Kitabı oku: «The Linden Walk»

THREE

‘Who on earth have you been talking to, all this time? I’ve tried to ring you three times, and you’re always engaged!’ The back door of Keeper’s Cottage was opened without ceremony by a breathless Julia Sutton.

‘Sorry,’ Alice smiled, ‘but it isn’t every day our son gets engaged.’ Their son. She, who had reluctantly borne and birthed him, Julia who reared him as her own. Dwerryhouse. At two years old, Drew hadn’t been able to pronounce her name. Mrs Lady he had said instead and she had been Lady ever since. And, thank God, she had come to love him deeply. ‘Isn’t it going to be grand? Lyn wants to wear Daisy’s wedding dress. She’ll have to try it on, next time she’s over – see if it fits.’

‘It will, near as dammit. Who else have you phoned, Alice?’

‘We-e-ll, Daisy, of course. And I mentioned it to Winnie at the Exchange and I rang Home Farm to tell Ellen and I’ll be nipping out to tell Polly. Not that she won’t have heard, of course. I’m so thrilled. Can’t seem to settle to anything, this morning.’

‘Nor me. In the end, Nathan asked me if I’d mind getting off the line; that he’s got parishioners who might want to get through. “Why don’t you pop along to Keeper’s,” he said. “Have a good old natter with Alice.” All of a sudden, he’s taken on a hounded look, poor love; something to do with women and weddings, he said.’

‘Tom’s exactly the same. Men can be very peculiar. But let’s have a sit-down, and talk about things.’ Alice set the kettle to boil. ‘By the way, did you phone Denniston House?’

‘I did. Told them Drew would be calling when he’s back from York. He’ll be wanting to say goodbye to Bas and Gracie. They’re going to Gracie’s folks for a week, then off back to Kentucky.’

‘And a Christmas baby for them. So much to look forward to. Tatty’s wedding, as well. We’ve been lucky there, haven’t we?’

‘Drew and Tatty, and them not getting together, you mean?’

‘Exactly. It could have happened, Julia. I mean, Drew losing Kitty and Tatty losing her Tim. Drawn together, they could have been. What would we have done? How would we have told them?’

‘I don’t know, and that’s the honest truth. But it isn’t going to happen now, Alice. Remember when we told Drew that you were his real mother?’

‘I do. Our Daisy acted up like a right little madam. Flounced off in one of her tantrums. Couldn’t accept there’d been another man in my life.’

‘Two men, did she but know it. Elliot Sutton who raped you and my lovely brother, who married you and claimed the child for Rowangarth. We were more than lucky, considering the lies we told and –’

‘White lies, Julia. Heaven must have approved of what we did. Drew was born fair as all the other Rowangarth Suttons; not dark like him. No need for Drew ever to know about his getting. There’s few living, now, who know.’

‘Just you and Tom. And Nathan and me. No worries that it’s ever going to get out, now.’

‘And Giles. He knew. So badly wounded. Never have a son for Rowangarth he said to me one night, when I was nursing him. He was in pain, and couldn’t sleep and we were talking. And I told him that that was ironic, because I had a child inside me I didn’t want. A rape child. Natural, him being the gentleman he was, to offer to marry me. I was grateful to accept, and why not, when Tom was dead, or so they said. That was a terrible war. I’m glad Giles lived long enough to know I’d had a boy.’

‘Poor dear Giles. Survived his war wounds to die of that awful ’flu. That ’flu took more people than were killed in the war. But what has got into us, getting all nostalgic and raking up the past! Let’s be having that cuppa, and get down to the present and Drew’s wedding. June, wouldn’t you say?’

‘It’ll be up to the pair of them, but I reckon next June would be as good a time as any. And the white orchids will be flowering, don’t forget, for another Rowangarth bride.’

‘Mm. Mother carried them to her wedding, and I did. And Kitty should have.’

‘Kitty. We aren’t going to be able to forget her, are we, Julia?’

‘No. And we don’t want to. Kitty is still a part of what was. Natural we should keep her with us.’

