Page 17 of A Class Act

‘He came looking for me.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He knew I worked at Graphite.’

‘Right?’

‘And he fed me little ice-cream kisses on the riverbank in some place called Marlow.’

‘Have you been drinking, Robyn?’

I smiled, even though remembering those kisses made me want to cry, knowing I’d never have them again.

‘Ice-cream kisses?’ she asked. ‘Are they like those little Iced Gems biscuits? Those little midget things? They’ve got BOGOF on them at the Co-op at the moment. Lola loves them, although,’ she added, ‘I do have to think about her teeth. Pure sugar.’

‘Don’t think you can saymidgetany more.’ I laughed.

‘We do up here in Yorkshire,’ she said dryly. ‘Remember your roots, Robyn.’

‘He’s a top London barrister, his brother is in the legal profession, his motherwasa top London judge. Oh, and, er, his father is the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales.’

‘Fuck!’ Followed by silence. ‘Hang on…’ I could sense her googling Roland Carrington as the expletive hung, accusingly, in the two hundred miles of air separating us. ‘And yet,’ she eventually said, ‘all he feeds you is cheap little biscuits?’

‘Oh, and his brother is unpleasant. Misogynist from what I saw… and heard… of him.’ I hesitated. ‘And racist.’

‘Ditch him,’ Jess snapped. ‘A barrister is bad enough. A racist barrister is just not on.’

‘I didn’t say Fabian was racist,’ I protested.

‘A barrister? Called Fabian? And from Buckinghamshire, for heaven’s sake? I bet he went to Eton, or one of those other top-knob public schools for the privileged rich. Don’t go there, Robyn.’

‘Do you not think you’re being slightly prejudiced, Jess? You know…’

‘Robyn,’ she said, but more gently now, ‘don’t talk to me about prejudice. I’ve lived with prejudice of different kinds all my life. Only last week a new inmate… guest,’ she correctedherself ‘…at Hudson House said she didn’t want “a darkie” serving her food.’ I could almost see Jess air-quoting the words.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake. Surely not? I thought we’d moved on from all that?’

‘You’re setting yourself up for heartache, Robyn,’ Jess warned.

‘No, I’m not,’ I said sadly. ‘Because I won’t be seeing him again.’

‘Ah, Robyn, caught you.’

I was very tempted to reply to my agent, Dorcas, that I wasn’t actually running away from her,butI swallowed the words wholesale and, instead, said, ‘Hello, Dorcas, how are you?’

‘Well, very well, as will you be when I tell you.’

My pulse raced and I put down the kettle I was just about to fill at the kitchen sink. ‘Tell me what? You have something for me?’

‘Sounds promising, Robyn, but, as always, don’t get your hopes up too high.’

‘OK. What?’

‘Now, as you know, the casting process is different for every show…’

Just cut to the quick without the homilies, I urged her silently. ‘What is it, Dorcas?’

‘A speaking chorus part.’

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