Billy Bentley hung about, looking down at Harriet, trying to control his restless horse.
‘Going to the hunt ball?’ he asked.
‘No, I’m not.’
‘Going away?’
‘No, I’m just not going.’
‘What a shame,’ said Billy, suddenly turning pink. ‘I say, I liked talking to you last night. Wonder if you’d come out one evening?’
‘I’d love to, but it’s a bit difficult,’ said Harriet, turning pink too. ‘I’ve got this baby, my own I mean, not Jonah or Chattie.’
‘Doesn’t matter a scrap,’ said Billy. ‘Bring the little chap with you if you like. Still got our old nanny at home; got nothing to do; love to look after him.’
Harriet was touched and wanted to tell him so, but next moment the whipper-in arrived with the hounds, who looked curiously naked without collars, tails waving frantically.
‘They haven’t been fed for two days,’ said an anti-fox-hunting youth who was waving a poster saying, ‘Hounds off our wild life’.
Grooms were sweeping rugs off sweating, shuddering horses; riders were mounting and jogging off in a noisy glittering cavalcade, with a yelp of voices and a jingle of bits.
Cory rode up on Python, black coat gleaming, eyes popping, letting out snorts of hysterical excitement at all the activity around her.
‘I’ll ring you this evening,’ said Billy. ‘Morning, Cory. That’s new, very nice too.’
‘Kit found her in Ireland,’ said Cory. ‘Had a couple of days on her with the Kildare.’
‘Up to his weight, was she?’ said Billy. ‘Bloody good. Put her in for the point-to-point, will you?’
‘I thought I might.’
‘Cory darling!’ It was Elizabeth Pemberton, wearing rather too much make-up, but looking stunning in a black coat, and the tightest white breeches. She caught sight of Harriet and nodded to her dismissively.
‘You are coming with us on Friday, aren’t you?’ she said to Cory.
There was a pause, his eyes flickered towards Harriet, then away.
‘Yes I’d like to,’ he said.
‘I think we’ll be about twenty-four for dinner,’ she said.
Big bloody deal, thought Harriet.
The Master was blowing his horn up the road. Next moment Arabella rolled up on a thoroughly over-excited bay, which barged round, nearly sending Harriet and the children for six.
As the hunt rode down into the valley, the pigeons rose like smoke from the newly ploughed fields.
‘Let’s follow them,’ said Harriet.
But when they got back to the car, she gave a gasp of horror. The back seat was empty; Sevenoaks had gone; he must have wriggled out of the window. She had terrifying visions of him chasing sheep, running under the horses’ feet, or getting onto the motorway.
‘We must look for him,’ she said, getting into the car and driving off in the direction of the hunt, which had disappeared into the wood. Then followed a desperately frustrating half-hour bucketing along the narrow country lanes, having to pull into side-roads every time an oncoming car approached, nearly crashing several times because she was so busy scouring the fields for Sevenoaks.
The hunt were having an equally frustrating time; hounds were not picking up any scent. Riders stood around on the edge of the wood, fidgeting. Then suddenly an old bitch hound gave tongue, and the chorus of hounds swelled, and the whole hillside was echoing. Pa pa pa pa went the melancholy, plaintive note of the horn, and the next moment the hunt came spilling across the road. There was a clash as stirrups hit each other, a snorting of horses, and they were jumping over the wall on the opposite side of the road. From the top of the hill Harriet watched them streaming across the field. There was Cory blown like a beech leaf in his red coat, standing up in his stirrups now to see what was on the other side of a large wall. The next moment Python had cleared it by inches. Hounds were splaying out by a small wood at the bottom of the valley, then suddenly they turned and came thundering back in Harriet’s direction.
‘There’s the fox,’ screamed Chattie, and gave the most ear-splitting view halloo.
Ten seconds later the hounds came flowing past her. Suddenly in the middle Harriet recognized a familiar figure, dirty grey, pink tongue hanging out, galloping joyously.
‘Oh look, there’s Sevenoaks,’ screamed the children.
‘Come here,’ bellowed Harriet.
For a second he looked in her direction and gave her a naughty, flickering, rolling look, then trundled on in the centre of the pack which swept in a liver, black and white wave over the hill.
All the pent-up emotion of the last twenty-four hours welled up in Harriet. She sat down on the bank and laughed until she cried.
Her elation was short-lived. The hunt was soon miles away. She must get back to William. She drove home feeling depressed — not merely because of the day’s catastrophic developments. She tried to analyse why, as she got the children a late lunch, and fed William. Perhaps I’m just tired, she thought.
‘I just landed on one of your hotels, and you didn’t even notice,’ said Jonah.
‘Oh God, how much do you owe me?’ said Harriet.
‘£1,000,’ said Jonah. ‘It was jolly honest of me to tell you.’
‘Jolly honest,’ answered Harriet, wishing he hadn’t.
‘Here’s £1,000,’ said Jonah. ‘Now we can go on for another half-hour.’
Harriet was dying for him to beat her. Worried about Sevenoaks, she was finding it impossible to concentrate. There was no way she could win now; she wanted to get the game over as quickly as possible.
Fortunately Sammy arrived at that moment, bringing Georgie and Timothy, the Pembertons’ elder child, who was a friend of Jonah’s, so all four children disappeared to the attic.
Sammy and Harriet went back into the nursery where William was rolling around on the rug.
‘How was Arabella’s party last night?’ said Sammy.
Harriet gave her an expurgated edition of what had happened.
‘It was hideously embarrassing, but Cory was so sweet about it afterwards.’
‘I think Charles Mander’s rather attractive,’ said Sammy. ‘He’s reputed to beat his wife. He’s known round here as Rotation of Riding Crops.’ She shrieked with laughter. ‘Fancy old Arabella shoving you off to do the washing up.’
‘She’d be quite attractive,’ mused Harriet, ‘if she didn’t push so hard.’
‘Must be getting desperate. I wonder how old she is. About thirty I should think. I hope I die before I’m thirty. It sounds so old.’
‘Forty must be worse,’ said Harriet. ‘Mrs Bottomley must be over fifty.’
They brooded silently over this horror.
‘Cory’s thirty-four,’ said Sammy. ‘It doesn’t seem too bad for a man; but, just think, when you were born he was fourteen, getting all clammy-handed and heavy breathing over girls at parties.’
Harriet thought she’d rather not.
‘Elizabeth and Michael didn’t have much fun last night either,’ said Sammy. ‘There weren’t any alkaseltzers in the house. We’d run out, but Michael came down in the night and had sixteen junior aspirins.’
‘What’s happening on Friday?’ said Harriet.
‘The Hunt Ball,’ said Sammy. ‘Everyone gets absolutely smashed and blows hunting horns, and rushes upstairs and fornicates in cordoned-off bedrooms.’
She picked up a cushion and peered round it at William, making him go off into fits of giggles.
Harriet was sorting out a pile of washing.
‘Who else is going to Elizabeth’s party?’ she asked casually.
Sammy looked at her slyly. ‘You mean who’s she asked for Cory?’
Harriet went pink.
‘I just wondered if any of the people I met last night are going to be there.’