Precious Things (13 page)

Rutherford called out again: ‘Let the show begin!'

Famous beauties, their hair cut in fashionably sharp bobs lined the room, partnered by handsome gentlemen of all nationalities. The crème de la crème of China's new elite. Shanghai's quarters were crawling with them – people who had come all the way to the Orient to escape the dour austerity of postwar Europe. A hundred or so chairs were set up in a perfect circle around centre stage. It had been an intimate performance – one of their most intimate yet – but God willing, it would guarantee them many performances for years to come.

People took their leisure time so seriously nowadays – even people as important as the Shah, seated in the front row in his elegant suit. With the growing popularity of the radio and picture houses, it was becoming that much harder to make a mark . . . They would be out of a job, soon enough. Lexi delicately adjusted the coronet above her ears. How attached she had grown to it. It made her feel almost . . . complete.

Balancing on the tiny platform high above the ballroom below, Lexi flexed her feet and waited for her cue, as the music swelled and gathered in volume. The evening had passed successfully, every act gathering gasps and applause. But everyone now was waiting – waiting for her. She steadfastly ignored the drop to the floor. The net was hardly visible – why, she could barely tell it was there. Was it definitely there? She felt a twinge of panic. Lexi saw the wide wooden boards swim in the shadows beneath her, and blinked. She told herself to stop being silly. Of course it was – Dariusz had checked everything before she ascended. The beating in her chest slowed. Her hands fell from the coronet, the ribbon pulled taut against her curls.

Lexi heard the music reach its crescendo, and stepped forward into the light, throwing her arms wide open. She felt the heat of the spotlight on her skin and heard the audience gasp. Crowned with her glittering coronet, she was the shining, glowing Queen of the Night. Her shining blue leotard blazed in the golden light, shooting tiny sparks of colour every time she shifted or moved. Tightly fitted and made of a thick stretched satin that moulded to her shape, it was all peacock-blue sequins, save for a glittering cavity at her chest. The heart of deep burgundy sequins seemed to pulsate and glow in the spotlights, matching the darker beads glinting on her headpiece.

The audience was hidden in the rustling, shifting darkness. Lexi took another step forward, as if hypnotised. It was only her, and her alone now. Time to pit herself against her failing body, to test what it was capable of, and see how far she dared go. She took a deep breath. Dariusz was right; she was ready. She could do this, she knew she could.

Lexi caught the scent of hair lacquer, made stronger by the intense heat of the lights. A drop of sweat rolled down her forehead, blurring her vision for a moment. She strained not to blink. The music built and built and then waited, but still she did not move. Lexi told herself to take another step, but her legs failed to obey her. Confused, a musician started up with his bass line again. Someone whispered in the audience. A woman cleared her throat.

Lexi took a deep breath, then another, and took a step forward. Then, whispering a short prayer, she launched herself into the air, catapulting herself towards the waiting bar. Her body found her rhythm and she felt herself moving as if in a dream, beads a-glittering and glinting in the light. Her body was fluid and at one with the air, flying and rolling. Everything she wanted her limbs to do, they did. She felt weightless, graceful, alive. She twisted, reached, stretched and found the bar every time, anticipating and accommodating the bounce of the thick white rope.

The finale. She steadied herself. Then doubled back to where she'd just been. Diving and rolling and soaring through the air, from bar to bar and up, up, up, the tip of her beautiful coronet glanced
against a chandelier and set the crystals tinkling in the silent room, which gloried in her grace and litheness. She was safe – it was fine! Of course it was.

Her heart grew full, and she distantly heard the audience break into applause somewhere in the ripe darkness beneath her.

Here it came, the last, most audacious move.

The very second she attempted the catch, Lexi knew she'd gone into it all wrong. Her shoulders shifted infinitesimally beneath her, and her hands slipped on the rope.

She wobbled, just a fraction too long, and felt the coronet slip down her forehead.

Lexi twirled herself to land upon the rope, leg sliding into place. For a second, she thought she'd been wrong. She had done it! The routine was all but complete now – she just needed to make it to the other side.

But she felt her balance tip ever so slightly to the left. Then to the right. And then she fell.

Tumbling head over heels in slow motion, thoughts entered and left her head, strangely calm and flowing, as the grosgrain ribbons fluttered around her face . . .

Memories of childhood, and her whole life since. She remembered that day at the parade, when she first saw Dariusz.

The screech of a violin – or was it a woman's cry – caught Lexi's ear. She was falling, falling. A very long way down.

