by Jilly Cooper
Now she could only think, In a few minutes I’ll see Tristan and I’ll die of excitement, but after tomorrow I won’t see him any more, and I’ll die.
At Valhalla she was disappointed to find no James in her caravan. Rozzy must have taken him on the set. Unzipping one of the bench seat cushions, she hid all Tristan’s parcelled-up papers and paintings inside. It was so hot, she changed into her new pink dress, took another slug of brandy and, because of her shaking hands, rather over-drenched herself in Fracas.
Someone had taken Wolfie’s Land Rover over to George’s house, so instead he grabbed Rannaldini’s pearlescent orange Lamborghini, which looked much in need of a jaunt. He whistled as Lucy jumped in beside him.
‘That dress is sensational.’
George’s gates were so swarming with police and press, Wolfie had to produce his passport.
‘Why did you and I go through all that,’ he asked wryly, as he stormed up the drive, ‘just to enable two people we’re absolutely crazy about to end up together?’
‘At least we’ll be giving Tristan the best wrap-party present ever,’ said Lucy, raising the bottle to her lips. ‘Thank you, Wolfie, for everything. It’s a pity’, she added wistfully, ‘you and I don’t fancy each other.’
‘I’ve known more unlikely things,’ said Wolfie, pulling up on the edge of the field. Thinking how pretty she looked with her pale cheeks flushed and her pink dress showing off her long legs, he amazed himself by taking her in his arms and burying his lips in hers.
‘Wow,’ gasped Lucy, when he finally let her go. ‘You are the most terrific kisser.’ Pulling his blond head down, she kissed him again.
Unfortunately pearlescent orange Lamborghini Diablos are very noticeable, particularly with Meredith turning pale and crying out to everyone as they reassembled after the break:
‘My God! Rannaldini’s car’s just rolled up on the opposite side of the field.’
Most people were therefore vastly relieved when, instead of a black-cloaked ghost, Lucy and Wolfie, hastily wiping off lipstick, emerged giggling from the Lamborghini.
‘Must go and find James.’ Lucy set off unsteadily towards Wardrobe.
‘Must go and make my peace with Bernard,’ said Wolfie, setting off nervously towards the set.
Heavens, there were a lot of police around. The extras in the stands, Granny in his press box, the marquees, the band were all massed on the south side of the field to allow the camera team in their car to race unimpeded up and down the north side.
‘Wolfie!’ bellowed Mikhail, cantering up on a smart bay pony. ‘How vas your dirty veekend?’
Everyone screamed with laughter and surged forward, tripping over cables to hug him. It was just the tension-breaker they needed.
‘Have a drink,’ said Ogborne, thrusting a beer can into Wolfie’s hand. ‘Thank God you’re back to defuse Tristan and Tabitha.’
On cue, up thundered Tab, leaping off her pony and pummelling her way into the crowd.
‘Hi there,’ mumbled Wolfie, turning very red.
Next moment he’d turned even redder, as Tab whacked him viciously across the face with the palm, then the back of her hand.
‘Bastard!’ she screamed. ‘How could you leave everyone in the lurch and let Tristan down like that? How am I expected to organize the ponies on my own and star in the film? You’ve let me down as well. I hate you.’ She was about to slap him again when, seeing how handsome he was, even with his navy blue eyes watering with pain, she burst into tears and pummelled her way out of the crowd again.
‘Don’t worry, Wolfie.’ Griselda clouted him on the shoulder. ‘There isn’t a soul she hasn’t bawled out – girl’s suffering from post-Tristan tension.’
Lucy, meanwhile, was waiting for a rail of dresses or one of the trestle tables covered in pastel-covered shoes suddenly to take off towards her as a tethered James bounded forward in rapturous excitement. To her horror no dog materialized.
‘Where’s James?’ she asked Rozzy, after she’d hugged her and handed over the bottle of Femme.
‘In your caravan. He’s not? Then he must have jumped out of the window. Mrs Brimscombe’s Cindy’s on heat. He’ll turn up.’
‘Why didn’t you bring him?’ asked Lucy, trying not to sound panicky or accusing.
‘He ran on to the field after a squirrel yesterday, and nearly brought down one of the ponies. Tristan banished him,’ said Rozzy, slightly defensively. ‘He wouldn’t eat or settle while you were away. Then he got all excited on Sunday night when I said, “Mummy’s coming home,” but when you didn’t, he gradually lost heart.’ Then, seeing Lucy’s anguished face, Rozzy added hastily, ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure it’s some bitch.’
