Well Groomed

by Fiona Walker

  ‘There you bloody are.’ He threw up his hands impatiently and turned on his heel to march back towards the box. ‘We were giving up on you. Hurry up – we’re practically the last here.’

  ‘Who’s driving?’ Tash asked, trailing behind him. With Franny not with them, someone else would have to take the wheel of the huge box.

  ‘I am,’ he muttered.

  Tash started to lag back, fear squirming in the pit of her stomach.

  ‘Let me,’ she urged. ‘You’ve been through one hell of a shock.’

  ‘I’m fucking driving – now get in and shut up. Ted and Stefan are staying in the back. You can come in the front with me.’

  The journey home started badly as Hugo punched out the glass of the indicator light by brushing the post of a gate on the Lowerton rear drive. Again Tash offered to drive and again she was told to go to hell.

  The last grey streaks of light faded out of the sky as they charged along the M4. Tash could hear Ted and Stefan talking in low voices in the rear. Normally they played raucous games of poker – often with Hugo – as Franny drove the long-haul home. But today was different as gloom prevailed. Tash had been careful to hide her rosette in the bottom of her trunk. With her knees tucked up to her chin, she chewed her way through nine-tenths of her nails and only had one little finger to last her the rest of the journey.

  Although Hugo tried his damnedest to kill them all on the last stretch, the high-tech coach-built box lived up to its design standards superbly, power-steering and braking them to safety every time he lost concentration. Even so, Tash felt as though she had lived eight of her nine lives in several incarnations by the time they reached Fosbourne. As a result, she and Hugo were no longer speaking at all and Tom Waits had been around on auto-reverse several times.

  ‘Be quick, I want to push off home,’ Hugo muttered as he pulled up outside Lime Tree Farm, not even bothering to turn into the yard.

  They had to unload hurriedly in the lane, further pressured by a weekender’s very clean Rhino jeep thundering up and, finding it couldn’t get around the box, hooting its horn angrily. Snob became increasingly maddened and unruly as a result. When they were finally out and the ramp was up, Ted thrust two fingers up at the angry jeep driver and stalked into the yard.

  Tash made her way to the cab with Stefan to say farewell, but Hugo didn’t even look at her, his white knuckles clasping the steering wheel as though it was the safety bar of a fair-ground fright-ride.

  Giving her a hug, Stefan breathed in her ear, ‘Thanks for your help today, darling – you were great. I’ll take care of him, I promise. Is Franny staying here tonight?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Get her to call me on my mobile at seven, will you?’ He winked.

  Nodding, Tash watched him climb up on his long, long legs, blond hair gleaming in the cab light before it was extinguished as he slammed the door. With Tom Waits still booming, Hugo drove off so fast that he took most of the hazel hedge with him.

  Having settled Snob and checked him over thoroughly for bumps and cuts, Tash left Ted mixing up his feeds and wandered into the kitchen, longing for warmth and sympathy.

  India was doing her homework at the table, chewing a pen thoughtfully, her blonde hair curled up on to her head and secured with a sock.

  ‘Good day?’ She looked up, pretty face scrunched in inquiry.

  Tash shook her head. ‘Kirsty hasn’t said anything, then?’

  ‘Haven’t seen her.’ India shrugged. ‘She dumped poor Betty and charged upstairs for a bath before heading off to London with thick Richie. They’re seeing some play with Maggie Smith in it. Richie was seriously pissed off because he’d got her muddled up with Maggie Thatcher and was desperate to try and meet her backstage.’

  ‘I see.’ Tash wasn’t taking much of this in.

  ‘Penny and Gus aren’t back yet.’ She stood up and put the kettle on. ‘Mum and Niall are in the sitting room. Tea or coffee?’

  Not answering, Tash wandered into the sitting room, eager for a hug.

  Niall and Zoe were sitting on the sofa, feet tucked beneath them, elbows on arm rests as they watched an old film over the rims of their tea mugs. They looked like a pair of matching book-ends. Even though they were sitting a respectable two feet apart, there was an air of intimacy between them that made her stop in her tracks.

  Neither looked up until Beetroot raced across the room and welcomed Tash with an excited series of yelps, her long, frayed-rope tail quivering with joy.

