Jilly Cooper - Appassionata

Musical Director and Principal Conductor of the RSO. Absolute sweetie and sly old fox, who lets others do the worrying.

GEORGIE MAGUIRE

World-famous singer and song writer.

CARL MATTHESON

Homespun American contestant in the Appleton Piano Competition.

JUNO MEADOWS

Second Flute of the RSO. Tiny and tantalizingly pretty, known as the ‘Steel Elf’.

MARY MELVILLE

Principal Second Violin of the RSO. A doting mother known as ‘Mary-the-Mother-of-Justin’.

SISTER MERCEDES

A very butch nun.

QUINTON MITCHELL

Third Horn of the RSO who wants to be First Horn.

SALVADOR MOLINARI

A naughty Colombian playboy.

MILITANT MOLL

A fiercely feminist rank-and-file viola player of the RSO.

ALEXEI NEMEROVSKY

Principal dancer of the Cossak Russe Ballet Company, known as ‘The Treat from Moscow’.

NELLIE NICOLSON

Third Desk cellist of the RSO known as ‘Nellie the Nympho’.

NINION

Second Oboe. Militant Moll’s exceedingly hen-pecked boyfriend.

NORIKO

An adorably pretty Japanese; rank-and-file First Violin of the RSO.

DECLAN O’HARA

Irish television presenter and megastar. Managing director of Venturer Television.

DEIRDRE O’NEILL

Irish judge at the Appleton Piano Competition, fond of a drop, known as ‘Deirdre of the Drowned Sorrows’.

VICTOR (VIKING) O’NEILL

First Horn and hero of the orchestra because of his great glamour, glorious sound and rebellious attitude. The Godfather of the Celtic Mafia.

SIMON PAINSHAW

First Oboe of the RSO. A walking Grove’s Dictionary who spends his time brooding on his reeds.

PEGGY PARKER

Owner of Parker and Parker department store in Rutminster High Street. A bossy boots and overbearing member of the RSO board.

ROGER ‘SONNY’ PARKER

Her frightful son, a composer of even more frightful modern music.

MISS PARROTT

The rather heavenly RSO harpist.

JULIAN PELLAFACINI

The highly respected leader of the New World Symphony Orchestra.

LUISA PELLAFACINI

His lovely bosomy wife.

NATALIA PHILIPOVA

An apparently untalented Czechoslovak pianist.

PETER PLUMPTON

First Flute of the RSO.

MISS PRIDDOCK

Mark Carling’s secretary, beloved of Old Cyril. An unfazed old trout.

ROBERTO RANNALDINI

Mega-Maestro and arch fiend, currently musical director of the New World Symphony Orchestra.

KITTY RANNALDINI

His third wife, in love with Lysander Hawkley.

JACK RODWAY

A randy receiver.

SISTER ROSE

A sympathetic nurse at Northladen General Hospital.

ABIGAIL ROSEN

American violinist, nicknamed ‘L’Appassionata’ whose dazzling talent and tigerish beauty have taken the world by storm.

THE RUTSHIRE BUTCHER

A very critical critic.

SANDRA

Christopher Shepherd’s secretary.

FLORA SEYMOUR

Wild child, pilgrim soul and daughter of Georgie Maguire. Destroyed by a teenage affaire with Rannaldini, now concentrating on the viola.

CHRISTOPHER SHEPHERD

Abigail Rosen’s agent, a control freak, who provides the respectable front of Shepherd Denston.

MISS SMALLWOOD

Secretary, Cotchester Music Club.

STEVE SMITHSON

Second Bassoon of the RSO and representative of the Musicians’ Union. Muscular right arm from throwing the book at people.

DAME EDITH SPINK

A distinguished composer and Musical Director of the Cotchester Chamber Orchestra.

TOMMY STAINFORTH

Principal Percussion of the RSO.

MRS DICK STANDISH

A skittish sponsor’s wife.

DENNIS STRICKLAND

Principal Viola of the RSO, known as ‘El Creepo’.

BILL THACKERY

Second Desk, First Violin of the RSO. Better at cricket than the violin. Jolly good sort.

JAMES VEREKER

A television presenter.

WALTER

A benevolent bass.

SERENA WESTWARD

Head of Artists and Repertoire at Megagram Records.

CLAUDE ‘CHERUB’ WILSON

Third Percussion of the RSO. Very dumb blond and orchestra mascot.

XAVIER

A Colombian orphan.

BOGOTÁ

A black labrador puppy.

JOHN DRUMMOND

Miss Priddock’s cat, office mouser to the RSO.

GERTRUDE

Taggie Campbell-Black’s mongrel.

JENNIFER

One of Lady Baddingham’s yellow labradors.

NIMROD

Rupert Campbell-Black’s lurcher.

MR NUGENT

Viking O’Neill’s black collie.

PENSCOMBE PRIDE

Rupert Campbell-Black’s favourite and finest horse.

SHOSTAKOVICH

Rodney Macintosh’s grey Persian cat.

SIBELIUS AND SCRIABIN

Abigail Rosen’s black-and-white kittens. Like magpies, the two of them bring joy.

TIPPETT

Dame Edith Spink’s pug.

TREVOR

Flora Seymour’s rescued mongrel.

In the second week of April, Taggie Campbell-Black crossed the world and fell head over heels in love for the second time in her life. The flight to Bogotá, delayed by engine trouble at Caracas, took fifteen hours. Taggie, who’d hardly eaten or slept since Rupert broke the news of their journey, could only manage half a glass of champagne. Nor, being very dyslexic, was she able to lose herself in Danielle Steel or Catherine Cookson, nor even concentrate on Robbie Coltrane camping it up as a nun on the in-flight movie. She could only clutch Rupert’s hand, praying over and over again: Please God let it happen.

By contrast Rupert, concealing equal nerves behind his habitual deadpan langour, had drunk far too much as he sat thumbing through a glossary at the back of a Bogotá guide book.

‘I now know the Colombian for stupid bugger, prick, jerk, double bed, air-conditioning, rum and cocaine, so we should be OK.’

At El Dorado Airport, the policemen fingered their guns. Seeing an affluent-looking gringo, the taxi-driver turned off his meter. As they drove past interminable whore-houses and dives blaring forth music, past skyscrapers next to crumbling shacks, Rupert’s hangover was assaulted as much by the shroud of black diesel fumes that blanketed the city as by the furiously honking almost static rush-hour traffic. There was rubbish everywhere. On every pavement, pimps with dead eyes, drug pushers carrying suitcases bulging with notes, tarts in tight dresses pushed aside beggars on crutches and stepped over grubby sloe-eyed children playing in the gutter. How could anything good come out of such a hell-hole?

As Taggie couldn’t bear to wait a second longer, they drove straight to the convent. Now, quivering like a dog in a thunderstorm, she was panicking about her clothes.

‘D’you think I should have stopped off at the hotel and changed into something more motherly?’

Rupert glanced sideways. No-one filled a body stocking like Taggie or had better, longer legs for a miniskirt.

‘You look like a plain-clothes angel.’

‘My skirt isn’t too short?’

‘Never, never.’ Rupert put a hand on her thigh.

By the time they reached the convent, a sanctuary amid the squalor, appalling poverty and brutal crime of the slums, the fare cost almost more than the flight. The Angelus was ringing in the little bell-tower. The setting sun, finding a gap in the dark lowering mountains of the Andes, had turned the square white walls a flaming orange. A battered Virgin Mary looked down from a niche as Rupert knocked on the blistered bottle-green front door. But no-one answered.