Upgrading (37 page)

“Andrew. Andrew Collins. I used to work there.” I hear my name being repeated to someone else. I decide that if it’s Debbie I’ll just put the phone down but it isn’t, it’s Maria.

“Andrew, look, I can’t really talk because Debbie will be back in a minute but Sami’s sort of disappeared.”

“What?” I get up quickly and start to pace around the room. “What do you mean she’s disappeared?”

Maria sighs deeply. “Oh, God. Listen, you mustn’t ring here again, OK and please don’t try and do anything because you’ll make things worse.”

“Maria, what the hell do you mean she’s disappeared?”

“She’s gone away for a while,” says Maria. “Thing is, Andrew, she was having a bit of fling with Ken Wheatley. The finance director? And anyway, her brother found out and went ballistic. He came here, beginning of last week, threatening to kill Wheatley. God, it was awful—such a mess. It was too much for security, old Ted nearly had a heart attack. They had to call the police and they calmed him down—Sami’s brother that is. Seemed like a nice bloke, really, just very, very upset. Can’t really blame him can you? What a shit!”

“Wheatley? I’ll say, I just can’t believe it. There was no clue, was there?”

“No one can believe it but it’s true. So, anyway, he’s on—what do they call it? Gardening leave, or something, probably going to get the sack I should think—”

“Where is Sami?” I almost shout at Maria.

“We don’t know, I think she did go home in the end. She didn’t even have time to clear her desk. I had to do it. Didn’t take long, very neat and tidy, actually, that’s Sami for you—”

“Have you got her home number?”

“Can’t give it out, Andrew.”

“Oh, Maria, for fuck’s sake—”

“Debbie’s the only one with it and she wouldn’t give it out to anyone, certainly not—”

“To me. Yeah, s’pose not.” Debbie probably thinks I’m the last person who could help her—and she’s probably right. “Poor Sami. Where does she live? Somewhere in Baling, isn’t it?”

“No, Hounslow, I think.” Christ, I can’t even remember that. How little I really know about her. Poor Sami, always smiling, always good, doing all the right things and look where it got you.

Maria suddenly whispers, “Gotta go—Debbie’s back.” The phone goes dead.

I put the receiver down. Suddenly there is a tight feeling in my throat and a pressure behind my eyes and I realize I’m about to cry. Oh, Sami, perhaps if I’d been there I could have helped. You could have told me about what was happening with Wheatley. I could have calmed your brother down. I could have helped you sort out your life. Perhaps instead of your thinking about me all the time and about the mess I was slowly getting myself into I could have been there for you a bit. Poor, poor Sami.

I arrive early at Joe’s and order a bottle of Badoit with lots of ice because I’m still dehydrated from the night before. Marion arrives just as I’m downing my third glass.

“Hi, sweetie.” She’d rung me an hour earlier, all love and kisses, to ask me if I would have lunch with her. The complete character U-turn had spooked me a bit. I agreed to have lunch partly because I want to get this wedding thing sorted out, well, all right, tie up the money aspect after the way Jonathan has ripped me off so royally—and partly because I’m hungry and there is no food in the fridge and, as usual, I don’t have enough cash to buy any.

I smile. It must be pretty unconvincing.

“Aw, poor baby,” she says, putting her bag down.

“I feel terrible.”

“You boys. You must have been really bad last night.” I look at her for a moment, wondering how she can do this. Aren’t I the one thing in her life that isn’t perfect and is screwing everything else up? She’s either being sweet to me as part of some sadistic mind game or she really just does not have normal emotions. I begin fingering my fork, looking at my Picassoesque reflection in it. A shattered, distorted face.

She knows perfectly well that I didn’t go out with Vinny last night.

“How much did you drink in the end?” I just look at her for a moment. “You were still at it when I came back, weren’t you?” She waits for me to say something. “Channing says ‘Hi.’” There is another pause. “You must feel bad. You needn’t have come if you didn’t feel up to it.” She reaches across and runs the back of her hand down my cheek. I turn my face away from her and tell her to get off me. Two Prada princesses on a nearby table turn to look at us and then carry on talking. Marion looks disapproving.

“Are you going to eat something? It’ll make you feel better.”

“I’d better since I’m here.” I’m starving actually.

“Well, don’t force yourself.”

Marion begins to chat a bit about how funny Channing was last night and about how there was a boy called Tony there who was so adorable and so funny and so cute she’d invited him to dinner next week. Then we eat just one course—bangers and mash for me, caesar salad for her—in silence.

As we wait for the bill, Marion says, “Don’t forget your wedding is on Friday.”

“I know.” Of course! So that’s why she’s being so nice to me, she wants to make sure it’s all going ahead.

“I thought you might have forgotten.”

“No.”

“I’ve given Ana Maria the morning off.”

“Very kind of you.”

“Have you thought what you’re going to wear?”

“Christ, no. Just a suit, I suppose. Do you want to buy me one as a wedding present?”

“We’ll see. Charles and Victoria have agreed to be your witnesses.” Marion looks down at the table and smiles.

“You think this is funny, don’t you?”

“No,” she says, hurt. “This is a big commitment for me.”

“For you?”

“Yes. To make sure the Home Office believes your story, you’ll be married to Ana Maria for at least a couple of years.” I look at her for a moment. Which is worse—having your lover married to another woman for two years or having your maid shackled to a no-hoper like me for that long? And, more importantly, which of us is she planning to get rid of first? She raises her eyebrows quizzically. “Besides, I don’t think you realize what kind of effect it’s having on me.”

“What kind of effect
is
it having on you?”

“I’m quite cut up about it.”

“You’re
cut up about it?”

“Of course, seeing my lover marry someone else. That’s a pretty bitter pill to swallow.”

I laugh. The Prada princesses and some other customers turn round.