‘Yes. Let’s hope that Lyndis will accept it, and understand …’

‘She will, Alice. Given time, I’m sure she will, so don’t let’s spoil this lovely day? Let’s be glad that everything has worked out so wonderfully well. And I’m not interfering, truly I’m not, but wouldn’t a June wedding be great? Plenty of flowers – roses, as well as the white orchids. And a marquee on the lawn. When I told Tilda and Mary the first thing they said was that thank goodness we could have a wedding that was almost normal. Food-wise, they meant. Tilda has been wanting something like this to happen. She remembers the dinner parties at Rowangarth, before the war.

‘“Such goings-on, and all of us running round like mad things. But it was right grand,” she said. “Mind, that was in Mrs Shaw’s day, and I was only kitchen maid, then.” I think she’s going to look forward to the challenge, now she’s our cook. And I know food rationing isn’t over yet, but we needn’t feel quite so guilty about getting a bit on the black market – just the once. It isn’t as if merchant seamen are risking their lives, now, getting food to us across the Atlantic’

‘Mm. Just this once. It’s a pity, hadn’t you thought, that Lyn’s mother is going to miss all the fun – the planning, I mean. Sad she’s so far away.’

‘There’s nothing to stop her coming over and joining in. She’d be very welcome. Drew has met her – just the once – and he says she’s a lovely lady. There’d be loads of room for her. Bedrooms and to spare. I think Lyn should suggest it to her, when she writes.’

‘Oh? But you won’t be living at Rowangarth for very much longer, will you? Be in the Bothy by Christmas, you said.’

‘Okay. So she can stay at the Bothy with Nathan and me. Lyn’s father, too. Who cares? But even with me not there, Drew will be able to manage on his own for a few months. There’ll be Mary and Tilda to look after him – and anyone else who might want to stay there.’

‘Mary and Tilda are both married and live out, don’t forget. They wouldn’t be on call twenty-four hours a day.’

‘Alice! You’re looking for trouble. Drew isn’t helpless. He had six years in the Navy, don’t forget. It’ll all work out, in the end. I suppose that all I can think of right now is that we’re going to have a Christmas wedding in the family and a Christmas baby, given luck. And another wedding in June. Makes you giddy, just to think about it.’

‘It does. And coming back to Lyn – I’ll bet you anything you like that as soon as she gets back to Llangollen, she’ll send a cable to her folks, Drew and I engaged. Letter follows. Hope she manages to get back all right. She’s got to change trains at Manchester and Chester, don’t forget. Hope she hasn’t got her head in the clouds and ends up in Liverpool, instead. And y’know, Julia – Drew and Kitty wasn’t to be, but he and Lyn will make a go of it, I know they will.’

‘They will, Alice. As long as we all remember – without being in any way disloyal to Kitty’s memory – that it’s Drew and Lyn, now.’

‘Drew and Lyn,’ Alice held high her teacup. ‘Bless them both. And may they be very happy together.’

She wiped a tear from the corner of her eye, then smiled brilliantly at Julia.

Her dear friend, Julia. Her almost-sister who knew all about first loves and last loves. She would, Alice decided, make a very good mother-in-law.

‘Well, look who’s here!’ Tatiana Sutton had seen her cousin’s approach and run to the door to greet him. ‘If it isn’t the blushing bridegroom himself. Come on in, do!’

‘Hey up, Tatty. I’ve hardly been engaged a day, yet. Give a man a chance!’ He took her in his arms, hugging her tightly. ‘I’m still a bit bemused. Never thought she’d have me.’

‘Have you? She’s been crazy about you for years! You’ll both be very happy, I know it. Hang on, and I’ll call Bill. He’s in his garret, painting. Won’t be a tick.’

‘No, Tatty. Give it a couple of minutes, if you don’t mind. You see, I feel really good about Lyn and me. Is that wrong of me? You’ll understand – Tim, I mean. How do you feel about marrying Bill, or is it too personal a question?’

