As I’m hovering over the DKNY display, an elderly woman wearing a gold-colored suit and carrying a Gucci tote comes up to me.

“Which one matches?” she says. “This… ” She holds out a tan satin bag. “… or this… ” She holds out a paler one. “It’s for evening,” she adds.

“Erm…” I look at her suit and at the bags again — and wonder how to tell her they don’t match at all. “The thing is, they’re both a kind of brownish color… and your suit’s more of a golden, yellowish…”

“Not the suit!” she exclaims. “The dog!”

I look at her perplexedly — then spot a tiny face poking out of the Gucci tote. Oh my God! Is that a real live dog?

“Don’t hide, Muffy!” says the woman, reaching into the bag and hauling it out. And honestly, it’s more like a rat than a dog — except a rat with a Gucci collar and a diamante name tag.

“You want your bag to match your… dog?” I say, just to be sure.

“If I can’t find anything, I’ll just have to have her hair tinted again.” The woman sighs. “But it’s so time-consuming…”

“No, don’t do that!” I say hastily. “I think the paler bag goes perfectly.”

“I think you’re right.” She gives it a critical look, then nods. “Thank you for your help. Do you have a dog?”

“Erm… not on me.”

The woman stares at me suspiciously — then stuffs the dog back in the Gucci tote. She walks off, and I resume my search, wondering if I need to buy a dog in order to be a real New Yorker. Except I only like big ones. And you couldn’t exactly lug a Labrador around in a Fendi clutch, could you?

Eventually I choose a beautiful Kate Spade bag in tan leather, and take it up to the counter. It costs five hundred dollars, which sounds quite a lot — but then, “a million lira” sounds like a lot too, doesn’t it? And that’s only about fifty pence. So this is sure to be a bargain.

As the assistant hands me my receipt, she even says something about it being “a gift”—and I beam in agreement.

“A complete gift! I mean, in London, it would probably cost—”

“Gina, are you going upstairs?” interrupts the woman, turning to a colleague. “Gina will show you to the seventh floor,” she says, and smiles at me.

“Right,” I say, in slight confusion. “Well… OK.”

Gina beckons me briskly and, after a moment’s hesitation, I follow her, wondering what’s on the seventh floor. Maybe some complimentary lounge for Kate Spade customers, with free champagne or something!

It’s only as we’re approaching a department entitled “Gift Wrapping” that I suddenly realize what’s going on. When I said gift, she must have thought I meant it was an actual—

“Here we are,” says Gina brightly. “The Saks signature box is complimentary — or choose from a range of quality wrap.”

“Right!” I say. “Well… thanks very much! Although actually, I wasn’t really planning to—”

But Gina has already gone — and the two ladies behind the gift wrap counter are smiling encouragingly at me.

This is a bit embarrassing.

“Have you decided which paper you’d like?” says the elder of the two ladies, beaming at me. “We also have a choice of ribbons and adornments.”

Oh, sod it. I’ll get it wrapped. I mean, it only costs $7.50—and it’ll be nice to have something to open when I get back to the hotel room.

“Yes!” I say, and beam back. “I’d like that silver paper, please, and some purple ribbon… and one of those clusters of silver berries.”

The lady reaches for the paper and deftly begins to wrap up my bag — more neatly than I’ve ever wrapped anything in my life. And you know, this is quite fun! Maybe I should always get my shopping gift wrapped.

“Who’s it to?” says the lady, opening a card and taking out a silver pen.

“Um… to Becky,” I say vaguely. Three girls, all wearing jeans and high-heeled boots, have come into the gift wrap room — and I’m slightly intrigued by their conversation.

“… below wholesale…”

“… sample sale…”

“… Earl jeans…”

“And who is it from?” says the gift wrap lady pleasantly.

“Um… from Becky,” I say without thinking. The gift wrap lady gives me a rather strange look and I suddenly realize what I’ve said. “A… a different Becky,” I add awkwardly.

“… sample sale…”

“… Alexander McQueen, pale blue, 80 percent off…”

“… sample sale…”

“… sample sale…”

I cannot bear this any longer.

“Excuse me,” I say, turning round. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop on your conversation — but I just have to know one thing. What is a sample sale?”

The whole gift wrap area goes quiet. Everyone is staring at me, even the lady with the silver pen.

