Blind Beauty (25 page)

One day a new horse came into the yard to go into training for the next season. His name was Galaxy and he was fat and lazy and kind. When Tessa went to fetch Buffoon for her afternoon ride, she suddenly had an idea. Galaxy needed exercising too, and why shouldn't Myra ride him out with her?

She asked Peter.

He said, “OK, but Myra rides Buffoon. You ride Galaxy.”

“My mother's a good rider. Was a good rider.”

“Good. She might be very useful in that case.”

After Myra's initial protests, which Tessa bore patiently (“I can't! I haven't ridden for years! Don't be silly, Tessa! What an idea!”) she was eventually persuaded to change into a pair of Sarah's old jods and gaiters and venture out to mount Buffoon.

Tessa was determined that her mother wasn't going to ride Buffoon more than the first few times, because riding Buffoon was what Tessa's life was all about. But to get Myra riding it was worth it. Peter and Jimmy were in the yard when they mounted and set off, probably to see what Myra was like, but pretending to be doing something else. Although she was so rusty, they could see by the way she mounted and rode through the gate that she had the seat of an old pro. In her teens she had made her living riding out racehorses in Ireland. It was a skill that did not go away, like swimming and riding a bike, although, being Myra, she was making exclamations of dismay about how weird she felt after all these years.

Peter said, having watched them ride away along the track, “She could be useful.”

Jimmy laughed.

He added, “She's a very attractive woman, now she's happy.”

Jimmy raised his eyebrows, but didn't say anything.

Tessa enjoyed watching Buffoon walking beside her, seeing him as other people saw him (although with her rose-tinted spectacles). He was said to be an ugly brute. Certainly he was no picture of a perfect thoroughbred, no delicately-veined Derby winner, but in his very presence, his great bones showing through, sliding impressively under the satin coat, Tessa saw, not ungainliness, but power. His stride was long and easy, the withers enormous with miles of horse in front of the saddle which gave the rider a fine sense of security. Two long ears twitched with interest at passing birds and flying hares, and back to the voice, kindly, and the large, resurrected eyes shone with well-being.

“So he's Shiner's colt, this one?”

Myra, now she was riding him, found him more interesting than before.

“Yes. Declan must have bred him.”

“Ah, what's become of the man, I wonder? Down the drain, I dare say, with all the drink. And Shiner – she'd be an old girl now. How you did love that filly when you were little!”

Tessa did not want this conversation. She had long ago drawn a veil across the pain of leaving Shiner, which had traumatized her life. (How could a horse traumatize a life? she wondered, now.) She hated her past and did not want to think of it now, yet Buffoon tied her to it.

“Let's trot,” she said, as the track rose to the hill, and she watched Myra posting easily to Buffoon's long stride as if she had been riding for the last twenty years.

Perhaps Myra could have a job in the yard when the horses came back into training? She could earn her keep! Already she looked like a new woman, out of her stupid tight clothes and with her hair all wild again, just as Tessa remembered her as a child when she laughed and shouted. Maurice had as good as stifled her in that dreary house before he finally duffed her up. Now she was free again. She seemed to realize it herself, sending Buffoon on into a canter as the hill steepened and laughing out loud with enjoyment. Tessa kept Galaxy back as he wasn't fit but he didn't fight her and Myra waited at the top.

“I'd forgotten how good it was, to be on a big horse again!”

“You could ride out, Ma, when the horses come in, and earn some money.”

“I could think of worse!”

Tessa hadn't seen her mother so happy for years. It made her laugh too. Perhaps she would learn to stand on her own two feet again? She hadn't whinged for quite a while, apart from the “I don't know what will become of me” chant. But when Sarah came back and claimed her caravan Myra would have nowhere to live. Tessa knew that there was no way she could share her caravan with her mother.

But no doubt that was a problem that could be resolved. For now the future looked promising.

T
he problem was resolved in a way that brought astonishment to the yard at Sparrows Wyck, and not least to Tessa. When Sarah came back, Myra moved out, into the farmhouse. Mrs Fellowes packed her bags and departed for a “nice little bungalow in the village, what I've wanted for the last twenty years” and Myra took over. And then it was quite plain for all to see that Peter and Myra were falling in love with each other. It was mutual, sudden, a flowering of two bereft and needy characters thrown into each other's path. Peter had never thought of taking a wife, Myra had been stultified by Maurice. Her arrival awoke in Peter a passion he had never guessed himself capable of. There it was! The stable was gobsmacked.

Sarah and Tessa decided there ought to be a party!

“Tell 'em all! Don't keep it under wraps!” Sarah exclaimed. “It'll only be gossip if you don't make it clear.”

“Peter Fellowes and Morrison's wife!”

It was the talk of the county, with goodwill behind the astonishment. Nobody knew Myra, Maurice having kept her under wraps all their married life, but when she appeared beside the quietly proud and happy Peter, she looked radiant. The colour was back in her cheeks, her black hair loose and shining, her eyes matching an emerald green dress she had chosen with Sarah which set her Irish colouring off to perfection. She looked to Tessa like the mother of her childhood, more than ten years younger than during her internment at Goldlands. In fact, beside her, Tessa suddenly felt drab and forgotten. It was young people that fell in love in that shouting way, not one's mother and employer! How could she ever have credited that Peter might become her stepfather?

