by Fiona Walker
‘I’m not!’
‘Everybody says so, even Rory. It’s been going on for ages, since Hugo was away in America.’
‘We’re truly not!’ she bleated, but it was obvious India didn’t believe her.
Hugo had placated the security guard. He called out to India that they had to go and started the engine before shouting something at Tash that she couldn’t hear.
India looked at her uncertainly.
‘Go,’ Tash insisted. ‘Tell Hugo I’ll go straight to the hotel. It’s the Hotel Ballenberg – the details are in the horsebox. Tell him he must come, India.’
‘And if he doesn’t?’
‘Then it’s over, isn’t it?’ She looked up at Hugo in the cab, that beautiful profile fixed straight ahead, that ludicrous, fierce pride unable to see the truth. ‘If he believes everyone else rather than me, then it’s over.’
Giving her a hug, India grabbed her own bag and jumped back on board just as Hugo released the air brakes with a deafening hiss. Tash could hear the horses kicking in the back as the big lorry slid away. She felt as though she was taking blows straight to her chest. Watching the tail lights fade and the Mogo logo disappear into the distance, she slumped down against the wall of the terminal building and sobbed.
The security guard, who was by now thoroughly fed up of these English idiots, marched up to her. ‘You cannot do that there. This is Düsseldorf Airport and we have rules, ja?’
‘Is there a designated weeping area, then?’ Tash asked, picking up her bag and wandering inside.
Chapter 71
Tash lay across two seats on a near-empty Air Berlin shuttle, wishing that she had booked herself on a Heathrow flight instead. The temptation just to go home had, for a while, been so strong that she had shut herself in an airport loo and cried, reminding herself that if Hugo followed and found out, she would look even guiltier. Lough would be back in West Berkshire. She was safer in Germany, fighting for her marriage.
By the time she reached Hotel Ballenberg she had been in transit for over sixteen hours and was dead on her feet. She would have happily slept in the foyer but they gave her a third-floor room with wooden walls, dark carved furniture and a beautiful view down across sweeping pine forests to a gorge. She stared at it from the little balcony where she took up position after a restless sleep and sat for hours on end, feeling sick, waiting for Hugo to call and tell her when he was arriving.
He didn’t call, or reply to the messages she left when his phone always went straight through to voicemail. She was convinced that he must have run straight into V’s loving arms.
In a daze, she phoned Haydown.
‘How are the Swiss Alps?’ Franny asked cheerfully.
‘Very like the Black Forest.’ Tash looked out across the undulating treetops and realised that Hugo couldn’t have let her know what had happened. He must still be on his way. ‘How’s Beccy?’
Franny reported that, having reappeared cheerful and unrepentant after her drive to Sheffield, Beccy had gone with Penny and Faith to the West Wilts trials that day: ‘I know it’s not my place to say this, but I think she’s pushing the horses – and herself – too far, taking too many risks. She knows no fear.’
When Tash called her mobile later, however, Beccy excitedly reported that she had just ‘ridden a blinder’ and won her class. It was hard to argue with results like that, particularly in the light of Tash’s own crippling nerves, which she was certain had blighted Haydown’s winning reputation all year, along with all the rumours about the Beauchampions’ rocky marriage. Thinking about Hugo made her well up so she hurriedly cut the call to Beccy with vague congratulations and reminders to ‘stay safe’.
It took several attempts to get through to Alicia. ‘The Krauts are marvellous,’ she reported. ‘They do everything. I’m thinking of getting a pair of my own for the Dower House. The children are happy as sand boys, and I don’t have to lift a finger. How are you and Hugo?’
Tash wavered, unable to tell her mother-in-law that she thought their marriage was over. Alicia had been the very first to suggest Hugo had a mistress, all those months ago when Tash was heavily pregnant with Amery. She hadn’t taken her seriously at the time.
Alone in the Black Forest, sitting high on her balcony, she tried to contact her own mother, but there was no answer on her mobile, so she was doubtless in some remote corner of the globe. In desperation and in need of an honest ally she called Penny.
