but could not see it on any of the tables or bookcases or even the floor. She was just investigating the mantelpiece when Richard appeared in the doorway, wearing one sock and shoe. He was carrying the other shoe.
‘No sock. No phone. Why aren’t you looking? Why are you staring in the mirror? This is important.’
Bella was beginning to feel she’d had enough of this. ‘I’m looking along the mantelpiece for your phone,’ she said frostily.
‘Why would I put it on the blasted mantelpiece? It’ll be in my jacket pocket.’
He held out an imperious hand for the article of clothing.
Bella was outraged. ‘Call me Jeeves, why don’t you?’ she snapped, handing it over.
He held the jacket up on one finger and went through the pockets without success. ‘Damn! What did you do with it? Did you turn it upside down?’
‘Oh, sure, I shook it out of the window.’
He yelled, ‘Will you stop being a facetious idiot and help me look?’
They glared at each other.
Then he turned away. ‘Oh, it’s hopeless. Do whatever you want.’
He started moving stuff around the crowded sitting room in a haphazard way but with increasing desperation.
In spite of her mounting indignation, Bella could see there was a problem.
‘It might have fallen out of the pocket, I suppose.’
‘That’s what I said …’
She cast his shirt aside and dived over the back of the sofa like a pearl fisher heading into the deeps. She lay flat on the floor and started to wriggle her arm under the sofa, groping about for alien objects. In quick succession she found a lipstick, a small plastic bottle of mineral water, half-empty, and a paperback. She lobbed all of them over the top of the sofa.
‘What are you doing?’ he said impatiently. ‘Your housekeeping can wait. I need—’
‘Hang on.’
Her fingers had encountered the edge of something small, flat and hard. It was just out of reach. Concentrating, Bella closing her eyes and stretched the very furthest she could manage. ‘Ow-ow-ow …’ She felt the sofa move under the pressure and grabbed. ‘Got it!’
She rolled on to her back, clutching the phone to her, and looked up, only to find Richard standing at her feet, looking anything but grateful.
‘Why didn’t you ask me to move the sofa?’
She ignored that. ‘Look, here it is.’
She scrambled up, flushed with triumph. The little phone had not gathered as much fluff and crumbs as the paperback but it was grimy. Richard took it from her. He shook out the jacket and draped it carefully over the back of an upright chair. Then he produced a pristine handkerchief from the pocket of his dress trousers and wiped the screen.
‘Thank you,’ she prompted.
But he was already calling someone. ‘Davis? A car. Soon as possible. No, not Battersea. Let’s think. Outside Mozart’s House on Ebury Street. Do you know that? Call me when you’re five minutes away.’ He shut it off. ‘Shirt.’ And held out his hand.
Quite suddenly Bella’s temper broke free. She put her hands on her hips.
‘Oh, yes. Very Royal.’
That startled him. ‘What?’
She clicked her fingers. ‘Jacket! Shirt! Phone! Car! Now!’ The last word came out as a shout.
‘And your point is?
‘Real people say thank you. Please, even. Real people don’t bark out orders like a dalek.’
‘I’m sorry. Thank you.’ But it didn’t sound as if he meant it.
She shouted, ‘Don’t think you can snap your fingers at me, sunshine. I’m not paid to take your crap.’
He stiffened. ‘What do you mean by that?’ Icicles hung from every syllable.
‘There are two of us late here,’ Bella hissed. ‘But does that matter to you? No, of course not. My first duty is to help Your Royalness get dressed and then go scrambling around under sooty sofas after your phone …’
‘You do not understand.’ Every word came out like machine-gun fire. ‘You have no idea what my life is like.’
‘Not sure that I want to.’ And she clicked her fingers mockingly. ‘Do this! Do that! Jump! Jump! Jump!’
His face went a dull red. ‘I have no choice,’ he yelled. ‘I am who I am. I do what I have to do. That means I am never late. Never. Can you understand that? People look up to me and I have to be there. I have to.’
‘Fine. Then stop shouting at me and go.’
He gave her a look full of fury and seized up his jacket without a word.
‘And don’t come back,’ Bella shouted.
She stamped off to the bedroom. She dragged clean clothes out of the closet, muttering to herself, and