Rivals

‘Not any more furious than I bloody am,’ roared Tony. ‘The little snake! I’ll murder Archie when I get home.’

‘Oh, please don’t!’ Caitlin, who’d had a great deal too much to drink, burst into tears.

‘For Christ’s sake,’ exploded Tony.

‘I like you so much,’ sobbed Caitlin, ‘and I thought you liked me.’

‘I do,’ said Tony in exasperation, handing her his blue spotted handkerchief, reeking of the inevitable Paco Rabanne. ‘I just can’t stand your father.’

‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes,’ sniffed Caitlin dolefully, ‘and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’

‘And you’re not going to tell Declan that you’re going out with Archie?’

‘Christ, no,’ said Caitlin. ‘I don’t want to get butchered in my prime.’

Tony did a lot of thinking as he drove home. When he turned on the light in Archie’s room, he found him huddled under the duvet, with his pyjamas buttoned up to the neck, desperately pretending to be asleep. Not for the first time, however, Tony astounded his son.

‘You can go on seeing that girl as long as you try and find out as much as you can about Venturer.’

‘That’s immoral,’ said Archie, shocked.

‘Don’t be bloody wet,’ said Tony brutally. ‘D’you want Corinium to lose the franchise?’

‘No.’

‘Or for me to forfeit four hundred thousand minimum a year?’

‘No,’ said Archie.

If he was rich, he reflected, he wouldn’t have to scrub mussels for three days every time he wanted to take Caitlin out to dinner. One day she would live in The Falconry with him. His father was right, he decided, blood was thicker than water. If Declan didn’t get the franchise, he, Archie, would look after Caitlin.

40

Taggie had a very wearing September. Getting a besotted and reelingly untogether Caitlin packed up and back to Upland House was bad enough, but dispatching Declan to Ireland was even worse.

As the departure date drew nearer, he grew increasingly reluctant to leave Maud or his precious franchise, which was just coming up to the boil.

Maud was plainly revelling in The Merry Widow. Declan was glad, but was her euphoria slightly over the top? And was it really necessary for her to have a bath, wash her hair and pinch yet more of Taggie’s clothes before every rehearsal? And when she carolled the words ‘All the world’s in love with love, and I love you,’ over and over again from the Southern Turret, who were they really aimed at? As the yellow woods turned gold and the swallows seemed to postpone their departure, and even the huge red suns sunk more slowly into Rupert’s woods in order to hear Maud’s exquisite notes floating down the valley, Declan prayed she wasn’t leading her leading man on too much.

Maud herself was much happier after Caitlin had gone back to school. No one was quicker on the draw than a teenager in love, which ruled out any illicit incoming telephone calls for Maud. But now it seemed Cameron Cook was always in the house, monopolizing the telephone and Declan, and not being deferential enough to Maud, the arrogant bitch. Anyone would think they were going off on a six months’ polar expedition rather than three silly weeks on location.

Maud also bitterly resented Cameron treating Taggie like a slave. Only this morning, on the eve of departure, Perry O’Donovan, who’d been cast as Yeats, wanted Cameron to call him back, and Taggie had taken the number down wrong.

‘Don’t keep apologizing,’ screamed Cameron, running out of breath after five minutes of invective. ‘Just get it right in future.’

The only person allowed to exploit and scream at Taggie, reflected Maud, should be Maud herself.

The eve of departure, in fact, was full of spats, and now at dusk Declan was in the library firing off last- minute instructions to Freddie, who was just back from Portugal again, and Rupert, who was just off to Virginia for a few days. Between them they would probably run things far more smoothly than Declan. The appalling Professor Graystock had also dropped in, returned from his working holiday in Greece to get ready for the new university year, and was, as usual, swilling Declan’s whisky. Dame Enid had just come down from upstairs, after going through Maud’s Merry Widow score with her and making some extremely helpful suggestions.

‘She’ll be totally irresistible,’ Dame Enid told Declan as she accepted a large pink gin. ‘Wish I were playing her leading man.’

Cameron sat in the corner going through her lists for tomorrow with half an ear on the meeting. She’d checked that everyone — actors, wardrobe, make-up, and crew — knew where to meet her and Declan at Birmingham Airport; she’d double-checked that the air-conditioned coach would be waiting to take them to Sligo by early evening, and that the hotel overlooking the bay would be expecting them for dinner.

Glancing across the room at Rupert, who was gazing moodily out of the window at Claudius chewing a library book, she knew that he was bored. There was nothing he loathed more than other people’s waffle. He’d been affectionate enough recently, but slightly detached; perhaps he always distanced himself before a separation. She hated the thought of him going to Virginia on his own. She couldn’t imagine American women leaving anything as beautiful or as explosively macho alone. She’d lived with him for sixty-eight days and — she glanced at her watch — eighteen hours, and she still wanted him continually.

‘Now, you all know that I’m on the end of the telephone,’ Declan was saying. ‘By the time I get back we should have the date for our IBA interview. Then we can start having dry-runs. I’ve booked Hardy Bisset to coach us. He’s ex-IBA so he’s witnessed the interviewing process from the other side. ‘There’s also a permanent exhibition on the history of television at the IBA,’ he went on. ‘Parties of school-children and tourists visit it every day. I think you should all try and have a look at it before the interview so you at least know something about the business you’re intending to run. Go in, in ones or twos, or it’ll look too obvious. We must get Wesley, Marti, Bas and particularly Henry along there, or they’ll make complete pratts of themselves at the interview. I think that’s all.’

He ran his hands through his hair and leaned back in his chair surveying the chaos on his desk in despair.

Rupert turned away from the window. ‘When d’you reckon Yeats’ll be finally in the can?’ he said.

‘For Chrissake, dumbass,’ screamed Cameron, ‘I’ve told you a hundred times, it’s pronounced “Yates”.’

Declan raised a disapproving eyebrow. Dame Enid was much more up front. ‘You haven’t learned to pronounce the word “hostile” yet, young lady,’ she snapped, ‘but you certainly manage to be it most of the time.’

‘Thank you, Enid. The age of chivalry is not entirely dead,’ said Rupert lightly, but his face had lost all expression.

Oh, God, thought Cameron, I shouldn’t have said that.

‘The answer to your question,’ said Declan to Rupert, ‘is sometime in December. We’ll have to edit and do all the VOs when we get back.’

‘I hope you’ve got in the story about Yeats cutting his precious fur coat in half because he didn’t want to disturb a cat who was sitting on it,’ said Dame Enid. ‘Must have been a good bloke to do that.’

‘Or the time that he signed a lot of cheques “Yours sincerely, W. B. Yeats”,’ said Professor Graystock, determined not to be upstaged. ‘Or even the story. .’ he began.

Rupert had had enough — fucking intellectuals. He walked out of the library, out of the front door, and down the garden. Migrating arrows of birds were flapping down the valley. There had been a storm at lunchtime; roses were pulping and disintegrating; tobacco plants prostrated themselves like palms before his feet. Beyond the garden, in one of his fields, the grass had been flattened by the deluge, as though a herd of elephants had been