HAMPTON STABLES, on the morning of their transformation into Hampton Dressage Centre, were a scene of intense activity. Every horse must be spotless and shining, with a clean bed, a fresh summer sheet, and a tail bandage. All the tack had been given a special clean the day before, even to whitening the lead-ropes and scrubbing the nylon girths. A table had been brought down from the flat, and stood in the tack-room laden with leaflets, photographs of Tamara and Lion in action, specially printed cards quoting their aims and charges, and a selection of books on riding provided by the British Horse Society for sale in aid of the British Equestrian Olympic funds. The Society had also provided a saleswoman to be in charge of this table, and she arrived immediately after lunch to take up her position. The thing had taken on much greater proportions than even Andras had expected, and the opening address was to be made by a famous Olympic rider and member of the B.H.S. Committee. Both Andras and Ginny knew that their success or failure rested with Tamara. If she refused to co-operate they might as well give up, for without her the place would be nothing. And if she made a scene when she got back it could ruin her as well. And yet Ginny felt that she was perfectly entitled to, for she still felt that what she and Andras had done was very nearly unforgivable.
There was still no sign of Tamara at two-fifteen, by which time the first visitors were arriving, and Andras sent Ginny down to the road to watch for the box.
“Explain to her that it is merely an experiment; say that if she does not like it I will leave immediately, without argument, so giving her an excuse to return to her old way of running things,” he told Ginny.
“I'll try to explain,” replied Ginny. “But it won't be easy. She's going to be dreadfully upset, Andras, as well as furious.”
“Luckily the drive is a long one,” said Andras unhelpfully. “You will have a little time. Ginny, it is for her sake also. You must understand that.”
“I know,” agreed Ginny. “I've said I'll try. But I still don't really think it's fair, any of it.”
Waiting at the end of the drive beneath the new notice, Ginny felt even worse about it all, but people were arriving now in a steady stream, a startling number of them, and it was too late to turn back. They must just hope for the best.
Once her first anger had worn off that morning Tamara found it impossible to hurry. She did not want to return to a place that was hardly hers any longer, to bitter rows with Andras, and with Ginny, of whom she had grown so fond. But she could not lose time for ever, even with two stops, one for coffee and another for lunch. It was two-thirty when she rounded the last bend in the road and saw Ginny standing beneath the glaring new black-and-white sign, her red hair blazing against the dark green of the high cypress hedge, her sharp face almost as white as her clean shirt as she watched the box come towards her. As it turned slowly into the drive she sprang in front of it, and Tamara was forced to stop. Ginny ran round to the side, tore open the door, and scrambled in, her bright green eyes fixed on Tamara's white, set face. Tamara did not look at her. She put the box into gear and they moved slowly forward, a low-slung white Jaguar crawling behind them as yet another visitor arrived. Ginny realized that however long the drive might be she must make a start if they were to have anything out before reaching the yard, and she burst into hurried speech.
“Tamara, please don't be furious,” she begged. “Andras says it's just an experiment; he'll leave at once if you don't like it, and you can go back to normal. People won't expect you to do anything else if he suddenly leaves. But he couldn't run a place like this without you—not with the schooling and everything. You did see the advertisement, didn't you?”
“I did,” Tamara told her.
“You will give the demonstration, won't you?” pleaded Ginny. “It's the reason most people are coming—to see you ride. They all ask to speak to you when they phone; no one ever thinks of it being Andras's place.”
“That must be very disappointing for him,” said Tamara sarcastically. “Yes, I suppose I'll give the demonstration. You've trapped me into that very neatly. Then I'll take my best horses and go. Andras can rent the stables from me until he can afford to buy them, and I expect he'll like to move into the flat. I'm sure you'll find rooms in the village easily enough. But I don't intend to stay here and either be pitied for my inability to keep an instructor or to play second fiddle to Andras.”
“But, Tamara, it's no good without you,” cried Ginny. “There are plenty of people who could instruct as well as Andras, but there's no one who could take your place.”
“I'm sure Andras will have no difficulty in finding someone,” Tamara told her. “And someone who will have less claim on the business than I have.”
“But, Tamara …”
Ginny could think of no argument strong enough to meet Tamara's bitterness, and anyway, the box was turning into the yard past the line of parked cars in the drive. There were people everywhere, looking at the horses, examining the buildings and the schooling facilities, looking through the books and leaflets in the tack-room, and just standing about in groups, talking. Andras had been showing White Lion to a group of people, but now he excused himself and came to meet them. Tamara was unfastening the bolts that held the ramp when he arrived with Ginny standing unhappily watching her.
