The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous by Jilly Cooper Page B

diets), ham, Scotch eggs and a bottle of Moe't.
        He'd just helped himself to most of the ham and the last of Ferdie's whisky when a white envelope thudded through the letter-box. Addressed to him it was marked:
        
    URGENT AND CONFIDENTIAL.
        
        'Dear Hawkley,' read Lysander with a giggle, again it took him several seconds to take in the fact that Ballenstein
        was an old-established firm who prided themselves on their utter discretion. In view of Lysander's recent very unfortunate publicity, the job was no longer open.
        The truth was that Rodney Ballenstein was not only a business friend of Elmer's but also had a new bimbo wife, whom he didn't entirely trust, and an equally glamorous PA on whom he had long-range designs. There was no way Rodney was going to have Lysander lounging round his office causing havoc.
        'Fucking hell!' Lysander screwed up the letter and threw it on the gas logs.
        At that moment the front door opened, there was a frantic scampering of paws and Jack the Jack Russell hurtled in like a bullet, yapping and jumping with all four feet off the ground, to greet his master.
        Jack was followed by Ferdie bringing in the emptied dustbins.
        'Hi,' he said, chucking the Evening Standard on the hall table, 'I was expecting you.'
        Ferdinand Fitzgerald was a fixer, as fly and commercially orientated as Lysander was ingenuous and unmaterialistic. A schoolfriend of Lysander's, he was also an estate agent who, despite the recession, was doing very well. In addition to selling houses, he charged for dinner parties and for friends to stay the night in Fountain Street and let out properties on his firm's books by the afternoon for chums visiting London to bonk in. Ferdie's Achilles' heel was Lysander, whom he adored and had protected both from the bullying and the advances of older boys at school and beyond and whom he let get away with murder.
        Very plump with a double chin and pink cheeks hiding an excellent bone structure, Ferdie looked like a cleanshaven Laughing Cavalier who'd slicked back his hair in an attempt to pass as a Roundhead. Cheerfulness, however, kept breaking in. He and Lysander were known to their friends as Mr Fixit and Mr Fucksit.
        Today as he hung up his long navy-blue coat in the hall, the Roundhead mood predominated, particularlywhen Lysander, who always poured out everything at once, immediately told him he had lost both the Palm Beach and the Ballenstein jobs.
        'Pretty stinking, getting fired before I've even got there,' grumbled Lysander, feeding Scotch eggs to a slavering Jack.
        'You should have signed the contract before you left,' reproved Ferdie. 'It's still on the kitchen table.'
        'There must be some party to go to,' said Lysander, 'I feel very depressed. How am I going to support Jack and the horses?'
        As Ferdie read the Ballenstein letter looking for loopholes, Lysander opened the bottle of champagne from the fridge and threw the cork on to the floor. Ferdie picked it up.
        'You live in a cork-lined room, Lysander. Sadly you lack Proust's application. This house has been tidy since you've been away. Annunciata took two days to muck out your room. No self-respecting pig would have dossed down in it. And you'll have to sleep on the sofa tonight. I've rented it to Matt Gibson and that's his Moet and his Scotch eggs you're feeding to that seriously spoilt dog. Look at the way he's scratched every door. And that is disgusting.' Ferdie removed two strips of ham fat from the gas logs with a shudder. 'How many times do I have to tell you? This is not a real fire.'
        'Don't you want to hear about Palm Beach?'
        'Not particularly. I've read most of it in the Standard. Look, we've got to talk about dosh.'
        'I've just got in.' Lysander was now feeding Jack Toblerone and trying to read Ferdie's Evening Standard, which was a later edition, upside