by Jilly Cooper
‘Heavenly smell.’ Georgie gave the scummy dark crimson mixture a stir.
‘I’ll give you a jar,’ said Kitty, ‘and fank you for the lovely bouquet, Ferdie. I got a lovely azalea from Guy as well.’
We even send separate presents these days, thought Georgie wearily.
‘And fank you for Miss Saigon, Lysander. I’ve been playing it all day.’
‘What else did you get?’ asked Georgie.
Kitty giggled. ‘A solar-powered calculator from Rachel, and a jumper from Hermione. It’s got a pattern wiv sheep round the bottom, which make my bottom look ’uger than ever.’
‘Typical,’ said Georgie. ‘And what did Rannaldini give you other than a thick ear?’
Kitty blushed. ‘Nuffink, but he’s been filming all day.’
‘Never mind,’ said Ferdie. ‘Marigold and Georgie are going to give you a special present. Let’s you and me go into the drawing room.’
‘In a place that won’t let us feel, I have found you,’ sang Miss Saigon.
‘Just let me hear this bit,’ pleaded Kitty.
‘You can hear it later.’
Kitty was flabbergasted to learn that Lysander had been paid to make Guy and Larry jealous.
‘But he seemed so keen, particularly on Georgie.’
‘Things have got a bit out of hand there,’ admitted Ferdie, ‘and I’m not sure it’s had the desired effect on Guy.’
But when he explained that Marigold and Georgie wanted to give her Lysander’s services, Kitty at first flatly refused.
‘I couldn’t do that to Rannaldini. It wouldn’t be right. Anyway nuffing would bring him back when he wasn’t there in the first place.’
‘But you love him.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Kitty gave a sigh. ‘I go weak wiv longing every time I sees him.’
‘Then it’s worth a try, just till Christmas. You’d like to be thinner.’
‘Oh, I would.’
After a lot of persuading, Kitty agreed to let Lysander help her improve her appearance, but not to his hanging around pretending to be keen on her.
‘It was realistic wiv Georgie and Marigold. They’re both beautiful.’
‘Not when he took them on,’ said Ferdie. ‘Look, I’d like to lose a bit myself. I’m going on holiday to the Algarve on Friday. I bet you a hundred pounds I lose more than you by the time I get back in the second week in October.’
That’s the rest of my running-away money, thought Kitty wistfully. Oh hell, it was worth a try.
‘All right, you’re on,’ she said, then blushing scarlet, ‘d’you fink it might help if I talked more proper? Marigold suggested elocution lessons like she ’ad. Marigold talks so lovely.’
‘No, no,’ said Ferdie hastily. ‘You don’t want to end up talking like Mrs Thatcher.’
In appalling embarrassment, Kitty and Ferdie were then weighed in, with Lysander and Georgie as witnesses. Kitty was eleven stone one, Ferdie over fifteen stone, until Lysander discovered two Jaffa oranges in his blazer pockets.
‘That’s cheating,’ he shouted, shoving Ferdie back on the scales. ‘You’re only fifteen now. Enter it in the game book,’ he ordered Georgie.
‘Kitty’s will-power is stronger than mine so she deserved a handicap,’ grumbled Ferdie. ‘And get that ghastly tight perm cut off,’ he added taking Lysander aside. ‘And I want her in contact lenses by the time I get back from Portugal.’
Rannaldini was away for two months filming and guest conducting. Georgie was working flat out on the album, seeing musicians and rehearsing for a concert in London the same week that Ferdie got home, which left Kitty and Lysander a lot of spare time.
He tried to cure her terror of horses by walking her round on Arthur who seemed slightly less lame, but although Kitty liked Arthur and took to making him his favourite bread-and-butter pudding, she still much preferred a fence between the two of them. She and Lysander also played endless tennis, worked out and swam. Seeing Kitty’s vast thighs inside which the gusset of her black bathing dress practically disappeared, Lysander wondered if it was all worth it, but he carried on because she was so touchingly grateful.
The drought continued, and was now called an Indian Summer. Leaves were so dry they clanged down. More cows wriggled across the sheep grid into Rannaldini’s woods.
One evening Lysander sat in the kitchen at Valhalla celebrating a large win on Rupert Campbell-Black’s horse Penscombe Pride and watching Kitty iron.
