amazing how people’s memory can change once they’ve had a big Fleet Street cheque waved in front of their nose.’
Outside the big mullioned window they could hear the clip-clop of horses’ hooves in the kitchen yard. Cate unbolted the big oak kitchen door to see Camilla climbing off a big bay mare. She was dressed in a pair of cream jodhpurs and fitted navy hunting jacket.
‘If there’s coffee on the go, I’ll kill for it,’ she called to Cate. She took off her riding hat, her blonde hair tumbling onto her shoulders.
‘Watch your step,’ Cate whispered as she approached the door, ‘Serena’s about to kill someone herself. Her story’s broken in the papers.’
‘What’s the matter?’ Camilla strode purposefully into the kitchen where Serena now had her head in her palms. She looked up as her sister entered.
‘Camilla. Thank God. There must be something legal we can do about this,’ she moaned.
‘But it’s true, darling,’ interrupted Cate delicately. ‘You and Tom have split up.’
Serena rounded on her sister crossly.
‘Thank you for the recap.’
Camilla was speedily running her finger over the text in professional mode.
‘We can potentially get an injunction to stop other things appearing – but we’ll be lucky to catch the News of the World coming out tomorrow.’
‘Anyway,’ said Venetia, curling a lock of hair around her finger, ‘it’s not entirely negative. I think you come out of it quite well,’ she said, pointing to the Mirror’s lead story, headlined, ‘Fairy Tale Over’.
‘What fairy tale?’ spat Serena, flinging newspapers across the room. ‘Beauty and the Bloody Beast? How can you possibly think I have come out of this “quite well”? Quite well is a multimillion-dollar divorce settlement, not tabloid humiliation.’
Having managed twenty-six years of Serena’s tantrums Venetia knew the best thing was to quash it as soon as possible. ‘Come on, let’s all go and get some fresh air,’ she said firmly, clapping her hands and herding them outside like a party of nursery-school children. ‘This will be old news by next week.’
Reluctantly Serena pulled on a pair of gumboots, grabbed Mrs Collins’ old multicoloured poncho from the back of the chair and slung it over her shoulders as they walked out into the grounds. The castle faded slowly from view as they walked further and further, the windows of the house glowing like a pumpkin against the dark drabness of the morning. From a distance Huntsford looked particularly grand, neo-Gothic with striking castellations, and the dramatic hills rising in the background cradled Huntsford like an emerald womb. Oswald had made some impressive renovations to the property since he inherited it; re-excavating the moat and adding a cricket pitch, a maze, a stunning light-filled orangery – and even a nuclear bunker in the eighties when everyone was feeling particularly jumpy about the Russkies. Even though it was looking a little ragged round the edges – the moat where Oswald used to take a daily swim was now full of moss, leaves and lichen – it still looked stunning at this time of day.
Serena was in no mood to sit back and enjoy the landscape. Her emotions were running riot. Anger. Hurt. And weaker forces she could hardly let herself admit – embarrassment and fear. It didn’t make sense, she thought, furiously stomping through the damp grass. Why would Tom be interested in some fat country girl, when he had her? She was sure Tom wouldn’t have been unfaithful, no matter what the papers said, but she was disappointed that she hadn’t found him waiting at the house when she’d returned from Egypt. After he’d finally been fished out of the Nile, Tom and Serena had had a prickly conversation about ‘spending some time apart’. Tom was going to take the first flight out of Cairo, while Serena had gratefully accepted Michael’s offer of his Gulfstream.
As there’d been no hordes of paparazzi waiting for her at Northolt, the RAF base in West London used by many celebrities to land their private planes, Serena had supposed that their bust-up had gone undetected by the media. She’d been relieved. On home soil she was sure she and Tom could work things out amicably, make a few choice appearances at the Ivy, smiling and holding hands to dispel any rumours, and take things from there.
But so far there had been nothing. No tearful appearances from Tom, no midnight phone calls, no expensive ‘forgive me’ Paula Pryke flower arrangements. Not even a text message to see how she was coping. The selfish bastard.
Having never suffered the indignity of being dumped before now, she couldn’t understand how their relationship had unravelled so fast, much less why Tom would want to end it so suddenly. What scared her most was what else it might be the end of – the best beds by the pool at the Eden Roc, the best table at the Cipriani, the invites to the couture shows, yacht parties, the Oscars. She felt nauseous thinking about it.
‘The worst thing,’ said Serena, getting suddenly aggravated and spinning round to face her sisters, ‘the very worst thing is that I’m in New York in a few weeks. Vanity Fair is hosting a party to celebrate my new film while I’m doing the East Coast junket. How can I turn up alone? I mean, Graydon isn’t even single any more.’
Cate and Venetia looked at each other cynically, looping an arm each through Serena’s as they walked along the long, dew-sodden grass as it sloped down towards the lake and the boathouse.
‘Come on, Sin, you are beautiful, talented, funny,’ said Cate, pulling her along.
‘Every man in the world would give his right arm to be at that party and find you single,’ added Venetia. ‘You’re fabulous.’
A weak smile pulled at Serena’s lips. ‘It’s true, isn’t it?’
Camilla smiled to herself. Such confidence in a crisis.
‘And that’s assuming you’ll even be single in a fortnight,’ she added, joining in the family motivation session. ‘Are you sure this isn’t just a tiff? What makes you think the relationship’s actually finished?’
Serena sighed dramatically. ‘The only way he could make this more final is if he hands me a bloody P45. He said he wants to take some “time out”, and he hasn’t even had the decency to call me.’
‘So why don’t you call him?’ asked Cate. ‘By the sound of it, you’ve hardly talked this through.’
‘No. Why should I be the one to ring him?’ Serena said tartly. ‘He was the one that behaved like a disgusting hooligan and then has the cheek to say we should take a break, as if I was the one in the wrong. He can keep that stupid fat country tart and see where that gets him.’
‘But if you don’t give him a ring, it’s going to be stalemate,’ said Cate pragmatically.
They had now reached the edge of the water. Serena looked out over the gleaming lake and began biting one tiny manicured fingernail. She looked sideways at Cate in a way that made Cate instantly on guard. She had a sixth sense when she was about to be manipulated by Serena.
‘You could always call him …’ Serena said slowly. ‘You two always got on. He’ll speak to you.’
Cate smiled and shook her head. ‘Oh no you don’t. Don’t try this one.’
‘Oh, please. I’ll do anything
