Perfect Timing (14 page)

The cold snap ended in the second week of January. Poppy, who'd complained bitterly about never being able to feel her toes, decided that rain was worse. One of her shoes had a hole in it. Her hair went completely mental in the wet. Her Shetland wool sweater smelled of damp sheep.

‘And this is supposed to be a treat,' Poppy sighed as they trudged through a churned-up field. Her top half was splattered with rain, her bottom half with mud. She had, brainily, chosen today of all days to wear white jeans and a dry-clean only shirt. The shirt, a market stall bargain, was shrinking faster than you could say cheap import.

‘It is a treat.' Jake was brisk. ‘Honestly, all this fuss over a bit of rain.'

‘A bit! A few dozen reservoirs full.'

‘Your first country house auction,' he protested, gesturing to the imposing building looming out of the semi-darkness ahead, ‘and all you can do is whine.'

Poppy wondered why the field-cum-car-park had to be so damn far away from the house. She thought dark thoughts about the people who had organized today's shindig. She wished her shoes didn't squelch.

Jake grinned at the look on her face. ‘Okay, okay. You can do some bidding.'

‘Really?' Poppy perked up at once. She hadn't been allowed to bid for months, not since the wasp-swatting incident last summer. Still, no danger of any wasps today.

‘We'll call it a trial run,' said Jake. ‘I have to disappear at lunchtime to see a buyer in Windsor. You can take over while I'm away.'

Chartwell-Lacey Manor heaved with potential buyers. Dealers mingled with members of the public. An awful lot of mud was being trailed through the house.

Poppy envied the sensible people in warm coats and wellies. She queued up for plastic cups of coffee in the east-facing scullery, blowing on her icy fingers and eavesdropping on the gossip of two local women behind her. Jake had briefly outlined the story of Dorothea de Lacey, the recently deceased owner of Chartwell, but he was a typical man, hopeless in the gossip stakes. What these women had to say was far more revealing.

‘…and what about them daughters of hers,' tutted the one in the purple tea-cozy hat, ‘all but tearin' each other's hair out to get their hands on the best bits of jewelry. It's a disgrace, that's what it is. Shame on them, after the way they treated the poor old duck.'

‘Except she was 'ardly what you'd call poor,' cackled the other one, pointing to the rolled-up catalogue she hadn't been able to resist buying, even though she had only come along for a nose. ‘What about them chandeliers in the ballroom, eh? Imagine 'avin' to get up a ladder and dust all them bits o' glass every week! And did you spot that portrait of Mrs de Lacey when she was young? Up for sale, along with the bleedin' furniture.' She shook her head in vigorous disapproval. ‘Those two money-grubbing bitches didn't even have the decency to keep a painting of their own mother. All they care about is gettin' their greedy 'ands on the cash. I tell you, Mabel, if I thought for one minute our Teresa'd play that kind of dirty trick on me, I'd turf 'er out o' the 'ouse so fast 'er 'eels wouldn't touch the ground.'

‘Poor Mrs de Lacey, God rest her soul. Nice old duck, she was,' muttered purple hat. ‘What she ever did to deserve daughters like that is beyond me.'

‘What the daughters did to deserve all
this
is beyond me,' the other one snorted. ‘Eh? Millions, that's what they'll get when this lot's been sold off.'

‘Should've left it to a cats' home,' growled purple hat.

The other one chuckled. ‘Should've left it to me.'

By the time Poppy found Jake again, his coffee was half-drunk and half-cold. He was studying dinner services, making careful notes in the margins of his sale catalogue and keeping a discreet eye on the other potential buyers swarming through the crowded rooms.

‘Sorry, I kept getting my elbows bashed.' Poppy handed him his plastic cup with a grimace. ‘I had to drink some to stop it being spilt.'

‘What's the time?' asked Jake. Viewing went on until eleven thirty when the auction began.

‘Only ten. How's it going? Any hot-lots?'

Hot-lots were those attracting a noticeable amount of interest from the dealers. Poppy loved to sound like a pro. When she'd first heard the expression she'd thought it meant stolen goods.

‘We aren't interested in hot-lots,' Jake said mildly. He showed her the notes he'd been making, and the prices he'd scribbled next to the items he was interested in. ‘Now, I'll be here for the first fifty or so lots. I'll watch you bid, and see how you get on, then head over to Windsor.' He paused and flipped over to the next page of the catalogue. ‘Here, you'll be on your own. Carry on bidding and whatever you do, don't exceed the prices I've put down.' He gave Poppy a measured look. ‘No getting carried away.'

‘What, not even by a knight on a white charger?' Poppy grinned and gave him a nudge. ‘You don't trust me an inch, do you? It's okay boss, no need to panic. I'm on my best behavior. Even better now my feet have begun to dry out. I won't let you down.'

