by Jilly Cooper
‘It all looks lovely.’ Kitty admired the crocus-yellow walls in the hall.
‘And I’ve found a cleaner, thank God, a Mrs Piggot,’ said Georgie. Then, seeing Kitty’s wary look, ‘I’m not sure how hot she is on cleaning, but she’s ace on gossip. She’s already told me the vicar’s a bit of a “puff”.’
She’s so attractive, thought Kitty wistfully, even with her dark red hair going greasy, and last night’s mascara smudged under her eyes, and a split in her jeans where they’d lost a battle with her spreading hips.
Forcing a large Bacardi and Coke on Kitty, Georgie bore her upstairs to a bedroom so large and high that even the massive still-unmade four-poster looked like a child’s cot. Blushing, Kitty averted her eyes from a damp patch on the bottom sheet. Crumpling the duvet was a large basset-hound.
‘This is Dinsdale,’ said Georgie, screwing up the basset’s jowly face, gazing into his bloodshot eyes and kissing him on the nose. ‘The one thing that can be relied on to look worse than me in the morning. Now, let’s look at these curtains. Goodness, you’ve done them well. Although they’re not really bedroomy, I’ve never been very good with flowered chintz. Let’s put them up.’
In no time Kitty found herself standing in her stockinged feet, acutely ashamed of her fat ankles, amid the clutter of Georgie’s dressing table, as she perilously hooked the curtains on to a big brass rail.
‘A bloody girlfriend rang me this morning’ — Georgie gazed moodily at the long blond tresses of the willows lining the lake — ‘saying wasn’t I worried about all those bimbos and separated women in London, waiting to seduce Guy while I’m down here. Guy of all people! He’s so stuffy about people having affaires. Then she said, “Do watch the drink, it gets to you in the country.”’ Georgie took a great slug of her Bacardi.
‘I’m a bit pissed off with Marigold,’ she went on, glancing across at The Grange which was in deep shadow. ‘Apart from flowers when we moved in — some rather awful mauve gladioli — I’ve hardly heard a word. She’s having problems with Larry. Nikki’s proving even more difficult to give up than smoking. He should try Nikki’s hypnotist again, and Nikki intends to take him to the cleaners. Funny when she always forgot to take his suits there when she was living with him. Now she’s never off the telephone screaming abuse at Larry, and dropping the telephone if Marigold answers.
‘And Lysander’s never off the telephone from Cheshire (dropping it natch, when Larry picks it up), offering to fly down and whisk Marigold away, which must be tempting. I didn’t really talk to him at the Rock Star launch, but he was faint-making.’
‘Gorgeous,’ sighed Kitty, remembering how Lysander had come over to kiss her hallo/goodbye as he was leaving the party. ‘There, I fink that’s OK.’
‘Looks marvellous,’ said Georgie drawing the curtains and plunging them into such total darkness that Kitty nearly fell off the dressing table. ‘We must pay you. No, don’t be silly. Let’s have another drink, then I must wash my hair.’
I’m obviously not going to get any lunch, thought Kitty, which was probably a good thing. She’d totally failed to go on a diet for Rannaldini’s return tomorrow.
‘Just as I expected, they look terrific,’ said a deep, carrying voice. ‘Why am I always saying, “You’re a brick, Kitty”?’
Guy looked so handsome that, as he put out a warm, strong hand to help her down, and then kissed her cheek, Kitty wished she looked less shiny from her exertions, and hastily fumbled for her high-heeled shoes.
‘What kept you?’ snapped Georgie, tugging the elastic band out of her hair.
‘Frog-spawn in the village pond, blue-and-white violets on the bank, primroses like day-old chicks. It was such a beautiful day, I walked. I suppose you haven’t remembered to put on the potatoes, Panda?’
‘Hell, I forgot,’ sighed Georgie. ‘I’m sorry, darling, but I’m not really hungry.’
‘Well, Kitty and I are,’ said Guy, ‘which is why I bought smoked salmon, pâté and vine leaves at The Apple Tree. It’s such a sophisticated shop. I arranged for us to have an account there.’
‘Which means Flora will chalk up fags and booze,’ said Georgie.
