Danielle, companion in Green Park

About Danielle

Nothing about Danielle announces itself, and that is the effect she has worked for. She is 170 cm, curvy, and carries it with a straight back and an unhurried walk. Her hair is long, black and poker straight; her eyes are brown and steady. She dresses in structured clothes, a good coat over a plain dress, with shoes built to survive a whole evening on Piccadilly. The jewellery is minimal and old, and she will tell you where each piece came from if you ask twice.

She is the most composed woman on this roster and the driest. Her English is formal, her humour arrives late and lands hard, and she has no interest in small talk that goes nowhere. Ask her about the twenties, about hotel architecture, about why one grand room works and the one beside it does not, and she will talk for an hour with real pleasure. Discretion in her case is instinct rather than instruction.

Her preferred evening begins under the high ceilings of The Wolseley on Piccadilly, where dinner runs late and the room deserves an early arrival. She takes a banquette when one is free, orders schnitzel without consulting the menu, and lets the conversation find its own pace. Green Park lies directly opposite, and on a mild night she will cross Piccadilly and walk its length under the plane trees before anything else is decided.

She comes in from South Kensington, twenty minutes at that hour. Look for her among the companions kept for Green Park, read what each length runs to at rates, and a date sent through booking is held.

• 170 cm, curvy, straight backed and unhurried
• Brown eyes; long black hair, poker straight
• Twenty nine; formal English, a very dry humour
• Travels in from South Kensington, twenty minutes
• Grand rooms, late dinners, the park afterwards

Arranging her evening

Danielle takes one evening at a time and likes the diary settled two days ahead. Tell Delphine the hour and the address; everything else is arranged without further correspondence.

Her figures are the house figures, set out in full on the rates page, and the whole arrangement runs in one written exchange from the first line to the confirmation.

An evening with Danielle

Danielle treats the first twenty minutes as a room inspection and makes no secret of it. She will tell you which part of the ceiling was added later, which lamps are wrong, and which waiter has been there longest. It is not showing off. She simply notices buildings the way other people notice weather.

Dinner with her is deliberate. She eats slowly, drinks very little, and asks the sort of question that changes the direction of an evening. By half past ten she is entirely at ease and the dryness has turned into something warmer. Her preference afterwards is the walk across Piccadilly into the park, which at that hour is dark, quiet and almost private. Whatever follows is settled between the two of you and nobody else.