Tessa was as surprised as everybody else.

Wisbey and Gilly said they had seen it as soon as they arrived back in the yard and Tessa must have been blind.

“But she only looks at that Buffoon of hers. She wouldn't have noticed,” Wisbey scoffed. “She's in love with that horse.”

The party was a great success, staged in a local country hotel. Technically it was a stable party, a party for the owners, but everyone came. It was autumn, the start of the new season, and everyone was making plans, talking of their new stars, full of optimism. Prospective new owners mingled with yard-lads and journalists, jockeys and rich daughters.

Tessa, who had never been to a party in her life, felt completely out of her depth. She knew she was still the girl that had stabbed Morrison-Pleydell, pointed out like an animal in a zoo. Maurice was still buying horses, and had San Lucar back with Raleigh for the coming year, but no one had seen much of him. No one was complaining.

Tessa stood watching the crowd chattering and drinking. She had no idea how to dance and realized that she wasn't much good at conversation either. Even her dress was hopeless, one of Myra's that Myra had taken in and shortened with her rather wild sewing. It was black and made her look like a witch. The evil fairy. That was what she felt like.

“Hi, Tess.” The voice was hesitant. “You look – fantastic.”

She looked up, startled. The voice was familiar, the sentiments not at all.

It was Greevy, himself looking rather amazing in a dark suit, holding a glass of champagne.

Tessa didn't know what to make of Greevy these days. He seemed far more friendly, in spite of his father. Tessa found herself blushing deeply, and didn't know what to say.

“I dare say Myra will be happier with Mr Fellowes than with Dad,” Greevy said. “Dad doesn't make people happy, does he?”

What on earth was she supposed to say to that? The understatement of all time.

“I don't live at home any more. I've got myself a flat in the village, walking distance from Raleigh's. It suits me fine. In fact I only see Dad if he comes to the races.”

How civilized he had become!

“I like my job, even if Dad did throw me in at the deep end. And you too – you've stayed with it. You've done well. Funny how things work out. That night – God almighty! He deserved it – what he did… but I'm glad I stopped you killing him.Where would you be now? Think of that! You owe me, Tessa – saving you…”

Greevy must have had a few drinks, to be so forthcoming.

“I wish I had killed him!”

“What, and still be in prison? You're crazy!”

“We all know she's crazy – you just found out?” Another voice broke in, and Tessa swung round to see the tanned, smiling face of Tom Bryant looking down at her.

She had to hide the shock that suddenly electrified her. She hardly recognized him from the invalid she had last seen. He looked so wonderful! Slender and obviously fit, in a fine suit and tie like Greevy, his sky-blue eyes were taking in her miserable figure.

“So, you're swapping stepfathers? A celebration surely? Don't mind Greevy here, he knows what I think of his dad, eh Greevy?”

Greevy laughed. “I've got a good idea. Don't worry, I can take it.”

They chatted like old friends while Tessa goggled beside them, heart thumping. What was it about Tom that made her feel so weird?

Then Tom turned to her and said, “Want some fresh air? I don't think you're a party person, not enough practice. Come and take a turn with me outside and tell me what you've been doing. Long time no see.”

He took her arm and steered her adroitly through the throng out on to the terrace. They walked down the steps and across the lawn to where a river made the boundary, running slackly in the sharp autumn sunlight. Their shadows lengthened towards it. Tom walked without a limp at all, and moved as easily as a dancer.

“You are better! It all worked?”

“Yes, better than anyone imagined. I've been so lucky! As soon as I was walking again I went to the States, and only came back last week. I've got relations out there, and lots of racing contacts. I started to ride out again, and got myself really fit and learned a hell of a lot into the bargain. It's been terrific. And I've already got some good rides lined up for the season. A year ago I thought my number was up – it's amazing.”

“You're so fit. It must help, when you have to fight back.”

“Yeah. Jockeys usually bounce back. I'm not the only one. I've just been really lucky. And what about you? And that great ugly beast of yours? Jimmy said he's still around.”

“Yes. Like you. Back from the dead. He can see now and I've got him really fit. I ride him out every day. Not with the others. Just in my time off.”

Tessa's face lit up as she started to tell Tom the story of Buffoon's rehabilitation. Tom listened gravely. What else had Jimmy told him? Tessa wondered. Nobody at home spoke of her ambition for him. It was just too difficult a hot chestnut to tackle.

“You want to race him again, don't you?” It wasn't hard for Tom to pick up this fact. “You're off your trolley, Tessa. He's too old, beat up. They never come back.”

Hearing it from Tom, the words that everyone had stopped saying at home because it was no use telling her, Tessa felt her world cave in.

“He will come back! You come and ride him! He feels marvellous!”

