Poppy paused for breath at the top of the third flight of stairs then knocked on the dark green door as Claudia had instructed. Several seconds passed before an abstracted male voice said, ‘Yes?’
‘Um, hi. My name’s Poppy Dunbar. I wondered if I could see you.’
‘Let me guess,’ said the voice through the door, ‘you’re a friend of Claudia’s and she’s sent you up here to act as bait. Your job is to lure me down to her party.’
‘Not exactly.’
‘Bullshit.’ He sounded amused. ‘I know the way her mind works. Don’t tell me, you’re a ravishingly beautiful blonde.’
‘Nope.’ Poppy smiled. ‘A ravishingly beautiful redhead.’
‘Hmm, shock tactics.’
‘I’m not one of Claudia’s friends either. She only sent me up here because she couldn’t think how else to get rid of me.’ Poppy thought for a moment then added, ‘And maybe to punish you for not putting in an appearance downstairs.’
‘Punish me? What are you, a tax inspector? A ravishingly beautiful redheaded tax inspector,’ Caspar mused. ‘Surely there’s no such thing.’
‘Open the door,’ said Poppy, ‘and find out.’
The attic studio was large, taking up the entire top floor of the house. There were canvases everywhere, propped against the white painted walls, stacked untidily on chairs, and littering the polished wooden floor. Also occupying space were three sofas—one dark blue, one black velvet, one tartan. There was also, Poppy couldn’t help noticing, an unmade king-sized bed.
‘Good heavens, a choice of casting couches.’
Caspar French, who was tall and tanned and very blond, broke into a broad grin.
‘We aim to please. I’m puzzled though.’
‘Oh?’
‘Well, I’m fairly sure we haven’t met before. And you say you aren’t a friend of Claudia’s.’ He paused, picked up an already opened Beaujolais bottle, held it up to the light, and discovered it was empty. Reaching for a Kit Kat instead, he dropped the wrapper on the floor, broke the bar in two and offered half to Poppy. ‘So what I don’t understand is how you came to be at the party. Unless we’ve been gate-crashed. Are you sure you aren’t an undercover tax inspector?’
‘I work for Kenda’s Kitchen,’ said Poppy, ‘the caterers.’
‘Ah.’ Caspar nodded. ‘And how’s it going? Is Claudia happy with the food?’
‘She might have been if your friends hadn’t eaten it all. I’m afraid Claudia isn’t very pleased with you.’
‘I’ll survive. I’m used to it.’
The area over by the window appeared to do duty as Caspar’s idea of a kitchen. As well as chocolate to sustain him, there were cans of Coke, a few half-full coffee cups littering the floor, an empty pizza box, and several more wine bottles. Picking his way barefoot through the chaos, Caspar discovered one that hadn’t been opened. ‘Hooray. White all right with you? Looks like something Australian.’
‘Thanks but I can’t. Much longer up here and I’ll get the sack.’ Poppy, suddenly nervous, wiped her damp palms on the back of her skirt. ‘The thing is, I overheard your friend Claudia saying you had a room to rent. So, I’d like to volunteer myself for it.’
Unable to find a corkscrew, Caspar had given up on the wine. Instead he began cleaning brushes, carefully soaking each one in turn in a jug of white spirit before going to work on them with a rag which had evidently once been an evening shirt. He was wearing a pale yellow cotton sweater with the sleeves pushed up, and extremely paint-spattered white denims. The smell of the oils he had been using still permeated the air. On the easel in the center of the room stood the current work-in-progress, two almost completed figures sprawling comfortably together on a sun-drenched lawn, their heads bent as though they were sharing a secret.
‘Gosh, you’re good,’ exclaimed Poppy. Realizing she sounded surprised she added hastily, ‘I mean, I’m no expert—’
‘That’s okay. You’re right anyway. I am good.’ Caspar turned and winked at her. ‘I’m up-and-coming. According to the dealers, at least.’
‘You’re certainly good at changing the subject.’ Poppy was bursting with impatience. ‘Go on, give it a whirl,’ she begged. ‘Say I can move in. I am house-trained. I pay my rent on the dot. I even Hoover occasionally.’
‘You haven’t seen the room yet. Are you an undercover journalist?’
‘I’m not an undercover anything.’ Poppy glanced at her watch. ‘But I’ll definitely get the sack if I don’t shoot back downstairs. Look, will you at least think about it and let me know?’ Seizing a nearby pencil—a sooty 6B with meltingly soft lead—she scribbled her address and phone number across the back page of an old Daily Mail and underlined it twice for good measure. Never again was she going to make that mistake.
‘I’m trying to decide what it is you have,’ said Caspar. ‘Nerve or style.’
Poppy handed him the newspaper. ‘Can’t I have both?’
***
Back downstairs she found herself cornered almost at once by Claudia.
‘Well, what did he say?’
‘That I had a nerve,’ Poppy dutifully replied.
‘Just what I thought he’d say.’ Looking immensely pleased with herself, Claudia smoothed back her blonde hair and waved hello to someone behind Poppy. When she chose to use it, Poppy thought, she actually had a nice smile. ‘You see,’ Claudia went on, ‘maybe it’s different where you come from but around here introducing yourself to total strangers and asking if you can come and live with them isn’t really done.’
‘No. Sorry.’ Poppy hung her head. ‘Sorry.’
‘Well then, that’s that sorted out.’ Having won, Claudia was prepared to be magnanimous. ‘I’m sure you’ll find somewhere else to live soon enough,’ she said kindly. ‘By the way, did Caspar mention anything about coming down to the party?’