‘Lucy,’ yelled Griselda, rushing up with an armful of polo boots, ‘thank God you’re back. Dear old René’s taken over and made everyone including Mikhail look like Claudine Lauzerte. Can you do Granny first, Alpheus second?’
‘I daren’t tread on René’s toes,’ said Lucy in horror.
‘Well, for a start you’ve got to do something about Alpheus’s hair.’
‘He’s now called Surly Temple,’ said Baby, leaning down from his pony and hugging Lucy. ‘We have missed you.’
‘I must find James, and Tristan and Tab to explain,’ muttered a distracted Lucy. Then, catching sight of a pile of tack on a nearby table, ‘That’s Tab’s saddle, the one with the blue and black check saddlecloth.’
‘Well, I’m not giving it to her in her present mood,’ said Rozzy. ‘You take it, Lucy.’
As she carried the saddle past handsome players on their shining ponies and breathed in the intoxicating smell of old leather, dung, sweating horse and expensive aftershave, and heard the thundering of hoofs, the bagpipe skirl of excited neighing and the chatter of the crowd accompanying Rannaldini’s overture, she realized how right Tristan had been to want polo to kick-start the film.
Next moment, Granny had erupted from the press box, tearing off his hot black inquisitor’s robes to roars of applause and revealing an elegant body adorned only by lavender silk boxer shorts.
‘Lucy, Lucy, I’m roasted alive in these clothes. Please turn me into Gordon Dillon again.’
‘Serve him right for burning all those heretics,’ giggled Meredith. ‘I must say the old dear’s kept his figure.’
‘Hello, Lucy, how was my beautiful France?’ shouted Oscar.
‘Lovely,’ shouted back Lucy, embarrassed but touched as everyone gathered round.
Everyone, that is, except Tristan, who by sheer willpower had driven his army on through the morning. Victory had been in sight. Now anarchy had broken out as all the troops deserted their posts to welcome Lucy. Nor had his temper been improved, on looking through Valentin’s long lens, to see Wolfie and Lucy in an orange Lamborghini and a passionate embrace.
‘Monsieur de Montigny, could I have a word about Claudine Lauzerte?’ asked Lynda Lee-Potter, who was snazzily disguised as a policewoman.
‘Not a single syllable. I talk enough to the flics,’ snarled Tristan. ‘Get back to fucking work,’ he roared at the crowd around Lucy.
Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes sexily smudged, her long legs smooth and brown below the clinging pink dress. Moving closer Tristan caught a whiff of brandy, which annoyed him almost as much as the Fracas wafting muskily from her hot, excited body, instead of the usual sweet, delicate Bluebell.
The diatribe pouring forth was mostly in French, but Lucy got the gist: that Tristan felt she had been totally irresponsible; that she had wrecked yesterday’s shoot by buggering up any hope of continuity, and had now come back to rot up this one. Totally appalled that a mouth that was made for kissing, drinking red wine and quoting poetry should be shouting such terrible things, Lucy remained speechless.
‘Couldn’t you have waited two more days to push off on your dirty little weekend?’ howled Tristan. ‘Get out, you’re fired.’
‘You’ve got it wrong,’ stammered Lucy, ‘We only went to France to—’
‘I don’t want to know,’ interrupted Tristan. ‘Collect your cheque from Production and get out.’
‘You ungrateful bastard!’ screamed Lucy. ‘After all Wolfie and I have done for you.’ And still clutching Tab’s saddle, she fled back to Wardrobe.
‘Whaddja do that for?’ Baby turned furiously on Tristan. ‘You’ll have a strike on your hands.’
‘Strike and you won’t be paid a penny!’ yelled Tristan. ‘Get back on that pony, and you get back into those black robes,’ he roared at Granny, then scowling round, ‘Where’s Wolfgang, so I can fire him?’
‘Too late,’ sighed Meredith happily. ‘Grisel’s just dispatched him to Bristol airport to collect Alpheus’s suit.’
‘Tristan’s just fired me.’ Lucy stumbled into Wardrobe, sobbing helplessly.
‘Oh, darling,’ cried Rozzy, putting down her steam iron to hold out her arms. ‘I’m so sorry, don’t cry. He’ll calm down. He’s just got so much on his plate.’
