The summer wedding, p.66
The Summer Wedding, page 66
Sylva Rafferty might have been the weakest rider of the four now the warring WAGs had dropped out, but she was a knock-out to look at, and in turn almost knocked out her expensive white smile as her magnificent silicone breasts bounced up and down in sitting trot, shooting hot looks at Vicente each time she passed him, thoroughly excited by the effect of the make-up she’d applied to his handsome face, as were their audience. Wootton’s head groom rode sublimely and looked startlingly like Penélope Cruz.
But by far the most spectacular combination was Haff on Quito, his showman’s panache carrying the modest little horse so that they outclassed the others by a mile. He was so mesmerisingly graceful that nobody watching thought to question the broad shoulders straining the seams of the polka-dot dress, and not one person laughed, even though he was also sporting a hideous Bibi Cavendish hat to hide his short hair, a rectangular astro-turf busby dotted with silk gerberas and butterflies.
The crowd cheered so heartily afterwards that Sylva, Vicente and Mia’s three horses all belted spookily out of the arena, leaving Haff to take such an extravagant bow that his makeshift mantilla fell off. To the crowd’s delight, Quito got down on one knee so that his rider could pick it up and flourish it like a córdoba.
While the guitarists reappeared on stage to accompany two erotically charged, foot-stamping flamenco dancers and a throaty, melancholic singer, Haff trotted back to the stable yard to do a quick change into some white breeches and a black T-shirt that showed off his narrow hips and big chest to manly perfection. Then he rode back in on Scully, accompanied by two of his friends from the Portuguese Equestrian Dance Company with their golden Lusitanos to demonstrate high-school movements, including the spectacular capriole.
‘I must go and congratulate Mum,’ Iris told Griff, hurrying away from the seating and between the marquees, where she was again almost mown down by her grandmother.
‘Gary Barlow is here!’ Jacinta gasped, beside herself with excitement. ‘You must introduce me, bonita.’
‘I don’t know him, Lito.’
‘No matter. I will introduce myself. This is such a fun party. Your mother is so clever. I am certain Leo will never want to go back to America. So many friends here, such love.’ She revved off, crying, ‘¡A beber y a tragar, que el mundo se va a acabar!’
Seeing Leo and Ivan exchanging a long, private look nearby, Iris wasn’t so sure she wanted to eat and drink as though the world was going to end. She hoped it was just the beginning.
She snatched her phone as it beeped, thinking it was Chloe again, but the message made her heart lurch uncomfortably. Be in the front row for the fashion show. ILY. D x
‘Hey,’ a languid voice whispered in her ear and she spun round into Griff’s lips for a delicious moment. ‘You OK?’ he asked.
‘Fine!’ She pocketed her phone.
‘The auction’s about to start,’ he told her, reaching up to loosen the hair she’d hooked behind one ear so that it fell sexily across her eyes. ‘I’ve been asked to be a topless porter in dicky-bow and cuffs.’
‘Great!’ She hooked her hair back again. ‘I look forward to seeing that. Just got to rescue somebody from Lito first.’
Her grandmother had now cornered an attractive blonde by the water terrace. Iris recognised the smoky-voiced singer-songwriter Trudy Dew, who had composed her grandmother’s favourite West End musical, Air!, which the old lady had been taken to see no fewer than twenty times last year. Jacinta was now demanding that she turn her life story into another hit musical. ‘Leesten to this Spanish guitar, Trudy,’ she entreated. ‘Can you not hear it calling to you? My life is passion, bullfighting, circus, horses, love. What do you think?’
‘I think it sounds amazing.’ Trudy politely searched in her bag for a card to hand over.
By the time Iris had hopped over to them on her crutches, a lofty, dark figure had rolled up to retrieve his famous wife, with a blond baby papoosed to his chest and a toddler in hand, suggesting they all go through to lunch because the auction was getting under way soon.
Lito turned to Iris. ‘I think I will go inside for a little rest, bonita. It is too hot out here and my hearing-aid battery needs changing.’ She tapped at it in frustration. ‘I ask Leo to change it earlier, but I think he only pretended. He is worried I weel bid on everything in the auction. Maybe you can get somebody to bring me some gazpacho.’
Iris’s Maltese terriers jumped up on to Jacinta’s lap to get away from the guests’ marauding dogs, and she chuckled. ‘I will look after your babies. They like to watch Jeremy Kyle USA.’
Iris limped alongside her as she headed across the lawns to the house.
‘You must come and fetch me when the cabaret is starting,’ Jacinta told her as she buzzed up the ramp into her annexe. ‘I want to see Laney’s revue. She is terrible zorra, but she always makes me laugh. This is a day for laughter.’
Iris lingered in the annexe, fussing around changing batteries, opening windows and arranging a table beside her grandmother with a cool drink, the remote control and her favourite toffees, before finally saying, ‘Lito, can I ask you something?’
