gestured to their surroundings. “Not that I’m complaining. This is heaven.”
Venetia smirked and Merry’s heart sank. She knew that look. It was the one when her aunt had A Plan.
“I’ve got A Plan,” Venetia said ominously.
Merry shifted uneasily. “I thought you might.”
“Do you watch Who Dares Dances, dear girl?”
Merry shrugged and shook her head. “What is it?”
Venetia tutted. “It’s a television programme.”
“Who Dares Dances? Sounds like something you have to paint your face green and wear camouflage gear for.”
Venetia looked mystified.
Merry waved her glass perilously. “SAS,” she explained somewhat obliquely. “Isn’t their motto, ‘Who Dares Wins’?”
“Very droll, my dear.” Venetia raised her eyebrows in an attempt to humour her great-niece. “It’s actually a sort of dance reality show.”
“Don’t watch much telly.” Merry yawned again. Her only thought was to get into the vast bed in her aunt’s spare room.
“Well, a weekly audience of three million viewers might disagree.”
Merry sat up and only just saved her glass of red from splashing onto the sofa. How many?”
“Three million. A week.” Venetia was satisfied she’d got her niece’s full attention now.
“F - I mean, blimey.”
“Quite. And just what is the capacity at dear Del’s club?”
“Two hundred and fifty – on a full night. About five, if they know it’s me on the bill. Three million though,” Meredith marvelled. “The power of TV, eh? But what’s it got to do with me?”
Venetia adopted an innocent tone. “I happen to know Bob Dandry who produces and directs the show. He rang me yesterday. One of their celebrity dancers has pulled out at the last moment, pregnant apparently.” She paused and then landed the final punch. “I rang him back this morning and suggested you.”
“What do you mean, you’ve suggested me?” Merry stared, slack-jawed, at her aunt.
“You are to report to Fizz TV Studios at ten o’clock on Monday next,” Venetia said, triumphant. “To do the ‘Big Meet,’ as I believe they so quaintly term it, with your dance partner.”
Merry tried to sit up straight, a difficult task on the slippery leather. “Venetia, what the hell have you done?”
“I’ve got you a job, darling. One even your parents won’t mind; they’re huge fans of the show.” Venetia raised her glass and then took a celebratory sip of wine.
Merry slid back down onto the leather. “Wha - what?” One word sank in.
Dance.
She was beginning to wish she hadn’t drunk so much. You needed a clear head to deal with Venetia in full sway. She sat back up again. “Dancing? Venetia I can’t dance!”
“My darling girl, if you ever got your head out from that Oxford scented cloud and into the real world, you’d realise that is precisely the point.”
“I don’t understand.”
Venetia looked down her long nose. “Patently.”
“I suppose it’s too much to expect you to explain?”
“Then I shall attempt to give you a potted history in popular culture,” she said and grinned malevolently. “More wine?”
After rising to pour another glass for each of them, Venetia settled back and launched into an explanation about the phenomenally successful Who Dares Dances, part reality show, part dance competition. She told a befuddled Merry that its last series, however, had been dogged by vote rigging scandals and a race row. How the new series was a much shorter one, a special six week run leading up to the annual comedy charity fundraising event in television, Jokes for Notes. Some contestants were to reappear, including winners of previous competitions. The emphasis, Venetia went on, with this series was to be on the money the show raised for its pet charity, Pennies for Pencils, by the public voting to keep in their favourite dancers.
“So I thought, with you being a comedian, you’d fit right into it all. Luckily, Bob agreed. He owed me a favour after the fiasco that was The Golden Egg.” Venetia referred to a doomed drama she’d been in a few years ago.
“Oh Lord,” Merry said, “This Bob fellow didn’t have a hand in that, did he?”
“He did, indeed,” her aunt replied, through thinned lips. “So, he owes me big time, as you young people say. Of course,” she added with her usual assurance, “I was wonderful in it. Just such a shame the leads were so awful.”
Merry laughed and then stopped short. “So, to get this right then, I’ve got to learn to dance?”
“Yes, but it shouldn’t be so hard; you had ballet lessons at school.”
“Venetia, that was years ago!”
“Oh, it’s better than nothing. And you have natural rhythm, after all. Inherited from me, of course.” Venetia waved Merry’s concerns away.
“Not sure about that,” Merry said gloomily.
“Merry, do you want this job or not?” her aunt asked with asperity. “I had to twist Bob’s arm most severely and the little weasel was very difficult. I think it’s about time you took something a little more seriously.”
“Oh aunty, don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I’m really grateful and so on, but I just simply don’t know if I’m up to it.”
“Merry, I know you and I know that underneath all that cheer and bravado is a mess of insecurity but I really think you can do this. I’m also assuming the thirty five thousand makes a difference?” her aunt added waspishly.
“What do you mean?”
Venetia gave an enormous sigh, “I feel as if I’m dealing with the hard of understanding. It’s your fee, Meredith.”
“You’re joking!”
“I assure you I’m not in the least. In fact, my humour is being stretched rather thinly in this conversation. You should know that I never, ever joke about money.”
“Thirty five thousand pounds!” Merry couldn’t compute being paid such a huge amount of money.
“That would pay off your student loan, I assume?”
“And the rest.”
“Then you’ll do it?”
Merry looked at her aunt and admitted
