'They really don't get on,' said Daisy apologetically.

'Are you sure you're not letting your animosity towards your ex-husband poison your judgement? Perdita's not a stupid child, just very disturbed. Perhaps if you could spend more time talking to her.'

Instead of slumped in front of the telly with a bottle of vodka, thought Daisy. In despair at the prospect of finding Perdita another school, she noticed the washing-up machine had stopped. It was so ancient, the door kept opening. Seeing Gainsborough sitting on the kitchen table with his back paw in the air like a leg of mutton, Daisy grabbed her sketching pad. Keeping the door of the washing-up machine shut with her bottom, she started drawing frantically. Next moment Ethel gave a bark of delight and Daisy steeled herself for another frightful row with Perdita. Instead, through the kitchen door, hardly knocking, came the most ravishing-looking man. Gosh, she thought, my luck has changed. Then as he turned towards her she noticed the long, livid scar running down the side of his face and realized to her horror that he must be Ricky France-Lynch, her landlord.

'Oh dear,' said Daisy, 'I thought you were Perdita.' 'It's her I've come to talk about,' said Ricky bleakly. 'Join the queue,' said Daisy helplessly, as the washing-up machine, changing direction, gave a great dragon's roar.

'What's she done now?'

Stammering, Ricky told her about riding Pilgrim and jumping the sheep trap. 'She could have killed herself and 10,000 worth of pony.'

'I didn't know she'd been riding them,' said Daisy appalled. 'I'm terribly sorry.'

'She's also been taking them to the pony club all summer.'

'Oh my G.o.d,' gasped Daisy. 'She's not here at the moment, but I promise it won't happen again.'

'I'll t-t-take her to court if she doesn't stop.'

'I don't blame you,' said Daisy. 'Look, do sit down.' As she moved forward the washing-up machine stopped. 'You have to lean against it,' she explained. Then, her eyes falling on the breakfast and last night's supper washing-up in the sink: 'I'm afraid it's an awful tip. Look, do have a drink, I've got some vodka, and I know Perdita's got the remains of a bottle of Malibu. She certainly owes it you.'

Ricky shook his head. Just for a second he looked slightly less grim. 'D'you always go around with knives through your head?'

'I expect Perdita wishes I did.' Crimson with embarra.s.sment, Daisy tore the knife off. 'I was sorting out the children's toy cupboard. Oh h.e.l.l, poor panda,' she pointed helplessly at black-and-white fur and blue foam rubber littering the hall.

'We've got so little s.p.a.ce,' she went on, 'and you know how hopeless children are at allowing anything to be thrown away.'

'Yes,' said Ricky.

'Oh, heavens,' said Daisy, mortified as she remembered about Will. 'I'm so sorry.'

'It's all right. Mind if I look round?'

Quailing, Daisy nodded. The only thing she'd done to the house was to put rose-printed paper up in Violet's room, and the damp had come straight through.

'We love it so much here.' Her voice trailed off as she thought of the dreadful mess he'd find in the children's bedrooms. Mindlessly, she drew in some whiskers on Gainsborough's face and thickened his tail. It was no good, she'd have to have a drink. As she was tugging the ice tray out of the hopelessly frozen ice box, Ricky came downstairs looking grimmer than ever. 'This place is an absolute disgrace.'

'It is,' agreed Daisy humbly. 'Anarchy somehow broke out after my husband walked out.'

'No, the state of it,' said Ricky. 'There's damp in every room. That sink's coming away from the wall. You need bookshelves and cupboards fitted in all the rooms. I've got builders starting in the yard tomorrow. I'll send a couple down here to sort things out. They can probably mend the washing-up machine.'

'Oh, thank you.' Daisy had great difficulty not bursting into tears again. 'Are you sure you don't want a drink?'

Ricky shook his head. 'I don't - not since Will '

'Oh, how stupid of me,' said Daisy, appalled. 'How could I be so cra.s.s?' And how awful too, she thought, for Ricky to be reminded of Will's death by that scar every time he looked in the mirror.

She was amazed when he sat down at the kitchen table and started stroking Ethel's lovely speckled head. 'Why's Perdita so screwed up?'

And he listened without interrupting while she told him about the failed O levels and having to sell Fresco, the first thing Perdita had really loved, and about Hamish never loving her and spoiling the other two.

'He wasn't Perdita's father,' Daisy blurted out. 'Who was?' asked Ricky.

'Some other man,' said Daisy, going scarlet. 'But because aunts and grandmothers and teachers and family friends all prefer Violet and Eddie, I sort of over-compensate to make it up to her. You give in because it's easier than facing one of her tantrums.'

Getting up, she put two pieces of melting ice into her gla.s.s of vodka, then, going to a yellow tin on the shelf, took out a tea bag and put it on top of the ice, then, unseeingly gazing out into the darkening garden, she switched on the kettle.

Taking the gla.s.s from her, Ricky removed the tea bag, switched off the kettle and, looking in the fridge and not finding any tonic, added orange juice to the vodka before handing it back.

