Page 72 of The Island of Lost Girls

A waiter comes, takes orders. Gemma sinks into a delicious cushion at the end of a long wooden bench overhung by a cloud of sweet-scented jasmine. Tatiana sits to her left, head of the table, and a man, in maybe his forties (she’s so bad at old people’s ages), hair cropped short to disguise the thinning and a Rolex on his wrist, to her right.

‘Jeremy,’ says Tatiana, and he shakes Gemma’s hand and smiles at her as though she’s a small plate of caviar.

‘Well, hello,’ he says.

More people join. Mostly men. Oleg, Dmitri, Christophe. An ethereal beauty called Hélène who looks as though she might snap if you twisted her. Someone puts a drink in her hand. A cold, chunky glass that feels as though it was made with only her hand in mind. The drink, gelid with crushed ice, is sharp with limes, sweet with brown sugar. It is delicious.

‘Are you liking that?’ The man called Jeremy eyes her glass and seems amused.

‘It’s lush,’ she says. Lush is her latest word. She likes it. It rolls off the tongue and feels pleasingly retro.

‘Caipirinha,’ he tells her. Then breaks the word down syllable by syllable. Kai-pee-reen-ya. ‘They drink them in Brazil,’ he says. ‘It’s their national drink.’

‘Have you been?’ she asks.

‘To Brazil? Many times,’ he replies. ‘I do quite a lot of business in Rio.’

Rio. The very name sounds like beaches. ‘I’d love to go to Rio,’ she says.

‘Play your cards right and it might happen,’ he says, and gives her a smile that makes her feel a bit puzzled and a bit uncomfortable.

‘Gemma’s only just come on to our books, Jeremy,’ says Tatiana. ‘Julia found her on Bond Street just last week.’

‘Oh,’ he says, and this clearly means something, for the arm that had been snaking along the bench behind her drops to his side and he sits up straighter. ‘So you want to be a model?’ he asks her, and his tone is kinder, less familiar.

‘I hope so,’ says Gemma. She finishes her lovely drink, and as if by magic another appears by her hand and the old glass is whisked away. ‘But really,’ she confides, because the drink is making her feel like confiding, ‘I’d like to be an actress, eventually.’

‘An actress?’ he says, and he seems amused again. She doesn’t really get why. She’s not trying to be funny. ‘Well, you must meet Maurice. He’s a producer.’

One of the men looming over Sara twists and looks at her over a fleshy shoulder.

‘That I am,’ he says. ‘And who have we here, then?’

‘This is Gemma, darling,’ says Julia. ‘She just signed with us a couple of days ago. We’re still showing her the ropes.’

Gemma smiles. Encouragingly, she hopes. Maurice is the first film producer she’s ever met. She hopes he survives the heart attack his purple face and fat cigar suggest he’s overdue. It would be a travesty if she made a contact this easily only for him to die on her.

Maurice’s pupils shoot wide as she smiles. ‘New, eh?’ he says. ‘And how old are you, then?’

‘Sixteen,’ Tatiana answers for her.

‘Well, you be sure to come and say hello when you’ve got a bit more experience,’ he tells her.

The caipirinhas have emboldened her. ‘I will,’ she says. ‘But how can I get experience if I don’t get any work?’

The age-old question, asked by every generation. It doesn’t seem an unreasonable one to her, but for some reason all the men burst out laughing. Unsure how she’s meant to respond, Gemma laughs along.

‘That’s the spirit!’ Maurice says, mysteriously, and turns away.

Another girl arrives, escorted by a man whose hair is so heavily gelled it looks like a plastic shower cap. Sara moves to the far end of the table and the gelled man goes and sits next to her. The new girl slips in between Gemma and Jeremy.

She’s exquisite. Shiny hair tumbling over her shoulders, golden eyes the shape of perfect almonds, their colour emphasised by shiny lines of sapphire and metallic gold. And she smells gorgeous, too: a lovely clean mix of citrus and mint and some faint long-forgotten garden flower that combines headily with the jasmine above their heads.

Someone pours her a glass of champagne. She turns to Gemma, assesses her. Not in a bitchy way. Neutral but friendly.

‘I like your hair,’ she says.

‘Thanks,’ says Gemma. ‘My nan’s from Barbados. I’ve always wanted hair like yours, though.’ The girl’s hair is enviable. So straight and sleek. Just a subtle curl at the end, like a mermaid’s.