‘¿Qué?’
She already had the television at top volume, which didn’t make it easy.
‘Do you think it’s possible to fall out of love with one person and into love with another, or do you think the two get horribly muddled?’
The old lady smiled and tutted. ‘If you think you love two people at the same time, choose the second. If you really loved the first, you would not have fallen for the second.’
‘Is that an old Spanish saying?’
‘No, bonita. I think it was Johnny Depp. I always admire that boy. Very like your father, I think. In fact, I will give your father that advice when he talks to me later. It might make it easier for him to tell me what he has to.’
Iris eyed her anxiously.
Jacinta held up a hand and let out a deep sigh. ‘I know what he is, bonita. I have always known, just as I know that you are not his. But you are mine. You are in here.’ She thumped her chest with a clenched fist and then coughed, eyes watering, signalling for her drink. When she’d recovered, she carried on: ‘I am an old lady and I am allowed to say I do not like what Leo has chosen, even if I must accept it because I love him. God knows what he is and He has given Leo a very good family and great love, which is clemency. But I do worry about your mother. She has been his angel. What will she do if he forsakes her?’
Iris wrapped her arms around her, pressing her cheek to the smoothly parted white hair. ‘I think it’s the kindest thing he can do for her sake,’ she said.
Leaving Jacinta sipping gazpacho in front of a wife screaming at her husband to quit hosting bondage orgies in their basement, she slipped upstairs and found her mother changing into an exquisite silk dress the colour of verdigris, which brought out her extraordinary jade eyes, the streaked bronze depth of her hair and the glow of her skin. Standing beside her and watching their reflections in the mirror, Iris recognised that she had inherited her mother’s features, but she’d never possessed the unearthly dryad quality that Mia always radiated, as though she was going to fade into a will-o’-the-wisp and disappear magically into an oak tree at any moment. Just as Mia had once played fragile victims and died in the final act with spell-binding brilliance each night, Iris had been typecast at a similarly young age as an action heroine who could fight her way out of any corner while cracking one-liners and taking no prisoners. She’d only dyed in the make-up trailer.
‘Dominic’s hair’s blond, isn’t it?’ she asked quietly. ‘Like mine?’
Mia nodded. ‘Almost white, rather like Ptolemy Finch. I loved your blond hair.’
‘When they started colouring it for the movies it seemed easier to stick with it. I’ve been thinking about letting it go blond again.’
‘Like Dom’s.’ Mia’s eyes were luminous as emeralds in the mirror. ‘Will you forgive me if I behave terribly oddly today?’
Iris pressed her lips to her mother’s head. ‘I would expect nothing less. You’ve been behaving oddly for years. Now I’m finally beginning to understand why. Lito says that if you love two people at the same time you must choose the second because you can’t have loved the first.’
‘Her Spanish sayings are nonsense sometimes.’
‘Actually it’s Johnny Depp,’ she muttered, rushing on. ‘But you’ve only ever been in love with one man. That’s just amazing.’
Pressing her hands to her face, Mia took a deep breath through her fingers. ‘This is the first day of the rest of my life.’
‘Is that one of Ivan’s motivational lines?’
‘No, it’s a bumper sticker Laney had on her Mini Cooper at university.’ She wandered across to her dressing table to add more blusher and reapply her lipstick, the will-o’-the-wisp made flesh. ‘We always joked that Laney’s driving felt like the last day of our lives. Nothing’s changed there.’ She rolled her glossy lips together and examined her reflection for flaws. ‘Iris, I’m going to set Leo free today.’
For a moment Iris didn’t register what her mother had said. Then she stood up in horror.
‘No!’ She moved closer, staring at the face in the mirror. ‘You can’t out him. I mean, OK, so Lito already knows, but you can’t expose him to—’
‘Lito knows?’
‘She says she’s always known. She says I’m still her family even though we don’t share blood.’ Remembering what she’d said to Ivan, she added proudly: ‘Being an Ormero is about sweat and tears.’
Mia burst out laughing, reaching for her hand. ‘You can say that again. And I’m not going to say anything to embarrass Leo, I promise you. I love him deeply, which is a great deal easier than being in love with somebody, as you know.’ Those gentle green eyes searched hers. ‘Don’t rush into anything with Griff, will you?’
‘I love him! I want to spend the rest of my—’
‘Take your time, Iris,’ Mia said firmly. ‘Have the time of your life.’
