Mount!

by Jilly Cooper

  ‘None of that,’ barked Roddy, turning pucer than his fifth glass of wine.

  Rupert took a hefty slug of brandy then launched into an attack on every aspect of racing: the greed of the bookies, the lack of government support, lousy prize money, avaricious racecourses resulting in far too many races and too many meetings on the same day, the massive over-breeding of horses, a prohibitive handicap system, so that good horses went abroad because they had nowhere to race, amateur stewards often so terrified of the bookies they’d do anything to let a horse keep a race, and bookies going offshore and not paying anything back into racing.

  ‘I used to train horses for other people, but gave up because I found them even more selfish and tiresome than myself,’ he told his startled audience. ‘And because they all tried to pull my wife.’

  ‘Oh Rupert,’ protested Taggie, wishing the green carpet would swallow her up.

  ‘On the other hand, owners have a lousy deal. Go to any meeting and after a race you will find nineteen out of twenty disappointed connections being lied to: “it’s the draw, it’s the rain, it’s the start, it’s traffic, it’s interference, it’s the trip, it’s too firm, it’s too testing, it was a messy race,” and so on. I hated telling lies – another reason I gave up training other people’s horses.’

  Then, like a small boy with a brick on the end of a rope, he attacked all the ruling bodies of racing for incompetence, pusillanimity and the inability to stick together.

  ‘How can hounds catch a fox, if they all rush off giving tongue in different directions. The British Racing Association, BRA, as it’s known, is a misnomer.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ thundered Roddy.

  ‘Because they often provide no support. They’ll accuse a trainer or jockey of something then spend months gathering evidence, by which time his owners or his rides have drifted away. If you asked me to sum up the state of British Racing today, I’d say it’s got too big, it’s destroyed the ground at too many tracks, the breed has been weakened, there are far too many horses bred, many often bad or unsound horses. I would cut the fixture list by twenty-five per cent, but the managing directors at the racecourse have different aims. Stable staff too should be paid properly and should be given decent time off.

  ‘And, if you want decent crowds, build up the horses like Frankel, Black Caviar, Kauto Star and Master Quickly’s dam Mrs Wilkinson and my own Safety Car, who make people flock to the races. Owners should also have the guts to keep these great horses in training as four- and five-year-olds and not whisk them off to stud, so the public has a chance to fall in love with them, like little Gimcrack.’

  The audience were looking stunned, so Rupert switched tack, making them laugh with a few jokes, bluer than his wickedly sparkling eyes.

  ‘I repeat, there are ladies present,’ boomed Roddy, turning even pucer.

  ‘Gimcrack,’ went on Rupert, ignoring him, ‘had a sire called Cripple and an uncle called Bloody Buttocks, neither of which would have got through Weatherbys today.’

  He then gave an impersonation of the ladies of Weatherbys trying out horses’ names on each other, to check if there were any double entendres, repeating in a prim voice words like ‘Forced King’ and ‘Far Canal’ over and over again until the audience were crying with laughter.

  ‘Finally,’ Rupert took another slug, ‘I’d like to thank York Racecourse Committee and the Gimcrack for an absolutely marvellous dinner, and congratulate them for being an equally marvellous racecourse where nothing is too much trouble.’

  Then, remembering how Roddy had banned Quickly, ‘So unlike our local Rutminster Racecourse, which has potholes all over the track, rotten food and spends fortunes on portraits of today’s committee. It’s hardly surprising Rufus Rutshire wants to build houses all over it.’

  ‘Rupert,’ murmured Lord Grimthorpe, ‘Rodders is about to have a coronary.’

  ‘To end,’ concluded Rupert, ‘I’d like to propose a toast to the health of British racing and to this year’s Gimcrack winner, New Year’s Dave, who is as sweet-natured as he is brilliant.’

  As he sat down to moderate cheers, Taggie mouthed down the table: ‘You are so clever.’

  ‘God knows how he got away with it.’ Nick Luck was shaking his head. ‘He’d better not do anything to prompt a stewards’ enquiry for a year or two.’

  Roddy was hopping like a maddened bullfrog.

  While more speeches followed, Rupert carried on drinking then reluctantly got up to go, having an early flight to Singapore in the morning.

  Aware that most of the audience would like to throttle him, he hustled Taggie down the steps and out into the weighing room, where they were accosted by a reporter from the Scorpion sidling up, to break the very sad news that Jake Lovell, the great showjumper and silver medallist of Rupert’s era, had just died at the tragically early age of fifty-nine.