  ‘Tash – we didn’t hear the lorry.’ Zoe put down her mug and stretched back over the sofa arm with a smile. ‘Win anything?’

  ‘Hugo dropped us in the lane.’ Tash noticed that they were watching an old black and white film of the soppy, sentimental sort that Niall normally loathed. From the flickering rectangle, Bette Davis was dabbing a diamond-like tear from her cheek with a crisp white triangle of hanky, her gloved hand quivering along with her lips.

  ‘What is it, Tash?’ Zoe was watching her with concern.

  ‘Surfer had to be destroyed.’ She watched as Bette lit a cigarette, lips still quivering. ‘He fell – I’m not sure quite what happened. Broke his back.’

  ‘Christ!’ Niall covered his mouth. ‘I’m so sorry, Tash angel. Oh, my poor love. Which one was he?’ he asked. ‘That big bay fella? Were you hurt at all?’

  She shook her head. ‘Surfer was Hugo’s horse, Niall.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Niall seemed to perk up at this, imagining it made things better. ‘Poor old Hugo.’

  ‘But you did okay?’ Zoe asked, reaching for her zapper and muting Bette who was throwing a bit of a distracting blue funk on screen, lips still quivering.

  Tash suddenly found she didn’t want to talk about the day with either of them. Although they would offer all the support and sympathy she could ask for, they simply would not understand what it was like. They loved horses, but they weren’t their life and that made them impossibly distanced from people like herself, Hugo and Stefan. Worse still, they were both regarding her with soft-eyed kindness, like a pair of parents preparing to listen to a teenage daughter ranting on about being dumped by a boyfriend. The stance made her feel impossibly uncomfortable.

  ‘Forget it – I’m going to have a bath.’ She stood up again, dropping Beetroot to the floor.

  ‘There are plenty of clean towels in the laundry cupboard,’ Zoe called after her. But, slamming the front door, Tash decided to head to the forge with Beetroot.

  Having fed Giblets and taken a long soak in the chipped bath, she curled up on the sofa with a trashy novel and ate her way through a packet of Just Brazils that a fan had sent Niall. After he claimed on Desert Island Discs that they would be his luxury, he was currently receiving about six boxes a week. Her feet warming on Beetroot’s tummy, she lobbed the odd one at the dog’s eager mouth. Beetroot had put on a growth spurt recently and was starting to look alarmingly like her father – the deceased, shaggy Lothario, Rooter. Tash no longer wondered why Niall was afraid of her; she was already bigger than Wally and, although most of her was gangly legs, she had a lean, mean lurcher look that was pretty terrifying when she growled.

  ‘You have to learn to love him,’ Tash told her, adoring the way her envelope-flap ears sprang forward, head cocked, eyes adoring – although Tash suspected she was more interested in the Just Brazil than the line of conversation. ‘Promise you’ll try to like Niall, huh? Just for me.’

  Beetroot chomped up the chocolate with great white teeth and looked at her benignly.

  He came in half an hour later, just as Tash was breaking into a second packet.

  ‘I stayed to the end of the film,’ he explained rather sheepishly.

  ‘Fine.’ She stuffed another chocolate in her mouth.

  ‘Was it pretty hellish today then?’ He slumped down beside her and took a Just Brazil, ignoring Beetroot who was growling ominously from beneath a cushion.

  ‘Very hellish,’ Tash passed the box to him. ‘Do you want someth
ing to eat?’

  He shook his head. ‘Zoe made me a big plate of some odd lentil stew stuff. Amazingly tasty. Everyone jokes about her cooking, but she’s bloody good, if weird. She says she finds ordinary ingredients limiting.’

  She watched as he headed into the kitchen to fetch the inevitable bottle of Bushmills, stooping to avoid the low overhead beams that he would no doubt crack his head on fairly soon after he had cracked open the bottle. She could always tell how drunk he was by how loud the smack was on impact.

  ‘Want one?’ He waggled the bottle at her, searching for a clean glass amongst their mountain of washing up.

  ‘No, thanks.’ She rubbed her chin awkwardly. ‘Do you have to tonight?’

  ‘Have to what?’

