Polo

39

Bart Alderton was so incensed at the result of the AGM that he promptly put Rutchester Abbey back on the market and cancelled his trip to England, preferring to spend the summer playing polo on the American circuit. This meant that, although Ricky was reinstated at Rutshire Polo Club, he was deprived of Chessie’s return.

‘Why d’you all have to interfere in my life?’ he shouted at Rupert.

‘Of all the ungrateful sods,’ complained Rupert furiously to Bas.

All this was extremely bad news for Angel who, banned as an Argentine from playing in England, had hoped for a restful summer, retained by Bart, but spared his company.

After a brilliant season in which he had contributed in no small way to the Alderton Flyers sweeping the board, Angel was tipped to go to four or even five in the November handicap listings. But this was no compensation for living in a horrible little bedsitter with no curtains nor air-conditioning and only a trickle of cold water which stopped altogether when the meter ran out; nor for being bullied by Miguel, who, operating his own mafia, bitterly resented Angel constantly seeking Alejandro’s advice, nor being bitched at by Juan, who equally resented Angel being as good-looking as he was and much better bred.

Angel detested Bart and dreamed of cuckolding him with the exquisite and discontented Chessie. His worst cross, however, was Bibi, who had taken on the job as Bart’s polo manager with all the fervour of a neophyte. Finding Angel surly and temperamental, she was constantly pulling him up for never getting up in the morning and letting down the Flyers by slopping round in sleeveless T-shirts, designer stubble, and too long hair flapping under his polo helmet.

In return, Angel had not revised his opinion at Christmas that Bibi was a spoilt, uptight, ugly bitch. He was fed up with her recording his botched shots in her little red book, and noisily remonstrating with him between chukkas. Argentine women were beautiful, submissive, admiring and not like this.

Angel had been often tempted to walk out, but swallowed his pride and clung on because he was desperate for a green card which would establish him as a registered alien and enable him to work anywhere in America. Half the foreign grooms and low-goal Argentine players were, like him, in the States illegally and, although they didn’t pay tax, they could be arrested, fined and immediately sent home if they were rumbled – which made Angel feel very insecure.

The day before the first round of the World Cup, Angel was taking six ponies round the vast, oval, sandy exercise ring at Palm Beach Polo Club. Persistent drizzle and lowering dark grey clouds reflected his mood. Refusing him player status, the infernal Bibi insisted that he do grooms’ work when he should be stick and balling. The sole compensation was that ahead, above the rump of a sleek, sorrel pony, bounced the even sleeker rump of Samantha, Shark Nelligan’s blonde and beautiful groom. Working for Shark for four years had bashed any assertiveness out of Samantha, and she thought Angel was absolutely wonderful. As Angel squeezed his pony and dragged the other five into a gallop to catch her up the April drizzle suddenly became a deluge. A second later Angel was overtaken by Jesus’s Chilean groom who, like a cat, loathed getting wet and was thundering his six ponies home as fast as possible. Next minute Angel was into a horse race.

‘Wanker,’ he screamed at the Chilean as his own six ponies fanned out, nearly pulling his arms off. He managed to stay put until he caught up with Samantha. Then one of her six horses kicked up a clod of sand into his face, and he had to let go of three of the lead ropes for fear of garrotting Samantha from the back. In the stampede that followed he was bucked off and, letting forth a stream of expletives, he watched the rest of his ponies disappearing into the Everglades.

Bibi, who’d just arrived by helicopter totally drained after filling in for Bart and having to address the Boston Chamber of Commerce last night, was absolutely furious. A mocking bird perched on the fence laughing at her and now Angel hobbled into the yard minus six of the horses who should have been playing in the World Cup tomorrow.

Nor would she listen to any excuses that Jesus’s groom had triggered off the cavalry charge. It was all Angel’s fault for trying to cut corners, ponying too many horses at once, who were now no doubt stuffing themselves with scrub, drinking contaminated swamp water and being threatened by alligators and rattlesnakes.

A prolonged search rounded up four of the ponies, two in Victor’s garden where they disturbed Lady Kaputnik sunbathing in the nude, one trying to enter the Players Club without membership and the fourth outside the local hypermarket.

‘Probably knew they were offering half-price carrots this week for the Easter Bunny,’ said Angel.

Bibi’s lips tightened. Miguel’s best pony, Maria, and Glitz, the black gelding Juan always saved for the vital fifth chukka, were still missing.

