We’re meeting in the lobby of Claridge’s—Lucinda loves hotel lobbies; don’t ask me why. I sit there patiently for twenty minutes, drinking weak black tea, wishing I’d canceled, and feeling sicker and sicker at the thought of seeing Magnus’s parents. I’m wondering if I might actually have to go to the ladies’ and be ill—when she suddenly appears, all flying raven hair and Calvin Klein perfume and six mood boards under her arm. Her suede spiky kitten heels are tapping on the marble floor, and her pink cashmere coat is billowing out behind her like a pair of wings.
Trailing in her wake is Clemency, her “assistant.” (If an unpaid eighteen-year-old can be called an assistant. I’d call her slave labor.) Clemency is very posh and very sweet and terrified of Lucinda. She answered Lucinda’s ad in The Lady for an intern and keeps telling me how great it is to learn the ropes firsthand from an experienced professional.32
“So, I’ve been talking to the vicar. Those arrangements aren’t going to work. The wretched pulpit has to stay where it is.” Lucinda descends into a chair in a leggy, Joseph-trousered sprawl, and the mood boards slide out of her grasp and all over the floor. “I just don’t know why people can’t be more helpful. I mean, what are we going to do now? And I haven’t heard back from the caterer….”
I can barely concentrate on what she’s saying. I’m suddenly wishing I’d arranged to meet Magnus first, on my own, to tell him about the ring. Then we could have faced his parents together. Is it too late? Could I quickly text him on the way?
“… and I still haven’t got a trumpeter.” Lucinda exhales sharply, two lacquered nails to her forehead. “There’s so much to do. It’s insane. Insane. It would have helped if Clemency had typed out the order of service properly,” she adds, a little savagely.
Poor Clemency flushes beet-red and I shoot her a sympathetic smile. It’s not her fault she’s severely dyslexic and put hymen instead of hymn and the whole thing had to be redone.
“We’ll get there!” I say encouragingly. “Don’t worry!”
“I’m telling you, after this is over I’m going to need a week in a spa. Have you seen my hands?” Lucinda pushes them toward me. “That’s stress!”
I have no idea what she’s talking about—her hands look perfectly normal to me. But I stare at them obediently.
“You see? Wrecked. All for your wedding, Poppy! Clemency, order me a G&T.”
“Right. Absolutely.” Clemency leaps eagerly to her feet.
I try to ignore a tiny rub of irritation. Lucinda’s always throwing little references like that into the conversation: “All for your wedding.” “Just to make you happy, Poppy!” “The bride’s always right!”
She can sound quite pointed sometimes, which I find disconcerting. I mean, I didn’t ask her to be a wedding planner, did I? And we are paying her quite a lot, aren’t we? But I don’t want to say anything, because she’s Magnus’s old friend and everything.
“Lucinda, I was wondering, have we sorted out the cars yet?” I say tentatively.
There’s an ominous silence. I can tell that a wave of fury is rising inside Lucinda, from the way her nose starts to twitch. At last it erupts, just as poor Clemency arrives back.
“Oh, bloody hell. Oh, fucking … Clemency!” She turns her wrath on the trembling girl. “Why didn’t you remind me about the cars? They need cars! We need to hire them!”
“I …” Clemency looks helplessly at me. “Um … I didn’t know….”
“There’s always something!” Lucinda is almost talking to herself. “Always something else to think about. It’s endless. However much I run myself into the ground, it goes on and on and on—”
“Look, shall I do the cars?” I say hastily. “I’m sure I can sort them.”
“Would you?” Lucinda seems to wake up. “Could you do that? It’s just, there’s only one of me, you know, and I have spent the entire week working on details, all for your wedding, Poppy.”
She looks so stressed out, I feel a pang of guilt.
“Yes! No problem. I’ll go on yellow pages or something.”
“How’s your hair coming along, Poppy?” Lucinda suddenly focuses on my head, and I silently will my hair to grow another centimeter, very quickly.
“Not bad! I’m sure it will go in the chignon. Definitely.” I try to sound more positive than I feel.
Lucinda has told me about a hundred times how shortsighted and foolish it was to cut my hair to above the shoulder when I was about to become engaged.33 She also told me at the wedding-dress shop that with my pale skin,34 a white dress would never work and I should wear lime green. For my wedding. Luckily the wedding-dress-shop owner chimed in and said Lucinda was speaking nonsense: My dark hair and eyes would set off the white beautifully. So I chose to believe her instead.
The G&T arrives and Lucinda takes a deep slug. I take another sip of tepid black tea. Poor old Clemency hasn’t got anything, but she looks like she’s trying to blend into her chair and not attract any attention at all.
“And … you were going to find out about confetti?” I add cautiously. “But I can do that too,” I backtrack quickly at Lucinda’s expression. “I’ll phone the vicar.”
“Great!” Lucinda breathes out sharply. “I’d appreciate that! Because there is only one of me and I can only be in one place at once—” She breaks off abruptly as her gaze alights on my hand. “Where’s your ring, Poppy? Oh my God, haven’t you found it yet?”
As she lifts her eyes, she looks so thunderstruck, I start to feel sick again.
“Not yet. But it’ll turn up soon. I’m sure it will. The hotel staff are all looking—”
“And you haven’t told Magnus?”
“I will!” I swallow hard. “Soon.”
“But isn’t it a really important family piece?” Lucinda’s hazel eyes are wide. “Won’t they be livid?”
Is she trying to give me a nervous breakdown?
My phone buzzes and I grab it, grateful for the distraction. Magnus has just sent me a text which dashes my secret hope that his parents would suddenly catch gastric flu and have to cancel:
Dinner at 8, whole family here, can’t wait to see you!
“Is that your new phone?” Lucinda frowns critically at it. “Did you get my forwarded texts?”
“Yes, thanks.” I nod. Only about thirty-five of them, all clogging up my in-box. When she heard I’d lost my phone, Lucinda insisted on forwarding all her recent texts to me, just so I didn’t “drop the ball.” To be fair, it was quite a good idea. I got Magnus to forward all his most recent messages too, and the girls at work.
Ned Murdoch, whoever he is, has also finally contacted Sam. I’ve been looking out for that email all day. I glance at it distractedly, but it doesn’t seem particularly earth-shattering to me. Re: Ellerton’s bid. Sam, hi. A few points. You’ll see from the attachment, blah blah blah.
Anyway, I’d better send it on straightaway. I press forward and make sure it’s gone through. Then I type a quick reply to Magnus, my fingers fumbling with nerves.