‘Lovely afternoon,’ he said.
‘It is . . .’ Butterflies began to flutter in Anna’s stomach. ‘We’re looking for Alfie?’
‘Alfie?’ The man exchanged a smile with his companion. ‘Is he expecting you?’
Anna caught Jonah’s smirk and discreetly elbowed him in the ribs. ‘I think so.’
The woman stubbed out her cigarette. ‘You’ll find Alfie inside.’
Anna thanked them and, ignoring Jonah’s whispered comment of ‘Alfie is Al Capone! We’re walking into a scene straight out of The Untouchables!’, went up the steps at the entrance.
Inside, they found not only a café but a whole vintage store, filled with retro classics from huge Bakelite radios to furniture, stacks of old records, crockery and linens. Authentic clothes hung on wooden rails around the walls, which were papered with sheets of old newspapers and pages from vintage magazines. Behind a glass counter beside a bulbous Frigidaire stood a tall, gangly man with jet-black, Brylcreemed hair, dressed almost identically to the smiling customer outside. His sea-blue eyes sparkled as he raised a hand in greeting.
‘Hey, kids.’
‘Hi – um . . . Alfie?’ Anna held out her hand.
The man frowned. ‘Sorry?’
We’ve made a mistake. This isn’t him. Anna swallowed her rising panic and took another step towards the man, as Jonah followed suit. ‘Are you Alfie? I have directions to meet Alfie, and I understand he’s expecting me?’ She held up the Harry Richman 78, by way of explanation. ‘The man sitting outside said . . .’
The shop owner’s expression became one of amusement, quickly transforming into a hearty laugh. ‘Oh, so you’re the girl. Anna Browne, right?’
He knew her name? ‘Um, yes, but I don’t understand. Are you Alfie?’
‘Me? No, love, I’m Fred.’ He shook her hand and Jonah’s, and then reached across to pat the polished green-and-gold brass horn of a gramophone next to the glass food counter. ‘This is Alfie.’
Of course! Alfie would ‘help you hear the music’. It made perfect sense now.
Fred motioned for Anna to give him the record and placed it with great care on the antique gadget’s turntable. The gramophone crackled into life and the undulating strains of Harry Richman drifted into the shop. A customer browsing the racks of Forties dresses nodded appreciatively in time as ‘Ain’t She Sweet’ played.
‘Original, 1927 gramophone record,’ Fred said, his eyes misting over a little, the way Jonah’s did when talking about his latest bit of camera equipment. ‘Gorgeous sound. Can’t do that with an MP3 now, can you?’ He studied Anna for a while. ‘Know anything about this song, Anna?’
‘Only that my uncle used to sing it to my cousin and me, when we were little.’
‘Classic Tin Pan Alley tune. There’s a story that Milton Ager composed it, inspired by his daughter Shana, but you don’t want to believe everything Wikipedia tells you. It’s someone who’s proud of his girl and wants the world to agree. Sentiment like that never goes out of fashion.’ Fred laughed again. ‘Hark at me, eh? My wife would die laughing if she heard me getting all emotional over a song. I’d say my kids would disown me, too, if they knew, but they flew the nest years ago.’
He invited them to sit at one of the three tables in the shop while he made a pot of tea and brought over a plate of home-made scones with a jar of strawberry jam. ‘There you go. On the house, that is. I had a bet with my business partner that you’d never show.’
As Jonah quickly descended on the unexpected afternoon tea, Fred pulled up a chair and sat next to Anna, who took a fortifying sip of hot tea and broached the question she hoped with all her heart the retro-shop owner could answer.
‘Can I ask you about the person who told you to expect me? They’ve been incredibly kind to me, but I don’t know their name. Anything you can tell me would be a great help.’ She noticed that Jonah had put down the scone half he was eating, leaning forward a little to hear Fred’s reply.
Fred’s shoulders rose in a shrug. ‘Sorry, love. I never met the bloke.’