‘Your sister is frankly dangerous.’ Penny started speaking before Tash could say more than ‘hello’. ‘She doesn’t listen to a word of advice and rides far too fast. Now, tell me what happened a Luhmühlen? Lough’s come back looking as though he’s just had his best horse shot, not won a four-star—’
‘I think Hugo might have left me for someone else,’ she whispered, saying it out loud for the first time with such a stab of pain that she couldn’t speak again for several minutes.
But Penny’s cynical reaction shocked her. ‘Oh, he’ll be back. Welcome to the Eventer’s Wives Club.’ She sounded almost cheerful to have a new recruit. ‘One starts out with such throat-cut shock, thinking you won’t see the week out, and then a year later they’re still shagging their way around the circuit like a dog pack and it no longer feels so dreadful. I hesitate to say it’s normal – I want to cut Gus’s balls off some days – but we rub along pretty well, and get the job done. We still make each other laugh, and at least the pressure for non-stop nookie is off, although he’s been dropping heavy hints about me wearing stockings this coming weekend. I suppose I could oblige; I’ve dug out an old linen dress suit for the big day that’s very serviceable and shows off the pins. Gotta keep these bad boys of ours aware of what they’re forsaking. What are you wearing to the wedding?’
As soon as the call ended, Tash crawled into bed and the foetal position, her worst suspicions seemingly confirmed by Penny’s lack of surprise. As with his great friend and ally Gus, Hugo’s infidelity must be an open secret on the circuit, kept as gently and kindly as possible from the ears of their wives.
To her total amazement she slept for fifteen hours straight through, waking up just in time for the hotel’s buffet Frühstück, which of course involved lashings of cold meats, cheeses and Brötchen. Ravenous, Tash helped herself to thirds, popped a few rolls and pastries in her bag for later and retired to her room to compose another text to Hugo, but she only got as far as I know you are having an affair … before she had to rush to the bathroom to be sick. The reality of the situation wiped her out.
He’d made her promise ‘no more texts’, but she was left with no choice. It was this or carrier pigeon.
Back on her balcony, she drafted her message long-hand on hotel writing paper. It was three pages long, tearstained and very heartfelt. But when she came to transcribe it into her BlackBerry, her huge breakfast still giving her terrible heartburn, she gave up and edited it down to a few lines:
When I tell you that nothing has happened between Lough and me, I expect you to trust my word, Hugo. And when I hear that you are having an affair, I don’t believe it. Or am I just a fool?
She sent it, not realising that by editing all the love and tenderness from her words she had stripped it to an aggressive, challenging minimum. Heartburn twinging, she went to have a shower. She had already run out of clean clothes; India had only crammed a few essentials into her bag. She had nothing suitable for going outside for a walk, let alone a wedding. Without Hugo she had no desire to hear the marriage vows out loud. She knew she hadn’t broken hers, but she strongly suspected he was smashing all of his right now.
Her phone beeped while she was in the bathroom, hand-washing her underwear. She raced through to read the message.
It was from Hugo.
Will be at the wedding.
That was it. No explanation, no apology, as succinct as a text to the feed merchant announcing he was on his way to pick up an extra bag of barley rings.
Hugo was good to his word. He was at the wed
ding but went directly there without stopping at Hotel Ballenberg. His hire car, thick with dust and dead flies from the journey, sported several alarming dents from a lengthy and recklessly fast mountain detour.
The marriage ceremony was taking place in a beautiful painted church in a medieval hamlet deep in the forest. It was pure Brothers Grimm. Had word come down from the hills that the giant ogre from the nearby schloss was looking for a virgin in exchange for three golden eggs and a handful of magic beans, nobody would have been surprised.
Hugo was outside the church doors in his morning suit, handing out service sheets with Gus Moncrieff when Tash arrived on one of the coaches ferrying the guests from the hotel. She was wearing a borrowed dress that was far too short, and an awful hat Penny had brought as ‘a spare’, and which looked like a dead pheasant.
‘Bride or groom?’ He looked up as she approached, those blue eyes like laser pointers.
‘Wife,’ she said, battling to stop her voice shaking. ‘I’m your wife, and I won’t let our marriage fall to pieces like this.’
‘Not now, Tash.’
