Precious Things (3 page)

‘Well, let's get you started then,' he said briskly. ‘I'll make the announcement today and we'll go through some arrangements. Now put those blasted flowers down and get a notebook and pen, Margaret. Come on, we haven't got all day.'

As they made a list of things to do, Maggie felt numb. And she had continued to feel that way for the rest of the morning.

There was a knock at the open door of her office. ‘Hiya – good weekend?' asked Zac, one of the permanent interns she'd hired with her staff budget of next to nothing, primarily to organise the floor stock for the weekly sale. He was a nice kid, but a bit hopeless. Maggie often thought that by the time she'd finished explaining something to him, and he had gone off and half-done the job, it would take far less effort simply to perform the task herself.

‘What should I do with this lot from Friday then, boss?' he asked, eyes motioning to the scuffed cardboard box in his arms, which overflowed with crocheted tablecloths and wrinkled linens she'd thought looked promising. For a bid of fifty pence above the five pound reserve, she'd secured it for herself.

‘Thanks, Zac, just here please,' Maggie said, motioning to a spare spot by her desk.

Maggie loved finding old things in job lots. They were full of junk sometimes, to be sure, but she'd also uncovered some absolute gems over the years. Like the clear Lucite handbag, not a scratch on it and still in its original fifties box from Saks Fifth Avenue, New York, which Maggie knew could go for five hundred pounds or more. She was holding on to it so she could pass it on to Pearl one day.

The thought of giving such gorgeous, precious things like the bag to her daughter made her glow with warmth. With no family heirlooms to speak of, they would be Maggie's legacy, something of value for Pearl to treasure or even sell one day if the situation arose. And if the bag was worth so much now, Maggie could only imagine what it might be worth in twenty or thirty years' time. Still she hoped Pearl wouldn't just see the beautiful oval handbag – which was flecked with tiny bars of gold and had a star-shaped motif etched into its hard lid – as an investment. What she really hoped, if she was being
truly
honest with herself, was that Pearl would ‘get' what the collecting bug was all about, that she'd understand her mother and her hopeless love of old things. Her respect for the craftsmanship and history behind such fine old pieces. What she wanted more than anything was that sort of understanding between them. Exactly what Maggie had never had with her own mother.

Maggie was startled out of her daydream by another knock at the door. This time it was Judy, the office manager. With a pile of manila folders stacked under her arm, she looked like she was heading to the filing room. Judy had been with the company almost twenty years now. People took her for granted, but there was something in her ruined beauty and quiet confidence that made Maggie suspect
that way, way back, once upon a time, she and Bonningham had been more than colleagues. She certainly knew the business inside out, and Maggie doubted there was a secret at Bonninghams that Judy wasn't privy to.

‘So, my love,' Judy said, pushing wisps of grey hair from her face. ‘What did old Bonners want, then?'

Maggie hesitated, and Judy stooped to look closely at her face. ‘Are you all right?' she frowned. ‘You're looking a bit peaky. You're not . . .?'

‘No, no,' said Maggie quickly. ‘Definitely not.' Why, when you had one small child, did everyone seem to think you were planning another one in quick succession? ‘Sorry, can you close the door, Jude? I'm fine. It's just, well . . . Bonningham just asked me to take over the floor. As head auctioneer,' she said, eyebrows rising in disbelief.

‘Really? That's great news!' cried Judy. ‘What's the problem then? You look a bit stunned . . . Oh, I know,' said Judy, sitting down, ‘Tim.'

‘He'll be okay, I think,' Maggie said, hesitating at the thought of her husband who, despite an often quick temper, had a strong moral compass and a sure sense of what to do in almost every situation he found himself in. Unlike her. ‘It's just that he started on his big project recently and we just agreed that I'd try to pull back a bit at work . . .' She bit her lip. ‘Oh, Judy, much as I want this, it's such bad timing. Pearl's already wanting more of me, and then there's Stella. She's prepping for her A levels at the moment. We should be around for her more, rather than less this year.' She shook her head. ‘I can't believe that this is happening now.'

Maggie knew the promotion would mean a whole lot more evening and weekend work. She and Tim were stretched tight as it were – almost to capacity. Why did everything always have to come at once? It had been just the same when she'd found out she was pregnant, nearly five years earlier.

Sotheby's had sought her out for a new role specialising in textiles. She'd just turned thirty (her personal, unspoken deadline for establishing herself in her career), but when the pregnancy test
had come up positive, she'd had to turn down the role: it was too risky starting somewhere new if she'd only have to go on leave when the baby was born. Her industry was so small that reputation was everything – it simply wasn't worth it. ‘We need to focus on our family now, Maggie,' Tim had said, and she'd known he was right.

Maggie's job was her passion, and she knew she was good at it. She had a real knack for uncovering the best treasures, and felt an almost uncanny sympathy for their unknown past. In the short time before they were moved on, Maggie saw herself as a guardian of sorts, or a matchmaker, teaming them up with people who would love them. She never grew tired of it. She liked the auctions too, feeling herself slip inside a different character whenever she was conducting a sale. Someone more confident and professional. An expert in her trade, if nothing else.

‘You absolutely deserve this job, Maggie, you know you do,' said Judy, reaching over to pat her hand. ‘And you'll be a star, I know it.'

‘Thank you,' said Maggie, smiling tremulously and feeling treacherous tears prick her eyes.

‘Well, can't sit around chatting all day,' said Judy briskly, pulling the manila folders close to her chest. ‘I'd better get back to it – the phone seems to be ringing off the hook this morning.' She turned away, but looked back at Maggie over her shoulder. ‘Lunch at Pret?'

‘Yes, definitely,' said Maggie, sitting up straighter and shooting Judy a smile as she shut the door behind her.