‘He’s still an ungrateful bastard. He’s convinced Wolfie and I have been bonking all weekend, when we’ve been working our backsides off proving he can marry Tab after all. I don’t know why we bothered.’
‘Have you told him?’ Rozzy handed Lucy a wodge of Kleenex.
‘No, Wolfie can.’ Then, hearing Tab yelling outside, ‘Oh, God, I’ve still got her saddle, I can’t cope with her bawling me out as well. You give it to her. I must go and find James. Hell, I haven’t got a car.’
‘Take mine,’ said Rozzy.
Tears blinding her, Lucy somehow reached Valhalla. She was so furious and upset, she went straight to the production office and wrote a furious letter to Tristan.
‘This is to let you know you’re a Montigny and can marry your precious Tabitha and be happy after all, you ungrateful pig. Don’t be horrible to Wolfie. I’m going to give all the papers and photos and things you need for proof to Rozzy.’
Having printed off the letter, she wrote ‘Dearest Tristan’ at the top and ‘your loving Lucy’ at the bottom, and streaked the ink with her tears.
She was shoving the envelope into Tristan’s pigeon-hole when she caught sight of a ravishing photograph of him on the front of the Daily Mail. How young and carefree he looked. She was just tearing it out, when she noticed the pictures beneath: one of Claudine Lauzerte, and another, slightly blurred, of Claudine with her hair – rather too long for a middle-aged woman, some would say – streaming down her back, as she kissed a beautiful dark-haired boy, who was fingering her cheekbones in wonder. Their eyes were shut but their long, long eyelashes tangled.
Lucy gave a moan. Slowly, agonizingly, she read the copy and understood why Tristan had never made passes, why he disappeared to his room early but never seemed to sleep much, why he was always so sad, the prince with the heavy heart. And how ludicrous had been all those speculations that he was impotent or terrified of women or in love with some smooth, older man, like Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief, when all the time he was sleeping with the most beautiful woman in France.
How idiotic for Lucy herself to pretend she had thought of anyone but him since December or that every drop of make-up, every false eyelash hadn’t been put on his singers to please him. It had been the best make-up she had ever done because it had been an act of love. She had only gone to France in the faint hope that Tristan might realize he loved her not Tab. But all the time neither Tab nor she had been in the frame. How he must have loved Claudine not to betray her.
I love him, she sobbed in a frenzy of despair. No pain could be more unendurable. But there could be. When she got back to her caravan there was no James to whack his tail against the walls and squeak with joy.
Neither the police nor any of the local rescue kennels had news of him when she rang in increasing panic. With a shiver she remembered the gypsy encampment outside Paradise, which had moved on since she and Wolfie had left for France. Maybe they had stolen James, or he had gone back to his own people to die.
Noticing Rozzy’s end-of-shoot presents, all beautifully wrapped in purple paper and shocking pink ribbons, Lucy was creepily reminded of Alpheus’s dressing-gown. Weeping with despair she plunged into the woods in search of James.
Back at Rutminster Hall, Gablecross and Karen had watched the filming of Baby’s winning goal. Now the crew was setting up for Baby’s and Tabitha’s ride-off. Looking round at the ravening media baying for blood and the massive police presence watching from the house or mingling with the extras or hiding in the trees that surrounded George’s increasingly churned-up polo field, Gablecross felt a growing unease.
‘All this attention only exacerbates the problem,’ he muttered to Karen. ‘Murderers get off on it. They’re turned on when they read about themselves. It pushes them into overdrive. But, even more ominously, Tristan and Madame Lauzerte have shoved our killer off the front pages. The only way he can get back again is to commit another murder. He’s outwitted a massive international murder hunt, but ultimately he gets his biggest buzz out of someone knowing exactly how clever he’s been. Which means he’ll have to kill again, so that beforehand he can boast to his victim how he did it.’
Karen shivered. The polo had been so glamorous, she had hitherto thoroughly enjoyed herself. Several photographers had taken her picture. The dashing Carlisle twins had asked what she was doing later. Glancing round, she said, ‘We’ve got an almost full cast of suspects.’
‘Except Wolfie and Lucy,’ replied Gablecross, whom Interpol had alerted of their arrival in England.
‘Hello, Tim, hello, Karen.’ It was Rozzy with two cups of coffee, ‘I gather you went home yesterday. How did you like Glyn?’
