‘Very,’ said Bella. Her mind started to wander.
The horse-faced niece droned on and on.
‘Incredible, fantastic, amazing,’ said Bella at suitable intervals. Then she said, ‘How marvellous’. The horse-faced girl looked at her in surprise.
‘How marvellous,’ said Bella again.
‘I said Mummy was in Harrods when the bomb went off last week,’ said the girl.
‘Oh God, I’m sorry,’ said Bella. ‘I misheard you. There’s such a din going on.’
Next moment one of Horseface’s friends came up and they started shrieking at each other. Bella escaped, but not before she heard Horseface saying, ‘That’s Rupert’s fiancée. I don’t think she’s quite all there.’
Bella retreated to a pillar again and ate three more éclairs, malevolently surveying the rest of the crowd.
‘Don’t look so horrified,’ said a voice. ‘You chose to marry into this lot.’
She jumped nervously. It was Lazlo.
‘They’re a load of junk,’ she snapped. ‘They should be driven over a cliff with pitch forks.’
Lazlo laughed. ‘I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself.’
A waitress came by with a tray.
‘Have an ice,’ he said. ‘Children are supposed to like them, aren’t they?’
‘I hate ices,’ her voice rose shrilly, ‘more than anything else in the world except you.’
At that moment Teddy came up, looking distraught.
‘Hullo, Bella,’ he said. ‘I say, Lazlo, I thought pregnant women only threw up in the morning. Gay’s puking her guts out upstairs. I’m sure Constance is going to smell a rat. She wants us to cut the cake now. She’s terrified everyone is going to drink too much.’
‘Poor old Teddy,’ said Lazlo, ‘but you did go into this with your flies open.’
‘I certainly did,’ sighed Teddy. ‘It’s hell being a bridegroom. No-one talks to you because they all think you ought to be talking to someone else.’
He wandered off, looking miserable, and they were immediately joined by a smooth looking man with auburn hair and heavy-lidded eyes.
‘Lazlo!’
‘Henri my dear, how are things?’
‘Pretty rough. I’ve had to sell half my horses and I’ve had to sell off the land, but at least they’ve let me keep the shooting. Hope you’ll come and stay for the twelfth.’ He held out his glass to be filled by a passing waiter.
‘I say,’ he went on. ‘Where’s this chorus girl Rupert’s got himself mixed up with? One hears such conflicting views. Charles is evidently rather smitten, but he always liked scrubbers. The rest of the family seem to think she’s absolute hell.’
Bella went white.
‘Judge for yourself,’ said Lazlo. ‘This is Bella.’
‘Oh God,’ said the red-headed man, looking not at all embarrassed. ‘Trust me to put both feet in it.’ He gave Bella a horseflesh-judging once-over, then said, ‘I must say I’m inclined to agree with Charles. You’re bound to get opposition if you marry into this lot; they’re so bloody cliquey. It’ll be your turn next, Lazlo. One of those pretty girls you run around with will finally get her claws into you.’
‘Hardly,’ said Lazlo. ‘Just because I enjoy a good gallop it doesn’t necessarily mean I want to buy the horse.’
The red-headed man laughed.
‘Cold-blooded sod aren’t you? I must say you’ve got a pretty smart crowd here today. Aren’t those a couple of Royals I see through the smoke?’
‘My Aunt Constance,’ said Lazlo, ‘would get blue blood out of a stone. I suppose I’d better go and organize someone or we’ll be here till midnight.’
Gay, looking pea-green but fairly composed, reappeared to cut the cake. Rupert fought his way over to Bella’s side.
‘God, what a hassle. The most terrible things are happening. Uncle Willy’s just exposed himself to one of Teddy’s female tenants. Has Lazlo been taking care of you?’
‘I’m sure he’d like me taken care of,’ said Bella.
Someone rapped the table. The speeches were mercifully short.
