His London secretary didn’t type as well as Kitty but she was much prettier. As he scribbled ‘Yours ever, Rannaldini,’ he felt he had been very good to Boris.

Showered and scented in a new grey satin dressing-gown, having assembled some exciting sex toys, including a three-fingered vibrator bought in Paris on the way home, and several phials of amyl nitrite, Rannaldini waited for Flora. Clive was collecting her from Heathrow. Outside, the dusty plane trees were past their best and the bleached grass of the park was already covered in curled-up brown leaves and couples in T-shirts and shorts sharing a bottle before tonight’s performance. Tomorrow you wouldn’t see a blade of grass for crowds jostling to gaze at him and Hermione.

While he waited, he flipped through the Requiem. He had conducted it so many times but one must always try and bring something new and exciting to a work. His thoughts strayed to Cordelia, the blond camera-person. She was new and very exciting. Tomorrow Flora had to return to Paradise to get her trunk packed for the autumn term, so he would ask Cordelia out after the performance. Then he could invite her to light his bedroom with its shiny indigo walls and ceiling, its dark mirrors and its rich crimson four-poster. He might even offer her a job on Fidelio. He would have loved a threesome this evening, but Flora, despite her habitual cool, would never wear it. Even so he was roused out of the most erotic fantasy by crashes on the door louder than Verdi’s thunderclaps. Through the spyhole he could see Hermione.

‘Let me in, Rannaldini.’

Hermione could cry louder than she could sing, and as the editor of The Scorpion had installed a bimbo in the next-door flat, Rannaldini let her in at once.

‘I cannot bear it, Maestro. Life is too short.’

Rannaldini agreed and opened a bottle of Krug.

‘You have been behaving very badly, Carissima.’

‘I know, Rannaldini.’

‘You will ’ave to stand in the corner, and you know what that means.’

‘Yes, yes.’ Hermione’s eyes glistened with excitement; he could smell the goaty reek of her body.

‘What a peety Keety is due any minute,’ Rannaldini smiled sadistically, ‘and you must leave now.’

‘Kitty won’t mind,’ protested Hermione, ‘say we’re rehearsing.’

‘We promised to treat Keety with compassion, remember?’

Hermione remembered no such thing.

‘When we get back to Valhalla,’ briefly Rannaldini massaged her bottom, ‘it will be the punishment bell.’

He was so worried Flora would arrive, as there was no late-night shopping to hold her up, that he was forced to get dressed and go down the eight flights of stairs and bundle Hermione into a taxi.

Flora arrived twenty minutes later wearing Georgie’s emerald-green leotard, weighed down by carrier bags full of knickers and bringing him duty-free Armagnac, Givenchy for Men and a new biography of Swinburne, whom he admired. Rannaldini, who never wore any other scent but Maestro, was touched. Knowing him to be rich, women seldom gave him presents. Rather indiscreetly he told her about the screaming match.

‘You need some Hermione Replacement Therapy.’ Flora took a slug of Krug. ‘The only time the silly old bag hits top E these days is when some journalist reveals her real age.’

‘You should take your singing seriously. Then you can replace her. What d’you think of these?’

He threw half a dozen photographs on the little table beside her.

‘Uck! Who are they?’

‘You, my angel.’ Rannaldini slid his hands over her breasts. ‘Don’t you recognize yourself?’

‘My God!’ Fascinated, Flora examined her own shining pink clitoris and glistening labia lips laid back like butterfly wings.

‘I enter two prints anonymously in competition in German pornographic magazine,’ announced Rannaldini proudly, ‘you win first prize!’

‘That’s nice! As I’m obviously going to plough my A levels I can put that in my cv when I start job-hunting. It might help in times of recession.’

At a rare loose-end Hermione went back to hers and Bob’s house in Radnor Walk. Always grumbling that she never had an evening in, she now had absolutely no idea what to do with herself. Bob, still tying up all the details for tomorrow, wouldn’t be home for hours. The maid, about to go out on her evening off, made Hermione a prawn omelette and was understandably irritated to find seven-eighths of it in the bin the following morning. Having sung a lullaby over the telephone to little Cosmo, who rudely told her to piss off, Hermione picked up the score of the Requiem. She’d show Rannaldini he couldn’t do without her tomorrow when she moved the promenaders to tears and then frenzied applause. How dare he boot her out because Kitty was in London? On impulse, to reassure herself she rang Valhalla.

‘’Allo.’ It was Kitty’s breathless voice. ‘’Oo’s that?’

Hermione thought she must have rung the London number. Dropping the telephone she re-punched the Paradise number, got Kitty again and hung up.

