‘No! How incredible,’ said Freddie.
‘Yes. And of course he was guest chef here in the early years.’ The voice of the public-relations officer charged with the task of showing Diana and Freddie round the hotel was growing chilly.
‘I had imagined you would be more au fait with the facts.’
‘We only heard yesterday – while we were still in England – we were to shoot part of this feature here,’ said Diana. ‘The whole thing has been a huge rush, as you can imagine.’
The PR officer, whose unlikely name was Metro, looked slightly mollified. ‘Of course. Well, you must decide for yourselves where you will be doing the photographs – but I would imagine the ballroom would suit you best.’
‘Marvellous idea, and thank you for the suggestion, but of course we are very much in the hands of the fashion editor,’ said Freddie, who had already decided that Diana tumbling temptingly out of a silk negligee, and leaning over one of the Pierre’s floral-painted basins, doing her make-up in the magnifying mirror above it, would be the Pierre’s contribution. It had transpired that they were staying there free as a quid pro quo for using it in one of the shots: always a tricky situation, with both sides determined to get their pound of flesh.
‘Oh, really?’ The tones became chillier still. ‘We were very much given the impression that we would have carte blanche – more or less – on the feature.’
‘Well, perhaps a touch of crème, I fear – there will have to be a little give and take,’ said Freddie, and then seeing that this piece of verbal whizzery was wasted on Metro, added hastily, ‘But do please show us the ballroom, so we can start to plan our pictures.’
Mollified, Metro led them to the vast acreage of the ballroom, with its twenty-three-foot-high ceiling, a fairy-tale forest of chandeliers and windows that would not have disgraced a cathedral.
‘Marvellous,’ cried Diana, taking her cue from Freddie. ‘Just perfect. But – as Freddie says, we mustn’t get carried away.’
‘And now, darling, we must go,’ said Freddie to Diana. ‘We’re going to be late for dinner. Thank you so much, Metro, for your time and all the fascinating information.’
‘My pleasure entirely,’ said Metro. ‘Now, I’m having a complete information pack sent to your rooms; anything else, you have only to call. May I ask where you are dining?’
‘Oh – with friends,’ said Freddie carefully. ‘At the Oyster Bar at Grand Central.’
An hour later, happily settled in the tiled vaults, wrapped in a plastic bib and halfway through her dozen Maine oysters, Diana had only to argue with Freddie over which precious hour of their day the place should occupy.
‘One vital advantage this has,’ said Freddie, ‘is it could be noon or midnight. The light never alters.’
‘We can’t waste noon light,’ said Diana.
‘Of course not. I think small hours. Oh, no – shit – it closes at midnight. OK, then, how about rush hour?’
‘Rush hour’d be good.’
‘Only thing is, light’s nice enough then for Central Park.’
‘You did say dawn for that.’
‘Yeah, I did. OK, we’ll pencil in six p.m. Then seven for the yellow cab. Good thing we haven’t literally got to do it in twenty-four.’
‘Why?’
‘My darling girl, where do you think you’re going to change?’
Diana looked around her and shrugged. ‘Here? Not much different from behind a bush on Hampstead Heath. That was my first day ever modelling. I was so excited I’d have stood naked in Piccadilly Circus. I feel a bit like that now,’ she added with a grin.
‘That’s why you’re such a great model,’ said Freddie, kissing her on the cheek. ‘You’ve never got tired of it. Now come on, we should get back to the Pierre. We’re meeting Ottilie there at nine.’
Ottilie, a terrifying Valkyrie-style six-foot blonde, with a face like an iceberg and hair like hemp, plus her retinue, were waiting for them in the foyer, with a mountain of clothes.
‘Hi,’ she said, her expression daring a smile to come near it. ‘Let’s go up to your room, Diana, and we can unload these and plan the shoot.’
She stalked towards the lift; Diana and Freddie followed meekly.
‘It’s all right,’ he hissed in her ear. ‘It’s the American way. They feel they have to frighten everybody.’
‘Oh. She’s succeeded.’
But once talking about shots and clothes and locations, a remarkable change came over Ottilie. She didn’t exactly smile but her face eased into an approximation of one; she knew a good idea when she saw it, liked a lot of theirs, threw in several of her own; and she was swift to seize opportunities and use them: so when a yellow cab broke down in the middle of Third Avenue, steam pouring from its bonnet like a volcano, she told Diana (also dressed in yellow) to get behind it and start pushing. Or hiring a helicopter – ‘I’ll argue with Miss Dickens about the cost’ – so they could fly past the Chrysler building in all its lace-like loveliness, with Diana’s profile etched against it.
They went up to a jazz club in Harlem, where she slipped the trumpeter ten dollars to let Diana blow it for two dizzy minutes; and agreed they should take the Staten Island ferry at two in the morning, and then had Diana, wearing a huge-skirted white ball gown, standing recklessly on the boat rail, with only the make-up lady hanging onto her dress for security, waving to the Statue of Liberty as they went past.
The entire shoot took three days, not two, and at the end Ottilie hugged them both and said they had been ‘quite good’.
Next day, their last, they got a call from Miss Dickens’s secretary; could they come down to the offices right away.
‘This is it,’ said Freddie. ‘She hates them.’
He always said that; it was the only time he ever displayed any lack of confidence.
American Fashion was based just off Times Square. It was rather unglamorous, very different from Vogue or Style, too many people crammed into too few offices. Even Miss Dickens shared her office with not only her secretary but also the beauty editor. She was unlike any fashion editor or editor Diana had ever seen, being tiny and rather timid looking, with mousey brown hair, half-moon spectacles, and clothes that looked at least five years out of date.
‘She says she’s too busy to go shopping or get her hair done,’ Freddie said. ‘She makes a thing of it; she can look fabulous, I’m told.’