She looked up at him, white-faced, and Tom saw again the light in those weird eyes and the passion that suffused the small wiry figure. This was what Morrison must have seen, he thought, when she launched herself at him with the knife. In her black dress, throwing out sparks, she looked marvellous.

“But to
race
?” He stuck to his guns. “He's too old now, to start again.”

“It's what I want.”

Tessa always got what she wanted. In the end.

“No. You're deluding yourself.”

“Look at you – nobody thought you'd come back.”

Tom laughed. “No? Well, I'm young, haven't you noticed? And lucky. Besides, I'm not a horse.”

“Come and ride him, and see what I'm saying. He feels just like he used to.”

“Well, I might. To humour you.”

To humour himself, perhaps. Was it possible that Tessa might learn to love something other than a horse? She gave no signs. One would no more try and steal a kiss from Tessa than enter the stable of a kicking mule.

“I exercise him in my own time. I never take work time on him. I ride him every afternoon, and that's my own time.”

“That's a hard day. And what about the race riding?”

“I've got to do as much as I can, because I need the money. I have to pay Peter. If you can get me some rides… tell them all how good I am?”

“Yeah, I'll do my best. You work at the riding, that's what's the most important. You could be up there – win a big one. You can do it.”

“Mum's on my side.”

She was the only one. But she was mad too.

They stayed talking, Tom telling her what he had been up to in America, and it grew dark and they went inside. Other people came to talk to Tom and Tessa left, not wanting any more. It was only three miles to walk home, and now she was wrapped in dreams and glad to be out in the night on her own. She went out through the car park which was completely deserted. An almost full moon glittered on the metal roofs, making it look like a sea. Tessa turned her face gratefully to the cool air.

By the entrance a large white car was parked on its own. There was a man in it, watching her. She sensed rather than saw him. She had to pass close to it to get out of the entrance and as she passed the door opened and a voice called her name.

She stopped, stupidly, instead of making a run for it, and a figure stepped out and caught her by the arm. The grip was painful.

“I want to talk to you!”

It was Maurice, breathing stinking whisky fumes over her.

“My dear little stepdaughter! Come and talk to me, tell me how my darling wife is enjoying herself these days.”

He dragged her into the car and Tessa heard the automatic locks click. She sat in the passenger seat, tense, trying not to show her fear. For God's sake, don't start the engine! she prayed. He could kill her.

“I wasn't asked to the party,” he said.

“Everyone was asked. It was an open invitation. You could have come if you wanted.”

“If
I
wanted? But no one else wanted
me
, did they?”

“No, they didn't.”

In the moonlight she could see his drawn, jowly face, and the ice-cold eyes. She was completely in his power. Yet, even in this extreme situation, she could not find the words to sweet-talk herself out of it. The hate rose up like bile.

“My mother is happy now, with Peter! And so is Greevy, now he's left you. And me! We're all happy without you! Can't you see what you are?”

And even while the words left her tongue she was telling herself what an idiot she was.

Maurice laughed.

“You never play your cards right, do you, Tessa? You're still just a spoilt brat as far as I'm concerned. A very nasty spoilt brat with a vicious streak. I am going to see that you get your just desserts.”

He put his hand out to switch on the ignition.

Tessa knocked it away. She tried to find her door handle, the panic rising, but knew it was locked anyway. There were headlights coming towards them out of the car park and she turned to scream out for help but Maurice knocked her violently against the window, nearly stunning her. He started the engine. Tessa reached out desperately and put her hand on the horn. She kept it pressed down and screamed again but fear stifled her voice. Only the headlight, flaring now across their struggles, gave her hope.

The car swung wide, crossed in front of Maurice's car and blocked the exit. Maurice, wild and drunk, lashed out at her again as she lunged for the ignition keys. He was so mad he was going to ram the car that blocked him.

The driver leapt out and Tessa screamed at him.

“Tom, mind out!”

She kicked out at Maurice's ankles and swung her fist at his face. Pure rage guided her blows and Maurice couldn't get the car in gear. He roared at her, and she lunged again for the ignition keys, this time managing to pull them out of the lock. The engine died as they dropped on the floor.

“Let me out! Let me out!”

She beat on the windows with her fists, thinking Maurice in his rage was going to kill her. But he sat quietly, breathing hard. Then he bent down to pick up the keys.

He clicked the door locks free.

“Get out,” he said.

He leant over and opened the door and Tessa stumbled, half fell, into Tom's arms.

“What on earth's going on? What were you doing to her?”

“She's hysterical. Take her home. Do I have to spell out to you that she's unhinged? Wasn't she put away for it, for heaven's sake?”

Maurice looked up at them, his face twitching with the effort to keep in control. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Whoever was unhinged at that moment, Tessa knew it wasn't herself. He looked just like the madman he was. She felt Tom's arms tighten round her.

“Are you all right?” he asked her.

“Yes. Make him go. Move your car.” Tessa could not bear the expression in Maurice's eyes, boring into her. It brought all the crises in her life spilling back, the black holes she didn't want to look into again.