More Than You Know by Penny Vincenzi Read Free Book Online

hoped they could see he had the other commodity.
    “My mum used to box my ears if I was cheeky.”
    “Good for your mum,” said Mr. Barlow.
    Matt got the job and felt immediately as if he had come home. This was a world he was completely comfortable in; he seemed to understand the way it worked in the most fundamental way. Wherever you looked there were new buildings going up, or old ones being refurbished.
    There were the big boys, of course: Jack Cotton, Charles Clore, Joe Levy, and Matt’s personal hero and role model, Harry Hyams, who’d made twenty-seven million by the time he was thirty-nine. That’s what Matt was going to do, possibly rounding it up to thirty million. It wasn’t a dream or even a hope; it was what he planned with a hard-edged certainty: he was going to build and own properties and fill them with the thousands of new companies that were also being spawned by the booming economy.
    “It’s a bit like a blind date,” said Mr. Stein when he was explaining the business to Matt. “There they both are, girl and boy, building and tenant, both perfect for each other, not knowing the other exists, needing an introduction. That’s where we come in. You don’t have to be a genius, Matthew, just a bit sharp. You’ll soon learn.”
    Matt didn’t have to learn sharpness; it was in his bones. Withinweeks Mr. Stein was leaving him to show clients round premises on his own.
    He didn’t realise until much later how fortunate he had been in Mr. Stein: how excellent was his grounding, how profound was his advice.
    “Two things count in this business, son,” he said over a pint of warm beer one evening. “One is that you have to be a gentleman. Your word is your bond. You can’t let someone think they’ve got an office and then a week later tell them they haven’t, just because someone’s come in with a higher offer. This is a small world, Matthew, and people have to trust you. And you’ve got to be able to get along with people, mix with all sorts. All gossip, this business, especially at the higher level.”
    There was one thing that Mr. Stein didn’t mention and that Matt had no need to learn either, and that was the importance of hard work. He decided regretfully that he couldn’t go down to the coast with Paul Dickens.
    He set out for the city as soon as the offices closed that Friday evening, reckoning it’d be better to get that side over so that he could be in the West End on Saturday; he’d delivered about fifty letters when he heard someone calling him.
    “Matt! Over here, Matt, it’s me, Charles Clark.”
    And there he was on the other side of Lombard Street, waving at him. He’d never have recognized him, Matt thought; he looked exactly like all the other toffs round here: rolled umbrella, bowler hat, pinstriped suit. But he seemed genuinely pleased to see Matt, grinning and waving him over.
    “It’s jolly good to see you, old chap,” said Charles, slapping him round the shoulders. “What are you doing here? Got time for a pint?”
    Matt said he thought so and followed him into the King’s Head on Lombard Street.

    “Remember Matt Shaw?” said Charles to Eliza next day. “He was in the army doing basic training with me.”
    They were having a drink in the Markham in the King’s Road—the newly dressed King’s Road, filled with pretty young people, glamourous cars, and the clothes boutiques that were replacing the old food shops, all following their leader, Mary Quant, who had opened Bazaar,the very first of them, as early as 1955. No one would believe it had been there that long, Lindy had told Eliza. “It seems so absolutely brand-new, but it’s just one more proof of Mary’s genius.”
    “Yes, course I remember Matt Shaw,” Eliza said. “He was quite tasty, as I recall.”
    “I ran into him in the city. He had quite a sharp suit on, filled out a bit, his hair’s longer. It was really good to see him. He’s working for an estate agent. Commercial variety. He’s