‘I’ll look for them in the Skylark. You’d better come with me,’ she ordered Angel, ‘and bring some headcollars.’

Angel growled histrionically. He hated woman drivers, particularly in helicopters, and Bibi had only just passed her test.

‘Why d’you need a helicopter?’ he hissed as he climbed into the passenger seat. ‘I thought you flew everywhere on your broomstick.’

Bibi’s bloodshot eyes glared at him over her huge horn-rimmed spectacles. ‘If you want to go on working for my father don’t give me any more lip, OK?’

The control stick had been taken out on the passenger side, but Angel still had pedals and a collective lever in front of him. A groom locked the doors and gave Bibi a thumbs up. Satisfied everything was in order, she started the two engines. With a last look round to see everything was clear, she pulled on the power with the collective lever, and with a shudder the Skylark lifted off the apron scattering orange blossom, putting up the mocking bird and sending the ponies galloping around the paddock.

Making a slow turn through 360 degrees to make sure no other machine was coming in behind her, she called the control tower who asked her her destination.

‘Local flying along the coast and around the Everglades and Palm Beach not above a thousand feet,’ replied Bibi, trying to appear wildly confident. She’d only done a few hours without an instructor, but she was damned if she’d betray any nerves.

‘Too much engine,’ said Angel idly.

‘Concentrate on the job,’ said Bibi curtly. ‘There are some binoculars behind you.’

Peering down, Angel saw scummy canals, swamp, olive-green scrub, ribbons of grey road and emerald-green polo pitches. There was the big stand, the aquamarine flash of a swimming-pool, and the white-and-yellow awnings of the Players Club – but no sorrel or black ponies. As they flew towards the ocean, sighting shrimp-pink swimmers and a few small boats on the azure water, the sun beat down on the glass bubble and the weather seemed perfect.

‘Nice piece of real estate,’ said Angel, squinting down at Donald Trump’s house.

‘You’re looking for forty thousand bucks’ worth of horses,’ reproved Bibi. ‘I’m going to switch on to automatic pilot.’

Angel watched her set the white balls on the auto-pilot indicator and, when she was satisfied they were stable, click on the switch. Hesitantly she took her hands off the controls, but the Skylark held its course and height. Bibi snatched the binoculars. She’d show this Latin creep how to search.

There’s Victor’s barn, thought Angel, leaning over to see if he could see a naked Sharon. The Everglades seemed to stretch out for ever, the canals glinting dully like crocodiles’ eyes in the baking sun. In the distance was a line of hills where, as usual, hung a bank of elephant-grey cloud. As they drew nearer, Angel disliked the look of the rain that hung like a dingy lace curtain between the swamps and the clouds. Bibi had not noticed any storm and was still busy scouring the scrub for ponies.

Then suddenly they were into rain. Bibi, who’d never faced a downpour before, hadn’t realized that the clear glass of the bubble would immediately lose its transparency like the frosted glass in a bathroom, making visibility impossible. Instinctively she reduced the power and the Skylark immediately slowed, making it even harder to see out without forward speed to clear the glass of rain. Next moment one of the engines had stalled. Seeing Bibi’s white knuckles on the controls, Angel realized she was absolutely terrified.

‘Christ, the altimeter doesn’t seem to be working!’ The rain became denser, a white snake of lightning unzipped the sky.

‘What am I going to do?’ screamed Bibi.

‘I can fly ’elicopters,’ Angel said. ‘Let me take over.’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Bibi hysterically.

Ignoring her, totally in control, Angel reached across and turned off the auto-pilot. He had the pedals and the collective lever on his side, but no control stick. Gently, but firmly, he tried to remove her hands. The Skylark was loosing height fast now and they were encased in lashing rain.

‘D’you want to get us both keeled? Let go. Leave it to me.’

Bibi was too frightened to resist. Flying a helicopter from the left-hand seat is not recommended in the flight manual, but somehow Angel managed to turn the machine round so they were flying out of the deluge and into the sunshine. To steady his hand, Angel rested his elbow on Bibi’s knee. Now he could feel the heat of her body, her T-shirt drenched with sweat, her heart hammering her ribs and the surprisingly full firmness of her left breast. Instinctively he moved his elbow up until it was resting in her groin.

Glancing down, Bibi saw Angel’s grooved, brown arm with its down of dark blond hairs lying along her thigh. Suddenly her legs seemed to have a mind of their own and closed to increase the pressure on his arm. As the Skylark shrugged off the rain and emerged into bright blue sky, she found herself wildly excited by such physical contact which was heightened by terror and a feeling half of resentment, half of slavish gratitude towards this handsome boy, who had so effortlessly taken over and probably saved her life.

