Jump.

Niall the vicar, worried that Etta was having Christmas on her own, dropped in, drank most of Ruthie and Hinton's sherry and reported with round eyes that Ione Travis-Lock had been roaring round the Salix Estate yelling at people to turn off their Christmas lights, and wasn't Woody the most charming chap?

As Romy and Martin had left for the ski slopes, Carrie Bancroft, determined to extract her pound of flesh, hijacked Etta for a dinner party on 23 December. Guests, mostly high-flyers from the City, had been emailed CVs of the other guests. Alan got drunk.

The party had meant extra beds to be made up in case these guests got snowed in and stayed the night. Etta noticed an open Pill packet beside Trixie's bed, wondered if it was for the benefit of Marius's glamorous red-headed stable lad, and would have tackled Trixie if she hadn't suddenly become so ratty and door-slamming.

Carrie and Alan were off to the Rockies the next day.

'Much cheaper than Courchevel,' Alan told the guests. 'And I won't have to mortgage the barn every time Trixie has a hamburger.'

Trixie had agreed to go with them, but was acting up at the prospect of being stuck with two warring wrinklies for ten days.

Alan was sweet and appreciative about the dinner party. Carrie was ungrateful and very critical. 'The onions weren't done, Mum, and the whole thing lacked flavour. You've been cooking too much for Romy and Martin.'

Thank G.o.d no one needed to stay the night. But once again there was general irritation that the major players, Shade and Valent, hadn't bothered to answer. So rude. Joey, however, had already told Etta that Valent and Bonny had moved on to the Seych.e.l.les.

'Keeping his eye off the ball, like Mark Antony distracted by Cleopatra,' mused Etta.

'Whatever,' agreed Joey. 'Bonny 'ates cold weather even more than the country, so they won't be down for a month or so.'

And it was cold. Etta's hand had shaken so much that morning she hardly needed to turn on her electric toothbrush.

23.

Once again, after midnight, leaving Carrie talking to America, Alan pa.s.sed out and Trixie locked in her room, Etta, singing 'Don't give up now, little donkey,' set out on the perilous journey down the icy white path to Little Hollow. Her spirits, as before, were lifted by the beauty of the snow. Ancient sycamore and oaks had become suddenly youthful with their twigs thickening and their bent backs wrapped in Arctic fox furs of snow. The weeping willows crouched like s.h.a.ggy white English sheepdogs. Close up, their tiny buds were flattened against their stems to escape the vicious east wind. Even the towers of Etta's mature conifer hedge soared like a diamante cathedral in the moonlight, their branches rising and falling in benediction over her plants.

After the heat of rus.h.i.+ng around in Carrie's kitchen, Etta relished the bitter cold. At least it wasn't thawing, so the beauty would still be there in the morning. Although her torch was fading, she decided, instead of going in, to take a little ramble in the woods. Suddenly she saw white leaves trembling ahead, and gasped and crossed herself in terror as she caught sight of a horse's white face drenched in blood the ghost of Beau Regard.

Forcing herself to move closer, she was horrified to find the ghost was real, a filly tightly roped to a high branch of a willow, with a huge open gash across one closed-up eye. Although desperately weak, she was clearly terrified, shrinking as far away as possible, nearly strangling herself in the process.

Her legs were suppurating and ripped to pieces, her donkeygrey body a ma.s.s of cuts and bruises, and as though a musket ball had been gouged out, blood seeped from her neck.

She was also skeletally thin, and from the sc.r.a.ped-away snow and scattered earth Etta could see that someone had been trying to bury her alive but had left in a hurry. In her one open dark eye was total panic and dreadful pain.

What monster, thought Etta in outrage, could have dragged her deep into the wood and abandoned her to her fate on the coldest night of the year?

'Oh, you poor angel,' she moaned, tearing off her coat and wrapping it round the filly's collapsing, shuddering body.

