Jesus! She was one of them! The realisation made her sit up suddenly, and the pale pink bubbles cascaded over her fingers. She was considered one of the crowd – because she was going out with Matt. But she wasn't. Since Windsor, she'd never been near a racecourse, and she took no notice of the strings as they sashayed past her bookshop on the way to the gallops each morning. And she and Matt never discussed anything to do with racing. She would never, ever be one of them.
'You okay?' Maddy was looking at her with some concern. 'Did you say something?'
Had she? 'Oh, yeah. Fine. Really, thanks.'
She sloshed back a quarter of the glass. Would they all be here tonight if it wasn't for her relationship with Matt? Did they all think that, despite her protests, she'd joined the club?
'Can I ask a question?' Gillian waved her hand in the air. Fortunately it wasn't the one with the glass in it. 'Can I ask Lucinda a question that's been bugging me for absolutely ages?'
They all looked at her doubtfully, with the exception of Fran, who was sitting cross-legged on a Buffy the Vampire Slayer bean-bag nicked from the twins, and was singing along quietly with the Verve. Lucinda shrugged. 'Not if it's sociology.'
'I want to know,' Gillian sat on the arm of the sofa and spoke very carefully, 'what you think of Tina Maloret. And I want to know how you can bear to share Charlie with her. I think, in your position, I'd be forced to violently remove at least one set of those spiky eyelashes.'
Jemima closed her eyes. It had bothered her, too, although she would never have dared to ask.
'They're real,' Lucinda smiled. 'The eyelashes. And the hair. And definitely the finger-nails – I've seen the scars. And I don't share him, Gillian. We're all free, grown-up, independent people. Anyway, if there's any division of spoils being done, then Tina is sharing him with me. She was there first. I'm the other woman – or one of them. So it's not a problem. See?'
'Not really. I mean, I'm an old married woman and of course I don't – er – fancy Charlie or anything like that,' Gillian paused to glare at Suzy who had screamed with laughter, 'but surely, it must hurt to know that he's – um – well, with someone else?'
Lucinda seemed to find this amusing. 'Nah. Not at all. Maybe it would be different if Charlie and I were in love and committed – but we're not. We're just having fun. Charlie Somerset might be just the most gorgeous man in the world – but he's also monumentally unfaithful. No woman would ever take him seriously. Not unless she wanted to end up getting hurt. Which I don't.'
Christ, Jemima thought, impressed. How cool. Had this girl ever been young? She seemed light-years older than anyone she'd ever met. She peered at Lucinda. Was she telling the truth? It appeared she was. She'd immediately returned to laughing over something with Suzy. Gillian was looking quite pink. Whether from wine or shock or lust for Charlie it was impossible to tell. Jemima somehow couldn't imagine them asking her the same probing and intimate questions about the stoical Matt.
'How's Matt?' Maddy must have read her mind. 'Working hard on Dragon Slayer's prep?'
His what? Jemima blinked.
'She means,' Gillian leaned across and managed to slide gracefully on to the sofa without disturbing either her wine or her cigarette, 'how is he coming along in his preparations for the National?'
Jemima tried to concentrate. It was very difficult as Lucinda and Suzy were now behaving like proper teenagers for once by shrieking loudly and anatomically about Charlie and Tina. 'I've no idea. Why? Is it important?'
'She's hoping you'll drop a few pearls,' Gillian continued, speaking in the careful way of someone who is surrounded by far too many empty wine bottles and knows that there's still a fair bit of evening left. 'You know, you and Matt – pillow talk. Something she can go back and tell Drew. Him and Kath are going to be all-out battlers at Aintree, and any bits of information regarding Dragon Slayer's condition and performance will be gratefully received.'
Jemima's mind was blank. Surely they'd only just had the Grand National? Did it all start again straight away then, like the Eurovision Song Contest or the Olympics?
Maddy shook her head. 'I wasn't fishing, Jemima, really. Don't listen to her. Just because we've got Bonnie in the yard doesn't mean that I'm on a spying mission. I was just being nosy about Matt. I mean, when I first met you, you were so anti-jockeys, and now –'
'I still am. Matt isn't like a jockey –'
The Verve had it to themselves. The flat was silent. Everyone stared at her.
'Well, I mean – we don't actually discuss horses or anything –'
'Old Matt got hidden depths, has he?' Suzy stretched across the floor towards another bottle. 'Too busy demonstrating his stud value to discuss horses, is he? I've always wondered what he was like in bed.'
