Fair Game

by Sheila Radley

  Neither the spinney nor the sugar beet field had produced as many birds as the first drive, and Martin felt that he hadn’t had a proper chance to demonstrate his skill with a shotgun. If he wanted to be invited again – and he certainly did, despite his reservations – he would have to improve his score during the afternoon. His last chance would be up at the big wood called Belmont, where the Treadgold brothers said there was sure to be plenty of action.

  Meanwhile, there was an hour’s lunch break to come. Martin would be glad to get some warming food inside him, but that was merely incidental. What he really looked forward to was the chance to impress that beautiful shy girl who had been misappropriated by Will Glaven.

  In Chalcot tradition the shoot lunch was held in the gun room, where a blazing fire gave off the scent of apple logs, and photographs of long-gone shooting parties looked down from the panelled walls. A large table was laden with platters of cold ham, cold game pie, fresh fruit, salads, cheeses, and a variety of bottles.

  Most of the party had assembled by the time Martin had washed the dogs’mud and slobber from his hands. The room buzzed with loud voices and laughter. He stood out in the flagged passageway for a moment, craning his neck in an attempt to see the girl, but she didn’t appear to be there.

  ‘Here I am, love!’ said a familiar voice behind him.

  ‘Ah – there you are!’

  Martin turned, guiltily readjusting from his golden-haired dream to the dark-haired reality of his partner.

  There was no denying it: Alison had neither the delicate beauty nor the vulnerability of the younger girl. She was lovely in her own way, certainly. He was still attracted by her smile, the glossy downsweep of her hair, and her eyes that were as green as peeled grapes. But she had never roused in him such a conflicting surge of intention, at once predatory and protective, as he had felt when he first saw the Glavens’guest.

  True, Alison had a lot of other things going for her. Just at the moment, having lost his emotional balance, he wasn’t quite sure what they were. But he didn’t intend to lose her, so he quickly kissed her on the cheek to compensate for the fact that he’d hardly given her a thought since they’d got out of bed.

  ‘Had a good morning?’ she asked.

  ‘Excellent.’ He glanced with approval at the bracken-coloured casual clothes she had chosen to wear. ‘You look very nice, darling. Absolutely right. Have you been here long?’

  ‘About half an hour. I’ve been talking to Hope Meynell, Mr Glaven’s son’s girlfriend.’

  ‘Oh, that’s her name, is it? She appeared before we left for the shoot, but took fright and rushed off again.’

  ‘So she told me. She says the gathering’s a bit intimidating, and we’re meeting here so that we can go in to lunch together. She’s a beautiful girl, isn’t she?’

  There was no point in trying to pretend he hadn’t noticed; Alison knew him too well for that. ‘Yes, she is. Will Glaven’s a lucky man. But I can’t honestly see her fitting in here. This sporting country life isn’t her style at all.’

  ‘Excuse me, madam –’

  ‘Sorry!’ Alison moved quickly aside, out of the way of the smartly dressed housekeeper and her daughter as they brought hot food from the kitchen to the gun room. The mother carried a steaming casserole that left a mouth-watering smell of spiced beef and peppers in its wake. The girl, sulking furiously, carried a dish piled with foil-wrapped baked potatoes.

  ‘Madam …’ Alison scoffed in a low voice. ‘This kind of life is hardly our style, either!’

  ‘I don’t see why not. We could soon get used to it.’

  ‘I wouldn’t want to. As for Hope, I don’t think she realised what she was letting herself in for. Ah, here she comes …’

  For Martin, the next few minutes passed like seconds. Hope Meynell was even more beautiful at close quarters than he’d anticipated. Everything about her – clear pale skin, tendrils of fine gold hair, lovely mouth, delicate figure – entranced him. She kept her eyes shyly lowered until they were introduced, but then she looked up at him with a half-smile that dazzled him with its blue brilliance.

  Alison was saying far too much by way of introduction, making unnecessary references to himself as her partner, and to Will Glaven as Hope’s. But Alison was somewhere out on the edge of his consciousness. He was focusing all his charm on Hope Meynell, aiming to convey to her that he understood her diffidence and that if she needed any support, preferably physical, he was her man.

