'It's nothing to do with the Nuke, Bathsheba dear.' Gillian smiled sweetly. 'It's to do with New Year's Eve, and traditions, and resolutions.'
'I'm going to give up eating olives,' Petunia confided to Jemima. 'Actually, I don't like them much and they give me chronic indigestion, so it's no hardship, but I really couldn't think of anything else.'
Glen, Jemima noticed, had come to a halt behind Emily and Marjorie Campion, elderly spinster sisters from the new estate. He was clutching the backs of their chairs and looking extremely concerned. He'd obviously had more experience of Gillian tanked up on Harvey's Bristol Cream than most people.
'Resolutions!' Gillian's voice roared round the room, drowning out the strains of Pan Pipe Reflections. 'Resolutions are made to be broken, don't you agree?'
Oh, God, she's seriously pissed, Jemima thought. Everyone else nodded happily.
However, I have no intention of breaking mine. I'd like to share it with you – and then add a bit of spice.'
This had the Parish Biddies on the edge of their seats. Jemima closed her eyes.
'I'm going to give up smoking.' Gillian beamed. 'At midnight tonight I will smoke my last cigarette!'
There was a ripple of applause and a muttered 'about bloody time' from the far corner.
'And there is something else I would like to share with you all. If this is a time for turning over new leaves and – well, turning over new leaves – I'd like to let you all in on a little secret.'
Jemima wondered if she could dash to the loo and bolt the door for the next three hours.
'I know this will come as a surprise to most of you – and definitely to my darling Glen.' She waggled her fingers in his direction. 'But I'm not all I seem to be.'
'Not all-bloody-there's more like it,' the same voice muttered.
'Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to tell you that I am the proud owner of Drew Fitzgerald's brilliant horse Bonnie Nuts.'
'Bloody liar!' The voice was indignant. 'Fizz Flanagan is.'
'No, it's one of the Saudi royal family,' Bathsheba corrected 'Lucinda told me.'
'And she should know,' Petunia piped up bravely. 'Considering that she's sleeping with Charlie Somerset.'
Ritual disembowelling was only prevented by Glen using his twenty-third psalm voice. 'Gillian! Are you sure?'
'Perfectly, darling. Ask Jemima.'
Jemima, blushing from her toes, nodded confirmation.
'But how? I mean – horses cost a fortune! Why didn't you tell me? How on earth can you have afforded to buy a horse? I know your writing is very profitable but –'
Gillian sashayed across the room and hugged Glen, almost unseating the Campion sisters. 'Darling, it's more profitable than you'd ever believe. Oh, look, I know you might be a teensy bit cross – but I don't want to keep it a secret any more. From you or from all our dear friends.' She took a deep breath. 'I'm Bella-Donna Stockings.'
'Fucking hell!'
Jemima blinked. Had Glen really said that? Bathsheba looked like she needed smelling salts.
Petunia grabbed a steadying handful of cheese straws. Everyone else sat rigidly, totally dumbfounded. Jemima, as always at moments like this, was terribly afraid she was going to laugh.
'Say you're pleased,' Gillian appealed to Glen. 'Tell me you don't mind.'
'Mind? You write pornography and you expect me not to mind!'
'It's erotica, actually.' Gillian looked a touch disappointed by the reaction. 'And no, I don't expect you to mind. You're a vicar.'
'It's because I'm a bloody vicar that I do mind, you daft bat!'
'Good Lord.' Bronwyn Pugh was on her feet. 'There's no call for that, Vicar. No call at all.'
Gillian gave a sob and fled from the room. Glen tore after her. All hell broke loose. There probably hadn't been so much fluttering and twittering and excitement beneath the post-menopausal Crimplene bosoms in years, Jemima thought. She very much doubted if they'd all be linking arms and singing 'Auld Lang Syne' tonight.
Bathsheba and the Campion sisters were tutting loudly that they'd always suspected as much. Bronwyn and Bernie helped themselves to another sherry. Several of the guests were searching for their hats and gloves.
'It's awfully exciting, isn't it?' Petunia nudged Jemima. 'Do you think there's any chance of us getting free copies?'
'I shouldn't think so. Anyway, I couldn't agree to that. It would ruin my profit margins – bloody hell!'
Everyone in the room was silent. The screaming from upstairs would have outdone the finale of
Fatal Attraction
. Holy shit, Jemima thought, he's stabbed her with a crucifix.
The sitting-room door flew open. A very un-stabbed Gillian belted in, followed by an equally distraught Glen.