She was in no hurry for him to remove his arm as they cruised slowly back to the polo club. But as Bart’s barn came into view, Angel handed back the control stick.

‘You breeng us down, I think.’

‘Shall I?’ she asked tentatively.

‘Is OK. I am here.’

Overwhelmed with relief that she wasn’t going to be shown up in front of the grooms, Bibi asked somewhat ungraciously where he’d learnt to fly.

‘In the Argentine Air Force – four years,’ said Angel simply. ‘Four months in zee Malvinas.’

‘Helicopters?’ whispered Bibi disbelievingly.

‘No, Mirages,’ said Angel.

When they got back to the barn, both ponies had been caught and were no worse for their joy ride. Bibi rang Luke the moment she got home. ‘Why didn’t you tell me Angel flew Mirages in the Falklands?’

‘You didn’t ask,’ said Luke flatly. ‘He and his brother Pedro brought down more Brit planes than any other pilots. Angel crashed behind enemy lines, and was interrogated by the Brits. Pedro was killed. Angel doesn’t like to talk about it.’

Bibi told Luke about the storm and Angel saving her life.

‘I guess you’ll have to be a bit nicer to him in future,’ said Luke curtly. ‘I gotta go. You might tell Dad what Angel did, then he might be a bit nicer to him too.’

Bibi felt rebuked. Red claimed that Luke hadn’t even been sleeping with Perdita, but he’d certainly been in a vile mood since she’d gone back.

Bibi, despite her cranky exterior, had a very big heart. She had never really got on with Grace, who quite blatantly preferred Red. Jealous of Red’s dazzling looks and charm, Bibi had nevertheless been conscious that Bart preferred her to Red, of whom Bart was also wildly jealous. But then Bart had fallen for Chessie and for months on end had had no time for Bibi at all, and Bibi had felt as though she’d lost a lover. Being so rich, she couldn’t comprehend any man loving her except for her money. Being Bart’s daughter, she worked triply hard in the hope people would think she’d got to the top by her own abilities rather than by nepotism.

Perversely, in the same way that an actress lets herself put on weight or is habitually late for auditions so she can blame her fatness or the lateness and not herself for not getting the part, Bibi wore huge spectacles and ugly baggy clothes and scraped back her hair, so she could attribute this to her not having a steady boyfriend. Anything rather than the agony of being hunted for her fortune. What she really wanted was an old-fashioned billionaire and loads of children, but felt that this was as against her feminist principles as it would have been to have a nose job in order to attract men.

Ahead lay one of the busiest weeks of Bibi’s life. Frantic at the office, she was also organizing a large charity ball for Cancer Relief in Palm Beach.

After a panic on Friday afternoon, because one couldn’t serve non-vintage champagne if one was charging $600 a ticket, Bibi got home to a smirking Chessie and a thunderous Bart. Her Trust Fund Baby boyfriend Skipper, who was supposed to be taking her to the ball, had begged off again saying his stepmother was dying.

‘The rat,’ said Bibi furiously. ‘Skipper loathes his stepmother.’

‘Perhaps he’s planning to hold a dance on her grave,’ said Chessie, who was having a manicure.

‘And it’s too late to get someone else.’ Bibi crashed down a large, white jasmine someone had sent for the tombola.

‘Take a shower, honey,’ said Bart. ‘I’ll find you a partner.’

The moment she was out of earshot, he dialled the barn.

‘I guess I’ve gotta thank you for saving Bibi’s life,’ he said to Angel.

‘Is nothing.’

‘For a start, I want you to have dinner with us tonight.’

Angel said he had a previous engagement. ‘Cancel it.’

‘Mrs Miguel ask me to deener.’

‘I’ll square Mrs Miguel. She’ll understand.’

Angel was outraged, particularly as Mrs Miguel had also asked Shark Nelligan’s groom, Samantha, and Angel would have had Samantha on a plate as well as the asada Mrs Miguel must be already cooking.

Having dressed for dinner frequently at home, Angel was further incensed when Bart ordered him to wear a tuxedo.

‘The hire-shop’s open on Worth Avenue, and for Chrissake don’t get a coloured shirt or a made-up tie, and see you shave properly, and don’t be late. Bibi’ll expect you around half seven. You’re going to the ball, Cinderella.’