She closed her eyes and, in that moment, the little apartment in Prague vanished. And to think of all the Pennyroyal tea she'd drunk, confiding in Suki, in the months she'd run late . . . All those lost chances . . . How could she recover from a fall like this? Impending failure and pain was imminent, but she felt strangely serene.

What had she been so scared of, all these years? Children seemed to provide all the satisfaction some women needed. But not her. She'd only felt a deep, angry fear . . .

Preparing herself for the net, Lexi groaned. Hitting the waiting elastic, she felt it bend.

And then snap.

A corner wrenched itself free from its pylon. Cries rang out in the audience, ringing against her ears.

Quick as a flash, Lexi saw the black streak at the edge of her vision dart across the floor.

Tumbling in the netting, she felt her wrist snap back sharply, tangled in the rope. Pain coursed up her arm, her vision blinded.

She fell heavily. But instead of hitting the ground, she slammed into Dariusz's waiting arms. The force of her landing jolted the air from her lungs and from his as well.

Dariusz righted himself, clutching her like a fallen bird from a nest.

He stared down, the deep black pools in his eyes unfathomable as he cradled her close.

Dariusz took a deep breath and smiled, and Lexi felt her heart fill with love and longing. She loved this man – he was the best thing that had ever happened to her. She wouldn't drink the tea next time, she promised herself. Nature could take its course.

The room released a collective sigh. Lexi felt the waves of disappointment.
The jackals!
They were enjoying this. Lexi looked up into her husband's face and tried to show him all the love she felt in that one single look. He smiled back at her, the muscles in his arms quivering.

They would make do. Who needed anything, when they had each other? There was a terrible quiet in the room.

Dariusz's lips parted, as if to say something. Lexi stared into the black hole of his mouth, suddenly afraid.

Attempting to say something, the words seemed stuck in his throat.

Dariusz's eyes bulged, wide and desperate. His body swayed back and forth. Back, and forth, again and again. His arms fell away and Lexi slipped to her feet. Pain shot up her arm but she scarcely felt it; she tried to steady him.

‘Dariusz?'

His name echoed out in the silence.

Dariusz suddenly swayed, and she jumped back. The great man toppled to his knees, the crack of his kneebones against the ballroom floor loud and obscene.

Lexi froze. She stared at him, panicked now. What was happening?

A look of sad resignation passed his face, piercing her chest.

Dariusz fell forward from his knees then, like a tree felled in the forest. Heavy, crashing down. He twitched and jerked briefly before becoming still.

Lexi realised her hands were at her mouth. She shook her head, unable to believe it, unable to speak. The coronet suddenly felt too tight around her head and she pulled it off, unable to tear her eyes away from Dariusz lying there, silent and unmoving. The crown dangled from her hand for a moment, before her nerveless fingers let it fall to the floor, where it was kicked aside by people running towards them, taking her, shouting at her, pulling at her arm.

There was a thunder of feet and people screaming. Rutherford was by her side, grimacing like a maniac, his mouth working, shouting words at her, words she couldn't understand. What was he saying? And people – so many of them – shouting, screaming, pointing.

Her voice came back to her. ‘Stop!' she cried, her hands to her head all of a sudden. ‘Stop it – all of you!'

She crumpled to the floor beside her fallen giant.

Putting her palm to the back of his head, still warm, then to her own face, Lexi touched her cheeks, her dry eyes.

And then allowed herself to be lifted and led away, like a child.

Maggie was perched on the edge of a pristine, creamy white sofa in Ulrika Fulton's sunlit sitting room. Earlier that day in her office, she'd checked the logs and seen that, yes, a Ms Fulton was the owner of the bargain job lot – the one that had contained her diamante-encrusted coronet. Maggie had tracked down her phone number and address, and had come to find out more for Francesca, as she'd promised.

‘So you don't know of any Yeshovs, or a person by the name of di Cosimo? That was her real parents' surname – or at least the name her adoptive parents gave her,' Maggie asked, holding her breath.

Despite the industrial-looking, almost monochromatic design of the Hampstead penthouse overlooking the Heath, the space was cosy and chic – just full enough not to feel sterile, but with an abundance of room to move and a high ceiling cavity which gave it a beautifully serene, soothing atmosphere. When Ulrika had first showed her into the living area, dotted with low white couches and dominated by a huge gold Buddha over the mantelpiece, the room opening seamlessly onto a polished concrete balcony lined with pots of bamboo and smoky glass lanterns, Maggie had gasped with delight and instantly wanted to go home and declutter her whole house.

