The sun was an hour off setting as she drove into a totally deserted Willowwood. She noticed Valent’s gates padlocked as she passed. Would he ever come back? Would he make the memorial service, which would be starting in a few minutes?
It was still terribly hot. Etta had a shower and pulled on her old jeans and a faded blue denim shirt from the sixties she couldn’t bear to throw away. Then, overwhelmed with restlessness, she took Priceless and Gwenny for a walk in the woods.
Down by the pond, on the edge of Marius’s land, she found his horses turned out. There was Count Romeo, History Painting, Not for Crowe, Sir Cuthbert, still a little stiff from the National, Doggie and Oh My Goodness. Suddenly, they all formed up and started hurtling round the pond, weaving in and out of the willows, snorting, kicking up their heels, stopping then galloping on again. Who could say horses didn’t enjoy racing?
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Over in Larkminster Cathedral, Tommy, who’d agreed to say a few words about Mrs Wilkinson, wondered how she’d get through it without losing it. She’d lost so much more weight, nothing fitted. Etta had lent her the black dress with a frilled collar which she’d once worn to Ione’s party. The only colour in Tommy’s newly hollowed face were eyes red with weeping.
Revving up for the memorial service, she’d hardly had time to think, but afterwards, how could she go on without Rafiq, Furious and Mrs Wilkinson, the three things she cared most about in life? How could she survive never feeling Mrs Wilkinson’s whiskery nose in her hand, or nudging her in the back, or hearing a low whicker of love, or being cheered up by her silly faces or by her particular way of carrying her lovely head to the right so she could see ahead out of her left eye?
Tommy still refused to believe Rafiq was behind it, but there had been a third sighting this morning near Bagley Hall, so she wrestled with hope and dread. If he were innocent, why hadn’t he got in touch?
The funeral bell had finished tolling. The same trumpeters who’d played at Aintree were up in the gallery, poised to launch into the Dead March from Saul. The cathedral was draped most beautifully with weeping willow branches intertwined with cow parsley. The place was absolutely packed, swarming with press and television cameras inside and out, as the procession came slowly up the aisle.
Huntsmen in red coats were followed by jockeys wearing black armbands (Rogue and Amber hand in hand) and stable lads and lasses from both Throstledown and Penscombe, who had dressed all in black. There was no coffin, Mrs Wilkinson’s Grand National winner’s rug and her head collar had been blown up with her.
The children from Greycoats occupied the front rows on the left. Tilda had been coaching them all week in a farewell song, ‘Goodbye dearest Wilkie, whose coat was so silky’, at the end of which they would wave goodbye.
The syndicate, all fighting back the tears, occupied the front pews on the right. Behind them were Marius and Olivia, a stonyfaced Rupert and Taggie, Bianca and Feral and an ashen Eddie Alderton, who had learnt a few lessons in the last week.
In the front row of the next block of pews sat Harvey-Holden with Jude the Obese, who took up most of the pew, which left little room for their caring new best friends: Martin and Romy Bancroft. Harvey-Holden had offered a massive reward.
‘I and the entire racing world,’ he had told The Times in an interview that morning, ‘will not rest until we have tracked down Mrs Wilkinson’s killer. I once owned this remarkable mare. She was stolen from me by gypsies and when I tracked her down at Etta Bancroft’s, I realized they had bonded and it would be heartless to part them, so I made the supreme sacrifice.
‘Now I and my wife Judy are offering not only two hundred and fty thousand pounds as a reward to anyone who leads us to the truth, but also two hundred thousand pounds to the Sampson Bancroft Memorial Fund, as an expression of our deep sympathy for Etta Bancroft.’
No wonder Martin and Romy looked like cats who’d got majority shares in Dairy Crest.
Deliberately timing their entrance just before that of the clergy came a very handsome couple, Shade Murchieson and Bonny, radiant in black velvet and new diamonds. Sauntering up the