Score!

Lucy hugged an increasingly trembling James. If only she could explain to the others why Tristan was being so difficult.

‘I miss the birds singing at twilight,’ she said, looking up into the trees.

‘They’re all exhausted feeding their young,’ said Jessica. ‘Mr Brimscombe told me nightingales disappear in July. One morning they’re here, the next they’ve gone, departing silently in the dusk.’

‘Like us next week,’ said Ogborne.

Burying her face in James’s coat, Lucy burst into tears, then leaping to her feet fled into the wood.

37

It was nearly nine and even hotter when Tab got home from working The Engineer. She went straight into the shower, then put on the coolest clean thing in her wardrobe, a virginal calf-length grey cotton shirtwaister, which she had never worn but which her American bosses had given her last summer for her birthday, probably as a hint she might curb her dissolute lifestyle.

God, it was stifling. She was already breaking out in sweat again. In the past she would have got stuck into the vodka, but staying off it seemed to be the only achievement she had to cling on to.

She missed Tristan so dreadfully. But as she breathed in a familiar smell of night-scented stock and philadelphus, she was flattened with longing for Penscombe. Tristan, however, had urged her to work at her marriage. Isa was back in England, and as she expected him home later she opened and applied the chic French make-up Simone had given her for her birthday. Then she drenched herself in Quercus, the disturbing, sweet yet lemony scent which Isa so loved.

Going downstairs she found Sharon panting on the kitchen floor. She was on heat, and most of the local dogs, including James, Trevor and Tabloid, when he escaped from his dungeon, had been hanging round Magpie Cottage. ‘At least one of us has got admirers,’ sighed Tab.

Listlessly she switched on the wireless. They had all been so caught up in Don Carlos, they had forgotten the outside world existed. Then she jumped to hear a soft, gruff, utterly familiar voice.

‘One of the children had taken her collar off for fun,’ her stepmother was saying.

‘Oh, no.’ Tabitha clutched herself in horror.

‘We were playing Grandmother’s Footsteps in the woods,’ went on Taggie, ‘and suddenly Gertrude had vanished. She’s deaf and blind. She must be so frightened.’ Taggie’s voice broke.

‘What does Gertrude look like?’ asked the interviewer.

‘She’s only a little black and white mongrel, but her black patches are mostly white because she’s eighteen.’

‘A good age,’ said the interviewer, ‘and your husband Rupert has offered an amazing ten-thousand-pound reward. A lot for such an old dog.’

‘She’s special to us,’ sobbed Taggie. ‘She eats Bonios in her paws like ice-creams. She was eating one yesterday, and this magpie, one for sorrow, snatched it away. She’ll be so bewildered. We just want to know she’s safe.’

‘Well, I’m sure with a ten-thousand-pound reward we’ll have the whole of England looking for her. That’s Gertrude, and the number to ring is…’

Tears were flooding Tab’s face. She had known Gertrude, Taggie’s dog, since she was eight, even before Taggie married her father. Rupert had had to work hard to win over Gertrude.

Gertrude had also starred at Taggie and Rupert’s wedding, escaping up the aisle and standing panting between her mistress and Rupert while the Bishop ranted about sexual mores. When anyone had a row at home, Gertrude, the peacemaker, would rush in rattling a box of Bonios. She had so much character.

Oh, poor Taggie, thought Tab. She must ring home at once. It took her three goes to dial because she was shaking so much, then the number was engaged. Feeling the need of Wolfie’s solid comfort, she dialled Valhalla.

Seeing Magpie Cottage’s number coming up, Rannaldini picked up the telephone. ‘My little one.’

‘May I speak to Wolfie?’

‘He is out. The calls are being diverted to the tower. I’ve been listening to your poor stepmother on the radio.’

‘Oh, God, it’s terrible.’

‘Maybe not so much. Clive was driving back from Cotchester just now and pick up small white terrier, smooth-haired and with curly tail. Maybe it’s Gertrude.’

‘Has she got a greyish patch over one eye and on her tail?’

‘She has.’

‘I’ll be over in a sec.’

Telling a reproachful Sharon she wouldn’t be long, Tab put on gym shoes so she could run faster.

Outside in the dusk it was even hotter. The once deep and dangerous river was so low she could paddle across it. The lights were on in Hermione’s house. She could see Mr Brimscombe still dead-heading roses in anticipation of night filming, and waved as she raced past. From the shrieks issuing from the tennis court, the final was reaching a climax. Someone called out but she ran on.