Geek Tragedy Read Online Free PDF Page B

front of Vanity. The girl then pulled a number of photos from a folder and fanned them out on the table. Vanity pulled her sunglasses down her nose and turned her bottle-green eyes towards Mervyn.
    ‘Mervyn darling, what a lovely surprise. How are you?’ She grabbed his knee with surprising force.
    Close up, Vanity was impressive. She had a striking, chiselled face, well preserved by alcohol and botox. A face which had only recently begun to curl at the edges. In ten years’ time it would probably implode, the wrinkles would mesh together to form the gnarled look that was the trademark of oak trees and the long-term chain-smoker, but for the moment she was an impressively attractive woman.
    Vanity didn’t bother to introduce the girl, who had meekly taken a seat and was lurking somewhere to her right. Presumably she was a personal assistant and general dogsbody.
    The actress pulled a cigarette out of the packet, slotted it in her mouth and ignited it with a huge gold lighter ( did anyone ever have the courage to tell her the hotel was non-smoking? he wondered). Her face almost turned inside-out with pleasure as she took a grateful drag.
    ‘Ready for another hour of legalised slave labour under the lash of Mr Josh?’ she drawled. ‘Greasy little bastard wants a pound of my flesh. I should have sent him the off-cuts from my last surgery.’
    ‘I noticed you weren’t happy with him,’ said Mervyn.
    ‘You could say that, darling. All settled now. Tripled my fee and got a better room so I don’t have to choke on the great unwashed’s BO. I showed that pubic-headed prick who’s boss, thanks to my book. If the pen’s mightier than the sword, I’ve given him a good hard jab in the arse with my biro.’
    Mervyn was curious. ‘Good autobiography is it?’
    ‘Of course it is, darling. It’s all about me.’
    ‘Am I in it?’
    ‘Darling! How could you not be in it?’ And she winked slyly.
    He looked down. Nope, they were still there. He could have sworn her eyes had just scorched the buttons off his shirt.
    ‘So how does your book tame Simon Josh?’
    ‘Read it and find out, darling. It’s very reasonably priced on Amazon. Apparently they’ve taken 40% off me—just like my second husband. Bastard. Anyway, time to open shop. The barbarians are massing at the gates.’ She gestured towards the doorway. Through it, Mervyn could see that her entrance had been noted and the ordered queue was swelling into a sizeable crowd.
    ‘Looks like you’re going to have your work cut out getting through that lot,’ he said.
    She sighed. ‘Yes. One does yearn for a shorter name, Sue Bloggs or something chavvy like that. Writing “Vanity Mycroft” a thousand times in a row does make the fingers ache somewhat.’
    ‘Worth it though. It’s a great name. Unusual too.’
    ‘Thank you darling. And it’s my real one, you know. Not a stage name. If you read my autobiography you’ll find that out…’
    ‘I’ll make it a top priority.’
    ‘…But I’ll tell you anyway, darling. It’s all down to a quaint family tradition we Mycrofts have, of naming our children where they were conceived.’
    ‘I’ve never heard of a village called Vanity.’
    ‘Not quite, dear. I was spawned during a desperate fumble in a Cardiff dressing room. My mother was playing Becky Sharp in an ill-advised tour of plays adapted from classic English novels. This one was Vanity Fair —hence my name. Vanity Mycroft.’ She took another drag. ‘Should count my lucky stars they weren’t doing Fanny Hill .’
    Mervyn looked again at the queue. All eyes were focused in her direction. ‘I don’t envy you, the amount of “Vanity Mycroft”s you’re going to have to write today.’
    ‘Oh don’t worry about me, Mervy…’ She gave him a smouldering look. ‘…As well you know, I happen to have very supple wrists…’
    She swung round and took a photo from the simpering girl who had scurried in front of her, lucky enough to be at the head of the