‘She must be told not to,’ said Guy sharply. ‘There was a list for ordering your hot cross buns. That’s what I call a proper village shop. I can’t believe it’s Easter in a fortnight.’
‘Ow, I love Easter,’ said Kitty. ‘Somehow you can’t wait for Jesus to rise from the dead and walk barefooted in the white dew among the daffodils.’
Then she blushed scarlet as Georgie said rather mockingly: ‘Dinsdale loves Easter, too, because it means chocolate. How was the vicar? Mrs Piggot says he’s gay.’
‘I had coffee with him and his wife,’ said Guy, who disapproved of gossip. ‘They were charming.’
‘Mrs Piggot says he’s a piss-artist,’ went on Georgie.
‘Takes one to know one,’ said Guy dismissively. ‘The gin’s dropped three inches since she’s been cleaning for you.’
‘I must wash my hair,’ said Georgie.
‘You haven’t got time,’ said Guy flatly. ‘You’ve asked Kitty to lunch. It’s already three o’clock and we’ve got to leave by four to get decent seats.’
‘The concert doesn’t start till five.’
‘And the rush-hour starts at four on Fridays in the country, and Flora’s singing a solo. We must be on time, Panda.’
Georgie looked mutinous. She was a celebrity. Everyone would be gazing at her. She couldn’t have dirty hair.
Reading her thoughts, Guy said, ‘You always look lovely, Panda.’
What a wonderful husband, thought Kitty enviously, kind and concerned but so firm like a Danielle Steel hero. ‘I don’t need any din — I mean lunch,’ she stammered.
A certain row was averted by the telephone. Georgie’s work in the last week had been constantly interrupted by the Press ringing up to ask how she was adjusting to the country, or by demands to go on television or the radio, all of which had been turned down by Guy.
‘My wife has shut herself away with a December deadline,’ he was saying briskly. ‘Well, I can answer that one. Dogs mostly.’
‘Who was that? What did they want to know?’ asked Georgie fretfully.
‘The Scorpion. What do you wear in bed?’
‘And you said, “Dogs”?’ Georgie started to laugh. ‘I do love you. People are going to think I’m even more of a slut than I am.’
‘I’ve got an idea,’ said Guy. ‘As we’ve only time for a sandwich now and it’s Flora’s first night in Paradise, I’ll take you all out to The Heavenly Host this evening.’
‘Perfect,’ said Georgie, ‘as a thank-you present for the curtains.’
‘I can’t,’ sighed Kitty, suppressing a simultaneous shiver of terror and longing, ‘Rannaldini’s flying in first fing tomorrow. I must see everyfink’s perfect.’
16
In fact, Rannaldini was already in England, finally having finished his film of Don Giovanni, which he had produced, directed, conducted, edited and, according to the wags of the music world, probably played the part of the Don with every woman on the set as well.
Arriving a day early at Heathrow in his private jet, he drove straight to the recently built Mozart Hall in Holland Park in order to surprise the London Met, who were rehearsing for a televised performance of Mahler’s Fourth, which he was to conduct on Sunday.
Not content with stalking out of the London Met’s performance of Beethoven’s Ninth three weeks earlier, Rannaldini was now outraged to learn from a rather large bird called Hermione that the guest conductor, Oswaldo, had been taking rehearsals with a joint in one hand and a baton in the other — such appalling lack of discipline. The London Met, however, were devoted to Oswaldo. He was gentle, hugely appreciative (Rannaldini had never learnt the English for thank you) and a marvellous musician. He listened to the more experienced members of the orchestra, and sought their advice on how things should be played. He also remembered his musicians’ first n
ames, bought them drinks on their birthday and tried to get them rises.
This was quite unlike Rannaldini, who had the ability to terrorize and hypnotize simultaneously, and who could reduce his entire string section to jelly by raising a jet-black eyebrow. (Telling themselves that the same eyebrow was probably dyed did nothing to reduce their terror.)
As Musical Director of the London Met, Rannaldini’s job was to control the orchestra and staff, choose guest conductors, select the soloists and plan the repertoire for the whole season. But as he was also Musical Director of other orchestras in Germany and mid-America, where the London Met were concerned, he would make a series of snap decisions twice a year over a three-hour lunch with Hermione’s husband, Bob Harefield, his orchestra manager. He then left Bob, and to a larger extent Kitty, to augment these decisions as he whizzed off round the world.