  ‘Really,’ drawled Rupert.

  ‘How do you feel, Rupert?’

  ‘Profound gratitude. Particularly,’ continued Rupert, ‘for his ridding me of my first wife, Helen. Jake did me a huge service by running off with her in the middle of the Los Angeles Olympics, leaving a depleted but utterly determined British team to take the Gold.’

  ‘Rupert, no!’ gasped Taggie in horror.

  The reporter gasped too, reeling from a mixture of shock and scoop.

  ‘What is running through your mind, Rupert?’

  ‘I repeat, profound gratitude for ridding me of my pseudo-intellectual, pretentious and totally unsuitable first wife, and freeing me up to marry the angel who is my wife today,’ said Rupert as he stalked out of the building.

  ‘I’m really, really sorry for Tory and Isa and all the family,’ Taggie stammered to the reporter before she fled after Rupert. ‘How could you?’ she panted when she caught up with him. ‘Poor Tory and poor Isa, he’ll be devastated.’

  ‘Payback time indeed. I have absolutely no sympathy for that weasel who pinched all my ideas. Talk about Leading Sore.’

  33

  Rupert arrived at Penscombe to find the paparazzi outside the drive and all the way down Penscombe High Street – and that a colossal row had broken out.

  Isa, who adored his father, was insane with rage at Rupert’s universally reported comments, particularly on behalf of his mother, who had been nursing a desperately ill Jake for months. Rupert’s diatribe had been the only negative in a fountain of eulogy. The press were already regurgitating all the old stories about Rupert bullying Jake, both at school and on the showjumping circuit, and how the feud had continued because of the annexing of Helen – right down to the acrimonious departure of Isa, as Rupert’s stable jockey and assistant.

  Turning on her laptop first thing to check how Rupert’s speech had gone, Celeste smiled in triumph. Gav deserved to be punished for resisting her advances, Rupert for jocking her off.

  She was not going to be demoted to shovelling shit unless it was over those two. Joyfully she drew out the bloodstained foaling certificate from under the lining paper of her bedroom drawer. It was still readable: ‘chestnut colt – 31 December’. Picking up her mobile, she dialled Cosmo Rannaldini’s number.

  ‘I’ve got some interesting information on Rupert Campbell-Black, Gavin Latton and New Year’s Dave,’ she said.

  ‘Come right over,’ purred Cosmo. ‘Get yourself to Aston Down and I’ll send the chopper. Gotcha!’ he shouted as he put down the telephone.

  ‘This is how I should always travel,’ reflected Celeste as Cosmo’s scarlet and magenta helicopter flew over the rustic cathedral town of Rutminster, with its olive-green sweep of racecourse. There was the long drive, winding up to Rutminster Hall, the Georgian mansion belonging to Roddy Northfield’s brother, Lord Rutshire.

  Roddy always gave her a lovely smile on the rare occasions beastly Rupert had allowed her to go to the races, and there, as the helicopter began its descent, was Valhalla, the great grey abbey guarded by its dark army of trees. Rooks fluttered out of a white shroud of mist as they landed
.

  A chauffeur in a Chelsea tractor met her and whisked her through rusty gates, bearing the inscription Amor Vincit Omnia. A stunning girl with an amazing willowy body and long shining dark hair was waiting at the door. She introduced herself as Sauvignon, Cosmo’s PA – which stood for phenomenally attractive, thought Celeste, feeling upstaged. Having led her along endless dark passages to Cosmo’s office, Sauvignon announced that he would be with her in a few minutes.

  When Rupert gave her a hard time, Celeste had always fancied a job at Valhalla, and studied the place on its website. But looking out of the window, she was taken aback by the splendour of the stud and the yard, which had been carved out of seemingly impenetrable woodland. Below lay a spaghetti of racetracks and gallops, runways for jet and helicopter, an equine swimming pool, indoor gym, massive indoor schools, lovingly tended gardens, endless stables and racehorses in rugs, out in stallion pens and fields, sweeping down to the River Fleet.

  There, on the right, was the famous Valhalla maze, where Cosmo held wild parties. Soon she’d be one of the guests. There, deep in the woods, was the watchtower where Cosmo’s sinister father, Sir Roberto, had composed, edited, ravished and near which, Celeste gave a shiver, he had been murdered.