Bart summoned Bibi out of the shower. She was wrapped in a pink towel, her soapy hair rising in a unicorn horn above her head. She had a glorious body and wonderful shoulders, reflected Bart. Such a pity she covered them up with all those butch suits and baggy dresses.

‘I’ve found you a guy – Angel. Luke tells me he saved your life.’

‘Did he tell you why he saved my life?’ said Bibi, suddenly hysterical. ‘Because he was ponying five horses and they carted him and we nearly lost the lot. I’d rather have no partner than him. Anyway, I’ll be too busy organizing things. And he’s a hick. He may have flown Mirages, but he’s got no savvy. He’ll probably roll up in jeans.’

‘I sent him to Worth Avenue,’ said Bart, ‘and I called them to make sure he hires the right gear.’

Bibi was thrown into a turmoil. I hate him, she thought furiously, he’s my social and professional inferior. I must not let myself be fazed.

But instead of the black-and-white sack-dress, which made her look like an overweight zebra, she picked from her wardrobe a clinging, coral-pink dress which had a short skirt and was cut low back and front. She’d bought it to wow Ricky in LA, but had never had the guts to wear it. Chessie and Bart had gone off to a drinks party and, in a rare act of charity, Chessie had sent her maid, Esmeralda, who used to be a beautician, to help Bibi dress.

‘Oh, Miss Bibi, just let me make you look gorgeous.’

By half past seven Bibi was ready. Her mane of hair flopped dark red and curly round her face and down her back. Replacing her heavy spectacles with contact lenses, she had allowed Esmeralda to draw kohl round her big, brown eyes and apply three layers of black mascara. She’d always been embarrassed by the size of her mouth and painted well inside it as Grace had taught her, but tonight Esmeralda took the lipbrush round the full outline and filled it in with bright coral.

The voluptuousness of Esmeralda rubbing moisturiser and brown make-up into her back and shoulders, with those magic fingers that daily massaged Chessie, had made Bibi realize with a pang how much she craved the caress of another human being.

Her red shoes had spike heels which she would plunge into Angel’s feet if he started cheeking her. Then she put on her diamonds, chandeliers at each ear, stones as big as marbles round her neck and left wrist. Inherited from Grace’s mother, they lit up her sallow skin, which the coral dress had already warmed.

‘You look beautiful, Miss Bibi,’ cried Esmeralda in ecstasy. She’d always felt Bibi got a raw deal.

‘If only my nose weren’t so big.’

‘You crazy?’ said Esmeralda. ‘No one worries about a Borzoi having too big a nose.’

Bibi was so excited she thought she’d faint. I am waiting for a man I really really want, she thought. Then Angel ruined it by arriving an hour late, by which time Bibi had drunk three-quarters of a bottle of champagne to steady her nerves. She needed it. Angel, with his bronze curls slicked back to show off the exquisite bone structure of his forehead, temple and cheek bones, his beautifully planed cheeks and jaw denuded of stubble and his eyes flashing like an angry Siamese cat, completely took her Gold-Spotted breath away. How could such angelic features conceal such a black heart?

With one of those diamonds I could buy half a dozen ponies, thought Angel sourly, as he paused to admire the beautiful pale pink house, the pale turquoise sweep of swimming-pool, the tree house in the multi-branched grasp of the ficus, the blue-decked lawn going into the ocean and the other wonderful houses peeping out of the trees on the opposite bank. Bad luck to live in Fairyland, reflected Angel, when you didn’t look like a princess. All the same Bibi looked much better than he expected, and her breasts were amazing; tawny smooth and full in that tight coral dress and he’d never dreamt the rest of her was so slim.

‘We’re not going in that,’ she said in horror, as Angel opened the door of his filthy Mini. ‘We go in mine.’

‘No, in mine.’ Angel took her arm firmly.

Bibi was about to jump away, but the sureness of his touch made her feel very unsteady on her red heels.

For a second they glared at each other. Bibi dropped her eyes first and, getting meekly into his car, threw a wicked-looking pair of spurs he’d left on the passenger seat into the back.

‘You going to use those on me?’ she spat, trying to control the hopeless thumping of her heart.

‘Not unless I ’ave to.’ Leaning across her to lock the door, Angel deliberately brushed her breast with his arm. ‘I only keep them for big matches.’

‘And I’m only a low-goal friendly?’

Angel switched on the ignition. ‘Nothing friendly about you,’ he said.

