‘Yes,’ I said quickly, to get it over with. ‘But I didn’t invent Prince William. Granny did that, to make it look like the man following me was a press photographer, I think. I should really check that with her. She has a fertile imagination.’ I paused. ‘I suppose at least she didn’t say it was Kate Moss I was dating.’
Jonathan blew out the breath in his cheeks and sank back into his seat.
‘Don’t be mad with me!’ I begged. ‘I didn’t know what else to do! I’d never normally . . . lie to a policeman,’ I finished, in a smaller voice.
Lying to authority figures was something everyone else in my family did, not me. Oh, God. I was reverting to type. It would be chain-smoking and cheese-backhanders before I knew it.
‘I’m not mad at you,’ he said carefully. ‘I could never be mad at you. Not even for . . . lying to a policeman.’
Was I imagining a hint of a laugh there? Surely not.
‘But . . .’ He exhaled again. ‘This stepping in to fix Ric’s little theft problem – it’s working, Melissa. This is what I meant! You made up the story to get this guy off the hook! Why couldn’t you just have said he’d picked you up in the car, you had no idea it wasn’t his, and let him talk his way out of it?’
‘I couldn’t! I couldn’t just stand by and let him—’
‘Deal with it himself?’
That was a good point.
Jonathan pressed on. ‘Or let his agent deal with it? The agent who gets paid to look after him? Who is more than equipped to—’
‘All right!’ I flustered. ‘You’ve made your point. But I owed him a favour! He got me out of trouble in the park when Braveheart attacked that other dog and that ghastly man went ballistic with me.’
‘And I guess he’s a friend,’ said Jonathan obliquely.
I turned to look at him. ‘Yes. He’s a friend.’
There was an awkward pause, where I wasn’t sure what to say.
‘Melissa, you have a big heart and it’s one of the things I love about you,’ sighed Jonathan. ‘But . . .’ He raised his eyebrows then dropped them. ‘Enough with the fixing, already. Leave it. Please. I’m really not going to tell you again. Just concentrate on relaxing. Enjoying New York. Being with me.’ He gave me his serious look, the one that seemed to see straight through to my lingerie. ‘Next time I catch you Honey-ing, you’re on the first plane back. I mean it, Miss Romney-Jones.’
‘OK.’
‘OK,’ he said and made a ‘drawing a line’ gesture with his hands. ‘End of afternoon. Let’s start again with this evening.’
I felt marginally better.
‘It should be a really nice evening tonight,’ he went on. ‘I haven’t seen Steve and Diana in ages, and they’re so keen to meet you. And the Grammercy Tavern is a great place to eat. You’ll love it.’
‘I’m sure I will,’ I said, trying to inject as much enthusiasm into my voice as possible.
To be honest, I was actually pretty shattered. Being arrested really took it out of you. I had no idea how Pete Doherty managed it so often. Secretly, I was yearning for a long bath, some amazing take-out from Jonathan’s encyclopedia of take-out menus, and the remote control of the cinema-size television, not another round of meeting his amazing friends, all of whom made me feel as if I were being interviewed for a senior position in a very friendly blue-chip investment bank.
I shot a sideways glance at his lovely chiselled profile, currently directing the cab driver round a more efficient route. Jonathan was bound to know some kind of foot massage. He was extremely good at, well, other types of massage. He’d studied it in some detail, apparently, to the point where he sometimes came out with some disconcertingly physio-type commentary, which rather took the shine off the experience, if you know what I mean.
Then I remembered that we weren’t quite at the smelly-feet-massage stage of things, and felt a terrible pang of homesickness for Nelson and his lumpy sofa. With Jonathan on it, of course. In his Ralph Lauren deck trousers.
The two images weren’t really mixing in my head.
I pulled myself together. I had a reputation to uphold here. Think. Party. New people. More names, and jobs, and addresses full of numbers. ‘Lovely!’ I said, in a voice that sounded eerily like my mother’s. ‘What time do we have to be there?’
‘Seven for seven thirty. So you’ve got time for a bath and a pot of that tea and . . .’ Jonathan ran a finger along my damp hairline, making my skin tingle underneath. ‘A quick lie-down?’
‘Great,’ I said. ‘Um, Jonathan,’ I added, ‘my feet are in shreds with all this walking. Any chance of a, er, a quick massage?’
