Well Groomed (9 page)

‘Great to see you, Tash!’ Gus greeted her with a whoop. ‘I was hoping you might pole up and help out. We’re bombed out with work. The horses need to come in to bed soon and most of them are crusted with frozen mud.’

‘I – er – well, I just came for a chat really. I’m going out soon.’

‘Oh, yeah, I see you’re tarted up for once.’

Tash smiled weakly, wishing Gus Moncrieff would occasionally treat her with the same respect for feminine wiles as he did the other females in his circle. He always remembered to compliment his wife when she dressed up, was in constant awe of Zoe’s understated sophistication, and positively drooled over his other working pupil, the red-headed, red-blooded and Monroe-chested Kirsty. But to Tash he gave the hair-ruffling, distracted attention of an owner patting his dog in passing. In fact, Tash reflected, he was more flattering to Wally than he was to her.

A tireless worker, Gus Moncrieff was in his early thirties but looked far older. He had a craggy, weathered face which was almost constantly dominated by a toothy smile, and a lanky frame which had far too little stuffing really to support it. A former point-to-point jockey, he still maintained his erstwhile anxiety to keep his weight down, aware that only the fittest, stockiest equines in his yard would be up to carrying his natural weight in the gruelling endurance phases of the sport. As a result, his skinny body had an apologetic stoop to it and his clothes, which had to be huge for his height and shoulders, hung off him like tent canvas after the guy ropes have been cut loose.

‘I’ll help you get some of your shopping in.’ Tash leaped up quickly, aware that she had just been slagging off Kirsty for not pulling her weight around the yard.

‘Thanks, hon.’ Penny appeared in the doorway, buckling under a vast box of beer cans. ‘Watch your step, it’s really freezing over out there. You look nice.’ She was momentarily distracted by a frantic hand-signal from Zoe, who was wide-eyed over her coffee pot, completely speechless.

Not noticing, Tash reached for her coat.

‘Wish I’d never agreed to give you that week off now.’ Gus followed her out, scratching his very short, almost crew-cut, blond hair. ‘Can you spare me a couple of hours to ride out Snob tomorrow? Ted’s so frightened of him he keeps making up excuses not to.’

‘I’ll see,’ Tash hedged. She’d had so little time off in the past year that she was unwilling to give it up.

By the time they’d slipped and struggled back into the house, Zoe had regained her senses and was gaping at Tash in astonishment. Penny, clearly in on her sister’s sudden realisation, was hovering nearby and turning pink beneath her woolly hat, fleece jacket and thermal gloves as she whispered excitedly about it.

Zoe hushed her hastily and turned to Tash.

‘Did you, um—’ She cleared her throat, voice back down to its customary calm, fruity note. ‘Did you say that you and Niall are going to be married?’

‘Yes.’ Tash set down a box of wine bottles on top of a pile of newspapers on the dresser.

‘Really?’ Penny was gaping at her as though she’d just said she was having a sex change.

‘That’s really what I said, yes,’ she sighed, removing two party packs of crisps from the top of the box.

‘You’re joking, right?’ Gus joined in the gaping.

‘No!’ she bristled, turning to face them. ‘Why is everyone acting as though we’ve gone mad? Matty spent most of yesterday afternoon trying to talk Niall out of it, and he’s my supposedly loving brother.’

‘It’s just,’ Zoe hugged her apologetically, ‘so sudden. Unexpected.’

‘We’ve been together almost two years – and living together since last August.’

‘Well, sort of, yes,’ Penny agreed. ‘In between living apart.’

Gus was trying hard not to laugh, which was even more insulting. Seeing Tash’s hurt face, he battled with his amusement and looked at her earnestly. ‘When exactly were you planning to get hitched?’

‘Well, Mummy’s keen on June.’

‘Next June?’ Zoe lifted a blonde eyebrow.

‘In six months’ time?’ Penny lifted one of her own.

‘In the middle of the bloody season?’ Both of Gus’s fluffy blond brows shot up in alarm too.

‘Yes, yes and yes.’ Tash wished she hadn’t got herself quite so excited about telling them; their reaction was far from encouraging.

‘Well, that’s great.’ Gus pulled himself together. ‘Natasha O’Shaughnessy, huh?’

‘I’m thinking of sticking with French.’ Tash started nosing around in Tesco bags, eager for a comforting snack.

‘And how does Niall feel about that?’

‘He suggested it.’ She located some crisps and ripped into the bag hungrily.

