To Die For

by Janet Neel

  ‘Not that soon.’ Brian Rubin had recovered himself, but Richard Marsh-Hayden was implacable.

  ‘You’re in trouble, Brian. Don’t feel bad, we’ve all been there, but don’t give us any crap either.’

  ‘What sort of trouble, excuse me?’ Tony Gallagher, thoroughly alarmed, was looking from face to face, and Richard turned on him in vicious impatience just as a buzzer went.

  Judith jabbed her finger on the door release and looked gratefully at the tall man, with a thick mop of dark blond hair, who was pushing the door shut behind him.

  ‘Michael. You up with the latest situation? Right now we’re just waiting for my bloody wife. She’s gone shopping, would you believe.’

  Michael Owens nodded to Richard, kissed Judith who had risen to greet him, and shook hands with Tony and Brian Rubin, carefully lowering the temperature of the meeting. He looked doubtfully at a small cane chair, decided against it and perched on the edge of Judith’s desk. ‘Could we have coffee?’

  ‘Of course.’ Judith reached for a phone to order it.

  ‘Tell him to be quick an’ all. No one’s got all afternoon to sort this out.’

  ‘Richard, you’re talking as if Selina will agree to sell if you just shout at her.’ Judith had been up since six, as restaurateurs have to be. ‘She only agreed in the first place because you were pushing her. She really wants the same as I do, to be left alone to run the two Caffs we’ve got and to open a couple more. Then we could raise money ourselves on the stock market.’

  Brian Rubin, uncomfortably seated behind Selina’s crowded desk, had turned scarlet. ‘That’s dishonest. And unbusinesslike. She agreed, you all did, and I’ve spent a pile of money, not to say three months’ hard work, to get this deal.’

  ‘I never agreed,’ Judith said, angrily.

  ‘No, but you’ve been professional about it. Up to now that is, when you’ve helped to bugger up the whole thing, excuse my French. You could be sued, you know. Interference with a contract.’

  ‘I didn’t do any of that. I tried to persuade Selina not to sell her shares right at the beginning, but we never even talked about it again until yesterday.’ She looked to Michael for support, and he took her hand.

  ‘You’ve been absolutely consistent, darling, from day one. But Brian’s right, we’re too far down the line to go back now. It’s just not fair to him, or sensible. So, Richard, do you know why she’s suddenly thrown a wobbly?’

  The question hung in the air and everyone in the room considered Richard Marsh-Hayden, whose relationship with a wife fully as wilful and strong-minded as he had never been smooth. He opened his mouth to be rude but closed it again in the face of Michael’s gently enquiring expression. ‘No. No, we didn’t have a fight, nothing like that. Hardly saw her yesterday. No idea what’s itching her, but I agree, she’d better forget about it.’

  Michael Owens nodded, plainly having expected nothing more revealing. ‘Judith, could we shift this stuff? I haven’t got a seat and there’s nowhere for Selina to sit either. Can we get someone to take it away?’

  ‘Sorry, Michael, but please not. It’s the new tunics and I must check them for fit before they get marked.’

  Michael Owens picked up a white chef’s tunic that lay half out of its cellophane wrappings on top of the pile. ‘It is marked, surely. It says Café de la Paix on the pocket.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that. We’re going to mark jackets with the names of the chefs and kitchen people.’

  ‘Why?’ Richard Marsh-Hayden asked, belligerently.

  ‘Because we keep losing tunics – or at least that’s what’s been happening while I’ve been over starting Caff 2.’ Judith Delves was sounding ragged. ‘So everyone is going to get four, as before, but with their names on, and their pay gets docked if they lose them. Or sell them, or give them to friends, or whatever they’ve been doing.’ She looked round at a sullen and unpromising audience. ‘Actually, since we’re all waiting, could we check the sizes and then I can get them into the back office ready for marking when Mary is in tomorrow. So Tony – Chef – would you try the large? And I’ll try the medium.’

  Tony Gallagher didn’t move, plainly in a bad temper, and Brian Rubin reached for a package.

  ‘I’ll give it a go – I can tell whether it’s right. We use tunics like these. And we mark them, you’re right there, Judith.’ He pulled off his elegant Armani jacket and hauled on a chef’s tunic, cursing at the buttons. ‘Bit big if anything,’ he said, hunching himself into it.