It was a hot, muggy evening. The ball was held in the garden of a house which reared up ghostly white in the moonlight like the Taj Mahal. Faint stars dotted a gleaming grey sky like children kept up too late. Vast oblong cars dropped off their passengers outside a big blue and white striped marquee. One of the men valet-parking looked at Angel’s Mini in disdain and took the keys from him by the tag, as though they were some particularly mangled shrew the cat had brought in. Lurking paparazzi went beserk when they saw Bibi with such a handsome stranger.

‘Look this way, Miss Alderton. Smile, Miss Alderton. Who’s your escort, Miss Alderton? What’s he been in, Miss Alderton?’

Angel looked as though he was going to smash all their cameras, so Bibi hustled him into the marquee.

‘He’s called Angel,’ she shouted over her shoulder.

‘Can you spell that, Miss Alderton?’

Bibi had worked hard. The marquee looked enchanting. Palms were banked at each end. Round the edge were tables draped in long, pale pink tablecloths, topped with pink roses, pale blue delphiniums and white freesias. A pale pink balloon rose from each day-glo pink number. The floor was covered in green astraturf, which kept catching the high heels of the women, so their swooping progress towards one another was not unlike that of mechanical dolls. Their faces were doll-like too, thought Angel, beautiful, tremendously overmade-up, and unsmiling because smiles betrayed lines round the eyes. Their jewels glittered in the candlelight, but although they made a lot of noise as they chattered away, like the Everglades outside, there was no real communication between them. And their eyes swivelled continually and rapaciously to see if anyone over their partners’ shoulder was richer, more famous or more interesting.

Bibi, used to attending parties like this with Trust Fund Babies who were perfectly at ease and tended to know everyone, was worried Angel would be gauche and out of place. But although she was kept frantically busy, organizing the tombola, finding people’s seats, seeing the waitresses kept the Moët circulating, and working the room herself because half the people in the room hadn’t yet bought Alderton airplanes, every time she glanced across at Angel he had been collared by another predatory lady and was looking quite at ease.

Fighting her way to his side, she introduced him to a Master of Foxhounds from Virginia in a red coat, who announced that the hunting season went from September to December.

‘Pity it’s over,’ said his mettlesome wife, gazing hungrily at Angel. ‘We must have a dance later. Argentines have such a wonderful sense of rhythm. I’ve got a big, big, day tomorrow,’ she went on. ‘I’m organizing Adopt a Handicapped Animal Day.’

‘Does that include Lame Ducks?’ drawled Chessie, ravishing in black lace, who had popped up on Angel’s other side.

‘You OK?’ Bibi asked Angel.

‘Don’t be unflattering,’ said Chessie. ‘I’ll look after him. Your father wants you to go and chat up George Ricardo, Bibi. He’s not struck by Alderton Lightnings enough yet. She looks quite good tonight,’ she admitted, as Bibi sulkily retreated into the centre of the room.

Angel shrugged. ‘OK eef you cut off her head.’

Chessie laughed. ‘Not very kind.’

‘I ’ate leetle Hitlers,’ said Angel moodily.

‘It’s in the blood,’ sighed Chessie. ‘Bart is the biggest bully, and Grace is appallingly bossy, never stops trying to improve people. It’s rubbed off on Bibi. She always goes out with such wimps, they never answer back. Oh God, Bart’s glowering at me. He’s wildly jealous of you. Hasn’t forgiven me for chatting you up on Christmas Day.’

Angel flushed slightly. ‘It was best part of dinner.’

Looking across, Bibi went cold. Not content with enslaving Ricky and her father, Chessie was out to catch Angel as well. By a hasty shifting of place cards, Bibi made sure she and Angel were nowhere near her and Bart.

Unfortunately, when they sat down she discovered that on Angel’s right was a beautiful, very tarty woman, with tanned shoulders rising out of a turquoise taffeta, strapless dress, turquoise toe and finger nails, and turquoise pearls to match.

‘My husband’s thinking of sponsoring a polo team,’ she said, squeezing Angel’s arm. ‘How would you like to come and play for us?’

‘He plays for my father,’ snapped Bibi. Champagne and longing had made her more aggressive.

Angel had been drinking Perrier. Starving, he wolfed his own egg mayonnaise and ring of caviar, and then Bibi’s.

Continuing to drink, Bibi tried to pump him about Miguel and Juan.

‘I don’t want to talk about them,’ said Angel. ‘Eef I tell you, you will run to your father, and why you interrupt when ozzer people,’ he nodded at the tarty woman in turquoise, ‘want me to play for them?’

