Your friend Sally
‘I don’t believe it.’
Estella grabbed the letter out of her hand and scanned it.
‘Who on earth is Gianni?’
‘An Italian count.’
Estella looked momentarily impressed.
‘My goodness, Don is going to be furious,’ she muttered. ‘I’m going to have to tell him.’
Georgia watched her mother speak to Don, who was turning more and more purple. After a few minutes he stormed over and demanded that Georgia tell him everything she knew about Gianni.
‘Honestly, Mr Daly, I don’t know a thing. I met him once for just a few seconds.’
‘You don’t even know his surname? How can the police help us if we haven’t got his surname? A port alert. That’s what we need. A port alert,’ and he was gone, flying out of the boathouse into his waiting Rolls-Royce.
Georgia stood on the path in a glow of a thousand fairy lights and felt a wave of concern for her friend.
She supposed Sally would be all right, but really, they didn’t know Gianni from Adam, and just because he had the right breeding didn’t mean to say he was the right sort. After all, Sally’s previous track record with men proved she was not a particularly decent judge of character.
She frowned, thinking about something Christopher Carlyle had said when they had first met, and went back into the boathouse.
She tapped Edward on the shoulder, and he spun round, looking pleased to see her.
‘Where’s your brother?’
‘Talking to whichever pretty girl will listen to him,’ he smiled, his grey eyes twinkling.
They found him at the makeshift bar, chatting to Clarissa.
‘Christopher. You said you’d met an Italian count here tonight. Which one is he?’
Christopher rubbed his chin and looked around.
‘Dark hair. Dinner jacket.’
‘That could describe anyone here,’ said Edward.
‘He had a red carnation in his buttonhole. There can’t be many of those,’ Christopher said weakly.
‘Help me look,’ said Georgia, quickly explaining about Sally’s letter.
‘She’s run off with her boyfriend?’ said Edward, incredulous.
‘It looks like it.’
‘Okay. You go that way, I’ll take the other side.’
There was no sign of the count inside the boathouse, so she went outside, praying that he had not yet left. A few couples were holding hands and watching the Thames shimmer like
Indian ink, but none of the men had a red carnation in his lapel. She moved to the side of the building – a tangle of trees and bushes. She knew from the party in Oxfordshire that this was the perfect clandestine spot for young lovers. If he was not here, then her only lead to Sally’s Gianni was gone.
She heard a rustle, and then a soft sound like a moan.
She pushed back the undergrowth and saw two people ahead of her, close together, almost touching. Her eyes searched for a red carnation, and then a beam of moonlight caught them and she realised that it was André and Frederick.