  ‘Nah.’ Tony Gallagher reached for another packet and helped himself and replaced his tunic with one of the new ones. ‘About right. You need the room in the shoulders, see, if you’re working rather than modelling.’

  ‘The medium size is OK.’ Judith sensibly ignored the last part of the sentence.

  ‘Hadn’t you better try it on a bloke?’ Richard Marsh-Hayden asked.

  ‘They’re unisex, and I wear medium, that’s why. But do please try one, Richard.’ She watched as Richard unpacked another jacket and put it on. ‘Comfortable?’

  He struck a model pose, shoulders twisted round. ‘Yup. Not bad at all. Come on, Mike, you got one too.’

  Michael Owens took off his jacket and found a large size and put it on, over immaculately cut trousers, and lunged forward, neatly and fast behind an imaginary foil.

  ‘Fits well,’ Judith said, professionally smiling at him, admiring the quick athletic movement.

  Tony Gallagher, upstaged, jabbed a finger towards the door, and they all heard the click of high heels accompanied by a rustling of paper. Judith pressed the lock release button and Selina Marsh- Hayden was in the room in a cloud of Diorissimo and a rustle of bags.

  ‘I really, really am sorry. There was this huge, huge queue, and I had to have my shoes back, they’ve been there months and there’s this little notice that says they’ll shred them or something if you don’t take them away.’ She smiled round the group, unapologetically. ‘Goodness, what are you all dressed as? Is this a game? Can I play?’

  ‘Be my guest. I’ve lost a day so far on this nonsense, I may as well waste a bit more time.’ Brian Rubin had had enough.

  Selina picked up a packet labelled ‘small’.

  ‘Do try it on, Selina,’ Judith said. ‘Then I can put them by for marking. There’s no point marking the gloves or the towels – everyone uses them, so they can go down now, please, Tony. In the hoist,’ Judith added as the service lift rattled up, loaded with coffee and biscuits, and Tony Gallagher, with poor grace, exerted himself to unload it and substitute packets of rubber gloves and piles of tea towels for the journey to the kitchen.

  She looked in appeal at Michael Owens, who nodded reassuringly and took off the white tunic he was wearing and organised the other two men to carry through tunics to the small inner office.

  ‘It fits fine. Bit loose but then I’m quite small.’

  Selina was wearing her tunic over the short cherry-coloured skirt, and looked, Judith thought wistfully, like the model she had once been, the top buttons becomingly undone in a way which would have got her fired at once from the Café de la Paix kitchen.

  ‘Get it off, Selina,’ her husband said, testily. ‘We need to get shot of this nonsense.’

  Selina took off the jacket, taking her time, handed it regally to Tony Gallagher and took the chair he had been sitting on, leaving him with the rickety bentwood chair on which he sprawled, legs splayed, in an open bid for dominance. The three other men in the room, after a single annoyed look from Richard, ignored him and fixed their attention on Selina. She hooked a strand of blonde hair, delicately highlighted, behind one ear and gazed back at them. ‘Well, I’m sorry I didn’t do this earlier but then there are lots of things I didn’t know before.’

  ‘Like what, for fuck’s sake?’ her husband snarled.

  She tucked the blonde hair in again, and addressed herself to Michael. ‘I was talking to this friend, who’s a very successful businessman. Anyway, he said that we – Judith and
me – would be mad to sell, everyone loved the Cafés and we ought to go on and build up a chain. Why let someone else do it?’ She looked under her eyelashes at Brian Rubin who was sitting, hunched and tight-lipped, behind the book-keeper’s desk. ‘He asked what profit we were making and when I told him he said it wasn’t enough for somewhere like the Cafés and something must be wrong with the costing, or we weren’t being careful enough. But we could sort that out, he said.’ She blinked sweetly at them all, inviting them to share her conviction, and her husband drew a breath in through his teeth. ‘And, as I’ve always said, haven’t I, Judith, it’s so much more fun running our own business than working for someone else—although it’s been very kind of Brian to offer – that I thought I’d rather stay as we are.’

  ‘We can’t do that, you silly witch,’ her husband exploded, and she stared back at him.

  ‘Who says?’