Lazlo stood up first to propose Gay’s and Teddy’s health. He was the sort of person who could quieten a room just by clearing his throat.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, in his husky, slightly foreign voice, ‘that so many of you have had to miss Goodwood. We all appreciate the sacrifice.’ He then proceeded to read out the Goodwood results.
God, that laid them in the aisles. They were all in stitches.
‘Bloody funny,’ said Rupert.
In a corner Uncle Willy was so drunk he was trying to light an asparagus roll.
Lazlo then told a couple of jokes – Bella had to admire his timing – before raising his glass to Gay and Teddy. Everyone round her drained empty glasses. The drink, due to Constance’s parsimony, was running short.
Teddy got up.
His heart was in his mouth, he said, and, as his old Nanny had told him never to talk with his mouth full, he’d better shut up. God, they fell about at that too. I wish I played to audiences like that, thought Bella.
He just wanted to thank Constance and Charles, he added, and toast the jolly pretty bridesmaids. The best man replied briefly and the room became a great twittering aviary again. Children were beginning to get over-excited and run through people’s legs. Grandmothers retired to the sidelines to rest their swelling ankles. Suddenly, there was a loud bang on the table and Bella turned hearing Charles’s voice.
‘I won’t keep you a moment,’ he said, his voice slurring, his eyes glazed.
‘Pissed as a newt as usual,’ said someone behind Bella.
‘I won’t keep you a minute,’ he said again. ‘But I just wanted everyone to know how absolutely delighted Constance and I are that our son, Rupert, has just announced his engagement to a very talented and beautiful girl.’
‘Charles,’ thundered Constance, magenta with rage.
‘Pissed as a newt,’ said the voice again.
‘I want you to drink to Bella and Rupert,’ said Charles. ‘I know she’ll be an asset to us all.’
Half the marquee had started mumbling, ‘Bella and Rupert,’ when Chrissie suddenly said, very loudly, ‘It’s not true. She’s not an asset. She’s horrible, horrible. She’s the biggest bitch that ever lived.’
There was a dreadful, embarrassed silence.
‘Shut up, Chrissie,’ snarled Rupert.
‘What’s that, what’s that?’ everyone was saying.
Lazlo had crossed the room in a flash.
‘Come on, baby, that’s enough. Upstairs with you.’
‘You don’t understand. No-one understands anything,’ said Chrissie and, wrenching her arms away from Lazlo, she fled out of the marquee.
Bella had also had enough. She fought her way out into the street and immediately found a taxi. Just as she had got in and was telling the driver to take her to the theatre, Rupert appeared at the window.
‘Bella darling, please wait.’
‘No, I will not,’ she hissed. ‘I’ve had enough of you and your bloody family for one afternoon. I’m not going to stand around getting insulted any more. Go on,’ she said to the driver. ‘Get going.’
‘Darling,’ pleaded Rupert, ‘for Christ’s sake let me explain.’
As the taxi moved off he reached in to grab her arm, but caught hold of the fox’s tail instead, which promptly came off in his hand.
Bella leaned out of the car.
‘And I’ll report you to the RSPCA for cruelty to foxes,’ she screamed back at him.
Chapter Eight
She couldn’t wait to get to the theatre to pour out all her miseries to Rosie Hassell.
When she arrived, she discovered Rosie was off with ’flu and an understudy was taking her place. The poor girl was absolutely sick with nerves and needed all the boosting Bella could give her.
Here I am at twenty-four, a real trouper with a Manx Fox, thought Bella, and she started to giggle helplessly. All the same, she gave a terrible performance. She couldn’t concentrate and she kept drying up and fluffing her lines.
Rupert rang her in the interval. It took all his powers of persuasion to get her to come out that evening.
‘Chrissie was tight,’ he said. ‘She’s been on a diet, hasn’t eaten properly for days, and she’s got this sort of crush on me. She passed out when she got upstairs. She’ll be absolutely mortified in the morning.’
‘She’s not coming out with us tonight?’
‘I don’t think so – just Angora, Steve, Lazlo and one of his birds.’
‘The Heavy Brigade,’ said Bella.