‘So, it’s definitely a man?’ Anna glanced at Jonah, who raised an eyebrow.
‘Well, I’m assuming it is, given the lyrics of that song.’
Anna felt the possibility of an answer slipping from her fingers. ‘I don’t understand . . .’
‘Ah, got you on a bit of wild goose chase, has he?’ Fred’s expression softened. ‘Look, all I know is that last Monday I got an email asking if the shop would be open this week and, if so, would I look out for a young woman called Anna Browne, who had an old 78 record she wanted Alfie to play. I replied to say that was fine, but never heard back. So Ernie – he owns this place with me – bet me fifty quid it was some idiot playing a prank.’
This amused Jonah no end. ‘You have email? Whatever would your customers think?’
The shop owner chuckled. ‘Don’t worry, we keep the computer well hidden. Fact is, without the blasted Internet we wouldn’t have any customers. It’s the irony of the vintage market today: your goods have to be authentic, but if you aren’t on the Internet or social media sites, people won’t find you.’
‘They didn’t give a name? In the email, I mean.’ She knew she was grasping at straws, but this was the closest she had come to meeting someone who’d had actual contact with the mystery gift-giver.
‘Not apart from yours, love.’
The wind left Anna’s sails as the last scraps of promise drifted away like a kite string let go in the breeze. She had been so sure that Alfie – or, as it turned out, Fred – would be able to give her more information on the parcel-sender. But now she had nothing more than another tantalising detail that meant nothing on its own. And then, as the stylus came to a scratching halt in the centre of the record, a tiny ray of hope emerged from the clouds in Anna’s mind.
‘Wait – could I see the email?’
‘No problem. Follow me.’
Fred led Anna through the beaded curtain behind the counter to a small storeroom where a shiny aluminium laptop looked incredibly out of place amid boxes of vintage stock. He fiddled with the keys until the email screen appeared, stepping back to let Anna see. The email read as he’d described, and Anna scrolled upwards to the last place she could hope to find a clue: the sender line.
Her heart dropped like a rock in the sea:
[email protected]
What kind of email address was that? Fighting the urge to cry, she thanked Fred and hurried back through to Jonah, who was enjoying a second cup of tea.
‘Let’s go,’ she said, taking the record from the gramophone and slipping it back into its sleeve, not daring to look him in the eyes.
‘What’s up?’
Now she was pulling at his elbow, lifting his arm and his cup away from his lips. ‘Please, Jonah . . .’
‘Can a chap not finish his tea?’ he complained, but Anna was already urging him out of the shop and onto the street.
All she wanted to do was run home as soon as she could, hurt and disappointment crowding in on her as she hurried down Cornwall Crescent, away from the shop and the owner and the stupid old gramophone . . . Who names a gramophone ‘Alfie’, anyway?
It was only when Jonah caught her sleeve, yanking her to a halt, that Anna turned to look at him, burgeoning tears on the verge of completing her embarrassment.
‘Anna, stop! What happened in there? Did he do something to you? If he did, I’ll—’
‘No, it wasn’t anything like that. It’s – nothing . . .’ How could she explain to Jonah how she felt? None of it made sense. It was nothing, when you looked at it. She had hung her hopes on a possibility so gossamer thin that it would never have held any weight. It mattered to her to know who the sender was, and what had just happened confirmed that beyond doubt. How was she ever going to know, if even the most promising clues led to dead-ends?
Jonah’s hand was warm on her arm, eyes full of concern. ‘Something obviously upset you. Talk to me. I can’t help if I don’t kno
w what’s up.’
‘You can’t help, Jonah.’ Her sigh echoed around the elegant stillness of the street. ‘I hoped the email address on the message would give me a name.’
Jonah frowned. ‘And?’
‘ . . . “Sender2006 at me-dot-mail-dot-com.” It’s hopeless!’
‘No, it isn’t.’