‘She says that to all good-looking players. She hasn’t got a husband.’

‘What prospect do I ’ave wiz you? Your father say to me, eef you stick at one, you go on playing wiz me, eef you go up, you’re fired. If I play well, I lose my job; eef I don’t, I get fired anyway.’ He gazed moodily at a quivering pink balloon, ‘Full of ’ot air, like everyone in Palm Beach.’

Angel had such a big mouth, thought Bibi, that when he yawned he looked really bored.

Stuffed breast of chicken followed and every time she tried to engage him in conversation, a new vegetable was plonked between them. Once again Angel wolfed everything on his plate, and Bibi ate nothing.

‘Are you sleeming? You don’t need to.’ Angel looked her up and down. ‘You look good tonight. Why don’t you look like that all the time?’

‘I could hardly wear this dress to the office.’

‘You’d get better results,’ said Angel, forking up her chicken.

‘I want to be taken seriously as a woman.’

‘No-one know you’re a woman in those ’orrible suits. Why you deliberately make youself look awful with those beeg glasses and your hair scraped back? I nevair knew you had a body before this evening. Why you ’ide it?’

‘I don’t know,’ mumbled Bibi.

‘Because you’re frightened of sex. You don’t think anyone will love you except for zee money.’

‘And would they?’ asked Bibi with a sob.

‘Of course, if you stop hurling zee weight around.’ Leaning across, Angel pinched the turquoise woman’s roll, spread it thickly with butter and tipped salt over it.

‘That’s so bad for you,’ reproached Bibi.

‘Zere you go again. Stop trying to improve people.’

Across the room Bart was singularly unamused to see his grossly underhandicapped ringer getting on far too well with his daughter. He should never have let them sit by themselves. Detesting small talk, he’d intended spending dinner talking polo with Angel.

‘What’s a toyboy?’ boomed the Queen of England’s second cousin who was sitting on Bart’s right. ‘You Americans, Mr Aldgate, are so good at remembering names.’

Bibi felt as though for twenty-two years she’d been a ship wrecked at the bottom of the ocean which is suddenly aware far above of a sun warming the surface.

‘What kind of woman are you looking for?’ she asked Angel.

‘Like my mother, but with none of her defects.’ He took Bibi’s wrist, examining each diamond. ‘I want a woman who is sexually liberated with a mind of her own,’ then, looking straight into Bibi’s eyes, ‘that I can dominate utterly.’

Bibi felt her entrails go liquid. ‘That is obnoxious,’ she said furiously. Out of the corner of her eye she could see her father bearing down on them, looking boot-faced. He was going to order her to work the room again. The band were playing.

‘Shall we dance?’ she asked Angel.

‘No,’ said Angel. Then, seeing her face fall, ‘Let’s start wiz the first lesson. I do zee asking. Will you dance wiz me?’

‘Oh, yes, please,’ breathed Bibi, leaping to her feet.

And her fate was sealed, because Angel was the best dancer she’d ever met. As he instantly became one with every horse he rode, he now became part of the music.

‘Wow,’ said Chessie enviously, watching Angel’s gyrating pelvis and flying feet, and his utterly still face, ‘talk about Travoltage.’

Gradually the room cleared. To keep up, Bibi kicked off her red shoes. Her scarlet toenails flashed like swarming ladybirds, her dark red hair flowed like seaweed and her lovely body writhed like a flame. Then the band switched to ‘Rock Around the Clock’, and each time Angel took her hand and put his other hand on her waist to swing her around, it was as though he was giving her an electric shock. Finally, such was the violence of her turning that he had to catch her as she fell.

‘Don’t move,’ he hissed as she tried to wriggle free.

‘That’s zee second lesson, don’t move until I say.’

Meekly Bibi rested in his arms, luxuriating in the heat of his body and the strength of his arms.

‘We go now,’ said Angel.

‘We can’t,’ said Bibi aghast. ‘They haven’t even drawn the raffle yet.’

Returning to their table, Angel took a sheaf of pink tickets from her bag and, tearing them into tiny pieces, dropped them on the floor.

‘You win me. I am first prize.’

Bibi’s jaw dropped. Her heart was pounding so hard she could hardly whisper. ‘Your place or mine?’

‘Mine,’ said Angel. ‘I want you to see my ’ovel, and I don’t want your father barging in in zee middle.’

Ignoring a furiously waving Bart, they slid out of the french windows. Picking a gardenia whiter than the moon, Angel put it behind Bibi’s ear.