'In the 1970s in Somerset, Roger Saul started his Mulberry workshop. When he sold out over twenty years later, deciding to run a hemp-seed oil farm instead, the brand went global, with prices tripling. But purists will still tell you that a Saul bag, with its tartan lining and oiled brass zips, is better than the modern Mulberry.'
'Good bye Annie, take your bags off to Primark, where they belong,' Donna said with a dismissive wave.
'Mrs Thatcher's handbags were Ferragamo,' Annie went on, determined to finish. 'Princess Diana preferred Dior, who returned the compliment by creating the Lady Dior in her honour. The average thirty-year-old British woman owns twenty-one handbags and will buy a new one every three to four months, owning about 160 in her lifetime. My Italian bags are vegetable-tanned using a process perfected in Italy over five hundred years ago.'
Annie paused for breath. 'So, don't tell me I know nothing about bags.' With that, she picked up her samples and, head held high, tried to leave the office with her dignity at least intact.
But, just as she'd turned to make for the door, Donna's voice rang out with glee. 'Oh Annie, I think you've sat in something.'
'It's Ribena,' were Annie's parting words. She gave the door as hard a slam as she could manage and stomped down the corridor straight past the reception desk.
'Nice boss,' Annie managed, heading straight for the stairs.
Sunglasses back on, shoulder bag lowered awkwardly over the Ribena stain, out on the pavement, Annie struggled to regain her composure. 'You are not going to cry about Harrods,' she told herself, 'you are not going to cry about Harrods.'
And anyway, if the Harrods accessories department was run by Donna, then it was bound to be awful. And she wanted nothing to do with it.
Sod the expense, she was going to treat herself to a taxi home. She stepped off the pavement and stuck out her arm at the next passing cab with its light on.
In the back of the taxi, face firmly towards the window, Annie watched the street scene in front of her eyes become blurry. Then she brushed the tears away from her cheek.
'All right, love?' the taxi driver asked her.
'Yeah . . . just one of those days,' she told him, trying to snap a smile back into place, 'I'll survive.' She smiled even harder, fishing in her handbag for emergency lipgloss and the other thing she found helped crying outbursts more than anything else. She popped two slivers of extra strong chewing gum in to her mouth and bit down.
Blinking hard, she cleared the blur from her eyes and told herself there were plenty of other shops. All over London. Just look out of the window! There were shops on every corner selling women the four handbags they bought every year.
The taxi was cutting through the side streets, shortcutting the clogged main arteries of London and winding them up towards Camden now, heading north to Annie's home in Highgate.
Yes, she was supposed to be going back to work, but she'd decided to go home, drop off her handbags, drink coffee, change out of the Ribena dress and recover before braving the shop floor again.
The taxi came to a halt in a side street. A big, silver four-by-four had stopped right in the middle of the road, put its hazard lights on and now the passenger's door was opening.
'Act like they own the blooming place,' the taxi driver complained.
Out stepped the passenger and Annie recognized her at once by the soft and sexy short bob and the glamorously foxy outfit. It was Svetlana's hairdresserphobe friend, Kelly-Anne.
The passenger door shut and the driver fired up his engine again. From her cab window, Annie watched as Kelly-Anne ran her fingers through her hair and walked happily down the pavement, her touchy-feely pale grey knitted coat, belted at the waist, hugging her cosily. She looked great and that made Annie feel a lot better. She would miss styling women when she was a shoe and handbag mogul.
The taxi pulled out and into the top of Camden High Street where, under umbrellas opened to offer shade against the bright autumnal sunshine, café-goers were sipping their drinks.
And there was Ed. What!? Her head snapped round so she could take a second look. His coffee cup was in mid-air and he was laughing over the top of it . . . and right beside him, laughing back, was a very attractive woman.
Who the hell was that? And what was he doing having coffee in Camden High Street anyway? Shouldn't he be at school?
Annie, passing briskly in the cab, had not had the chance to have a proper look at his companion. The only details she'd taken in were that the woman was pretty, with dark hair and a delighted-looking laugh. Annie certainly didn't recognize her.
'Maybe she was Italian?' she wondered, panicking. Maybe it was Giovanna? Maybe this was why Ed was back at his sister's and not making any attempt to contact her. He'd lured Giovanna back from Italy . . . and now he wanted to move her back into his life.
No. She was being ridiculous. She was being irrational. Ed was allowed to have coffee breaks. He was allowed to meet women that she didn't know. There was probably a completely innocent explanation. That woman was probably a supply teacher who'd been assigned to the music department . . . and Ed was buying her a coffee to be friendly. But in Camden? So far from the school?
There had been no word from Ed since he'd stormed out of the house on Wednesday night. Since then she'd tried very hard to shut him out of her thoughts because the situation was making her very tense. Hadn't he realized yet that nothing was solved by silence? Did he seriously think she was just going to phone him up one day and say, 'Come back, I totally agree with you, I'm going to do everything you want'? If he thought that, he was deluded. She was too far along the road now. The Timi Woos were flying off the eBay site. She'd already made nearly £400 in profit and she was about to place a new order with Mr Woo.
As the taxi wound uphill into Hampstead her phone began to ring and she delved into one of her bags.
