“Let’s go and congratulate him,” said Malise and Fen simultaneously, but Helen was too quick for either of them. Jumping over the row in front, she rushed out and down the steps and, red hair flying, she rushed to meet Jake.

“Oh darling, darling, darling,” she said, seizing his hand.

Jake looked down at her. Color in his face now, dazzlingly happy, handsome as never before, all efforts at impassivity gone.

“We did it,” he said incredulously. “We really did it,” and in the euphoria of winning, he bent down and kissed her, and she kissed him back, clinging on to him.

In the riders’ stand, trapped by the crowd, Fen’s eyes met those of Mrs. Macaulay.

“Your brother-in-law,” said Mrs. Macaulay accusingly.

“Yes,” said Fen, equally accusingly. “My sister’s husband.”

From the right she saw Rupert, white with rage descending on Jake and Helen. Fortunately, at that moment Sarah, in floods of joyful tears, and the rest of the British grooms swarmed round Jake and Hardy. Instantly they were joined by Wishbone and the American and German teams, who were all patting him on the back and showering him with congratulations. Count Guy arrived with a magnum of Krug.

From then on, everything was a daze. Jake was terribly glad to see Malise looking so happy, and Fen jumping up and down, and he was both pleased and sorry when he heard the poor Nigerian, the last to jump, had been unable to cope with the strain and had knocked up twenty faults, which meant Jake had the silver and Wishbone the bronze.

Everywhere he turned there were photographers and people reaching forward to pat Hardy.

“I can’t think why he isn’t biting everyone,” crowed Sarah. “Now he’s a medalist, he’s obviously turned over a new leaf.”

The jumps were cleared and the huge Clydesdales dragged on the winners’ podium. Together, Mary Jo, Jake, and Wishbone rode into the ring, followed by their three grooms. Sarah got a special cheer for her beauty and her red, white, and blue hair. Then the grooms took the horses as the riders mounted the podium. Jake found it difficult not to laugh as the girls carrying the boxes of rosettes, like flag-sellers, came out with their ludicrously stiff, wide-apart-


legged walk.

He bowed his head as the president’s wife hung the silver medal round his neck, touching it immediately, checking it was real. He thought his heart would burst with the wonder of the whole thing. Mary Jo was crying unashamedly as the three flags climbed up the flagpole and the band played the “Star-Spangled Banner.” Wishbone had no handkerchief, and had to blow his red-veined nose on his shirttail.

“Well done,” said Prince Philip, shaking them all by the hand, but particularly Jake. “Only clear round,” he added. “You must feel very proud.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Jake was so dazed with emotion, he was glad to get back to Hardy, who was so festooned with long-tailed rosettes he could hardly see through them. He wanted to stay with him afterwards but he was swept off to a press conference. By the time the reporters had finished with Mary Jo, Jake had consumed at least a bottle and a half of champagne.

“Pity you didn’t get a gold, Jake,” said the Los Angeles Times.

“Frankly I’m bloody glad to have the silver. Being a gypsy, traditionally I cross people’s palms with it. It’s the right medal for me.” Everyone laughed.

“All the same,” he went on, looking at the forest of cameras and notebooks and tape recorders, “it’s a pity Dino Ferranti had to pull out, or Mary Jo and I might easily have been a rung lower.”

“Do you think there’s any reason you did so well?” asked the Daily Telegraph.

“I had a good backup team,” said Jake, and proceeded to thank everyone from the family to Malise, to the nurses and doctors at the Motcliffe.

“What are your plans for the future?” asked the New York Times.

“I’m going to ring my wife and then go and get plastered.”

Dudley fought his way through the huge crowd of fans waiting outside. “Congratulations, Jake. Brilliant, brilliant performance. We’ve kept a line open for you in the commentary box. We’d like to televise you breaking the news to Tory, if we may.”

“You may not,” said Jake. “One doesn’t often ring up one’s wife to say one’s got a silver. Some things should be done in private.”

Going into the commentary box, he slammed the door. “Can I put a person-to-person call through to Mrs. Lovell?” he said, picking up the telephone.

“Certainly, Mr. Lovell,” said the switchboard girl. “Congratulations.” He got through incredibly quickly.

“Oh Jakey, oh Jakey,” Tory was laughing and crying so much he could hardly hear her. “It’s so wonderful. You both were so wonderful. The whole village have been here watching it. They’ve drunk us out of house and home and now they’re having the most terrific party. We’re all so proud of you.”