Chapter 57
Simon was a born salesman, a gavel-twirling flatterer who could convince a crowd it wanted something enough to part with three times its value, drive two competitive bidders into arch-rivalry and persuade a reluctant hand to thrust itself evangelically upwards. Ably assisted by Leo, who acted modestly as head porter in a shabby brown covert coat with the best asides and one-liners of the day, he elicited vast sums of money to add to the coffers. As auction-room assistants, Griff and one of the burly Spanish estate hands had agreed to roam around the crowd holding up lots and eliciting higher bids, bare-chested and beguiling. Only just out of his sling, Griff’s shoulder ached as he carried around a huge bronze of a dressage horse donated by a local sculptor, fixed smile in place, aware that his hopes of being heroic were falling short of his usual standards.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Iris hurrying out of the marquee, yet again looking at her telephone, but could do nothing as bidding for the bronze heated up, already in four figures.
Sorry so late, Chloe had texted. Thought a friend was dropping me off, but he’s had to fly and I’m waiting for a taxi. Can you make sure no horses are around?
This is Wootton; there are horses everywhere, you dolt, Iris had replied, glancing at her watch. The mounted fashion show is on in 15 mins.
Stall it. Be with you in ten. C x
Iris hurried towards the stables.
By the time Haff was prepared to take the podium in the marquee for his speech about the Javiero Coaching Centre, the sum raised towards the inner-city dressage school had already broken Wootton Gala records.
The Spaniard was introduced by Mia. Her voice was clear and true, each word resonating with emotion, First, she thanked the guests for coming and for their generous support, then she talked about Haff and the work he did. ‘In a moment, Juan-Felipe will tell you a little bit more about the amazing project that today is helping to fund, but first I want to take this opportunity to thank somebody without whom none of this would be possible.’ She looked across at Leo. ‘Somebody without whose charity work many lives would not have been worth living, and whose own life is going to change completely today…’
Unaware that her mother was going off script, Iris had limped down to the stable yard to find the amateur models wavering between panic attacks and revolt, claiming they hadn’t been told they were expected to ride naked. Intimidated by the size of the glossy black Friesian horses that they were to ride – they were nothing like the wiry hedge-hopping hunters they were used to – they were equally horrified by the sight of Bibi Cavendish’s millinery creations, lined up like giant liquorice allsorts on the fence-posts alongside the main yard. One of Mia’s committee stalwarts was shouting at them to think of the good cause while Vicente helped a tall man hold horses ready to mount.
Waving a hat in each hand, which made the horses start back in alarm, the committee stalwart was starting to panic: ‘You all knew about the nudity! It’s in your contracts. Underprivileged children will suffer if you do not do this!’ She leapt on Iris with relief as she approached. ‘Iris, quick! Help me leg these girls up!’
‘We were told nothing would show,’ said a mottle-faced girl who whipped in for the Pelham Hunt and appeared to be the ringleader in the revolt. She held up a piece of crumpled elastic. ‘What’s this?’
‘A modesty G-string,’ explained the stalwart, and added winningly, ‘I also have pashminas…’
‘Does Mum know about this?’ Iris asked, seeing a way to stall for time. ‘It’s a family event. Half the celebrity yummy mummies of the Home Counties are here with their children.’ Then she almost fell over as a friendly black nose prodded her from behind with a familiar whicker. To her horror, she recognised one of Dougie’s Friesian stallions.
She glanced at the horses gathered on the yard and identified each one as from her ex-fiancé’s stunt team. The tall, blushing man in charge of them was Dougie’s business partner, Rupe.
‘Hi, Iris.’ He managed an awkward wave.
‘Is Dougie here?’ she asked bluntly.
‘Um… yah, no, hah.’ Blushing even more furiously, he gave one of the models such an exuberant leg-up that she was kneeling on the saddle.
‘Where is he?’ Iris growled. Had Chloe demanded that the show be stalled because she’d known Dougie was around?
‘Definitely not here!’ he spluttered, fingers crossed behind his back as he turned to entreat the other models to follow their friend into the saddle. ‘See how fine she looks, ladies?’ The girl did indeed look ravishing, a bronzed slip of hard hunting muscle on a magnificent war horse, plumed organza hat and feathery scarf transforming her into a fairy princess.
The stalwart was holding up her pashminas, like an eager stallholder at a souk.
Soon draped in a great many designer scarves, carefully arranged to cover nipples, the models agreed to mount, and the stalwart ran around with tit tape to ensure a modicum of modesty was preserved. Affable Rupe, trying to avoid touching anything controversial as he helped the girls mount, was now grabbing them by the ankles and throwing them up over the horses’ backs like dead stags.
Iris was still trying to think up a reason to insist they all wait when she noticed something glint in the shadows under the overhang of the stable roof. Limping closer, she saw that a horse was waiting in a stable wearing full medieval barding, metal armour protecting his chest and quarters and a segmented shell arching over his neck. A metal champron covered his face, but Iris would have known that whicker anywhere. Hurrying closer, she saw tufts of grey mane poking out above his face armour and his lower lip drooping beneath. With a series of loud clanks, he turned to look at her with eyes as kind as those of an equine Claire Rayner.