'I wouldn't know. We don't do that, either.' Christ. Why had she said that? Now they were all looking at her with expectation.
'To be honest, I've never quite figured out what you two do do together,' Gillian said. 'I mean, I know he never stays over when he comes here because I watch him leave from our window. And you don't stay at his house. You must have something in common – and as it's obviously not sex or horses, I'm baffled. Is he into train-spotting or stamp-collecting? Come on, Jemima, tell us what you and the mysterious Matthew get up to in your spare time.'
Jemima pulled a face. What exactly did they do? Well, they talked, and went for meals – not all that successfully because Matt only ate naked salad – and they went to the cinema. It was pretty boring, looking at it like that. 'Not a lot, really. He's just a friend.'
'Holy hell.' Suzy sat up, and having lost her glass under the sofa drank straight from the bottle. 'That's a bit unusual in this place. Being friends first. Usually no one makes friends until after they've been to bed.'
'Maddy did with Drew,' Gillian said. 'Didn't you, Mad? And now we'll soon be hearing wedding bells.'
Suzy and Maddy exchanged glances.
Gillian giggled. 'Oooh. Not a rift? I wondered why we hadn't received an invite. I mean, I knew you'd have a civil ceremony so Glen wouldn't be involved, but with the divorce coming through next month, I was sure
'There's no rift,' Maddy said, pushing her wayward hair behind her ears. 'We – um – just haven't got round to finalising anything yet.'
Suzy took another swig from the bottle. 'Crap, Mad. Tell them. They're your friends. They'll understand.'
'Shut up!' Maddy hissed. 'Just because you and Luke are washed up and public about it, it doesn't mean –'
'Me and Luke are not washed up! We're just having a difference of opinion!' Suzy tried to stand up and couldn't manage it. She sat heavily on the edge of the beanbag, dislodging Fran who didn't seem to notice. 'But you must tell Drew how you feel, Mad. He deserves to know the truth.'
Gillian leaned forward, ears pricked. 'What's going on? Have I missed a major village scandal?'
'If you have, then so has Ma,' Lucinda said. 'And that's unheard of. I haven't had a whiff of this one.'
'That's because there's nothing to get a whiff of,' Maddy said quietly. 'Suzy's exaggerating.'
Suzy's answering 'Bollocks' didn't seem very helpful. Jemima, seeing tears welling in Maddy's eyes, interrupted gaily, 'Anyone like a nibble? The twins made them. They're mostly Marmite.'
Everyone, except Maddy who stumbled away from the sofa muttering about going to the loo, took something dark brown and glutinous from the proffered plate. What a lot of undercurrents, Jemima thought, licking a rather pleasant if unusual combination of Marmite and rose from her fingers. Everyone, it seemed, with the possible exception of Fran who was totally sloshed, had something they were hiding. Including her.
As if on cue, Fran suddenly started singing again, despite the fact that the Verve had stopped. Jemima picked her way across Suzy and Lucinda and replaced the CD with one of the twins' favourites. Fizz Flanagan started punching his anarchy into the silence.
'Cool! He's the owner of Bonne Nuit,' Suzy shouted above the rapping. 'I can't wait for him to co
me to Peapods. He's dead lush.'
Jemima shot Gillian an enquiring glance. Gillian shook her head so violently that her teeth rattled. God! Maddy and Drew; Suzy and Luke; Lucinda keeping Charlie secret from Bathsheba; her own dark hidden agenda with Vincent; and now Gillian still refusing to acknowledge ownership of the horse. That the information was kept from Glen, she knew, but she'd certainly expected Gillian to have shared it with her friends. Especially Maddy. Which meant that Drew hadn't told Maddy, either....
Hiding behind the pale curtain of her hair, Gillian managed to avoid Jemima's eyes and smiled. 'I've met him, actually. Fizz Flanagan. He's very pleasant.'
'You haven't! Where?' Lucinda was attempting to remove Marmite from her hair and gave it up as a bad job. 'At a gig?'
'Vicar's wives don't do gigs, dork!' Suzy was alert, too. 'Come on, Gillian. Where'd you meet him?'
Get out of that one, thought Jemima, who knew every detail of the Newmarket sale story off by heart. She beamed at Gillian. 'While you're explaining your relationship with Fizz to the girls, I'll just go and see if Maddy's okay. She's been a long time.'
