Free The Importance of Being Emma by Juliet Archer Page B

new boyfriend and his parents are coming to dinner and everything has to be perfect. Are you visualising the new boyfriend, Harriet? He’s a young, up-and-coming guy, director of an SME – ’
    Harriet looked blank. ‘Annessemmee? That’s a designer label, innit?’
    ‘ SME stands for Small or Medium-sized Enterprise,’ Elton said grandly. ‘Like Highbury Foods.’
    Emma seemed to be trying not to laugh. ‘Exactly like Highbury Foods, Philip. Now, Harriet, you want to cook something impressive, yet foolproof. Don’t look so terrified, it’s just pretend, remember you ooze self-confidence from every pore. That’s better. You reach for something from the Harriet’s Secret Recipes range … Just hold up that tin to your right, it’s Betty’s Best Creamed Rice Pudding, but no one will be any the wiser. And smile – brilliant!’
    She bent over the tripod in a very provocative pose, to which she seemed totally oblivious, and started snapping away. I switched my gaze to Harriet. She still looked tense and there was something odd about the whole scene …
    ‘ Hang on,’ I said, ‘there’s a picture of a tree directly behind you, Harriet, and it looks as though it’s growing out of your head – which I’m sure isn’t the sophisticated image Emma has in mind. I suggest you move slightly to the left.’
    My intervention did two things, as I’d intended. It made Harriet giggle, which meant she looked more relaxed and in character; and it reminded Emma that she needed to focus less on matchmaking and more on the task in hand.
    Whether she paid the slightest attention remained to be seen.
     
    ~~EMMA~~
    At half past three, with the photo shoot over, Harriet and I followed Philip to his house. There’d been some confusion over the transport arrangements; naturally, Harriet and Philip had brought their own cars to Hartfield and each of them offered me a lift to Little Bassington. However, I was determined to take my own car so that I could get away when it suited me and leave Harriet and Philip together for the evening. I persuaded Harriet to leave her old Nova at Hartfield and travel with Philip (I lingered on his name with great emphasis) or me.
    The simpleton chose me.
    Little Bassington must have been quite a pleasant village at one time. Unfortunately, it had been ‘enhanced’ by the addition of what I could only describe, in the style of Prince Charles, as carbuncles: pustules of tasteless modern architecture deforming the original rows of picturesque cottages that lined the high street. Philip guided us into one of these carbuncles, a small, newly built estate termed, rather optimistically I felt, Paradise View. From the outside, his house was a repellent neo-Georgian mock-Tudor monstrosity. Inside, words failed me; but they certainly didn’t fail Harriet.
    She looked round the poky lounge and gabbled some sort of foreign language. ‘Oh, you’ve got a Klippan, so have we, isn’t that amazing? And some Gubbos, or are they Klappstas? And over there, don’t tell me, that’s a Lack.’
    Philip grinned. ‘Correct, with a Dunker next to it.’
    They both burst out laughing.
    ‘ I don’t get the joke,’ I said, with a tight little smile.
    Philip was immediately contrite. ‘Sorry, Emma, you’ve obviously never shopped at Ikea, they give their furniture the weirdest names. They’re Scandinavian,’ he added, as if that explained everything.
    ‘ My little brother has a Fartfull,’ Harriet said, almost in hysterics.
    I rolled my eyes. ‘Really?’
    ‘ Yes, it’s a child’s desk – ’
    ‘ And it means speedy in Swedish or Norwegian or something,’ Philip put in.
    ‘ How interesting. Now, where’s your PC, Philip?’
    Harriet and Philip exchanged knowing looks. Then she said, ‘On something called a Jerker, I’ll bet!’
    ‘ I beg your pardon?’ I tried not to let my irritation show; at least they were bonding nicely.
    ‘ A computer table,’ Philip said, hastily. ‘It’s upstairs, I’ve