She then tried to untie the rope but in her struggle the filly had pulled the knot too tight. Her body went rigid, trembling at any contact.

Nor could Etta get a signal on her mobile.

'I'll be back in a minute, darling, please don't die.' Sobbing with rage, Etta stumbled back to Little Hollow, rang Woody and Jase and left a message on Joey's mobile, telling them where the filly was. Then, s.n.a.t.c.hing a couple of blankets and a knife, Etta rushed back and cut her free. Although she was still trembling frantically and desperate to escape, the filly, too weak to move, collapsed in the snow.

Woody and Jase were there in twenty minutes, held up by the difficulty of getting a trailer into the wood, the wheels slipping and whirring up the snow. At the sound of voices, the filly made another desperate attempt to get up, to hide anywhere, but again she slumped, shuddering helplessly.

Woody and Jase were appalled.

'b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, b.a.s.t.a.r.ds,' hissed Jase, who dealt with horses every day but had never seen anything so dreadful.

She was so thin, the whole of her pelvic frame could be seen as well as her spine and ribcage.

'Only answer is to shoot her.'

'Oh please no, try and save her,' pleaded Etta.

Jase pointed towards her neck. 'Some druggie seems to have attacked her with a chisel,' then, pointing to her feet, 'She's not wearing plates.'

'We must find somewhere to put her,' begged Etta.

'Never get her back through the wood,' mused Woody, 'better take her to Valent's. He's away another month. There's a gate up there into Badger's Court. There's a downstairs room with a couple of storage heaters we could use. Place'll be gutted in a few weeks, but Valent likes somewhere to work if he comes down.'

The filly put up no resistance now. Somehow, slipping and swearing, they managed to lift her into the trailer, then b.u.mped her as little as possible over the rough track, as they tripped over tree roots, fallen branches and old bramble cables, before crossing the orchard to Badger's Court. Here they installed her in Valent's study, which had a chandelier and an Adam fireplace. The storage heaters were immediately switched on.

It was the only room intact in the building. The floors had

In the study, however, which must have been a little drawing room, all the works of Walter Scott still filled a bookshelf. The walls were primrose yellow and on the stripped wooden chimneypiece stood an invitation: 'Mrs Hugo Wilkinson at Home'.

'We'll call you Mrs Wilkinson,' said Etta.

The filly's sunken eye, razor-sharp bones and old-fas.h.i.+oned-radiator ribs made her look prematurely aged, but after a glance at her teeth Jase said she was young, probably only three or four.

They decided it was too late to call out a vet. But despite the snow, Woody and Jase proceeded to go east, south and west, bringing water and wood shavings from Woody's carpenter's workshop, oldish good-quality hay, because new hay was too rich, from Not for Crowe's stables and tubing to pour water into her to rehydrate her.

Mrs Wilkinson was soon tucked up in a bed of shavings three feet deep and banked deeper up the wall so she could really snuggle up and not roll over on her back and be unable to get up. Joey flipped when he arrived and caught sight of her.

'I'll get the sack. Valent will be gutted.'

'Room's going to be gutted anyway,' reasoned Woody. 'Poor little girl, keep your voice down, she's terrified.'

In the light from the chandelier they could now see how hideously cut about and infected was her poor body and how she flinched at any touch, as if awaiting further torture.

'Who could have done it,' raged Etta, 'dragging her into the wood, leaving her to die?'

'She's been knocked about the head.' Jase examined the huge cut across her right eye. 'Probably lost the sight in this one.' Then, examining the deep gash on her neck and mopping it gently with disinfectant, he added, 'Reckon someone gouged out her microchip to escape detection. To have one means she must have been born after 1999.'

As he examined her legs, he shook his head in horror.

'Think she's been tangled up in wire, perhaps in a car crash. Gypsies were here last week but they've moved on.'

Joey went off to get a camera he kept in his Portakabin: 'Better photograph the evidence.'

'She's so totally starved and dehydrated the most important thing is to get some water into her,' said Jase, stroking her shoulder.

