Country Pursuits (7 page)

There would be Angus, of course, and Calypso
and her new boyfriend Sam, who everyone was very excited about meeting. Maybe she'd found a decent man at last. At least his name sounded normal; Calypso's previous boyfriends had all had names like Snake, Rabid and Rev.

Caro was coming by herself, as Sebastian was off on a boys' weekend in Monaco (which was actually the truth, for once). Harriet would be on her own as well. Camilla had been fretting about the male to female ratio, until Angus offered to bring two of his friends, Ed ‘Sniffer' Clevedon (called that on account of the way he was always after the opposite sex), and someone mysteriously known only as ‘Horse'.

‘Are you sure they'll behave themselves?' Camilla had asked Angus anxiously. ‘Caro hasn't been out properly since she had Milo, I don't want to scare her off before the first course.'

Angus had winked and slapped her bottom affectionately. ‘No party is a party without the Horse and Sniffer there, they'll be a riot!'

‘That's what I'm afraid of.'

The prospect of out-of-control dinner guests aside, Camilla had the menu to think about. She and Caro could put on a jolly good spread, having both done a course at the Prue Leith cookery school. Although Camilla was ashamed to admit she relied mostly these days on M&S and the gourmet range at Waitrose. She was determined, however, not to have a cellophane wrapper or foil lid in sight for this meal. After much deliberation she'd decided to go for smoked salmon mousse for starters, rack of lamb with dauphinoise potatoes for the main course, and the promised lemon meringue pie for pudding.
This would be followed by petit fours she was going to attempt to make herself, and cheese and biscuits. Calypso had made a half-hearted offer of help, but after Camilla had come down one morning and found her absent-mindedly dropping cigarette ash into her bowl of Alpen while chatting on her mobile, she had firmly put her on drinks duty in the living room.

Caro had just flopped down exhausted on the sofa after putting Milo down for his nap, when there was a knock at the door. Her heart sank. She really wasn't in the mood for visitors, but she hauled herself up and went to answer it.

‘Caro! Have you got a minute?' Caro's heart sank even more. Standing on her doorstep was Lucinda Reinard, the current owner of Twisty Gables. In her early forties, she had moved to the village three years earlier with her second husband, a rangy laconic Frenchman called Nico, who Caro always caught staring at her bosom. Lucinda once confessed, after one too many G and Ts at the Jolly Boot, that the reason they had moved away from London was to make a fresh start after her husband's affair with a glamorous blonde boutique owner. Even though the two women were entirely different, Lucinda had taken a shine to Caro, calling them ‘kindred London spirits'. Caro knew they were anything but, but that didn't stop Lucinda.

‘Er, yes. Is everything all right?' Caro asked. ‘You look a bit stressed.' Lucinda was a well-fleshed horsy blonde woman who reminded her of Princess Anne in the throes of a minor breakdown.

‘I am! Bloody Julien's been at my Cacharel
pashmina with the scissors. I just caught the little horror flying around the garden in it pretending to be Superman!' Julien was Lucinda and Nico's five-year-old son. She also had a precocious pair of eleven-year-old twins, Hero and Horatio, by her first husband. ‘Anyway, I was just passing and wanted to know if you fancied coming along to the pony club quiz night with me next week. I'm organizing it, thought it would be a good chance for you to meet some of the other girls, see what you think of it all. You'd better not leave it too much longer to put Milo's name down, they are
dreadfully
oversubscribed at the moment.'

Caro sighed. Lucinda had made it her mission to try and get Caro to sign up to practically every club and society in the district. ‘Can't have you at home all day while your husband's away!' she had told her. Since decamping to the country, Lucinda had forgone her townie roots with a vengeance. ‘Integrating with the village is
so
important for one's family,' she had insisted. Caro tried to hide her irritation. ‘Milo's not one until next year, Lucinda, I'm sure it won't matter just yet. Besides, he might not like horses.'

Lucinda looked at her as though she was speaking some foreign, incomprehensible language.

‘Of
course
he'll like horses!' she cried. ‘The twins are quite besotted with their ponies; I don't know what I did to keep them from under my feet before.'

At that point, Milo started crying upstairs. Caro had never been so pleased to hear the sound.

‘Look, I'm going to have to go—' she started. Lucinda looked past her down the hall and smiled
sympathetically, revealing large white teeth with a gap between the front ones.