“It’s a pretty bitter pill for
me
to swallow,” I say through gritted teeth.

“I think it’s the least you can do for me,” she says coldly, her dark eyes narrowed. “I’ve given you a home for the last few weeks, taken you on trips and how have you repaid me? Getting drunk, abusing my staff. Cheating on me—yes, I know about that Australian slut. You’re certainly making plenty of money out of it.” Her tone lightens. “Which reminds me, I’ll give you a cheque this afternoon.” I don’t answer for a moment. “If that’s OK with you?” I still don’t answer, wondering whether to tell her to stuff it and walk out now. “Unless you don’t want it.”

“Thank you, thank you, I’m very grateful.”

“If you want cash it will take a bit longer,” she says, looking around the room to see if there is anyone she knows.

“No, a cheque is fine,” I mutter. Cash would be safer, but makes it all even more demeaning. But this is the last time she’ll taunt me like this. And somehow it makes me all the more determined to get that money, her money. I know now what I’m going to do with it. I’m going to use it so sensibly, invest it, make every penny work for me. It’s small change to her, a couple of trips to New York, a shopping trip to Paris, but it’s a massive sum to me and I’m going to use it to start a business or put down a deposit on my own flat, something worthwhile, something laudable, something that will give me some security so that I never have to do this, never have to beg again. Something that even Jane couldn’t disapprove of even if she would be appalled by how I got it.

The bill comes back and as Marion signs the slip for the first time in our relationship I get a close look at her credit card.

She goes off for a seaweed rub and I wander down Fulham Road, window shopping as usual, until it occurs to me that the only way I’m going to get one over on Marion, the only thing that will really spook her is if she realizes I know who she is. If she knows that I know she told me a pack of lies on our first lunch date and that I know she is not the Upper East Side aristo she pretends to be but … who is she? Someone else. I’m sure it won’t help me get anything out of her financially but it will just make feel better. Besides, I think I deserve to know the truth: father in the discount furniture business, dodgy South American hubbies, Kremer Holdings and all. Not least I want to know why her credit card has “Mrs. J. Martinez” written on it. The only person who can help me and corroborate Davina’s story is Victoria. I can’t go to Channing because he’ll just go running back to her and besides, I can’t stand the sight of him. I didn’t get to ask Victoria the other night but now might be my chance.

I grab a taxi with the £20 Marion has given me.

“Where to?” asks the driver and I give him Victoria’s address.

Victoria arrives back at her house just as I do.

“What a delightful surprise,” she says, taking off some huge dark sunglasses with massive gold coins on the arms and then triple-kissing me. Bending down so far makes me feel a bit queasy again but I recover myself. “I was having lunch at the Collection with an old friend from Spain. We used to live in Madrid, you know. Guess who she is staying with in London?”

“I’ve no idea,” I say quite truthfully.

“Her sister! Can you believe it?” Well, very easily actually, but I manage to look suitably surprised. “Will you have some tea?” says Victoria as she lets us in.

“Thanks very much, I’d love to.”

Victoria says something in Spanish to her maid and then we sit down in her tiny living room. She chats about some people I don’t know and then asks how things are going in the hotel business. I look at her for a moment and then realize that’s supposed to be me.

“Oh, I’m not in the hotel business.”

“I thought you worked in hotels,” says Victoria, totally unembarrassed.

“No,” I say in a friendly way. “I’m … Well, I’m just deciding what to do next.”

“Very sensible,” she says seriously. “It took me many years to decide what I wanted to do with my life.” We both sit in silence for a moment trying to think what she must have plumped for. A career in lunching, perhaps?

“Victoria,” I say, leaning forward in the ridiculously small seat I’m squashed into. “I was just wondering something.” How am I going to put this? “About Marion.”

“Oh, Marion,” says Victoria, laughing and clapping her hands together. “I love Marion, she is my best friend in all the world.”

“Yes,” I laugh as if to say “Isn’t she everybody’s?” “Well, Marion and I were teasing each other last night—”

“Oh, Marion! Always teasing, always joking.”

“Yes, always. Erm, well, we were joking about our previous lovers, you know. She was trying to guess who mine were and I was trying to guess who she had been out with or, you know, even married to before she started going out with me.”

“Oh, Marion has had lots of husbands. She love them.”

“Oh, I’m sure she did love them—”

“Yes, Marion love husbands.” That is not quite what I meant but never mind.

“There was Edward, wasn’t there?”

“Oh, yes, Edward.”

“Yes.” There is a pause. “Did you know him?”

“Oh, no, she is diborcing Edward before I know her.”

“Oh, of course. What about the South American guy?”

“My father love Marion, she’s so funny, so beautiful.”

“Yes, I know. But who was the South American guy?”

Victoria looks at me. “My father.”

“What? Marion was married to your father?”

“Yes, that’s how I know her.”

“Your father’s … what was his name? Josef?”

“Yes, they meet in a restaurant in Rio and fall in love.”

“And was your mother still alive, then?”

“Oh, yes, she was in the ladies’ restroom.”

“Right.”

“Then she married British man.”

“Yes, Lord something or other.”

“Right.”

“Then she married another South American? Carlos or something?”

“Yes, Carlos. Bery nice man. Bery funny. Bery generous. Bery good shot.”

“Good shot?

“With a gun, you know.” She aims an imaginary fire arm at me.

“Right. Very useful. Do you know what her father did?”

“Her father? Oooh, what did she say her father did?”

“Was he a lawyer?”

“Lawyer, that’s right. Very good.”

“It’s just that someone, er, one of her friends told me that he sold furniture or something.”

“Ah yes, so they say. In Scarsdale or Queens, I think.”

“So he
wasn’t
a lawyer?”

“Oh, I can’t remember,” laughs Victoria.