by Jilly Cooper
‘It really doesn’t matter, I’ve had such a heavenly time,’ cried Etta. As they took the steep footpath on the right of the barns that ran down through the woods to Etta’s bungalow, Cadbury leapt into the stream, bouncing around, snatching at great mouthfuls of water.
To the left through thinning trees, they could see the extent of the work going on at Badger’s Court.
‘Poor Niall, the vicar, is desperately low.’ Taking Etta’s arm so she didn’t slip, Dora had to shout over the din of the builders. ‘No one really goes to church except Martin and Romy sometimes, Direct Debbie and the Major, Painswick who I’m staying with and Old Mrs Malmesbury who keeps geese. She’s very deaf and yells to poor Niall to speak up.
‘And of course the Travis-Locks, who’ve got their own pew and a door from their garden into the church. Niall’s so petrified of Ione he can hardly get a syllable of sermon out, and she’s always bullying him to urge the congregation not to flush the loo and to bicycle to work. And he’s useless at refereeing rows between flower arrangers and bell-ringers. But he’s rather a boozer, so lock up your brandy if he descends on a pastoral visit. Now here we are at your bungalow.’
‘Which makes even the New Rectory look like a period gem,’ said Etta bitterly.
‘Well, the yellow blends in nicely with the autumn colours,’ said Dora kindly.
‘It’s been such a treat. You have both cheered me up so much,’ said Etta, hugging Cadbury. ‘Oh, look at that glorious horse,’ she added in wonder as a huge black gelding with a zigzag of white blaze came pounding past, hooves sending up sparks from the road.
‘That’s Ilkley Hall,’ said Dora. ‘He belongs to Shade Murchieson, a rich and incredibly difficult owner. Half of his horses are with Rupert and half with Marius Oakridge. Marius is terrified Shade’s going to take his horses away and send them all to Rupert because Rupert’s more successful. Shade likes to keep trainers on the hop.’
Etta remembered Shade Murchieson at Sampson’s funeral, saying ‘Fuck’ when he got an email that his horse hadn’t won. Shade of the brutal good looks and the hard, indifferent eyes.
‘Hang on a sec.’ Etta rushed into the bungalow and rushed out again waving a beautiful royal-blue collar studded with brass dog’s heads. ‘I noticed Cadbury’s collar’s a bit worn. I’d like you to have this one, given to Bartlett for her last birthday.’ Etta’s voice trembled. ‘She never wore it.’
‘Thank you so much,’ said Dora. ‘I love it to bits and it will really suit Cadbury, thank you so much, see you very soon.’
13
Etta’s day got better and better. She managed to pick up, feed and get pyjamas on Poppy and Drummond and supper of baked potatoes and beef stew into the oven at Harvest Home before Martin and Romy returned from a day spent wrestling over the legal aspects of fundraising.
‘You’ve no idea how hard it is even to print raffle tickets these days,’ grumbled Romy.
Clinging on to willow branches, Etta walked for a second time down the steep path, wishing Bartlett was waiting with waving tail and big loving brown eyes, only to find her son-in-law waving a bottle on the doorstep.
‘Carrie has gone to Tokyo, so I thought I’d drop in and see how you were.’
‘Wonderful,’ cried Etta. ‘Sorry about the mess.’ She removed a pile of Dornford Yates so Alan could sit on the sofa.
‘As long as we can find the corkscrew.’ Alan rootled around in the kitchen drawer. ‘You must get a special hook for that utterly crucial instrument.’
‘I’ve had such a good day,’ sighed Etta. ‘An absolutely darling child called Dora banged on my door with those lovely roses and such a sweet dog, which she says I can walk. She took me on a tour of the village and told me all about Valent and Bonny, and the Travis-Locks – we saw her biking off like a Valkyrie – and the Major and his wife Direct Debbie and lots of gossip about Seth and Corinna, and Ilkley Hall pounded by. Nor did I know that someone called Toby Weatherall, who lives here, works for Carrie.’
‘I don’t know for how long.’ Alan filled two large glasses to the top with red. ‘Toby’s pretty thick and chinless and addicted to long weekends slaughtering wildlife, which doesn’t fit my wife’s 24/7 work ethic.’
‘But Dora’s such a darling, so clever, and so kind to geriatrics like me.’
‘Dora has a lot of artistic older brothers and sisters, and a much older father, who died a few years ago, who she misses dreadfully.’
‘She doesn’t like her mother very much.’