Unable to say more because the lump in her throat was threatening to garrotte her, Tash rushed into the church and deliberately sat among some German-speaking riders, who all looked at her – and her hat – in alarm. She tipped the feathery brim down over her eyes and cried throughout the ceremony for all the wrong reasons.
Jenny looked stunning in a huge meringue complete with embroidered horses on her train and a tiara as tall as a top hat. Dolf wept as he said his vows. They rode away after the ceremony on his favourite event horse.
Hugo travelled back to the hotel in a different coach from Tash and, thanks to Jenny’s super-efficient and partisan seating plan, spent the next three hours at the roof garden reception sitting between an influential, busty German sponsor and a willowy Belgian dressage coach, while Tash sat between Brian Sedgewick and Mick James, both of whom had heard how bad things were between her and Hugo and offered a shoulder to cry on in best eventing tradition:
‘Always fancied you,’ Mick said matter-of-factly, ‘so if you need a bit of comfort …’
‘Hugo’s a difficult man,’ Brian said more cautiously. ‘His breed need constant stimulation and yet no distractions. You are very stimulating, but also far too distracting, Tash. I have a lovely little cottage in the Lakes if you need some time away to think …’
Tash tuned them out, just as she did the speeches, continually finding her eyes drawn to Hugo.
His eyes, surprisingly, seemed equally drawn to her, although his expression was unreadable. He was downing champagne horribly quickly, she noticed.
By contrast, she couldn’t even drink her way to oblivion. Alcohol was making her ill.
When the tables were pushed back for dancing she fled gratefully for the lifts.
Just as the doors were closing a hand reached in to pull them back and Hugo stepped in.
‘Going down? Or do you just do that for Lough?’
Tash closed her eyes despairingly for a moment. ‘What do I have to do to stop this?’
‘Divorcing me would stop it pretty effectively.’
She felt faint with dread. ‘I don’t want that.’
‘Don’t you?’
The lift shuddered to a sudden halt and a fat German in swimming trunks stepped in, heading for the basement pool. He nodded at Hugo and stared lustily at Tash’s short dress.
When their floor came at last they stepped out. Tash slotted in the key card, but Hugo made no move to follow her into the room.
‘I guess this is it,’ he said quietly.
‘Is it?’ she croaked, turning to look at him.
He nodded, his face quilted with tightly knotted muscles.
Tash felt the long corridor walls tilt in as her vision tunnelled for a moment. She gripped on to the door handle, worried she might faint. ‘I don’t know how to make you believe me that nothing happened with Lough. Nothing. I don’t care if I never set eyes on him again in my life, just so long as I don’t lose you.’
His eyes darted towards the lifts, as though longing to step in to one and avoid the topic.
‘You have to trust me, Hugo.’
‘I don’t see how.’
‘We have children together.’ Her voice broke with emotion. ‘We have built so much, our family life, our livelihood, our love’ – she battled back sobs – ‘and we’ve built trust, even if some of that has been lost. It’s all about trust. We can build it up again. We just have to talk.’
He let out a long sigh. ‘You really think that can mend this?’
‘Surely it’s worth a try?’ She held open the door, heart punching up into her throat with such hope and fear that it felt as though it would dislocate her jaw.
He walked inside.
Shaking with relief as she followed behind, Tash closed the door and leant against it. ‘I love you so much. It’s been such a hellish year. We have to lay our hearts on the table here about – everything.’ Her voice shook as she thought about the V texts.
But Hugo was not a man brought up to talk, let alone lay his heart or any other part of his anatomy on a table. He’d heard enough for now. Turning to look at her in a storm of silent, misunderstood confusion, he did the only thing he knew to work.
Moments later the borrowed dress slid to the floor and Tash’s well-spring of eternal optimism bubbled up again as Hugo scooped her up and carried her to the bed.
The Beauchamps missed the wedding celebrations that night.
Up in their wooden, bedtime-story room, with its twisty hand-carved furniture and shutters, Tash and Hugo celebrated togetherness in body if not in mind.
It had been less than a week, but Hugo could already feel more bone jutting through his wife’s skin, which had previously yielded softly to his touch, and she had a new listlessness that concerned him. He was amazed by how deeply she slept afterwards and worried that she was ill, but at least her unconscious state meant he could go on to the balcony to smoke and plot ways of murdering Lough.
