was because he wanted to show the place off.
Going into the drawing-room, she had exclaimed with pleasure at the Renoir over the mantelpiece.
‘Don’t touch it,’ screamed Tony, ‘or you’ll have the entire Gloucestershire constabulary on the doorstep.’
Cameron had only met Monica once or twice at office parties, or at the odd business reception. And occasionally Monica sailed into Corinium to collect Tony. The galling thing was she never recognized Cameron. In one way, Monica’s lack of interest in Tony’s job made it much easier for him to deceive her. In another, brooded Cameron, if you had a rival, you wanted her at least to be aware of your existence.
‘Lady Baddingham is a real lady,’ Miss Madden was fond of saying when she wanted to get under Cameron’s skin.
Cameron liked to think Tony only stayed with Monica because the silly old bag gave him respectability, and he didn’t want any scandal before the franchise was renewed.
Getting up from her desk, Cameron wandered round the living-room. It was the only room in the house she’d redecorated, papering the walls in scarlet with a tiny blue-grey flower pattern and adding scarlet curtains, and a blue-grey carpet, sofas and chairs. She had acquired a new piano in England, lacquered in red, but had brought with her from America the dentist’s chair upholstered in scarlet Paisley, the dartboard, the gold toe from the Metropolitan Museum, and all the videos of her NBS programmes. Beside them on the shelf were now stacked the thirteen prize-winning episodes of ‘Four Men went to Mow’ and the two documentaries Cameron had also made on All Souls’ College, Oxford, and on Anthony Trollope, who’d based Barchester on Salisbury, which was, after all, within the Corinium boundary.
On the mantelpiece was a signed photograph of the four young actors who’d starred in ‘Four Men went to Mow’, and a huge phallic cactus, given to her as an end-of-shoot present by the entire cast.
After all the screaming matches, it had been a great accolade.
Tony obviously wasn’t coming, Cameron decided; she’d blown it once and for all. The weekend stretched ahead, nothing but work until more work on Monday.
For consolation, she picked up that week’s copy of
Going over to the window, Cameron realized it was snowing. There were already three inches on top of her car, and soft white dustsheets had been laid over the houses opposite. Snow had also filled up the cups of the winter jasmine that jostled with the Virginia creeper climbing up the front of her house. If you wanted to get to the top you had to jostle, reflected Cameron. Tony had hinted he might put her on the Board, but she knew James Vereker, Simon Harris, and all the Heads of Departments would block her appointment to the last ditch. She had interfered at all levels, criticizing every programme, and every script she could lay her hands on. She knew she was unpopular with everyone in the building. But she didn’t want popularity, she wanted power and the freedom to make the programmes she wanted without running to Tony for protection.
She was so deep in thought, she didn’t notice the BMW drawing up, nor that Tony was outside until he lobbed a snowball against the window. She wished he didn’t look so revoltingly handsome in that red coat. Cameron detested hunting, not because she felt sorry for the fox, but because of the bloody-minded arrogance of people like Tony and Rupert Campbell-Black who hunted.
‘How was it?’ she asked, getting a bottle of champagne from the fridge.
‘Great.’
Immediately her antagonism came flooding back.
‘How was Rupert?’ She knew her interest would bug Tony.
‘Bastard didn’t turn up. But Bas had heard a rumour that Declan had bought The Priory, so I told everyone he was joining Corinium. It was OK,’ he added, seeing Cameron’s look of horror. ‘It was too late for any of them to ring the papers. You should have seen James’s face.’
Cameron grinned.
‘That’s an improvement,’ said Tony. ‘Why were you so bloody bootfaced at the meeting?’
‘I had a migraine.’
They both knew she was lying. But, excited by dancing with Sarah and upsetting James, and even more by the prospect of bringing Cameron to shuddering gasping submission, Tony didn’t want a row. He soon had her undressed and into the huge brass bed, now curtained with pale-grey silk, which he or rather Corinium had paid for, just as they had paid for the whole house. The excuse was that putting up visiting VIPs in Cameron’s spare room would be cheaper than the Cotchester Arms, which served awful food and had no air conditioning.
‘Do you do this to keep your mind off your work?’ asked Tony later, as a naked Cameron straddled him in all her angry, voracious beauty.
Cameron leaned over and took a gulp of champagne.
‘Who says it takes my mind off my work? I’ve got an idea.’
‘What?’ Feeling those muscles gripping his cock, Tony wondered how he ever refused her anything.
‘I want to produce Declan when he arrives in September.’
Leaving Cameron at six o’clock, Tony drove up to London. He’d put on a jersey over his evening shirt, and planned to bath, shave and breakfast at his flat in Rutland Gate. As he was going up a deserted Kensington High Street, his car was splashed by another — some celebrity being raced the opposite way to Breakfast Television at Lime Grove, lights on in the back as he mugged up his notes.
Red coat over his arm, Tony let himself into his flat. For a second he thought he’d been burgled. Clothes littered the hall; bottles, glasses and unwashed plates covered the kitchen table. Then, going into Monica’s bedroom, Tony discovered the naked figure of his son Archie, come home once again from Rugborough on the tube, fast asleep in the arms of an extremely pretty, very young girl.
Tony’s bellow of rage nearly sent them through the double glazing. The girl dived under the flowered sheets. Archie mumbled that he was terribly sorry, but he’d thought his parents were at the Hunt Ball.
‘We were,’ snapped Tony. ‘Now I’m going to have a bath, and I want her out of here by the time I’ve finished.’
At least Archie had the manners to take the girl home, reflected Tony, as he soaked for the second time in twelve hours in a boiling bath. Pretty little thing too. He’d always been nervous Archie might turn out a bit AC/DC. Having a very dominant but adoring mother didn’t help, but he was pleased to see Archie following in his father’s footsteps. Tony was extremely fond of his elder son. He was frying eggs and bacon when Archie returned very sheepishly.
Having bawled him out for his disgraceful behaviour, Tony said, ‘Where the hell does your housemaster think you are?’
‘In bed, I suppose.’
‘But not whose. How old is she?’
‘Sixteen.’
‘Over age, thank Christ. If you ever use Mummy’s bed again, I’ll disinherit you. I hope you took precautions.’
‘We did,’ mumbled Archie. ‘I’m really sorry. We were going to change the sheets.’
‘Think how upset Mummy would have been.’
‘We don’t have to tell her, do we?’ Archie’s round face turned pale.
Thinking he would also have some very fast explaining to do if Monica discovered he hadn’t reached the flat until eight o’clock, Tony agreed that they didn’t.
‘But don’t let it happen again. You’ve bloody well got to pass your O-levels. You know how important qualifications are. Now I suppose you expect me to give you breakfast?’
8