The words Caspar had affectionately employed were: ‘Silly old bag, let her sweat.’ But Claudia wasn’t the only one who could be gracious in victory.
Poppy said, ‘I’m sure he’ll be here soon.’
‘I say,’ purred Angie Slade-Welch twenty minutes later. ‘You have to admit there’s something awfully attractive about a man who just doesn’t give a damn.’
‘Mother, Clark Gable’s dead.’
‘Never mind Clark Gable.’ Angie was beaming away like a lighthouse. ‘Your landlord’s turned up at last. Does he cultivate that just-got-out-of-bed look or is it natural?’
‘It’s accurate,’ said Claudia in pointed tones. ‘He spends his life just getting out of bed. Beds, rather. Oh for heaven’s sake,’ she sighed, catching a glimpse of the paint-spattered white jeans. ‘He could have changed into something decent before he came down. He’s not even wearing shoes.’
‘Nice feet,’ Angie observed with a nod of approval. ‘Anyway, why should he wear shoes? This is his house. He can walk round stark naked if he likes.’
Claudia cringed. ‘Don’t tell him that. You’ll only put ideas into his head.’
‘Or yours.’ Angie loved to embarrass her daughter. ‘Come on, you can tell me. What really goes on in this house when there are just the two of you here? Is anything likely to develop, do you think—?’
‘Mother!’
Angie shrugged. ‘Only asking, my darling. You never tell me anything so how else can I find out? And he is irresistible, isn’t he? Go on, whisper it.’ She lifted herself playfully on tiptoe, tilting her head. ‘You can’t tell me you don’t fancy him rotten. And living together like this… well, he must have made a pass at you at some stage.’
A glass bowl of cornflowers stood on the marble mantelpiece. Claudia, in front of it, realized she had been abstractedly de-petaling the blue flowers. This was the effect her mother always managed to have on her. What Angie actually meant was that Caspar must have made a pass, even at her, at some stage.
He hadn’t though. In all the time she’d known him, thought Claudia, there hadn’t been the least bit of a pass made. Not even the teeniest hint of one.
As for the other less than delicately worded inquiry… of course she fancied Caspar rotten. She did feel, however, that she was hiding it well. To look at her nobody would ever guess. And, Claudia thought with feeling, just because she did fancy him didn’t mean he wasn’t also wildly infuriating to live with. Caspar might be irresistible but he was irresponsible too.
‘No,’ she told her mother, quelling the urge to seize the front of Angie’s bronze satin bustier and haul it upwards. Over the past hour it had slithered lower and lower, revealing a perilous amount of pert bosom. Her mother had no doubt arranged for this to happen. She was proud of her small but perfectly formed breasts.
‘No pass? Oh bad luck.’ Angie’s blue eyes gleamed like sapphires. ‘Never mind, you can always live in hope.’ The toe of her tiny shoe nudged a pile of shredded petals into the fireplace. ‘Poor flowers, whatever did they do to deserve this?’
‘Claudie, you look gorgeous. Happy birthday,’ said Caspar, coming over at last and kissing her warmly on both cheeks.
It was the type of gesture that could never be mistaken for a pass. It was also, thought Claudia, the first time she had seen him all day. Having crawled home at dawn and slept until mid-afternoon, Caspar had been closeted ever since in his studio, supposedly working.
He smelled of toothpaste and turpentine. He had also been using her Nicky Clarke shampoo again. As she breathed it in Claudia wondered how someone could be so incapable of remembering to buy his own shampoo, yet never ever run out of oil paints.
‘You’re late. Your friends have eaten all the food.’ She turned and pointed to the guilty-looking mutt brought along by Caspar’s sculptor friend. ‘And that hideous mongrel has slobbered his way through a whole basket of chocolates. Charbonnel et Walker champagne truffles,’ Claudia added, though why she bothered she didn’t know since Caspar was a stranger to remorse. ‘They were a present from the girls in the office.’
‘Dear old Hoover, such a connoisseur,’ Caspar said fondly. ‘He’s always appreciated a decent class of chocolate.’
‘And thanks for the birthday card.’
‘Oh dear, you are cross with me.’ He grinned. ‘I know, why don’t I paint you one?’
Claudia wasn’t going to be won over that easily. ‘Most people grow out of giving homemade cards by the time they’re ten.’
‘You’ll have to excuse my daughter,’ sighed Angie, ‘it’s so long since she last got laid.’
‘Mother—’
‘Only teasing, sweetheart.’
Realizing she wasn’t having the best of evenings, Caspar put one arm around Claudia’s brown shoulders. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t buy you a card. I thought maybe we could go somewhere nice for lunch tomorrow… as a kind of belated present.’ His mouth twitched. ‘Or do you hate me too much?’
‘That depends.’ Claudia’s resolve began to weaken, as Caspar had no doubt known it would. ‘Somewhere how nice?’
‘The Marigold.’ He knew it was one of her favorite places to go. Luckily, it was one of his too. ‘Come on, cheer up. We can go berserk on oysters and champagne. You know you want to.’
‘I know I’d want to.’ Angie’s smile was catlike. ‘Sounds heavenly. Is there room for one more?’
Caspar looked at Claudia.
Angie pouted. ‘Just a little one. Oh please, couldn’t I come too?’
‘Um…’ said Caspar.
The last person on earth Claudia wanted muscling in on their cozy lunch à deux was her man-eating mother.
‘No,’ she said before Caspar was obliged to be polite. ‘You could not.’