Jake said, ‘Hmm,' and drew another Biro from the inside pocket of his ancient Harris tweed jacket. ‘Here, you'll want to copy the prices down.'

‘No need.' Having swung into super-efficient executive mode, Poppy tapped the catalogue with a forefinger. ‘I'll use this.'

By twelve o'clock, Poppy had cheered up no end. Chartwell-Lacey Manor was just like something off a film set, the auctioneer was unexpectedly handsome with an almost roguish twinkle in his eye—usually they looked like bank managers about to confiscate your credit card—and the atmosphere was building nicely. It was, Poppy felt, wonderfully dramatic and glamorous. Very Lady Jane and Lovejoy.

She could hardly wait for Jake to leave. She had already bid three times and been successful twice. The adrenaline was swishing through her like nobody's business; and if it was this good bidding with Jake beside her, how much more thrilling was it going to be when she was on her own? It would be like flying solo for the first time, she thought dreamily, without an instructor to stamp on the dual controls…

‘Okay,' Jake murmured. ‘I'm off. I'll be back before three.' He passed the catalogue across to Poppy and pointed to the lot numbers the auctioneer was currently dealing with. ‘If you want to grab a sandwich, do it now. You've got twenty minutes before he reaches the Venetian glass.'

Poppy was seriously hard up this week. She batted her eyelashes at Jake.

‘Be an angel. Lend us fifty pence for a sandwich.'

‘Oh shit, oh help,' Poppy wailed a quarter of an hour later, her blood running cold as she realized what she had done. This was the other kind of adrenaline rush, the nasty kind that seized you when you realized you'd made a huge mistake, and it wasn't going to go down at all well.

It was the cheap shirt's fault for having shrunk in the rain. As the morning had worn on, it had become tighter and tighter. It was like wearing a pantie-girdle over your shoulders.

Worried that at some crucial moment she might not be able to lift her arm to bid, Poppy had nipped into one of the downstairs loos, wriggled out of her sweater and blouse, and dumped the blouse in a wastepaper basket. The Shetland wool itched like mad against her bare skin, but at least she could breathe again. The sensation of actually being able to inflate her lungs had been positively exhilarating.

So exhilarating, thought Poppy with a sick feeling in her stomach, that she'd danced off to the makeshift canteen for cheese and pickle sandwiches and a Mars bar, quite forgetting to take Jake's copy of the catalogue with her when she went.

Poppy stared wretchedly at the sink where she'd dumped it while she was doing her quick change. That had been twenty minutes ago and the sodding thing had gone, been swiped no doubt by some rotten thieving opportunist too stingy to buy their own.

Stay calm, stay calm, don't panic, Poppy willed herself, before sweat could begin to trickle down her back. She couldn't cope with that
and
the Shetland wool.

Well, it's simple, she decided moments later. I have two choices here. Either I twiddle my thumbs until Jake gets back and tell him I haven't bought anything because I didn't bid for anything because I lost the catalogue with his price list in it because I'm a complete wazzock… or I have a go at doing it myself.

With no money left, she had to relate her tale of woe to the man selling the catalogues and beg him to let her have one for nothing. Then, curling up on lot hundred and twenty-eight, a Victorian carved-walnut balloon-back armchair on cabriole legs, Poppy pored over the pages, willing herself to remember which of the items Jake had wanted her to go for. Lots seventy-three and seventy-five, the Venetian glass, she was sure about. And the satin-finished Lalique glass clock, hadn't he scribbled two thou by that? Then, there were lot numbers eighty-three and eighty-four, the Ferdinand Preiss figures whose prices she couldn't be certain about. They would probably each fetch around five hundred pounds.

Poppy scribbled her own prices down, keeping her ears pricked to make sure the auctioneer didn't start on the Venetian glass without her. Lot eighty-nine… her pencil hovered over the page… was a box of assorted paintings. She knew Jake wanted them because when she'd glanced at his list earlier the number had rung a bell; eighty-nine was what she always ordered from their local Chinese takeaway: king prawns with mushrooms and egg fried rice.

‘Lot number seventy-three,' announced the auctioneer, making Poppy jump. ‘A fine example of Venetian glass, a handmade sweetmeat dish…'

Poppy scrawled four hundred next to lot eighty-nine and scrambled to her feet. She wriggled her way into the auctioneer's view and began bidding away. Oh, the giddy adrenaline rush now that she was actually doing it herself… no chaperone, no stabilizers!

She didn't get the dish, it went in a frenzy of dealing to a woman in a pink straw hat at the front of the room, but the auctioneer gave Poppy an encouraging wink afterwards. She wondered if it meant ‘never mind, better luck next time' or ‘hello darling, fancy a drink?' He really was good-looking. Pumped up with adrenaline, Poppy grinned back. Perhaps it meant both.

