Jilly Cooper - Score!

But at what price? Claudine’s husband Jean-Louis, the appropriately named Minister of Cultural Affairs, was universally acknowledged to be a brute.

And that was another reason why Tristan had identified with Carlos. He had experienced all the hell of loving a married woman, with a stern, undemonstrative, unfaithful yet possessive husband. He could never drop in on Claudine unannounced, never expect her to ring him in case the telephone number showed up on a bill closely scrutinized by Jean-Louis’s accountants, never ring her at home in case one of the spying servants answered. Nor could he write because Jean-Louis or his secretary, also a spy, frisked the post.

As Claudine became even more adored because of Tristan’s films, and was voted the Most Admired Woman in France, Jean-Louis’s jealousy increased, and so did the interest of the press who followed her every move.

At first she had been reckless and while they were on location spent all night in Tristan’s arms. This had compensated for the endless taunts that he was a closet gay, impotent, incapable of sustaining a relationship. He had also had to endure the hostility of beautiful women like Chloe and Serena, who couldn’t understand why he rejected their advances, not to mention the endless matchmaking of his brothers’ wives.

He had prayed Claudine would leave Jean-Louis and move in with him or, better still, marry him. He didn’t give a toss about the twenty-four-year age gap. Sometimes, when life became unbearable, she had come near to it.

But just before Étienne’s death, one of Claudine’s friends had rung to say a newspaper was on to her and Tristan and about to blow her saintly Madame Vierge image sky high. Claudine had no desire to relinquish the moral high ground, so she had retreated into her arid marriage. Gradually, for Tristan, hope had died, but he couldn’t stop loving her.

Until suddenly he had been jolted by Tab, and believed, by some miracle, there might be life and love after Claudine. But Rannaldini had promptly stamped on that flower.

In his most despairing thoughts since then, Tristan had dreamt that Claudine, having four children of her own, might not mind that he couldn’t give her children. He had so longed to see her again at the screening of The Lily in the Valley : he knew Jean-Louis was in Tuscany and was devastated when she’d failed to show up, on the excuse that filming commitments in Wales were too heavy.

He had forced himself to go to Hortense’s party the next day, but the sight of numerous Montignys, a tribe to which he no longer belonged, milling around the lawn — Aunt Hortense in navy blue pinstripe, the Croix de Guerre in her lapel, his self-regarding brothers and their braying wives, and the smell of crayfish drifting over the white rose hedge — had sent him fleeing back to Valhalla.

Here he collected the address book with Claudine’s telephone number in Wales, showered, changed into the peacock-blue shirt and the jeans she had given him, and on which Lucy had put the patch of a greyhound’s head, and set out for the sleepy village of Llandrogan.

He had rung from Valhalla to say he was on his way, his mobile cutting out before Claudine could say no. He had driven like the devil and arrived while she was getting ready, her hair, which she hadn’t had time to wash, still in rollers, with only one eye made up and her tummy still blown out from an early supper.

As he bounded upstairs like Tigger, she had sent him down again to pour himself a huge drink, which, by the time she had joined him, had become two. She had looked so exquisite, he had swept her back up to bed, which had not been a success. He had come instantly. In the old days, he would then have made love to her with his tongue and his hands, until he was raring to come again. Now he sensed her relief.

‘It couldn’t matter less, chéri , we’re both exhausted. I have lines to learn and I’ve got to get up at six. I’m not as young as I was.’

It was a far cry from The Lily in the Valley when they had made love all night, and the violet shadows beneath eyes softened by happiness had only enhanced her haunting beauty.

Claudine herself, that Sunday evening in Llandrogan, had suddenly felt too old and set in her ways. Reason has reasons the heart knows nothing about. She didn’t want him to stay the night. She longed to take off her make-up and cover her face with skin food. Worry about the lurking paparazzi would keep her awake when she needed to look good on the set, and if she fell asleep she might snore.

When Tristan told her about the problems with Rannaldini, she had been unsympathetic. All directors became increasingly twitchy as the end of a shoot approached. Unable to bear it any longer, he had dropped the bombshell that Maxim was his father. To his amazement, she wasn’t very interested.

‘The aristocracy have always been irregularly conceived, chéri . My sister wasn’t my father’s daughter. I’m not sure I was either. Jean-Louis’s father was a naughty old boy too. Whenever we go shooting on the estate I notice how the beaters all look like Jean-Louis.’

‘For Christ’s sake, it’s not the same. My grandfather was a psychopath who raped my sixteen-year-old mother, so I’m three-quarters his mad, tainted blood.’ Tristan had wanted to hit her, but had shaken her instead.

‘Stop it, you’re hurting me,’ she had cried.

And what the fuck d’you imagine you’re doing to me? thought Tristan.

‘I cannot have children,’ he said bleakly.

Claudine had shrugged.

‘There are too many children in the world. They’re nothing but trouble. Marie-Claire is threatening to marry a pied-noir . Patrice is divorcing. Béatrice is pregnant by her Egyptian boyfriend. Jean-Louis is out of his mind with worry.’ Then, seeing Tristan’s blackening face, ‘Anyway, chéri , you have elder brothers, it is not as if there’s any need to carry on the Montigny line.’

When he tried to explain, he knew he was boring her. He would have liked to have left then, but he had drunk too much brandy, and was too tired so instead he had crashed out on her bed. She had shaken him awake at three thirty. It would soon be light.

‘I’m so terrified of the English press — they’re everywhere.’

It wouldn’t do to forfeit being the Most Admired Woman in France, thought Tristan savagely.

As he had driven away from Llandrogan into the desolation of dawn, and pulled into a field to sleep, he had been reminded of the time he had broken the news of Maxim being his father to Lucy and how she’d given him black coffee, laced with Drambuie, wrapped him in her duvet, held him shuddering in her arms and listened and listened, and how her hair was the same soft brown as rain-soaked winter trees.

Coming back to earth, still pacing his cell, he remembered how on the day after the murder, for the first time in months, Claudine had actually slipped into a telephone box in Llandrogan to ring him, pleading with him not to use her as an alibi. She must know he’d been arrested, but she was clearly not coming forward to save him. There was no light in the little frosted window. And no dawn for him.

As Karen walked into the Pearly Gates with Ogborne after the cinema, Jessica dragged her outside into the drizzle.

‘I found this in my bag. I wrote Oscar’s mobile number on the back of it on Thursday. It’s a memo from Tristan to Bernard and the props department, saying he was planning to reshoot part of Posa and Carlos’s pistol scene in the Unicorn Glade on Friday night, and he would need the.22 out of the props cupboard. Is it important?’

Karen didn’t even notice the drizzle become a downpour.

‘Yes, it is,’ she said joyfully.

‘And, by the way, Mikhail’s looking for you,’ said a relieved Jessica. ‘He’s in the production office.’