Riders

7

Oblivious to the continued grumbling of the head of the hostel, who was still hovering in the hall, Helen fled upstairs to her room and rushed to the mirror, just to reassure herself that she was still there and that such a thing could have happened.

“He called,” she whispered, “he really called.”

With all those girls chasing after him, he’d bothered to get her phone number from Nigel. Then she buried her face in the primroses, breathing in their faint sweet smell, before collapsing onto the bed.

She must pull herself together. Rupert was a terrible rake, who attracted females far too effortlessly, no doubt leaving a trail of destruction in his wake, like Macheath. And what about the dreadful sexist things he’d said to Maureen, and what about married Gabriella, with whom he’d vanished for two hours at the ball? Perhaps she shouldn’t go; her heart hadn’t mended after Harold Mountjoy; a second break would be far more difficult to repair. But the thought of not seeing him made her faint with horror. She felt quite out of control, swept along like a branch chucked into a raging torrent.

Besides, there was no way she could get in touch with him to say she had changed her mind; and would she ever be any good as a writer if she didn’t experience life?

It had been a very long day. If she didn’t want black circles under bug eyes the next morning, she ought to get some sleep, but instead she sat down at her typewriter and covered six pages of foolscap describing the day. These she slotted into a folder marked “England 1973.” Then she cleaned her teeth for two minutes, using dental floss between each tooth, and sank to her knees to say her prayers. A convinced conservationist who believed in husbanding nature’s resources, she was horrified, when she got to her feet, to see that she’d left the tap running.

She woke in wild excitement. But elation soon gave way to panic as clothes littered the normally tidy room.

On and off, and on and off went the gray angora dress, which went best with her hair, but might be too hot if they went to a crowded restaurant. On and off went the crocus yellow silk shirt which brought out the color of her eyes, but, worn with a gray suit, made her look too much like an efficient secretary. The rust suit was too autumnal, the steel blue wool dress was lovely, but she was perspiring so much with nerves she might have great embarrassing dark circles under the arms. Finally she settled for the kilt and matching beret and green velvet coat she had bought from the Scotch House, worn with a frilly white shirt.

Then, what about makeup? She knew you shouldn’t wear much for church, but too much for God would be too little for Rupert. Really, it was very hard dressing for both, like having God and the Devil to dinner. Perfume was wrong for church, too Delilah-ish, so she settled for pouring half a bottle of cologne over herself instead. Much against her principles, she’d taken one of the tranquilizers she’d been given when she split up with Harold Mountjoy. It was having no effect at all. When she found herself rubbing deodorant into her cheeks and moisturizer under her arms, she realized she was really over the top.

She was ready by ten-fifteen, waiting in the dark polished hall. Various dowdy lady academics were milling around, getting ready for outings to museums or galleries. If only one of them would tell her she looked nice; but lady academics don’t notice such trivialities.

She took a surreptitious glance in the full-length mirror and suddenly decided that she looked ludicrous in the matching tartan beret and kilt, just like an air hostess. Racing upstairs, she changed back into the gray angora dress. Oh God, there was lipstick on it. She covered the mark with a pearl brooch, which looked ridiculous just above her left nipple. Her newly washed hair was all over the place from so much dressing and undressing. She rammed it down with a gray velvet hairband.

She couldn’t stop shaking. It was now twenty-five to eleven. At first the minutes crawled by, then they started to gallop. He couldn’t be coming; it was ten-fifty. Perhaps she’d heard him wrong, but she was sure he’d said half-past ten. She tried to read a long analysis of the Watergate crisis in the Sunday Times, but the words kept blurring, so she gave up and gazed at some horrible shocking pink hyacinths that were twitching outside in the cold wind.

Perhaps, in her state of cardiac arrest, she’d given him the wrong directions to Regina House, saying left when she meant right. It was two minutes to eleven; she musn’t cry, it would make her mascara run, but what did it matter when he obviously wasn’t coming anyway? It was just some diabolical plot to raise her hopes and then dump on her from a great height because she was part of the saboteurs.

