Rivals (21 page)

‘Sit down. Congratulations to both of you,’ he said briskly. ‘I’ve just heard off the record that we got our highest local rating ever for your interview with the Princess.’

Declan sank into one of the low squashy sofas, which, with his long legs, were desperately uncomfortable unless one was lying down.

Tony leant back in his chair: ‘Cameron and I have decided it’s time you spread your wings, Declan.’

Declan looked wary.

‘We’d like you to interview Maurice Wooton this week.’

‘He’s not big enough,’ said Declan flatly. Lord Wooton was a high-profile Cotchester property developer but of little interest nationally. ‘And I’m already doing Graham Greene this week.’

‘That’s OK,’ said Cameron. ‘Do Lord Wooton as a special after the ten o’clock news on Friday night.’

‘Why can’t James do him?’

‘James is already doing Sarah Stratton in the Famous Man slot on “Cotswold Round-Up”. Besides, we want you.’

‘I’m only contracted to do one interview a week.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Tony. ‘We’ll pay you extra. We just want you to get really involved in the station.’

‘I don’t have the time.’ It was so hot in Tony’s office that Declan could feel his shirt drenched in sweat.

‘That’s what researchers are for,’ said Cameron, as though she was explaining to a two-year-old. ‘Deirdre Kilpatrick’s been working on Maurice Wooton all week. She’s come up with some terrific stuff. After all,’ she added tauntingly, ‘a guy as great as Henry Moore wasn’t too proud to employ studio assistants.’

Like a dog struggling out of a weed-clogged pond, Declan heaved himself up from the squashy sofa. ‘I do my own research,’ he said coldly, and walked out.

Hooray, thought Cameron, it’s begun to work.

On Thursday morning Cameron rang Declan at home. It was his official day off. He’d stayed up until four in the morning reading Graham Greene. Inspired, he was determined to spend the next two days on his Yeats biography, and here was Cameron’s horrible rasp ordering him to come into a meeting tomorrow at eleven o’clock.

‘So we can kick some ideas around about the line you might take with Maurice Wooton.’

Declan hung up on her. When he hadn’t shown up by eleven-thirty the following morning, Cameron rang The Priory in a fury. She got Maud, who said she was sorry but Declan was in bed.

‘At this hour? Is he ill?’

‘Not at all,’ said Maud. ‘He’s reading.’

‘Put him on.’

Declan told Cameron to go and jump in the River Fleet and that he’d no intention of coming in for any meeting. Tony then rang Declan and ordered him to come in that evening and interview Maurice Wooton. Declan, having just received an eighty-thousand-pound tax bill, which he had no way of ever paying unless he went on working at Corinium, said he’d be in later, but wouldn’t submit questions beforehand.

He slid into Corinium around two o’clock, when he knew Cameron and Tony would still be at lunch, and went down to the newsroom to talk to Sebastian Burrows, the youngest, brightest and therefore most frustrated of the reporters.

‘Deirdre Kilpatrick’s been working like mad on your Maurice Wooton interview,’ said Seb.

‘Deirdre Kill-Programme,’ said Declan.

Seb grinned: ‘You can say that again. Maurice is emerging as a total sweetie.’

‘You got any dirt on him?’ asked Declan.

‘He’s one of Tony’s best friends, isn’t that enough?’

‘Not quite – anything concrete?’

Sebastian’s thin face lit up. ‘I’ve got enough to send him down for ten years, but I daren’t use it.’

‘Give it to me,’ said Declan. ‘I’m going out.’

On the same Friday, Rupert Campbell-Black, having spent all week in meetings with the FA and the Club Managers trying to thrash out some suitable compromise on football hooliganism, decided he felt like a pit pony who needed a day off, and went hunting with Basil Baddingham.

Scent was very bad, however. It rained all day and the foxes sensibly decided to stay in their earths. Having re-boxed their horses, Rupert and Bas got back to Rupert’s dark-blue Aston-Martin to find the windscreen covered with leaves like parking tickets. Removing their drenched red coats and hunting ties, and putting on jerseys, they drove home through the yellow gloom.

‘Who shall we do this evening?’ said Bas, who was feeling randy.

‘No one,’ sighed Rupert. ‘I’ve got my red box to go through, and I’ve got to look in at some fund-raising drinks party.’

‘Pity,’ said Bas slyly, ‘I was going to show you the most amazing girl.’

‘That’s different,’ said Rupert. ‘Where does she live?’

‘Penscombe Priory.’

Thinking Bas meant Maud, Rupert said, ‘Isn’t she a bit long in the tooth for you?’