  Before Martin could win another smile from her, though, Lewis and Will Glaven emerged from the gun room in search of their guests. Will appropriated Hope immediately, putting his arm round her shoulders and steering the poor girl into the room to face their loud friends. Lewis welcomed Alison, gallantly recalling that he had previously met her at the County Show, and led her in too.

  Martin was left to follow on his own. And the unsympathetic glance that Alison gave him in passing told him quite clearly that it served him right.

  At first, he didn’t much enjoy the lunch. The morning’s activity – the noise of the shotguns and the acrid smell of cordite – had given him a headache, which wasn’t improved by the volume of talk and laughter.

  He was also having to come to terms with the fact that he’d made a bit of a fool of himself in Alison’s eyes, and all to no purpose.

  Martin was sitting almost opposite Hope. Lewis Glaven was at the head of the table, with Hope on his left, Will beside her, and then Tweedledum and Tweedledee. On Lewis’s right was Mrs Wilson-Brown, with Martin next to her, then Alison, then Barclay Dodd.

  If Hope had wanted to appeal to Martin for help, or at least register an interest in him, she could quite easily have caught his eye. But though he watched and waited, she never once looked in his direction.

  There was no doubt that she was feeling wretchedly out of place at the shoot lunch. It was an informal, old-friends-together occasion. Conversation was general, and almost exclusively agricultural and sporting. Will was in high spirits and joined in, but though he tried to reassure and encourage Hope she seemed bewildered by the heartiness of it all. She rarely raised her eyes, and she ate hardly anything. Whenever the Treadgold brothers became too raucous, she flinched.

  Lewis Glaven smiled on her benevolently, but spent most of the time roaming round the table, wine bottle in hand, attending to his duties as host. Dorothy Wilson-Brown addressed a few kindly remarks to Hope across the table, but she had to raise her voice in order to be heard and this made her sound so formidable that the girl was visibly alarmed. Martin offered one or two witticisms, trying to catch Hope’s attention; but though Mrs Wilson-Brown was amused, the girl seemed not to hear him.

  And the reason for that was plain to see. Despite her social unease at Chalcot, Hope Meynell was very much attracted to Will Glaven. When she raised her eyes, it was to no one else.

  Martin observed them as they sat closely together and communicated in murmurs, sometimes becoming passionately entangled in each other’s gaze. Will was clearly a man besotted – and who could blame him? The pair of them made Martin feel like a long-married man.

  He was envious, of course. All the same, it was clear to him that there was an imbalance in their ardour. Attracted to Will though she was, Hope was definitely holding back; almost certainly unwilling to commit herself to the Chalcot way of life, Martin thought. And Will was aware of her problem. When they looked away from each other, they both had troubled eyes.

  But intervention was out. Martin acknowledged that any further effort to interest Hope Meynell would be a waste of time. He’d regained his balance, and lost his headache, and so he turned to his right with the intention of being nice to Alison.

  He found her deep in conversation with her neighbour on the other side. Or rather, since it was Barlcay Dodd, who couldn’t hear her, she was listening with every appearance of interest as he told her in detail the sporting history of his Ashthorpe estate.

  Tait could have set about rescuing his future wife, but
he decided callously that she might as well get used to pretending not to be bored. It would be good practice for all the civic and social functions they would be expected to attend when he reached the rank of chief constable.

  Instead, he turned back to Dorothy Wilson-Brown. He wasn’t keen on becoming more closely acquainted with her dim brothers, but the old girl seemed to be well worth cultivating. She was the kind of doughty woman who would know and be known by everyone who mattered in the county; an invaluable contact.

  It was a bonus to find that she was also an excellent table companion. Her conversation was wide-ranging, she had a fund of anecdotes, and she responded to Martin’s wit with an agreeably dirty chuckle. Confident that he had made a good impression, he turned from her with the intention of going to Alison’s rescue.