The club secretary had just pinned the lunchtime menu on the board and several of the inmates surged forward, trying not to look too eager, watering at the mouth at the prospect of roast beef and treacle pudding to liven up their uneventful lives. In utter despair, fighting back the tears, Helen turned to stumble upstairs, but just as the hall grandfather clock struck eleven the front door pushed open and Rubert walked in, coming towards her with that lovely loping athlete’s stride. Unlike most people, he didn’t automatically lower his voice when he entered an institution.

“Darling, darling, I’m desperately sorry. I had to look at a horse in Newbury on the way up; the traffic was frightful,” he lied. “Are you all right? Did you think I wasn’t coming?”

He walked up to her and, taking her hand, kissed her on the cheek.

Helen gazed up at him, unable to get a word out. Overnight, she’d changed him, in his red coat, into some kind of devil, and here he was turning up, looking just the sort of preppy young man of whom her parents would approve. The severity of the impeccably cut dark suit, striped shirt, and blue tie only served to set off the dazzling good looks. A shaft of pale sunlight coming through the window gilded the smooth blond hair. It was as though a light had been turned on in the dark hall. Even the dingy academics gathered around the notice board changed the object of the salivating, gazing at him unashamedly.

“You want to go to church, don’t you?”

Helen nodded, still speechless.

“Well, it’s not too late. We’ll probably miss the B-film and the ads, but get in for the big picture,” he said, putting his arm through hers.

“I’ve never been to Hammersmith before,” he said, opening the car door for her.

“It’s a fascinating ethnic cross section,” said Helen earnestly.

In the back of the Porsche, sitting muddily on a huge pile of unopened letters, newspapers, and old copies of Horse and Hound, sat a grinning black labrador.

“This is Badger,” said Rupert. “He’s the only being in the world who thinks I can do no wrong.”

Badger thumped his thick black tail joyfully, scattering the letters, and, leaning forward, gave Helen a great slobbery kiss.

“Don’t preempt me, Badger,” said Rupert, driving off so fast that the dog nearly fell off the backseat.

“Badger insisted on coming today,” Rupert went on, “to see if you were as pretty as I said you were.”

Embarrassed, Helen said, “Don’t you ever open your mail?”

“Not if I can help it. It’s always people wanting my money or my life.”

He drove her at great speed to the Guards’ Chapel. Immediately they’d crept into a back pew, Helen sank to her knees. Rupert, sitting sideways to accommodate his long legs, noticed she really prayed, eyes shut, lips moving. Confessing in advance the sins she’s going to commit later this afternoon, he thought dryly. While she was kneeling, he examined the freckled hands with their slender wrists and colorless nail polish, the small beaky nose, the very clean ears, the lipstick drawn not quite to the edges to disguise a large mouth, the frightful Alice band holding back the gorgeous, dark red hair — it was the color of drenched fox rather than bracken. Wondering if she had a ginger bush, he felt the stirrings of lust. He’d tank her up at lunchtime and take her back to his mother’s house. As she sat up, he noticed the perfect ankles, slightly freckled beneath the pale tights.

“Nice scent,” he whispered.

For a second she looked at him, her huge wide-apart yellow eyes flecked like a conference pear, then smiled shyly.

Christ, she’s adorable, he said to himself.

He had deliberately not picked up a hymn book on the way in so he could share hers. As their hands touched she jumped as if burnt, then, realizing she was overreacting, tried to relax.

“Forty days and forty nights, tempted and yet undefiled,” sang Rupert loudly and quite out of tune.

During the sermon, Helen found her thoughts straying as she glanced at the crimson and gold banners topped with little gold lions with crowns on their heads, and breathed in the scent of a nearby arrangement of white lilac and narcissi. Among the congregation were several grayhound men in dark suits, with lean, carved features and very straight backs, accompanied by conservatively dressed women with good enough cheekbones to get away with turbans or hats with no hair showing. The altar was draped with purple for Lent. Helen was horrified to find herself wondering whether a dress in that color would suit her. She must concentrate.