“Miss Blake,” he said anxiously, “I hope you are not angry? Everyone is very enthusiastic; they are looking forward greatly to seeing you ride.”
“It's all right, I'm going to ride,” Tamara assured him. “It seems that you and Ginny make a good pair. This is a wonderful way to steal yourselves a business. Ginny will tell you what I'm going to do. I don't need help, thank you. I can unload my own horses.”
“What does she mean?” asked Andras, as Tamara climbed the ramp to untie Count.
“She's going to walk out,” Ginny told him wretchedly. “She's just taking her best horses and going. She says she'll rent you the stables, and you can take over the flat. And she says I'll be able to find a room in the village. I've never seen her like this before, Andras; she's just cold and quiet.”
“She cannot mean this; it is quite ridiculous,” exclaimed Andras. “Did you tell her that I will leave myself?”
Ginny nodded. “I told her everything you said,” she told him. “She just didn't seem to take any notice. What can we do?”
“It is all right. I will leave tonight; then she will have no reason to go,” promised Andras. “I am sorry, Ginny. It seems that I have made a bad mistake.”
“But where will you go?” Ginny asked him. “What about Ambassador?”
Andras shrugged. “We will find somewhere,” he told her. “There is no need for you to worry about us.”
But Ginny, knowing what Ambassador meant to him, was worried already. Tamara came down the ramp leading Count, and the crowd turned to watch as she led him across the yard to his box. Ginny and Andras watched helplessly as she removed his head-collar, leaving him loose, and returned for Countess. Several people came to watch more closely as the mare was unloaded, and a majestic woman in a flowered frock and a short white coat said to Andras, “l suppose they are just back from a competition? What did they win?”
Before Andras could reply Tamara said, “Sorry to disappoint you, but we're just back from a film. These are carriage horses.”
The woman looked slightly taken aback, and muttered something about thinking that they specialized in dressage, not carthorses, but someone else asked if they would think of taking horses to break to harness, and after staring at her for a moment Tamara said, “It's possible.”
There was a surprising murmur of interest, and Ginny felt a ray of hope. If Tamara realized that she was more necessary to Hampton than Andras any day she might change her mind and decide to fall in with the new arrangements and help to make a success of them. Tamara was leading Countess across the yard, her face expressionless, and they knew that it was impossible to discuss the future with her at the moment.
Her horses settled, Tamara disappeared towards the house, and ten minutes later she returned wearing the white trews and scarlet tail coat in which she gave the displays. Bates, seeing her coming, took down White Lion's tack. Andras was already shepherding people into the school for the opening address and the first part of the show, in which he planned to ride Ambassador in a short display and to give a demonstration lesson to Ginny, Lydia, and another pupil. When he explained this to Tamara she nodded, and sat calmly down to wait in the tack-room. Feeling completely helpless against her stony silence, Andras went off to get Ambassador ready.
The opening speech by Steven Dickinson was short, well thought out, and to the point, and after a burst of applause he went to take his place in the balcony, above the row of straw bales which had been put in the school to seat the main portion of the audience, and the display began.
Andras's demonstration of the stages of schooling a young horse up to novice test standard, with a commentary read by Ginny, was watched in absorbed silence, and very well received. So was the lesson, given by Andras, still on his magnificent brown horse, to Ginny on Flash, Lydia on Golden Prize, and sixteen-year-old Joseph Craven on Mosaic. Andras's gift for teaching came over well to the interested audience, as did the concentration that he could get from his pupils. There was one other item before Tamara's display, and that was a lunging demonstration, with Ginny on Mosaic. The audience found it fascinating, and Tamara, riding White Lion in behind the school, heard their applause, and their eager questions when Andras invited them, and thought angrily that they seemed able to get on very well without her. Lion was fresh, but quite controllable; but she had little heart for riding him, even when Bates beckoned to her from the gateway.
“You're on, Miss Tamara,” he told her. “Good luck.”
She did not reply, and as Lion went past him Bates put his hand on the white stallion's bridle.