  But Alison seemed perfectly at ease. She now had the attention not only of Barclay Dodd but of Tweedledum and Tweedledee. The brothers, having quietened down on black coffee, had clearly taken a shine to her. They were competing to entertain her, and Martin found himself registering both pride and affection as he saw how well she was dealing with them.

  When he tried to cut in, though, she ignored him. Come to think of it, she’d been ignoring him all through lunch.

  Perhaps she was peeved because of the way he’d gazed at Hope Meynell. A silly reaction, but he supposed it was understandable. He would have shrugged it off – except, he remembered wryly, that he still had some serious persuading to do.

  Alison didn’t yet know that she wasn’t going to be allowed to wander about freely during the afternoon, or that the camera was banned. She didn’t know that she was expected to stand with him, watching the shoot. And now he’d had some experience of what a driven shoot entailed, he certainly didn’t want to have her with him.

  Even he had felt a touch of shame and pity when he saw pheasants being brought down badly wounded rather than dead. How Alison would react, he dreaded to think. She’d be upset, of course – she hadn’t the kind of country upbringing that would enable her to stand her ground stoically and look away. But tender-hearted though she was, she wouldn’t burst into tears and run off, either.

  Alison Quantrill could be as tenacious as her father when it came to putting right what she thought was wrong. Martin was sure that she would protest against the killing of the pheasants – and not discreetly, either. She wouldn’t confine her complaints to him, she was far more likely to disrupt the whole shooting party, regardless of the fact that it would ruin his chances of being invited again.

  It was a risk he wasn’t prepared to take.

  Alison had made a good impression so far, and he wasn’t going to let her spoil it. It would be to everyone’s advantage if she were to plead a headache and go home straight after lunch. He’d have to put it to her diplomatically, of course … not mentioning the pheasants, but laughing at the ridiculous country-house custom of women being expected to stand with their men, and saying that he refused to inflict it on her. Something like that.

  But there was no time to speak to her at all. The lunch break was suddenly over, and everyone was on the move. Lewis Glaven immediately rounded up Alison and Hope.

  ‘Now, my dears,’ he said briskly, steering them out of the room, ‘as soon as you’re ready, we’ll be off. You must both travel with me in the Range Rover – host’s privilege!’

  That was it, then. Alison was being taken to the shoot and there was nothing Martin could do to prevent it. There’d be precious little he could do to stop her from making a conspicuous fuss when it started, either.

  Scowling with frustration, he went to collect his shotgun for what would probably be his last appearance as a guest on the Chalcot estate.

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘An excellent meal, Mrs Harbord, thank you!’

  Lewis Glaven had appeared in the kitchen doorway, shooting coat on and cap in hand. He was clearly anxious to get away, but punctilious as always about showing his appreciation to his staff.

  It had been a very busy morning for Ann Harbord. As well as making lunch for the shooting party and baking cakes for their tea, she had prepared a great panful of Scotch broth for the keeper’s wife to heat up for the beaters. Her daughter was supposed to help when the Glavens were in residence, in return for her generous weekly pocket money, but Laura had been infuriatingly sullen and difficult all morning.

  Lewis’s thanks, though, made up for everything. Conscious that she was hot and looking less than her best, Ann hurriedly smoothed down her sharply cut black hair and assured him effusively that working for him was always a pleasure. He gave her an abrupt nod and turned away.

  ‘And thank you, too, Laura,’ he said, gruff behind his moustache. Ann was thankful that he’d evidently decided to forget her daughter’s furious outburst yesterday evening. He produced his notecase from an inner pocket and took out an over-generous ten-pound note. ‘Spoilt your Saturday morning, I daresay. We’re obliged to you for your help – eh, Mrs Harbord?’

  He made no attempt to hand Laura the money, but placed it on the table and went. Ann, calling out thanks on her daughter’s behalf, almost ran down the passage after him, but he was already closing the back door.

  Laura stared crossly at the banknote. She didn’t want Mr Glaven to forget how angry she was about pheasant-shooting. And she certainly wasn’t going to be bribed to keep quiet!