But as soon as the door closed, Maggie slumped back in her chair with a sigh. Why was she feeling so churned up? She should be over the moon with excitement, not close to tears. Her eyes fell on the hydrangeas in the vase on her desk, next to a small collection of photographs. They were mostly of Tim and Pearl, although there was one of her childhood friend Kate and her parents. Maggie pushed down the familiar twinge of guilt and shame . . . She hadn't seen them in years. She picked up a small silver-framed photo of a tiny Pearl in Tim's arms, and thought back to those first few months after Pearl had been born.

‘What do we do with her, Tim?' she'd wailed, cross-eyed with fatigue from all the sleepless nights.

‘Wear earplugs?' he'd suggested, equally clueless but far less perturbed.

They had felt their way into parenthood together, even if Tim had been there before with Stella, albeit a long time before. Maggie had felt rudderless. The tiny person ruling their days and nights was like a very small, very disgruntled dictator who announced her discontent whenever things appeared to calm down even for a moment. Tim always seemed so good at handling stressful situations, whereas Maggie had felt perpetually uncertain as to whether she was doing the right thing. And her uncertainty was compounded by her anxiety about work. In those first early months after Pearl was born, she seemed to worry all the time: should she try juggling a full-time career with motherhood, or stay at home and have the family get by on one income? Should she try to build on her successes at work, or would that mean not being the kind of mother she'd always hoped to be? Going part-time at Bonninghams simply wasn't an option, but at the time she couldn't contemplate leaving work altogether. Maggie had been reminded of her own mother's choice to stay at home, and how unhappy it had made her. She just couldn't seem to figure out the best solution for their predicament.

‘If you want to work, work,' Tim had said, ever the pragmatist. ‘Do what you need to do. I just don't want you freaking out because you feel overwhelmed.'

He had a point. Tim was her rock, always there to ground her. Eventually Maggie returned to Bonninghams, placing Pearl in Tim's work creche the week after she turned five months old. She'd felt awful at first, as she shrugged on her slightly tight, slightly scratchy pre-baby suit and headed out the door. It felt good later though, at work, knowing that she had the next seven hours to do what she loved. But Maggie had felt terribly guilty admitting that even to herself.

That had been almost four years ago, and Pearl had grown into a determined, spirited little girl. Maggie felt her heart twist with love and guilt every time she thought about her. She wanted to work
and
she wanted to spend more time with her daughter. So why couldn't she have both? There was just no easy solution. Sometimes it seemed to Maggie that the balance between work and home was as delicate and finely wrought – and as prone to snapping under pressure – as the gold chain hanging around her neck.

Maggie's fingers brushed over Tim's and Pearl's faces in the silver frame –
her family.
God, how she loved them. With such a fierceness that sometimes she felt as if she'd die if anything ever happened to them. After the rocky start of Pearl's babyhood, things had seemed to be getting easier. But then Stella had come to live with them.

Tim's daughter from a previous relationship had turned up on their doorstep a few months earlier. Eyebrows knitted in a panto act of fury, she had brushed Maggie aside and stomped past her in those trademark big black boots, shouting, ‘Dad! Dad!' and barging down the hallway. Into their home and into their lives like a big rock thrown into a pond grown finally calm after a storm.

Stella with her dark eyes, long pale limbs and blue-black locks that made her look like a French chanteuse. With her boys and her short skirts and her smoking, which she thought Maggie and Tim were too stupid to notice. Her monumental strops. On the rare occasions that Stella
was
pleasant to be around, it usually meant she wanted something: money for an all-ages music festival or a trip to the chain stores on Oxford Street, or a lift somewhere to meet her equally disaffected friends. Stella regarded Maggie with the sort of disdain one usually reserves for a particularly old, smelly dog when it ambles up to lick your face.

An email message box popped up on Maggie's screen, and Maggie placed the framed photograph back on her desk. It was from Bonningham, with a phone number listed in the subject header.
Call Eloise Thompson, a producer at Channel 4. They're looking for a valuer to comment on last week's costume sale on
Mornings
. Very important we make this happen.

Maggie sat back, a little stunned. This was immediate proof Bonningham trusted her: securing publicity like this was huge. Sotheby's and Christie's could always impress the media and clients with their
name alone, by comparison Bonninghams had to work very hard for clients, coddling and wooing them to part with their treasures. It was even harder with journalists or – the holy grail! – television producers.

Right
, Maggie thought, picking up the phone and already dialling the number, glancing over again at the photo of Tim and Pearl.
No pressure then.

Later that day, after the special off-site auction of the Wilkinsons' pieces, Maggie's plans for catching up on her paperwork had disappeared as quickly as one of Suzanne Wilkinson's false smiles. After grabbing a cup of instant soup from Bonninghams' small kitchenette in lieu of lunch with Judy, Maggie had taken the inventory to accounts, then had had to quickly rearrange the floor stock before fielding a long and rambling call from an old dear inquiring how much she could expect for her ‘antique' John Lewis bookshelves and sets of commemorative salt and pepper shakers.

Maggie had felt queasy watching the Wilkinsons attempt to be civil towards one another throughout the auction in their home. A society couple in the throes of a bitter divorce, they didn't take any prisoners in an argument. God, they reminded her of her parents . . . Venomous. A steady throbbing had started up at the base of her skull at the thought, and the aspirin she'd taken hadn't managed to lift it.

‘Just sign here, please,' Maggie asked Suzanne Wilkinson after the auction. The pinched, cosmetically enhanced former model in her camel twinset and pearls ran a finger down the inventory with all its little ticks in the
sold
column. She looked deeply unimpressed – despite the fact that Maggie had managed to garner three or four times the value in bids than she'd initially quoted them.