“Thanks, Sarah, we’ll be fine.” Uncle Bill cuts her off and turns his attention to me. “Lara. Have a seat.”
As I sit down, I’m aware of Sarah moving away and the soft swoosh of the door closing behind me.
There’s silence, apart from Uncle Bill tapping something into his BlackBerry. To pass the time, I look at the wall of pictures of Uncle Bill with famous people. Madonna. Nelson Mandela. The whole England football team.
“So, Lara.” At last he looks up. “What can I do for you?”
“I… um…” I clear my throat. “I was…”
I had all sorts of punchy openers prepared. But now that I’m actually here, in the inner sanctum, they’re all drying up on my lips. I feel paralyzed. This is Bill Lington we’re talking about. Huge, jet-setting tycoon with a million important things to do, like telling the president how to run his country. Why would he go to an old people’s home and take a necklace from an old lady? What have I been thinking?
“Lara?” He frowns questioningly
Oh God. If I’m going to do this, I need to do it. It’s like jumping off the diving board. Hold your nose, deep breath, go.
“I went to Aunt Sadie’s nursing home last week,” I say in a rush. “And apparently she had this visitor a few weeks ago who looked just like you, called Charles Reece, and it didn’t make any sense to me, so I thought I’d come and ask you…”
I trail off. Uncle Bill is looking at me with as much enthusiasm as if I’d whipped out a hula skirt and started dancing.
“Jesus Christ,” he mutters. “Lara, are you still claiming Sadie was murdered? Is that what this is about? Because I really don’t have time-” He reaches for the telephone.
“No, that’s not it!” My face is boiling, but I force myself to persevere. “I don’t really think she was murdered. I went there because… because I felt bad that no one had ever shown any interest in her. When she was alive, I mean. And there was another name in the visitors’ book, and they said the guy looked exactly like you, and I was just… wondering. You know. Just wondering.”
My heart is pounding in my ears as I finish.
Slowly, Uncle Bill replaces the telephone receiver and there’s silence. For a few moments he looks as though he’s weighing up exactly what to say.
“Well, it looks as though both of us had the same instincts,” he says at last, leaning back in his chair. “You’re right. I did go to see Sadie.”
My jaw drops in astonishment.
Result! Total, instant result! I think I should become a private detective.
“But why did you use the name Charles Reece?”
“Lara.” Uncle Bill gives a patient sigh. “I have a lot of fans out there. I’m a celebrity. There are a lot of things I do that I don’t trumpet. Charity work, hospital visits…” He spreads his hands. “Charles Reece is the name I take when I want to stay anonymous. Can you imagine the fuss if it were known that Bill Lington had personally come to visit an old lady?” He meets my eyes with a friendly twinkle, and for a moment I can’t help smiling back.
It kind of makes sense. Uncle Bill is such a rock star. Taking a pseudonym is the sort of thing he’d do.
“But why didn’t you tell any of the family? At the service, you said you’d never visited Aunt Sadie.”
“I know.” Uncle Bill nods. “And I had my reasons for that. I didn’t want to make the rest of the family feel in any way guilty or defensive about not having visited themselves. Especially your father. He can be… prickly.”
Prickly? Dad’s not prickly.
“Dad’s fine,” I say tightly.
“Oh, he’s great,” Bill says immediately. “An absolutely fantastic guy. But it can’t be easy being Bill Lington’s big brother. I feel for him.”
Indignation surges through me. He’s right. It’s not easy being Bill Lington’s big brother, because Bill Lington is such an arrogant tosser .
I should never have smiled at him. In fact, I wish there were a way to take smiles back.
“You don’t need to feel sorry for Dad,” I say as politely as I can. “He doesn’t feel sorry for himself. He’s done really well in life.”
“You know, I’ve started using your dad as an example in my seminars.” Uncle Bill adopts a musing tone. “Two boys. Same upbringing. Same education. The only difference between them was, one of them wanted it. One of them had the dream.”
He sounds like he’s rehearsing a speech for some promotional DVD. God, he’s up himself. Who says everyone wants to be Bill Lington, anyway? Some people’s dream would be not to have their face plastered across coffee cups all over the world.
“So, Lara.” He focuses back on me. “It was a pleasure to see you; Sarah will show you out.”
That’s it? My audience is over? I haven’t even got to the bit about the necklace yet.
“There’s something else,” I say hastily.
“Lara-”
“I’ll be really quick, I promise! I just wondered, when you visited Aunt Sadie…”
“Yes?” I can see him trying to keep his patience. He glances at his watch and touches a key on his keyboard.
Oh God. How am I going to put this?
“Do you know anything about…” I’m stumbling over my words. “I mean, did you see… or possibly take, by accident… a necklace? A long necklace with glass beads and a dragonfly pendant?”