  No doubt billions had been spent on the place. Cosmo’s study included a grand piano, two sofas draped in fur rugs, shelves filled as much with orchestral scores as racing files. Apple logs crackling in the fireplace scented and warmed the room. On the mantelpiece was a gilt and ormolu clock of Apollo Driving the Chariot of the Sun; the horses would be non-runners on such a dark day.

  On the walls were a Picasso Clown, portraits of Cosmo’s heroes – Byron, Wagner, the Marquis de Sade, his father, Roberto Rannaldini – and Roberto’s Revenge in his gleaming dark-brown glory, rearing up, towering over his handler. Celeste was giggling over a naughty painting of Don Juan, humping some lady of the manor in the orchard while casting an eye over her pretty maid, who was hanging out her mistress’s washing, when Cosmo swept in, still in indigo silk pyjamas, wafting very strong, musky aftershave.

  ‘Celeste.’ He took both her hands, then in his deep, caressingly beautiful voice, ‘So sorry to have kept you. Welcome to Valhalla.’

  ‘I’ve been admiring your office, and this amazing view. It reminds me of Penscombe.’

  Just for a second, Cosmo’s face hardened into the steely glare with which his father had petrified entire orchestras, then he relented. ‘But vastly superior. Let me get you a cup of coffee. We’ll save the champagne for later.’

  ‘Lovely property,’ gushed Celeste. ‘Is it very old?’

  ‘Very. During the Civil War, it was a Royalist stronghold.’ Pouring into a blue cup coffee even darker than his eyes, Cosmo pointed to one of the mullions on which was carved the head of a cavalier. ‘Alleged to be Prince Rupert of the Rhine.’

  Another Rupert’s head might soon be on the block, Cosmo thought happily as he handed her a plate of pink sugar biscuits, and directed her to the end of the sofa near the fire, plumping a cushion on which was embroidered I may be here, but my heart is on the racecourse.

  ‘Well, well,’ Cosmo said gently, sitting down beside her. ‘Ah, here’s Isa.’

  Celeste had always fancied Isa – taller than most jockeys, the black cobra with his wild black hair and closed gypsy face. Today, with reddened eyes and extremely pale, he seemed more vulnerable. Before leaving, Celeste had tarted herself up in the briefest, cutest little black leather mini-skirt and jacket. Fortunately, she’d washed her hair last night so it floated long, lush and gleaming red. She had drenched herself in the last of Lark’s scent.

  ‘I’m so sorry for your loss, Isa.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Isa handed two black armbands to Sauvignon, to give to Tarqui and Roman Lovell, who were about to set off with four horses for the All-Weather at Southwell. Even death didn’t stop the show going on. ‘Tell Roman not to talk to the press.’

  Getting up to put her coffee cup on the table, Celeste could see from the big gilt mirror how lush she was looking. All this was wasted on Isa and Cosmo, however, who were only interested in Dave’s original foaling certificate.

  Pretending to search for a tissue, Celeste switched on her tape recorder. Before she handed anything over, she wanted big money. Cosmo took a snort of coke and switched on his own tape recorder as he examined a Christmas card from Roddy Northfield, showing Rutminster Manor in the snow.

  ‘Well.’ He smiled at Celeste.

  ‘I hate to be commercial but my career’s on the line, so I’d like something up front.’

  ‘Of course.’ Cosmo opened his desk drawer and handed over a couple of grand of laundered money in fifty-pound notes.

  ‘For starters?’

  ‘Of course, we promise.’

  ‘And a job and protection, once the story breaks? I can’t return to Penscombe, Rupert would rip me apart.’

  ‘Of course,’ Cosmo said, reflecting that she was a tough little thing. A smile like eastern light spread across his face as he and Isa pored over the faded bloodstained document.

  ‘“Chestnut colt – thirty-first December”,’ muttered Isa. ‘Whose writing is this?’

  ‘Gavin Latton.’

  ‘Oh, Floppy Dick in person.’ Cosmo was jubilant.

  ‘He swore me to secrecy,’ sighed Celeste. ‘Got pretty nasty. He’s powerful at Penscombe. I’d lose my job if I snitched.’

  ‘Rupert knew,’ snapped Isa.

  ‘Must have done. He and Gavin are as thick.’

  ‘As thieves,’ added Cosmo. ‘This will bring them both down. Corrupt and fraudulent behaviour. Rupert could lose his licence for ten years, and Gavin’ll probably never work again.’

  The Horses of the Sun tolled one o’clock.

  Out of the window, mighty, magnificent, bounding, white L-shaped blaze identifying him, Roberto’s Revenge could be seen dragging a nervous stud hand along a grass track, getting fit for the next covering season.