‘Of course, bloody nightmare at that age. Bloody nightmare at any age! Ha ha ha.' She looked at her watch and panic flittered across her face. ‘Christ, look at the time! I've got to take Hero to cello practice and I've a mountain of paperwork to get through. Let me know what you want to do about next week.'

I won't be coming, thought Caro as she watched Lucinda's ample rear disappear down the path towards a muddy Range Rover. She knew Lucinda was just being kind, really, but the thought of spending the evening in a room full of loud, domineering women and their rowdy offspring held about as much appeal as watching John Prescott do a naked pole-dance. Upstairs, Milo's cries had developed into blood-curdling yells. Once again, Caro ran up the stairs to placate him.

THE DAY OF
the dinner party arrived, and from midday Camilla had been in the kitchen roasting, basting, tasting and whisking. The smoked salmon mousse now resting in the fridge was a triumph. The lamb had been studded with rosemary and garlic and was ready to go in the oven later. Potatoes and vegetables were under control. Camilla had ended up cheating on the petit fours and buying them from the Swiss confectioner's when she was dashing through Cirencester on her way home from work, but they were exquisite. The only thing that was a slight let-down was the lemon meringue pie. She had followed Nigella's recipe to the letter, but it hadn't looked, well, quite so messy in the picture in the book. Camilla's version looked more like a pile of vomit than a gastronomic triumph, but she figured she could smother it in cream and dim the lights when she brought it in.

It was 6.45 p.m. The guests were arriving in forty-five minutes. Calypso had just told her Sam was stuck in bad traffic on the M4 and would be there by 8 p.m. at the latest. The Bollinger was chilling in the fridge, and several bottles of red were opened
and resting comfortably on the table in the dining room.

Camilla was upstairs in her bedroom getting ready. She had on her favourite black dress from Alice Temperley, her mother's pearl necklace, and black pumps from French Sole, deciding heels were not a good idea if she was going to be rushing to and from the kitchen all night.

Calypso materialized in the doorway. She was wearing the shortest of T-shirt dresses, with a thick, low slung belt around her slender waist. Her legs were bare, apart from a silver ankle chain and patent stilettos that were easily six inches high. Her streaky blonde hair was pulled back in a high, unforgiving ponytail which only served to highlight her cheekbones and kohl-rimmed eyes. Huge silver earrings in the shape of anchors hung from each ear.

Calypso gave her sister a cursory once-over.

‘You wearing that?'

‘Yes, why?' said Camilla defensively. ‘What's wrong with it?'

‘Oh, nothing, it's just like, a bit . . . blah,' replied Calypso, turning to walk down the hall. ‘I'm fixing a Screwdriver, d'ya want one?'

Camilla declined. Knowing the strength of her sister's cocktails, she didn't want to be on her back before the main course. She turned to the mirror. OK, she might not look as cool as Calypso, but convenience outweighed style tonight. ‘Blah it's going to have to be,' thought Camilla, and tugged her dress down a bit before heading downstairs.

The first guest to arrive, at 7.21 p.m., was Caro, clutching a bottle of Pinot Grigio. Camilla helped
her out of her coat. Caro was wearing a black skirt that looked slightly too tight, and a purple see-through blouse with a built-in camisole underneath it. She also had a bright red lipstick on that didn't suit her, so that, unfortunately, she resembled a tacky barmaid, rather than the glamorous model from the pages of
Tatler
that she had been hoping to imitate. She also had a smear of something white across her right boob, which looked specifically baby-orientated.

‘You look lovely, Caro,' said Camilla dutifully. ‘There's some kind of a stain on your top, though.'

Caro looked down. ‘Bugger! I thought I'd wiped all Milo's sick off me. Bills, can I borrow a cloth?'

Calypso, coming out of the kitchen with her second super-sized Screwdriver, heard the tail-end of the conversation and looked horrified. ‘Urgh, gross!' she said, and whisked past them into the living room. By the time Camilla had got Caro settled in there with a drink, the doorbell rang again.

This time it was Harriet, brandishing a bottle of wine and a beautiful bunch of flowers. ‘Oh Hats, they're beautiful,' said Camilla, taking them. ‘Thank you!'

