Jilly Cooper - Score!

Rannaldini, delighted at the turn of events, had been playing Iago. Clive, who had let himself into Magpie Cottage with Rannaldini’s master key, had been responsible for putting Martie’s photo in Isa’s sock drawer. He also tipped off Rannaldini when Isa was away, enabling him to ring Tab and drip poison into her ear.

‘Isa is finding it so difficult to break with Martie. She was so capable, and they were together seven years and he is seven years older than you.’ Which was vilely hypocritical of Rannaldini, who was intending to move in, despite being nearly thirty years older than Tab himself.

He would play the same game with Isa, telling him how wild Tab was, how young and unstable, how late coming home, how not always alone, how fond of the bottle. Subtly, slowly, treacherously, the same shoulder Rannaldini was providing for them both to cry on was the wedge he was driving between them. He encouraged Tab to use his indoor school and have a cross-country course built on the estate. Her suspension would be up in August in time for Gatcombe. But he still hadn’t given her any allowance. Let her beg for it.

The National Hunt season was nearly over. Isa’s winnings were shoring up Jake’s yard so money would grow even tighter. Playing his usual cool waiting game, Isa had not pestered Mr Brown about Peppy Koala.

Finally, Mr Brown rang him. ‘I’m dead choked your little Tabitha lost the baby. How is she?’

‘Pretty depressed.’

‘Not surprising, the way you treat her. If you can’t be nice to a pretty lady like that, how can I trust you with my little horsy?’

‘That’s crazy,’ said Isa sharply. ‘No-one fusses over horses like my father. Where were you thinking of sending him?’

‘Well, Sir Roberto Rannaldini’s offered me so much dosh I nearly sold to him, but in case Peppy’s that good I’m giving him to your other father-in-law, Rupert Campbell-Black.’

If Isa couldn’t blame Tab for losing the baby, he could, and certainly did, for the loss of Peppy Koala.

The following day Rannaldini and a suicidal Tab rode round Paradise. A big red sun was disappearing into the mist like the brake light of Apollo’s chariot, putting a pink rinse on the bare trees and a rose flush along the horizon. Conscious that they were about to be invaded by far more famous singers, robins and blackbirds were carolling their heads off.

‘I’ve had some lovely letters about the baby,’ muttered Tab, ‘from Lucy in Belgium, Meredith, Mr Brown, and even from that glamorous French director you invited to our wedding. He sent me a lovely poem about Little Rupert really existing and being a plant of light.’ For a second, her stony little face softened.

That one would have to be knocked on the head very quickly, thought Rannaldini.

‘Mrs Brimscombe told Isa how sorry she was about the baby,’ he said idly. ‘Isa said, “At least it’s given Tab something new to grumble about.”’

‘The bastard,’ gasped Tab.

‘I suggested you get a part-time job.’

‘And what did Isa say?’

As the sun sank, all the birds that had been singing so madly went silent. As the glow in the west became an orange fire, Rannaldini noticed a little adolescent moon turning her slim back on such ostentation. She reminded him of Tabitha.

‘He said you were unemployable.’

‘God, he’s a shit. You wait till the bloody ban’s lifted — we’ll show him.’

‘That’s how I wanted you to react,’ said Rannaldini silkily.

As he moved his horse close to The Engineer, his hypnotic black eyes were level with Tab’s. Perhaps he had such an impact on women, she thought, because he was small enough to dazzle them, like a low-angled winter sun.

‘Filming starts the week after next,’ he announced. ‘I’d like to offer you a job on Don Carlos. As mistress of the horse,’ he added sententiously.

‘Sounds perverse?’

‘As well as hunting, war scenes and polo during the overture, horses will be needed for Philip’s coronation, and Tristan might want to film Carlos and Posa galloping across country. We need someone to organize it. We’ll pay you a very good fee.’

‘Won’t people think it a bit odd you hiring a totally inexperienced member of your wife’s family?’

‘Not in the least. Tristan has already signed up his delectable niece, Simone, to handle continuity.’

‘Can The Engineer have a part?’

‘A starring role.’

‘Then I’ll do it.’

She was flaming well going to show Isa and Rupert that she could do her bit for the marriage.

What Rannaldini did not tell Tab was that also joining the crew, as second assistant director, and as hellbent on proving himself, was his eldest son, Wolfgang. This had come about because Rannaldini, wildly jealous of Rupert’s rapprochement with Marcus and closeness to Xavier, wanted his son back, and had ordered Sexton to employ him.

The twenty-four-year-old Wolfgang, who had just gained an excellent law degree in Germany, had agreed to work on Don Carlos as a filler before taking up a plum job in Berlin. He had not been back to Valhalla for six years, ever since Rannaldini had pinched from him his beloved Flora Seymour, who was then a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl.

Highly, if somewhat rigidly, intelligent, Wolfgang had read Schiller in the original, and parallels between the cold, tyrannical Philip stealing Elisabetta from his son Carlos were not lost on him.

Now a jackbooting Eurocrat with a slimline briefcase and narrowed eyes, Wolfgang was determined not to let Rannaldini bully him. His job would be to run errands, keep the chorus in order and yank singers out of their dressing rooms, which in turn would give plenty of opportunity for bullying.

I am completely over Flora, Wolfgang told himself firmly and repeatedly, as he hurtled down the M4.

The only car that overtook him was a red Ferrari. Glancing right as it shot past, Wolfie nearly rammed the car in front, for in the passenger seat, yacking her head off to a beautiful boy instantly recognizable as the tenor playing Carlos, was Flora in person.

Wolfie had to pull into Membury service station to recover.

I am not over her, he told himself bleakly.

Unaware of the havoc she had just caused, Flora was much too busy worrying about tomorrow’s filming.

‘You just have to hit the mark and mime to your own voice,’ said Baby soothingly. ‘It’ll be a doddle, I promise you.’

‘Hey doddle doddle, I’m sure it’s going to be more difficult than any of us think.’

‘There’s bound to be a voice coach around to bring us in. God, I could murder a burger. Let’s stop at that Little Chef.’

‘You mustn’t. You look fantastic. Adonis Carlos.’

After a week at Champney’s, Baby had lost his double chin and his gut.

‘I can wear all my jackets as wraparounds like the Queen Mother,’ he crowed. ‘And I adored being whipped by all that seaweed.’

Flora gazed gloomily at the yellowing verges. It hadn’t rained for weeks. The motorway was littered with furry corpses desperate to reach the river. Crows hung overhead like vultures.

‘George and I were so miserable at the prospect of being separated.’ She sighed. ‘We had a stupid row last night and slept back to back loathing each other. We were just making up when Trevor barked hysterically at some non-existent burglar. By the time I’d defied George and let Trev out and in, the mood was broken. And Trev doesn’t give a stuff,’ she added, as the little dog raced back and forth along the top of the back seat, yapping furiously at dogs in other cars.

‘And that’s the precious life blood of a master spirit you’ve just devoured,’ she said reproachfully, as she retrieved a chewed-up copy of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin from the back seat.