It's the boys! My little boys! My babies! They've gone to the fucking Nuke!'
'They do drugs, you know.' Bronwyn spoke up from Floss's back seat. 'Everyone knows that.'
'What, the twins?' Jemima nearly veered off the road. 'They're only children!'
'Not the twins, silly girl! No – these rave places – they do drugs. Vitamin E. I've seen it on the News.'
How, Jemima wondered, she'd managed to get Bronwyn, Petunia and Bathsheba in the back of her car, she really wasn't sure. Bernie Pugh, well strapped in, was sitting rigidly beside her. Ted Cox had been left open-mouthed on the drive. There was some scant hope that the Campion sisters may have picked him up in their Morris Minor.
Glen and Gillian had torn off in the elderly Triumph, leaving everyone else, teeth chattering in the subzero temperatures, staring blankly after it on the frosted gravel. Jemima had yanked open Floss's door. The scramble for the seats had been like the first day of the sales. Those not lucky enough to find accommodation in the leading cars, had tumbled into whatever transport was available. The resulting convoy was just like the chase scene in
Clockwise.
She turned up the heater as she rounded the Peapods bend far too fast and winced. They'd all end up in the stream if she wasn't careful. To hell with the fact that she'd probably had too many sherries – every policeman in the Thames Valley would be patrolling the Nuke. They wouldn't, surely, be breathalysing anyone on the back roads of Milton St John. She'd just have to park Floss a decent distance from the marquee.
'You can hear the music from here!' Petunia piped from somewhere beneath Bronwyn and Bathsheba. 'Doesn't it sound lovely?'
It did, actually. It sounded bassy and sexy and primal and altogether exciting.
Jemima, trying to suppress total glee that she was actually going to the Nuke, attempted to remind herself of the potential severity of the circumstances. She kept failing miserably. She only wished she'd had time to change out of the wool dress and slip into something by Dolce & Gabbana.
'I always knew Gillian was up to no good.' Bathsheba leaned across from the back seat as they hurtled along the single-track road in the darkness. The only signs of life were the Triumph's tail-lights streaking occasionally ahead of them and the Nuke's blue strobes dancing across the sky. 'Her being a porn writer comes as no surprise. No surprise at all. Devious so-and-so. Marching with us – pretending to be on our side! You and her were in cahoots, no doubt, young lady?'
Jemima smiled serenely. 'We were. And I'm very proud of her. And if you say anything detrimental about me or Gillian or Bella-Donna Stockings or Fishnets, then I'll stop the car and turf you out. Okay?'
After a moment's stunned silence, Bathsheba muttered mutinously, 'That's as maybe, but you tell me why her kiddies have run away tonight. Disturbed, that's what they are. No proper mothering at home. Why else would they want to be going to this – this – Nuclear thing?'
'Probably for the same reason as your daughter.' Jemima risked a glance in the driving mirror. 'Only, of course, Lucinda will be safely and chastely escorted by Charlie, won't she?'
'Attagirl!' Bronwyn trumpeted. 'And shut up about them damn Fishnets tonight, Bathsheba, do. There's more important things to bother about than Gillian writing a bit of slap and tickle.'
Bathsheba huffed a bit but said nothing. Jemima's smile edged up a few hundred watts in the darkness. Bernie Pugh patted her knee. 'I reckon she'll have enough trouble with the Vicar, my love. If she can win him round, then she shouldn't worry about a few mardy old women.'
There was a squawking explosion from the back seat.
'Here we are.' Jemima squealed Floss to a halt on the outskirts of the field. 'Holy shit!'
The whole world must have been there. Not only was the music loud enough to jar her bones, but if the crowds outside the marquee were anything to go by, then inside must be total bedlam.
'Goodness! It's like the war years!' Petunia was first out of the back of the car. 'Look at all those bivouacs!'
Half a dozen additional tents had sprung up round the marquee. Each pulsed with a life and colour of its own. Locking the doors, and deciding to leave the Parish Biddies to their own devices, Jemima hurtled towards the entrance. If they hadn't slaughtered each other on the journey, Glen and Gillian must be somewhere inside. She was pretty sure she'd never find them. There must be thousands and thousands of people.
'Ticket!' A bald man in a tuxedo barked. 'Or arm-pass!'
Jemima stared at him. This was no time for niceties. She glanced over her shoulder. A stream of weirdly clad children were queuing behind her. She shrugged towards the nearest boy who was probably about twelve. 'Martin's got my ticket. 'Bye.'
