by Jilly Cooper
‘Tristan was right to reshoot. But what the hell is Rupert going to say?’
‘Of all the fucking two-timing shits,’ roared Rupert, brandishing the Mail.
‘Whatever’s the matter?’ said Taggie, aghast.
‘Montigny’s been screwing Madame Lauzerte for the past three years. They only released him from gaol because he was caught bonking her in Wales the night Rannaldini was murdered.’
‘Oh, the beast,’ wailed Taggie.
‘And all the time he’s been two-timing darling little Tab. I never liked him, poncy intellectual, you can’t trust the Frogs. And he had the gall to summon her onto the set by nine o’clock. She mustn’t see the Mail, it’ll break her heart.’
Tristan was very white when he came off the telephone to Rupert.
‘He’s one to talk,’ said Meredith indignantly. ‘There was a frightful scandal some years ago when it came out that he’d been rogering Amanda Hamilton, who was not only aeons older than him and the wife of the finance minister but also liked being spanked. Rupert’s conveniently forgotten all that. Don’t let it faze you.’
‘I won’t,’ said Tristan.
He knew exactly what he wanted, rattling out orders like a Kalashnikov, driving everyone. Seldom had there been such tension on a film. But despite police everywhere and a murderer in their midst, by one thirty they had beaten the clock by one minute twenty seconds. They had shot mêlées, cavalry charges, throw-ins, and polo groupies slavering over Baby chucking down his stick. The temperature was rising steadily, the grass drying off fast. Mist swirled upwards all over the park. At any moment the puddles would boil over. The extras, even if they did all look like Claudine Lauzerte, had cooperated all the way; the discipline of the crew, despite thumping headaches, had been superb. There was just Alpheus’s little scene and Tab’s big one when she rode Baby off, and they could wrap.
‘Claudine’s pompous husband is close friend of Papa,’ Simone whispered to Griselda. ‘Should I accept huge sum for interview with the Daily Express?’
‘Of course, sweetie. Imagine Tristan and Claudine being an item. Jolly humiliating for little Tab to lose out to a woman nearly three times her age.’
Tab, the only person not cooperating, was in a worse mood than yesterday: sending Alpheus and Bernard flying with her pony, and yelling at Wardrobe because her polo shirt had suddenly become too loose, her toggle too shiny, her hat too big and her boots too revoltingly new.
She had also refused to let René make her up — ‘I don’t want to look like bloody Claudine Lauzerte’ — even though René was raving over her beauty.
‘Look at the length of her nose and the eyes, and the moulding of her face. She must steal the show.’
‘That’s another reason for wanting to murder her,’ said Chloe sourly. ‘I think we can take it she’s read the Mail.’
Now Tab was bawling out the props department.
‘You’ve put out the wrong fucking saddle for my pony. Mine’s got a blue and black check saddlecloth. None of this would have happened if flaming Wolfie had been here.’
77
Wolfie and Lucy learnt in St Malo that Tristan had been released, and duly celebrated. The following morning, they caught the early boat. While Lucy was buying a large bottle of Femme for Rozzy for looking after James, Wolfie picked up the Mail, turned green and hastily hid it. The bastard, he thought furiously. How could Tristan have done that to poor, darling Tab? He must get home and comfort her.
Having dumped the hired car at St Malo, they took a taxi back to Valhalla. To steady her nerves, Lucy took increasing nips from a bottle of brandy she’d bought for Tristan. Last night she had written him a long letter, explaining everything she had learnt at Montvert and then sealed it into a huge brown envelope, which contained all the other relevant material. Then she wrote ‘Tristan de Montigny, Private and Confidential’ on the outside. She had also washed her hair, shaved her legs, bronzed them with Piz Buin. Then, in a St Malo boutique, she had spent too much money on a lovely short-skirted sleeveless dress in wild rose pink and on a sexy sophisticated scent called Fracas to wear at the wrap party.
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 an
d 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.