He looked at me seriously. ‘Why didn’t you say, honey? I’ll get Lori right on it.’
One and a half blocks later I had a Milk and Almond Pedicure booked at Bliss Spa, for ten o’clock the following day.
Awfully nice, but not really what I had in mind.
Jonathan and I arrived at the Grammercy Tavern on the dot of seven fifteen. He was looking dashing in a cream linen suit, and I was wearing one of my slinky Honey silk dresses, which had returned from Jonathan’s dry-cleaner looking newer than when I’d bought it in the Selfridges sale and about four times more expensive.
He caught me drawing a deep breath as we got out of the cab and almost laughed.
‘Hey! Relax!’ he said, slipping his arm round my waist. ‘It’s just dinner with a few friends.’
‘It’s easy for you to say that,’ I said, though I didn’t object to his steering me confidently past the intimidating doorman. ‘I haven’t met this many new people since freshers’ week.’
‘What can I say?’ he said, giving my wrap to the receptionist. ‘Everyone’s dying to meet you. Listen, before you meet your adoring public, did I tell you how beautiful you’re looking this evening? In fact,’ he added in an undertone as we made our way towards the bar, ‘I will be pleasantly haunted by the last time I saw you in that dress all through dinner.’
I nudged him to shut up, but playfully. I remembered too: it had been our three-month anniversary – which was quite an evening, put it like that. Oysters had been involved, as had dirty martinis and a ride on the London Eye.
‘Jonathan! Hey, man!’
Another man in a suit, sitting next to another man in a suit, sitting next to two women, also in suits, sitting next to Kurt and Bonnie Hegel, waved at us, and Jonathan steered me towards them with a discreet hand on the back.
They all looked like they’d come straight from work, and suddenly I felt overdressed, not underdressed. God. Was I ever going to get this right?
I smiled and got ready to concentrate on remembering their names. When I got nearer, I realised to my horror that one of the women in suits was Jennifer with the Flapping Tongue from Bonnie’s party.
OK. Rise above it, rise above it, I told myself frantically. She’s more embarrassed than you.
‘Melissa! Hi!’ gushed Bonnie, engulfing me in her usual embrace of bones. ‘You look absolutely stunning! You look like Catherine Zeta Jones!’ Much as I liked Bonnie, it was like being hugged by something from the Natural History Museum. I wondered if I felt all squelchy by comparison.
‘Hello, Bonnie,’ I said when she released me. ‘What a gorgeous jacket.’
‘You see!’ she stage-whispered to the two women next to her, directing a huge smile my way. ‘You see? Isn’t she a darling?’
I wasn’t sure what they saw, but concentrated anyway as Kurt introduced everyone: he and Bonnie we knew; I certainly did remember Jennifer, yes; Wentworth was another university friend of Jonathan’s, as was Steve.
‘And this is my wife, Diana,’ Steve added. ‘We’re all set to give birth in eleven and a half weeks’ time!’
‘Hello, Melissa,’ cooed Diana, flicking back her coppery fringe to see me better. She had one of those precision-cut messy bobs that fell back into place perfectly every time she moved her head.
I gulped. I’d barely even noticed she was pregnant. Everyone here was so fit
.
‘So you’re back in New York!’ observed Wentworth.
‘Seems so,’ said Jonathan.
‘Oh, you are so London these days!’ shrieked Bonnie. ‘“Seems so,”’ she repeated in deadpan tones. ‘Come on!’
‘Jonathan, I need to drag you aside for a moment,’ said Wentworth. ‘Yeah, yeah, OK, I know!’ He raised his hands against the barrage of Friends-style barracking that ensued. ‘But I’m looking at this apartment and I need the inside line from the man here about the board.’
‘Oh, God, if it’s where I’m thinking, you may as well not bother,’ said Steve, rolling his eyes. ‘You are a dead man walking. We tried that, didn’t we, honey? You have to have a Nobel Prize or a direct line to George Bush Senior to get past those guys.’
Diana nodded. ‘We made donations to every charity you can think of, we put the freaking dog on a macrobiotic diet to get him under the pet weight limit, and we still didn’t get invited back.’
‘Melissa, I refuse to have you listen to that awful property talk,’ said Bonnie, taking me by the arm and patting the spare seat next to her. ‘Let’s get you a drink. Champagne, isn’t it?’