It was not a pleasant task, inserting tubing into the filly's nostril and down through her oesophagus. The greatest danger was directing the tube into her windpipe by mistake and drowning her. Jase and Woody held her head and body still as Joey poured the water.

Unable to witness such helpless terror, Etta bolted back to Little Hollow. Then she unearthed Sampson's duvet, king-sized to accommodate his ma.s.sive shoulders, and a yellow, light blue and orange striped duvet cover in his old school colours. On her return Etta taped it up to Mrs Wilkinson's ears for extra warmth.

Woody had found a kettle meanwhile and produced some very strong, sweet black coffee. 'Even more delicious than Foxy Lady,' said a grateful Etta.

By the time they'd drunk it, it was three in the morning and she insisted they went home.

'So must you,' chided Joey.

'You've all got to work tomorrow.'

Jase opened the thick Prussian-blue velvet curtains. The snow was still falling softly, wrapping up the world, like Sampson's duvet round Mrs Wilkinson.

'I don't,' he said. 'No racing, it's Christmas Eve.'

'I'm going to stay with her,' said Etta firmly. 'Martin and Romy have gone skiing.'

'I better get back to Mary,' said Joey. Mop Idle had been jealous in the past of Joey's roving eye.

'Thank you all so, so much,' stammered Etta.

'We'll be back first thing,' promised Woody, thinking of the sailor he'd picked up in Cheltenham and left in his bed, who'd probably robbed him and shoved off by now.

'I doubt she'll last the night,' Jase murmured to the others as they went out into the moonlit rose garden.

24.

Etta stayed with Mrs Wilkinson all night, stroking her, praying, watching, worrying, telling her about the lovely life that awaited her if she pulled through.

'I'll never let anyone be unkind to you again.'

Despite her fears, Etta felt a strange peace and happiness, remembering her Pony Club days with Snowy, thrilled that she had something to love again. Woody, arriving with a loaf of bread to make toast and a jar of honey, found them both asleep in the wood shavings.

Mrs Wilkinson even accepted a piece of toast.

Later in the morning of Christmas Eve, Jase's friend Charlie Radcliffe, the most admired local vet, turned up to examine her. The snow and bitter cold had taken its toll. By daylight they could see that her iron-grey coat was brown and crusty from mal-nutrition. She was still too weak to stand or walk on her own but she was eating and drinking.

'Well done. You've saved her life,' Charlie told Etta. 'She certainly wouldn't have survived another night outside. But there's a long road ahead. Whatever got entangled with her legs has given her an infection,' he added as he dressed and bandaged her sores. 'Someone's been laying about her with a shovel and Jase was right, they certainly tried to hide her ident.i.ty. She's had a microchip gouged out.'

Etta's voice broke. 'Someone's done perfectly dreadful things to her.'

'We'd better report it to the RSPCA or the ILPH,' said Charlie. 'They could winch her and get her on a drip in a veterinary hospital.'

'Oh please don't.' Etta was almost hysterical. 'They'll take her away.'

'Well, she'll die because all her internal organs will get crushed if we don't get her up off the ground. If she's too weak to stand, we'll have to winch her.' Charlie looked up at the ceiling. 'We could hang a sling from those beams.'

Charlie, who was wearing a bow tie, check s.h.i.+rt and horn-rimmed spectacles, had crinkly dark hair, pugnacious features and the belligerent, exasperated air of a pathologist in a television whodunnit, but he had the gentlest hands. After they had slung Mrs Wilkinson up he gave her a ma.s.sive shot of antibiotics.

'Keep tubing her, she ought to take in at least four gallons a day. And keep her off any new hay or concentrates, they might give her colic.'

Etta ran home and collected her wireless and some leg warmers she'd been intending to chuck out. Now she taped them to Mrs Wilkinson's bandaged legs with Elastoplast, wrapping them in baking foil to make her even warmer.

