‘Mia Farrow has in-laws?’ The woman looked at her with disbelief.
‘She did – but way before she met Woody and adopted all those children, of course.’
‘OK … ’
‘She was still working for MGM at the time and had just married Frank,’ Holly continued, warming to her theme. ‘He took her to Hoboken to meet his mother – his dad was long dead. I mean, how old was Frank when he married her? Like fifty or something … So she ran out and bought a full Jersey ensemble: you know, Jackie O glasses, Gucci bag, pink Chanel suit … She thought it would make a good impression on Mamma-in-law. And do you know what happened?’
The woman was staring, her green eyes shining and her mouth agape with interest. ‘No.’
‘Mama Sinatra started yelling at Frank in Italian to get that transvestite out of her house, he wasn't fooling her.’
‘No… ’ The woman's eyebrows had crawled to her hairline.
‘Because she had just gotten that pixie cut? True story – or so I’ve heard.’
‘Wow, that was great!’ The woman picked up the bag with delight, and asked Holly to wrap it up for her. ‘I’m Alexandra by the way,’ she told her. ‘Alexandra Konecki.’
‘Holly. Nice to meet you Alexandra – and I hope your mother-in-law loves the bag.’
When the customer had left, Holly smiled, wondering how her mind managed to save all these stories she’d come across years ago, and then have her pop them out at will just like that. She just had one of those brains, she supposed.
Shortly after her most recent customer had departed, the doorbell chimed once again and Mona Sachs appeared.
‘So what the hell happened to my Halston?’ the stylist asked without preamble, and to her horror Holly realised she’d never sent over the garment as per Mona’s request from the other day. While her mind was great at storing useless information, clearly her attention to detail wasn’t up to the same level.
‘Oh Mona, I’m so sorry, things have been crazy! I have it ready out back and everything, it just completely slipped my mind … ’
She waved an arm. ‘It happens, don’t worry about it. My society queen just had to make do with Versace. Poor dear,’ she added sardonically.
Society queen…
Holly paused, thinking of something.
‘I’ll make it up to you, I promise. But Mona,’ she asked, ‘have you ever heard of a woman called Margot Mead?’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘Sweetie, that’s like asking me if I ever heard of Rudy Giuliani. Of course; Margot Mead is royalty amongst the Upper East Side set.’
Holly’s expression brightened. ‘Do you happen to know her personally?’
‘Are you kidding me? Nobody knows these women personally, not even their own damn husbands. I’ve come across her assistant a couple of times, though. Jessica, nice girl.’
Holly’s eyes widened. An assistant … She cleared her throat, deciding she should share the information about the bracelet with Mona. She didn’t know why she hadn’t thought about it before. It might even belong to one of her clients, although this was doubtful given that the box it was found in had been delivered directly to the store. And, as it was, Mona typically bought from them, and had never used them to sell anything.
When she’d finished outlining the details, as well as Samuel from Tiffany’s suggestion that Margot Mead might be the one to help identify the egg charm, Mona nodded slowly.
‘There’s a very good chance she would know who something like that belongs to – hell, it might even belong to Margot herself.’ The thought had crossed Holly’s mind too, but because she had no way of getting in touch with Margot, she thought she needed to explore avenues related to the other charms first.
However, it seemed Mona might well be able to short-circuit the search. She scrolled through her trusty BlackBerry. ‘Here you go,’ she said, finding the details for Jessica, the assistant she’d mentioned before. ‘Give her a call. I’m sure she’ll be able to help.’
Holly couldn’t believe her luck. ‘That’s fantastic, Mona, thank you. I so appreciate it.’
‘Don’t mention it. But if you still happen to have that Halston lying around, I have another use for it … ’
‘Oh of course.’ Holly duly retrieved the shirt and wrapped it up.
She was still buzzing with anticipation when, after Mona left, she quickly picked up the phone and dialled Jessica Edwards’ number. That buzz was soon deflated when she got voicemail.
She left a garbled message about how she urgently needed to get in touch with Margot Mead, with a mention that Tiffany’s had suggested Margot might be able to help with a query – figuring that the mention of the store might be enough to pique the assistant’s interest enough to return her call.