She didn't get lot seventy-five either, or eighty-three, but she hit paydirt with the second of the Ferdinand Preiss figures, beating off nervous competition from a housewifely-looking woman to clinch the deal for four seven five.

‘Sold.' The auctioneer tapped his gavel and nodded at Poppy as if to say ‘There, I knew you could do it!' He gave her an encouraging smile. ‘Name?'

‘Poppy Dunbar.' She had to say it; he looked as if he really wanted to know. Then she remembered who'd be writing out the check. ‘Um… Landers.'

Did he seem disappointed? Did it make her sound married? Poppy ran the fingers of her left hand slowly, front-to-back, through her hair so he would see her ringless state. The exhilaration of bidding—and winning—was still with her. Was this surge of lust real or was she suffering an acute attack of auction-fever?

Poppy didn't know and didn't care. She just wanted to do it again.

And I can, I can, she thought joyfully, studying her catalogue and running her finger down the list. Four more lots, then it was the box of paintings, assorted. She hadn't seen them herself, but Jake was always on the lookout for good picture frames.

She'd hazarded a guess and scribbled four hundred in the margin. Poppy bit her lower lip. Maybe, to be on the safe side, she should limit herself to three hundred…

‘…three hundred and fifty, am I bid three hundred and fifty?'

The auctioneer's eyes flickered in Poppy's direction. The corners of his mouth twitched as if he were silently urging her on. She felt hypnotized by the look he was giving her and by the breathless silence that seemed to have descended on the rest of the room. At this moment, she had everyone's rapt attention. So this was how it felt to be the Queen.

Poppy wished she could do one of those slow Lovejoy winks, but she knew she'd only look as if a contact lens had popped out. Instead, she nodded, twice, like a chicken.

‘Three fifty to the lady on my left. Am I bid four hundred?'

The attention swung to the other side of the room. A male voice—she couldn't see who—said ‘Yes.'

Outraged—and not wanting to appear cheap—Poppy shouted, ‘Four fifty.'

‘Five hundred.'

Something weird was happening. Her fingers and toes had gone numb. And she was breathing much too fast. Heavens, never mind looking like a chicken… now she sounded like a dog.

Poppy tried to concentrate on the bidding. Even more weirdly, she realized, she no longer knew how much money five hundred and fifty pounds actually was.

‘Five fifty? Do I have five hundred and fifty?' The auctioneer was gazing at her once more, lulling her with his voice, coaxing her into saying yes.

‘Yes,' Poppy whispered. Then again, more loudly: ‘Yes.'

There were no more bids. The gavel went ‘tap' on the auctioneer's desk. ‘Thank you,' he told Poppy, reaching for his pen. ‘Landers. Right, ladies and gentlemen, we now come to lot number ninety…'

‘Lot what?' said Jake, his dark eyebrows drawing ominously close together. ‘Eighty-nine? I didn't want lot eighty-nine.'

‘Yes you did.' Poppy felt the first stirrings of panic. She nodded, to prove herself right. ‘King prawns and mushrooms with egg fried rice.'

‘What?'

‘Jake, you definitely marked eighty-nine. I
know
you marked eighty-nine…' Her voice began to falter. Numbers were funny things; they played tricks on your brain. She could visualize the menu as plain as day now. King prawns and mushrooms were ninety-eight. Eighty-nine was beef chow mein.

‘Poppy, you wrote four hundred pounds next to it.' Jake was sounding less amused by the second. He pointed to her hastily scribbled figures. ‘Then you crossed it out and put three hundred pounds for a box of the tattiest and possibly the most terrible paintings I've ever seen in my life.'

‘I—I didn't.' Poppy began to stammer. Oh help, now she was feeling really sick. ‘Look, I'll p-pay you back…'

‘You mean you went
over
three hundred? How much,' Jake thundered, ‘did you bid?'

It was no good, he was going to find out in a matter of minutes anyway. Poppy braced herself.

‘Five fifty.'

The explosion didn't happen. Cautiously, she opened her eyes. Maybe he wasn't going to lose his temper with her after all.

‘Right, that's it,' hissed Jake. He was white with rage. ‘That
is
it. I've had enough. I can't afford you anymore, Poppy. You'll have to go.'

Poppy waded through the churned-up field blinking rain out of her eyes. She no longer even cared that she was plastered with mud up to her knees. She was trying to do as Jake had instructed and dump the box of paintings in the back of the van but Jake hadn't told her where he'd parked the van and she couldn't find it.

She barely noticed as a loaded-up lorry trundled past, missing her by inches. All Poppy could think about was Jake, in front of an audience of fifty or so auction-goers, picking through the contents of the box, flaunting her stupidity for all to see. He couldn't have looked more disgusted if they'd been crawling with maggots. Each painting he picked up was worse than the last.

