Jilly Cooper - Score!

‘No.’ Clapping her hands over her ears, Tab frantically shook her head. ‘No, no, no!’

‘Wolfgang threatened to kill his dad after he heard that tape,’ taunted Gablecross. ‘Hope you weren’t telling porkies. Might ’ave encouraged that young man, even your father, to kill Rannaldini, or did you tell your husband?’

‘I didn’t.’

‘Hello, I’m back. Lovely basket of fruit arrived for you, Tab, darling.’

As a slender, very tall girl walked in, Gablecross leapt guiltily to his feet. This must be Rupert’s wife, Taggie. She looked hardly older than her stepdaughter. Unfortunately he was too late to stop Sharon wriggling out from under her chair. Frantically searching around for a present, she snatched Tabitha’s photographs off the table, and proudly bore them over to Taggie.

‘Drop, Sharon, for God’s sake!’ Tab stumbled forward, snatching the photographs, then crumpling to the floor, sobbing hysterically. ‘They think I killed Rannaldini, that I led him on to rape me. Please don’t look at those pictures.’

Seldom had Karen witnessed such fury; a tigress protecting her cub.

‘How dare you b-b-bully her after all she’s been through, you horrible, horrible beast!’ yelled Taggie.

Even Gablecross stepped back.

‘You’re right, he is a beast,’ agreed Karen. Together she and Taggie lifted a weeping Tab to her feet. For a second, she froze, rigid with revulsion, then collapsed weeping in Taggie’s arms.

‘I didn’t want anyone to know about the rape. I wouldn’t have blurted it out to Dad or Wolfie. I was just so devastated about Gertrude.’

‘I know, darling.’

‘I feel so awful about Mummy. She’s had such a terrible time with the press over the years. Imagine the f-f-field day Beattie Johnson’s going to have when she finds out Rannaldini raped me, particularly if the police say I led him on, and what will the Lovells say? Jake hates me, and Isa’s never forgiven me because of Peppy Koala. Oh, Taggie, I’ve made such a mess of my life.’

‘You haven’t.’ Taggie tugged the red scarf from her dark hair, holding it for Tab to blow her nose on, as if she’d been Bianca.

‘You’re good, brave and beautiful.’

‘Like a beautiful car that doesn’t work,’ wailed Tab. ‘I loved Lysander, Isa and Tristan so much. Why didn’t any of them love me? Because I’m bad luck, that’s why, and I don’t want to bring any more to Mummy. I love her so much too, but she’s never rung to see if I’m OK. I expect the police have already told her I pulled her husband. What’s she going to think when she sees those pictures?’

What would you think if you knew your sainted mother had grassed about your beloved father’s gun? wondered Gablecross bitterly.

‘What will she say when it all comes out?’ mumbled Tab.

‘Perhaps it can be hushed up?’ Taggie turned beseechingly to Karen.

‘Tabitha’s been very co-operative,’ said Karen, who was feeling thoroughly ashamed of herself.

Taggie turned back to Tab. ‘Look, why don’t we ask Mummy to stay for a bit?’ Her far too kind heart was already sinking as she made the offer.

But a tiny spark had ignited Tab’s face.

‘Could we? Oh, Taggie, you are kind. I hate her rattling about in that creepy house, stalked by Rannaldini’s ghost.’

‘And you must open your lovely basket of fruit,’ said Karen. ‘Mangoes and persimmons. Someone wants you to start eating again.’ She handed Tab the tiny envelope.

They were from Wolfie.

‘Perhaps he might drop Mummy off,’ sniffed Tab. ‘I’d love to see Wolfie again.’

Gablecross was profoundly depressed. Karen had bawled him out for bullying Tab, Rupert Campbell-Black had lodged a ferocious complaint with the Chief Constable, Gerry Portland was threatening to take him off the case altogether, and he had absolutely no idea who had killed Rannaldini.

It was nearly dark. Walking towards the Valhalla car park he nearly had a fit as he saw a young boy sobbing in Rupert’s arms. Then he realized it was Flora, back for a brief appearance as Elisabetta’s bodyguard, who’d just been subjected to another short back and sides for the sake of continuity.

‘George is a ghastly bore and a pleb, darling,’ Rupert was saying, ‘and far too old for you.’

‘You’re older than Taggie, and you’re happy,’ wept Flora.

‘We’re not talking about me and I’m certainly not a pleb. George is so insanely jealous, no-one as gorgeous as you stands a chance. If he’s kneecapped old biddies in the past, he’s quite capable of doing you a mischief and putting a contract on Rannaldini.’

‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ sobbed Flora. ‘I love him so much.’

Passing Wardrobe, Gablecross saw Rozzy Pringle getting dress shirts ready for the extras in the ball scene. Looking at the big hot iron in her hand, the scissors and pinking shears hanging from the walls and the safety-pins and needles spilling out of boxes, he thought there were plenty of murder weapons here.

‘Sergeant Gablecross,’ called Rozzy, blushing slightly, ‘you’ve been working so hard, I thought you might have forgotten your wedding anniversary on Sunday so I got a card and wrapped up some presents.’

‘You shouldn’t have done that.’ Gablecross spoke roughly to hide the lump in his throat. ‘How much do I owe you?’

‘It’s a present — or presents.’ She laughed. ‘You’ve been so sweet to us.’

‘Not what Rupert Campbell-Black thinks.’

‘He’s a brute.’

‘You’ve saved my bacon. I had forgotten,’ said Gablecross gratefully, as he scribbled, ‘All my love, Tim,’ in a Happy Anniversary card. ‘Thanks so much. Every man should have a woman like you.’

‘I wish my husband thought so,’ sighed Rozzy.

It was a highwayman’s night, with racing black clouds and the stars making only cameo appearances, except for blazing Jupiter, still pursuing a glittering yellow half-grapefruit of a moon.

Gablecross couldn’t wait to get home to Margaret. He needed to run his latest suspicions past her and have a moan about Karen getting on his nerves. Approaching the Greenview estate, passing the waiters wearily closing up the Chinese restaurant, he reached in the glove compartment for Hermione’s CD, saw Brian Chambers’s blue Volvo coming the other way, and nearly drove into a wall. Passing his house he saw Margaret in the kitchen in her dressing-gown. She didn’t look glammed up. Maybe they’d just had sex, or she knew Brian well enough not to bother too much. Swinging the car round, Gablecross drove over to Rutminster Hall.

He knew, having got away with a solo raid on Clive, and having received a warning from Portland this afternoon, he was putting his career on the line. But, like a junkie needing a fix, he had to follow his hunch. If George Hungerford had experienced a quarter of the murderous rage he himself had just felt towards Brian Chambers… And he was not taking Karen. A tough, uncommunicative businessman would never open up in front of a woman.

Rutminster Hall lay on the other side of town, as far as possible from the Greenview estate. George wouldn’t spoil his own rolling hillside with eczema rashes of little houses, thought Gablecross savagely. No lights were on, but music was pouring so loudly out of the speakers that George didn’t hear the car coming up the drive. Only people who lived in magnificent parks could get away with playing music that loudly. Only when Gablecross banged the car door did George come racing round the side of the house.

‘Flora!’ For a second he seemed to disintegrate with disappointment, then seeing Gablecross’s ID card, he brusquely invited him in.

‘I haven’t got long.’ It was a lie; he had all eternity to long for Flora.