‘Where is he, by the way?’ Gus looked around. ‘Writing guest lists?’

Tash poked out her tongue at him. ‘He’s walking the dog.’

They all stared at her. ‘What dog?’

‘Beetroot.’ Tash grinned. ‘You see, we have to get married. Give her a stable family home.’

‘A shot-gundog wedding then?’ Penny took off her woolly hat and ruffled her hair with a grin.

Once the news of their engagement had been announced at the Olive Branch that night, Tash and Niall were the grateful recipients of free champagne all evening.

‘Ees so, so good.’ Marco Angelo danced attendance around them, flapping serviettes and menus in between serving his ambrosial food. ‘A wedding in the village! We haff not had a wedding for years!’

‘Well, I’m not sure if we’re getting married here,’ Tash confessed, catching Niall’s eye.

‘Off course! You getta married in Catholic church – how could I forget?’ The dapper little man smoothed back his pewter grey hair. ‘You getta married in St Gabriel’s in Marlbury, yes?’

‘Er, no.’ Niall cleared his throat. ‘I’ve been married before, remember, Ange?’

‘Oh, no worries. Father Quigley, he ees very sympathetic priest. He marry myself and Den, no?’

‘I think my parents actually want me to marry from my old home.’ Tash smiled apologetically. ‘Near Windsor.’

‘Oh.’ Marco’s mouth puckered slightly. ‘Still, he is not far to drive. I arrange cover for that day, no?’

‘Sure.’ They both smiled up at him anxiously.

From the comments they had received that night, it seemed that all the congratulatory, excited locals were expecting an invitation to the reception at the very least. Once Tash and Niall added the eventers, film industry friends, mutual families and older friends, the reception was going to be simply colossal.

‘Everyone wants to gawp at your film-star pals,’ Tash giggled.

‘Little do they know, I hardly have any.’ Niall shrugged.

This wasn’t strictly true – Niall made firm friends wherever he went and on whichever film he made. But he remained in close contact with just a few, knowing too well the trap of superficial, sycophantic relationships which had propelled so many other actors into an ever-decreasing spiral of cliquey self-destruction. Niall liked keeping a firm grasp on reality, on the world outside the privileged film industry, which by its very nature set up a false morality, an artificial ivory tower of wealth, sexual availability and immunity to guilt.

‘Do you honestly think we’re doing the right thing?’ Tash asked as they walked very slowly and carefully back along the glacier-hard, slippery lane to the forge.

‘No,’ Niall confessed. ‘But I’m quite happy about doing it.’

‘Me too.’ She grinned, listening to the delighted yelping from their small cottage as Beetroot sensed they were just yards away.

Giblets, now given permanent residency in the small, walled back courtyard, watched in confusion through the panelled glass of the kitchen door as Tash and Niall fell through the opposite door from the lane, stumbled as far as the sofa and, not bothering to undress beyond a cursory lifting and unbuttoning of layers, coupled with laughing, eager speed.

Beetroot, even more confused, bit Niall firmly on the ankle just as he was getting into his rhythm.

Moments later the telephone rang as Niall’s agent, having tried to trace him all evening, finally tracked him down.

‘We’ll try this again later.’ He kissed Tash on the mouth and, easing himself away, settled down to talk to Bob Hudson.

Giving his hair a final run through her fingers, Tash picked up Beetroot and wandered upstairs to warm up the bed in anticipation.

When Niall finally joined her almost an hour later, played out from arguing with Bob, she was asleep. Her long lashes swept towards her pale cheeks and her broad, slightly muscular upper arm was pressed to her mouth, guarding it from kisses. Curled into the small of her back, Beetroot let out an ominous growl.

‘Why d’you hate me, huh?’ Niall whispered, cocking his head and trying to stare the young dog out.

With her big, fluffy envelope-flap ears flattening to the small, black dome of her head, Beetroot’s growl deepened.

Anxious not to wake Tash, Niall backed away and spent the night perched on the very edge of the bed, eyes wide open, heart heavy with guilt. Bob – as antisocial in his hours as ever – had passed on two pieces of information to him. The first was bad enough – a thankless task which he had to break to Tash in the morning. The second was a far trickier prospect, both to take in himself and to tell her. He was determined to keep it quiet for at least a few more weeks while he made up his mind.

ON THE MORNING OF New Year’s Eve, it snowed thickly in West Berkshire.