Rupert had no such intentions. After staring at the priest for a few minutes with half-closed eyes, he extracted a paint chart out of his pocket and studied the colors, finally marking a Prussian blue square with a cross. Then he produced yesterday’s evening paper and, folding it up into a small square, started to read the racing results.

“Hooray,” he whispered, “I’ve won £50—it’ll pay for a lunch.”

Helen tried to ignore him and stared stonily in front of her. But as the sermon droned on a loud snore suddenly rent the air. Rupert had fallen asleep and the next moment his head had flopped onto her shoulder. Several of the grayhound men, and a woman in a red turban like piped fish paste, glanced around in disapproval. Helen nudged Rupert sharply in the ribs. He woke up with a start, glanced round in bewilderment, and then grinned at her totally without contrition. The smile suddenly softening the arrogant deadpan features and creasing up the long blue eyes, reduced her to complete panic. Harold Mountjoy had never affected her like this.

She was relieved when the organ galloped through the last hymn and they surged out into the sunshine. Rupert nodded to several of the congregation, but didn’t stop to talk until one of the grayhound men called out to him.

Rupert stopped, said, “Hello, Tommy,” and introduced Helen.

After the inevitable brisk swapping of mutual acquaintances, Tommy said, “You’ve been doing very well; meant to come and buy you a drink at Olympia. Look,” he added, lowering his voice, “there’s a horse that might interest you at the barracks. Bought him in Ireland just before Christmas — make a top-class puissance horse.”

“Can I come and look at him after lunch?”

“About four.”

Helen wondered if she were included in the invitation and was shocked by her relief when Rupert said, “We’ll be there.”

Before lunch he insisted on taking Badger for a walk in the park. It was a perfect spring day. Thickening crimson buds fretted a love-in-the-mist blue sky. The banks were draped with crocuses of the same Lenten purple as the altar cloth. A host of golden daffodils, retarded by the bitter winter, had just reached their prime and nodded their pale heads in approval. Helen longed to dawdle. But there was no chance of wandering lonely as a cloud. Rupert, with his brisk military walk, set off at a cracking pace. Helen, her high heels pegged by the soft grass, was soon panting to keep up.

“Did you buy the horse you looked at this morning?” she asked.

“It was a retired racehorse,” said Rupert. “After flattening four fences it suddenly decided to stage a comeback and carted me halfway to London. Couldn’t stop the bugger and I’m pretty strong.”

“What happened?”

“Fortunately the London-Newbury express thundered straight across our bows, the horse decided he wasn’t ready to be strawberry jam and skidded to a halt. Must say I was shit-scared.”

Brought up that no gentleman swears in front of a lady, Helen wished he would not use such bad language.

“I’m starving,” he said. “Let’s go and have some lunch.”

“Will it be very smart?” asked Helen.

“Not until we get there,” said Rupert.

The restaurant, despite being sandbagged up to the gutters against IRA bomb attacks, was extremely smart inside with cane chairs and tables, a black and white check floor, and a forest of glossy tropical plants, emphasizing the jungle atmosphere. From the kitchen came a heady waft of garlic and herbs and from the dining room the same swooping my dear-punctuated roar of a successful drinks’ party.

The head waiter rushed forward.

“Meester Campbell-Black,” he said reproachfully. “You deedn’t book.”

“I never book,” said Rupert.

“But I ’ave no tables.”

“I’m sure you can find us one, nice and private. We don’t want people bothering us.”

“And you cannot bring dogs in ’ere. The health inspectors, they will shoot me.”

“Badger’s different,” said Rupert. “He’s a guide dog for the blind drunk. Now, buck up, Luigi, don’t keep us waiting.”

