Jilly Cooper - Riders

“What a bloody useless day,” he said.

“It could be improved dramatically,” said Gabriella, riding her horse alongside him. “Why don’t we slip home? Charlie’s gone shooting.”

“Probably like to count me as part of the bag,” said Rupert, looking at his watch. “It’s only a quarter to three. Worth giving it another hour.”

He was relieved to see Billy emerging from the wood, his head buried in his horse’s neck to avoid the branches.

“I feel better,” said Billy. “I’ve just been sick behind a holly bush. Have you got any brandy left, Rupe?”

“Not much,” said Rupert, handing him the flask. “Better finish it.”

Rupert’s fiendish behavior was soon relayed with relish to the rest of the Antis. Helen, unable to work up any indignation at all, picked a bunch of primroses and wrapped them in a paper handkerchief dipped in a puddle.

Briefly, Paul and Nigel had lost the hounds, but had found them again in full cry within the walls of some huge estate. Unable to get at them physically, the saboteurs launched their toughest offensive. All hell broke loose as smoke bombs and thunderflashes exploded, foghorns wailed, and horns and whistles were blown.

“Jesus Christ! Some buggers are shooting in the covert. Pull hounds out,” yelled a huntsman.

Helen hid behind an ash tree, saying her prayers as the saboteurs charged about, yelling, screaming, slipping on wet leaves, tripping over bramble cables and the long silver roots of beech trees. Hounds had gone to pieces. All Helen could hear was whimpering. Nigel shimmied up the wall to look.

“Master’s lost control,” he said happily.

To the left, the Land Rovers with the heavies were moving in threateningly. Paul seized Helen, bustling her into the front of the car.

“Let’s beat it,” he said.

“Where are Maureen and Nigel?”

“Mo’s in one of the other cars,” Paul put his foot down on the accelerator, “and Nigel’s got some ingenious plot of his own, but my lips are sealed. He’s taken Fiona’s car; said he’d join us later.”

It had started to spit with rain. Old ladies hurried home, putting on headscarves. Women rushed out into the cottage gardens, taking in washing.

“You’re not wearing your safety belt, Ellen,” said Paul. “Wouldn’t want an attractive young lady to come to any harm.”

Turning on Radio Three, he accompanied a Beethoven sonata in a reedy tenor. Helen had a feeling he was glad they’d shed the others.

“I know you’re Nige’s girl,” he said throatily.

“I am not,” said Helen tartly. “There is nothing between us.”

“That makes a difference. Didn’t want to tread on anyone’s corns. I happen to be playing at a concert at the Festival Hall next Saturday. Wonder if you’d care to come. We could have an Indian afterwards.”

Helen, who hated curry, said she’d look in her diary, which he seemed to regard as a satisfactory answer. As he rabbited on about the orchestra and the paper he was writing on shrews, Helen found it was unnecessary to make any other comment than the occasional “um.” Breathing in the apricot dusk, she wondered what Rupert Campbell-Black was doing now.

Rupert and Billy hacked back to their horse box through the pouring rain, discussing which horses they should take to the Crittleden Easter Meeting, which started on Friday. Billy, who’d put his collar up and turned his hat back to front to stop the rain running down his neck, was trying to light a cigarette.

“Did you see the girl with the Antis?” asked Rupert, in that deceptively casual way that meant he was interested.

“Bit thin,” said Billy.

“Marvelous face, though. Doesn’t sound English. How the hell did Nigel get hold of her?”

“Perhaps she likes his mind.”

“Hardly likely to be anything else.”

Rounding the corner, fifty yards away, they saw Nigel busily letting down the tires of Rupert’s horse box. Riding on the verge, he hadn’t heard them coming.

“Leave this to me,” said Rupert softly.

Sliding off the mare, throwing the reins to Billy, he sprinted down the road and, taking a flying leap, landed on Nigel with a crash, knocking the breath out of his body. Next minute he had dragged him up a grassy side lane and was systematically beating him to a pulp. It was Billy who dragged Rupert off.

“For God’s sake, that’s enough. You don’t want to be done for murder.”

At that moment Frenchie, the groom, woke up from sleeping off his lunch and appeared out of the front of the horse box, rubbing his eyes.

“Where the hell have you been?” snarled Rupert. “Getting pissed as usual, I suppose. Here, take the horses and get me some rope.”

Pulling off his hunting tie, he stuffed it into Nigel’s mouth, then systematically stripped off Nigel’s clothes, looking down with distaste at the white skinny body. As Rupert tied his hands and feet with spare head-collar ropes, Nigel gave a groan and started to wriggle.

“Think he’ll be all right?” said Billy.

“Sadly, yes, the little shit,” said Rupert, giving him a kick in the ribs. “It’ll take him half an hour to wriggle down the road. It’ll still be light; someone’ll pick him up. Pity it’s such a warm night.”

He picked up Nigel’s combat jacket and removed his address book from the inside pocket. As he flipped through it, they hitched a lift in the horse box back to the blue Porsche.

“How riveting,” said Rupert. “He’s got Fiona’s telephone number, and mine, the little bastard, and yours too. What did he call that girl? Helen, I think. Here’s one. Helen Macaulay, Regina House, W. Fourteen. Where the hell’s that?”

“Shepherd’s Bush or Hammersmith.”

“Frightfully unsmart,” said Rupert. “I wonder if that’s her.”

Helen got in around midnight. The walnut and cottage cheese paté and the vegetable curry had been disgusting. She’d hardly eaten anything, but, still dazed by Rupert Campbell-Black, had drunk more cheap elderberry wine than was good for her.

Maureen had glared at her all evening; Nigel had never turned up and Paul had somehow engineered that he drop her off at Regina House after dropping Maureen at her digs.

“I won’t come up for a coffee, Mo. I expect you’re tired,” he said.

Helen suspected that Maureen, standing in her furry coat like a disgruntled Pyrenean mountain dog, was no such thing. Outside Regina House Paul said, “May I kiss you, Ellen?” and lunged goatily. His beard tickled, he had B.O., and his breath smelled of curry. Helen lost her temper.

“You’re too sanctimonious for words, right. You had a glorious day playing cops and robbers and feeling smug to boot, and what’s more I’d like to report you to the RSPCA for being horrible to hounds.” Leaping out, she slammed the car door in his face.

Now she sat in her room feeling ashamed of herself and gazing at Harold Mountjoy’s photograph, which seemed to have lost all its appeal. She noticed the spoilt, slightly weak expression, the hair carefully combed forward to cover the lined forehead and crow’s-feet round the eyes.

“ ‘My only love sprang from my only hate,’ ” she whispered. She’d never see Rupert again. He obviously had millions of girls after him and, anyway, he was thoroughly spoilt. She looked at the primroses in the tooth mug with the ochre centers and pastel petals. She’d have to put him in her novel, then she could dream about him. Slowly she undressed, gazing at her body in the mirror. She’d never really studied it before, and yet he’d said it was beautiful. She found she’d put her nightdress on inside out; that was supposed to be lucky. She could do with some luck. She jumped at a sudden pounding on the door. It was the principal of the hostel in a camel hair dressing gown, hair in a net.