaac’s recent divorce and Ruth’s eagerness to please the boss had spilled over into an out-of-hours relationship. The fling had lasted weeks, and within six months Ruth had been posted to Kosovo. At first she had thought it had been a rather extreme reaction to their break-up, but the truth was that Isaac had known about her desire to become a foreign correspondent and had done everything in his power to make that happen. For that she would always be grateful.