In a rage Abby went back to the conductor’s room and leafing through the Eroica pencilled in a huge ‘No’ beside every repeat sign, which meant a lot of work for the library, who had to change all the parts before the evening.

During the Brahms Second Piano Concerto in the first half, Abby noticed Viking smiling at a pretty redhead in the audience, and pointing to his watch to suggest a rendez-vous after the concert. Abby then proceeded to knock a quarter of an hour off the Eroica giving heart attacks to several ancient bass players, and everyone got their last trains.

For an orchestra whose hobby was grumbling, the RSO were delighted with George Hungerford. Socially maladroit, he was deficient in small talk, but he asked the right questions and listened carefully to all the answers, aware that a grievance aired is usually a grievance forgotten. He also recognized individual players in the building and then put up their photographs in the foyer, on the premise that the public ought to recognize them, too, and he invited them back to drinks at his splendid new house.

George would generate work, the RSO decided, and get them out of trouble. He certainly generated too much work for Miss Priddock and very tactfully provided her with an EA (an executive assistant, so Miss Priddock felt upgraded, too). The EA turned out to be a ravishing bimbo called Jessica who’d just returned with an all-over tan from the Seychelles. Nothing could more successfully have demolished the Berlin Wall between musicians and management, as male players, who hadn’t visited the top floor in years, plied Jessica with flowers, chocolates and invitations like love-sick schoolboys. El Creepo even got stuck up the tallest horse-chestnut tree in the park the day it was rumoured Jessica was sunbathing topless on the flat roof.

‘Isn’t George a ball of fire?’ exclaimed a besotted Miss Priddock, as she handed Abby her mail.

‘Fire’s the operative word,’ said Abby gloomily. ‘He’ll have me out of here the second my contract ends.’

Desperately tired and unhappy, she was grateful to have three weeks’ break at the end of June, while Ambrose, the Fat Controller, who was back from San Francisco, took over as guest conductor. But she dreaded the caballing when he, Miles and Lionel got together.

THIRTY


Abby found it impossible to recharge her batteries while staying at the Old Bell. She was too conscious of the RSO festering at the other end of town. Too proud to call Howie and say she wanted out, she decided to think positively and look at the cottage by the lake of which Viking had spoken. Longing to capture the fun and friendship of her days at the Academy, she telephoned Flora, who was uncharacteristically listless. Wiped out by Helen’s marriage to Rannaldini, she had found herself increasingly marking time and unable to concentrate at college.

‘And I’ve got another year to go.’

‘There’s a viola vacancy at the RSO,’ said Abby. ‘Why don’t you audition for it? Don’t say you know me, right? Then you could come and share a cottage with me down here.’

‘God, I’d like that, I’m fed up with London, particularly in this heat.’

‘How’s Marcus?’ asked Abby carefully, reluctant to confess how much she missed him.

‘I hardly see him, he’s so busy writing letters, taking in pupils and fending off their frightful mothers. He hasn’t got any time to practise, let alone come out in the evenings.’

‘Mothers are far too old for Marcus, goddamn cradle-snatchers.’ Abby was predictably outraged. ‘He’d find lots of teaching work down here, he could start with any soloist booked by the RSO. Perhaps he’d like to share this cottage as well.’

There was a long pause.

‘He might,’ said Flora. ‘I’m sorry, Abby, but you were such a bitch to him.’

‘I know, I was so uptight that night, I don’t know what got into me. I really miss him.’

‘Well, you’d better ring him then.’

‘Why don’t you get him to drive you down to the audition, then we can go and see the cottage afterwards.’

‘They weren’t at all enthusiastic at college,’ grumbled Flora, as Marcus turned off the M4. ‘Just because I’m missing a day’s rehearsal for the end-of-term concert. You’d have thought my career was more important.’

‘They probably can’t forgive you for not becoming a singer.’

‘That’s what they tell me every day,’ sighed Flora. ‘What d’you think about sharing a cottage with Abby?’

‘I don’t know. It would be nice to have somewhere I could practise. I started playing Rachmaninov’s Second Sonata at eleven o’clock last night and people on both sides started banging on the walls, but I’m not sure I can cope with Abby’s ego.’

In his shirt pocket was a letter which he already knew by heart.


Darling Markie,

Please forgive me, I’m sorry I chewed you out.

I miss you so much — both as a friend and as an advisor. We used to have such fun discussing repertoire…

Fun for her thought Marcus wryly, remembering the hysterics, the endless demands and the interrupted nights.

Along the Gloucestershire lanes, he noticed the trees were losing the tender green of early summer. The hedgerows were festooned with wilting dog-roses. Buttercups and dog daisies shrivelled amidst the newly mown hay.

‘Heaven after London,’ sighed Flora. ‘Maybe we could cope with Abby’s ego if there were two of us. You could do the night shift.’

‘I practise at night. Jesus, it’s hot.’

Marcus looked terribly white and had lost a lot of weight.

‘Let’s get an ice-cream and a bottle of wine,’ suggested Flora. Then, looking down at her sawn off T-shirt, frayed Bermudas and dusty bare feet, wondered, ‘Do you think I look smart enough for an audition?’

‘Frankly, no. We’ve got time to nip into Bath and buy you something.’

‘Do I really want this job if I’ve got to tart up?’

‘Yes, you need some fun.’ Marcus took his hand off the wheel and stroked her cheek.

‘How’s your mother?’ asked Flora.

‘OK.’

Flora’s second question was more difficult.

‘How’s Rannaldini getting on with Tabitha?’

‘She’s in America for a year working in some racing yard.’

Marcus didn’t tell Flora, Helen had caught Rannaldini leering at Tabitha undressing through a two-way mirror.

‘I’ve got a new viola joke,’ he said to distract her. ‘How many viola players does it take to wallpaper a room?’

‘How many?’

‘Three — if you slice them thinly.’

Candidates at auditions are judged 70 per cent on their playing, 30 per cent on their ability to fit into the relevant section. The right attitude was needed, a core of hardness to cope with the cut and thrust of orchestral life. You couldn’t be too sweet or likely to cry if you were shouted at. Neither shrinking violets nor violists were encouraged.

Auditions could be very acrimonious. The leader of the orchestra could favour one candidate, the section leader another, the musical director or a member of the board another. Steve Smithson opposed anyone from abroad on principle. But no-one felt remotely enthusiastic that morning about the colourless bunch struggling through solos from Telemann’s Viola Concerto. They seemed to encapsulate all the jokes about the dumbness and dreariness of viola players.

The boardroom clock edged towards five past one.

‘Flora Seymour’s late,’ said Miles, looking at the last name on the list.

‘Give her another five minutes,’ said El Creepo, the section leader, who dreaded the prospect of re-advertising the job.

‘If she can’t turn up on time there’s no point in employing her,’ said Lionel, who was longing to share a bottle of chilled white wine in the long grass with Hilary.

They were the only people left except the accompanist who was thinking of the marmite-and-scrambled-egg sandwiches in tin foil at the bottom of her music case. It was a measure of the lacklustre nature of the morning’s performances that none of the other section leaders had bothered to stay for more than a few minutes.

‘OK, that’s it. Sorry, Flora,’ Miles ran a red Pentel through her name.

‘Flora’s the one who’s sorry,’ said a clear piercingly distinctive voice. ‘I can’t even pretend there was a pile-up on the motorway. We stopped in Bath to buy suitable clothes to be auditioned in, and I forgot the time. I’m really sorry.’