Here's someone in an even worse state than I am, he thought. To his amazement, he found himself saying, 'Bas has already spoken to me about Perdita. He thinks she's got fantastic potential. If she promises not to bunk out of school any more, and tries to get her O levels, I'll give her a weekend job working in the yard. If she takes that seriously, and pa.s.ses her O levels, I'll teach her to play polo.'

For a second Daisy's face quivered; then she blew her nose noisily on a piece of kitchen roll.

'Are you sure it won't be a bore?'

Ricky shook his head. 'The probation officer's keeping tabs on me, I can't drive or leave the country for a year. Give me something to do.'

'That is the nicest thing that's ever happened,' said Daisy slowly. Like a golden retriever searching for a sock togive a returning master, she looked frantically round the room. Then, ripping the drawing of Gainsborough from her sketching pad, she thrust it into his hand.

Perdita came in ten minutes after Ricky had left. She looked pale, truculent and dangerous.

'Something wonderful's happened,' said Daisy.

'You've found a lover,' spat Perdita. 'So what else is new?'

Daisy winced. 'Ricky France-Lynch came round.'

'So?' For a second, Perdita looked terrified, then resumed her normal expression: furious dark eyes in a white, cold stony face.

'You're to go and see him at eleven on Sat.u.r.day.' 'Whatever for?'

'He's going to offer you a part-time job. And if you work hard and get your O levels, he'll take you on full time.'

'After the way he swore at me this afternoon I'm not sure I want it,' said Perdita coldly.

Daisy resisted a desire to shake her. Instead, she asked what she wanted for supper.

'I'm not hungry,' snapped Perdita. Stepping over the toys Daisy had turned out, she flounced into her bedroom and slammed the door. Waltzing deliriously round the room, she pulled out the only photograph of Ricky she hadn't ripped up and, whispering, 'At last, at last,' started covering it with kisses.

16.

At a quarter to eleven next morning Perdita sauntered downstairs, reeking of the remnants of Daisy's last bottle of Je Reviens. Her deliberately dishevelled, newly washed hair fell halfway down her back. Her normally alabaster skin was smothered in bronze base to hide two spots which had sprung up overnight on her nose and chin out of nerves. An excess of royal-blue eyeliner and mascara ringed her angry eyes. She wore no bra. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, as rounded as scoops of ice-cream, were emphasized by the tightest royal-blue T-shirt. No pants line marred the impossibly stretched navy-blue jodhpurs. Flicking her whip against gleaming brown boots, she posed in front of Daisy. 'Dressed to kill,' she said sarcastically.

Certain to kill any pa.s.sion in Ricky, thought Daisy. Perdita was much too beautiful to smother herself in that muck, and the twelve pounds missing from the housekeeping must have paid for that T-shirt.

'HI look like a wh.o.r.e,' said Perdita, reading her mother's thoughts, 'I'm only taking after you. I've no idea when I'll be back, if ever.'

Outside it was still hot. The sun had dried the dew, but the fields were still strewn with cobwebs. Forget-me-nots and jade-green watercress choked the stream. At the top of the ride Ricky's house skulked like a grey battleship in its ocean of turning beech trees.

'This should be fun,' said Frances to Louisa, as Perdita strolled into the yard, cigarette still hanging from her lips. 'Is she applying for a job as a hooker?'

The ponies, peering out over their bottle-green half-doors, however, made no secret of their delight at seeing Perdita, who had been stuffing them with carrots nicked from Philippa Mannering's garden all summer.

'It'll be interesting to see how fit you've got them,' said Frances nastily. 'And I'd put that out,' she added, pointing to a 'No Smoking' sign over the tack room door.

Chucking her lighted cigarette in a dark green tub of white geraniums, ignoring Frances's look of disapproval, Perdita went up to each pony, hugging them and pulling their ears. Even Kinta, known to bite everyone, rested her face against Perdita's, leaving a blob of green slime on her right nipple just as Ricky came out of the tack room. Yesterday his face had been animated with rage. Today it had resumed its normal impa.s.sivity. Close up, Perdita noticed the putty-grey pallor, the black hair flecked with grey, the livid scar running from right eyebrow to jawbone. His mouth had vanished in a grim line. Neither the thick, curly eyelashes nor the black rings underneath them tempered the bleak animosity of the slanting dark eyes above the hard Slav cheekbones.

Perdita felt a strange mixture of pa.s.sion and compa.s.sion. I'll make him better, she thought. He's going to be my lover and the father I never had. I'm going to be the love of his life and the child he lost.

Ricky looked at Perdita. Even the crude make-up and the obscenely tight clothes could not really detract from her beauty. Yet in her wanton, blatant s.e.xuality, she was terrifyingly close to both Beattie Johnson and Chessie. A waft of Je Reviens reached him, sickly sweet amid the stable smells of horse sweat, leather, straw and droppings. He was overcome with revulsion.

'Tack up Sinatra,' he said to Louisa.

Louisa and Frances exchanged awed but gleeful glances. Sinatra was the most difficult ride in the yard. He had to be gagged up to the eyeb.a.l.l.s for anyone to control him. Bred in Kentucky, his coat had the mushroom-fawn silkiness of a Weimaraner. Brilliant on his day, he bucked under the saddle and pulled like the Inter-City to London.