‘No, unfortunately not,' said Ulrika, shrugging her thin shoulders apologetically. She reached for the coronet, which was lying in its nest of tissue paper on the glass coffee table in front of her, and a frown flickered across her face. She touched the beads gently, almost gingerly, with long, thin fingers clustered with ornate, heavy silver
rings. ‘You've cleaned it. It looks beautiful, doesn't it? But I don't know anything about its history at all. Only what happened when I wore it myself.'

‘And what was that?' Maggie asked, her curiosity piqued, but Ulrika shot her a look, letting her know she'd probed too far. Maggie swallowed her disappointment, only for her heart to leap with Ulrika's next words.

‘I do remember finding it, though. I got it on the Portobello Road, oh, years ago. From this fantastic gypsy woman called Lily . . . She—Oh, never mind. It was just odd, the way it came to me.' Ulrika sighed and looked away. ‘I sewed it onto a dress . . .' She gestured with her hands towards her chest. ‘I loved it, such an ornate, strange piece, but, I don't know, I felt like it gave me bad luck somehow. That there was some bad juju attached to it. There's something about its energy . . . Not entirely positive, I don't think.' She smoothed out the tissue paper and laid the coronet carefully back on the table, her fingers lingering for a moment on the pearly beads.

‘Bad luck?' Maggie blinked in surprise, wondering what Ulrika meant. She felt almost the opposite about the coronet herself, and yet Francesca's connection to the piece seemed so haunting, too.

Ulrika laughed huskily. ‘I know, fanciful, isn't it? It was a strange experience, that shoot . . . Oh, it was such a long time ago now, I won't bore you.' She pushed her straight silvery hair back behind one ear. ‘It must have been thirty or forty years ago.' She looked up at Maggie, her mouth curving into a youthful smile. ‘But I can't complain. It made me famous, after all, that shoot, and it brought me back to London.'

Maggie could see how stunning the ex-model still was, even though she thought, she must be in her seventies by now. Maggie still couldn't quite believe she was sitting in Ulrika Fulton's living room.
The
Ulrika Fulton. It had only been last week that Maggie had co-opted Judy to help track down the owner of the box of odd bits and pieces in which she'd discovered the coronet. When Bonninghams' database had come up with a Ms Fulton, she hadn't made the connection immediately. Judy had been peering over her shoulder when Maggie was searching,
and when Ulrika's name had come up, she'd shrieked in excitement. ‘Ulrika Fulton! God, I remember her!' It was only then that the penny had dropped. A prominent model from the seventies, Ulrika's stick-thin limbs and preternaturally wide eyes had graced the covers of many fashion magazines and various iconic ad campaigns. Like Twiggy or Veruschka, Ulrika was known only by her first name, a supermodel long before the term was even invented.

Maggie had tracked down the colleague at Bonninghams who'd handled the sale to get all the details. Apparently Ulrika had been getting rid of her parents' belongings, which included a few boxes of junk that she'd been storing in the house she'd inherited many years before. Maggie had rung the number on the form, half-thinking she might encounter a snooty assistant, and had been surprised to find herself talking to the smoky-voiced Ulrika herself. Intrigued by Maggie's story, Ulrika had invited her over to discuss the coronet in person. Maggie almost had to pinch herself.

Ulrika sat back on the couch and idly reached to pick up one of the tribal curios grouped together on a low table nearby. ‘Maybe if you tried Portobello Markets?' she suggested, turning over a small beaded Haitian doll in her hands. Its eyes were small red pins, sharp and fathomless. ‘I know it's a long shot. Lily was ancient, even back then. She's probably dead by now.'

‘I think I remember her . . .' Maggie said slowly, searching through her memories. ‘She still had a stall back in the late nineties, didn't she? That's when I started going myself.'

‘I'm not sure . . . I haven't been in ages, but she was a fairly permanent fixture.' Ulrika put the doll back on the table. ‘Maybe not quite all there, I thought . . .' she said, tapping the side of her head. ‘But she was always around, no matter the weather. Like me, back in the day.' Ulrika leaned back into the plush sofa, her voice becoming warmer and more dreamy. ‘I loved going to the markets, especially when I could get there early in the mornings, you know. But the afternoons were fun too. Before a session at the Electric Cinema, or a drink at the Portobello Star, perhaps. It was great to just go and soak
up the atmosphere . . . so vibrant, such a hive of creativity.' She clicked her fingers, made a little weaving motion from side to side with her body. ‘You'd always bump into famous models or designers wandering along, or someone making a short film. Artists and musicians and all sorts of other folk hung out there – minor royals, beggars – even the occasional footballer,' she said, a smile playing across her face at the memory. ‘The ethnic communities gave it such flavour, kept it from becoming too pretentious, but everyone was so cool. To me it never really felt like London, but like somewhere else – some fabulous melting pot of people and cultures.'

