Part 21 (1/2)

'No.' I laughed. 'I'm just someone who knows little or nothing about the game but I want to learn. I've inherited pots of money from my grandmother and I thought I might spend some of it having fun playing polo with the n.o.bs.'

He quickly lost interest in us, no doubt believing that we were ignorant proles who should go and spend our money elsewhere, just as I intended. I don't exactly know why, but I didn't really want either Peter or Pyotr Komarov to hear that I had been asking after him at the Guards Polo Club.

There were two matches played, each lasting a little under an hour and we stayed for them both. We watched the second from the tables and chairs placed in front of the clubhouse. The sun shone more strongly through the high cloud and it became a delightful spring afternoon, ruined only slightly by the continuous stream of noisy jetliners overhead in their climb away from Heathrow airport. I didn't want to think about the one that would take Caroline so far away from me the following day.

We chatted to half a dozen more people and all of them had heard of Peter Komarov, although not all of them were as positive about him as our man in the grandstand.

'He's not a good influence,' said one man. 'I think he has too much power in the game.'

'How come?' I asked him.

'He not only sells horses, he leases them too, especially to the top players,' he said. 'That means that some of the best international players are beholden to him. Doesn't take an Einstein to work out the potential for corruption.'

'But surely there's not a lot of prize money in polo?' I said.

'Maybe not but it's getting bigger all the time,' said the man. 'And there's been an increase in gambling on the matches. You can now wager on polo with some of the betting websites. And who knows how much is gambled overseas on our matches, especially in Russia. I think we would be much better off without his money.'

'Does he put money into the game then?' I asked.

'Not half as much as he takes out,' he said.

No one had heard of either Rolf Schumann or Gus Witney, but I didn't mind, I had reaped a wonderful amount of information about the elusive Mr Komarov, including a gem from the clubhouse caterer, who also provided the food for the Royal Box. She was certain of it. Both Pyotr Komarov and his wife, Tatiana, were vegetarians.

'Why are you so excited?' asked Caroline as we stood on the platform waiting for the train back to London. 'Apart, of course, from the fact that you are with me again tonight.'

'Did you hear what that catering woman said?' I asked.

'Something about the Komarovs being vegetarians,' she said. 'So what's exciting about that?'

'It means that even if they were at the gala dinner at the racecourse, they couldn't have been food-poisoned because I'm pretty certain the poison was in the sauce that was on the chicken.'

'So?' she said.

'They didn't turn up at the Delafield box on the Sat.u.r.day when they were expected to,' I said. 'And they couldn't have missed that lunch because they had been ill the night before, at least not like everyone else, because they hadn't eaten the right stuff. So why didn't they turn up? Was it because they knew there would be a bomb going off?'

'Hold on a minute,' she said. 'That's a h.e.l.l of a conclusion to suddenly jump to, especially when you've claimed in the past that the poisoning was to stop someone being at the lunch and now you're saying that maybe the bomber wasn't poisoned at all but still didn't turn up.'

She was right, of course. It was confusing.

'But suppose there was someone else the bomber didn't want to be at the lunch,' I said. 'Then both could be true.'

'You need more than ”suppose”,' she said. 'Suppose the bomb was aimed at the Arab prince after all. You can make anything you like sound sensible with ”suppose”.'

Our train arrived and we sat in a carriage surrounded by a party of children on their way home from a theme park. It had been a birthday outing and they were all so high on the experience, describing with screams and laughter how frightening the rides were and how much fun it had been to survive them.

Caroline leaned on my shoulder. 'I want lots of kids,' she said.

'That's a bit sudden,' I said. 'We're not even living together yet and you want kids?'

For an answer, she just snuggled down closer to me and hummed. I don't think it was Nimrod Nimrod by Edward Elgar. by Edward Elgar.

I cooked dinner in Caroline's white and chrome kitchen, and she played her viola for me as I did. We had stopped at the supermarket in Waterloo station and bought some ingredients and a bottle of wine. I prepared a beef stroganoff while Caroline played the first movement of Bach's Violin Concerto in E major Violin Concerto in E major, her favourite piece. She was right. It sounded great on the viola.

'Is that the piece you're playing at the Cadogan Hall?' I asked.

'No, sadly not,' she said. 'I would have to play the violin to ever play this at a concert.'

'But surely you could play a violin too?' I said.

'Oh yes, I could,' she said. 'But I don't want to. I'm a violist not a violinist, and it's out of choice. Violins are so tinny compared to the mellow tones of a viola. Most of the orchestra think that we violists are failed violinists but it's not true. That's like saying trombonists are failed trumpeters, or flautists are failed oboists. It's ridiculous.'

'Like saying waiters are failed chefs,' I said, although I knew quite a few waiters who were just that.

'Exactly,' she said. It was clear to me that this wasn't the first time she had built up a head of steam over the issue.

'Caroline,' I said seriously, 'you don't have to prove your worth, certainly not to me. Be confident in your role as a violist. You don't have to apologize for not being something else.'

She stood next to me and leaned back against the worktop.

'You are so right,' she said in a determined tone. 'I'm a violist and pleased to be so.'

We laughed and drank a toast to Miss Caroline Aston, violist and proud of it.

'So what are you playing at the Cadogan Hall?' I asked 'Concerto for violin and viola by Benjamin Britten,' she said. by Benjamin Britten,' she said.

'Can you play it for me?' I asked.

'No,' she said. 'It would sound silly.'

'Why?'

'Because it needs to be played by two people, one with a violin and one with a viola. It would be like listening to only one person while they were having a conversation with someone else that you couldn't hear, as if they were on the telephone. You wouldn't get the full meaning.'

'Does music always have a meaning?' I asked.

'Definitely,' she said. 'Playing a musical score is like telling a story using notes and harmonies, instead of letters and words. Music can invoke huge pa.s.sion and symphonies should carry the listener through the full range of emotion from antic.i.p.ation and sadness and melancholy in the early movements, to delight and joy at the climax.'

I couldn't claim that my dinner would tell a story but I hoped that it might provide a share of delight and joy, albeit briefly, on the taste buds.

I trimmed the beef and cut it into strips before seasoning and then searing it in a hot frying pan. Then I fried a sliced onion and some mushrooms until they were tender and added them to the beef with some plain flour. I poured a generous measure of cognac over the mixture and, much to Caroline's horror, flamed off the alcohol.

'You'll set the whole b.l.o.o.d.y building on fire,' Caroline shouted as the flames leapt towards her ceiling, and I laughed.

Next I carefully poured in some sour cream and a small amount of lemon juice, and sprinkled some paprika over the top. I had previously taken a large potato and, as Caroline didn't have a kitchen mandolin, I had grated it on the large-hole side of her box cheese grater to produce long thin strips of potato which I now fried briefly in a deep-fryer to produce crisp brown potato straws, while my beef mixture warmed on a low heat.

'I thought beef stroganoff was served with rice,' she said, watching me. 'And I didn't expect a chef to use my deep-fat fryer.'

'I use one all the time,' I said. 'I know that fried food is not considered very healthy but it tastes so good and it's fine if you use the right oil for the frying and eat it only in moderation. I certainly wouldn't use lard like they used to.' I lifted the basket of potato straws out of the oil. 'It's traditional in Russia to serve beef stroganoff with potato straws, although lots of people like serving it with rice.'

We sat together on the sofa in her sitting room and ate off trays on our laps.