‘Anthea’s an absolute bitch who doesn’t give Dora any money, so combined with a truly kind heart, she has a dubious ability to flog stories to the nationals, so watch it. Dora’s now staying with Miss Painswick, an old biddy who used to be the school secretary.’
‘Who lives in Ivy Cottage,’ said Etta triumphantly. ‘Dora suggested we went to the cinema together.’
‘You need someone more exciting than that.’
Etta noticed Alan was looking unusually smart in a blue and yellow striped shirt and light blue corduroy jacket. His blond curls, usually rumpled after a day of writing, were brushed smooth. As he bent over to top up her drink, she smelled lemon aftershave and toothpaste.
‘I shouldn’t,’ she said, putting her hand over her glass. ‘I’m terrified of turning into an old soak.’
‘Marius Oakridge’s horse Stop Preston is running at Stratford on Thursday.’
‘I saw him today, he’s gorgeous.’
‘He’s a very good horse, but rather given to mulish antics. Why don’t you come?’
‘I’ve got to look after Drummond and Poppy,’ said Etta wistfully. ‘Martin and Romy are still on their charity course.’
‘I’ll put on twenty quid for you,’ said Alan, then idly, ‘Did Dora say anything about Bonny Richards and Valent?’
‘That she climbed up a walnut tree and saw them disappear into an upstairs room for hours and hours, and Bonny came down with her shirt crumpled.’ Etta put one hand on her hip like Dora and thrust out the palm of the other.
‘Not platonic then,’ grinned Alan, wondering if it was worth ringing his old newspaper, but he’d lost the taste for selling stories. They always expected one to do more work following them up.
‘How’s the book going?’ asked Etta.
‘Backwards. I’m bored rigid with depression. Perhaps I should interview you.’
‘I’m fine. Today’s really bucked me up. There’s going to be tons to watch in the village. Everyone adores you and Trixie, according to Dora. The dear child sent me some glow stars to stick to the ceiling.’
‘That’s nice.’ Alan drained his drink, rinsed his glass and put it in the dishwasher. ‘I better go home, I’ve not done enough work yet.’
Kissing his mother-in-law, he went out into the night, but turned left to where he’d parked his car earlier, rather than right and home to Russet House. If Carrie was going to use Etta as a spy, Alan was going to use her as an alibi.
14
Later in the week, having spent an awful morning getting Drummond and Poppy off to school with suitably E-zero and organic lunch boxes, sending off change of address cards: ‘Mrs Etta Bancroft has moved to Blot on the Landscape bungalow’, and writing to insurance companies and people who hadn’t realized Sampson was dead, Etta was delighted to receive another visit from Dora and Cadbury in his new royal-blue collar. They carried her off on another familiarization tour. It was such a mild, sunny autumn morning that Dora pointed out two men, stripped down to their tight jeans, who were sunbathing in deckchairs on Valent Edwards’s flat roof.
‘That’s Woody Adams and Joey East, Valent’s site manager, the one who built his own house in the village. Woody’s the local tree surgeon, stunningly good-looking. If he appears at the window when old ladies are playing bridge, they promptly revoke.
‘In fact, if I hadn’t got a gorgeous boyfriend,’ Dora flashed a white blob on her mobile at Etta, ‘who’s at an audition as we speak, I could easily be tempted by Woody.
/> ‘Joey, the other man in a deckchair, is a terrific boozer, probably sleeping off a hangover. He and Woody and Jase, the local farrier, who’s the worst tipster in the world, have a syndicate. They own a horse called Not for Crowe.
‘Such a sweet story: Lady Crowe, who’s a big owner round here, read the catalogue for Rutminster Sales and put in a bid for a chestnut gelding, but retreated in horror when she saw him in the flesh. So a label saying “Not for Crowe” was hung from the poor thing’s head collar. Woody, who’s such a softie, felt so sorry for him he bought the horse for the syndicate and they called him Not for Crowe.
‘I think Lady Crowe got it right,’ sighed Dora. ‘He’s a darling but he comes last in every race. They’ve got a second horse, a dark brown with a white face called Family Dog, who came third at the Penscombe point-to-point, but there were only three horses in the race. They’ve asked me to join their syndicate.’ Dora beamed with pride.
Willowwood was such a beautiful village, thought Etta, scattered as it was over the steep hillside, all higgledy-piggledy, so fields reared up above houses, and cars and cows appeared to be running along the rooftops. It had such a mixture of big houses on the green, terraced houses on the high street concealing charming gardens and winding paths leading up to other houses, jewelled by equally pretty gardens.