She signalled to the waiter, then turned back to me.
‘So, tell me, how are you finding everything?’
Everyone asked me that, all the time, as if I were the first English person to set foot in Manhattan since the Mayflower landed, and I was never sure what to say: ‘It’s all so big!’ was clichéd but true. And they were being nice, and I wanted to be nice back, so I could hardly say, ‘Why are you all so obsessed with dental products?’ or ‘What’s with the sales tax on coffee?’
Bonnie and Diana were looking at me eagerly.
‘It’s all so big!’ I carolled. ‘And the subway map makes no sense whatsoever.’
‘Oh, you are funny. Let me come with you one morning,’ said Bonnie indulgently. ‘I’ll show you how it works.’
‘Not that you need to take the subway, with Jonathan’s car service?’ added Diana.
‘Oh, I prefer public transport,’ I said and when she looked stunned, I added, ‘I like to see people? See where I’m going? That sort of thing.’
My flute of champagne arrived with about seven different dishes of nuts and nibbles. About two seconds later, the black-clad form of Jennifer materialised and placed itself on the seat next to mine. The breasts did not move during this manoeuvre.
Bonnie and Diana exchanged glances.
‘Hello, Jennifer,’ I said, to show there were no hard feelings.
‘I’m so sorry,’ said Jennifer in a big rush. ‘I have to apologise. I’ve been carrying around this . . . this awful tumour of guilt.’ And she scrunched up her hands to demonstrate the tumour-ness of her guilt. ‘My thoughtlessness must have made you feel insecure and humiliated, and you must believe me when I assure you that no one was in any way discussing you, or you and Jonathan, or you, Jonathan and Cindy—’
‘Or Jonathan, Cindy and Brendan,’ put in Diana.
‘Or any combination of the above,’ said Bonnie firmly.
‘I am so mortified.’ Jennifer put a hand to her string-of-pearls area. ‘Can you forgive me? I so want us to be friends. Jonathan is a wonderful, dear old friend of mine, and any woman he chooses to spend his life with is a woman I really want to get to know.’
‘Well . . .’ started Diana, but Bonnie shut her down with a look.
Good going, Bonnie, I thought approvingly.
Jennifer now had a Hand of Appeal on my knee, which was taking it a little far. Call me old-fashioned, but there’s a time and a place for a hand on the knee, and this wasn’t it. But she looked genuinely mortified, and something about her reminded me of Gabi. The Botkier handbag, maybe.
‘Really, there’s no need,’ I said. ‘Please let’s just wipe it from our minds. I’m always putting my foot in it. And now you’ve met me you know I’m not blonde – and not even that young!’
‘Really? How old are you?’ she asked, rather directly.
‘Oh, er, twenty-eight?’ I stammered.
Jennifer put her head on one side. ‘Really.’
‘So, let me just get this straight in my head, was that someone else?’ Diana butted in. ‘I definitely heard Jonathan dated a blonde girl.’
‘I think wires were crossed,’ I said firmly, before Bonnie could start complicating matters.
‘Well, I appreciate your graciousness,’ said Jennifer. ‘I don’t think I could be so kind.’ She sighed. ‘The British have beautiful manners. It’s like . . . they’re just born with a natural grasp of etiquette.’
I thought of Godric. And Roger. And Gabi. And Prince Philip.
Though he was, of course, technically Greek.
‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ I demurred. ‘The accent covers a multitude of sins. And it doesn’t wash at home, sadly.’
‘But you do have great manners,’ said Bonnie. ‘I noticed that when we were over there. All the little kids say please and thank you. It’s adorable.’
I wondered where Kurt and Bonnie had been staying. ‘Well, I suppose we do get it drilled into us,’ I said. ‘Thank you for saying so.’
‘Oh. My. God!’ exclaimed Jennifer, as if she’d just had a marvellous idea. ‘You could run classes in it here! I’ve seen things like that on the internet. You get to spend a week in a stately home in the UK, and learn all about flower arranging, and the aristocracy, and how to curtsey properly.’
‘Really?’ I hoped my father never stumbled on that website. My mother would be teaching port-passing before she could say ‘bilk’, along with everything else.
She nodded. ‘Oh, yah. The HR department at the agency I work for? The head of PR went on a course, so she’d know how to deal with some of our British clients? She can make scones now.’ Her brow furrowed. ‘Scoones? Scones? Scornes?’
