by Jilly Cooper
Noticing Tristan’s hands clamped to his thighs to stop them shaking, Chloe said gently, ‘When I got my first Amneris at the ENO, I splurged on one of your father’s drawings.’
‘He would have loved painting you.’ Tristan found he could say it without too much pain. Chloe couldn’t have been prettier, he decided, very French, in fact. Her straw-coloured bob had a thick fringe, which emphasized permanently smiling, slightly dissipated eyes. Tristan had also noticed long slim legs and a black cashmere bosom, arching like a purring furry cat inside her dove-grey suit.
Glancing up, her eyes widened and held his for longer than necessary. She would be perfect to screw on location, he thought, but since Étienne’s death his libido seemed to have gone into hibernation. He knew he had snubbed Serena the other night, and would have to put in a lot of spadework if she wasn’t going to act up during the recording. Idly he noticed Chloe putting Sweetex into Alpheus’s cup of coffee, and wondered if they were having an affaire.
‘Carlos loved his granddad, Charles V, like Prince Charles loves the Queen Mum,’ Sexton was telling Granny’s boyfriend, Giuseppe, who had sunk nearly two bottles of red and was still flirting with Serena in the hope of a fat record contract.
At last Rannaldini had reached the table. Wafting ‘Maestro’, his famous scent, created specially for him by Givenchy, longing to goad all the male members of his cast that in Mikhail Pezcherov he had discovered the greatest bass baritone of the age, he immediately insisted that everyone swap places.
‘It is crazy,’ grumbled Tristan, who was now next to Granny, ‘Giuseppe, who is twenty-eight like me, is playing not only Alpheus’s father, but Fat Franco’s grandfather, and he must be half Franco’s age.’
‘That’s opera for you,’ said Granny, in his beautiful voice. ‘Although no stretch of the imagination would go round Franco’s waist these days.’
‘Have you met Rupert Campbell-Black?’ asked Tristan.
‘I would walk naked across the Arctic Circle for a touch of his nether lip,’ sighed Granny.
‘He thinks Don Carlos can’t work with Hermione and Franco.’
‘Then you’d better stamp your pretty foot and replace them, my dear.’
Hermione had finished her third helping of apricot tart when everyone was asked to toast the Queen.
‘Most people oughta be drinking to themselves,’ muttered Sexton. ‘Never seen such a bunch of fairies.’
A roll of drums, and the awards started. Having accepted his gold statuette of a harpist, Alpheus proceeded to thank everyone, from the sound engineer to his wife Cheryl, his fine sons and Mr Bones, his German shepherd, ending with Mozart who had, after all, composed the music.
‘How very caring.’ Hermione clapped vigorously. ‘I’m much looking forward to working with Alpheus.’
She was irritated that it was too dark, except on the platform, for everyone to see how lovely she was looking. Tristan de Montigny was lovely-looking too, and even seemed to be getting on with that acid-tongued Granny. As well as an affaire, Hermione was looking forward to having many in-depth conversations about herself with Tristan.
Rannaldini was table-hopping again. Posing for the Daily Express with David Mellor, he smirkingly fingered the carpet burns on his knees and elbows, acquired while seducing Serena Westwood in her new office last night. It had made him feel like a schoolboy.
‘I’ll have her but I’ll not keep her long,’ he murmured, blowing Serena a kiss across the tables. Just long enough to control her during the recording so that she used exactly the takes he wanted.
There was a great cheer as the newly married Viking O’Neill, golden boy and first horn of the Rutminster Symphony Orchestra, who had hit Rannaldini across the room after the Appleton piano competition, sauntered up to collect his award for his recording of the Strauss concertos.
‘What a beauty,’ murmured Granny, putting on his spectacles.
‘If Polygram’ll release him, I want him to play first horn in Don Carlos,’ whispered Serena.
‘Ladies and gentlemen.’ A grinning Viking seized the microphone. ‘Once upon a time, three dogs took part in an intelligence test at Crufts. They had to arrange a pile of bones in the best shape. The first dog who came in was an architect. He looked at the bones, built a pretty little house and everyone clapped and clapped.
