Rivals (12 page)

‘Caitlin!’ The tall girl blushed.

‘And I’ve lost my heart,’ continued Caitlin, training her binoculars back on Rupert Campbell-Black’s house. ‘Will you introduce me?’

‘He’s not here that much,’ said Lizzie. ‘But when he is, I’m sure he’ll introduce himself.’

‘It’s not fair,’ moaned Caitlin. ‘I’m going to bloody boarding school next week, and I won’t get first crack at him. He’s bound to fall for Taggie – or even Mummy,’ she said dismissively.

There was a knock on the door and a removal man came in with a yellowing dress in a polythene bag: where did Mrs O’Hara want this put?

‘My wedding dress,’ said Maud theatrically, rising to her feet and holding it against her. ‘Just to think, twenty-one years ago.’

‘Ugh,’ said Caitlin. ‘It’s gross. How did you get Daddy in that? But I suppose he didn’t see you till he came up the aisle, and then it was too late.’

‘Caitlin, hush,’ chided Taggie, as Maud’s face tightened with anger. ‘Mummy looked beautiful; you’ve seen the photos.’

‘Oh, put it in my bedroom,’ snapped Maud, going back to the
New Statesman.

‘I’m not sure I’m going to like living in the country,’ said Caitlin, fiddling with the wireless. ‘No Capital Radio, no
Standard
, no second post.’

‘No second post!’ Taggie’s gasp of dismay was interrupted by a knock on the door. Another removal man wanted to know where the piano was to go.

‘On the right of the front door,’ said Maud.

‘Not there,’ shrieked Caitlin. ‘Wandering Aengus is shut in there, and that stupid bugger Daddy’s let him out twice already. ‘

And there’s Daddy, the nation’s biggest megastar, thought Lizzie.

‘Aengus is our cat. He’s a bit unsettled,’ said Taggie, smiling apologetically at Lizzie.

‘Oh look,’ sighed Maud, unwrapping a baby’s bottle. ‘That was Patrick’s when he was a baby.’

Caitlin tapped the fast-emptying whisky bottle with a finger. ‘And this was Daddy’s when he was forty-two,’ she said accusingly.

‘Oh, go away,’ said Maud, shooting her another dirty look.

Peering at a pile of books in the corner, Lizzie was highly gratified to see a copy of her first novel.

‘I wrote that,’ she blurted out.

‘Did you?’ said Maud in amazement, picking up the book and examining the photograph on the inside flap.

‘When I was thinner,’ said Lizzie humbly.

‘It was really good,’ said Maud. ‘I thoroughly enjoyed it.’

At that moment a punk Lord Byron wandered into the room. He had flawless cheek bones, short dark glossy vertical hair, and an inch of violet shadow under his eyes, which were like Maud’s only darker and much more direct; obviously the son Patrick who had so dazzled the village shop.

‘Darling,’ said Maud in excitement, ‘this is Lizzie Vereker. She wrote this marvellous novel, and she lives down the valley, so perhaps Penscombe won’t be such a cultural desert after all.’

Patrick said, ‘Hullo, Lizzie,’ and announced that he’d liked the book too, and where did his mother want the piano?

‘In the big drawing-room.’

‘Too cold; you’ll never play it in there,’ said Caitlin.

‘Put it in the small sitting-room, then,’ said Maud.

‘There won’t be room for anything else in there, not even a piano stool,’ protested Patrick.

‘Oh well, you sort it out, darling, you’re so good at that sort of thing,’ said Maud.

‘And don’t let Aengus out,’ screamed Caitlin.

Patrick’s reply was drowned by a bellow of rage from outside and Declan stormed in holding a piece of paper in one hand and the cordless telephone in the other. Lizzie caught her breath. She’d never expected him to be so tall and broad in the shoulders, or quite so heroic looking. He had very thick dark hair streaked with grey, and worry and hard work had dug deep lines on either sides of his mouth and round his eyes, which were as sombre and dark as the rain-soaked yew trees outside. But even with half-moon spectacles fallen down over his broken nose, a quarter of an inch of stubble and odd socks, one had to admit his force.

‘This is Lizzie Vereker,’ announced Maud. ‘She’s brought us some eggs and a bottle of champagne, and she writes lovely books.’

Declan glared at Lizzie as though she didn’t exist.

‘I can’t find the focking A-D directory.’ His Irish accent was much more pronounced than the rest of the family. ‘I can’t find my focking telephone book. I can’t get through to Claridge’s. I can’t get any answer from directory enquiries in London. I’ve been trying for the last half-hour.’

