Then I can’t help myself.
‘Simon, if I ask you a straight question, will you give me a straight answer?’
‘’Course I will. You know that.’
‘And I want the truth from you now, and none of your spin.’
‘Truth and nothing but,’ he says, the eyes boring into me.
‘You seem so calm and reassured and that’s brilliant, but, well … just how worried are you at this point in time? Because you must be, just a bit. I mean, deep down.’
Desperately need him to say, ‘Worried? Me? Not a bit of it! In fact, I’m so supremely confident she’ll walk through the door this evening, that I’m fully intending to start packing ski gear and snow boots for our holliers tomorrow, the very minute I get back from the restaurant.’
But instead, he goes quiet. Worryingly quiet.
Which is wrong, all wrong! I’m the one having a wobbly here; he’s meant to be rock of sense that talks me in off the ledge!
‘At this point in time?’ he eventually says, ‘I’d give it a four out of ten. If I ever make it all the way up to ten, then I’ll really start panicking.’
Have to bite my tongue clambering into his car. It was a trick question! He was supposed to say zero out of ten!
Cosmic shift in that moment. And I’ve now officially gone from absorbing his calm aura, into hand-me-a-Xanax territory.
2.25 p.m.
Stephano Sacetti turns out to be short, round and welcoming. Kisses us both on both cheeks, Mediterranean style, and waves us into his private office on the top floor. He’s actually a v. charming man, twinkly-eyed and sallow skinned, with an expensive-looking silk suit and the faint whiff of cigar smoke off him.
Says all the right things, all the stuff I needed to hear: that we’re not to worry, that Kitty is a v. responsible person. (Eyes went slightly goggly at that. Kitty’s many wonderful things but responsible is most definitely not one of them. But then given that this is her boss-man, I figure she must have put on one hell of an act in front of the guy.)
Anyway, soon as we arrived, he immediately printed us off a long, long list of all the staff, waiters, bar staff, delivery men, kitchen staff, right down to Polish guys that scrub down the loos, who were all around during that same last shift as Kitty. Way more than I’d ever have thought, but then you must need a small army of staff to run an ever-growing empire like this. Plus, as he tells us, it was the night before Christmas Eve, the place was packed out; it was a case of all hands on deck.
Jeez, scanning through it, the list runs to almost two full pages, literally dozens of names and their contact numbers. He’s even thrown in the contact details of diners who’d booked in that night and who’d left their phone numbers when making reservations. Everything we need and absolutely no stone unturned, in other words.
On the way out, we do a quick scan on each level of the restaurant, just in case there’s someone working that either of us might recognise. Place is surprisingly busy; there’s a whole clatter of young girls in Ugg boots with gel nails and too much false tan, all chattering excitedly over coffee and buns in the Food Hall Café about their Christmas sales bargains. Meanwhile the entire restaurant level is bustling with families having a post-Christmas lunch/hangover cure, or else diners who just couldn’t have been arsed cooking another big meal two days running. Simon just strides through every level confidently, me racing after him to keep up.
Only see one person we can ask though, a young part-timer who works down in the Food Hall. Francesca Sacetti is a cousin of Stephano, but then approx. fifty per cent of the staff in here all seem to be cousins of Stephano. (If you ask me, the Sacetti family are a bit like the Corleones, only legit.) We head over to where she’s busy restacking tins of olives on the shelves and ask if she’s seen Kitty at all.
No, she blinks innocently back at us. Says she’s been in Palermo for past two weeks. First day back at work today.
Should have guessed by her shagging suntan. Then she asks, wide-eyed, ‘Why, what’s the matter? Is something up with her? Is Kitty OK?’
Not off to a v. good start.
4.05 p.m.
Back at Kitty’s, stuck on our phones, the pair of us. Bit like a telesales conference in here. Lists covered in biro marks surround us, scattered all over the floor. My ears physically sore and raw red from being on the phone for the past few hours. At this stage, we’ve a system of sorts going. We’ve both crossed out the names of people we actually got to speak to but who were no help to us, then made dirty big red marks beside the names of anyone who didn’t actually answer their phone, but who we’ve left messages for, practically begging them to call us back urgently.
Net result to date? Sweet feck all.
8.20 p.m.
Still here, with my voice nearly hoarse by now from talking on phone.
On the plus side, between the pair of us we’ve at least managed to make some kind of headway and now have a good long list of people we’ve left messages for and who are to get back to us; people who might just be able to shed a bit of light on the whole thing. On the minus side, though, in spite of everyone we did actually manage to speak to, we’ve got absolutely nowhere. In cop-show-speak, no leads to talk of. No one’s seen or heard a whisper from Kitty in days, and no one’s spoken to her on the phone either. No texts even to say Happy Christmas, nothing.
As if she’s just vanished into thin air.
9.05 p.m.
Eventually, Simon slumps forward, holding his head in his hands and looking about as shattered as I feel. He has to be feeling the uselessness and futility of this, I just know. Know it without being told.
‘Listen, I’ve an idea,’ I tell him tentatively, not wanting to panic the guy, but at the same time, anxious to do more than keep on cold calling a bunch of total strangers late on Stephen’s night, when everyone we talk to would far rather be stuffing their faces with Cadbury’s Selection Boxes, while watching Mamma Mia!
He looks over to me, red-eyed with tiredness by now.
‘Don’t freak out on me,’ I say, ‘but I really think it’s time to start checking around hospitals. Just in case … Well, you know. She might have been at some party and maybe something happened to her on the way home? And say she was taken to a hospital somewhere and no one has a clue who she is?’
He looks worriedly into space for a second, then nods his head.
‘I’m only praying you’re wrong,’ he says, jaw clamped tightly, ‘but it’s certainly worth a shot.’
Sick with nerves now, I get back onto the phone, go online, look up the number for Vincent’s Hospital and dial.
9.20 p.m.
Bloody waste of time! Hospitals turn out to be a total dead end. Didn’t take me long to ring every single one with an A&E unit in the greater Dublin area as there’s not that many. And once I navigated my way past ‘Are-you-next-of kin?’ type questions and explained the situation, I pretty much got the same response from all of them.
V. sorry for my trouble, but it’s impossible to give that information over the phone. Have I tried contacting the police, is all I’m asked, over and over.
Right then. Nothing for it but to call into each and every hospital we can think of, first light tomorrow, as they say in search-and-rescue TV shows. Better than sitting round here ringing a total bunch of strangers who know absolutely nothing, feeling useless and with all confidence fast draining from me.
Anything’s better than that.
9.35 p.m.
Agree we need to call it a night. As