When Rannaldini had joined the London Met eight years ago, he had rowed constantly with the Board. Apart from being away so much, he cost them a fortune in overtime, because he was always late, and then would make the orchestra spend three hours getting three bars right. But, because he had been so successful, he now had them eating out of his very grasping hand and could do what he liked.
For Rannaldini sold records. The London Met loathed him, but he bullied them into perfection. They were the best and most famous orchestra in Europe, and they never had an empty seat.
They were also the best looking. Resplendent himself, Rannaldini liked beauty in others, and knew that audiences liked gazing at beautiful people, particularly when the music became too demanding. Bob Harefield, therefore, scoured the country for attractive young musicians, who played more vigorously, were more malleable and much cheaper. In the London Met, unless you were exceptionally gifted, over forty you were a marked man.
Biographers tended to attribute Rannaldini’s machiavellian nature to his early life. His father, Wolfgang, had been a German army officer, who met Rannaldini’s mother Gina, a chilly left-wing intellectual of great beauty but uncertain temper, during the last despairing days of the war, when the Germans had withdrawn up the leg of Italy.
Returning to Italy after a gruelling three years in a POW camp, Wolfgang found Gina living on the edge of a small Umbrian hill town, unhappily and most unsuitably married to Paolo Rannaldini, an Italian gentleman farmer, who’d lost practically everything in the war. Although Gina had grown less beautiful and more cantankerous, the affaire started again, until Paolo found out, by which time Wolfgang was quite relieved to be seen off with a shotgun. Having failed to withdraw down the leg of Gina, however, the result was a baby called Roberto, who took Paolo’s name but little else.
After this reversal, Paolo increasingly sought refuge in drink and other women and occasionally to beating up little Roberto. Gina, blaming her son quite wrongly for sabotaging the political career which she had always dreamed of, was terribly hard on him, frequently hitting him for displaying the same sybaritic nature as his German father. Even worse, she gave him no affection, particularly humiliating in a country where mothers hero-worship their sons, and took no pride in his achievements.
Irresistible to women, Roberto grew up fatally drawn to those who rejected him, or gave him a hard time like his mother. In return for his savage upbringing, he dealt out savage treatment to his musicians, his staff, and any woman foolish enough to fall in love with him.
In his late teens he left Italy and sought out his father, now a rich Hamburg industrialist who, proud of his unexpectedly glamorous, talented son, gave him some money and introduced him to a rich but plain wife, who supported him through three years at music school and gave him a son, little Wolfgang.
Just after leaving college, Rannaldini had another break, conducting his first performance of Medea, during which he fell madly in love with Cecilia, a famous but incredibly temperamental visiting soprano who was playing the leading role. He married her as soon as he could get a divorce. Cecilia bore him several children, of whom Natasha was the eldest, and helped him hugely with his career.
A musician of genius, who could play several instruments, including the eternal triangle, Rannaldini had been persuaded by Cecilia that he would only have the ultimate control he craved if he became a conductor. Their stormy marriage lasted fifteen years, and only foundered when Rannaldini’s affaire with Hermione became too public and Cecilia’s jealousy too excessive. Leaving her because she was too much trouble, he married Kitty because she was absolutely no trouble at all.
An improviser of genius, Rannaldini expected his musicians to be note-perfect at a first rehearsal. He was lucky in that he had a memory instant as a Polaroid. Glanced at, a page of music was not forgotten. Thus he was always able to conduct without a score, which was good because he never lost vital eye-contact with his orchestra, and because he was too vain to wear spectacles in public.
Rannaldini was a dandy. His tailcoats were only perfect after twenty-five fittings. Women had been known to die for Rannaldini’s back with its broad flat shoulders beneath the polished pelt of pewter-grey hair. The front was even better, with the sculptured, usually tanned, features, the beautifully shaped, slightly thin lips, and the dark, dark eyes that not only mesmerized orchestras, but gazed deep, deep into women’s eyes until their eyeballs melted.