He dialled the number again, then held out the receiver, so they could all hear the parrot screech of the unobtainable.

‘Shall I try?’ said Lizzie. ‘You have to dial 192 for London directories in the country, and then 01 before the number.’

Two minutes later she got through to Claridge’s and handed the telephone to an amazed and grateful Declan, who asked to be put through to Johnny Friedlander.

Lizzie almost fainted. Johnny Friedlander was a brilliant, madly desirable American actor, with a well-known cocaine habit, and a penchant for under-age school girls.

‘
The
Johnny Friedlander,’ she mouthed at Taggie.

Taggie nodded and smiled.

Declan was put straight through, and invited Johnny on to his first programme for Corinium next month.

‘I’d ask you to stay with us,’ Declan went on in his world-famous husky infinitely sexy smoker’s voice, ‘but we’re in shit order this end, and you’d do better in a hotel. We can have dinner after the programme. I’ll get our contract people to talk to your people. Thanks, Johnny, I can’t think of a better person to kick off the series.’

‘But he’s never given an interview ever,’ said Lizzie in wonder, as Declan came off the telephone.

‘I know. Isn’t it great?’ Declan suddenly smiled, a wide, slightly gap-toothed grin, which made him look much more like Taggie, and made Lizzie feel utterly weak at the knees. ‘And all because you know how to use a telephone,’ he went on. ‘If I’d left it any later, he’d have been looped or refused point blank. I’ll certainly read your book.’

He turned to Maud. ‘D’you hear that, darling? Johnny’s coming on the programme.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Maud, without interest. ‘Hell,’ she went on, reaching the end of another torn bit of paper, ‘this piece on Princess Michael is continued on page eight. Do see if you can find it, Taggie.’

She started frantically burrowing in the tea chest, throwing discarded bits of newspaper all over the floor. Taggie raised her eyes to heaven.

Lizzie turned to Declan: ‘What are you writing at the moment?’

‘Cheques mostly,’ said Declan.

Gazing out of the window, towards the pond, he suddenly started, and grabbed the binoculars from Caitlin, nearly garrotting her with the straps.

‘Grasshopper warbler,’ he said a second later. ‘Pretty rare for this part of the world. There are some marvellous birds round here.’

‘There could be some marvellous blokes too,’ said Caitlin, rubbing her neck and snatching back the binoculars to train them once more on Rupert’s house, ‘if they were ever at home.’

‘I’m off to the public library, darling,’ said Declan, attempting to kiss a still scrabbling Maud on the cheek.

‘But you haven’t had any breakfast or lunch,’ said Taggie in distress.

‘Trust you to push off leaving us to do all the work,’ grumbled Maud.

‘Leaving Taggie to do all the work,’ said Declan with a slight edge to his voice.

After he’d gone, and Maud and Lizzie had had some more whisky, the doorbell rang.

‘Probably the local paper, and your father’s not here,’ said Maud, who was now reading about Boy George.

But it was another bouquet of flowers, brought in by Caitlin.

‘Who are they for?’ asked Taggie, hope flaring then dying in her eyes, when Caitlin opened the envelope and read: To
Declan and Maura.
‘That’s a new one, Mum.’

Seeing the flash of irritation on Maud’s face, Lizzie wondered quite how much fun it must be to be married to such a famous man. Lizzie had experienced the same thing in a smaller way being married to James, but she wasn’t stunningly beautiful like Maud. It must be awful looking like that, and having people getting your name wrong, and wanting to gawp all the time at your husband.

‘Where’s Grace?’ said Maud fretfully.

‘Not up yet,’ said Caitlin. ‘Said she couldn’t sleep because of the quiet. I suggested the removal men should drive their vans round and round hooting under her window to remind her of the juggernauts in Fulham. Grace is our so-called housekeeper,’ she explained to Lizzie. ‘Patrick says she ought to join the RSPCA, she’s so kind to spiders.’

‘I must go,’ said Lizzie regretfully.

‘Have another drink,’ said Maud, not looking up.

‘Have some lunch,’ said Taggie. ‘I was just going to make some omelettes.’

‘I must work,’ said Lizzie. ‘Thanks awfully. The children’ll be home soon; it must be nearly four.’

‘I’ll walk some of the way with you,’ said Caitlin. ‘Gertrude needs a walk. Do you want to come with us, Mummy?’ Her voice was suddenly conciliatory, as though she regretted cheeking her mother.