She ducked beneath the momentarily distracted tuxedoed arm and belted inside. It was like nothing on earth.
The lasers pulsed to the bass line, and the bass line pierced her emotions. Jesus! An entire generation of children looking very grown up in heavy make-up and pantomime costumes were gyrating wildly. Tribal wasn't in it.
How would they ever find Levi and Zeke in this lot? Trying to get accustomed to the perpetual noise, lights, and motion, Jemima could see no one she recognised. There were probably hundreds of parents across the country tonight in the same state of despair as Glen and Gillian. But where the hell should she start?
Irritatingly, she wanted to dance. It was wildly infectious, although she'd probably never regain her normal hearing again. And she needn't have worried about the long woollen dress. People wore absolutely anything. And in some cases apparently nothing but body paint.
'Jemima! Hi!' The voice was at Concorde level. 'You are real, aren't you?'
She turned round. Lucinda, clutching two bottles of mineral water, was jigging on the spot beside her. Overwhelmed with relief at a familiar face, she tried to say hello and explain why she was there, but the music swirled her voice away.
Lucinda laughed, shrugged, and continued jigging. Jemima grabbed at her ski-tanned arm like a lifeline. God – she looked gorgeous. Jemima felt the recent bubble of optimism deflate inside her. Charlie, with the dual delights of Lucinda and Tina to entertain him, would never, ever, give her a second glance. Suddenly the conker-coloured dress and her glasses seemed to label her frump of the decade.
Lucinda, who was wearing what appeared to be a purple petticoat and nothing else, with purple and pink sequins attached to her eyelids, and fresh flowers entwined in the plait, looked like a dream. Her golden body gleamed beneath the lights. Jemima felt old and jaded and wanted to go home.
In a brief moment of relative hush, Jemima put her mouth to Lucinda's ear. 'Of course I'm bloody real! You haven't taken something, have you?'
'I reckon they've spiked the water,' Lucinda yelled back. 'I'm hallucinating! I thought I saw my ma just now! Spooky!'
The music changed and Lucinda slipped her arm away. Mouthing, 'Cool! Grooverider! I love this one! See ya!' she disappeared into the stomping sea — no doubt to be reconciled with Charlie.
Jemima closed her eyes. This was a completely pointless exercise. The Nuke was due to run until seven in the morning. It would have been far more sensible to arrive at kicking-out time and collect the twins then. But they were only eight – almost nine. Surely they couldn't have got past the doorman?
She forced her way back towards the entrance of the marquee. It had been so different the last time she'd been here. Then she'd laughed and danced with Charlie and wanted the night to last for ever. She'd hoped, really hoped, that he wouldn't go home with Tina. But of course he had.
'Arm-stamp if you're going into another tent!' a gruff voice barked in her ringing ear. 'Pull yer sleeve up.'
Jemima did. At least that was one problem solved. She wouldn't have to purloin another prepubescent for the purpose.
She shivered in the icy semi-darkness outside. It was still crowded with people cooling off, chilling out, smoking, dancing as they laughed and talked. The noise, although eardrum shattering was, by comparison to inside, almost bearable.
The field was awash with police. Several giggling children, still executing pretty neat dance steps, and obviously chock-a-block full of Bronwyn's Vitamin E, were being led away between officers.
'Thank God,' a familiar voice drawled in her ear. 'Someone of my own age to play with.'
She'd wanted to kiss Charlie many times – but never quite as much as at that moment. Wearing grubby white jeans and a navy polo shirt, he looked more sexy than any man ever had a right to.
'Lucinda said you were here.' He pushed his damp hair away from his forehead. 'But as she said she'd also seen her ma, I didn't believe her. Your mate Trev Perkiss is dealing in there like there's no tomorrow. I wondered if she'd taken something dubious.'
Trev Perkiss? Oh, Reynard. 'Is he a dope dealer as well?'
'He's just a dope. Tonight he's apparently calling himself Morpheus – the dream-giver. I'd like to give the bastard nightmares.'
'Didn't he stay in custody after the hunt, then?'
Charlie shook his head. 'Slippery sod. His mum cleans at the police station. She's probably got the Chief Commissioner's ear – or some other part of his anatomy. Cautioned and released pending social reports. Christ –' He looked along the row of slumped but still-dancing young boys in baggy combats and vests arrayed on the other side of Jemima. 'Are you with them?'