Etta felt so sad she hadn’t got a garden. But it was the beauty of the stone, like a looking glass, turning grey on cloudy dull days, platinum blond in the noon heatwaves, soft rose red at sunrise and sunset, rich gold on this sleepy, midge-flecked October morning, that made the place so lovely.
Reaching the very top of the village, Etta and Dora turned right, down into the high street, passing a statue of a handsome Cavalier with long stone curls, waving a plumed hat and astride a splendid pacing horse.
‘That’s Sir Francis Framlingham, Mrs Travis-Lock’s great-great-great-great-great or something who was a bigwig in the Civil War. It was all fought round here, you can see bullet holes in the church.’
Turning off the high street, Dora led Etta up a lane and some stone steps through the lychgate into the churchyard, on to mossy, springy grass cushioned by the dead.
‘What a beautiful church.’ Etta admired the soaring spire and glinting gold weathercock.
‘Twelfth century.’ Dora was about to push through the big oak door when she glanced at the noticeboard in the porch.
‘Oh bugger, run for it. Flower de-rangers at eleven thirty.’ Then, at Etta’s startled look: ‘Mrs Travis-Lock and Debbie Cunliffe are about to do the flowers and have wildly opposing views on colour schemes and who decorates what bit. And I for one don’t fancy telling you the Willowwood legend about Mrs Travis-Lock’s rellies with her butting in all the time. I’ll give you the history tour next time I’m down here.
‘Look,’ she hissed, dragging Cadbury and Etta behind a large plague stone as stack-heeled shoes and thick flesh-coloured ankles topped by a vast clashing orange, scarlet, crimson, bright yellow, royal blue and purple herbaceous border came scuttling past, revealing from the back a seal-like body in a strawberry-pink coat and skirt and iron-grey curls more sculptured than those of Sir Francis Framlingham.
‘That’s Direct Debbie,’ said Dora, falling about with laughter, ‘frantic to get inside before Ione rolls up.’ Then, at the crunch of wheels on gravel and the crash as a bicycle came through a side door into the churchyard: ‘Too late, too late, here comes Ione with flowers of delicate hue in front and back basket. Birnam Wood’s going to be in collision with Birnam Wood Two any minute.
‘And here comes Painswick, who I’m staying with,’ whispered Dora, as a woman in her late fifties and a blue tent dress, who had the face of a disenchanted Pekinese and her arms full of bronze chrysanthemums, ran up the path.
‘Painswick’s quite religious but she can’t have a comforting crush on the vicar because, as I told you, he’s gay,’ said Dora, as they retreated down the steps and headed back to the high street.
‘Now that house, Sky Cottage, belongs to Pocock, a lonely widower, who keeps himself busy running the allotments and calls himself Tower Captain because he organizes the bell-ringers. He’s a very good gardener and works for Mrs Travis-Lock and formerly for your son Martin, who sacked him.’
‘Oh dear,’ sighed Etta.
‘Because they wanted a low-maintenance all-lawn-and-trampoline garden and Pocock likes borders and flowers.
‘One of Willowwood’s greatest tragedies,’ Dora rolled her eyes dramatically as she pointed to a sweet little house with a yellow door, ‘is that Lark Cottage over there used to be rented by Rogue Rogers when he was first retained by Marius Oakridge, before he became champion jockey. Rogue was seriously wild, and evidently pulled everything except curtains. After he left, blondes were found under the floorboards. I wish he still lived there.’
‘He’s a wonderful jockey,’ agreed Etta.
At that moment, a tall man shot across the road into the pub.
‘That’s Mrs Travis-Lock’s husband, Alban,’ hissed Dora. ‘No one’s offered him another job since he left the Foreign Office, not even some stupid quango to boast about at drinks parties, so he’s very sad with no one to boss or influence. Their black Lab, Araminta, is also having a nervous breakdown; she’s so used to policemen on guard duty petting her and cooks in the kitchen feeding her midnight snacks, poor dog. Mrs Travis-Lock’s not the sort of person to indulge husbands or Labradors. She’s refusing to cook Alban any lunch, so he goes to the pub,’ Dora lowered her voice, ‘putting away rather too many with your son-in-law and Seth Bainton when he’s around.’