But she couldn’t resist another chance to get at Steve.
She made a real hash of the last act. Wesley Barrington had to carry her the whole way. There was a great deal of applause at the end, both for him and the understudy.
‘Roger’s out front,’ said Wesley, out of the corner of his mouth, as bowing and smiling, they took the last curtain call.
‘Oh God,’ said Bella. ‘I’d better make myself scarce.’
Roger, however, came back-stage immediately.
‘Well done,’ he said to the understudy, his square freckled face breaking into a smile of approval. ‘That was a lovely performance. Now clear out and get changed somewhere else.’
When she had gone, he shut the door and leant against it. ‘That was a cock-up, wasn’t it,’ he said grimly. ‘I suppose you got tight at the wedding.’
Bella shook her head. ‘Not enough. That was the trouble.’
‘Hell – was it?’
‘Hell would seem like a day at the seaside compared with that little bunfight. The Henriques really don’t like outsiders, do they? Trespassers are very much persecuted.’
She lit a cigarette with a trembling hand.
‘Putting the heat on, are they? Are you sure you’re doing the right thing, marrying this boy?’
‘Oh, not you too,’ groaned Bella. ‘I thought you were my friend.’
‘I am, and one of your greatest fans too. I know you can make it really big, but not if you go on giving lousy performances like this evening. You’re in bad shape, angel. If I touched you, you’d twang. And you look frightful too. No-one looking at you could see any reason why Othello should have the hots for you.’
‘Thanks a lot,’ said Bella, and started to laugh.
‘That’s better. Now you’ve got three days off, haven’t you? For God’s sake get some sleep. What are you going to do?’
‘Spend the weekend at the Henriques’ country hot seat.’
‘You’ll enjoy that. It’s very plushy. Hot and cold servants in every bedroom, and the country is absolutely magical.’
‘If that’s supposed to cheer me up,’ said Bella, ‘it’s an experience I would gladly forgo. You know how I hate the country.’
It was only when she got out of her costume that she realized she’d brought nothing to wear. She hated the willow green dress as she hated hell pains. The only alternative was a T-shirt with a picture of Clark Gable on the front and a crumpled pair of black knickerbockers which had been at the bottom of her cupboard for weeks and smelt of old mushrooms.
Oh well, she thought, tugging them on, I’ve got the top batting average for wearing the wrong clothes, why spoil the record?
It was four o’clock in the morning and the night had fallen to pieces around her. They had gone from disco to disco, and ended up in one of Rupert’s haunts, where the musicians played cool jazz.
Chrissie had cried off, pleading a headache.
She can’t stand seeing me and Rupert together, Bella thought wryly. And Lazlo had brought a ravishing Spanish girl with him, with a long black plait trailing down her beautiful brown back.
Steve had ignored Bella all evening. It was as though a sheet of glass had risen between them. Not once did he ask her to dance.
She was dead with exhaustion, but some masochistic streak wouldn’t allow her to go home.
They were all dancing now, Steve still laughing with Angora. Rupert, his cheeks flushed, his hair tousled over his face like some Bacchante, was pressing his body against Bella’s, muttering endearments into her ear. Lazlo was kissing his beautiful Spaniard, his hands slowly caressing her brown back, which was arched towards him in ecstatic submission, the two of them exuding so much white-hot sexuality it rubbed off on everyone else.
I can’t stand it, thought Bella in agony, and wrenching herself away from Rupert, she fled into the loo and burst into a storm of weeping.
After a few minutes she managed to pull herself together and looked at her face in the mirror. It was pale grey. She rubbed some lipstick on to her cheeks. The effect was horrible.
And you can stop grinning too! she snarled silently at Clark Gable, who was baring his teeth across her bosom.
Rupert was dancing with the Spanish girl when she got back to the table. Lazlo was smoking a cigar. Bella sat down as far away from him as possible and gazed into her drink.
‘You won’t find the truth in the bottom of a shot of Johnnie Walker,’ he said.