“Don't think too badly of them,” he said gently. “They did it for the best, for you too.” Tamara looked down at him silently, her eyes softening for a moment, then she was riding on towards the open doors into the school. Ginny watched the beginning of Tamara's display with her heart in her mouth. But it quickly became obvious that Tamara was not going to let what had happened affect her riding—at least not in any obvious way. White Lion was going brilliantly—more brilliantly than Ginny had ever seen him go before. His extended trot was a miracle of speed and extension, his passes and renvers and travers bursting with impulsion, his passage and piaffe incredibly light and elevated, his canter a study in balance and collection. But there was a brittle quality about his brilliance that was not normally there, and Ginny realized that it stemmed from his rider. Their performance lacked smoothness and there was an indefinable tension about the muscles of the stallion's great neck and the set of his supple white ears. She doubted if many people would notice anything, as they were seeing him for the first time; it was only because she had studied him before with such intent interest that she recognized it now, but she felt no happier because of that. It was such an unhappily clear indication of Tamara's feelings.
The high-roofed school re-echoed to the applause as Tamara brought Lion into his final piaffe under X, her scarlet coat vivid against the milk-whiteness of her horse, her face a closed, icy mask. She acknowledged the applause with a slight bow, and sent Lion forward into an ordinary trot towards the doors, which Bates and Ginny were rolling back. Glancing towards the shifting, eagerly talking audience as Lion went past her, Ginny saw Sue's puzzled face among them, and knew that she, at least, had realized that there was something slightly wrong.
The opening had been a success. People took a long time to leave after the display; they stood about the yard in the evening sunlight, talking, and enjoying the social nature of the occasion, wandering from box to box looking at the horses, talking to Andras, and, when they could corner her, to Tamara, who had changed back into jeans and a checked shirt and come back to settle White Lion and make sure that the bays were comfortable.
They all naturally thought that she was the leading light in this new enterprise, and much against her will Tamara found herself forced to discuss their future as a dressage centre, their plans and aims, the possibilities of them training harness horses as a sideline, and to answer questions and give advice. She found that she could answer easily; almost unconsciously she had gone over the same ground as Andras many times, and she knew exactly how she would run the place if it was really hers. But that was ridiculous, she realized suddenly, in the midst of answering the questions of an elderly ex-Cavalry colonel. Of course Hampton Dressage Centre was hers. Legally Andras had no right whatever to assume control. He and Ginny had behaved unforgivably in doing all that they had, but it was done, and it could be successful. It would be crazy to walk out now and give them the business on a plate. Escaping from the colonel into Count's box, Tamara knew what she was really going to do. She was going to stay, and run this newly born establishment. But there would be no more lapses into friendship on her behalf. Andras, Ginny, and even Bates would be her staff and nothing more, as they should have been all along. Her mind made up, she emerged into the yard to spread the propaganda which was to bring her the success that she had always, almost secretly, wanted.
When the last visitor had gone, churning down the drive in an ancient Austin, and the girl from the British Horse Society had packed up the remaining books and leaflets, to be sent back later, and been driven to the station, Tamara's staff gathered unhappily about her in the tack-room. Tamara faced them from behind the table, where she was gathering up the photographs. Her face was still cold and her eyes shuttered, but she had obviously definitely decided something, and they wondered anxiously what it was. Tamara did not leave them long in doubt.
“I've changed my mind,” she told them coldly. “This may be a disappointment to you, but I'm staying. This place is mine, and it will be run by me. The next time that anything is done without my permission the person responsible will not have a second chance. I hope that is understood?”
There was a murmur of agreement, and Ginny said, “We're awfully glad, Tamara. It could never last without you.”
“My name is Miss Blake,” Tamara told her pointedly. “And I do not intend to give you the opportunity of testing the truth of your last statement. Now we'll do the feeds. Ginny, start cleaning this tack, please.”
She swept out of the room, followed by Andras and Bates, and Ginny was left in no doubt as to her future policy for running Hampton. They were Tamara's employees, and they were never again to be allowed to forget it.
Tamara showed no signs of relaxing her cold manner during the next few weeks. Ginny found living with her far less comfortable than it had been; she was now an intruder into Tamara's privacy, and as such she had no rights in the lounge except by special invitation and for meals, and there was no friendliness about Tamara. Hoping that eventually she would go back to her old manner, and that the happy evenings spent talking horse in her shabby room would return, Ginny put up cheerfully with her present manner. At least Tamara had accepted Andras's changes, and certainly the stables were much improved. They began to be almost constantly busy, with an ever-increasing number of pupils, some casual, some taking the concentrated residential course, and living in a hotel down the road. New liveries came in for Tamara to school, including two to be broken to harness—both good youngsters—the telephone never seemed to stop ringing, and the post fell in heaps on to the porch floor every morning. Their first special event, a lecture on field dressage, was a great success. Andras gave the talk, with Tamara to demonstrate on Mosaic and Icicle, and afterwards he invited questions, of which there was no shortage. If only Tamara had been more friendly and her hurt less obvious Ginny would have found life perfect. Flash was improving every day: there was no sign of the pathetic, stumbling, bony animal Branton had known, and he showed great promise as a dressage horse. And with Andras's promise to lend her the money his future seemed secure.