‘Whichever you like. Lovely!’ I said, because I honestly couldn’t think of anything else to add, apart from, ‘Did Jonathan tell you to tell me this?’
‘So, Melissa!’ cooed Diana. ‘Are you shopping it up like crazy?’ She winked at me conspiratorially. ‘You can tell us. It’s just girls together! We won’t tell Jonathan!’
I laughed along with them, despite the fact that (a) Jonathan didn’t seem to care what I spent on clothes, and (b) I wasn’t really what you’d call a shopaholic, not compared with Gabi.
‘Well, I’ve got a suitcase full of those plastic bleach things you stick on your teeth, what do you call them? White Strips,’ I said. ‘We don’t have them at home. And I found the most amazing thank-you notes in that nice Crane’s store, but apart from that . . .’
A cacophony of tinkly laughs drowned out my other admissions, which were going to be: nasty American chocolate that tasted of earwax (to try to break my own mid-afternoon snacking habits); several insane books on etiquette that would make the Queen freak out with social inadequacy (to be put on the office shelves to reassure clients); giant-size tubs of Palmers Cocoa Butter (my rule being that if you’re going to have lots of surface area, you should keep it nice and soft); and breath fresheners. Americans seemed crazy about them. There were whole aisles full of them in pharmacies and I’d laid in a stock for the office. I might as well have had shares in Tic-tacs, the number of boxes I pressed onto clients.
‘Listen,’ said Bonnie, touching my arm, ‘heaven knows Jonathan’s no stranger to mad shopping, but if you want to hide any bags over at our apartment until you go home, we won’t let on!’
And off they went again, laughing through their perfect noses and casting knowing nods at each other.
‘I hide my emergency Bendel’s card in my ante-natal bag!’ hooted Diana. ‘It’s the last place Steve’d look!’
‘Nooo! Sherman thinks I cut up my Bloomie’s plastic but it was really his donor card!’
‘You can tell us,’ said Diana, wiping her eye. ‘You’re among friends. How much’ve you spent?’
‘No, really,’ I insisted. ‘I don’t really ever find much in the shop
s. I usually make my own clothes. You know, nothing much fits when you’ve got, um, my curves’ – I waved a hand at my ample bosom and swooping hips – ‘so I prefer to run something up myself. Or convert some of my granny’s clothes.’
I realised they were all looking at me with strange expressions. ‘She did some modelling when she was younger,’ I added defensively, in case they thought I wandered around in M&S cardies and slacks. ‘Um, Lanvin, I think. She knows all about darts and letting out seams, anyway.’
‘Vintage!’ breathed Diana, stroking my cardigan reverently. I tried not to back off, but it was quite weird. I felt like a donkey in a petting zoo. ‘Oh, my God. I should have guessed that cashmere wasn’t new. And you do it yourself?’
‘Oh, yes,’ I said. ‘We learned. At school.’
Bonnie, who had ordered more drinks and about a gallon of mineral water, looked shocked. ‘At school?’
‘I know!’ I said, with a self-deprecating laugh. ‘Ridiculously behind the times. I should have been doing business studies or something, not learning how to greet a duchess at a ceilidh. Still—’
‘Pardon me,’ interrupted Diana. ‘A duchess? At a what?’
‘A Scottish country dance?’ I elaborated. ‘We did that too, for gym when it was too wet to play hockey. Lace-up pumps and everything! Gay Gordons, Strip the Willow. Sounds quite racy, doesn’t it? Only it absolutely isn’t. Not with the boys we had to dance with. Some of them acted like they’d never seen girls before.’
Come to think of it, most of them hadn’t. And if there weren’t boys available the taller girls had to ‘volunteer’. As if being a foot taller than everyone else wasn’t complex-making enough. I still habitually led and bowed, much to Jonathan’s chagrin. I didn’t tell them that though. I didn’t want them thinking I went to some kind of Victorian institution.
Bonnie was shaking her head in amazed fascination. ‘Oh, my God! Oh. My. God! I had no idea! So, were you, like, at school with anyone royal?’
They were all looking at me now, and I wasn’t quite sure what they wanted to hear. But at least I was on firmer ground than with cross-media advertising budgets or apartment boards.