Out of the Blue. Isabel Wolff

no thank you,’ she replied, looking slightly furtive. ‘This is my handbag, you see.’

      ‘Really, madam?’ he said suspiciously.

      ‘Absolutely,’ Lily shot back with a dazzling smile, her refulgent teeth sparkling like frost against the rich, dark bronze of her skin. ‘I always hang on to this one,’ she explained. I knew why. She’s very naughty like that. But then, as I say, Lily has always broken rules. As the waiter retreated she put the bag under the table and quickly undid the zip. Then she looked at me, grinned, and swiped the last bit of meat from my plate.

      ‘Here, darling!’ she whispered as her beautifully manicured hand shot down below. ‘Auntie Faith wants you to have this.’ We could hear snuffling, snorty little sounds, followed by a tinny whine. Katie, Sarah and I lifted the cloth and peered under the table where Lily’s Shih Tzu, Jennifer, had just scoffed the last of my lamb. A pink tongue shot out and wrapped itself around her furry little face; then she stared at us blankly with a pair of huge, bulging, black eyes.

      ‘What a sweet hairstyle,’ said Sarah with a laugh. Jennifer’s flowing locks had been gathered into a top knot and secured with a sparkling clip.

      ‘Oh yes, she’s so gorgeous,’ Lily replied with a sigh. ‘Isn’t she, Faith? Isn’t she just the prettiest little thing in the world?’

      ‘Oh, yes,’ I lied, looking at Jennifer’s undershot jaw, her crooked teeth, her bearded chin and flat little face. ‘Jennifer’s just … great,’ I added with a hypocritical smile. Again, some people might think that Jennifer’s an unusual choice of name for a dog. In fact her full name is Jennifer Aniston. This is because of her long, silky blonde hair, and because she’s ‘worth it’. At least I hope so, because Lily spends half her salary on that pooch. The Louis Vuitton doggy bag, for example – that’s at least five hundred pounds’ worth. She’s also got eight Gucci dog collars, five Chanel leads, two Burberry coats, three Paul Smith bowls, and you should see her bed! It’s like an oriental tent, complete with Chinese wall-hangings and a silk rug. The purpose of this, apparently, is to remind Jennifer of her ancient origins in Imperial Peking. Shih Tzus were temple dogs, and Lily worships hers. But between you and me, Jennifer Aniston is simply not my type. She’s not Graham’s, either. He tends to stare at her, slightly incredulously, as though he’s not entirely sure she’s a dog.

      ‘How’s magland?’ I asked brightly, changing the subject.

      ‘Fabulous,’ Lily replied. ‘Here’s the February issue – look! It’s just come in from the printers, I’m having them biked all over town.’ The magazine felt heavy in my hands, and shone under the spotlights like ice. Moi! it proclaimed on the masthead, above a photo of Kate Moss. I glanced at the headlines: ‘Pees and Queues – Five Star Loos!’ ‘Prolier Than Thou – the REAL New Labour!’ ‘It Girls – Just Lamé Ducks?’ and ‘Pulling Power – Our Top Ten Tweezers!’

      ‘Hype springs eternal!’ muttered Peter, rolling his eyes.

      I gave him a discreet kick, then Sarah and I flicked through the magazine, careful to admire, aloud, the wonderful photos, the features, and the fashion. And the ads, of course. There were lots of those. Some of them, I happen to know, cost thirty thousand pounds a page, which is more than I earn in a year. There was one particular ad for an expensive face cream, with a photo of a Persian kitten, and though I’m a doggy sort of person, I just couldn’t help going, ‘Aaaaah!’

      ‘That’s the “classical conditioning” reflex, Mum,’ said Katie knowledgeably. ‘Extremely effective for selling. It works by establishing an association between a product and a pleasant feeling. Stayman and Batra did a fascinating study in 1991 which proved that emotional states affect consumer choice.’ As I say, she’s not like other girls. In the meantime Lily had been rattling on about circulation and pagination and subscription rates and God knows what. ‘We’ve got a hundred and twenty advertising pages,’ she explained happily, ‘and a hundred and thirty editorial. This is our biggest issue yet. We’re on a roll.’

