'God, no – I came with Bernie Pugh and the Parish Biddies.'
'I do love a woman with a sense of humour.' He squinted at her through the layers of multicoloured darkness. 'You haven't done anything, have you?'
Her? No, never! Her life had been orderly, decent, and practically blameless. Oh, right – he meant drugs. She smiled. 'Only OD'd on Harvey's Bristol Cream. Listen –'
She told him about Levi and Zeke's disappearance. 'Still I think they should be easy to spot – even in this crowd – after all, they're so tiny.'
He grinned at her. 'Jemima – this is Milton St John. Every bloody tent is awash with flat jockeys on holiday. Anyone over three foot nothing will stand out like a virgin at a white wedding.'
Of course, he was right. She shivered as the December temperature penetrated the blood-boiling heat from the marquee.
'Come on then, we'll give it a go.' He moved away in the direction of the satellite tents. 'Only another four to search.'
'What about Lucinda?'
'Lucinda's with a lot of her St Hilda's chums. It was very exciting for a while. A whole pack of eighteen-year-olds wearing ballet skirts.' He shrugged. 'Eighteen is probably their age
and
their waist size – but they all seemed as old as Methuselah to me. It's a very dedicated sport, this – all they wanted to do was bloody dance. What about you? Matt hasn't returned from Devon for tonight, has he? He's not waiting for you to join him for mayhem on the dance floor?'
They were halfway between the marquee and the first tent.
'Matt didn't go to Devon.'
'He did. Recuperation for his shoulder. He told me.'
'Not unless they've introduced passport control between Teignmouth and Newton Abbot, he didn't.'
Charlie raised his eyebrows but said nothing. He indicated towards a tent surrounded by an ethereal orange glow and a thumping life of its own. 'We'll start here. It's Ragga.'
The rhythm reverberated. The guttural lyrics were so dirty that they made
Spanky Panky
seem like Rupert Bear. Jemima loved it. The girls were dressed in jungle prints and jewels and skin. Charlie, who seemed to know a lot about the club scene, raved about Beenie Man and Bounty Killer. She assumed they were horses.
There was no sign of Levi and Zeke.
They drew a blank in the other tents, too. Mind you, it had increased her education no end. Speed Garage was very flash with everyone looking like they should be at a Commem Ball and swigging champagne from the bottle, while Big Beat had an almost male clientele – it was hip hop and techno, Charlie screamed in her ear. Very laddish. Sort of seventies stuff with sex.
Handbag House was really bizarre. If she'd thought the marquee dressers were outrageous, then this lot beat them hands down. It looked like an explosion in a Julian Clarey clone factory.
'Ministry of Sound?' Charlie looked a bit shocked at her non-comprehension. 'Ibiza?'
She continued to shake her head. She thought she recognised some of the music from Radio One but she couldn't be sure. Whatever it all meant, it was a million times better than swigging sherry in the Vicarage.
'Back to the marquee, then,' Charlie said, shivering. 'God, it's cold out here. I wish we could get a proper bloody drink. I'm completely pissed off with water – and anything half decent has been tucked away behind the bar for the grown-ups to plunder later. I might have to bribe the barmen.'
Jemima stopped. The scything wind sliced through her woollen dress. Two minutes ago she had thought she'd never feel cold again. Now, with black clouds piling across the luminous black sky, it looked and felt like it would snow. Should she go home now? Did she want a re-enactment of dancing with Charlie in the marquee? Something else to add to the increasing pile of Charlie Somerset interludes which had developed an irritating habit of invading her sleep?
Charlie smiled at her. 'You might as well have a bit of a bop while you're here. There isn't much else we can do about the kids. No doubt Gillian and Glen will have told the police and they'll be able to keep an eye open for them.'
'Gillian and Glen aren't exactly on the best of terms at the moment.'
'Nah?' Charlie shouldered his way through a pack of kick boxers. 'Well, it must be a bit stressful for them.' 'She's told him about owning Bonne Nuit.'
Charlie stopped walking. She almost cannoned into him. She had to veer off to one side to avoid touching him.
'She also told him where the money had come from.'
'Bugger! And I missed it! Drew and I have been speculating for months!' He gave her a glimpse of the gloriously sexy crooked grin. 'So, go on? Where? Is she blackmailing the Mothers' Union?'