Sure enough, within half a minute, Luigi beckoned. It was quite an experience walking through a restaurant with Rupert and Badger. Every head turned, necks cricked, nudges were exchanged, as people looked first at him, then at Helen, trying to work out who she was, if anyone. The restaurant seemed to be packed with beautiful people, the girls all wearing fashionable flared trousers down to the ground with never a boot showing, their red nails tapping on their slim thighs, smoothing back their streaked hair and calling, “Hi, Rupe” as he passed.

Luigi installed them at a table divided from the rest of the restaurant by a dark green wall of tropical plants. Immediately Helen fled to the Ladies’. She felt so drab in her gray dress, with her pale church face gazing back from the mirror. Savagely, she ringed her eyes with pencil, added a coral splodge of blusher to each cheekbone, painted her mouth to match, and emptied so much Miss Dior over herself that it made her sneeze.

Back at the table, Rupert had ordered a bottle of Dom Perignon and removed his tie. Badger, lying at his feet, thumped his tail. Breathing in the newly applied Miss Dior, Rupert noticed the additional makeup. All good signs.

“I haven’t been in London on a Sunday for ages,” he said. “It’s nice, and it’s the first time I’ve had a chance to look at you properly — that’s even nicer. You’re really an astonishingly beautiful girl. What the hell were you doing with Nige?”

“We work together.”

“In publishing?”

“I read manuscripts and write blurbs. Actually,” she blushed, “I’m also working on a novel.”

“Can I read it?”

“It’s only in draft form.”

“Well, you must put me in it, then. I’ll be Prince Charming. Nigel can be the toad. You’re not really his girlfriend?”

“No, I am not,” said Helen with some asperity. “He just asked me out with the Antis yesterday. How did you get my phone number?”

“Well, Billy and I found Nigel letting down the tires of our lorry, so I shook him till his lentils rattled, then left him trussed up like a Christmas turkey and appropriated his address book. What did you think of your day out?”

“Very cruel. All those people tearing after a poor defenseless fox, ripping it apart for fun.”

“Have you ever seen a chicken coop after a fox has been, all with their heads bitten off and left? Foxes kill for the hell of it, too.”

“The fox doesn’t get a chance,” protested Helen, “with you blocking up their earths and digging them out with terriers after they’ve gone to ground.”

Rupert shrugged his shoulders. “Farmers wouldn’t let us hunt across their land if we didn’t.”

He filled her glass, although she’d drunk only half of it, looking at her meditatively.

“Hunting’s like adultery,” he said. “Endless hanging about, interspersed with frenzied moments of excitement, very expensive and morally indefensible.”

“Why d’you do it, then?” asked Helen primly.

“Hunt or commit adultery? Because I enjoy them both. I fancy other people’s wives from time to time. I enjoy riding hell for leather across country. It’s one of the best ways of teaching young horses to jump anything; or stop an older horse getting stale. Horses love it, so do hounds, so do the people doing it. You just don’t like to see people enjoying themselves.”

“It’s still wrong for people to get all dressed up for the pleasure of killing something,” said Helen, hotly.

“Darling love, the saboteurs had far more fun than we did yesterday. Billy, my mate, always says if ever they abolish hunting he’s going to join the Antis.”

Helen, remembering how she’d attacked Paul last night, had to concede he was right.

“But Nigel does have principles,” she protested. “He’s a strict Vegan.”

“Farts all day in the office, I suppose,” said Rupert, yawning.

Helen blushed, but refused to be deflected.

“Nigel,” she went on earnestly, “has not eaten anything that moves for ten years.”

“Not even jelly?” asked Rupert.

Helen tried to look disapproving and giggled. “You’re impossible.”

“Impassible, am I?” said Rupert, mocking her pronunciation. “Well, you certainly won’t get past me in a hurry.”

Luigi arrived with the menu. Helen noticed there were no prices.

“What are you going to eat? I’m sure Luigi can flambé you some nut cutlets, but why not be really decadent and have a large rare steak?”

Luigi particularly recommended the scampi served with a cream pernod sauce or the filets of wild duck with juniper berry sauce.

“No, I don’t want any of your mucked-about rubbish, Luigi. My guest would like…” He turned to Helen.

