During the following term, Jessica began sleeping at Paulo’s apartment during the day and spending most of her waking life accompanying him to nightclubs. On the rare occasions she and Paulo dropped into the Slade, few people recognized them. She became used to a string of different girls coming and going during the day, but she was the only one who spent the night with him.
The third letter, which Professor Howard handed to Jessica personally on one of the rare occasions she did get up in time to attend a morning drawing class, could not be ignored. The principal informed her that as she had been caught smoking marijuana on the college’s premises, her scholarship had been rescinded and would be awarded to another student. He added that she would be allowed to remain as a pupil for the present, but only if she attended classes and her work greatly improved.
Professor Howard warned her that if she still hoped to graduate and be offered a place at the Royal Academy to study for an MA, she would have to build a portfolio of work for the examiners to consider, and time was slipping away.
When Jessica went home that afternoon, she didn’t show the letter to Claire, who rarely missed a lecture, and had a steady boyfriend called Darren, who considered a visit to Pizza Express a treat.
Jessica made sure that whenever she visited her parents or grandparents, which was becoming less and less frequent, she was always soberly dressed and never smoked or drank in their presence.
She made no mention of her lover, or the double life she was leading, and was relieved that Paulo had never once suggested he would like to meet her family. Whenever one of her parents raised the subject of the Royal Academy, she assured them that Professor Howard was delighted with her progress, and remained confident that the academy would offer her a place the following year.
By the beginning of her second year at art school, Jessica was conducting two lives. Neither of them in the real world. This might well have continued if she hadn’t bumped into Lady Virginia Fenwick.
Jessica was standing at the bar of Annabel’s when she turned at the same moment as an elderly lady with her back to her and spilled some champagne on her sleeve.
‘What are the young coming to?’ said Virginia, when Jessica didn’t even bother to apologize.
‘And it’s not just the young,’ said the duke. ‘One of those new life peers Thatcher has just appointed had the nerve to address me by my Christian name.’
‘Whatever next, Perry?’ said Virginia as the ma?tre d’ guided them to their usual table. ‘Mario, do you by any chance know who that young lady is standing at the bar?’
‘Her name is Jessica Clifton, my lady.’
‘Is it indeed? And the young man she’s with?’
‘Mr Paulo Reinaldo, one of our regular customers.’
For the next few minutes Virginia made only monosyllabic replies to anything the duke said. Her gaze rarely left a table on the far side of the room.
Eventually she got up, telling the duke she needed to go to the loo, then took Mario to one side and slipped him a ten-pound note. As Lady Virginia wasn’t known for her generosity, Mario assumed this could not be for services rendered, but for services about to be rendered. By the time her ladyship returned to the duke and suggested it was time to go home, she knew everything she needed to know about Paulo Reinaldo, and the only thing she needed to know about Jessica Clifton.
When Paulo took Jessica to Annabel’s to celebrate her nineteenth birthday, neither of them noticed the elderly couple seated in an alcove.
Virginia and the duke usually left the club around eleven, but not tonight. In fact the duke dozed off after a third Courvoisier even though he had suggested on more than one occasion that perhaps they should go home.
‘Not yet, darling,’ Virginia kept saying, without explanation.
The moment Paulo called for the bill, Virginia shot out of the stalls and made her way quickly across to the private phone booth discreetly located in the corridor. She already had a telephone number and the name of an officer she had been assured would be on duty. She dialled the number slowly and the phone was answered almost immediately.
‘Chief Inspector Mullins.’
‘Chief inspector, my name is Lady Virginia Fenwick, and I wish to report a dangerous driving incident. I think the driver must be drunk, because he almost hit our Rolls-Royce as he overtook us on the inside.’
‘Can you describe the car, madam?’
‘It was a yellow Ferrari, and I’m fairly sure the driver wasn’t English.’
‘You didn’t by any chance get the registration number?’
Virginia checked a slip of paper in her hand. ‘A786 CLC.’
‘And where did the incident take place?’
‘My chauffeur was driving around Berkeley Square when the Ferrari turned right down Piccadilly and drove off towards Chelsea.’