The Stars’ Tennis Balls Read Online Free PDF Page B

that. Typocritical. You surprise me sometimes, Rufus.’
    ‘Another toke?’ Cade proffered a half inch of joint. ‘I meant hypocritical.’
    ‘No, you didn’t. You may
think
you did, but your brain knew better. You can’t have failed to read
The Psychopathology of Everyday Speech,
surely?’
    ‘Bollocks,’ said Cade.
    Ashley rose. ‘Well, I had better be going up to change. What a joy to get out of this confining nonsense.
    This was a lie. Ashley rarely felt more joy than when dressed in the Sunday uniform of striped trousers, tailcoat and top hat.
    ‘Arsehole,’ said Cade. ‘Fucking fucking arsehole.’
    ‘Why thank you, dear.’
    ‘No, not you. Maddstone. Who the fuck does he think he is?’
    ‘Quite,’ said Ashley, leaving. ‘Sweet dreams.’
    ‘Mind you,’ Rufus Cade rumbled to himself, leaning back in his armchair as the door closed. ‘You’re an arsehole too, Ashley Bastard-Garland. let’s face it, we’re all arseholes. Ow!’ He had burnt his bottom lip on the last thin quarter inch of joint. ‘All arseholes, except Ned fucking Maddstone. Which makes him,’ he reasoned to himself, ‘the biggest arsehole of all.’
     
    Pete and Hillary were wearing the insufferably smug look they always assumed when they had made love the previous night. Portia tried to cancel out its atmosphere by moving around the kitchen with extra noise and impatience, banging drawers so loudly that the cutlery inside resonated and jingled like a gamalan. Fierce Tuscan sunlight streamed through the window and lit the big central table where Pete was slitting large batons of bread.
    ‘This morning,’ he said, ‘we shall feast on prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella. There’s cherry jam, there’s apricot jam and Hills is brewing up some coffee.’
    ‘We have feasted on exactly the same things every morning since we got here,’ said Portia sitting herself down with a glass of orange juice.
    ‘I know. Isn’t it wonderful? Hills and I were up early this morning and we went into the village for fresh bread. Smell that. Go on. No, go on.’
    ‘Pete!’ Portia pushed the proffered loaf away.
    ‘Someone got out of bed the wrong side this morning –'
    Portia looked at her father. He wore an unbuttoned batique shirt, an elephant hair bracelet, wooden sandals and, she saw with a shudder, tight maroon swimming trunks that emphasised every bulge and curve of his genitals.
    ‘For God’s sake – ‘ she began, but was interrupted by the sleepy, shuffling entrance of her cousin.
    ‘Aha!’ said Pete cheerfully. ‘It’s awake. It’s awake and needs feeding.’
    ‘Well
hi
there!’ said Hillary who had developed the strange habit of going slightly American whenever she spoke to Gordon. This also drove Portia mad.
    ‘So what’s up?’ Gordon said, moving a shopping bag from the seat next to Portia and sitting down.
    ‘Well now,’ said Hillary brightly, as she set down a coffee jug between them, ‘Pete and I were thinking of maybe checking out the palio.’
    ‘Its been and gone, Hillary,’ said Portia with the exasperated air of one addressing a child. ‘We met that family who’d seen it last week, remember? A rider fell off his horse right in front of them and there was a bone sticking out of his leg. Even you can’t have forgotten that.’
    ‘Ah, but there’s more than one palio in Italy, precious,’ said Pete. ‘Lucca has its very own palio this evening. Not as spectacular or dangerous as Siena, but rather fun they tell me.’
    ‘Lucca?’ said Gordon through a mouthful of bread. ‘Where’s Lucca?’
    ‘Not too far,’ Pete replied, pouring coffee into a large bowl to which he added hot milk. Fragments of skin floated to the top. Looking at them made Portia want to retch. ‘I wanted to go there anyway. It’s the olive oil capital of the world, they say. You can watch it being pressed. I thought we might swim and read this morning, then make our way slowly there, driving by the local roads and lunching