‘Rachel says it’s a wicked waste of energy ironing underpants and ’ankies,’ announced Kitty, ‘but can you imagine Rannaldini goin’ on the rostrum wiv a crumpled ‘ankie.’
‘Why did you marry him?’
‘I was his secretary.’
‘I know that.’
‘It was the Wednesday. I asked him if I could have the Saturday off to go to a wedding. “That’s very inconvenient,” he said. “Whose wedding is it?” I said, “It’s mine, Rannaldini.” He was ever so upset, I fink he was worried he wouldn’t find nuffing when I was on honeymoon. That night he turned up at our ’ouse at two in the morning. Mum was ’opping. Rannaldini drove me to Valhalla. Dawn was breaking, an’ there was a white dew, and all the birds in the air was singin’. It was so beautiful. He was separated from Cecilia by then. He said I couldn’t marry Kevin, because he was going to marry me. Just the same way he used to say: “Bring your book in”. You know how forceful he is.’
‘Christ,’ said Lysander in awe. ‘What happened to all the presents and the cake and things?’
‘They went back.’ Kitty hung her head. ‘It was the worst fing I ever done. Mum was so upset, so was Kevin’s mum and dad, Kevin was – ’ Kitty went pink – ‘he was ’eartbroken.’
‘But you’re Catholic, Kitty. It’s a mortal sin to marry a divorced man.’
‘No, I’m C. of E. Rannaldini’s Cafflic. The vicar at ’ome was ’orrified. Rannaldini got a quickie divorce and married me three weeks later.’
‘I’m gobsmacked,’ said Lysander. ‘Was it ever any good?’
‘Was he faithful? No, never. I caught him phoning Hermione on our honeymoon. “Nuffing will change, my darlink,’ he was reassuring her. An’ it didn’t.’
‘You’re singeing that shirt,’ said Lysander.
Kitty jumped and snatched up her iron.
‘I just ’oped one day he might fall in love wiv me, like Mr Rochester. I’ve read too many romances. People say pack it in, but I ’ate frowing flowers away when they ain’t all dead.’
‘Oh, poor Kitty.’ Lysander got up and hugged her. ‘Once we get you glammed up, he’ll get really jealous.’
‘Some ’ope,’ sighed Kitty. ‘How’s Georgie?’
‘Suddenly terribly uptight about Rachel.’ Lysander poured more Perrier for Kitty and Muscadet for himself.
‘That Guy’s keen on her?’ asked Kitty. ‘I expect he’s just jealous because Georgie likes you so much, and Rachel’s so pretty.’
‘Pretty awful,’ said Lysander. ‘I hate Georgie being miserable. Do you think I should ask her to marry me?’
‘Marry you!’ said Kitty in amazement.
‘We get on so well. I’d look after her.’
He was so touching in his total seriousness, his bluey-green eyes suddenly as vulnerable as Maggie’s, his cheeks flushed with sudden excitement, that Kitty said: ‘Oh, I know you would.’
Lucky Georgie, she thought, taking a grey silk shirt from the pile. ‘The only problem,’ she went on, ‘is I don’t fink Georgie could cope with your present job, hangin’ round neglected wives. I mean she feels safe with me because I’m not a fret. But she had such a shock wiv Guy and Julia, I think her next hubby would need to do somefing which didn’t involve women.’
‘Then I must get Arthur sound,’ said Lysander earnestly, ‘and get a proper job.’
‘How is Arfur?’ asked Kitty fondly.
‘The vet’s coming tomorrow. I’m terrified he’ll say he needs another year’s rest. He loved those rock buns you made him.’
‘Don’t talk about food. I’m starving,’ moaned Kitty.
‘You’ve lost ten pounds,’ encouraged Lysander.
‘I wish I could climb into the tumble-drier and shrink myself down to a size eight like Natasha’s purple flares.’
‘Rachel doesn’t approve of tumble-driers,’ said Lysander. ‘She’d peg you up on the clothes-line.’
Meanwhile the subject of such intense speculation was wrestling with the fiendish complexities of Rachmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto. The recording was not until late October. It was not a work Rachel approved of – too flash and overtly romantic – but she was obsessively determined the London Met, and Rannaldini in particular, should find no fault with her. She was also desperate for her career to take off again to keep pace with Boris whose Berlin Wall symphony was being premiered in the Mozart Hall in November, and even more with Chloe who’d just opened in Don Carlos at the ENO to rave reviews.