In a fury she rang Rannaldini, who had his head between Flora’s legs and mumbled truthfully that he couldn’t talk. Then when Hermione threatened to come round, he said he would take it in another room. Having put on the mute button while he brought Flora to orgasm, he proceeded to tell Hermione he had lied to her.

‘I am with Cecilia not Keety, but I didn’t want to upset you before your big night. I want you to sleep well and ’ave beautiful dreams.’

‘Why are you seeing Cecilia?’ demanded Hermione.

‘A crisis about Natasha’s future. We have to discuss UCCA forms.’ Rannaldini lowered his voice. ‘I must go, Carissima.’

‘Why are you such a terrible liar?’ asked Flora fascinated.

‘When I was five I own up to stealing chocolate and my mother beat me, which I didn’t like. So I never bother with the truth again.’

Hermione had a terrible night. She went to bed early, passed the long lonely hours brooding about Cecilia, flicking channels and then ordering the maid and Bob to make her endless cups of camomile tea and honey when they returned. Having been persuaded by Bob to take a Mogadon she was wracked by nightmares about losing her place, forgetting the notes and arriving at the Albert Hall to find Cecilia singing in her place.

After another pill at five in the morning, she woke at midday when the maid brought her breakfast and the Daily Telegraph. The doctor would be coming round later with her Vitamin A and B jabs to give her stamina and keep the saliva going. She had just taken a large mouthful of fried bread when a picture of Cecilia on the Arts page, with a caption about a husband and ex-wife team in the forthcoming Fidelio, re-ignited her rage.

When she dialled The Savoy where Cecilia always stayed, a maid answered. Cecilia wasn’t to be disturbed.

‘Say it’s Mrs Harefield and it’s important.’

Finally, out of curiosity, Cecilia allowed Hermione to be put through and was very surprised when Hermione congratulated her with great warmth on getting the part of Leonore. ‘I know how good you’ll be.’

‘Vy, tank you, ’Ermione.’ Although placated, Cecilia was still suspicious. ‘That is large of you.’

‘Is Natasha all right?’

‘Vy should she not be?’

‘Did Rannaldini give you those tickets last night?’ asked Hermione idly. ‘I thought we might all dine together afterwards.’

‘I did not see Rannaldini last night. I only fly een this morning,’ said Cecilia. ‘He was with Keety last night.’

‘He was not,’ screamed Hermione. ‘Kitty was in Paradise. I checked. Rannaldini said he was discussing Natasha’s UCCA with you.’

‘The fucker! He no discuss UCCA wiz me,’ screeched Cecilia. ‘Ven did he tell you zat?’

But Hermione was gone, tugging on her clothes and roaring round to Rannaldini’s. The lift was still broken and a cellist was lugging his priceless Strad up the stairs, when Hermione overtook him. Shoving aside Rannaldini’s London secretary, who was holding the door open for the cellist, she barged inside.

‘Rannaldini’s not here, Mrs Harefield,’ said the London secretary aghast. ‘He’s just slipped out.’

‘Of whom?’ screeched Hermione. ‘Don’t lie to me.’

Charging into the bedroom she met Rannaldini coming out of the shower wrapped in a red towel.

‘You wicked liar,’ screamed Hermione.

Terrified she was going to knee him in the groin, Rannaldini clapped his hands over his testicles, leaving his face exposed. Next moment Hermione caught his eye with a punishing right hook. Rannaldini would have hit her back had not the cellist appeared open mouthed in the doorway, followed by a screaming Cecilia.

Very Italian, with snapping over-familiar dark eyes, an oily, olive complexion, streaked blond hair and a muscular worked-out body, Cecilia was wearing an immaculate black suit with a long collarless jacket and a short pleated skirt and looked as though she’d come straight off the catwalk with every claw out. Gathering up a bust of Donizetti with a manic jangling of bracelets, she hurled it at Rannaldini, who ducked so it shattered the mirror behind him, which had witnessed so much of their lovemaking.

‘Scellerato, scellerato,’ screamed Cecilia, echoing Donna Anna as she started working her way through a bowl of alabaster eggs.

‘Monster of vice, sink of iniquity,’ screamed Hermione, echoing Donna Elvira.

‘Bastard,’ screamed Cecilia, just missing Rannaldini’s left ear.

‘She’s right, you are a bastard,’ yelled Hermione, kicking Rannaldini’s shins and rushing out of the flat.

‘Not my Strad,’ screamed the waiting cellist as Rannaldini ran into the living room and grabbed his cello to stem the bombardment.