How to Kill Your Family(97)

I just couldn’t get my head around how Lottie could’ve been seduced by such a chap. She was weak and young, sure, but Christ this man was antithetical to everything she’d ever known. It disgusted me, truth be told. My sisters were born into a happy family where convention and tradition meant a lot. I thought that I was too. But instead, I had landed here after my mother was foolish enough to give herself up for one night with a playboy who holidayed in Marbella and occasionally featured on a TV show about new business ideas called Mogul Wars.

Class matters, Grace. I know it’s not the done thing to say that, but I think it’s utter madness to deny a truth just because it’s uncomfortable. I don’t know what you thought of Simon’s background or his fondness for watches so large they could be a bedside alarm clock, but I imagine you had similar reservations. I don’t want to say that it was worse for me, but come on, it was worse for me. I grew up bang slap in the middle of the rigid class system the British skilfully created a thousand years ago. It’s always worse for those of us who are teetering precariously between the categories – at least you knew where you were in the order.

I spent a few months bouncing between work and Lottie’s house, trying to give my sisters a sense of normality, and if I’m honest, trying to give myself the same. In London, I was progressing in the office and earning a decent whack, but back in Surrey it became increasingly obvious that Christopher hadn’t been quite as comfortable as we’d assumed. His will left everything to Lottie – the house, the car, his investments, and pension – but he’d remortgaged without any of us knowing just three years ago, and he’d been dipping into his pension to pay the girls’ school fees and cover lifestyle expenses. Nothing too fancy – Christopher wasn’t a spendthrift – but as I say, our social circle had pretty exacting standards and Dad was clearly as keen to keep up with the Joneses as anyone. Only in our case, it was the Guinnesses, the Montefiores, the Ascots.

Lottie preferred to bury her head in the sand, distracting herself from any immediate issues that her husband’s death had thrown up by gardening almost obsessively from dusk until dawn. Every time I tried to broach the subject with her, bulbs would be shoved in my hands or weeds lobbed at my person. Once she walked through a spiky hedge just to get away from the conversation. But I had pored over the numbers and I knew that we needed a cash injection and fast. Losing the house would be an indignity that none of us would easily bounce back from. Our family is traditional, and I was now the head of the house, regardless of modern norms. Lottie couldn’t or wouldn’t face up to the facts, so I took on the mantle.

I’m practical, Grace. I was often berated by my English teacher for lacking the imagination necessary to understand great fiction. I couldn’t see the point in most of it myself; if I’m going to read a book, I want it to be an autobiography. Sports focused if possible. I’ve never felt it held me back in life. I’m not a dreamer. I know what I want and what I need for a good life, and I’ll work my arse off to get it. But I didn’t have enough time to secure my family’s future while holding a junior position in the City. So I took a different course of action.

Can you see what’s coming a mile off? I guess it’s fairly obvious. I decided that Simon would be our lifeline. The thought first came to me one night in my bedroom, as I went over the accountant’s notes on the mortgage, the school fees, the running of the house. The outgoings were enormous and there was no future income large enough to knit it together. Just ask your real father, a voice inside my brain whispered. I almost laughed. Me, contacting that man out of the blue, and asking him to fund a family he knew nothing about. Nonsense. And even if I could, I certainly didn’t want to get involved with that man. Not from any moral qualms – money is money and he certainly had plenty – but because it was all so tasteless and grubby. A newfound father, a man who was photographed with oligarchs at slightly seedy private members’ clubs. A Bentley driver.

I dismissed the thought, but it kept coming back. Every time I looked at the finances, his name danced around my mind. Finally, after a slightly harried conversation with the accountant, who explained bluntly that the girls would have to leave their school at the end of the year unless something was done, my resolve crumbled.

You don’t email a man like Simon Artemis. I’ve learnt that from a few short months in the finance world. People like that are too important. They have five assistants and their inbox is monitored, sieved, messages prioritised and actioned in minutes. Anything I sent would be assigned to the ‘bonkers’ pile and left well alone. So I turned up at his office. It was a risky move, but I felt the direct approach suited me well. From reading the financial pages every day, I knew that the Artemis company was eyeing up a smaller clothing company called ‘Re’belle’ with choice real estate in Soho and Kensington. The ancient owner wasn’t budging, insisting that the business would always be a family-run one. I used the name of his son at reception, and said I was there to open up a new channel of communication. It could’ve all gone tits up, but the assistant seemed to know who I professed to be (I suppose Benny Fairstein is a fairly memorable name if you’re in the fashion business) and got on the phone immediately. I only had to wait for ten minutes before I was shown into Simon’s office. His eyes narrowed as I entered, and I knew I only had a moment to explain who I really was.