Spectacularly out of control I rocketed past Angie, Simon and Emma, the actress on the grey, Hugo and his muckers. Then I cannoned past Sam in pink, who shot me a startled look, then the huntsman and the whipper-in, in mustard. Finally – trust me, it didn’t take long – I shot past the hounds, who scattered like beads of mercury as I galloped through them, ensuring that in five short minutes, I’d broken every single rule in the book.

When I finally turned an enormous circle way out in the next field – the next county, probably – and headed back, Thumper galloping joyously to rejoin his new friends, Angie’s face was white and horrified. ‘What are you doing!’ she shrieked, appalled.

‘Couldn’t stop,’ I gasped, skidding up beside her and jolting to an ungainly halt, hat over my eyes. ‘Bolted.’

I wanted to die, actually. Knew I probably would soon, too. I felt green with fear, sick as a dog and way out of my depth.

‘But you’re making a complete tit of yourself!’ she hissed as, fortuitously, the whole field pulled up, pausing as they drew a copse.

‘I know!’ I wailed. ‘What shall I do, Angie? Shall I go home?’ I couldn’t look at Sam. I mean, the master.

‘No, don’t give up yet. Just keep at the back with the no-hopers. Come on, I’ll come with you.’ She turned her horse’s head.

‘No, Angie,’ I said quickly, knowing this was indeed the true hand of friendship. ‘You stay at the front, I’ll go.’

‘Well, look, see those stragglers?’ She pointed behind us with her whip. ‘The alkies and the point-to-pointers, the children – you go with them. And for Christ’s sake, don’t come up the front again.’

‘Righto,’ I said meekly, hauling on the reins, trying to make Thumper see reason; at least for long enough to let me join the hoi polloi.

As I rode towards them scarlet-faced, I realized they were laughing at me. But not altogether unkindly, and when they’d all introduced themselves, it became abundantly clear that they were not only hugely friendly, but much more accepting than the smart crowd. They didn’t mind a bit that it was my first time out and I’d broken every rule under the sun; in fact, once they’d dried their eyes and stopped holding their sides, they told me they’d all done it once, and that Angie was a complete pain in the tubes out hunting. She thought she ran the show and was only trying to get into the new master’s breeches. I laughed along rather disloyally, vowing never to be that obvious.

Off we set again, this time, happily, at a more sedate pace. Thumper, his initial gallop under his belt, seemed to settle; perhaps, like me, recognizing he’d lost the Darwinian struggle and acknowledging his true place with the novices at the back. And I had a rather jolly time of it with my new friends, one of whom was the ravishing redhead who’d stripped off at the meet, a nurse called Polly. Then there was an electrician called Sparks, on an equally sparky ex-racehorse; an old rogue called Gerald with come-to-bed cataracts; Ted the local butcher, his face like one of his cheaper cuts of beef; and my very own painter and decorator, Grant, on a huge coloured cob.

‘Grant! I didn’t recognize you in your hat! Didn’t know you did this sort of thing?’

‘Yeah, every week. I’d rather spend my money on this than send it down the red lane in the boozer. A farmer lends me his horse. Likes it exercised.’

I felt rather shamed as we cantered on. I’d always assumed hunting was the province of the hideously wealthy, but these people were not remotely privileged. It was clearly a sport like any other, and although you obviously needed the four legs beneath you to do it, they weren’t all pampered, expensive steeds like Angie’s, but shaggy, workmanlike beasts pulled in from the field, begged and borrowed.

‘My brother hunts in Ireland,’ Polly told me breathlessly when we finally drew up on the outskirts of a wood. ‘And over there the kids follow on bikes, donkeys, whatever. You don’t have to have a horse. It isn’t quite like that here, but we’re certainly not the Beaufort. You don’t have to join a queue to get in and you won’t get ticked off for not looking the part. Although I might just lend you a hairnet next time.’ She grinned.

‘Thanks!’ I grinned back thinking that this was more like it, and next time I really would look the part: no safety pins, no mud, but perhaps on Agnes, who’d be less scary. Yes, I could do this; but I’d take the slow route, not be in such a rush. The field was moving on again and I gathered my reins to go with them, but at that moment a solitary fawn-coloured hound bustled past me. Thumper, startled, lashed out with his left hind leg.