‘No, I’m talking about the daughter,’ said Bas. ‘She’s absolutely stunning.’

Back at The Priory, Grace, the housekeeper, who was making ridiculously slow progress sorting out the attic, stumbled on a trunk of Maud’s old clothes. Maud, who had just finished her last P. D. James and was suffering from withdrawal symptoms, wandered upstairs and started trying them on. Now she was parading round in a black-and-red-striped mini which fell just below her groin and showed off her still beautiful legs.

‘I remember walking down Grafton Street in 1968 in this,’ she said, ‘and an American clapping his hands over his eyes, and screaming: “Oh my Gard, can they go any higher?” My hair was down like this.’ Maud pulled out the combs so it cascaded down her back. ‘I was only twenty-four.’

‘You don’t look a day more than that now. Amizing,’ said Grace.

‘Oh, I adored this dress too.’ Maud tugged a sapphire-blue mini with a pie-frill collar out of the trunk. ‘I wore it to Patrick’s christening. I wonder if I can still get into it.’

‘Fits you like a glove,’ said Grace, who was trying on a maxicoat. ‘Amizing.’

As Maud admired herself in an ancient full-length mirror propped against the rafters, she heard Gertrude barking. Not displeased with her appearance, she went downstairs, then paused halfway. Below her in the hall, she could see two heads: one very dark, the other gleaming blond. Her heart missed a beat.

‘Maud,’ yelled Bas, ‘are you in?’

‘I’m up here,’ said Maud with the light behind her.

Bas looked up. ‘Caitlin,’ he said. ‘I thought you’d gone back.’

‘It’s me.’ Maud came slowly down the stairs. ‘Grice and I were being silly trying on my old clothes.’

‘How old were you when you first wore that?’

‘About twenty-one.’

‘You look about sixteen today,’ said Bas, kissing her.

‘Flattery will get you an enormous drink. I assume that’s what you’ve come for. Grice,’ Maud yelled up the stairs, ‘can you come down and fix some drinks? I’ll go and change.’

‘Don’t,’ said Rupert. ‘I bet Declan fell in love with you in that dress. I’m quite safe,’ he went on, also kissing Maud. ‘Some bloody hunt saboteur sprayed me with Anti-Mate this afternoon.’

‘Where’s Declan?’ asked Bas, as they went into the kitchen.

‘Ordered in to do an extra programme,’ said Maud, getting a bottle of whisky out of the larder.

‘My evil brother got the screws on him already?’ asked Bas. ‘Have you got anything to eat? I’m absolutely starving.’

‘There’s some chocolate cake and a quiche in the larder,’ said Maud, splashing whisky into three glasses. ‘Have a look and see what you can find.’

Rupert prowled round the room. There was a huge scrubbed table in the centre of the room, with chairs down either side. Poetry and cookery books crammed the shelves in equal proportions. A rocking-horse towered over Gertrude’s basket in the corner. Aengus the cat snored on some newly ironed shirts by the Aga. On the walls were drawings of Maud in
Juno and the Paycock
, and a corkboard covered with recipes and photographs of animals, cut by Taggie out of newspapers. Apart from a television set on a chest of drawers, every other available surface seemed to be littered with letters, bills, colour swatches, photographs waiting to be stuck in, dog and cat worming tablets, biros that didn’t work, newspapers and magazines.

‘Nice kitchen,’ said Rupert.

‘It’s like the room described by Somerville and Ross when they were packing up before moving,’ said Maud. ‘Under everything, there’s something.’

Valerie Jones, who dropped in half an hour later, didn’t think it was a nice kitchen at all. She was shocked to find Maud showing at least six inches of bare thigh, and Rupert and Basil with their long-booted legs up on the table, all getting tanked up on Declan’s whisky. Rupert was eating bread and bramble jelly and reading the problem page in
Jackie.
Bas was finishing up the remains of a mackerel mousse with a spoon. Gertrude, eyeing the remains of the quiche and the large chocolate cake, was now sitting drooling on the table on a pile of unironed sheets, which would no doubt go straight back on the beds, thought Valerie with a shudder.

Valerie herself, natty in a ginger tweed suit and a deerstalker, said she had just been to a Distressed Gentlefolk’s Committee Meeting with Lady Baddingham, and, deciding to ‘straike while the iron was hot’, had looked in to see if Maud had any jumble for the Xmas Bazaar next month.

‘Having just moved, you must have lots of old junk to throw out.’

‘Only her husband,’ said Bas, starting on the quiche.