'Leave off the running reins - and he doesn't need a double bridle or that martingale,' ordered Perdita, following Frances into Sinatra's box.

'We're the best judge of that,' snapped Frances. 'He throws his head when he stops.'

'I've been riding him in a headcollar all summer.'

'On your swollen head be it. My G.o.d, is Ricky ever going to knock you you into shape.' into shape.'

'Talking of shapes,' drawled Perdita, staring contemptuously at the scrawny, hipless, bustless Frances, 'yours leaves a great deal to be desired.'

Ricky made no comment about the lack of martingale, but handed her a hat as soon as she was mounted.

Aware it would flatten her hair, Perdita grumbled that she didn't want to look like Mrs Thatcher going down a mine.

Put it on,' said Ricky sharply.

Ricky stood in the middle of a sandy, oblong corral which was enclosed by post-and-rail fencing except for a gate at one end and a stretch of wall at the other. For a start he made her circle on different legs, leading to small circles, then into figures of eight. Each time Sinatra changed legs perfectly.

'Blimey,' said Louisa.

'Keep your weight on the inside leg,' said Ricky. 'Now circle the ring at a gallop, then turn at the top sharply, changing legs.'

Knowing this was the most important move in polo, Perdita cantered round sweetly, calmly, then leaning right forward, she sent Sinatra thundering down the side of the ring, only just preventing him crashing into the wall. Going into a lightning turn which nearly brought the pony down, before Ricky could stop her, she careered back to the other end, executing a turn so sharp that Sinatra's fawn nearside should have been full of splinters.

'Stop showing off,' howled Ricky.

'Just proving he's better in a snaffle.'

'He only stopped to avoid c-c-concussing himself.'

'c.r.a.p,' said Perdita rudely, and, swinging round, galloped back, pulling Sinatra up five yards in front of the wall, turning so fast that for a second both pony and rider vanished in a cloud of brown dust. Emerging, she thundered up to Ricky, slithering to a halt three feet away from him, running her hand up and down Sinatra's bristly poll to show him her appreciation.

'Well?' she taunted Ricky.

'Your weight's too far forward.'

'It can't be.'

'b.l.o.o.d.y can. If you hadn't antic.i.p.ated those stops, you'd have been right over his neck.'

After a quarter of an hour on Sinatra, by which time his silken coat was dark brown with sweat, Ricky changed her on to Kinta, the widow-maker, who required the brute strength of a Juan O'Brien to halt her wilful stampede.

'This should be even more fun,' hissed Frances to Louisa.

'She rides jolly well,' conceded Louisa.

'Ricky'll never put up with this kind of lip.'

Perdita's method of stopping Kinta was simple. She rode her flat out at the brick wall at the end, which must have been five foot high. Sitting still in the saddle, she made no attempt to pull her up. Unable to stop, Kinta had no option but to hoist herself over the wall, just catching it with a cannon bone and pecking on landing.

'I think we'll walk back, you stupid b.i.t.c.h,' Perdita chided the hobbling pony as she opened the gate and returned to the ring.

'What the f.u.c.k d'you think you're playing at?' White with rage, Ricky bent down to examine Kinta's leg. 'Teaching her a lesson. Look how she's learnt it.'

Swinging Kinta round, she hurtled her towards the wall. 'Stop,' yelled Ricky too late.

As if she were doing a dressage test, Kinta swivelled round, changing legs perfectly, hurtled down to the far corner and turned again.

'Blimey cubed,' said Louisa in amazement.

'You keep forgetting to stop in a straight line,' said Ricky, determined not to praise her, 'and you never look round to check who's behind you. Anyone coming down the line would take you clean out.'

'n.o.body here,' shrugged Perdita.

'It's got to be instinctive for when there is someone,' said Ricky. 'Look, look and keep looking into the distance, never at your hands.'

At that moment a yellow-and-crimson hot-air balloon came over the hill, letting out a great recharging snort. Kinta, nervy at the best of times, jerked up her head, hitting Perdita smartly on the nose.

Totally unsympathetic, Ricky ordered her to go on circling the ring, doing small turns. For Perdita, frantically wiping away blood as it splattered her and Kinta, the session deteriorated sharply. Ten minutes more on Kinta were followed by twenty minutes on Wayne, Ricky's favourite pony, still circling, turning, then swinging round and putting her left hand on Wayne's custard-yellow right quarter at the trot, until her face and neck were streaming with sweat and blood, and her mascara and eyeliner were smeared and making her eyes sting.

Wayne flattened his big donkey ears and rolled his bruised dark eyes in martyrdom. Like an instinctive footballer who doesn't need to train, he was appalled to be subjected to such boring manoeuvres. The sun grew hotter.

'I will not give in, I will not give in,' said Perdita through clenched teeth. Her t.i.ts were agony, bouncing around. But just as she was about to crack, Ricky signalled to Frances to bring in a bucket of polo b.a.l.l.s. Wayne perked up as Ricky smoothed out the pitted sand in the centre with his boot and put down a ball.

'We'll start off with the nearside forehand, so you want him on the nearside leg.'