“Oh, pâté, and a small steak and a green salad.”

“And I’ll have smoked salmon, and grilled lamb chops, very rare, with some fried potatoes, and can you bring an extra steak for Badger? He likes it well done, and we’ll have a bottle of Number Six, and another bottle of this while we’re waiting.”

While he was ordering, she admired the beautifully lean curve of his jaw. Unlike most Englishmen, and particularly ones who spent so much time out of doors, there was no red tinge to his complexion which, even without the suntan, would have been pale olive. Glancing around, he caught her gazing at him. “Well?” he said.

“You’re very tanned.”

“Skiing last month.”

“I hear you’re an expert at horseback riding.”

Rupert grinned. “You could call it that. The show jumping season’s about to start in earnest. It’s Crittleden next weekend. Why don’t you come down on Saturday?”

He was touched to see how thrilled she was.

“I’d just love to. I’d so enjoy seeing one of your performances.”

“With any luck you might be seeing one of those before that,” he said, smiling at her with those wicked, dangerously direct eyes. Helen chose to ignore the innuendo. Was it Badger or Rupert under the table, pressing against her leg?

“How did you get into that terrible coven?”

Helen looked disapproving.

“Regina House is a very distinguished institution. It was founded to accommodate women of substance.”

“Oh, that’s what’s the matter with them,” said Rupert. “I thought they all looked like that frightful harridan that was out with you yesterday, the one with more spare tires than the Firestone factory.”

Under the influence of the wine, Helen found herself more and more at ease, minding less and less about his flip remarks. As their first course arrived, she found herself telling him about her first digs and the unfixed tom and the lecherous lodger.

“I gained ten pounds.”

“Well, it seems to have gone in the right places,” said Rupert, gazing at her breasts. He ate very fast, finishing his smoked salmon before she was a quarter way through her pâté.

“This is excellent paté.” She pronounced it “part-ay.” He wondered idly if her accent would get on his nerves. “I’m afraid I can’t finish it, I’m awfully sorry.”

Off her grub, thought Rupert; another good sign.

“Now is the time for all good dogs to come to the aid of the partay,” he said, spearing it with his knife and handing it under the table to Badger, who gobbled it up with more thumping.

As their second course arrived, she tried to steer the conversation on to more academic lines. Did he enjoy reading?

“Not a lot. The best book I’ve read in years is The Moon’s a Balloon.”

“Do you go to the theater a lot?”

“Well, I went once,” said Rupert.

Helen determinedly didn’t look shocked. Writers had to accept all kinds of people.

Rupert was picking his chop bones now, tearing the meat off with very strong white teeth; particularly good teeth, she noticed, for an Englishman.

“Have you any siblings?”

“What?”

“Brothers and sisters,” she explained.

“Only one. A brother, Adrian. Very bright. My mother’s favorite. He runs an art gallery.”

“Oh, which one?” asked Helen eagerly.

“The Bellingham; specializes in modern stuff.”

Helen said she’d been there often.

“Awful tripe, don’t you think?” said Rupert. “Adrian gets frightfully miffed when I tell him Badger could do better with his tail dipped in a paint pot.”

All these remarks were drawled out with a completely deadpan face. She couldn’t tell if he was sending her up.

“At least you must go to the cinema?”

“No,” said Rupert. “Quite honestly, if you’ve got nearly thirty horses, as Billy and I have, many of them novices that need bringing on, or top-class horses that need keeping up to the mark, you don’t get much time for anything else. We’ve got a man and three girl grooms, but we still get up at six-thirty and seldom leave the yard before nine or ten at night. Horses still need looking after on weekends. And you’ve got to keep looking at other horses all the time in case you miss something. Nearly all the year round we’re traveling nonstop from show to show all over the world. You don’t get to the top by going to French films or hanging around art galleries.”

“I’m sorry,” said Helen, feeling corrected. “Do you do the same sort of thing as Mark Phillips?”

“He events, I show jump. Ours is the serious stuff; eventing’s for gifted amateurs.”