‘No thanks,’ said Maud vaguely. ‘I must measure up some windows for curtains.’

‘Curtains, indeed,’ muttered Caitlin as she and Lizzie left the room. ‘The only thing my mother measures with any efficiency is her length after parties. ‘Then, noticing Lizzie’s raised eyebrows, ‘I’m afraid I’m at the age when one tends to criticize one’s parents a lot. Sadly one can’t sever the umbilical cord gently. It has to be done with a razor blade and without an anaesthetic.’

Along a winding passage Caitlin opened a door into a large octagonal room, the base of one of the mediaeval turrets. Tall, narrow ecclesiastical windows with stained glass in the top panes provided the only interruption to shelves and shelves of books.

‘Daddy’s library,’ said Caitlin. ‘I thought, being a writer, you’d like it.’

‘How lovely,’ gasped Lizzie.

‘I think Daddy bought the house because it already had shelves in.’

They went out of the West door on the other side of the house, past stables and a clock tower with a roof covered in ferns and dark moss, through a vegetable garden which had been taken over by nettles, and an orchard whose stunted lichened trees grew no higher than seven feet, because of the constant blasting of the winds.

‘Patrick says it’s going to take a fleet of gardeners to keep this place in order,’ said Caitlin. ‘And what with my school fees, and the re-wiring, and the new roof, and Mummy’s
House and Garden
fantasies, Daddy’s bloody well going to need his new salary.’

Out in the sunshine Lizzie noticed how pale and thin Caitlin was and thought a few terms playing games and eating stodge at a vigorous girls’ boarding school would do her no harm. Gertrude bounced ahead, plunging into the beech wood after rabbits. Certainly, slithering down the wood was easier than climbing up.

‘Is Rupert Campbell-Black as attractive as everyone says?’ asked Caitlin.

‘Yes,’ sighed Lizzie. ‘He seems to get more so.’

‘They say he was very wild in his youth.’

‘Well, he’s had a rather extended youth.’

‘And brainy.’

‘Well, street bright, and very sharp with money.’

‘My brother Patrick is like that. I have brains. Taggie has beauty. Patrick has both.’

‘Oh you’re going to be very beautiful,’ said Lizzie truthfully.

‘I may blossom,’ said Caitlin beadily. ‘But at present I am undernourished, and my teeth leave a lot to be desired. I had to make the dentist put this beastly brace on. My mother only believes in going to the dentist when one’s teeth hurt.’

‘And Taggie seems very efficient in the kitchen,’ said Lizzie. ‘Isn’t
she
bright?’

‘Not at all. She’s dyslexic, poor darling, hardly stumbles through Mills and Boon, and she has fearful trouble with recipe books, which is a pity, as she wants to be a cook. Patrick said it was ghastly when she was small, everyone thought she was retarded because she couldn’t read. Mummy shouted at her all the time, never thought of taking her to an educational psychologist.’

The wall at the bottom of the beech wood marked the end of Declan’s land. Caitlin scrambled over it and held out a hand to help Lizzie.

‘How beautiful,’ she said, gazing at the flat water meadows and the bustling little stream. ‘I can imagine mediaeval knights jousting here in the old days.’

She whistled to Gertrude who’d belted the other way, and who now rushed back, splashing and drinking in the stream.

‘The ghastly thing about having brilliant famous parents,’ Caitlin went on, ‘is you never feel the centre of the universe, because they’re so obsessed with their own lives. And if you do brilliantly at school, everyone nods sagely and says Declan’s daughter, it’s in the genes; and if you do badly like poor Tag, they just assume you’re lazy or bloody-minded. Tag’s self-confidence was in tatters when she left school.’

‘But she’s so beautiful,’ protested Lizzie.

‘I know, but she doesn’t realize it. She’s madly in love with Ralphie Henriques, one of Patrick’s even more brilliant friends. After months of pestering, he seduced Tag at a May Ball at Trinity this year. God, look at those blackberries!’ Caitlin started tearing them off the bushes with both hands and cramming them into her mouth.

‘I hoped Tag would tell me
exactly
what it was like. One can’t obtain one’s entire sexual education from the pages of Jackie Collins, but she just clammed up, and he never rang her again. Just one postcard from Cork, and nothing since. Can you imagine doing that to Tag? That’s why she waits for every post and jumps on every telephone. Patrick says Ralphie’s got someone else, some pert little blonde who reads Sophocles in the original. Poor Tag can’t even read English in the original.’