‘Oh God, I hope he hasn’t hit him,’ I said, turning distractedly, but my new friends had moved on, out of earshot, not at a gallop but a fast trot, in single file across a ploughed field. I was last. Thumper, aware of this, registered his displeasure by lifting his front hooves off the ground when I held him back, but still I held him, because I’d spotted something fawn and inert in the bushes.

‘Shit!’

I was off in a trice, pulling the reins over Thumper’s head, dragging him into the undergrowth. There in the bracken lay the hound: stretched out stiffly, a terrible gash to its head. I gazed in horror. Blood was pouring down its cheek. Oh God, was it dead? I lurched forward, touched it. Shook it. It most certainly was. Either that or unconscious. I felt for a heartbeat. Nothing. I shrank back, aghast. Oh God, I’d killed a hound. Or Thumper had, which was surely one and the same thing. My hand flew to my mouth.

‘Oh God, I’m so sorry!’ I wailed, crouching over it again, stroking its poor fawn coat, the reins looped over my arm as Thumper danced impatiently on the end. ‘You poor thing!’ I whispered. There he’d been, happily running along with his mates one minute, and then, courtesy of yours truly, stone dead the next. Tears sprang to my eyes and I gulped hopelessly, wringing my hands. Thumper cavorted, but I ignored him. In fact right now I downright hated him and spun round to tell him so in no uncertain terms.

‘You stupid stupid horse!’

I cast about desperately for help. One by one the hunt was disappearing across the ploughed field over the brow of the hill and, horrified as I was, I couldn’t help feeling relief. For something else was building in my breast. Some other, weighty emotion. Terror. I was fairly sure that up there in the litany of hunting sins, this was the most heinous. Forget not having the right kit. Forget not addressing the master correctly, overtaking him, the whipper-in, the pack; this was the black cap. Not just for the hound, but for me too.

Dry-mouthed, I stared at the empty horizon. All gone. No one even in the distance. But if I was tempted momentarily to get back on and just turn and belt for home, for the safety of my cottage and a nice cup of tea, I resisted manfully. No. What I’d do, what I’d jolly well do, was get back on and catch up with them. Yes. Tell them exactly what had happened. Fess up.

Heart pounding and feeling very fluttery and sweaty-palmed, I somehow, with the help of a log, got back on a prancing and distressed Thumper – but not as distressed as I was, oh God no – and around we spun. We galloped off across the middle of the sticky plough, then through a gate and sharp left across a meadow. The riders in the distance were going at speed now, and I realized I’d have to leap a ditch or two along the way to catch up. But ditches were nothing to me now. Risking my own neck was a mere trifle. In fact breaking it was hugely preferable to what was about to befall it.

In a trice I was steaming up a grassy hill beside Polly, the nurse. A good person. A nice person. Think of the hours she worked, the minimum wage, the bedpans. She’d understand. And maybe it wasn’t dead, after all? Maybe she’d administer mouth to mouth?

‘Polly –’

‘Oh, hi, you’re back! We were worried about you. Gosh, you must have jumped those ditches – well done!’

‘Polly, I –’

‘Holes on the right!’ she shouted in warning as we careered past a badger set.

Thumper swerved violently to avoid the craters in the ground, and of course I was doing my level best to stay on, let alone speak. And with every furlong we galloped, we were getting further away from the poor dead hound. One of many, of course. So many. Look at them all streaming out ahead. Heaps of them, so of course he wasn’t missed. But I must impart my intelligence. Must divulge the grave news. We were jumping now, a series of little blackthorn hedges, not very big, but as I landed beside Polly’s huge grey, I screamed, ‘I’ve done something – I must tell you!’

She swung around. Only, to my horror, it wasn’t Polly at all; it was Emma Harding.

She looked annoyed at being yelled at, mid-jump. ‘Oh, it’s you.’ She glared. ‘I hope it wasn’t you on the crops back there.’

‘What?’ We’d straggled to a halt before a massive hedge that not even the thrusters could jump.

‘Someone went on the crops, and you were specifically told to keep to the edge.’

I gazed in wonder. She’d slept with my husband for four years, wanted my children’s inheritance, and now she was telling me not to trample a few Weetabix seedlings?

‘And you should have a red ribbon on that horse’s tail if it kicks.’

I went pale. Did she know? Had she seen?