On a perfect winter morning, I mount a dapple grey horse in an icy farmyard a few minutes from the Prime Minister’s country home and prepare to go hunting with the Chipping Norton set. David Cameron’s local hunt, the Heythrop, is meeting just round the corner from where the PM lives, in the Oxfordshire village of Dean, and the Cotswold elite are out in force.
As we hunt, we will be skirting the estates of Jeremy Clarkson and Rebekah and Charlie Brooks. There are more socialites gathering on horseback than you can shake a hunting crop at, though at this stage I am not aware I might have to.
The scene could hardly be more like a Christmas card. Ladies in quilted jackets offer the 50 or so riders glasses of mulled wine. But a strange atmosphere prevails. Icier even than the freezing weather are the looks I get from the Chipping Norton crowd.
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