‘The next dog was a town planner,’ went on Viking, in his soft Irish accent, ‘who scoffed at the dog architect’s little house, knocked it down, and rebuilt the bones as a beautiful town. Everyone clapped even more. Finally, the third dog came in. He was a tenor, and he ate all the bones, shagged the other two dogs and asked for the afternoon off.’
Such screams of laughter greeted this joke that Viking could hardly be heard thanking his record producer, the orchestra and his divine new wife, the conductor Abigail Rosen, which brought even more resounding cheers.
Returning to the Polygram table, Viking disappeared into the vast congratulatory embrace of Fat Franco on his way back from a grope or a toot or some other mischief. For a second, Franco pretended to box Viking’s ears for making snide jokes about tenors, then the two men put their heads together until Franco gave a bellow of laughter.
Seeing his chosen Don Carlos collapse on to his four gold chairs again, scooping up petit fours as though they were Smarties, Rannaldini shouted rudely: ‘Unless you give up sweet things, Franco, you’ll never get into Charles V’s tomb.’
‘You no give them up,’ shouted back Franco. ‘Viking tell me how you sail through air like dashing elderly gent on flying trapeze and flatten sweet trolley and member of Arts Council.’
You wait, vowed Rannaldini, as the roars of laughter subsided. I’ll cook your goose before you’ve had time to stuff your gross belly with it.
At the announcement that Chloe had won the People’s Award, the entire room rose cheering to its feet, except Hermione.
‘I am clapped so often that I am not used to clapping,’ she told Alpheus, as he returned, brandishing his award.
As Chloe, in her discreet dove-grey suit, reached the platform, a huge blow-up of her naked on the sleeve of her prize-winning record appeared, to even louder roars of applause, on the monitor.
As Serena put her hand on Giuseppe’s crotch, he fell into the petit fours.
‘Best place for him – young people need their sleep,’ said Granny, who was feeling much happier after a long chat with Tristan. The boy was too sweet for words and had wonderfully revolutionary views on playing the Grand Inquisitor.
‘Are you ready, Dame Hermione?’ asked one of the Identikit press officers, as vast illuminated olive-green letters announced the Opera Award of the Year.
‘This is the big one,’ said Hermione, whipping out her powder compact.
Meanwhile, losing no time for revenge – after all, Franco wasn’t a Shepherd Denston artist so they wouldn’t lose 20 per cent of his massive fee – Rannaldini was talking in an undertone to Howie Denston. ‘Do you know anything about a tenor called Baby Spinosissimo?’
‘Making waves in Australia, heartbreaking looks, I’ll check out his availability. And by the way,’ Howie lowered his voice, ‘we’ve got to watch Alpheus. He tried to get Liberty Productions, American Bravo and Shepherd Denston each to pick up the tab . . .’
‘You will ensure cash settlements for Dame Hermione,’ interrupted Rannaldini, as his mistress mounted the rostrum.
‘Good people,’ began Hermione, but alas, Rannaldini’s mobile had rung.
‘Tabitha is home, Maestro,’ said Clive, his leather-clad bodyguard, silkily.
Rannaldini leapt to his feet. ‘I ’ave to go,’ he told the astounded table.
‘But what about your award?’ cried an aghast Howie.
‘You accept eet,’ said Rannaldini blithely. ‘A family problem come up. I call you,’ he shouted to Tristan.
‘Most of all I would like to thank Maestro Rannaldini.’ Hermione wiped away a tear.
But she had lost her audience, as every eye followed Ra
nnaldini out of the room.
Rannaldini could hardly fly his helicopter home for excitement. Would days of riding out in all weather have coarsened Tabitha’s amazing beauty? Would being fired so ignominiously have tempered her extraordinary arrogance, her capacity for rage?
Evidently not. Rannaldini entered the west courtyard through ancient gates, optimistically crowned with rusty iron letters spelling the words omnia vincit amor. Sprinting up a mossy, paved path, flanked by lavender bushes, and pushing open the heavy oak door he found Helen spitting with fury. Tabitha was showing no contrition at all. Halting her mother in mid-lecture, she had snapped that she hadn’t flown five thousand miles for an earful and sloped off to the yard to settle The Engineer for the night.
‘Now she’s attacking the vodka,’ spluttered Helen. ‘We’ve clearly got a lush on our hands – Rupert always drank too much. And after over a year away she didn’t even peck me on the cheek.’
