Indira stubbed out her cigarettes. “Visually, you want to see shot after shot of balls being sunk, until there’s one left and everything hangs on what happens next. The audience should be able to understand what’s happening intuitively.”
I put the nib between my teeth and plucked it free, leaving me with a long hollow tube. I spat the nib onto the desk and remembered a story William had told me.
“Of course, real ‘era appropriate’ would be a duel.” I laughed.
Indira’s eyes expanded like they were going supernova. “Could we?”
“Oh God, Indira. No!”
She was pacing around the Old Coach House. “What about paintball guns?”
Before I could reply, she was screaming into her walkie-talkie. “I need the props department, now! And get me the phone number for an armourer.”
Chapter 28
William
I’d rather made a hash of things. It was the last day of filming forThe Love Manor, and Petey had barely said two words to me since our silly little argument. He’d been coming in late, leaving early, and spending the precious hours in between downstairs, bashing away at his laptop. Which made today jolly uncomfortable because Indira had invited me, Mum, and Bramley to watch the filming of the big climax. We were sitting on the Great Lawn in front of the monitors, alongside Indira. Petey was marching back and forth in his trademark boiler suit, headset on, clipboard in hand, having what looked like a very serious conversation with Jonty and Armando.
“When do you think I should give them the acorns?” Mum asked.
“Who?”
“Jonty and Armando.”
I looked around. Indira was distracted by her walkie-talkie. On the Great Lawn, Jonty and Armando were rehearsing. They were standing twenty paces apart, pointing pistols at each other, while Petey barked instructions.
“I should go now, I think.”
“Right you are, darling.” She slipped out of her seat and started heading towards them.
“Be sure to stand in between them,” I called after her. “Ideally, you want to get caught in the crossfire!”
“Champagne, my lord,” Bramley said, presenting a bottle of Tesco’s Finest Prosecco.
“Not yet, Bramley. Let’s save that for precisely the right moment.”
“Who wants an acorn!” I heard my mother cry—immediately before two loud cracks of gunfire and a scream.
“Now, I think, Bramley.”
All three of us got a dressing-down from “the armourer,” who looked and sounded like a character from a Guy Ritchie film. For someone whose entire job is firing munitions with pinpoint accuracy, he wore Coke-bottle glasses and had a surprising number of missing fingers. Which was perhaps why both Jonty and Armando had missed my mother? In any case, we were confined to quarters for the rest of filming. Indira had to be talked out of duct-taping us into our chairs.
“She could do with a few days at your Aunty Karma’s retreat,” Mother whispered into my ear. “A good aura cleanse and kidney detox would do her the world of good.”
I have to say, I was inclined to agree. Something about Indira smoking three cigarettes at once suggested not all was OK.
Finally, the moment had arrived. Dusk was, for the show’s purposes, pretending to be dawn. Jonty and Armando were dressed in knee-high boots, black breeches, white shirtsleeves, waistcoats, and era-inappropriate safety goggles. They were standing back to back on the Great Lawn, paintball guns (which the show’s art department had tinkered with to look like pistols) held upright in front of their noses. Standing between them, and well back, was Queen Dorinda Carter—in a gold-embroidered dress of purple silk, her hair braided and piled up on her head ina spectacular African beehive. Behind her sat the entire cast ofThe Love Manor.
Petey appeared at Indira’s side and muttered something I couldn’t hear. I glanced at him hopefully. His eyes briefly caught mine, but he looked away.
“And action!” Indira called.
Dorinda was imperious. “Gentlemen, you are here to settle a matter of honour. Are you prepared to proceed? Or will either party offer satisfaction?”
I leant over to Indira and whispered, “They can yield?”
“Petey Boy’s idea,” she murmured. “If they both yield, they split the winnings evenly. If they don’t, the duel is on. Fucking brilliant TV.”