Ed?
she wondered nervously. Mr B, wanting to know about Harrods? That was going to be an awkward conversation. But where were the zips? What had he done with the zips? She snatched up the phone and looked at the screen. To her relief, she saw that the number was Connor's.
'Hello you!' she greeted him, trying to sound as bright as she could.
'Hello gorgeous girl, did I just see you whiz past me in a taxicab? You looked bloody miserable. And how come you're whizzing past in taxis while I have to walk everywhere?'
'Yes I am in a cab,' Annie told him, 'I thought you were so famous now that you had a car and a driver to take you everywhere.'
'As if . . . are you all right then?'
'Oh I'm fine . . . Ed seems to have another woman. But I couldn't be better.'
She was both surprised and hurt when Connor replied, 'You know what, my agent is on the other line, I'm going to have to call you right back. Sit tight.'
Ralph Frampton-Dwight does lunch:
Light grey suit (vintage Gieves & Hawkes)
Pink shirt (same)
Pink silk tie (same)
Pink silk socks (holiday in Sorento)
Brown leather slip-ons (same)
Total est. cost: long forgotten
'
Where the bloody hell are you?'
Connor was on his way home. He'd been partying at a friend's house, which had involved staying up drinking and gossiping until 5 a.m., kipping on the sofa for several hours and then leaving before noon. He'd still managed to dash out before the host emerged and roped him into clearing up.
Hell, he'd been rude. Never mind, he'd take the guy an extra-nice bottle of something the next time he went round. Hector had been at the party, just briefly for half an hour or so; in fact as soon as Hector had realized Connor was there, he'd left.
Once Hector had gone, Connor had felt, for the first time in a very long while, lonely in a crowd and without giving it too much thought, he'd turned to the wine bottle in front of him for comfort.
Now his T-shirt was sticking to him underneath his jumper as he walked. He was sticky, sweaty, unshaven, his hair was grubby and messy and he needed to get home and shower from top to toe. He needed to get last night out of his head, his mind and definitely out of his hair. He needed to get his act together for the Big Lunch with Sam Knight tomorrow.
The bridge of his nose hurt. He gave it a rub and realized that he must have knocked the scab off at some point. It felt a little crusty, as if some dried blood was sticking round there. God, he needed a wash. He could at least have washed his face before leaving. What if he bumped into someone important? He was walking up Belsize Park Road for God's sake.
That was when he saw Annie speeding past in the back of a cab. Or thought he saw Annie.
After giving her a quick ring to find out, he cut her off to answer the call from his insufferable, pompous arse of an agent Ralph (
Rafe)
Frampton-Dwight, known to his clients as Frightful-Twit. Still, the man got him lots of great work and other actors queued round the block to get onto his books, so he could hardly complain.
'
Rafie
darling, lovely to hear from you,' Connor gushed as charmingly as he could through the increasing pain of his hangover.
'Where the bloody hell are you?' came Ralph's angry response.
This took Connor by surprise. Where the bloody hell was he? Where the bloody hell was he supposed to be? OK, yes, yes, over the years, there was the odd little meeting or appointment . . . hell, even audition he'd been a tad late for . . . or, only very occasionally, missed. But he was sure there was absolutely nothing scheduled for today . . . Thursday?
'Where am I?' Connor asked
Rafe
. 'I'm walking up Belsize Park Road in search of a bloody bacon butty.
Wrong place to look, really. Where are you?'
'Connor McCabe!!' Ralph Frightful-Twit erupted but in a low voice, as if he didn't want to be overheard, 'I am sitting in the sodding Chelsea Dining Room waiting for Sam Knight to turn up for a meeting arranged five weeks ago because he's thinking of casting you in his next sodding film. That's where I am, you imbecile. Get. Over. Here. NOW.'
'Oh fuck,' was Connor's pithy response, 'I thought that was on Friday.'
'This
is
Friday you hopeless wanker.' Clearly the gloves were off now.
'Have I got time to go home and change?' Connor wondered.
'No you bloody well do not. In fact –
fuck's sake
,' Ralph muttered under his breath, 'that's him now. Just get here!'
In the back of the taxi, Connor attempted to smooth down his hair. Then he flapped his sweater and T-shirt to try and let some fresh air circulate. Better keep the sweater on, he reasoned; less chance for the stale sweaty smell to escape.
Bloody shit damn expletive buggering bloody hell.
He'd been preparing for this meeting for weeks . . . months! He'd been to AA! Detoxing! Wheat-free! Pumped up! Annie herself had approved the perfect outfit for today: subtle designer jeans, just the right side of broken in, a very flattering blue cashmere T-shirt, shoes the perfect groovy crossover between shoe and trainer, and a Ralph Lauren blazer.
Now, here he was speeding towards Mr Knight in a stinky T-shirt, a jumper with holes and a pair of chinos which, on closer inspection, appeared to have a wine stain on the knee. He didn't even want to think about the stinky, ragged baseball boots on his feet. Shit!
And Mr Knight was one of those Californian health nuts. Only ate raw vegetables and seeds, swam a mile before breakfast, all that kind of crap.
Connor fell into something of a gloom as his taxi sped towards the Dining Room. Would they even let him in? he wondered.