  ‘Leading Sire-in-waiting,’ Cosmo gloated. ‘Oh boy, this will help him.’

  ‘Is that I Will Repay?’ asked Celeste.

  Isa got out a calculator.

  ‘New Year’s Dave must have won nearly a million running illegally as a two-year-old. He’ll be disqualified from all those races, which will push Rupert right down the Leading Sire list. Dave beat and prevented I Will Repay from winning the richest Group Two for two-year-olds, and I as the owner would have made an infinitely better Gimcrack speech,’ sighed Cosmo. ‘Poor Rupert will never be forgiven for last night’s tirade. The timing is perfect, he’s offended everyone. There isn’t a stakeholder in racing who won’t want to ram a stake into his heart. And what about the poor punters?’ Cosmo started to play an imaginary violin.

  ‘And what about compensation for poor Rosaria and her repellent husband,’ said Isa. ‘If Geoffrey had come second in the Gimcrack, they might have scraped enough money together to have taken him to the Breeders’ Cup.’

  ‘Oh Rupert.’ Cosmo had another snort of coke. ‘You really are up shit creek.’

  ‘What happens now?’ asked Isa.

  ‘I’ll telephone the British Racing Association Integrity Department,’ said Cosmo, looking at his watch, ‘who will probably be at lunch.’

  ‘And I’m ready for that glass of bubbly,’ piped up Celeste.

  ‘Sure,’ said Cosmo. Then, as Sauvignon walked in, ‘Can you take Celeste to the canteen and give her some lunch.’

  When Celeste looked outraged, Cosmo added, ‘We’ll sort things out later. We really appreciate you telling us, I’ve just got to put the wheels into motion.’

  ‘But I still need to get my stuff from Rupert’s before you break the story!’

  ‘Sure, sure.’

  When a reluctant Celeste had finally left, Isa said: ‘We can’t give her a job. She didn’t even recognize Roberto’s Revenge.’

  ‘Course not,’ said Cosmo soothingly, ‘but we’ve got to keep her sweet till after the enquiry. She’s a key witness.’
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br />   Isa, however, had collapsed on the sofa with his head in his hands.

  ‘I’ve got to sort out Dad’s funeral. Mum wants it tiny, but the press’ll never leave us alone.’

  Cosmo put a hand on Isa’s shoulder. ‘It’s horrible, I’m sorry. We couldn’t bury my father for months after his death. When they’ve been as ill as your father, you think it would be a relief, but once they’re dead, you start remembering their old selves, and you miss them appallingly. My father was a monster, but he made me laugh. At least you had a father you were proud of. Console-toi.’ Cosmo poured Isa a brandy.

  ‘I’ve got to get hold of the death certificate, and there’s so bloody much to do for the funeral.’

  ‘I’ll help you with the readings and the music, and I’ll get the New Year’s Dave thing started,’ said Cosmo. ‘This’ll be a death certificate for Rupert, and to cheer yourself up, Dave’s now favourite for the Guineas and the Derby, but on January first, he’ll be a four-year-old, which rules him out of both of them. And even if Rupert denies everything and hangs Gav out to dry, it means Gav won’t be here any more to nurture Quickly and Touchy Filly. Oh, gotcha, gotcha!’

  ‘Celeste’s frantic to get her stuff out of Penscombe,’ Sauvignon told Cosmo after she returned from lunch. ‘I pumped her about Rupert’s horses, but she didn’t seem to know much about them. She’s a nympho, eyeing up all the lads in the canteen. When she went to the Ladies, I found a tape recorder in her bag.’

  ‘Perhaps she should come and work for us.’

  ‘I took out the tape,’ said Sauvignon.

  An ex-model just turned thirty, Sauvignon was spectacularly glamorous. She had a smallish straight nose, perfect for photographs, and a mouth made bigger with carefully applied scarlet lipstick, which lifted a hard, cold face when she smiled. The wine which she had renamed herself after was the same amber as her hypnotic yellow eyes. She had also had elocution lessons to iron out her Cockney accent.

  Cosmo employed her to lead up his horses to draw maximum attention to them in the paddock. She also instilled fear into his staff, who nicknamed her the Nazicist. This was because as well as being spiteful, she was also utterly self-obsessed. When she was talking about herself to someone, her eyes swivelled constantly to find someone more important to talk about herself to. Very spoilt because of her looks, she was accustomed to getting her own way.