The Favours and Fortunes of Katie Castle
Fabulously funny, sharp and totally unputdownable first novel from a great new talent‘My name is Katie Castle, and this is the story of how I had everything, lost it all, and then found it again, but not quite all of it, and not in the same form, and, if I’m perfectly frank (which, I have to confess, doesn’t come naturally) not nearly so good.’Katie’s adventures in the world of London fashion, from the giddy heights to which she’s already schemed, via the warehouses of the East End, the glamour of Paris and the abrupt descent to the polyester nadir of Willesden, mark an exceptional debut on the fiction scene.
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A Paperback Original 2002
Copyright © Rebecca Campbell 2002
Rebecca Campbell asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007117895
Ebook Edition © JANUARY 2014 ISBN: 9780007571581
Version: 2016-08-03
Contents
Part One: the razing of katie castle
chapter two: in matching knickerbockers
chapter three: cavafy, angel, and the loading bay of doom
chapter four: a technical interlude, concerning
chapter Five: visceral couture
chapter six: how can i deny, she’s mine, i’m hers?
chapter seven: the deed of darkness
chapter eight: a short chapter, punctuated by a colon
chapter ten: in which katie doesn’t cry
chapter eleven: the house of mirth
chapter twelve: the second time as farce
chapter thirteen: katie looks back in languor
Part Two: the three metamorphoses of the spirit
chapter fourteen: katie’s dead-dog bounce
chapter sixteen: katie goes native
chapter seventeen: tea with the ayyubs, a gaudy bullfinch, and other festivities
chapter eighteen: strange meetings
chapter nineteen: a winged victory
At five past six, every day, the same question:
‘Katie, what have you done?’
For some people that might have been a question filled with foreboding. You know, what have you done with your life; or look what you’ve screwed up now. But from me, at this time, it always got the same answer, a smart answer:
‘Made coffee, chatted to the girls, tried (and failed) to make the printer print, had my nails done next door at the NY Nail Bar, went for a latte at Gino’s (flashed my second best smile at the divine boy, Dante, but I wouldn’t tell Penny that), chatted some more to the girls, thought about the collection, phoned the factory (why can’t they learn to speak English?), got a sandwich from Cranks, puked it up in the bog, had a spat with the French, sent reminders to Harvey Nicks and the new shop in Harrogate. Just the usual.’
And Penny, breathing exasperation into the phone, always came back with, ‘You know exactly what I mean. What did you do?’
And so I’d give up. ‘Three and a half.’
‘Not bad for a Tuesday.’
‘Bloody good for a Tuesday. But today’s Wednesday.’
‘Well, not bad for a Wednesday either. What did you say you did?’
‘Three and a half.’
‘And what about Beeching Place?’
‘Just one and a half.’
‘Oh. Still, that’s … six thousand for the two shops.’
‘Five.’
‘You know I’m no good at fractions. What did you say you did?’
The miracle is that I managed to stay sane for so long.
I suppose when I first went to work for Penny she was pretty good. After all, she’d built Penny Moss up from not much more than a market stall into a perfectly respectable business, a business that people had almost heard of, even if they sometimes got us mixed up with Ronit Zilkha, or Caroline Charles or, heaven forfend, Paul Costelloe. Two shops and a wholesale side that had taken off, and was cruising at a comfortable altitude. People had worn our clothes on daytime telly. Penny, conspicuously without Hugh had been in Hello!. Well, okay, OK!. But, as Penny pointed out to anyone who’d listen, it’s got a bigger circulation anyway. A cabinet minister wore one of our suits at the party conference (a coffee tussah silk affair, like a funked-up Chanel) and, for the first time, looked more feminine than her male colleagues. Professional women who want to look chic and chic women who want to look professional wear our clothes. The next time you’re at a wedding look around you. There, amongst the neuralgic pink and monkey-puke yellow, you’ll see our clothes: subtle, perfectly tailored, elegant.
Where were we? Yes, just as we were beginning to make some real money, Penny started to get battier. She’d always had tendencies. Odd flights of fancy, a fondness for viscose. But now she was forgetting things. Losing things. The usual signposts in the foothills of senility. If I sound callous it’s because she’s not
