CHAPTER ELEVEN
Our hurried steps soon returned us to the villa but much had changed. A whole army of carriages were now parked on the driveway and stretched down the road. There were big and little, square and squat, and many of them featured crests and fine pairs of horses. The drivers congregated around a beer keg provided for the occasion and drank to the cheer of their employers.
We slipped past them and into the house where maids and men scurried between the kitchen and the open doors of the terrace. The stone platform was now thick with people drinking champagne and showing off their wealth. The crowd spilled out onto the sandy beach but stopped a few yards shy of the trial area which was cordoned off with thick ropes. A booth with a roof had been set up at the edge of the te