‘Hush,’ reproved Maud softly. ‘Funnily enough, I’ve just been trying on all my old clothes. This was the dress I wore at Patrick’s christening. The priest gathered up my skirt with the christening robes by mistake and all the congregation were treated to the sight of my red pants.’

Valerie didn’t want to hear about Maud’s pants. ‘Then you must have lots of jumble,’ she said.

‘I never throw clothes away,’ said Maud.

‘Well, I’ve brought you a brochure of our Autumn range,’ said Valerie, determined to turn the visit to some advantage.

‘Kind,’ said Maud, chucking the brochure into the débris on the Welsh dresser. ‘Have a drink.’

‘Ay’m driving. Have you got anything soft?’ said Valerie.

‘Not round here, with Maud wearing that dress,’ said Rupert, cutting himself a piece of chocolate cake.

‘I’ll have a tea then,’ said Valerie, ‘and I’d love a piece of that gâteau, and those bramble preserves look quite delicious.’

‘Taggie picked the blackberries down your valley; we ought to give you a pot,’ Maud said to Rupert, as she put the kettle on. She felt wildly happy.

At that moment Grace walked in, wearing Maud’s red and black mini.

‘This is Amizing Grice,’ said Maud.

‘Amizing,’ said Grace, gazing at Rupert in wonder. ‘I’m just off to that lecture on glass-blowing at the Women’s Institute, Maud,’ she went on. ‘See you later.’

‘I didn’t know there was a WI meeting tonight,’ said Valerie, perplexed.

‘Straight up to the pub,’ explained Maud, as the front door banged.

‘It’s not a very good idea to be on Christian name terms with one’s help,’ said Valerie reprovingly. ‘We don’t really do it in Gloucestershire, you know.’

‘’Bye, Grace! Have a good evening,’ yelled Rupert.

Valerie’s small mouth tightened. Watching Maud pouring boiling water over a teabag, she hoped the mug was clean.

‘This quiche is seriously good,’ said Bas. ‘And for Christ’s sake leave some of that chocolate cake, Rupert.’

‘Did Grace make it?’ enquired Valerie. Maybe Grace was more of a treasure than she had at first appeared.

‘Grace can’t cook a thing,’ said Maud. ‘Taggie made all this. She wants to break into catering and do people’s dinner parties.’

‘She’d better come and work at the Bar Sinister,’ said Bas. ‘Darling, I wondered where you’d got to.’ He swung his feet off the table and stood up as Taggie came in.

She was very pale, with her hair in a thick black plait down her back, and wearing one of Declan’s red shirts above long, long bare legs.

‘Hullo,’ she said in delight to Bas. Then, embarrassed that he aimed straight at her mouth, turned her head slightly so he ended up kissing her hair. At that moment, over his shoulder, she saw Rupert. She gave a gasp of horror and turned as red as her shirt.

To Valerie’s equal horror, Maud removed the teabag from Valerie’s tea with her fingers. Then she introduced Taggie to everyone.

Smiling at Valerie, but totally ignoring Rupert, Taggie took a tin of baked beans out of the fridge and started to eat them with a spoon.

‘I’m sure we’ve met before,’ said Rupert, puzzled. ‘You’re not a Young Conservative, are you?’ Then, suddenly he twigged and started to laugh. ‘I remember now. It was at a tennis party.’

Taggie blushed even deeper.

‘Brilliant quiche, stunning mousse, marvellous chocolate cake,’ said Bas with his mouth full.

‘Oh, it was for Daddy’s supper,’ began Taggie, distressed, then stopped herself. Sometimes she could murder her mother. She was about to go upstairs when Bas grabbed her hand and, sitting her down beside him, tried to persuade her to work for him at the Bar Sinister.

‘It’s really kind of you,’ mumbled Taggie, ‘but I worked in a restaurant for two years. I want to branch out on my own.’

‘You can come and cook my breakfast any day of the week,’ said Rupert. She looked so different from the angry child who’d screamed at him about his stubble. ‘You were quite right,’ he added to Basil.

Again Taggie ignored him.

‘It’s very good of Bas,’ said Maud with a slight edge to her voice. ‘Most girls would leap at a job like that. I always had to de-emphasize my career for Declan,’ she added fretfully.

Taggie, however, was totally thrown. She couldn’t take in what Bas was saying. She was only conscious of this horrible monster, who’d haunted her nightmares for weeks, whom she’d last seen oiled, brown-skinned, erect in every sense of the word and as totally unselfconscious of his nakedness as a Zulu chief, and who was now drinking her father’s whisky and laughing at her across the table. Out of sheer nervousness, she leapt up and turned on the television.