  ‘I bloody say.’

  Tony abandoned his sprawl and crashed forward on his chair. ‘I told you, Selina, I want to work for a bigger group. You won’t have me if you want to go on on your own.’

  Selina, cool again, pushed bags aside and rested her chin on her hand. ‘You have to give up your five per cent if you go, remember?’

  It was quite clear from Tony’s expression that he remembered all too well. ‘That’s not fair.’

  ‘Yes, it is. And it’s in the shareholders’ agreement.’

  Michael Owens had sat absolutely still while battle raged, waiting his chance. ‘Selina, I invited Brian to join us because he has a major interest in all this, but if this is a discussion better held among us as shareholders, I am sure he would rather leave us to it. We do need to understand better what has prompted you to change your mind. You’ve far too much sense to have abandoned a route we all agreed just because of a chat with someone.’

  This appeal to reason silenced the group, as it was intended to. It was Richard Marsh-Hayden who took charge. ‘Tell you what, Brian, it would be better if you left us to … to discuss among ourselves, yeh?’ Judith made to protest but Michael touched her hand and she stopped. Tony did not speak, but his expression suggested he was seeing the last lifeboat starting its motor, as Brian Rubin left, angrily expressing a hope of a successful outcome and a quick one.

  As the door banged behind him, Richard swung on Selina but she faced him down. ‘What this man actually said, darlings, was that on our turnover we ought to be making a lot more margin and we would find we had a leak somewhere.’ She looked round the group who were all staring at her. ‘Don’t you see? We may be selling the Caffs far too cheap. I mean, I’m not saying I’ll never sell, but Judith and I have worked our butts off and I’m not selling for less money than we ought.’

  ‘Selina. We can’t afford to go that way. We need the fucking money.’ Richard Marsh-Hayden was only just keeping his hands off her.

  ‘You mean you need the money.’

  ‘Hang on.’ Michael was sitting still, in contrast to everyone else in the room. ‘The business needs the money. We are close to breaching our banking covenants. Which means, Tony, that we are close to giving the bank every excuse for calling in our overdraft. So either we have to put up more money – and that may not be convenient for all of us – or we’re bust. Can’t pay our bills.’

  ‘You could put up some cash,’ Tony said, sullenly.

  ‘I could. But equally we’re being offered a good price and there’s always an alternative investment.’

  ‘And one which’ll pay off a bloody sight better in the long run.’ Richard Marsh-Hayden was too anxious to leave the point alone.

  ‘This one will pay off if we just wait a bit and find what’s happening to our profits,’ Selina insisted.

  ‘Maybe so,’ Michael said, calmly. ‘But we are where we are, and I have to say I don’t think we can get round this corner without a cash injection. Which I would be unwilling to provide.’

  ‘And me,’ Richard said, grimly.

  ‘I couldn’t,’ Tony confirmed, watching Selina.

  ‘Well, I could put up some,’ she said.

  ‘Don’t be so bloody silly,’ her husband said, violently. ‘You’re overdrawn on both accounts, so unless you’re selling your favours you can’t either.’

  Judith cleared her throat. ‘I would be prepared to put up £20,000 just to see if we couldn’t do better.’

  Michael’s left hand jumped convulsively and he turned to look at her. ‘I don’t think you’ve taken this line before.’

  ‘I know, and I’m sorry. But it’s my money from Dad. I don’t want to sell now, you all know I don’t. I agree with Selina, we’re selling too soon and for not enough cash.’

  ‘Selina?’

  ‘I’m not going to give up. We can get by with Judith’s cash.’

  ‘I see.’ Michael shook his head at Richard and Tony, then sat, in thought, refusing to hurry. ‘In conscience then, I think we must tell Brian Rubin that the deal is off. Thirty per cent of the shareholding – Selina and Judith – don’t want to sell, so we can’t deliver enough votes to get any kind of special resolution through.’ He looked round to make sure he had everyone’s attention. ‘I have to say that I think we may face legal action from Rubin. He’s spent a lot of money.’

  ‘Well, too bad,’ Selina said, rudely, releasing tension. ‘I’m sorry you’re pissed off, boys, but you’ll be glad in the end, I promise.’

