Free The Rich Are Different by Susan Howatch Page A

the ill-educated proletariat are never even going to be able to pronounce the name, let alone understand the allusion to India.’
    ‘But I’m not catering to the proletariat! I’m catering to all those upper-classwomen who have until now been inhibited from using cosmetics and who can afford to pay for their new fashion through the nose!’
    ‘Then you’re out of touch with the economic facts of 1922. I’ve no doubt you could make a shilling or two peddling paste to the aristocracy, but if you want to give me a reasonable return for my money you’ll cater to the masses. England is ripe for mass production; that’s where the money is and that’s where I’m putting my capital.’ I stacked her sketches together and handed them back to her. ‘Change the colouring. Gold is hard to read and although I like the blue it’s too pale to create a strong impression. I’ll bring over a market research team from New York to decide which colours would create the most sales impact.’ I began to roam around the room just as I did when I was dictating, and allowed my mind to fasten wholly on the problem. ‘Scrap the fancy lettering – have firm strong capital letters which everyone can read. Scrap the name Taj Mahal. You want a name which sounds like the virginal heroine of a nineteenth-century novel. Let me see. What were all those Trollope women called? Lily, Belle, Glencora—’
    ‘I am
not
calling my product after some bally awful Victorian heroine!’
    ‘Then let’s think of something classical – why, of course! Diana! That’s it! Diana Slade – very pretty and elegant, much more charming than your real name. We’ll call the firm Diana Slade Cosmetics, and you can name your perfumes after the different goddesses of antiquity!’
    ‘But what’s that got to do with India?’ stormed Dinah.
    ‘Absolutely nothing, but who cares so long as the product sells?’
    ‘I care! I care, you beastly, vulgar, money-grubbing American!’
    I swung round in surprise, but fortunately managed not to laugh. After considering my approach, I avoided all apologies and said instead: ‘Dinah, when I was a young man, a little younger than you are now, I arrived home penniless in New York with a pregnant wife and had to earn my living. I had a bogus Oxford accent, a love of the classics and a passionate distaste for vulgarity. However, it didn’t take me long to discover that these dubious virtues were of no use to me when it came to surviving in a town like New York. I learnt to survive in a hard school, Dinah. I just hope your course in the art of survival will be easier than mine was.’
    There was a pause before she said unevenly: ‘I’m sorry. I was only shocked by how suddenly you changed into a fast-talking, utterly twentieth-century businessman complete with a pronounced American accent.’
    This time I did laugh. ‘I warned you I was a New Yorker! You didn’t think I made my money by declaiming poetry by Catullus, did you? But maybe I should start quoting again to reassure you that Dr Jekyll isn’t entirely Mr Hyde. “
Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus
—”’
    ‘“—
da mi basia mille!
”’ responded Dinah promptly, raising her mouth to mine for a kiss, and as I slid my arms around her waist I couldn’t help thinking that she really was the most remarkable girl …
    [2]
    The nextmorning after breakfast we went sailing. I had already decided to stay an extra night in Norfolk so that on the following day I could call on the Slade family lawyers in Norwich to discuss the purchase of the estate. There would have to be an independent valuation, but I thought that in view of the dilapidated state of the house and the lack of modern conveniences I should be able to make the purchase cheaply.
    By that time London seemed as remote as New York. Deciding firmly that I would not think of any business for the next twenty-four hours, I hoisted the sail of the little dinghy and with Dinah at the tiller we set off across