Zoe watched the feathery flakes drift almost aimlessly down to the frosted hoggin drive where they were settling with alarming speed. The trees had already turned into huge mushrooms, the hedges were just fat, piped trails of mashed potato and the fields stretched as uniformly white as fresh foolscap paper.

‘We’ll be lucky if even the locals can make it at this rate.’ She turned to roll her eyes at her daughter India.

Fourteen years old and already as tall as her six-foot brother, India towered over her mother as she hovered nearby in the sitting room, trying to help tidy up for the party but anxious not to incur Gus’s ire by moving a single back-of-an-envelope list or battered copy of
Eventing
magazine.

‘I hope at least a few turn up.’ She was twisting her long tangle of blonde hair under her chin like a beard. Even doing her goat impression, she looked unspeakably pretty and far more adult than her years. ‘The more people we have in here,’ she pointed out cheerfully, ‘the warmer it’ll be.’

‘Nothing can compare to the chill factor at the forge.’ Zoe shuddered. ‘I popped in there this morning to give them some dog food – they’ve been feeding that poor little mite turkey leftovers all week – and I could barely talk for chattering teeth.’

‘Are they really going to get married?’ India curled her lengthy frame into the sagging velvet sofa and picked at a frayed cushion, downcast eyes veiled by lashes.

Zoe shrugged. ‘Not sure, darling. Certainly not from the way they were both sulking earlier. Niall has to fly back to the States today to re-shoot some scene for that over-budget action thing that they’re all in a panic about – Tough Justice, is it?’

‘He won’t be coming to the party then?’ India was practically destroying the cushion.

‘Shouldn’t think so, darling. Tash was sulkily trying to phone round for flights when I left.’

‘You know I don’t want to go, angel,’ Niall pleaded. ‘I can’t bear to leave you after so little time together – with ourselves not even announcing the wedding properly.’

Tash was throwing what few of Niall’s clothes she could find into his battered leather hold-all. The zip wouldn’t shut as it had become enmeshed in an airport luggage tag, chewing it into a sticky pulp. Fighting a losing battle with it, she was trying desperately not to cry, using her uncombed hair as a curtain to hide her unfocused, stinging eyes.

‘I’ll probably make it back for a few days next week,’ Niall said with shattering lack of conviction. For a top-rated actor with two Baftas in the loo, he couldn’t lie for toffee.

‘You start shooting in Scotland on the sixth,’ Tash reminded him, a catch in her throat.

‘So I do.’ He was scratching his stubble thoughtfully. ‘But that’s much closer to home, so it is. I’ll be down here all the time. And you can come up to me.’ He flashed a hopeful smile in the direction of her hair.

‘Sure.’ Tash’s voice was wobbling so much that she shut up and wrestled some more with the stubborn zip.

‘I love you.’ Niall buried his face in the crown of her head, breathing in the comforting smell of her shampoo.

After the car had come to collect him, its driver grumbling that the lanes were almost impassable and the M4 a snowy death trap even at thirty miles an hour, Tash flopped on to the sofa with Beetroot. Shivering with misery as well as cold, she wept into the fragile dog’s bristly black and biscuit coat.

When she noticed that Niall had left the little painting of them she had given him behind, she howled twice as loudly.

Penny phoned at lunchtime to ask if she could bring along any spare plates and glasses she had. Still buried in the sofa, Tash sniffed deeply and bravely and announced that she wasn’t going to be at the party after all.

‘Rubbish!’ Penny was as brusque and unsympathetic as ever, like a jollying head girl telling a home-goal-scoring lacrosse player to ‘buck up’.

‘I can’t, Penny,’ Tash wailed. ‘I know it’s unspeakably wet, but I just want to go to bed and sniff his pillow. He’s promised to call me the moment he’s in LA.’

‘And when will that be?’

Tash sniffed again. ‘Not sure – he couldn’t get a direct flight. ’Bout seven tomorrow morning our time, I think.’

‘Which, by my calculations, gives him the chance to celebrate New Year there as well as in the air. Twice, in fact. The least you can do is celebrate it once.’

‘He’s doing it for both of us.’ Tash hung up, feeling rotten.

She chewed the knuckles of her left hand and, looking down at her bare, calloused fingers with bleary eyes, remembered that Niall had promised to buy her an engagement ring on Monday. Somehow she didn’t feel very engaged. Like a Mercury payphone, she felt totally unrung. She sometimes doubted that what they had together could be called a relationship at all.