As they drew level with the pub, assailed by a heavenly smell of garlic, red wine and roasting meat, Cadbury sniffed excitedly. Etta, who’d been living on cheese on toast, boiled eggs and latterly Drummond and Poppy’s leftovers, felt wonderfully hungry and very daring.
‘Shall we have lunch in the pub?’
‘That would be cool,’ said Dora. ‘Are you sure? One of the good things about the Fox is they allow in dogs.’
15
Outside the pub, an inn sign of a jaunty fox in a red coat riding a grinning hound attempted to pacify the anti-hunting brigade. Inside, the message was less ambiguous: horns, hunting whips, bridles, foxes’ brushes and pads on silver mounts, even a stuffed fox in a glass case fought for space on the whitewashed walls with gleaming horse brasses and photographs of hunt servants drinking outside large houses, hounds spilling through the village and in full cry across khaki fields.
‘That’s me on my pony Loofah,’ Dora pointed to a ferocious child, flaxen pigtails flying, hurtling along with the leaders, ‘and that’s Marius Oakridge, the trainer. His father was Master for yonks. Marius is completely one-track – “What war in Afghanistan?” – he never stops working, even hunting he’s always trying out young horses or schooling them.’
‘He’s gorgeous.’ Etta peered closer. Even surrounded by a laughing group, knocking back glasses of port and accepting pieces of fruit cake, Marius, on a sidling chestnut, looked isolated, his pale face guarded, still and thoughtful.
‘That’s his stunning wife, Olivia, on the grey,’ added Dora, ‘and that’s Claudia, the wife of Willowwood’s other trainer, Ralph Harvey-Holden. She left him last summer, because he’s so jealous and threatened to sell some horse she adored. And that hound’s called Oxford. He was walked as a puppy by Old Mrs Malmesbury, and often runs home to her at Catkin Cottage if the hunting gets boring.’
Etta felt terribly guilty. Sampson had thoroughly disapproved of her going into pubs. She was, however, so touched by Dora’s kindness, particularly when Dora immediately introduced her to Chris the landlord, who was fat and jolly, with a big smile, slicked-back dark hair and tired bloodshot eyes, which winked a lot.
‘Chris runs this place brilliantly,’ explained Dora, ‘particularly because he allows dogs in. This is Cadbury’s favourite pub.’
Cadbury thumped his tail expectantly.
‘Chris, this is Mrs Bancroft who’s ju
st moved into Willowwood.’ Hearing the name, Chris’s smile dimmed then returned to full beam as Dora added, ‘Alan’s mother-in-law.’
Putting down the glass he was polishing, Chris pumped Etta’s hand. ‘Any friend of Alan’s, who incidentally has spoken very warmly of you, Mrs Bancroft. ’Ave one on the ’ouse.’
‘How incredibly kind, are you sure? I’d love a small glass of white wine. I’ve got to pick up my grandchildren later.’
‘And you don’t want to be drunk in charge of a monster,’ said Dora. ‘I’d like a Coke if that’s OK, Chris.’
‘We were hoping we might have some lunch?’ asked Etta. Somehow having food in a pub made it less decadent.
‘All up there.’ Chris pointed to a blackboard. ‘Fishcakes is nice. Pheasant’s tasty, so’s Irish stew.’
‘How lovely, fishcakes for me.’
Dora, thinking of a doggie bag for Cadbury, said she’d like steak and chips.
‘That’s an awfully big glass, thank you,’ gasped Etta. ‘So cosy and such a lovely fire and, even better, At the Races on television.’
‘Local Derby at one thirty,’ said Chris as Etta wandered towards the set. ‘Marius Oakridge and Harvey-Holden have both got horses running in the maiden hurdle at Stratford. Harvey-Holden’s maiden proved a bit of an ’urdle for him.’ Chris winked at Etta. ‘He named an ’orse Claudia Dearest after his missus, and she’s pushed off.’
‘Poor man,’ cried Etta, ‘how humiliating.’
‘He’s not very nice,’ said Dora. ‘He doesn’t feed his horses or pay his staff enough, and he works them much too hard, and he threw Claudia’s saddle out into the pouring rain.
‘I was going to take Mrs Bancroft round the church and tell her about the Willowwood legend,’ Dora added to Chris, ‘but Mrs T-L and not much C and Direct Debbie were about to have a punch-up.’ Then as Chris coughed and gave her a warning look, Dora swung round to find Alban Travis-Lock lurking in an alcove behind the racing pages of The Times.