Apart from his childhood which still gave him nightmares, Rannaldini had two great sadnesses. He was one of the greatest conductors in the world, but he minded that he was only an interpretative artist. He had composed in his youth, but, able to absorb other people’s music so effortlessly, he was terrified of being derivative and banal, and not succeeding 100 per cent. Secondly, he would have given anything to be six foot rather than five foot six.
And now he was back, padding stealthily into the new Mozart Hall a day early. The orchestra had already played Mahler’s Fourth to a rapturous reception in Vienna the night before. Afterwards most of the musicians had stayed up for Oswaldo’s birthday party, preferring to catch an early morning plane home for the rehearsal while still tight.
With the cheers of the sophisticated Viennese audience still ringing in their aching heads, they felt there was little need to do more than touch up a few difficult passages and practise with Hermione, who was to be the soloist in the fourth movement on Sunday. As Rannaldini was due back tomorrow, there was very much an elegiac feeling of the last day of the holidays, which was intensified by the players’ paraphernalia of music cases, dinner-jackets, evening dresses in plastic cases and holdalls which littered the front-stall seats and the gangway. No-one even minded that a cleaner was hoovering the red carpet up in the dress circle.
Hands floating above the music like a seagull, tall and gangling with a shock of blond hair, Oswaldo swayed on the rostrum, his ginger T-shirt showing two inches of bony white back each time he raised his arms.
‘This is dancing music,’ he said, calling a halt in the second movement. ‘It should be a little yar.’
Short of English, he pushed his elbows upwards, swaying his narrow hips to illustrate an imaginary beat.
‘Christ, I’ve got a hangover,’ said the leader of the orchestra, calling out to a passing Bob Harefield, ‘Get us an Alka-Seltzer, there’s a love, and let’s have a black-coffee break at the end of this movement, Ossie.’
But suddenly the musicians at the front desks started to shake, without knowing why. Then, gradually, as a faint sweet-musky scent reached the nostrils of the entire orchestra, they realized it was Rannaldini’s horribly distinctive aftershave, Maestro, specially created for him by Givenchy, wafting over them, as he strolled towards the rostrum.
‘A little yar,’ he murmured silkily. ‘What a very specific instruction. Not very OK ya in this case.’
The leader of the orchestra dropped his bow, the percussionist choked on his toffee, a bassoonist hastily put down P.D. James, the harpist stopped painting her toenails, a beautiful violinist in a purple shirt, deliberately placed at the desk nearest the audience, stopped reading a letter from her boyfriend. A fem
ale horn player, who’d been infatuated with Rannaldini since he’d bedded her on the orchestra’s last trip to Japan, dived behind the cellist in front, frantically combing her hair, and applying blusher to her blanched cheeks. A paper dart intended for Oswaldo fell at Rannaldini’s feet. Oswaldo melted away like snow in the morning sun. Bob Harefield on his way into the hall with a fizzing glass of Alka-Seltzer went sharply into reverse.
Normally chatter swelled whenever there was a halt, but now the hall was totally silent. Musicians, still trickling in because they hadn’t expected Rannaldini, were greeted with a sabatier tongue which slashed through their excuses.
‘Another pile-up on the motorway? The traffic was terrible from the airport?’ bawled Rannaldini to a little flautist weighed down by Sainsbury carrier bags. ‘The road was perfectly clear ten minutes ago.
‘A train taken off? Balderdash!’ His voice rose to a scream. ‘You’re late! If it happens again you’re fired.’
‘I’m sorry, Rannaldini, there was a bomb-scare in Sloane Square,’ said a front-desk violinist scuttling in.
‘Bomb-scare,’ purred Rannaldini, as the man frantically tuned his violin, twiddling and twisting the nobs with a shaking hand. Then with a roar, ‘I’ll put a bomb under you, all of you! Just look under your cars before you leave.’
Slowly he mounted the rostrum. As gleamingly brown from the LA sun as any of the cellos in his string section, he kept on his black overcoat with the astrakhan collar because he hadn’t adjusted to the cold March weather. Letting the score drop to the floor in a gesture of contempt, he removed his Rolex and laid it on the music-stand, then stood as still as one of his own Valhalla statues, establishing dominance.
The orchestra edged nearer their music-stands, wishing they could have fastened seat-belts against turbulence. Suddenly the music they’d known backwards five minutes ago seemed terrifyingly unfamiliar.