‘Where is she?’ demanded Rannaldini.
‘In the Blue Living Room.’
The Blue Living Room, an upstairs drawing room, which everyone else at Valhalla still called the Red Morning Room, had just been redecorated by Helen at vast expense in soft blues and rusts to complement her own hazel-eyed, red-headed beauty. The orange flames dancing merrily in the grate and the last tawny leaves on the beech outside enhanced the effect. Rannaldini’s Étienne de Montignys and Russell Flints had been banished in favour of an autumnal watermill by Samuel Palmer, and a Canaletto of sea-blue Venice. An embracing Cupid and Psyche by Canova provided the only erotic note.
Tabitha sat slumped in a carved brown chair, which was Rannaldini’s only contribution to the room, watching Wallace and Gromit on television. She was wearing frayed jeans and a Stop Puppy Farming T-shirt. A green toggle clung to her wrist like mistletoe. She was very thin – probably from taking those mad mood-inducing slimming pills to keep her weight down.
Her face was deathly pale, the long turquoise eyes bloodshot and heavily shadowed, the long nose reddened, the mouth clamped round clenched teeth in an attempt not to cry. White-blonde hair, used to being washed every day, hung lank and greasy to her collarbone. She was clutching a yellow Labrador puppy as though it were a hot-water bottle.
‘Where d’you get that animal?’ asked Rannaldini sternly.
‘Sharon? She was a stray, wandering round the docks.’
Rannaldini clicked his tongue. ‘Have you alerted the quarantine authorities?’
Tab’s eyes darkened in terror.
‘Please don’t betray me. I couldn’t leave her in Kentucky.’
Rannaldini, who was never too hot, put a log on the fire.
‘How d’you fiddle it?’
‘I came through France. There’s a boat smuggling in thirty dogs a day. The Engineer and I had to wait as it only sails when there’s no moon.’
‘How long have you been travelling?’
‘Four or five days.’
Rannaldini filled up her glass.
‘Naughty little girl,’ he said softly, taking Sharon and examining her. ‘Certainly she doesn’t look rabid.’
He dropped the puppy gently on the floor.
‘How can we punish you?’ he purred.
‘The American Horse Show Association’s done that already, for Christ’s sake.’
‘So they should have done. Risking the life of that beautiful horse I gave you.’
‘Engie’s fine, I promise you.’
Tab’s light, clipped drawl was so like her father’s. Every time he heard it, Rannaldini was excited by how much he could hurt Rupert by controlling and manipulating her. Moving round the room, only pausing to run an admiring hand over Psyche’s marble bottom, he pressed a button on the back of Tab’s chair. She gasped then screamed, as its wings suddenly clamped round her waist, trapping her.
‘What the fuck – lemme go!’ Fighting tears, she clawed fruitlessly at the imprisoning wooden arms, until she nearly pulled the chair over.
‘It’s a debtor’s chair,’ mocked Rannaldini, as he closed in on her. ‘Eighteenth century. Used to trap debtors like you. I’ve been looking for one for ages. You owe me two grand for your journey home, remember.’
‘I’ll pay you back.’ Tabitha flinched away.
When she could retreat no further, she allowed his fingers to caress her cheek for a second, then dropped her head like a snowdrop.
‘My father’s such a bastard.’
Rannaldini shrugged.
‘Maybe he’s pleased Marcus is gay. Probably never wanted a son competing with him.’
Having left pawmarks all over Helen’s pale blue Regency sofa, Sharon was now attacking a cushion Helen had embroidered of a virgin and a unicorn. Neither Tab nor Rannaldini took any notice.
Rupert’s remark about gaining a daughter when Marcus had shacked up with Nemerovsky had been the one that had hurt her most, confessed Tab.
‘He’s got a daughter, for Christ’s sake.’
‘And what a daughter,’ said Rannaldini lovingly.
‘I want to make him madder than he’s ever been before.’
‘Let’s find something really to worry him.’
Rannaldini moved fast. With his Polaroid memory, he had not forgotten four and a half years ago, his leading jockey, Isaac Lovell, and Tabitha exchanging an impassioned eye-meet in the paddock before the Rutminster Cup. Isaac had been riding Rannaldini’s vicious but generally victorious horse The Prince of Darkness, who’d fallen at the last fence. Tabitha had been the groom looking after Arthur, a big grey gelding, trained by her father, Rupert.