Maddy was sitting on the edge of Jemima's bath looking sick. Jemima perched beside her. 'Do you want a coffee? I probably should have handed round the Marmite soldiers first. It might have mopped up a bit of the booze.'
'No thanks.'
'And there's nothing else I can get for you?' Jemima felt at a bit of a loss. She didn't know Maddy well enough to mention the problems with Drew. And she'd had far too much to drink to risk mentioning her father. 'There's some brandy somewhere.'
'I'm not drinking, thanks. I'm chauffeuring Suzy and Fran.'
Unsure as to whether it was polite to leave a guest perched on the edge of your bath while you returned to the jollity, Jemima stayed put. She didn't mind too much. The bathroom had grown to be one of her joys. Gillian's taste for cream Victoriana decorated with rosebuds and forget-me-nots wouldn't have been her first choice, but it was lovely. And it was streets ahead of the cracked and mismatched porcelain in her previous bathroom.
Maddy took a deep breath. 'Sorry if I've put a dampener on things.'
'You haven't! Honestly! These things happen –'
'They do to me.' Maddy looked at her through a tumbled mass of auburn curls. 'I really wanted this to be perfect. I thought, just for once, that something I did wouldn't end up in a Godawful mess.'
Floundering, Jemima patted her shoulder. 'I'm sure it'll work out. Whatever it is.'
'No, it won't. Drew wants to get married next month.'
'And you don't?'
Maddy shook her head. 'It's all gone wrong – oh, bugger. I wasn't going to cry –'
Jemima yanked off yards of loo roll and pushed it into Maddy's hand. Radiohead seemed to have taken over the sitting room and were singing sadly through the crack in the door. It seemed very suitable.
Oh, sod it, Jemima thought. I'm hardly the best-qualified person to deal with relationship problems. She knew she was going to have to change the subject. There weren't many to choose from. 'Er – my father seems very happy at Peapods. I'm so pleased that he's settled.'
Maddy's snuffled reply was unintelligible. Jemima hoped it was enthusiastic. She tried again. 'You don't mind him moonlighting for the other trainers, then? Apparently he's getting a lot of work.'
Jemima again interpreted the hrummph from beneath Maddy's curls as an affirmative. 'Oh, good. Only he really needs to build his self-esteem.'
Well, didn't they all? Except Lucinda, of course. The entire evening looked like developing into a Vanessa Feltz special.
'Vincent's been wonderful,' Maddy sniffed, screwing up the loo roll and lobbing it neatly into the lavatory pan. 'And not just with the garden. He's done loads of retiling on the stable roofs, and all the electrics, and he's built a sandpit for Poppy. And a swing ... He made her a swing from one of the apple trees with a little box-seat so that she can't fall out. He says he'll replace it with a proper seat when she's old enough.'
Jemima found it difficult to swallow. Vincent had made a swing like that for her, too. A million years ago, before she'd known about the rows and the tears and the lack of money. There'd been a garden with trees, and a rope swing, and Vincent had pushed her high into the pink-and-white blossom and she'd shouted, 'Higher, Daddy! Higher!' and her mother had been there, laughing ... She snatched at a handful of loo roll and blew her nose.
'Must be catching.' Maddy sniffed again, then looked at Jemima with swollen eyes. 'You're very kind. I'm so sorry. I keep crying these days.'
Jemima, who hadn't had a good cry for years, nodded in solidarity. 'My mother used to say it was the best thing in the world.'
'Mine said it all the time, too.' Maddy rubbed her eyes. 'She just never said it made you look so bloody ugly afterwards.'
Jemima managed to giggle. Maddy looked as though she might join in. She gave a further sniff. 'Thanks for not asking awkward questions. No wonder Vincent's so proud of you. Still, it's like father like daughter, I suppose. You've both done well since you came to Milton St John. And he's so good with his money, isn't he?'
Jemima, who had been about to suggest that they rejoined the party, was instantly on full-alert at the mention of Vincent and money in the same sentence.
'He puts me to shame,' Maddy said, easing herself from the edge of the bath. 'I mean, we can't afford to pay him very much – and I know he's got his other little jobs – but managing to save enough to buy a car –'
'What car?' Jemima had seen him at least twice in the last week and he hadn't mentioned buying a car. He hadn't mentioned it since the day before her shop opened. 'Is he still thinking of buying one?'