“Hardy was your baby,” said Jake. “You sorted him out for me.”

“He jumped so brilliantly; and when he bowed; and the only clear too. Speak to the children.”

“How much did you win?” asked Isa.

“Can you take me to Disneyland?” said Darklis.

Jake asked if he could speak to Tory again. “I miss you,” he said. “D’you want to fly out for the team event?”

“Oh, I’d love to. Can we afford it?”

“I think so, now,” said Jake.

“Boyson just rang by the way,” said Tory. “He said you’d kept your side of the bargain, he’d be keeping his. Oh, listen, listen, can you hear?” she said in a choked voice. “They’re ringing the church bells, oh Jakey, it’s two o’clock in the morning. No one’s asleep. They’re cheering and dancing in the street, and the pub’s open, and they’re ringing the bells in your honor. Listen!”

Down the wires, Jake could hear the faint peal. He was so moved he couldn’t talk anymore. “I’ll ring tomorrow,” he said. “I love you.”

“I love you,” said Tory.

“Everything all right?” said Fen as he came out of the box, wiping his eyes.

He nodded. “Absolutely marvelous. They’re ringing the church bells.”

Perhaps it’ll be all right after all, thought Fen.


59


They gave him a ride in a police car, sirens blaring, to get him back to the Olympic village.

“I’m sorry,” said Jake at the gates, feeling dazedly for his security chain. “I seem to have mislaid it.”

“All right, Mr. Lovell, we know who you are,” said the security guard. “Congratulations.”

The other British athletes were euphoric.

“Well done,” said Sebastian Coe and Daley Thompson, hammering him on the back.

The weight lifters hoisted him shoulder high and carried him around the village. Everyone bought him drinks. Jake looked in the mirror in the little room as he changed to go out to dinner. He found his security chain where he’d left it, around his neck, under his shirt.

“You are a superstar,” he said, jabbing his finger at his reflection, pleased that the two pointing fingers met every time, proving he wasn’t drunk. He wished he could go out quietly and celebrate with Sarah and Fen; he didn’t want the strain of behaving well. He wished Tory was here to share in the triumph, but he had never before known such personal happiness.

Determined not to betray his devastating disappointment, Rupert was in no mood for a victory celebration. He had wanted to leave show jumping in a blaze of glory, moving smoothly from the gold medalist’s podium into politics and, possibly, Amanda’s arms. Now, the months of training and abstinence had gone for nothing. And although Rocky had jumped like a pig with chilblains, and Rupert had beaten the hell out of him afterwards, a small voice inside told him it was not Rocky’s fault.

When he had got back from Las Vegas, with the torn-up pieces of Amanda’s letter in his pocket, he shouldn’t have stayed up half the night talking to people at Suzy’s dinner party. He was thirty-one, not eighteen anymore. Finally, letting himself into the bedroom at two in the morning and finding Helen breathing specially deeply, pretending to be asleep, Rupert — king of the catnappers — had been unable to sleep himself, lying awake and thinking about Amanda.

Now he was expected to go out and celebrate that little jerk’s freak silver. Malise had rocketed him after the competition.

“These things happen with horses and the less said about your cock-up today the better. Now we’ve got to go all out for the team gold. You’ve got six days to get Rocky together, and I want you on parade at half-past nine tonight.”

“What for?”

“To celebrate Jake’s silver.”

“I’ve got a previous engagement,” said Rupert coldly. “I’m taking Helen and her mother to Ma Maison.”

“That’s where we’re all going.”

“Cost a bomb,” snapped Rupert. “Hardly imagine the Olympic fund will stretch to that.”

“It’s already been paid for,” said Malise, not without a certain quiet pleasure which he afterwards regretted. “Garfield Boyson rang from England and guaranteed the bill in advance.”

Rupert’s face took on that curiously dead expression that boded trouble. Garfield Boyson had already approached Rupert; in fact he was the only sponsor Rupert would have been prepared to work with. If Boyson had picked up his bills for the next two years, he would have been able to slack off and only enter for the big prestigious competitions, gradually devoting more and more time to politics. And now Jake had pinched the sponsorship from under his nose.

“I thought you weren’t going to drink until after the team event,” said Helen as Rupert, hair still wet from the shower, but already dressed in a gray striped shirt and white trousers, poured himself four fingers of whisky.