  2

  Francesca Wilson, Bursar of Gladstone College, wife to Detective Chief Superintendent John McLeish and mother of William McLeish, aged twenty-one months, was sitting on her bed, gazing at a small test tube. She put it down, looked unseeingly at her son who was rubbing her expensive night cream into his right knee-cap, and read, for the tenth time, the printed instructions.

  ‘That,’ she said, stunned, removing the jar from her son’s hands and substituting a bunch of keys and a toy car, ‘is undoubtedly a purple ring. I’ll write to the Lancet.’

  ‘Why?’ William had only a few words and this was the one he used most, on a random basis along with ‘No’.

  ‘Because we only thought of it four weeks ago,’ Francesca said, dazed, as if to a fellow grown-up. ‘And I’m only eight days late,’ she added, wonderingly. ‘We’d better tell Daddy.’

  ‘Daddy.’

  ‘Oh dear.’ Francesca recalled all the instructions about how to introduce your child to the fact that he would have to share his parents with a sibling. Watching William dismember an ancient and cracked pair of sun-glasses he had found in the drawer by the bed, she remembered that she had been pleased to welcome her next brother Charlie but progressively disillusioned by the arrival, at just under two-year intervals, of Peregrine and the twins, Jeremy and Tristram. William would be two and a half when his brother arrived. Or his sister, she thought with a surge of hope. Or his twin brothers, a second disheartening thought suggested.

  ‘Ma.’ William had looked up and seen her face and was clambering feverishly on to her lap.

  ‘No, it’s all right, Will, don’t worry. Look here’s Susannah and I know you are going off to see Tim and Lizzie. I’ll just ring Daddy – no, sweet, you go and find a biscuit, I’ll come down.’

  William’s Daddy, blast him, was in a meeting as usual and this was not the kind of message that could be left with a secretary. She thought of ringing her mother, but decided she couldn’t. This was the sort of news a husband had to receive first. But it was impossible to sit at home contemplating a future so utterly changed. It would have been easier if it had been one of her days at Gladstone College; the financial and administrative affairs of an all-women university college left little time to worry about the future. She remembered then, with pleasure and relief, that she did have an errand to do and a sibling to see, even if she could not tell him her news. Tristram, one of the twins, was at twenty-eight beginning slowly to make progress as a tenor in classical opera. He had toured Eastern Europe in a small experimental company, singing lead or second lead parts; indeed she had been to Budapest
to see him as Cavaradossi in Tosca, wearing grubby jeans and a doubtful blond wig. He had caught an agent’s eye and was now at the Coliseum with Tosca, but not of course as Cavaradossi. He would be appearing as one of the villainous Scarpia’s henchmen, once in Act One and once in Act Two with about four bars in each act if she had that right. Fortunate, however, to get the job at all in so distinguished a company, and she could easily ring him up and see if he was free for lunch.

  Three hours later, after a satisfying encounter with Gladstone College’s principal banker and a trip to the National Portrait Gallery, she headed across two sets of roads, making for lunch at a spot highly recommended by friends. ‘Very nice with kids, don’t mind them at all, and the steak frites is to die for,’ one of her fellow parents had assured her. She stopped outside and gazed at it doubtfully; it looked rather smart with lots of gleaming brass and polished tables. But inside she could see two women, each with someone of about Will’s age climbing all over them. She pushed through the swing doors and stopped, startled. A very tall young man, with dark red hair, dressed in several layers among which at least one waistcoat and two shirts were discernible, was bent over the reception counter, considering a document.

  ‘Matt?’

  The young man straightened up and stared back at her. ‘Wonder-woman!’ He swept her into his arms and kissed her warmly. ‘What are you doing here, Fran?’

  ‘Lunch with a brother who doesn’t seem to be here yet. What are you?’

  ‘Seeing a client.’

  ‘Who is?’

  ‘Chef.’

  He was economical with words, she remembered, entirely uncertain whether she was glad to see him or not. ‘I didn’t realise you were a grown-up solicitor.’ Attack had always been the safest policy with Matt Sutherland.

  ‘Qualified two months ago.’

  ‘And you have your very own clients already.’

  ‘Yup. At least one. We know his family.’

  Since the clients of Peter Graebner’s firm were drawn predominantly from the criminal classes of West London, this was not necessarily a recommendation.