A cat, a Russian Blue, stalked into the room and jumped lightly onto Ulrika's lap. She stroked his back absent-mindedly, her silver bracelets jangling gently as her hands swept over the cat's fur.

Maggie sat back, contemplating Ulrika's face, which was lined so deeply it almost appeared to be scarred. Deeply tanned skin stretched over perfect bone structure and around eyes which were such an intense blue, sending out a searing, intelligent gaze. To Maggie, the woman's face was extraordinarily beautiful – wonderful evidence of a life well lived. Ulrika put her in mind of the American artist, Georgia O'Keeffe, who'd spent so much time working in the deserts of northern New Mexico that her face had acquired the appearance of a lovely worn leather pouch with the same button-bright eyes.

‘That's the thing about modelling,' Ulrika said, misinterpreting her thoughts. ‘It leaves you rather a lot of life left to live when it ends.'

‘I can imagine,' said Maggie, wondering how Ulrika filled her days.

‘When the Turkey shoot came out, my phone started ringing off the hook. Then everything just took off to a whole new level. You know, I wanted to make my parents happy and they never really liked me modelling – especially my mother. But I figured out quite early on that you can't really live for other people – if you don't find out what's right for you, you can easily end up living someone else's life.'

‘I completely agree,' said Maggie warmly. She thought about Francesca taking over her adoptive parents' business, never knowing who her real parents were, and then her own mother and all the times Maggie had had to defend the decisions she'd made, when her mother still seemed to care.

‘You know, I think you could track down Lily pretty easily, find out if she's still alive,' Ulrika said. ‘Some of the stallholders there now would have known her – many of them have been around forever. What about Spencer? His family's owned that store for years. If he doesn't know how to find her, then he'll know someone who does.'

‘Spencer – of course!' Maggie sat up, excited. ‘He comes into Bonninghams all the time looking for stock. He's the perfect person to ask.' She beamed at Ulrika, feeling energised again at having another lead to follow.

‘Thank you so much, Ulrika. Ms Yeshov will be thrilled,' she said, getting up from her seat, hoping that whatever information she did find for Francesca would be a help rather than a burden. The Russian Blue leapt off Ulrika's lap and bolted down the hallway. Suddenly, Maggie felt as nervous as Ulrika's skittish cat. She wasn't sure if she should ask, but then told herself, why not? There was nothing to lose.

‘I was wondering, and I hope you won't be offended, but is there any chance I could get you to sign something for me?' She pulled out a magazine from her satchel; even after all these years it was still glossy. Ulrika's face registered brief surprise, and then a slight wariness. Perhaps she was suspicious that Maggie would try to make money from it?

‘It's not for me,' Maggie said quickly. ‘It's for my daughter, Stella. Well, my stepdaughter. She's fifteen and completely mad for fashion . . . I know she'd be completely thrilled.'

Ulrika broke into a wide smile, the creases around her eyes crinkling up into a thousand tiny folds, and Maggie understood the mercurial charm that had kept Ulrika at the top of the modelling game for nigh on a decade.

‘Of course,' she said graciously, leaning over the magazine. It featured Ulrika on the cover; a dramatic shot of her as a much younger woman with long, almost colourless hair parted in the middle. She was wearing the most spectacular Edwardian-inspired dress with a high neck and a cameo at the collar. Her eyes were sleepy and vacant, nothing like the piercing gaze she directed at Maggie.

‘This is the one,' Ulrika said, tapping the page with one long finger. ‘The shoot I was telling you about. It was taken in Turkey, when I was almost ready to give modelling away . . . I remember all of them. How can you forget? The camera makes a record but it almost steals something from you, until there's nothing left but your face on the page. I know how the Native Americans felt. Then you realise that that's all it is, an image. No indication of what you were really feeling at the time – awkwardness, discomfort or total bloody loneliness, being somewhere completely foreign and thrown in at the deep end. Fashion,' Ulrika sighed, ‘is so much surface. But there's always something more going on, if you care to look.'

Maggie nodded, taking the old copy of
Vogue
back from Ulrika, feeling slightly discomfited. She knew there was a story there and wished she could ask more, but she didn't want to appear rude. There was something secretive about the older woman that warned Maggie away from asking too many questions. Besides, Ulrika was now walking her back towards the door.

‘Thank you for visiting, Maggie,' she said. ‘That was an odd little trip down memory lane. Strange to see that thing again – what do you call it, a coronet? It's a good reminder of how far I've come.' Despite her words, Ulrika seemed eager for Maggie and the coronet to be gone.