      At the front was an article about dieting and a profile of Sharon Stone. There was an extract from the new Ian McEwan novel, and the society diary section, ‘I Spy’. There were pages on lotions and potions, and a competition to win a car. Now, I love competitions. I do quite a lot of them, though obviously I couldn’t enter this one because friends of the editor are barred. But whenever I’ve got time I send off the forms. I actually won something recently – I was really chuffed – a year’s supply of Finish rinse aid. I’ve never won anything big though, but maybe one day I will.

      By now, Mimi, who works at Radio 4, had plucked up her courage and was talking to Lily about her career.

      ‘Other women’s magazines have falling circulations,’ Mimi said, ‘but yours seems to be soaring.’

      ‘It’s gone up by twenty per cent since I took over,’ said Lily triumphantly. ‘They’re all quaking in their Manolos at Vogue!’

      ‘Would you like to come on Woman’s Hour?’ Mimi asked. ‘When I’m back from maternity leave? You’d be talking about Moi!, of course, and about your innovatory editing style. But I think the listeners would also like to know about you – your background, and your convent days.’ Lily snorted with laughter.

      ‘I wasn’t exactly a model pupil. Ask Faith!’ I smiled and nodded. It was true. But there are reasons for that. There are very good reasons why Lily, though obviously gifted, was rather difficult at school. For a start, she was just plucked from her home: it was done with the best of intentions, but she was taken away and placed in an environment where she was bound to feel she didn’t fit in. At eight, her exceptional brain was spotted by a teacher, who told the local priest, who then contacted the bishop, who wrote to Reverend Mother who agreed to take her on as a scholarship girl. And that was how Lily left the Caribbean to be educated at St Bede’s.

      ‘Lily was a brilliant pupil,’ I said. ‘She wanted to be top in everything, and she was!’

      ‘Except good behaviour,’ Lily pointed out with a throaty laugh. This was absolutely true. We had to go to confession every Saturday morning, and she used to spend hours in there. I was convinced she must be making things up, so I remember once telling her that inventing transgressions was, in itself, a mortal sin.

      ‘It’s a bit like wasting police time,’ I explained, ‘so you really shouldn’t fabricate sins.’

      ‘I wasn’t fabricating anything,’ she retorted, rolling her huge brown eyes.

      I’m afraid Lily wasn’t what you’d call popular. She could be very sharp, for example, and the girls feared her razor tongue. When we were sixteen, Sister St Joseph gave us a career talk and she looked at Dinah Shaw, who was terribly dim, and said, ‘Dinah, what are you going to be when you leave St Bede’s?’ And Lily shouted, ‘Twenty-five!’

      But if, as I say, Lily was naughty, it was because of all the appalling snobbery and spite. Venetia Smedley was the worst. She came from the Channel Islands and was known as the Jersey Cow. At breakfast one morning – I’ll never forget it – Venetia announced, in a very loud voice, ‘My parents are off to St Kitts next week. They always stay at the Four Winds in Banana Bay. Isn’t that a coincidence, Lily? Perhaps your mother will be cleaning their room.’ Lily just looked at her, lowered her spoon and said, ‘Yes, Venetia. Perhaps she will.’ But a few months later she exacted a dreadful revenge. Venetia had had bridgework, having fallen off her pony two years before. She was very embarrassed about this and would never let anyone see her cleaning her teeth. Lily made some toffee; it was unbelievably sticky because – I only learned this afterwards – she’d adulterated it with glue. Then she offered some to Venetia, and the look of triumph on Lily’s face when Venetia’s three false teeth came out … ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, Venetia,’ she said sweetly. ‘I forgot that you wore dentures.’ Afterwards, I found her in the grounds, rocking with laughter. And she looked at me gleefully and whispered, ‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. I will repay!’ And she did.

      She’s still calling