“Do you know Mr. Phillips?” Helen felt ashamed for asking.

“Yes, he’s a very nice bloke.”

“Will he marry Princess Anne?”

“So he tells me,” said Rupert, filling up her glass. Helen tried not to betray how impressed she felt.

She couldn’t eat any more of her second course than her first. Rupert gave her steak to Badger.

“It’s so expensive, it’s awful,” said Helen in distress.

“It isn’t offal, it’s steak,” said Rupert, again imitating her accent.

“Did you go to Eton College?” she asked.

“No, Harrow.”

“Lord Byron went there,” said Helen excitedly. “He was an extraordinarily fine poet.”

“Pulled some amazing girls, too.”

“His letters are fascinating.”

“Supposed to have had his half-sister.”

Luigi brought brandy for Rupert and coffee and chocolate peppermint creams for Helen.

“No, thank you,” she said. “I’ve given up candy for Lent.”

“I’ve given up women,” said Rupert, taking her hand, “except you.”

Almost on cue an exquisitely beautiful girl with long, blue-black hair barged into their jungle glade.

“Rupert Bear,” she screamed, “what are you doing, skulking away like a babe in the wood? Aren’t you frightened of all the wild animals?” she added to Helen.

But before Helen could answer, the girl had rattled on.

“Nicky Cripps is absolutely livid with you, Rupe. He booked this table weeks ago and you just pinch it from under his nose. Aren’t you going to offer me a drink, Rupert Bear, just for old times’ sake?”

“Beat it,” said Rupert icily.

“Oh, well, I’ll have to help myself,” and, picking up Rupert’s glass of brandy with a shaking hand, she drained it. Suddenly there was a tremendous thump from under the table and Badger emerged grinning, pressing his black face into the girl’s crotch.

“Hello, Badger,” she said in a choked voice. “You’ve always been keener on me than Rupert Bear is.”

Glancing at Rupert’s face, Helen tried to lighten the atmosphere.

“Why do you call him Rupert Bear?” she asked.

The girl looked at her pityingly. “Don’t you know? Rupert BA-R-E, because he spends so much time with his clothes off.” Reaching over, she picked up the cross that hung round Helen’s neck. “And don’t think that’ll keep you safe. You won’t be able to ward him off any more than anyone else, and afterwards he’ll spit you out like a grape pip.”

Rupert got to his feet. “Get out,” he said in a voice that made Helen shiver. “You’re drunk and you’re boring us.”

The girl gave a sob and fled. Helen escaped to the loo. She felt quite sick. Her face was flushed, her eyes inflamed.

As she slapped on some makeup, two girls came in, heading for the loos, shouting to each other over the partition.

“Bianca’s just had a showdown with Rupert Bear,” said the first. “And all in front of his new girlfriend.”

“She won’t be new by next week,” said the second, “she’ll be an ex like the rest of us.”

As she emerged from the loo, Rupert, having paid the bill, was waiting for her.

“What’s the matter? You’re shaking.”

“I want to go home.”

“Don’t be silly.” Taking her hand, he led her back to the car.

“Now, what happened?”

“Two girls were talking in the john.”

“What did they say?”

Helen told him.

Rupert took her hands again, holding them tightly.

“Look, I’m sure it upset you, and what Bianca said, too. But if you and I are going to have anything going together, and I feel we can, you must shut your eyes and ears to gossip. If you’re any kind of celebrity, which I suppose Billy and I are, people will always bitch about you. If they don’t know you, they make it up; if they catch you snapping at a traffic warden because your mother’s just died, they’ll assume you’re always bloody-minded. I had a brief walkout with Bianca. I broke it off. I’ve even had girls accusing Billy and me of being queer because I haven’t made a pass at them. You listen to me, not anyone else. Is that clear?”

Helen nodded, speechless.

“You’re terribly sweet.” Leaning forward, he kissed her very gently. At first she resisted, then, as her lips parted, he drew away.

“Come on, we’ve got to see that horse.”