Ginny herself was making rapid progress under Andras's instruction, and watching one of the lessons in which she was taking part, Tamara congratulated herself on recognizing the child's promise when they first met. Ginny's leg was scarcely noticeable by now, and she herself had almost forgotten it. It was so much stronger that she had almost ceased to limp, and soon she would once again be able to wear skirts without embarrassment.
These days Tamara seemed to live in a world apart. She was very busy schooling the new liveries, four of which were exclusively hers, and only one of which Andras rode. Of the five, three were thoroughbreds, all under six, one was a three-quarter bred combined training horse whose dressage needed improvement, and the remaining one, there for re-schooling as he had turned nappy on a weak rider, was an Anglo-Arab, a light chestnut gelding with a piggy eye. This was the one that anyone, including Andras, rode, as his chief need was work and firm handling. There were also the two harness horses: a small thoroughbred whose owner was crippled, and a part-bred hackney who had failed to show any promise as a show jumper. The stables were now completely full, and they even had to turn away several possible liveries owing to lack of room. The horsey magazines had written the opening up very well, being especially complimentary about Andras's teaching methods and Tamara's riding, only one of them mentioning that White Lion's transitions could have been smoother and that there was a shade of tension in his performance. This, together with their new name and policy, had worked wonders on their custom, but all her staff's attempts to reach Tamara failed miserably. She had vowed never again to let herself imagine that she had made a friend or an ally, and it would take something very drastic to make her change for a second time.
June ended and July came in, a blazing, hay-scented, green and gold and scarlet month, with the roses a mass of blinding colour in the gardens of the house, and sometimes two evening rides going at once, one taken by Tamara in the field, while Andras took the other in the school. Their lecture-demonstrations were now almost a weekly feature, religiously reported by the equestrian Press, and Ginny, almost sick with nerves, entered Flash for his first test. She travelled to the show-ground in the box with Tamara and two liveries, Icicle, who was entered for the Prix St. George, and the combined training horse, Cloudburst, who was entered for the Novice. His chief trouble was over-excitement in the arena, as he always expected to jump. It was almost like old times again, thought Ginny, in between cold waves of panic at the realization of what was ahead. The only difference was Tamara's cold, aloof manner, instead of her sharp variations between sarcasm or fury and sincerity and friendliness. It was like sitting in the cab beside a stranger, and Ginny wished that she had travelled behind with the horses. Coming back, she decided, she would find some reason to do so.
The tests were being held in Kent, an hour and a half's drive from Hampton, and Ginny felt sicker than ever when she saw the ground ahead of her. There were two arenas, marked out professionally with little white paling fences and white ropes across the entrances. The quiet, rather serious audience was seated well back from the actual arenas so that there was no risk of them disturbing the competing horse, and the judges sat in small white tents. Ginny did not envy them their job under hot canvas beneath the blazing sun.
They had arrived well ahead of time to ride the horses in, and Flash and Tamara's novice were unloaded first, as the Prix St. George came much later. The Novice test was under way already, but there was a fairly big entry, and there was plenty of time. Both horses were excited at first, especially Cloudburst, who kept looking wildly around him for hounds or jumps, but they settled down after the first few minutes, Flash especially beginning to go well. Tamara had grudgingly lent Ginny an old dark blue showing jacket and a cracked pair of boots, and she had borrowed a stock. She wore her jodhpurs and the faded hard hat, and altogether she felt rather out of place among the exquisite riders who surrounded them. But Flash was going like a dream, and he looked as well bred and beautifully turned out as anything there. Tamara, as perfectly groomed and turned out as her horse, took herself off to a quiet corner on the other side of the field, and Ginny, knowing better than to follow, was left to her own devices.
There was no longer time to be nervous. She had only just finished the essential riding in when the loud-speakers began to call her number, and, reaching the Novice test collecting ring, she discovered that two people had not turned up, and the test was ahead of time.
“You'll be next,” the steward told her.