‘I thought Alfie could help me. He couldn’t – because he was an inanimate object and I’m an idiot for not guessing that. I thought the shop owner would know who sent me the parcel, but he didn’t know anything. And even the stupid email address was no help to me. I don’t have a name. I don’t know who’s sending me things. So tell me, why isn’t this whole thing hopeless?’
Jonah moved his hand from Anna’s elbow, raising it to brush a tear from her cheek. It was a small, deliberate movement that instantly brought Morwenna’s hands to Anna’s mind and opened the floodgates. As she crumpled against her friend’s broad chest, his heart beating comfortingly against her ear, she finally let go of the frustration that had been steadily building with the lack of – and the sudden return of – the parcels.
Jonah held her until her tears began to subside and her breathing returned to normal. Then, as she stepped back from him, flushed from the display of emotion and unexpected physical contact, she saw his hesitant smile.
‘It isn’t hopeless, Anna. You have a contact now. You can email whoever it is and say thank you – ask your questions, demand a name. If . . . if that’s what you want?’
Anna stared up at the Yorkshireman’s soothing grey eyes. ‘It is.’
‘Only I thought you said you weren’t interested in finding out who they are? That the gifts were more important than who sent them.’
I did say that, didn’t I, in the beginning?
So much had changed since the initial surprise of the gifts. Now she cared about who it was – because she wanted to know why. ‘It’s different. Now I want to know: who they are, why they chose me, what they hoped the parcels would achieve – all of it.’
‘Does it matter?’
‘It matters to me.’
‘Then send them an email. And demand answers.’
I will, Anna promised herself as she and Jonah wandered back towards Portobello Road, her friend unusually quiet as he walked by her side. I’ll do it tonight.
Twenty-Seven
FROM:
[email protected]
TO:
[email protected]
SUBJECT:
Thank you so much!
Anna’s brow furrowed. That was wrong. Too friendly.
SUBJECT:
Parcels
That didn’t work, either. Too businesslike. She let out a sigh. It had taken her the better part of an hour to get this far: how long could one email conceivably take to write? Perhaps she was overthinking this. There had to be a simpler way . . .
SUBJECT:
Alfie says hello!
Who was she talking to, a seven-year-old? Tired and annoyed, she pushed her chair back from the dining table and walked stiffly to the kitchen for a glass of water. The blank email form glowed accusingly at her across the living room.
This should be easy. Say hello, thank them for the gifts and ask for their name. It’s hardly rocket science.
So why did every word seem weighted with importance?
The blue digital-clock display on her oven winked 11.49 p.m. at her repeatedly. It was too late to call anyone, even Jonah, who had an early start for his next filming assignment in the morning. Not that he’d specifically offered his help this time, which Anna found odd, considering his enthusiasm for seeking out Alfie earlier today. In fact he had spoken very little on their way back to Walton Tower, receiving Anna’s thanks in the corridor outside their apartments with a muttered ‘No problem’, and walking to his door without looking back. Had he been embarrassed by Anna’s outburst? Even now, hours afterwards, she wished Jonah hadn’t seen her cry. Was it a step too far in their friendship – or the embrace that followed? Perhaps he wished that hadn’t happened, too?
A heavy sense of unease settled over her, as unwilling to leave her mind as the frustratingly blank email form on her computer. The parcel’s arrival had been so welcome, so exhilarating after the weeks without: how had that suddenly changed? While the thought behind the old record and the trip to the vintage shop had been well meant, what did it achieve? Like all her gifts to date, what did it mean? Instead of an adventure, the parcels were leading her up dead-end alleys; and, for the first time, Anna found herself wondering if the mysterious gifts were a good thing for her. All she wanted was a quiet life. She liked the changes she had seen in herself, but perhaps they were enough for now. The not knowing and her building frustration weren’t fun at all.
It was late and she knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep until she’d sent her message. I’m thinking about this too much. I’m just going to send the email and stop worrying . . .
