“And now, to present the award, I’d like to welcome TV personality, former chairman of Pergamon Press, and—a little bird tells me—nascent NOVELIST! Daniel Cleaver!”
Gaaaaaaaah!
“What’s he doing
here?” said Tom. “I thought he was in Transylvania with Princess Disney of Bimboland.”
—
“Ladies and Gentlemen, Archer Biro,” Daniel began, looking toned and glowing, like a successful politician who’s just had a facial. “It is a tremendously arousing honour to be standing amongst such an array of radiant lady finalists: almost like wandering into the Alternative Miss World Competition.”
I flinched on his behalf, waiting for roars of outrage, but instead there was a ripple of amusement.
“Oh, isn’t he a hoot,” said Pat Barker, turning and wrinkling her nose amusedly.
“I’m actually just waiting for the swimwear segment,” Daniel continued.
There were roars of laughter.
“Obviously, it has taken me rather longer to learn to pronounce our esteemed finalists’ names than to read their actual works of rare genius. The result, which I hold in this gilded Ryman’s envelope, was, apparently, an extremely close shave—something, of course, never to be undertaken by the ladies assembled before me.”
The strong, female literary voices were now beside themselves with mirth.
“And now, with trembling hands, and with thanks to Trinity College, Cambridge, for a perfunctory grounding in Proto-Indo European, I pronounce the winner to be…”
He opened the envelope with a huge amount of fuss, “Yes, it’s like trying to extract a condom from its packaging, and actually— Oh! My darlings! My dearest readers and finalists! It’s a draw!—between Omaguli Qulawe for The Sound of Timeless Tears and Angela Binks for The Soundless Tears of Time.”
—
As soon as the speeches were over, Daniel was swamped by a sea of gorgeous young publicists and I dived off to the Ladies’ to recover my composure.
“Don’t even start with that line of thought,” said Tom, as I excused myself from the table. “Give it a few more years and all the power is with the women. Fuckwittage becomes a luxury you can’t afford when your hair’s falling out and your stomach’s hanging over your waistband.”
Had total meltdown in the Ladies’, thinking that I looked a hundred years old, and started plastering myself with makeup, at which Tom put his head round the door and said, “Stop right there, darling, or you’ll come out looking like Barbara Cartland.” Eventually I emerged from the Ladies’ into the hall and came face-to-face with Daniel.
“Jones, you gorgeous creature,” he cried, delighted. “You look younger and more attractive than when I last saw you five years ago. No, seriously, Jones, I don’t know whether to marry you or adopt you.”
“Daniel!” said Julian Barnes, approaching with his thin-lipped smile.
“Julian! Have you met my young niece, Bridget Jones?”
—
9 p.m. In loos again, touching up own youthful beauty with more blusher. Blurry good party. Thing about Daniel is he’s really is very charming and I really don’t feel old anymore.
Which was, in a way, what I think the entire Archer-Biro Prize was saying one ought not to allow oneself to feel because of a man.
“Go for it, girl,” said Tom, handing me a drink as I emerged from the loos again. “Get back on that horse.”
—
10 p.m. Daniel and I were stumbling, wine-filled, in the flow of drunken attendees pouring out of the venue.
“So what happened to the princess?” I said.
“Oh, over, over. Shame, really. I think I would ultimately have made rather an effective king: cruel, but beloved.”
“Oh dear. What went wrong?”