Rachel was still burying herself in work, because, apart from her children, who got increasingly on her nerves, there was little cheer in her life. Her longing for Boris made her vile to him every time he came to pick up the children. She couldn’t even bring herself to say anything nice about the Requiem, because Chloe had been sitting outside in the car. It was she, not the poor laboratory animals whom she was always campaigning to save, who should have had her vocal cords cut.
She had had high hopes of Lysander as the ideal dalliance, but, beyond kindness, he had shown no interest. She had hoped even more of Bob, who was on her wavelength intellectually. When Hermione was away, they’d taken the children for a picnic by the River Fleet. Bob was the only person who could control the appalling Cosmo, although yesterday the little fiend had disrupted all the wildlife along the river banks with a new toy speedboat.
When Rachel had tried to explain about noise pollution, Cosmo had told her to piss off, and her own disloyal children had roared with laughter, refusing to make daisy chains because they wanted to play with the boat, too. Realizing Rachel was worried about whirlpools, Bob had helped the children dam up one of the little tributaries still running into the Fleet, so they could paddle and sail their boat.
‘I’m not eating this crap,’ said Cosmo, when offered carrot cake and cauliflower quiche for tea.
Bob refused more politely. ‘Honestly, Rachel darling, I never eat tea.’ No wonder he kept that lean taut body.
Bob had also chucked away his cup of tea, flavoured with goats’ milk, when she wasn’t looking, and instead encouraged her to stretch out on the dusty bank with a cold bottle of Sancerre. After the second glass, seeing her children engrossed in their dam, Rachel had tried, over the appalling din of Cosmo’s speedboat to discuss the far more appalling behaviour of Rannaldini and Hermione.
But Bob had deflected her. ‘Not on such a lovely day. I truly don’t want to talk about it.’
‘But you must feel so humiliated. They’re so odiously public. You ought to have some outlet. You can’t dam the libido up for ever.’ Rachel started to cry. ‘I know I can’t. I’ve been celibate for seven months now. Come over to supper after the kids have gone to bed.’
As if they had a separate life of their own, her pale slim fingers walked across the burnt grass and crept into Bob’s.
‘Daddee,’ it was little Cosmo’s screech. ‘The boat’s stuck.’
‘Well, for Christ’s sake, unstick it,’ screeched back Rachel. But Bob’s fingers, which had not returned the pressure, were gently withdrawn as he got up to help.
Wandering home along the river, when their eyes weren’t meeting, Bob had said, ‘Sweet of you, Rachel dear, but I’ve got to go back to London.’ Then, smiling slightly to soften the snub, ‘Let’s take an acid-rain check on this one.’
And the hot flush of mortification had kept sweeping over Rachel ever since.
Even Rannaldini, who’d been so disgustingly suggestive at the tennis, hadn’t been in touch so that she could reject him.
Hoards of men used to run after me, thought Rachel despairingly as she sunk her sweating, aching fingers once more into the keys, banging out the doomed, infinitely sorrowful opening theme.
‘Dum, da-di-da, da-di-da, da,’ sang Rachel. No-one will ever chase me again except married lechers who get a buzz out of deceiving their wives.
If only she could transmit the depth of her sadness to her playing, but she was hampered by the colossal technical demands of the piece, the explosions of notes which must be perfect.
Boris had warned her of the viciousness of Rannaldini’s criticism. Horrible man. Rachel had a vision of his face, heartless, cold, yet the black eyes blazing with lust and sensuality. Despite the punishing airless heat, Rachel shivered.
The church clock striking three brought her back to earth. She must collect the children at four. Lysander had given her a litre of gin some time ago, which she’d never drunk because she loathed the stuff, but had been intending to turn into sloe gin. Walking over to the tennis tournament at Valhalla, she’d noticed a bumper crop of sloes still green along the footpath which Rannaldini had closed to the public. They should be ripe now. Rannaldini was away. If she were quick she could make a detour on her way to school.
She had been concentrating so hard. Only when she went outside did she realize that it had been raining, a brief violent shower, which flattened the bleached grass and drenched the trees, but made as much impact on the rock-hard ground as spitting on an iron. As she ran up the forbidden footpath, Rannaldini’s woods lay ahead pulsating and boiling like a jungle, incubating insects, dark greeny-grey beneath a white-hot sun which had already dried the tops of the trees.