'She's Bella-Donna Stockings.'
'Fucking hell!'
'That's exactly what Glen said, actually.'
Charlie's eyes gleamed. 'Really? Truly? It's not a wind-up?'
'No wind-up. I've known for ages. She was trying to lose some of her income by buying the horse. She hadn't expected you to do so well on it.'
Charlie still shook his head. 'God, I can't believe it. And I always fancied her in a sort of Madonna-ish way. Oh, not conical bras and stuff – I mean the real one. More kind of pure and untouchable. And she writes hard-core porn!' He sighed. 'I could have helped with the research. I wonder who did?'
'No one, apparently. She's got a very vivid imagination. And she doesn't write porn, she writes erotica,' Jemima corrected, wanting to giggle at his expression. 'And I'm very proud of her. She's very clever.'
'And devious. And so are you. How the hell did you manage to keep it quiet?'
'I always keep secrets.' She walked towards the marquee and flashed her invisible purple star under the scanner. 'Remember?'
Inside, it was once again wall-to-wall noise and movement. The dancers looked as though they'd be going until it got light. Reynard, or Morpheus, or whatever his bloody name was tonight, had obviously had a bumper selling spree.
She wondered if Charlie was going to try to find Lucinda, and tf he was, whether she should go back to the Vicarage. There wasn't much point in her staying – she hadn't even glimpsed the rest of the search party – and as far as she knew, Levi and Zeke could he snugly tucked up in bed.
'Fancy a drink?' Charlie's mouth was close to her ear.
She swallowed. 'Please – even if it's mineral water.'
'I thought we could raid Gareth and Diana's more grown-up supplies. While the barmen are otherwise engaged.'
The barmen had balloons on their heads and were all dancing with each other. Three hundred people were climbing over the bar and raiding the bottles. Charlie elbowed his way through the throng. 'Whisky? Vodka? Gin? Or do you want to stick to sherry?'
'Anything but sherry.'
She watched him as he poured two generous measures of gin into half-pint plastic tumblers and added a threat of tonic water. She'd definitely have to walk home.
'Do you and Tina go clubbing?'
'Yeah. A bit. It's not my scene, really. But she needs to be noticed.' He downed a quarter of the glass. 'She's a bit scared of going off, you know. I mean half the catwalk models on the big agency's books are under seventeen. She's getting past her sell-by date.'
'Will she retire on her fortune and raise children then?' Jemima sipped the practically neat gin, not really wanting to hear the answer.
'God knows. I think she wants to go into advertising. We don't talk about it much. We don't talk about anything much.' Charlie stopped and looked towards the music end of the marquee where a massive crowd had gathered round the DJ. 'What's going on?'
The drum 'n' bass died away. The after-effects still rang in her ears. It was like being underwater. The echoes of a clock chime thundered through the marquee. Everyone started counting down.
Big Ben. Almost midnight. Seven-and-six-and-five-and.... '
Charlie put his glass on the bar and took hers from her hand.
... three-and-two-and....
The marquee erupted. Everyone was screaming and kissing and hugging. Balloons cascaded from the ceiling.
'Happy New Year.' Charlie pulled her towards him. 'I'm so glad I'm a traditionalist ...'
He kissed her. Gently. And then not so gently. And then she was kissing him back, and all the noise and colour and explosive vibration was inside her head and invading her body.
The DJ welcomed in the New Year with a blast mix of Roni Size and 'Auld Lang Syne'. Jemima simply didn't hear a thing.
He hadn't won the King George. He was pretty sure he wouldn't win the Cheltenham Gold Cup which was now only an hour away. And the Grand National? Forget it. And it was all Jemima's fault. Since New Year's Eve, Charlie simply hadn't been able to get her out of his mind.
It could have been so different. If only Gillian hadn't come belting up at what seemed like a split second after midnight, yelling that they'd found the twins bopping to Fizz Flanagan in the Ragga tent, and wasn't it a hugely tremendous relief? If only Lucinda hadn't shed her St Hilda's chums and said oh, hi, to Jemima, and then entwined herself around Charlie and said they had a lot of New Year's kisses – and the rest – to catch up on. If only Jemima hadn't looked at him shyly and sadly and said Happy New Year and walked away....