FROM:
[email protected]
TO:
[email protected]
SUBJECT:
Hello
I’d like to thank you for the very kind and thoughtful gifts you have sent me. I don’t know who you are, or why you decided to give me these things, but I want you to know that they have meant a great deal.
I don’t understand why you haven’t given your name, but I suppose you have your reasons for doing this. I’d like to be able to thank you in person – is that something you would be happy to do? If so, you know where I work already, and now you have my email address. If not, thank you for your generosity and for thinking of me.
I hope to hear from you soon.
Best wishes
Anna Browne
Satisfied, she sat back in her chair. Asking the sender to meet her in person was a bold move, especially for her. But she had to know. Maybe her invitation would persuade whoever it was to come forward. Maybe then her questions would be answered and she could get on with her life. Until the mystery was solved, she was stuck. It scared her, but it was the only way.
Taking a deep breath, she hit Send.
Twenty-Eight
Juliet Evans was not a woman to be trifled with. Not by anybody – and least of all by some jumped-up businessman playing newspapers on the Board of DayBreak Corp, owner of the Daily Messenger. She glanced around her large top-floor office, with its wraparound view of the city skyline and huge glass desk. When she had first assumed ownership of this room she had felt like the world was literally at her feet. This morning she felt the city calling for her to jump.
The stack of flattened boxes against her desk needed to be filled, to escort her down the corridor to the former deputy editor’s office. Since Bev Holder had been promoted in a blaze of glory to editor-in-chief of the Daily Post – the Messenger’s biggest rival – the office had remained empty. Now Juliet’s name had been hastily stuck to its door. I taught that woman everything she knows, Juliet glowered, throwing a handful of papers into a box and already wishing she’d had coffee before embarking on this joyless task. She’s brilliant – but so am I. So much for gratitude . . .
But gratitude was in short supply in this building. Never mind that she had worked impossible hours against mountainous odds to turn the paper into one of the Big Four nationally. Never mind that she had single-handedly launched the careers of many of Britain’s brightest and boldest journalists. None of that carried any weight against the measure of the mighty buck. The bottom line was always money.
She would never get this done before eleven. Her two assistants were busy briefing the team on the imminent arrival of Damien Kendal – the crass, overfed, ego-inflated Board director whose gargantuan backside would soon be irrevocably denting the expensive Italian leather of Juliet’s office chair. Clearly, she needed help. She could make a call from her desk phone (while it remained hers), but the sight of her beloved office in disarray was too much. She needed to be away from it. Discarding the half-filled box of papers, she grabbed
her handbag and headed for the lift.
Any of the interns or assistants close to Juliet, or working in the newsroom, would be likely to add fuel to the whispered wildfires of gossip already spreading through the building. Juliet needed someone she could trust. The person she had in mind to help her was where she should be, thank heaven, smiling behind the desk at reception. The two junior receptionists were alongside her, which meant that Anna Browne could be spared for the morning.
Excellent, Juliet thought. Perhaps today wouldn’t be a complete disaster after all.
‘So?’
Sheniece and Ashraf flanked Anna like a pair of demanding meerkats. Anna marvelled at how quickly the latest addition to the reception team had been brought up to speed on the happenings in her life. Ashraf, it had quickly become apparent, was as much a purveyor of quality gossip as Sheniece and Ted, and almost as fast at sniffing it out.
Anna gritted her teeth into a smile. She didn’t need a day of interrogation after the sleepless weekend she’d endured. ‘I’m not talking about it, okay?’
‘He never replied!’ Ashraf clamped a hand to his heart as Sheniece shook her head.
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘You didn’t need to, babe. It’s all over your face. Are you all right, Anna? I mean, rejection is a hard burden to bear . . .’
‘Shut up, Ash! She doesn’t want to be reminded of it, does she? I mean, when my Steve did the dirty on me and disappeared, I was mortified for weeks . . .’
A Parcel for Anna Browne Page 18