'He's already got it.' Maddy paused in the bathroom doorway. 'A really nifty little thing – oh, don't ask me what it is – I'm the world's worst driver. But he's as pleased as punch with it. Oh, hi, Gillian. Yes, I'm fine. No problems.'
'Goody.' Gillian, still fully equipped with cigarette and glass, was hopping from foot to foot in the hall. 'If you two have finished bonding, do you think I could squeeze in for a wee?'
They left at just after one. Gillian, who had offered to stay and help with the clearing-up, had got as far as the sofa and was nursing the plate with the remainder of the Marmite soldiers. Jemima, knowing that there was no way on earth she was going to tackle glass-washing at this hour, stacked everything into the sink, sloshed on enough Fairy Liquid to disperse an oil slick, ran the tap for thirty seconds, and closed the kitchen door.
There were far more important things to think about than squeaky-clean crystal. She'd have to go and see Vincent in the morning. Where the hell had he got enough money to buy a car? Demolishing every shrubbery in Milton St John under the pretext of being a wow with Japanese garden design, wouldn't buy him a car. And he couldn't get credit. There was no question of a down-payment and easy terms. He'd been gambling. She knew he'd been gambling. She'd throttle him. He'd promised.
'All done?' Gillian's eyes were glittering. 'I'm going to have one hell of a hangover tomorrow. It went very well, don't you think?'
Jemima supposed it had. There had been a lot of soul-baring.
'When are you going to tell everyone that you own that horse?'
'Uh?' Gillian blinked under the no-nonsense punch of the question. 'Where did that come from?'
'I was just thinking that we were all keeping secrets tonight. I wondered how long you intended keeping yours.'
'Until I don't have to.' Gillian uncurled herself from the sofa and handed the Marmite soldiers to Jemima. 'Drew's been a star about the whole thing. We've registered the horse – but until it runs for the first time, I don't want anyone to know. You haven't told anyone, have you?'
'Of course not,' Jemima mumbled, having stuffed a Marmite nibble into her mouth and immediately wishing she hadn't. 'Will Glen be furious when he finds out?'
'Furious? No, of course not. He'll probably just have me excommunicated.'
Chapter Eighteen
Kath Seaward push
ed her panama – a memento from her holiday on the Isle of Man – up away from the bridge of her nose, and looked enquiringly across her desk at Tina Maloret. 'Surprised to see you down here again so soon. It's only two weeks since you were last in the village. Unless it's because you can't keep away from bloody Somerset, in which case you must be sodding insane. Does this mean we're definitely on for the National?'
'Dead-on definite. Dragon Slayer looks superb.' Tina raised perfectly etched brows across Kath's office towards Matt. 'How's he riding? Jumping well?'
'Out of his skin. As you'll see in a moment when we go up on to the gallops.'
Matt disliked brainstorming sessions, especially impromptu ones like this. They always caught him off guard. Kath, however, insisted on these owner-trainer-jockey discussions; she said it forged a link. She never went quite so far as to admit to anything quite so girlie as bonding. But more than anything he felt uneasy with Tina. To her, Dragon Slayer wasn't living, breathing, flesh, blood, and muscle, with brains and emotions. To her, he was pure business. And no other owner had the ability to make him feel so amateurish. So inadequate.
He tried to outstare her. It was like trying to outstare a snake. 'He's never been better. Actually, if you want my opinion, I think we should be putting him into an August bank holiday meeting somewhere just to keep him on the boil. We've got a week to get the entries in. Say at Huntingdon – somewhere out of the way.'
He felt, rather than heard, Kath's hiss of breath. She'd told him to keep his mouth shut. But he was the one doing all the work on the horse, wasn't he? He was the one who felt the adrenalin pumping, the muscles tightening. He was the one who knew just how great Dragon Slayer was, how much he was dying to get out there and run for ever.
'I don't think we actually asked for your opinion, did we?' Tina crossed her legs, which despite the heat were encased in sheer shiny stockings, and leaned towards him. 'You stick to your job, sweetie, and let Kath make the decisions.'
Kath, damn her, laughed. 'That's right. Keep the buggers in their place. I wasn't planning on running him until September. I think we'll just up his work-rate a bit until the weather cools off. We'll give him an extra gallop or two to test his stamina and make sure he hasn't gone soft through the summer.'
Jumping to Conclusions Page 20
