Giggling, Dommie pointed a frantic finger at two rows in front, where Sukey, wearing a khaki shirt, canvas jodhpurs and a pith helmet, had just sat down.
‘She looks as though she’s been shooting Tayger,’ he whispered to a twitching Daisy. ‘Can’t you see her resting a well-shod foot on Drew’s back?’
Next moment Daisy felt even worse, for Bas had come into the stand with Rupert and Taggie. All in dark glasses, they totally ignored the photographers who were going berserk. Rupert was wearing a panama over his nose and holding Taggie, who was looking very pale and thin, tightly by the hand. Daisy hadn’t seen him since the awful row when Ricky had thrown him out.
‘Here they come,’ said Seb, as the players cantered on to the field. ‘Have you ever seen ponies like the Flyers? Bart must have bred every single one from Derby winners on both sides.’
But Daisy was watching Drew who, as he rode past, was still issuing last-minute instructions to the Brazilian ringer. She hoped the back of Sukey’s very clean white neck wouldn’t be scorched by her longing. Red, who was now hitting a ball around near the stands, very pointedly blew a kiss at the leggy blonde with the King Charles spaniel puppy.
‘Who’s she?’ asked Daisy.
‘A slag,’ said Seb. ‘Dommie and I had her last week.’
‘Why are you two so addicted to threesomes?’ drawled a voice.
‘Because Seb’s too lazy to get girls for himself,’ said Dommie. ‘Hello, Mrs Alderton.’
As Chessie, minxy as ever in white jeans and a navy-blue cashmere jersey, but wearing a fraction too much rouge to hide her pallor, sat down beside him, Dommie kissed her on both cheeks.
‘Thank God your ex is only umpiring,’ he went on, ‘so you can’t put a hex on his game. We were only just saying how beautifully your husband’s mounted his team.’
‘Costs him enough!’ Chessie helped herself to Dommie’s drink. ‘Oh, there’s Ricky,’ she added wistfully. ‘You have to admit, he’s the best-constructed man in polo. Look at the way those broad shoulders narrow into the hips, and at the length of his thighs. Christ, he’s gorgeous.’
As if drawn by her desire, Ricky glanced up, and glanced hastily away.
‘We’ll have to throw a bucket of water over you in a minute,’ said Seb. Then, lowering his voice: ‘Do look! Suke’s neck’s gone bright pink with disapproval.’
‘Silly bitch,’ said Chessie. ‘Bart’s livid. Jesus was the first umpire he objected to, because he’d once sacked him. Then they offered him Charles and Ben Napier, and Bart objected again, because he’d sacked them too. Then they came up with Ricky, and Bart said, “My wife sacked him, so
‘Ricky hated doing it,’ said Dommie. ‘He loathes coming within a million miles of your husband, but he reckoned the best way he’d size up the opposition was to umpire the match.’
‘I’m sure we’ve met,’ said Chessie, knowing perfectly well who Daisy was, and that Ricky’d been protecting her. God knows why thought Chessie. Daisy struck her as being extremely plain.
‘This is Daisy, Perdita’s mother,’ said Seb.
‘Ah,’ said Chessie, ‘Perdita wouldn’t be my favourite person if I were you.’
‘She’s none of our favourite person,’ said Dommie. ‘No, don’t cry, sweetheart,’ and, unrolling another eight feet of blue Andrex, he proceeded to wipe Daisy’s eyes.
‘Dommie’s madly in love,’ announced Seb.
‘Do we know her?’ asked Chessie, mildly interested.
‘It’s a “he” and a pony,’ said Dommie excitedly. ‘No, I know horses bore you rigid, Chessie, but this one’s something else. He’s a little Australian Waler with legs like crowbars. I saw him at a gymkhana last summer and he was so competitive, he galloped ahead in the sack race and brought the sack back every time in his teeth. His owners wouldn’t part with him then, but this summer he started napping badly so they let me have him for meat money. He is so brilliant and so clever and so gutsy like Fantasma he’ll take anything on. And he’s got two white stripes on his withers, so I’ve called him Corporal.’
‘Oh, belt up, Dom,’ said Seb. ‘Go and get us all another drink.’
