“Sebastian?” Daisy shrugs. “He’s a bit naughty, to be honest. He comes round to the flat—it’s very nice and everything—it’s lovely actually—and then we don’t speak for a week. Once it was two weeks. He admitted afterward he’d gone on holiday without telling me. Not that he’s obliged to. It’s. It’s like. To be honest, I don’t know what it is.”
“Did you say he was married?”
“Divorced. Everyone says I shouldn’t see him.”
“He sounds like a twat.”
“He’s very good in the moment. He makes me laugh. He’s kind of bad—but in a good way.”
“I think I prefer good in a good way.”
“Phillippe sounds perfect in every way!”
Daisy has named the male party in Chantal’s earlier account.
“He said he wanted to give me babies.”
Daisy’s eyes widen—the usual comparison is to saucers—and she squeals. The man on the next stool (wild crayfish and rocket) actually looks around.
“What he actually said was, he wanted to give me triplets.”
“Shut. Up!”
Chantal fiddles in her handbag and puts a cigarette (unlit) in her mouth, ready for the pavement.
“You’re fabulous, Daisy,” she says. “You should have someone better. What does he do anyway?”
“Estate agent.”
“They’re lying scum. They’ll say anything.”
“I know. But he is quite funny with it.”
“Hilarious.”
“He tells stories against himself.”
“His cynical way to get you to think he’s a decent guy deep down.”
“Do you know—I think he might be.”
Chantal shakes her head and dismounts from her stool. “Daisy, think about it for like, two seconds. A divorced estate agent. Could there be a worse prospect?”
“So what does Phillippe do?”
“He’s a gardener. Well, that’s what he does for money. What he really is, is a sculptor.”
“Jesus.”
“I know.”
“A sculptor!”
“He’s got a massive—”
“No!”
“Pair of hands.”
Long pause. Chantal says, “Want to finish my tuna wrap?”
“I shouldn’t,” says Daisy. “I can barely fit into my own clothes.” She inhales and runs a thumb inside the top of her skirt. But evidently discovering some play in the system, adds, “Oh all right, go on then.”
Desperate to find someone posh to change places with a fish-gutter from Grimsby—the five-star aristo we had squarely in the frame for the gig having bailed when he noticed where Grimsby actually was on the map—I spent the afternoon mainly wandering around Berkeley Square meeting quite a few of the berks who gave that address its name!
I was collaring likely types, dropping in the C-word (Channel Four), explaining that although the fee was “tokenesque,” the platform was fabulous (a plain lie!) and the “adventure” could actually be a real eye-opener. And think of it too from Darryl’s point of view, I told them—he was the fish man—living in your fancypants house and not knowing how to work the electric curtains, or what all the different knives are for (not those exact words, obvs).
You’d think I was trying to sell bubonic plague! The horror on their faces could have made a TV show in itself and I made a mental note to suggest it at the next Ideas Meeting.
One red-faced chap with velvet tabs on his camelhair coat took me for a hooker!—“You’re too late, my love,” he drawled, “but I’m up in town again on Thursday”—so I went to Rymans and bought a clipboard.
It didn’t help.
The best was a fabulous young buck, stripy shirt with cutaway collar, double cuffs, wondrous silk tie and shiny pointy shoes; everything about him throbbed with privilege, entitlement, noblesse oblige, other words like those. He listened patiently to the spiel with a small smile playing about the immaculate features—I came that close to asking if he exfoliated—and when I finished he said—and I quote—“I’ve very much enjoyed listening to your pitch, but to be perfectly honest, I’d rather have my fingernails ripped out. However, best of luck with it. If it helps, there’s a chap I know at Lazard’s called Thorogood. I believe his people own a good deal of land around Grimsby. He could be worth a shot.”
A smart woman who could only have been a few years older than me passed by. As I opened my mouth to speak, she carried on walking and said, “You’re very pretty, but I already give ten percent of my salary to charity.”
“It’s not charity,” I called after her. “It’s Channel Four.” (Well, it was, sort of.)
“Regards to Ant and Dec,” she called back over her shoulder (inappropriately).
And then my mobile rang. Mum’s neighbor, sounding wobbly. A courier had been trying to deliver a parcel and was getting no answer on the doorbell. She said she knew Mum was—how did she put it?—“not the woman she was.”
“I’m worried she’s had a fall or something, Daisy.”
An Uber from Mayfair to Whetstone, every sort of disaster scenario playing in my head, my heart thumping like a thumpy thing. Mum’s had what they call “memory issues” for over a year now; she regularly forgets to put the receiver back on the phone, which is doubtless why I kept getting the engaged signal as we crawled through London’s all-day traffic jam. Lately, however, things had become significantly worse. Just last week, for example, she asked me, “Where is everyone, darling?”
“Where’s who, Mummy?”
“Derek. And my daughter.”
“I’m your daughter, Mummy.” (The clue was in the word Mummy. Honestly, it was heartbreaking.)
“Yes, I know you are, darling. I mean the other little girl.”
“Do you mean Auntie Vicky?” (Mum’s younger sister; died eleven years ago.)
“Yes, Vicky and Derek.”
Well, Derek, my hopeless father, ran off when I was two to live in Italy with the Whetstone Trollop (as Mummy used to call her). And there were other signs of Mum’s mental guy ropes snapping: a teabag in the electric kettle, handbag in the fridge (found after a long search), Daily Mail crossword filled out—but all completely wrong!
Maybe you can imagine what I thought I might discover when we finally reached the house. Fatal stroke. Nonfatal stroke. Honestly, the image of her lying there helpless, unable to understand what had happened to her, unable to call for help…
To distract myself as we inched along the Finchley Road, I phoned Thorogood at Lazard’s.
“Do you