‘They're off the estate, actually,' said Harriet grinning. ‘I went and picked them this arvo; at least that flower-arranging course I went on taught me something!' She shrugged off her coat to reveal a plunging red dress which showed off an enormous, milky white cleavage. Harriet had obviously tried to tame her frizzy hair and failed, as it was now scraped back in an unflattering bun with bits sticking out everywhere. The whole effect was a rather unnerving blend of Dolly Parton meets Worzel Gummidge.

‘Golly, Hats!' giggled Camilla, staring down at her friend's décolletage. ‘Where did they come from?'

Harriet looked anxious. ‘It's too much, isn't it? I've been standing in front of the mirror for hours. Mummy bought it for me; she said I have to stop dressing like an old maid. I don't think it looked as revealing as this on the hanger, though.'

‘It's fine! You look great,' said Camilla, stretching the truth for the second time that night. ‘Come on, let's get you a drink.'

A few minutes later, the doorbell rang again, and this time the door was nearly knocked down as someone hammered on it. Camilla ran to open it and was confronted by Angus, dressed in black tie, a Santa Claus hat incongruously perched on his huge head. Flanking him were two equally enormous men. One was dressed in full drag, complete with blonde wig and fishnet stockings, and the other was dressed as a giant fairy with wings, a wand and a pink tutu. They looked like clones of Angus, with their big meaty bodies and ruddy red cheeks, except the one on the left had a huge, Desperate-Dan-style chin, and the fairy on the right was sporting an inane, gap-toothed smile. Camilla's heart sank.

‘Hello, you foxy filly!' boomed Angus, clapping a hand around the men either side of him. ‘You've met Sniffer,' he said, cocking his head to the one dressed in drag. ‘And this is Horse.' The hulk of a man next to him flashed his gap-toothed smile and curtsied in his tutu.

‘Angus, it's not fancy dress,' said Camilla faintly, as they all thundered in, filling the narrow corridor completely.

‘Yah, I know,' said Angus. ‘But me and the chaps
thought it would be jolly good fun; keep you ladies entertained all night!'

‘If you know what we mean,' leered Sniffer, looming over her. Camilla pretended she didn't, and wondered just what Angus had been saying to his friends about her.

It was too late to do anything. Camilla stood aside helplessly and watched them barrel into the living room. Cool as a cucumber, Calypso lit her cigarette and looked at them.

‘Didn't know there was a dress code, lads.'

‘Yah, we decided things needed livening up a bit,' boomed Sniffer, his eyes travelling up and down her endless legs. He took in the make-up and earrings. ‘Are you a pop star or something?'

Calypso ignored him and took a drag.

‘So!' said Camilla brightly. ‘Let me introduce everyone. Caro, this is er, Sniffer and Horse. Guys, this is my sister Caro, and that,' she indicated Calypso, ‘is our younger sister, Calypso.'

Horse bared his substantial teeth in what Camilla took to be an inviting smile. ‘Yah, well I can see good looks run in the family. I do have a liking for sisters.' Sniffer elbowed him conspicuously, and they fell about laughing.

Camilla ploughed on. ‘This is my best friend, Harriet Fraser.' All three of them rounded on Harriet, who until that point had been trying to shrink unobtrusively into the armchair in the corner of the room.

‘
Mamma mia!
' said Sniffer, looking down into the acres of cleavage.

‘You don't get many of
those
to the pound,' chortled Horse. Harriet went bright red and put a
cushion over her chest. Angus, sharply prodded by a furious Camilla, realized his friends might have gone slightly too far. ‘Come on, you two, leave the poor girl alone. What's a chap got to do for a drink around here, anyway?'

‘So why are you called Horse?' asked Calypso sarcastically.

A smug smile spread across Horse's face and he gestured down to his crotch. ‘Can't you guess, gorgeous?'

‘Urgh!'

Sniffer stepped in. ‘Stop lying, Horseman! Your name has got nothing to do with how big your dick is,' he said. Horse's red cheeks paled slightly.

‘No?' asked Calypso, leaning forward and showing her first spark of interest so far. ‘Why's he really called Horse, then?'

Angus guffawed. ‘Because he used to have huge front teeth at prep school!' He turned to Horse. ‘Isn't that right, you goofy twat?'

Angus and Sniffer roared with laughter, while Horse looked thoroughly put out. ‘Leave it out, you bastards,' he said petulantly. ‘I had to wear a brace, so what?'