Tragically Arthur had died of a massive heart-attack, way ahead of the field but just the wrong side of the winning-post. Slumped sobbing over Arthur’s body, Tabitha had been too distraught to feel the hand of sympathy Isaac Lovell had dropped on her shoulder as he led home the unhurt but shaken Prince of Darkness.
The Campbell-Blacks and the Lovells had been feuding for nearly forty years, since Rupert had bullied Jake at prep school for being the cook’s son and a gypsy with a wasted leg. Gyppo Jake and Rupert had slogged it out on the international show-jumping circuit throughout the seventies, with Jake finally getting his revenge during the Los Angeles Olympics by running off with Rupert’s then wife Helen.
Later Jake had returned to his wife, Tory, Helen had eventually married Rannaldini, Jake and Rupert had both switched to training, but their feud had not abated. One reason, apart from loathing Rannaldini, why Rupert had disinherited Tabitha and Marcus was because photographs had appeared of both of them smiling at Jake Lovell, who as the Maestro’s trainer had been a witness at Rannaldini’s wedding to Helen.
If Helen and Jake had once fallen so passionately in love, reflected Rannaldini, might not history repeat itself? By a delicious coincidence, Isa Lovell was coming to lunch tomorrow, which would give Tab a decent night’s sleep.
Unhampered by scruples, Rannaldini didn’t give a stuff that Isa was already living just outside Melbourne with a tough little tomboy called Martie. They had invested in a yard that had done brilliantly its first season but which still needed capital. For this reason, Isa had come home to make serious money in the National Hunt season and also to help his father, Jake, now increasingly debilitated by the polio he’d had as a child. Rannaldini had several horses in training with Jake, and had invited Isa over to try out two mares he had bought in France and to plan for the future.
As usual Rannaldini had another motive. During the winter in Melbourne, Isa had won three of Australia’s biggest races, including their Grand National, for Baby Spinosissimo, the young tenor, whom Rupert had suggested should play Don Carlos. Isa would know if Baby was sufficiently broke to accept the part for a quarter of Fat Franco’s fee.
There was nothing youthful about Isa Lovell. Money had always been tight when he was a child: at six he was helping in the yard and jumping at shows, at eight coping with very public trouble in his parents’ marriage, and his mother’s attempted suicide. Despite having been champion jock
ey three times, he was aware at twenty-six that he would soon have to support his parents, and was therefore considering moving into training.
Isa had trendily tousled black hair, lowering black brows, and slanting, suspicious dark eyes dominating a pale, expressionless face. He looked like the second murderer in Macbeth and had a Birmingham accent you could cut with a flick-knife. But at five foot eight, he was tall for a jockey, with an undeniable brooding gypsy glamour. Not above dirty tricks on the course, where he was nicknamed the Black Cobra, he was as arrogant as Tabitha and, as champion jockey, had had his pick of the girls.
After fourteen hours’ sleep, a long, scented bath and a raid on her mother’s bedroom Tab, unaware Isa was coming to lunch, wandered into the Blue Living Room. She reeked of Helen’s favourite scent, Jolie Madame. She was wearing Helen’s new dark green cashmere polo-neck, which turned her turquoise eyes almost emerald. Her newly washed hair flopped arctic blonde over her white forehead, as she sidled over to the drinks tray to get stuck into the vodka.
‘That is not a suitable breakfast and that’s my roll-neck,’ began Helen furiously.
‘Shut up,’ murmured Rannaldini, but with such venom that any further reproach froze on Helen’s lips. ‘We have a guest. Tabitha, my dear, I don’t think you’ve met Isaac Lovell.’
Tab halted, tossing her head so haughtily Isa could see up the nostrils of her long Greek nose and the curling blonde underside of her lashes. But as he breathed in her scent, he was so unaccountably overwhelmed by foreboding that he found himself trembling.
Tab in turn saw a young man as dark and narrow as the gallows, and as still as the embracing Cupid and Psyche on the plinth beside him. His eyes were filled with hostility and in his hand was a glass of tomato juice as blood red as the feud between the two families.
‘What the hell’s he doing here?’ she demanded in outrage.
‘Discussing my horses,’ said Rannaldini.
