House of Bells Read Free

shoulders hunched under the weight of all that silence, all those words unsaid.
    He outwaited her, which was just mean. At last – talking to her knees, because she could, apparently, still not talk to him – she said, ‘I hate it. All of it. All of this,’ with one wild champagne-spilling gesture which might as well have been a gesture back through time to the girl she used to be, when she used to spill champagne for the sheer gorgeous hell of it. ‘I hate being the party girl that people pay for, because it gets their parties in the paper. I hate being so desperate I’ll go to bed with anyone for a hundred quid and a kind smile – and, actually, don’t bother about the smile. I
hate
that. I hate the way everyone thinks it, and I hate the fact that it’s true.’
    â€˜Actually,’ he said, ‘what everyone thinks is that you don’t care what you do now.’
    â€˜That’s true, too. At least, that I’ll do anything for money. Why not?’ After these last years, why would she even hesitate? ‘But no, I do still care. I just try not to show it. You won’t give me away, will you, Tony?’
    â€˜Never,’ he said. ‘Not give you away, and not sell you either. I will use you, though, if you’ll let me. If you’ll do anything for money, will you do a job for me?’
    That shrug was becoming harder every time. She really, really wanted to say no.
Not for you, Tony love. Not you. Please don’t ask me.
    But it was too late, and so she managed to shrug at him with her poor overburdened shoulders, and she managed to say, ‘Yes, sure. Why not, if the money’s right?’
    â€˜Money’s not an issue,’ he said.
    She snorted. ‘Speak for yourself, love.’
    â€˜No, I’m serious. You can have all the resources of Fledgwood Enterprises at your back, if you need them.’
    She blinked, sipped, said, ‘What is it, then? This job?’ Not hat-check girl at one of his father’s parties, that was for sure.
    â€˜It’s for the
Messenger
. Undercover work, an investigation.’
    â€˜What? You’re bonkers. I’m no bloody journalist.’
    â€˜No – but you are a girl who needs to hide. Or you could be. It’s the perfect cover, sweetheart. If you’re blown, it’s just all the more convincing. And you’d be out of London, a long way away from all of this. No one’s going to forget about you, I’m not saying that – but, well. Nine days’ wonder, you know?’
    â€˜More like nine months,’ she said; and then heard herself, realized what she’d said, started to cry. It wasn’t at all what she’d meant; she was just trying to be bitterly clever, the way she did when she was trying to keep up with Tony. But that was a hopeless enterprise in any case, and it had led her to walk flat-footed into the heart of sorrow. Nothing new there. She despised herself for many reasons – every good reason, and quite a few that were no good at all but she used them anyway – and this was one of the best: that she tried to be slick and tripped herself every time.
    She wasn’t clever enough to be any use to Tony. She couldn’t save herself, let alone help anyone else. Or expose them. She wanted to say so, but talking was all manner of hard, too much to manage while she wept; and when he passed her a hankie that only made her more incoherent because she’d never been any good at gratitude.
    â€˜Oh, keep the sodding thing,’ he snapped, when she tried absurdly to hand it back to him. Or maybe he’d said ‘sodden’; she really wasn’t sure. And then, ‘Keep it,’ he said, ‘and go home. Meet me for oysters at noon, and I’ll tell you what I want.’
    â€˜I can’t,’ she said, gulping. ‘I can’t go home. Dr Barrett’s paying me to be here . . .’
    â€˜How