Score!

‘Haven’t you grown since I last saw you?’ he drawled, then, tilting his head sideways to glance at Rannaldini’s lifts, ‘Or maybe your shoes have.’

Trouble ahead, thought Tristan, as Rannaldini’s face contorted with fury.

Etienne had always painted in a north-facing studio, claiming that the harsh light picked out every wrinkle and red vein, showing the face as it was. Rupert must be forty-six or forty-seven but, as he sat down on the window- seat looking north over the park, his beauty made Tristan gasp. The sleek, thick gold hair, untouched by grey and brushed back from the wide suntanned forehead, emphasized the lovely shape of the head. The long, heavy-lidded, rather hard lapis-lazuli blue eyes, the high cheekbones, the Greek nose, the short upper lip pulling up the curling mouth, the smooth olive complexion could all have belonged to a Latin or a statue, the face was so still. Then Rupert caught a glimpse of a portly mongrel in a tartan coat, waddling along behind an old lady, which reminded him of his wife’s dog, Gertrude. His eyes softened and his mouth lifted, and Tristan wondered how any woman ever resisted him.

‘Sorry Declan can’t make it,’ Rupert was now saying, in his light, flat, clipped drawl. ‘He forgot he was taking my children, his grandchildren, to Toad of Toad Hall. He always swore he’d never accept a peerage and now he has it’s clearly unhinged him, particularly if he’s intending to waste ten million on some crappy opera.’

Rupert then proceeded to tear the project to shreds. The only person he praised was Sexton for raising such an incredible amount to subsidize such tosh. Rannaldini immediately rose to his feet and opened the door.

‘If you won’t come in with us,’ he said icily, ‘we’d better look elsewhere.’

‘We can’t, Ranners,’ said Sexton aghast. ‘It’s goin’ to be a mad scramble as it is. We gotta start filming by the end of March because the first scenes take place in a forest wiv no leaves. It’s goin’ to be grite,’ he added to Rupert, his eyes shining brighter than his gold necklace. ‘Two mighty armies meeting on the skyline, and then the ’unt streaming down the ’ill.’

‘Where’s that being filmed?’ asked Rupert.

‘Fontainebleau,’ said Tristan quickly. ‘The French government have put in a lot of money.’

As Venturer were putting in even more money, countered Rupert, the film should be made on Venturer territory, namely in his woods at Penscombe.

‘Most beautiful beechwoods in the country,’ he added, haughtily.

‘That is debatable,’ snapped Rannaldini.

‘Let’s debate it, then,’ snapped back Rupert. ‘We can also get the Cotchester Hunt for virtually peanuts, and hounds won’t have to go into quarantine. You’ll never find decent hounds in France.’

Tristan had visions of drawing his sword for his country’s canine population.

The reason Rupert wanted his woods filmed was to categorize them even more firmly as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty to scupper any evil plans to slap a motorway through his estate.

Rannaldini, who was determined the first act should be shot in his beechwoods at Valhalla, also to stop any motorway through his estate, said the French would never agree to it being filmed at Penscombe.

‘Anyway, your house at Penscombe was only built in the late eighteenth century, too modern for Carlos,’ Rannaldini added dismissively, ‘whereas Valhalla is medieval and steeped in religious tradition.’

Seeing Rupert’s eyes narrow, Sexton said hastily, ‘We do need to film in a monastery-type situation, Rupe.’

So Rupert switched to the fatuousness of the plot.

‘I mean, the guy’s in love with his stepmother.’

‘Can’t agree more, Rupe,’ interrupted Sexton excitedly. ‘I was just saying to Ranners, why don’t we make Elisabetta Carlos’s real muvver? Incest is really hot at the moment.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Rupert, who disliked his mother even more than his stepmothers.

Tristan, who often fell asleep in meetings, was really enjoying this one, and having great difficulty not laughing.

‘The plot’s far too complicated,’ went on Rupert. ‘Needs a narrator to tell you what’s going on. We’d better use Declan.’

Then, at least, Venturer’s lawyers could claw back a massive fee for Declan’s services. Rannaldini, who intended to introduce the opera himself for an even more massive fee, said this was totally unacceptable, so Rupert attacked the cast.

‘They’re all geriatrics. How can that old bat Hermione Harefield, who must be well into her forties, play a girl in her teens?’

Then before Rannaldini could reach for his sword:

‘Or Fat Franco, who’s forty-six and at least forty-six stone, play a twenty-year-old Infante? Don Kilos, that’s a joke, and there aren’t many of those in the opera.’

‘Fat Franco goes down very well wiv punters,’ said Sexton, reasonably. ‘He’s one of the biggest names of opera.’

‘Biggest being the operative word. Here’s the guy you want.’ Rupert chucked a photograph down on the table.

‘Wow, who’s he?’ Tristan grabbed the photo in excitement.

‘An Aussie called Baby Spinosissimo, not sure that’s his real name.’

‘Speenoseeseemo,’ said Rannaldini coldly. ‘He’s totally inexperienced.’

‘And breathtakingly good-looking,’ said Rupert. ‘Taken them by storm in Oz. Done well enough to buy himself several racehorses.’

‘And, eef he landed the part of Carlos, would no doubt be able to afford more horses for you to train,’ said Rannaldini bitchily. ‘Leave the casting to us. You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘How about Elisabetta becoming an American?’ suggested Sexton, who never gave up. ‘They adore Dame Hermione in the US.’

‘Shows how stupid they are,’ snarled Rupert. ‘America was hardly built, like my house,’ he glared at Rannaldini, ‘in the middle of the sixteenth century, and Hermione would have even more difficulty in passing herself off as a Red Indian than as an eighteen-year-old virgin.’

The meeting ended in uproar.

‘Who’s getting married?’ asked Tristan.

‘Lovely girl — conductor actually — called Abigail Rosen, marrying a lucky sod called Viking O’Neill,’ said Rupert, breaking off one of Rannaldini’s crimson orchids and putting it in his buttonhole.

‘Rannaldini knows Viking,’ he added nastily. ‘He’s the horn player who hit him across a hotel dining room a few nights ago. Easy as a shot-putter — or shit-putter, in Rannaldini’s case.’

But the gods were on Rannaldini’s side. As the front door banged behind Rupert, Helen Rannaldini rushed into the sitting room.

What a beautiful woman, thought Tristan, admiring the tragic, ravaged face, as he leapt to his feet. But Helen was too distraught to notice him.

‘Oh, Rannaldini, Tabitha’s on the phone. She’s been fired! I hoped I’d catch Rupert.’

‘He’s gone, let me talk to her.’ Rannaldini whisked out of the room. ‘Perhaps you could organize some drinks, my dear.’

He was sweating with excitement as he picked up the telephone. As he had predicted, his stepdaughter had flipped when his faxes had arrived. Tabitha had always been Rupert’s favourite child and suddenly Marcus, her brother, had stolen his affection. She was shocked rigid to discover Marcus was gay, and crazy with jealousy that Rupert seemed to approve of Marcus’s new love.

‘Daddy was always so foul about my boyfriends, and now he’s crawling all over some poofter. And there’s even a photograph of Marcus and Nemerovsky hugging on the front of the Washington Post — yuk!’

Having read the faxes, Tabitha had ridden in a cross-country competition, hurtling over the fences as though death were the favourable alternative, before sliding off her horse, The Engineer, fifty yards past the post. The course doctor had diagnosed her as dead drunk.