  If only he’d tried to hand her the money … How she would’ve enjoyed refusing it, with pride and scorn! That would have shown him.

  But if she rejected it now, he wouldn’t even know she’d done so. Besides, leaving home for good was bound to be expensive … Half-ashamed, she snatched up the money and pushed it into the back pocket of her jeans.

  Her mother was scolding her because she hadn’t thanked Mr Glaven, but Laura had too much else on her mind to take any notice. She’d spent half the night and all morning worrying herself sick about the pheasants.

  Dozens of birds had probably been killed already, and more would die this afternoon if she didn’t soon get out there and put a stop to it. At least her favourites, Fitzroy and Francis and Fred, ought to be safe today, because they had no reason to roam as far as Belmont. But their turn would come later in the season, unless she could shame Mr Glaven into stopping the shoots for good.

  Her insides were tight with anxiety. As she scraped the plates, the look and smell of the meaty remains almost made her heave. Swallowing her nausea, she loaded the dishwasher and banged it shut.

  ‘That’s my lot,’ she snapped. ‘I’m off – can I have my week’s money now?’

  ‘Do you call that finished?’ exploded her mother. ‘There’s still the gun room to put straight, and this kitchen to clean –’

  ‘That’s your job, not mine. I’ve done everything I’m supposed to, and more besides. You heard what Mr Glaven said. He’s grateful to me, even if you’re not.’

  Her mother gave way at the mention of Mr Glaven, as Laura had known she would, and reluctantly handed over the usual ten-pound note. Laura muttered a sarcastic ‘Thanks a lot’ – the last words she intended to say to her – slammed out of the kitchen and raced upstairs.

  Packing to leave had been easy. First thing this morning she had rolled up as much as she could cram into her sports bag, and that was it. None of the details about running away – what to take, where to go, what to do – were important. All she could think about was how she was going to stop the shoot. What happened after that would have to take care of itself.

  She pulled on her SHOOTING PHEASANTS IS WRONG sweatshirt, changed into her DM boots, picked up her sports bag and took a final look round her room. Grown up though she was, she felt sorry that she had to leave her toy animals – particularly the giant teddy bear that her father had given her.

  But real live suffering pheasants are far more important than stuffed toys! She clumped out, shutting the door resolutely behind her.

  As an embarrassed afterthought, she dodged back and pocketed the smallest of the bears for luck.<
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  Hers wasn’t a mountain bike like Darren’s, but an old wreck that had once belonged to her mother. It only had three gears, instead of his eighteen – but at least that saved her from having to keep making decisions. It had a rack which would hold her bag, and it would get her as far as –

  Well, as far as she decided to go, once she had stopped the shoot.

  Laura pedalled fast, scarf flying; out of the stable yard, over the slippery fallen leaves that carpeted the long tree-lined drive, through the open gates and on down to the village. She saw Reg Brunt’s Daihatsu Fourtrak, parked outside his bungalow next to the butcher’s shop, but fortunately there was no sign of Mr Toad himself. No doubt he was sleeping off a large lunch.

  Laura hadn’t intended to think about Darren, but she couldn’t help doing so as she passed the house where he lodged. She was still angry with him, after the way he’d first mocked her for caring about the pheasants, and then had the nerve to offer to join her in stopping the shoot. She didn’t want him, and she didn’t need him. Her plan was made, and if he came out of the house now, this minute, and repeated his offer, she would still tell him to get lost.

  She just wished that she hadn’t begun to feel alone and slightly afraid.

  At the far end of the village, the road forked. Instead of taking the familiar route to Breckham Market, Laura turned off to the right and pedalled as fast as she could along the narrow road that meandered towards Ashthorpe.

  The road was bordered by verges of ragged, fading grass. Beyond the grass on the left was a ditch and a red-berried hawthorn hedge. On the right, overhung along much of its length by trees in their autumn colours, was the old wall that bounded the Chalcot estate. Everywhere smelled of damp earth and leaf mould.