Miracle on Regent Street (52 page)

‘I’m sorry,’ I sniff. ‘It’s just that
you’re
wrong.’ I look up at them all. ‘There aren’t going to be any more makeovers because
there isn’t going to be any more Hardy’s. I found out today that Rumors have bought us out. All our efforts have been wasted. It’s over. I’m just sorry that I dragged you
all into my stupid plan. I should have known it would never have worked. I’m so sorry.’

There is silence for a moment as we all sit staring at the table whilst the festive crowds in the pub chat and laugh. It feels like we’re stuck motionless on the ground whilst the rest of
the world whips madly on a merry-go-round before us.

Felix speaks first. ‘You have nothing to be sorry for, Evie.’ He clears his throat and holds his fist up to his mouth, and I see that he is emotional himself. ‘I’ve had
the happiest two weeks working with you all. Doing this has brought me to life again. I just wish that it could have done the same for the store. But no one else had the courage to try, and so you
should be proud, Evie, not sorry. We may not have our jobs any more, but I for one feel I have made some wonderful lifelong friends. And that’s been worth any amount of hard work.’

‘Hear hear!’ claps Lily, dabbing her eyes with her Chanel-monogrammed scarf. ‘As some Frenchman once said: “There are some defeats more triumphant than victories.”
We did our best for Hardy’s, and whilst we didn’t manage to save the old place, what we did was make a difference to a lot of people. You have to remember that, Evie darling.’

Just then the pub door swings open and a gush of cold air blasts in as a familiar figure appears, holding a bundle of newspapers.

‘Sam?’ I say, standing up as he approaches our table quickly. He’s clearly been running: his face is flushed and there are little beads of sweat on his forehead. He pulls off
his hat and rubs his head.

‘Sorry I’m late,’ he grins round the table at us all, and I’m sure I see Velna swoon.

‘What are you doing here?’ I ask. ‘I thought you couldn’t make it tonight?’

‘I rearranged th . . . things, didn’t want to hah miss a me . . . meeting,’ he pants. ‘Besides, I couldn’t wait to show you guys this!’ He thumps down a pile
of
Evening Standards
on the table and everyone grapples for a copy, their hands obscuring the front cover. I finally manage to grab one and have to steady myself by holding on to the table
when I read the front page.

‘We made the front page?’ I gasp, looking up at Sam with utter disbelief.

‘We sure did!’ Sam says proudly, his brown eyes shining. ‘Our story is the spoiler on every newspaper sandwich board across the city!’ I put my hand to my mouth as I have
a flashback to Brian yelling at me as he put out his sandwich board this afternoon. He didn’t just want a chat, he was obviously trying to tell me Hardy’s had made the news.

‘CAN SECRET SANTAS SAVE THIS DEPARTMENT STORE?’ yells the
Standard
’s headline, and there’s another of Sam’s photos underneath followed by an in-depth article
about the gradual reinvention of Hardy’s. I can hardly believe it. But my surprise and delight is dulled by my knowledge of what went on today. If only this had happened a few days ago.

‘That’s great,’ I say, the initial excitement draining from my body as I think about how close we may have come. It makes it all the harder to accept that our fight is
over.

Everyone else nods at Sam and then glumly puts their papers back on the table and picks up their drinks.

‘Hey? What’s up?’ Sam says, looking around at our faces. ‘Don’t you see what this sort of coverage means? Customers! More than Hardy’s can probably handle!
And that’s not the only good news . . .’ He waits for our reaction. But there’s nothing. We sip our drinks uncomfortably. ‘Come on, guys!’ he rallies.
‘Can’t you look more excited? This is what we’ve been aiming for! In fact,’ he adds, his mouth twisting upwards into a smile, ‘it’s more than we’ve been
aiming for . . .’

I can’t let him go on any more. He needs to know the truth.

‘It’s brilliant news, Sam, really, it is,’ I say. ‘But it’s too late. It’s all too late.’

Sam sinks down onto an empty seat and stares at me. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I overheard Rupert and Sebastian and the other board members talking to the guy from Rumors. The sale was agreed this afternoon.’

‘But I thought we had till Boxing Day?’ Sam says, furrowing his brow.

I shrug defeatedly. ‘Looks like they changed their minds.’

‘But that doesn’t make any sense!’ Sam says, shaking his head. ‘They haven’t given us a fair chance and, besides, that was before any of them saw this!’ He
holds up the paper and we smile sadly at him. He puts it back down on the table and looks at us all despairingly. ‘Come on, guys, are we really going to give up just because the board of
directors have? These sorts of deals take ages to finalize! We might still be able to claw Hardy’s back from an impending sale! After all, no one has stopped us so far! So who’s
in?’

I see Lily lift her chin determinedly and glance at Felix, who is straightening his tie and rolling his shoulders back as if preparing for some OAP-style fisticuffs. Jan Baptysta is cracking his
knuckles. As is Justyna. Velna has started humming ‘Waterloo’, Abba’s 1974 Eurovision-winning entry loudly, which I presume means she too is up for a fight.

I glance at Sam and he raises his eyebrows questioningly at me. I pause and look at everyone. ‘So are we all with Sam?’ I say at last, and there is a chorus of approval from the
group. Sam nods and smiles at me as Felix disappears to get Sam a celebratory drink. Minutes later he plops a pint down in front of him. Sam takes a sip and immediately takes charge of the
meeting.

‘Can I tell you the even better news now you’re all feeling a bit more positive?’ Sam smiles as he picks up the
Evening Standard
again. ‘On my way here I had a
call from someone at the
Metro
. They’ve seen the
Evening Standard
’s coverage and are running something in their morning paper, too . . .’

