Visitors were asked to write a short story on modern celebrity. The winner would get star billing on the Steffi site as well as having Andrew Crofts as a mentor to help work up the story into a novel, find an agent, publisher and so on.

Short Listed: Queen of Hart’s
By Helen Parker

The very beautiful Diana Hart checked her diary. “Interview; eight-thirty,” she read, moving her lips soundlessly. She didn’t want to be late for journalist, Martin Trashear. He was writing a book about divorce and he’d asked if he could use Di as one of the case studies. Celebrity always sold.
“I’ll change the names of course,” he’d said, his voice warm with sympathy.
“Ok, let’s use the name – Priscilla,” said Di, as if plucking it out of thin air.
“What about your husband, what shall we call him?”
“You can stick with Charlie, he won’t read it anyway. He’s too busy gardening and opening the seventh branch of his precious supermarket chain.”
“That’s Charlie Hart, ‘King of Super Mart’,” said Martin, switching on his tape recorder. “And that’s why you are known as Di, Queen of Hart Marts.” She wanted anonymity, but he could always drop a few hints.
Di’s was a local story that had done the rounds for years: plucked from obscurity as a classroom assistant on the rough Highgrove Estate by Charlie Hart, bachelor and local millionaire businessman.
“Stuff of fairy tales,” Di’s step-grandmother, Babs, had said with a chuckle. “Finally, a bit of money in the family. I can stop bingo-calling and you can buy yourself some decent clothes for a change.”
Yes, clothes, thought Di with a shudder. She remembered the episode with the Highgrove Herald. Charlie’s mum, Liz, had ‘phoned the editor and leaked the name of her son’s girlfriend. Before you could say ‘Buy One Get One Free’ the photographer had turned up with a zoom lens.
“Come on Di, give us a smile.”
Well she’d given more than that and Liz, her mother-in-law, had never let her forget it. The sun had come out and it had shone right through her blouse.
“I wasn’t wearing a bra,” explained Di, looking demurely at Martin through long lashes.
“Oh, I see,” he gulped. “Did it upset Charlie and Liz?”
“Oh, yes, there was a right royal row. The Herald put the picture on page three …”
“Did they?” He scribbled something important.
“…with a headline,” she said in a whisper. She leaned across the desk and took his hand. I think Charlie finally decided to marry me when he read it: ‘Hart’s New Tart gets a Head Start’. He fell in love with the image, you see. But I’m not a tart, Martin; I’m just a strong woman.”
Martin nodded mutely.
“Liz didn’t like it,” she continued, pursing her lips at the thought of her mother-in-law. “Her taste is perhaps a little more – conservative than yours?” suggested Martin helpfully.
Di pictured the canary-coloured outfit that Liz had worn to the wedding. “Hmmm, more Liberal Democrat, I’d say.
“She didn’t like me being strong, Martin. She didn’t like the fact that I was a wife, that I had two sons and that I wanted to work for the Hart firm as well.”
“Did you have any training?”
“No, Charlie said to me after the honeymoon: Here’s the key to the till, there’s the stock for the shelves – now get on with it. And I did. I’d always shopped around before I met Charlie, so I know what a customer wants from their supermarket: they want bread that stays fresh for three weeks, a good range of pre-cooked English curries and trolleys with wheels that all go in the same direction. Charlie became jealous of my success and tried to undermine me. He made me doubt myself.”
“It wasn’t just your work he criticized, was it Di?”
“No – he made me feel worthless.”
“In what way?”
“He had someone else Martin.”
“Priscilla?”
She nodded. “An old flame from his days at Tesco. She worked on the cooked meats. I think it was the white overalls and the little hat that attracted him. He’s always been a sucker for uniforms, ever since he was in the scouts.”
Martin watched his beautiful patient blink back the tears. Poor Diana Hart. She only wanted to be loved. Her customers loved her, her sons loved her and if rumours were to be believed, local boutique owner David Friedbread loved her too. Only Charlie Hart failed to see the attraction.
Di crossed her lovely long legs and took a deep breath. “I don’t sit here with resentment, Martin, I sit here with sadness because a marriage hasn’t worked. I sit here with hope because there’s a future ahead, a future for my husband, a future for myself and a future for Hart Marts. But I had to leave him because there were three people in this marriage. It was a little crowded, Martin.” Then she stood regally and picked up her handbag.
“Same time next week?” he asked.
“I can’t I’m afraid. I’m in Paris next week.”
“With Charlie?”
“No, with a good friend.”
“I’ll miss you,” he said and for a split second she seemed to hesitate.
“I have to get away, Martin. But I’ll see you when I get back.”
“When will you be back?”
“Sunday August 31st.”
Martin never forgot that date and neither did the Highgrove Herald. It was a sad day and one that changed the course of supermarket history.
Babs knew the Hart story would make a good book and she wasn’t wrong. The Death of a Marriage was a bestseller in Highgrove but Martin never told anyone that Di Hart had collaborated with him and neither did she. Charlie suspected of course but it was too late now. Just after midnight on Saturday 30th August he and Priscilla were working in the deli section of the new Hart Mart when it happened. The bacon slicer had a faulty connection, according to Di, and she hadn’t had a chance to get it fixed. Charlie and Priscilla had been electrocuted in a compromising position.
Of course Martin’s book ensured that Di became even more famous. In fact she wasn’t just queen of Hart Marts now, she was queen of all she purveyed.