‘Dum, da-di-da, da-di-da, da,’ sang Rachel, breathing in the rank stench of drying nettles, which had grown so tall they concealed the first PRIVATE – KEEP OUT notice. Blackberry fronds clawed her bare ankles and arms like importuning creditors. She could hear a rattle of distant thunder. Her head ached from gazing at little black notes all day.
Traveller’s joy draped acid green leaves and lemon-yellow flowers over the NO FOOTPATH: TRESPASSERS PROSECUTED sign. Nature doesn’t care about trespassers, thought Rachel. As she waded through waist-high grass, her shoes filled with water. Gretel had taken the children to school this morning, so Rachel had gone straight to the piano without bothering to wash. She supposed this was as good a bath as any.
To her joy, the blackthorn copse was groaning with sloes, shiny and dark like Rannaldini’s eyes, but softened by the palest powdery-blue bloom. Holding her shopping bag underneath to catch the loot, she systematically stripped each branch, swearing as the sharp thorns plunged into her fingers. She glanced at her watch, she must go in ten minutes. She only need fill half the bottle. The recipe said white sugar, but she’d get unrefined brown from The Apple Tree instead. Just as she was reaching up to a high branch, she heard voices and started violently, shrieking as a particularly sharp thorn stabbed her arm.
‘What was that?’ said Rannaldini’s voice sharply.
Rachel dropped to the ground, burying her face in the soaking grass, heart pounding, praying he’d go away. She cringed as a brown slug, big as a rat, edged towards her. How ghastly if Rannaldini caught her. Instead the sinister Clive jumped over a small wall just beyond the blackthorn clump and trained his rifle on her.
‘Don’t shoot,’ screamed Rachel.
Rannaldini followed at a more leisurely pace.
‘I might have guessed,’ he said softly. ‘Bugger off,’ he added to Clive. ‘I’ll handle this.’
Lying flat on her face, Rachel was aware of sloes scattered all round her.
‘Get up,’ ordered Rannaldini.
Leaping down like a great cat, he still made sure he was on higher ground, when she scrambled, raging with embarrassment, to her feet.
‘Can’t you read? This is private property, you stupid bitch. You’re trespassing as well as stealing.’ The words came out like rifle shots.
‘This is a public footpath.’
‘Was,’ snapped Ra
nnaldini. ‘And the wall was always mine. I didn’t know you were a thief.’
Deliberately he stamped on half a dozen sloes, then, removing his shiny brown ankle boot, showed their wounded crimson flesh.
Rachel winced. ‘You bastard!’
Looking down, she was appalled to see how transparent the wet grass had made her muslin shift and her cheap white rose-patterned trousers. She could see the moulded line of her breasts and sticking-out nipples, the pink flesh of her legs, and the dark GIVE WAY sign of her pubic hair. Rannaldini, however, had no intention of giving way.
‘Today I not bastard. I forgeeve them who trespass.’
Rachel’s heart pounded even more painfully, but she couldn’t move as he reached out, testing the pudgy warmth of her breast through the drenched muslin.
‘Bra-less in Gaza,’ he mocked. ‘You certainly advertise your wares.’
He couldn’t tell if her thin face was wet with tears or rain, as his hand strayed downwards. ‘No knickers either.’
‘I got up first thing to practise,’ stammered Rachel, ‘then rushed out in a hurry. I didn’t want to be late picking up the children.’
‘You left plenty of time to steal my sloes.’ Rannaldini clenched and unclenched his fingers.
With his other hand he drew her to him, kissing first her forehead, then both her unplucked eyebrows, then her mouth.
‘No!’ Suddenly aware she hadn’t cleaned her teeth, and loathing herself for minding, Rachel clamped her lips shut.
‘No?’ Rannaldini moved away slightly. ‘Do you have any choice?’
His hand slipped inside her sleeve, caressing its way up her arm, pulling at her long, silky armpit hair, before curling round to caress her breasts.
Rachel gave a moan, trying to duck her head away, as Rannaldini ruffled the slight down on her upper lip with his tongue.
‘Leetle wild thing, eet will be like making love to an animal. A goat perhaps.’
‘I hate you.’
‘No, no, you ’ate yourself for wanting me so much, Mrs Levitsky.’
Rannaldini relished calling women by the names of the husbands he was cuckolding.
‘I’m not Levitsky any more, I’m back to Grant now. Someone’s coming,’ gasped Rachel, hearing a snatch of ‘For All The Saints’ sung in a loud baritone.