She also dragged one of Valent's leather chairs back into the office and settled into it, to be on a level to stroke a hanging Mrs Wilkinson, who gradually relaxed, twitching her ears in time to the carols from King's College, Cambridge.

At moments the filly's eye would glaze, her whole body shudder and shrink into itself. Thinking she was losing her, Etta would sing, 'Don't give up now, little donkey, Bethlehem's in sight,' in a quavering treble, because the song always made her cry.

She must have dropped off because she was suddenly roused by church bells rollicking out across the frozen air. Poc.o.c.k, the Tower Captain, was on great form ringing for Midnight Ma.s.s.

Poor Niall. Etta had promised to go, but hoped the congregation would be swollen by families home for the holiday. At least she was appropriately spending Christmas night in a stable.

'I'm sorry I'm not in church, G.o.d and Niall,' prayed Etta, 'but please save this sweet horse. Happy Christmas, Mrs Wilkinson,' she added, kissing her on her pink nose.

25.

After three days, Mrs Wilkinson gave the first whicker of delight, when Etta returned from stocking up at the village shop. After six days, she was able to stand for a second, come off the sling, had normal droppings and had perked up no end. Etta started feeding her boiled barley and linseed bought by Jase from the local feed merchant, two-thirds water to one-third of barley with a little jug of linseed. Etta boiled it overnight in a big pan on the stove in the bungalow. Mrs Wilkinson found this delicious and very comforting on a cold winter's morning and was soon licking her bucket clean.

Etta also mixed in a small amount of sugar beet for slow-release energy: four smallish feeds at 7am, 12pm, 5pm and 10pm every day. Seeing Mrs Wilkinson respond, Etta was utterly captivated and during the evenings read Walter Scott from the bookshelf out loud to her. She seemed to love the swinging rhythms of 'Lochinvar' and 'The Lay of the Last Minstrel'. She also liked music, particularly when Etta sang to her.

Etta was touched too that Mrs Wilkinson preferred to have everything fed to her by hand and, even when she came in to dress the filly's wounds, had stopped shrinking away.

After ten days, she managed to walk to the door, swaying like a toddler on its first outing, then fell over again as she tried to leap away in terror because Joey had dropped in with some carrots. Jase and Woody couldn't keep away either. After the pub closed, Chris and Chrissie arrived with Friday's special, bread and b.u.t.ter pudding, and were gratified when Mrs Wilkinson accepted a second and even a third helping.

Her right eye was still closed and Charlie Radcliffe confirmed she had lost the sight in it, but the other eye, dark blue, big and beautiful, no longer looked on the world with terror. She was still woefully thin, her pelvic bones protruding, but gradually a lovely thoroughbred filly was emerging.

Etta was alarmed that news of the rescue was spreading round the village. People visiting the sick were also motivated by an opportunity to see what sort of c.o.c.k-up Valent Edwards was making of Badger's Court. Miss Painswick, Poc.o.c.k and Gwenny the cat, who would curl up in the wood shavings, all made frequent trips. Niall the vicar popped in bringing barley sugar and on the second Sunday after Christmas a sprinkling of paris.h.i.+oners were exhorted to pray for the continued recovery of Mrs Wilkinson.

'Is she the woman who's moved into the Old Rectory?' boomed Old Mrs Malmesbury.

Rumours still swirled about Harvey-Holden's fire and Denny Forrester, the head lad, who had allegedly topped himself.

'Doesn't add up,' said Jase. 'Denny was a dote, loved his horses, he'd never have burnt them to death.'

'Poor darling, at least you were spared that fate,' said Etta as she began reading Ivanhoe Ivanhoe to Mrs Wilkinson. to Mrs Wilkinson.

Etta had, however, been touched to get a sweet note from Harvey-Holden, saying he was determined to rebuild his yard, that he had been moved to tears by her kind letter and very generous cheque and hoped she'd come and have a drink one day soon.