Down below them on the field, Angel couldn’t stop shaking. He could hardly hold the reins, let alone manage his whip and stick. He’d spent an hour at the nearest Catholic church that morning, but how can one ask for absolution for a murder one is about to commit? On the other hand, as Bibi still wouldn’t return his calls, his marriage was obviously over, so what did it matter if he spent the next twenty-five years in some British gaol? The Guards Club, with its rain-soaked banks of azaleas, fields stretching out like eternal billiard tables and revolting English ex-army officers in blazers barking instructions into walkie-talkies, made him feel sick. No-one knew that there was a sprinkling of Malvinas earth in the bottom of his polo boots, and no one had noticed the silhouette of the Malvinas stamped on the front of his pale blue helmet. A plane flew over and he wished he was on it.
But there was the loathsome Captain Benedict unconcernedly tapping a ball around a few yards away. Instantly, Angel was back in the Malvinas, with Drew lounging behind a table with a borrowed sheepskin coat round his shoulders against the punishing cold, drinking one cup of coffee after another and not offering anything to Angel, who was standing on his agonizingly smashed-up knee, trying not to sob with pain, as one question relentlessly followed another in Drew’s strongly accented but fluent Spanish.
At that moment in Angel’s terrifying reverie his dark bay mare, Maria, took advantage of his inattention to give a colossal buck, which sent Angel flying through the air.
‘There’s Angel Solis de Gonzales, ex-fighter pilot, showing us how well he can fly without a plane,’ mocked Terry Hanlon, polo’s joker, from the commentary box.
The crowd roared with laughter. Angel ground his teeth. Red, who had caught Maria, brought her back to him. As Angel replaced his hat, Drew noticed the Malvinas silhouette stamped on the front. Taking in the wild, haunted eyes, the deathly pallor, the stubble and the damp, bronze curls escaping from beneath the rim, he knew he’d seen Angel before somewhere and was assailed by a feeling of menace.
Two by two, like animals going into the ark, the teams lined up. Victor beside Perdita, the Brazilian beside Angel, Drew beside the leaping, dancing Red, and hulking Shark beside a constantly shouting Bart. Ricky hurled the ball in with unaccustomed viciousness.
As planned beforehand, Angel and Perdita rode their opposing players off the line to let the ball pound through to Red, who whacked it towards the boards, scorched after it, then stroked a beautiful forehand round to Perdita who had galloped upfield towards the centre. Caught off guard and making gallant attempts to catch up with her, Drew felt as if a truck had hit him as he was ferociously bumped by Angel, who then thundered upfield so that when Perdita, out of nerves, totally missed a long shot at goal, he was able to charge up behind her, pick up the ball and, with a beautiful nearside forehand, pass to a racing-down Red, who effortlessly stroked it between the posts.
‘Oh, Christ,’ said Seb in awe, ‘if those two are going to be the pivot of the Flyers’ team, they’ll be bloody hard to beat on Sunday. Come on, Tigers, sock it to them.’
Victor took a swipe and missed the ball.
Behind the stands the sun, which had had difficulty getting through, like Bart, at last pierced the grey curtain of cloud, spotlighting the drama on the field. Rupert put his panama on Taggie’s head.
‘Rupert’s alleged daughter has hardly touched the ball at all,’ murmured Dommie to Chessie.
Shark was meant to be marking Perdita, but as no-one gave her any passes, he left her and went to Drew’s aid. But although he and Drew were both incredibly powerful defensive players, they couldn’t contain Red and Angel.
‘Red, Red, Red, Gonzales, Gonzales, Gonzales’ (he hadn’t time for Solis) seemed to be the only words on Terry Hanlon’s lips.
Then Angel jumped the boards at mid-off and hit a nearside backshot of forty yards, placing the ball just in front of the opposition posts. Before Shark or Drew could get there, Red had whistled down like a bullet and in it went. The crowd were in ecstasy, bursting over and over again into roars of applause.
At first Drew thought he was imagining things. As his opposing Number Two, Angel was meant to mark him, so initially he dismissed the hurtling kamikaze bumps as Latin exhuberance. Then a pelham bit was jabbed into his kidneys, a pony’s head swung into his shoulder so hard that even the pony shook its head for twenty seconds, elbows rammed his ribs and, riding up beside him, Angel got his knee underneath Drew’s leg and tried to tip him out of the saddle.