Sitting outside, he found Tash’s draft text to him paper-weighted by a potted alpine on the table. He read it in the half-light, eyebrows raised.
Then he set light to it and watched its ashes flutter away towards the treetops.
Reaching for his phone, he texted V. Not over yet.
Be brave, darling one, she replied with gratifying speed, as always.
The following morning Tash skipped the big gossipy breakfast and enjoyed a long soak while Hugo laid siege to the buffet downstairs, his appetite predictably enormous.
After her bath, she wrapped herself in a towelling robe and peered at her reflection. The black eye that Cub had given her at the first trot-up in Luhmühlen had now faded to a patchy yellow, lending her face an unflatteringly jaundiced tinge, but there was no denying the way in which the hollows beneath her cheeks heightened her bone structure and made her eyes look huge. Her face bore little resemblence to that of the plump-cheeked, happy wife who beamed out from so many photograph frames at Haydown, hugging Hugo and their children. This morning, she let herself hope that happiness was within reach again; they were both turning over new leaves as eagerly as two gardeners preparing their Chelsea stand.
Then she wandered out onto the balcony to breathe in the Black Forest air and found Hugo’s phone on the table.
‘Don’t look at it,’ she told herself firmly, turning away.
She turned back. For a few moments, Tash turned to and fro on the high ledge like a figure on the Trumpton clock before she gave into temptation and grabbed it.
Soon the little rubber-armoured mobile was flying through the air, high over the pine trees, where its manufacturer’s indestructibility guarantee would be tested to the limit.
Still swathed in her robe and her wet hair up in a turban, she marched downstairs, tracking Hugo down to a table of very hungover eventers, including the Moncrieffs.
‘Who is V?’
He stared at her blankly for a moment.
‘Is she your mistress?’
The restaurant had fallen eerily silent, apart from the odd scrape of a chair being moved back to allow a better view of the confrontation.
‘Ah, V.’ He slowly set down his coffee cup on its saucer, adjusting the spoon to sit neatly in the rim. ‘V means no more to me than Lough does to you. Trust me.’ His eyes met hers challengingly. ‘It’s all about trust.’
At that moment the newlyweds walked in to a raucous round of applause. Jenny made a beeline for Tash and Hugo.
‘I’m so glad you two have made up your differences.’ She hugged them both happily. ‘It’s a double celebration now. I told you this place is wildly romantic. Good to see you’ve been using the spa, Tash. Now promise me you’ll both come on the forest walk today? We’re going to have a huge picnic and play volleyball.’
Tash couldn’t look at Hugo. She hoped they might find his phone out there somewhere, even if trust was still far out of reach.
Chapter 72
‘No!’ A universal cry of horror went up in the Moncrieffs’ tatty sitting room as Hugo and Oil Tanker ran out at a straightforward corner on the Aachen cross-country course. Only Lough remained silent, his face giving nothing away as he stood apart, arms crossed in front of him, at the back of the room.
The Lime Tree Farm mob had gathered on the threadbare sofas and chairs with dogs on their laps and mugs of tea in their hands. All were wearing breeches, having ‘just popped in for five minutes’ tea break’ to look in on the European Championships action. Now, with the British trail-blazer in trouble, they couldn’t drag themselves away.
‘That was so unlucky,’ said Penny.
‘Oh, c’mon, he’s riding like a dork,’ Lemon pointed out cheerfully as Hugo turned a circle and took the alternative before kicking on away from the fence while dispirited Union flags were waved by a couple of eager Brits in the crowd. ‘He’s probably been up all night with his pretty new groom. Leopards never change their spots.’
Perched on a footstool by the bookcases, Faith shot a warning look across to the armchair in which the little Kiwi was sprawled, keeping up his constant critical commentary. His barbed and personal remarks kept edging dangerously close to revealing Hugo’s drunken New Year’s Eve tryst, a secret he’d sworn to keep for Beccy’s sake, as Faith had. She was certain the Moncrieffs would pick up on the insinuation that Hugo was bedding Penny’s niece, but they were totally absorbed by the on-screen action.