  ‘Drink.’ She smiled apologetically. ‘I thought we could have a chat – we haven’t talked properly in ages.’

  ‘Sure.’ He was already pouring himself out three inches. ‘We can talk while I have a wee night-cap, angel. What d’you want to talk about?’

  ‘Oh,’ she kept her tone light and vague as she fiddled with a cushion tassel, ‘the wedding and stuff.’

  There was a bitter edge to his laugh. ‘In that case, I definitely need a drink.’ All three inches slid down his throat and, banging the glass down, he immediately poured himself another, dark hair flopping over his face.

  ‘I can’t talk to you if you get drunk, Niall,’ Tash said softly.

  He looked at her, a smile playing on his lips as he held the glass to them, eyes merry.

  ‘That’s your problem, angel, not mine,’ he said softly, taking a long sip, his gaze raking over her indulgently. ‘You look so sexy tonight – all clean and scrubbed and fresh. Will you tell the dog to get in its basket so I can sit down and touch your skin?’

  Tash closed her eyes for a brief second. It was hopeless talking to him when he was like this – it was Niall in deNiall; he was impenetrable in his cheerful, insouciant assertion that nothing was wrong. She had tried it before, but he would be a wonderfully attentive listener who heard nothing. His eyes would blaze into hers throughout, he would touch her and kiss her and tell her he loved her, which was just what she wanted to hear. Almost inevitably they would end up in bed – Niall’s answer to all rows. But they never had rows, Tash realised. That was the problem. Who could have a row with someone when they agreed with everything you said and tried to take your clothes off while you were saying it?

  ‘Have the whole bottle.’ She stomped off with Beetroot, too tired to face the battle which he always won by not fighting at all.

  When Niall tried to climb in with her later, Beetroot growled so much that he elected to sleep on the sofa. Although Tash slept on throughout, Beetroot cocked her head with interest as she heard him trip clumsily down the stairs and stagger into the sitting room. A moment later there was a loud thwack as he hit his head on the low beam in the kitchen.

  Sitting in the dark in his own vast kitchen, Hugo could hear the electric clock on the oven creaking through the seconds, could see the shadows of the looming, old-fashioned furniture lit by the various pilot and power lights that gleamed from every electrical appliance.

  In his hand was the brown and blue rosette Tash had won on Snob earlier that day – one of the grooms had found it at the bottom of a tack trunk and handed it over to him, assuming it was his. The memory of how lousily he had treated her was twisting in his stomach like cramp. He’d been so wrapped up in his own failure, jealousy and confusion that he’d blown everything.

  For a moment he considered driving down to the farm to apologise, but he knew that Niall was around at the moment. In other circumstances he might have gone ahead for the hell of it, but he had ridden his best horse to its grave today and his confidence and pride were shattered. He was deeply ashamed of himself and shaking with nerves and self-doubt. And the hundred-weight straw bale that was breaking the camel’s back was the fact that he was now absolutely certain Tash no longer wanted him. She was going to marry a man who, worse than anything, Hugo genuinely liked, a man who was kinder and brighter and far more likeable than he himself was. That hurt more than hell itself.

  Grabbing the phone, he searched around for his wallet and pulled out a business card, flipping it over to read out the home number written on the back.

  ‘Lisette? Hugo – yes, fine, thanks. The place is all yours as long as you can guarantee that the running of the yard won’t be interrupted. That’s great. Yes – next week, then. Call me.’

  Tash woke after midnight and, finding herself alone with Beetroot, had a brief moment of panic before she heard the muted sound of the television floating up through the door to the stairs. Niall was clearly still up and, from the sound of it, watching Beavis and Butthead. She could hear his low, melodious laugh breaking in every now and again over the television’s gruff American chatter and strident music.

  Staring at the phone by the bed, she wondered whether she should call Stefan and check that Hugo was okay. But she didn’t dare call straight through to the house in case Hugo picked up the call and took it to mean she was panting away fantasising about him, and besides her diary with the number for Stefan’s mobile written in it was at the farm.