“You don’t know what a sample sale is?” says a girl in a leather jacket eventually, as though I’ve said I don’t know my alphabet.

“Erm… no,” I say, feeling myself flush red. “No, I… I don’t.” The girl raises her eyebrows, reaches in her bag, rummages around, and eventually pulls out a card. “Honey, this is a sample sale.”

I take the card from her — and as I read, my skin starts to prickle with excitement.


SAMPLE SALE

Designer clothes, 50–70 % off.

Ralph Lauren, Comme des Garçons, Gucci.

Bags, shoes, hosiery, 40–60 % off.

Prada, Fendi, Lagerfeld.


“Is this for real?” I breathe at last, looking up. “I mean, could… could I go to it?”

“Oh yeah,” says the girl. “It’s for real. But it’ll only last a day.”

“A day?” My heart starts to thump in panic. “Just one day?”

“One day,” affirms the girl solemnly. I glance at the other girls — and they’re nodding in agreement.

“Sample sales come without much warning,” explains one.

“They can be anywhere. They just appear overnight.”

“Then they’re gone. Vanished.”

“And you just have to wait for the next one.”

I look from face to face, utterly mesmerized. I feel like an explorer learning about some mysterious nomadic tribe.

“So you wanna catch this one today,” says the girl in blue, tapping the card and bringing me back to life, “you’d better hurry.”


I have never moved as fast as I do out of that shop. Clutching my Saks Fifth Avenue carrier, I hail a taxi, breathlessly read out the address on the card, and sink back into my seat.

I have no idea where we’re heading or what famous landmarks we’re passing — but I don’t care. As long as there are designer clothes on sale, then that’s all I need to know.

We come to a stop, and I pay the driver, making sure I tip him about 50 percent so he doesn’t think I’m some stingy English tourist — and, heart thumping, I get out. And I have to admit, on first impression, things are not promising. I’m in a street full of rather uninspiring-looking shop fronts and office blocks. On the card it said the sample sale was at 405, but when I follow the numbers along the road, 405 turns out to be just another office building. Am I in the wrong place altogether? I walk along the pavement for a little bit, peering up at the buildings — but there are no clues. I don’t even know which district I’m in.

Suddenly I feel deflated and rather stupid. I was supposed to be going on a nice organized walking tour today — and what have I done instead? I’ve gone rushing off to some strange part of the city, where I’ll probably get mugged any minute. In fact, the whole thing was probably a scam, I think morosely. I mean, honestly. Designer clothes at 70 percent discount? I should have realized it was far too good to be—

Hang on. Just… hang on a minute.

Another taxi is pulling up, and a girl in a Miu Miu dress is getting out. She consults a piece of paper, walks briskly along the pavement, and disappears inside the door of 405. A moment later, two more girls appear along the street — and as I watch, they go inside, too.

Maybe this is the right place.

I push open the glass doors, walk into a shabby foyer, and nod nervously at the concierge sitting at the desk.

“Erm… excuse me,” I say politely. “I was looking for the—”

“Twelfth floor,” he says in a bored voice. “Elevators are in the rear.”

I hurry toward the back of the foyer, summon one of the rather elderly lifts, and press twelve. Slowly and creakily the lift rises — and I begin to hear a kind of faint hubbub, rising in volume as I get nearer. The lift suddenly pings and the doors open and… Oh my God. Is this the queue?

A line of girls is snaking back from a door at the end of the corridor. Girls in cashmere coats, girls in black suits, girls tossing their springy ponytails around, and chattering excitedly into their mobile phones. There’s not a single one who isn’t wearing full makeup and smart shoes and carrying some sort of designer bag, even if it’s the teeniest little Louis Vuitton coin purse — and the babble of conversation is peppered with names of fashion houses. They’re all pressing forward, firmly moving their stilettos inch by inch along the floor, and all have the same urgent look in their eyes. Every so often somebody pushes their way out of the door, holding an enormous, nameless carrier bag — and about three girls push their way in. Then, just as I join the end of the line, there’s a rattling sound, and a woman opens up a door, a few yards behind me.

“Another entrance this way,” she calls. “Come this way!”

In front of me, a whole line of heads whips round. There’s a collective intake of breath — and then it’s like a tidal wave of girls, all heading toward me. I find myself running toward the door, just to avoid being knocked down — and suddenly I’m in the middle of the room, slightly shaken, as everybody else peels off and heads for the racks.