Ginny thanked him, and wished that she had not suddenly forgotten the test. “Enter at A,” she muttered to herself desperately. “Ordinary trot to X. But what then?” Then the other competitor was leaving the arena, the rope was taken down, and she was riding round outside the white line, waiting for the signal to begin.
Once started, the sequence of the test came easily, and suddenly she was no longer nervous. Flash was quite calm, and full of impulsion, his ears relaxed—always an excellent sign with him—and his mind on what they were doing. Ginny felt as though she were in a dream, letters and movements came and went so swiftly, and there was complete silence from the audience, broken only by the thud of Flash's hooves on the trampled track, the slight creak of his saddle, and the wild, cascading song of a lark somewhere overhead. Then, suddenly, it was almost over, she was riding up the centre and bringing Flash to his final halt, legs four square, head up, one ear pricked, the other turned back towards her, as she bowed to the judges and rode forward, round the top of the arena, and back towards the exit at A. There was a sudden burst of enthusiastic applause, and Flash's concentration broke for the first time; he pricked both ears sharply, and snorted through wide-blown nostrils. Ginny leaned forward to pat him, suddenly thinking, “This can't be me, Virginia Harris, the odd one out of the family, who could only get a job with horses if she worked for Vic Tyler because she had a bad leg and no experience. And certainly this can't be Flash, the half-crippled ex-racehorse everyone was so sorry for.” But it was, and the congratulations from those among the audience who knew her brought Ginny back to earth. One of the people to pat Flash and tell Ginny that he had done a beautiful test—the best so far—was Sue.
“I've heard all about him from Tamara,” she went on. “You've done a marvellous job on him. Why, I wouldn't mind making an offer for him if he's ever for sale.”
“He isn't even mine yet,” Ginny told her. “He still belongs to the man I used to work for.”
“Oh yes, of course. The gypsy who stole cars.” Sue laughed. “It's a fascinating story. Like something out of one of those endless pony books.”
Ginny smiled dutifully, not sure whether or not she liked Sue, with her faintly patronizing manner and smooth, round, much-photographed society magazine face. Then Sue looked past her and said, “Hello, Tamara. Proud of your protégée?'
“She rode quite a nice test,” admitted Tamara coldly. “Put Flash away please, Ginny, and saddle Icicle.”
“Yes, Miss Blake.”
Squashed, Ginny rode Flash across the field towards the box. But she was still very pleased with him, and she found time to give him an apple before saddling and unloading the other grey, supercilious Icicle.
Tamara had escaped rapidly from Sue, on the useful excuse of being the next competitor, and now she was walking Cloudburst around the collecting ring, trying to persuade him to relax, and herself to concentrate in spite of her violently conflicting feelings about Ginny's excellent test. On the one hand she felt proud because she had discovered both Ginny and Flash and given them their start, and on the other jealous because it had taken Andras to bring out the best in them, and because people like Sue seemed to be adopting Ginny now that she was obviously going to be good.
Her own test on Cloudburst was not bad, but it took far more effort on her part to get the results that Ginny and Flash got so easily by working as one, instead of two, as Cloudburst insisted on making them do. When her number was called, Tamara had pushed everything else firmly out of her mind, but the horse was still difficult, and she knew that they still had a long way to go before his over-excitement and lack of concentration could be cured. There were no congratulations for her from Sue, though several people did say “Well done, Tamara,” as she rode out, and she felt a fresh rush of resentment. Back at the box, Ginny had Icicle out and was leading him about, letting him get used to his surroundings, and Tamara swung down and handed her Cloudburst's reins.
“Put him inside,” she commanded, taking Icicle.
“How did he go?” asked Ginny, wishing that Tamara would relent and become her old self once more.
“Not so well as your brilliant horse,” replied Tamara shortly, and mounted the second grey.
Sadly Ginny began to unbuckle Cloudburst's bridle.
Icicle redeemed Tamara's name by displaying coming greatness in the Prix St. George, and this time she had nothing more to wish for in the enthusiastic applause of the delighted audience. She was glad that she had asked his owner's permission to enter him as exhibited by the Hampton Dressage Centre.
When the results of both tests were announced Ginny was third out of the big Novice class, with Tamara fourteenth, and in the Prix St. George Icicle was second to a very experienced horse who had competed abroad with considerable success. They drove home in triumph with the rosettes fixed on the windscreen, but Tamara's manner towards Ginny was still icy, and Ginny had no difficulty in gaining her permission to travel in the back with the horses.