‘That’s great news!’ I exclaim. ‘That’ll reach all the commuters in the morning who didn’t get the
Evening Standard
tonight!’

‘But that’s not all,’ Sam grins. ‘The editor from the
Metro
told me that the
Daily Mail
, who own the
Metro
, have agreed to run it in their paper,
too, in a couple of days’ time! Forget local papers, we’re going national!’

Lily whoops and claps her hands and everyone joins in.

‘Oh my God, that’s incredible Sam!’ I gasp. ‘How the hell did you manage that?’

Sam shrugs modestly. ‘I’ve been told I can be quite charming when I want to be,’ he says with a wry wink. ‘There is a catch, though: the
Mail
need a new angle.
They don’t want to regurgitate coverage of the same story and the same makeovers. We need to do something big, something brilliant that will get the whole country talking . . . and then
shopping at Hardy’s! But the question is, what?’

Everyone immediately looks at me. I pause for a moment to gather my thoughts. ‘I guess it’s time to bring out the Christmas Big Guns,’ I say at last, thinking of the reams of
vintage decorations I’ve been sorting through in the stockroom and the ideas we’ve been working on since the last meeting. We’ve been waiting for the right moment to give
Hardy’s the Christmas makeover it really needs. And there isn’t going to be a better moment than this. I clear my throat and stand up, feeling like a sergeant major rounding up his
troops.

‘We need to turn the store into a winter wonderland so that Sam can take the picture to the
Mail
’s offices. Which means, we need to do the makeover to end all makeovers.
Tonight.’ I look at my watch and drain my glass. It’s nearly nine o’clock. That gives us eleven hours. ‘So who’s coming back to the store with me?’

There is no reply and for a moment I think I’ve gone too far. Then my ears are filled with the sound of chairs scraping as everyone stands up and pulls on their coats, chattering
excitably. Sam takes my arm gently and we all pour noisily out of the pub and into the cold – but no longer bleak – midwinter.

T
he store is eerily dark when we pile in through the staff entrance. A layer of snow has settled on the pavements outside and taken the temperature
down to Arctic levels. Everyone is shivering and looking blankly around us. All of a sudden the store feels really big and our group feels really small. I’m paralysed with fear that I
don’t actually really know what I’m doing. It doesn’t help that everyone is looking at me expectantly, waiting for me to tell them where to start. Justyna coughs loudly and for a
moment I am reminded of the sound of an air-raid siren. It is just the trigger I need.

I close my eyes for a moment and try to imagine the Hardy’s I want to see; the one that it used to be back in the post-war glory days when country had gone through hell and heartache and
Hardy’s survived to tell the tale. I imagine well-dressed women strolling through the halls arm in arm with their lovers, mothers, children and best friends. I imagine Nat King Cole’s
velvety voice crooning from the speakers, singing about chestnuts roasting and Jack Frost nipping. I can visualize thick garlands of greenery draped around the atrium with mistletoe and holly
twined around it, gloriously coloured home-made vintage paper chains hung round the doors, twinkling fairy lights wrapped around pillars and doorways. Crepe-paper crackers and nativity scenes, the
hand-carved wooden shoes I unpacked yesterday . . . and, of course, the most important thing of all, the Hardy’s Christmas tree, back standing proudly by the grand central staircase.

‘Jan?’ I say briskly. ‘I have a job for you. It requires you somehow finding and purchasing a very big Christmas tree. Tonight.’

‘He can take my van!’ Sam offers, and within minutes Jan has disappeared on his mission.

‘Right, everyone,’ I clap my hands and look at them all. ‘Are you ready?’

The next four hours pass in a haze of hard work and high spirits. Boxes of decorations are unpacked and hung, assembly lines are created to get all the decorations moving from
the stockroom to the shop floor, songs are sung, jokes are made and Sam takes photographs of us all working. Hour by hour the empty boxes and mess that surrounds us gradually starts to look like
the winter wonderland I have in my head. The tiny shoe decorations have been cleverly stacked by Lily on a Perspex stand, which Sam has built in the shape of a Christmas tree and wrapped with
strands of mistletoe. We’re going to put it in one of the windows illuminated with some pretty fairy lights and then recreate the Tree of Shoes idea in the shoe department using the gorgeous
vintage Hardy’s ex-display evening shoes.

Felix has come up with a brilliant idea of putting vintage beauty products, like the gold lipstick holders and pretty compacts, into actual snow globes in a display in one of the windows.

Inside the store I’ve laid a path of letters to Santa that leads to a grotto on the fourth floor. Felix has promised to dress up as Santa and hand out gifts in the days leading up to
Christmas. These letters have been painstakingly handwritten and popped into faded old airmail envelopes by Velna and then tied into little bundles with string. Lily has been sitting wrapping boxes
in brown paper and then decorating them with ribbons of gold, green and red for the past two hours. She has a ballet dancer’s eye for detail and each one is beautifully finished. And Velna
and I have spray-painted gold over one hundred Conference pears, which I plan to thread on string with some cranberries and holly and then drape over the door arches of each department.

And this is all without Hardy’s secret weapon; the store’s original decorations that used to deck the place; the ones that look and smell and feel like Christmases past. A row of
painted toy soldiers line the windows, like marching marionettes. Little Santas and snowmen and faded felt-covered reindeer join them. As well as entire snow-capped villages and little painted
elves, there are old Santas’ boots that were once filled with candies, and miniature vintage bottlebrush snow-covered Christmas trees. Vintage glass jars have been filled with old satin-sheen
and glass baubles that have lost their hooks and can’t be used on our tree. All of them make you dream of snow and stockings, Santa and carol singing. Looking around me I am suddenly filled
with the real spirit of Christmas. And for the first time since yesterday I’ve even forgotten all about Joel and what a pig he turned out to be.