And he'd tried to follow her, but she'd disappeared into the throng outside. He'd stood in the icy early morning, the first snowflakes dissolving in his hair, and wanted to cry.
Charlie, who reckoned he'd performed every sexual equation known to man – and woman, of course – had been blown away by a kiss.
The snow had continued intermittently through January and into February. When it wasn't snowing, the temperatures plummeted to subzero again, and covered the Downs with royal icing. Now it was March and a reluctant thaw had set in.
Drew and Kath, like every other National Hunt trainer in the country, were tearing their hair out over the disruption to their Blue Riband schedules. And, even more worrying, the weather in Ireland had been fairly mild by comparison, and the trials at Fairyhouse had thrown up some surprising, and extremely hot, competition.
Charlie had spent a lot of time sitting on the counter in the bookshop, or sprawling in Jemima's chair behind her desk. They'd talked – as they'd always talked – about everything.
They'd discussed the wave of gossip that had roared through Milton St John after Gillian's revelations. She had appeared on breakfast telly and all the local news programmes. Glen, after his initial shock, had been inordinately proud and supportive and, having received a rather censorious letter from the Bishop, had declared his intention of turning Baptist.
The Bishop, who had always had a soft spot for Gillian, Jemima told Charlie, had then battled his way through the Berkshire snowdrifts, and spent a weekend at the Vicarage. Gillian had shown him the classic works of other erotica writers such as Anaïs Nin, and pointed out that eminent writers such as D. H. Lawrence, and even good old Shakespeare, were not above hurling in huge chunks of pure titillation. The Bishop had left, convinced that God worked in mysterious ways indeed, with a parcel of Fishnets in his suitcase.
They'd talked about Matt's rather surprising suntan on his belated return from Devon. Jemima had said she hadn't seen much of him since he'd been back. Charlie hadn't been sure whether she meant she hadn't seen
Matt,
or she hadn't seen all of his suntanned body, and had been too scared to ask.
They'd talked about Lucinda's return to Southampton for the new term. They'd even discussed Tina's nation-wide television advertising campaign for a shampoo, which meant that they both saw her in their living rooms far more often than they wanted to.
Neither of them had mentioned New Year's Eve.
Bored to tears with the enforced lay-off because of the weather, Charlie had cleaned every bit of tack he could find at Peapods a million times; driven Maddy to distraction by picking Daragh up just as she'd got him to sleep; and started smoking again.
'For God's sake – tell her,' Maddy had insisted, falling over Charlie's legs in Peapods' kitchen yet again. 'Because if you don't, I will.'
'It won't make any difference, Mad.' He'd thrown his half-smoked cigarette into the embers of the range. 'She thinks I've got about as much depth as a puddle.'
'Charlie.' Maddy had dumped Poppy Scarlet and one of the new litter of kittens on his lap. 'You're absolutely gorgeous. You're kind and funny. You've never, ever failed to get any woman you've wanted. You've got Tina – well, not so much now, granted – but then she's working abroad a lot. And Lucinda in the vacs. And the postmen still get hernias from delivering your fan mail. Why the hell should Jemima turn you down?'
The kitten had turned round three times, purred, and fallen asleep on his knees. Charlie had buried his face in Poppy's dark, silky hair, curly like Maddy's. It smelled sweet and fresh, and made him want to cry. For more than a decade he'd known that these surrogate babies were the nearest he'd ever get to having his own child. An accident had put paid to any chance of him ever establishing a Somerset dynasty. It had never been a problem. Until now. Because until now he'd never met anyone he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.
He lifted his head from Poppy Scarlet. 'Because I don't just want to go out with her.'
'Well, no, you wouldn't.' Maddy stopped in the middle of sorting out Daragh's Babygros from the tumble dryer. 'But I'm sure Jemima wouldn't mind going to bed with you eventually. It wouldn't be that much of a hardship.'
'I want to marry her.'
There. Now he'd said it. It had been hammering inside his brain for ages. Months. From long, long before New Year's Eve. For the first time in his life he had found the woman he wanted to marry – and he couldn't.
Holy hell!' Maddy dropped the clutch of multicoloured towelling all-in-ones, and plonked herself in the rocking chair opposite him. 'Are you sure?'
He'd never been more sure of anything in his life.
Maddy picked up another kitten which was about to investigate the bottom oven. 'What about Matt? Are they still together?'