  Nestling deeper into her pillow, she hoped to God he was all right. When she closed her eyes, she could see him back in the cramped horsebox, his beautiful face desolate. Part of her still loathed him for the shabby way he’d treated her, his appalling contempt and the childish pleasure he seemed to derive from reminding her of that awful, fierce crush she had wasted on him for so many years. But she knew that, unlike Niall, attack was Hugo’s first, second and third line of defence – he was savagely private and proud. Today he had, for the briefest of moments, broken down and shown a weak side she’d never known existed. And he’d done so to her of all people – shy, useless Tash whom he thought hopelessly wimpy. But instead of digging deeper and trying to extract the pearl, she had let him clam shut again. She was gnawed through with guilt and, though she hated admitting it to herself, raging, heart-pounding disappointment.

  Twenty-One

  * * *

  THE NEXT MORNING, NIALL left for Yorkshire to start the location shoot for The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

  Determined not to pine, Tash threw herself into work.

  At last given the all-clear to bring Hunk back to top-level competition fitness, she launched into an intensive training programme, relishing his eager obedience compared to the struggles she’d been having with Snob of late. A gentle giant bay with a Roman nose and knowing eyes that reminded Tash of Leonard Rossiter, he was the comedian of the yard, known for his face-pulling stunts and incurable greed for Polos – no other mint had the same effect on him. Biddable, armchair-easy and a great listener, he was a joy to ride.

  Over the next week, as Hunk got better, Snob went rapidly downhill. Penny and Gus had decided that it would be fun to train him to pull a carriage for Tash’s wedding. After one session in the menage with Ted long-reining him from behind while Snob dragged a tyre around to accustom him to tugging, he tugged so hard Ted and the tyre travelled several hundred yards at full gallop. The incident left the horse jittery and mistrustful. The next day a loose plastic bag sent him into such a panic out hacking that he chucked Franny and returned to the yard alone, leaving her to limp the three miles back with a twisted ankle. Thankfully, she hitched a lift with Stefan who was popping down to see her.

  ‘I’m never riding him again,’ she announced huffily afterwards.

  No one complained. After all, having quit Hugo, she was currently working for just food and keep so she could dictate a few rules. The only person who couldn’t stand the loud-mouthed, sexy new arrival was Kirsty, who conducted heated and very public rows with her almost every morning as Franny continually pointed out how slap-dash and sloppy her work was.

  ‘I’m a senior rider here,’ Kirsty yelled. ‘No’ a groom. I shouldna even have to muck out.’

  ‘No, you should bloody well muck in like everyone else,’
Franny hissed.

  With thick Richie still in tow, Kirsty huffily decamped to visit her parents in Scotland, telling her gullible fiancé that Franny was the unrecognised love-child of Pavarotti and Janet Street Porter. She had already nick-named Franny the Stable Rubber because of her second-skin PVC and rubber wardrobe.

  ‘And she’s the sporran of Satan,’ Franny hissed. ‘That big Australian beefcake she’s engaged to must have Scotch mist before his eyes not to see through her. She’ll be back in Hugo’s bed before he’s through customs next week. She’s known as Lassie at Haydown because she’s always whimpering at Hugo’s bedroom door.’

  With Sally out of the Richmond house so much these days, Matty suddenly started realising that, far from being a fifty percent chore-sharer since becoming a parent, he had, for years, been a five percent stake-holder and sleeping partner. He found it impossible to work during the day when Sally was out and the two youngest children were in the house, needing to be fed, cleaned and entertained. Missing his mother, Linus cried almost incessantly. Tor was old enough to be posted in front of the Disney Channel (of which Matty had once thoroughly disapproved) which provided at least a brief period of quiet while Linus had his afternoon nap, but she was notoriously troublesome and, left alone for more than a few minutes, would grow bored and seek distraction. She had already pulled apart the television remote, torn up several of Matty’s research books and pulled out the reels of half a dozen videos, two of which were Matty’s only copies of Forty Minutes documentaries that he had directed in the eighties when he was just starting out. He was livid.

  Things came to a head when, distracted by a duster salesman at the front door, he returned to his study to find that Tor was colouring each of the keys of his laptop with indelible marker pens, and that she had covered his screen with breakfast cereal stickers of the latest cartoon craze, Mega-Galactic Space Squirrels.