‘All I can say about these,' he'd declared icily, ‘is the best thing about them is the frames.'

The rickety frames were mainly ex-Woolworth, circa thirty years ago. They were made of grimy off-white plastic.

A couple of dealers sniggered.

‘I mean, for Christ's sake,' Jake raged, ‘how could you even
think
I'd be interested in garbage like this?'

‘I didn't see them.' Poppy's voice was small. She felt terrible and Jake wasn't even letting her apologize.

‘Then you're even more stupid than I thought.'

‘I'll pay for them.'

‘Don't make me laugh. Only this morning you had to borrow fifty pence for a sandwich.' He glared at one of the larger pictures, a chocolate-boxy painting of two spaniel puppies peeping out of a flowerpot. Then he dropped it disdainfully back into the box. ‘What I don't understand is how you managed to get
up
to five fifty. Was someone else really interested in this rubbish or was the auctioneer bidding off the wall?'

To suggest that she had been bidding against a nonexistent buyer was the ultimate insult.

Poppy whispered, ‘There
was
someone else.' She saw the auctioneer walking past. No, mincing past. He glanced at Poppy and glanced away again. Up close she saw his eyes were mean and his hair dyed. Bidding-fever had a lot to answer for. She wondered how she could possibly have found him attractive.

Now, out in the rainswept field, Poppy realized she was going round in circles.

The van was nowhere to be seen. She didn't have the nerve to go back inside and tell Jake she couldn't find it. He would only go even more berserk.

She had reached the main gate leading out onto the road. Without stopping to wonder if it was sensible, Poppy hoisted the box of paintings onto her hip and turned left. Left for London. He didn't want to see her again, let alone employ her. Well, Poppy decided, she couldn't face seeing Jake either. She'd been on the receiving end of quite enough fury for one day. All she wanted to do was go home.

‘Eeyuch, look at you!'

Claudia, fresh from her bath, looked suitably horrified when she opened the front door.

‘Sorry. My key's in my pocket.'

‘You're all wet.'

‘I'm not, am I?'

Wearily, Poppy hauled the box of paintings into the house. What she really longed for was a hot bath but knowing Claudia, she'd just emptied the hot water tank.

Claudia, rosy-cheeked and bundled up in a fluffy white robe, padded after her into the sitting room.

‘I say, is something wrong?'

‘Jake sacked me. I owe him five hundred and fifty pounds.' Poppy collapsed on the floor, pulling off her sodden shoes and socks. ‘And I've probably got trench foot. Otherwise, everything's fine.'

Poppy was looking sad and bedraggled. To make up for pinching all the hot water, Claudia made her a coffee with brandy in it. She listened to Poppy's sorry story while she was doing her makeup. She gave her nails an unnecessary manicure and a final coat of pink polish. She ran upstairs and came down again wearing a new sage green shift dress with expensive looking shoes to match. She squirted herself with heaps of Dior's Eau Svelte.

‘Oh,' said Poppy at last. She had been enjoying having someone to moan to. ‘Are you going out?'

‘Wait until you see him,' Claudia confided gleefully, ‘you won't believe it! He's heavenly, completely gorgeous. His name's Will.'

Poppy was astonished. She'd had no idea Claudia could be so enthusiastic.

‘When did all this happen?'

‘At lunchtime. A few of us from the office went to Rossini's for lunch.' Claudia was practically hugging herself at the blissful memory. ‘And he was there with a crowd of friends. The girls kept saying he was looking over but I didn't believe them. Then, just as we were about to leave, he waited until I glanced across… and pretended to take one of his eyes out!' Poppy's face was a picture. To show her how he'd done it, Claudia mimed the action. ‘He held it in his hand, bent down on one knee and rolled the pretend eyeball across the floor towards me.'

‘What did you do?'

Claudia giggled. ‘I rolled it back to him.'

‘And then he came over,' prompted Poppy.

‘And then he came over—'

‘And said: “I was hoping you'd catch my eye.”'

‘Oh bum,' wailed Claudia. ‘You've heard it before! I thought it was really original.'

‘Sorry.' Poppy felt mean. She began pulling the paintings out of their box. Since she didn't have anything else to do she might as well polish up the few frames that weren't plastic.

‘Anyway, his name's Will and he's a broker,' Claudia went on compulsively. ‘He lives in Fulham and drives a red Lotus.'

Won't go with your nail polish, thought Poppy.

Claudia smiled a blissful smile. ‘And he's taking me to Tatsuso.'

Poppy assumed this was good news. To make up for just now, she said, ‘That's terrific.'

The doorbell rang. Claudia let out a squeal of excitement. ‘That'll be for me! You get it!'

Before Poppy could lever herself to her feet, they heard Caspar making his way downstairs and the sound of the front door being opened.

Poppy said, ‘It's been got.'