‘Very much,’ lied Karen.
‘He’s a charmer,’ said Rozzy wistfully. ‘Was Sylvia much in evidence?’
‘No,’ lied Gablecross.
‘I hope you’ll catch the murderer today,’ Rozzy lowered her voice, ‘because we’re all dispersing tomorrow. I’ll miss you both so much.’
‘The feeling’s mutual. Have you seen Lucy?’
‘She was here,’ confided Rozzy. ‘She and Wolfie went all the way to France to clear Tristan’s name and the beast has gone and fired her. The poor darling’s rushed off to Valhalla in floods.’
‘Sorry to hear about your lovely dress,’ said Karen.
‘Horrible, wasn’t it?’ For a second Rozzy’s eyes brimmed. ‘But Tristan, who’s a darling, when he’s not being a beast, gave me some money to buy another so I rushed into Rutminster first thing.’
‘Find anything nice?’ asked Karen.
‘In Peggy Parker’s, of all unlikely places. I thought she was all Lurex and sequins.’
Gablecross looked at his watch. Tristan and Oscar were still fussing over lights. Anxious to get going before their ponies became maddened by flies, Ricky France-Lynch and the Carlisle twins were pointedly hitting balls to one another.
‘Ouch,’ yelled Sexton, as one hit him on the ankle. ‘Ow, Christ, ’ere comes trouble,’ he added as, parting crowds and crew like a flea comb, Rupert stalked up to Tristan.
‘Have you got some sort of death-wish?’ he hissed. ‘How dare you reshoot everything when we’re so pushed for time and money? And if you think I’m going to put a farthing into your crappy production after the way you screwed up my daughter! Why didn’t you level with her that you were regularly ramming ten inches of Parisian sausage into that geriatric Claudine Lauzerte? Amazing you could get in for the cobwebs. Don’t clench those Frog fists at me! You haven’t got a jambe to stand on.’
Rupert seized Tristan’s arm and was clearly about to thump him, when Sexton bravely interceded.
‘Look, Rupe, we all know you’re fired up, but we are against the clock, so why don’t you castrate and incinerate Tristan and tug out his toenails after we’ve wrapped?’
Valentin burst out laughing. Rupert was dickering whether to deck Sexton and Valentin as well, when everyone was distracted by the arrival of Hermione, flanked by outriders, waving graciously from the back o
f an open limo. Like gulls following a plough, a flock of paparazzi had crashed the party in her wake.
‘I have come to stand by my director, Tristan de Montigny, in his hour of need,’ she was loudly confiding to hundreds of black tape-recorders. ‘My heart also goes out to Claudine Lauzerte, and her husband Jean-Louis, the Minister of Cultural Affairs, at this difficult time.’
‘Were you aware, Dame Hermione, that Tristan was having a far from cultural affaire with Madame Lauzerte?’ shouted James Whitaker.
‘Below the belt, James,’ said Hermione reproachfully.
‘Tristan certainly was,’ said Adam Helliker, to howls of mirth.
‘Are you in this scene, Dame Hermione?’ asked Classic FM Magazine.
‘Indeed,’ Hermione inclined her huge flamingo-pink picture hat, ‘but only as a face in the crowd.’
‘You can’t, Hermsie.’ Seizing her hand, Sexton helped her out of the limo. ‘The point of this scene is that Carlos is ordered by Philip to dump his polo totties and marry an unseen Frog princess, namely you. It blows your cover if you’re seen in the crowd.’
‘But polo is international,’ pouted Hermione. ‘It would be logical for Elisabetta to jet down for a chukka or two.’
‘God in heaven.’ Tristan clutched his head. ‘We’ll have to shoot round her.’
‘Now where is my son, whose photography . . .’ Hermione turned back proudly.
But Little Cosmo had jumped limo and was ringing Ladbrokes, who were taking bets on who had killed Rannaldini. Cosmo was gratified that his mother was 10–1, but decided to put a couple of hundred each on his stepbrother, Wolfgang, and Meredith, his putative father’s boyfriend, neither of whom appeared to have any alibi.
The burning sun was boring through Tabitha’s hat. At any moment she’d burst into flames. Having screamed at everyone on the set, she was now leaning against her pony, a beautiful grey gelding called The Ghost, unable to mount until her missing saddle turned up. Flora, who’d been gossiping to Baby, came over with a glass of iced orange juice.