‘Coming from you, Drew, no it isn’t. And I’m very happy about Bill and me. He knows that Tim and I were lovers. Bill and I haven’t been. He would rather wait, he said, till we were married. But it isn’t a problem, not even when I talk about Tim, once in a while. Tim is a part of my past and you can’t wipe out what has been – just accept you’ve got to live with it, be it good or bad.’

‘Thanks, Tatty. I hoped you’d say that. I won’t ever forget Kitty, Lyn understands that.’

‘I like Lyn, Drew. You’ll be great together, like Bill and me.’

‘And Mother and Uncle Nathan, too. A different kind of loving, Mother told me, but good.’

‘Exactly. So let’s sit in the conservatory and talk weddings. Yours and mine.’

‘Y’know something, Tatiana Sutton? You were such a brat when you were little, but you’ve grown into a lovely person – and beautiful, like your mother.’

‘Why thanks, cousin dear. And there’s another happy second-time-around. My mother and Ewart Pryce. She’s stupidly happy with him but she wasn’t, with my father.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I just do, that’s all. No one would talk to me about my father. Elliot Sutton. For all I knew about him, he was just a name on a gravestone. I even asked your mother to tell me, and she’s a most reasonable lady and broad-minded too, but not one word would she ever say. She just went all vinegar-faced then said, rather apologetically, that she didn’t remember a lot about him because he was always gadding about, somewhere or other. And then she said, “Mind, if you were to ask me about Nathan …” Why does she so obviously love my father’s brother, yet hates my father?’

‘Don’t know, Tatty. All I know is she goes all pofaced about him. Lady, too. I’ve learned to keep off the subject.’

‘Well, I’ve found out, Drew, but keep it to yourself, mind. Uncle Igor told me, swore me to secrecy, though. I got quite close to him. Used to visit at Cheyne Walk when he was there alone living in the basement, and the Petrovska here at Denniston because of the bombing on London. And I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned bombs on London.’

‘Tatty, bombs did drop on London. Nothing’s going to change that. But are you sure you want to tell me?’

‘I’m sure. Quite simply, my father was a womanizer. He didn’t love my mother but she had a title. Countess, actually, which meant very little in Russia and still less when you are a penniless White Russian refugee. But he married her to please his mother because she was a bloody snob and wanted a title in the family, and was desperate for a grandson. Grandmother Clementina thought her money could buy anything. I think had my little brother not been stillborn, my father could have gone his own sweet way with his mother’s blessing and his pockets lined with cash.

‘But my father overstepped the mark. Whilst Mother was pregnant he seduced a housemaid, here at Denniston. She was very beautiful, I believe. Spoke no English. Natasha Yurovska. She came with them to England when the Communists took over in Russia.’

‘So what happened to her?’ Drew felt bound to ask.

‘When my brother was stillborn I was told that the Petrovska and Uncle Igor took my mother and the housemaid back to London; both of them away from my father. I don’t know what became of the girl. It was all hushed up, the Petrovska saw to that. Had to be. Natasha Yurovska was pregnant.’

‘And does my mother know this, Tatty?’

‘About Natasha? I don’t know, but I don’t think that’s why she hates him. I reckon Uncle Nathan knows, though. Mother was once deeply religious – used him as her confessor I believe, but priests never say anything.’

‘And are you thinking what I am thinking …?’

‘That I have a brother or a sister – well, half so. It was one of the good things about finding out about my father, but I shan’t try to find him – or her. Needles in haystacks, and that sort of thing. But somewhere out there, someone belongs to me. I’ve asked my mother but she told me she didn’t know when or where Natasha Yurovska’s baby was born. Nobody would tell her. I sometimes think that even Uncle Igor wasn’t told. The Petrovska refused to say. But this is neither the time nor the place to lay souls bare. I’m sorry, Drew. I shouldn’t have gone on about it, especially when you are so happy – and me, too. We should forget about my father. He’s gone, and we shall talk about weddings and about being happy – and that it’s all right if sometimes we mention Tim and Kitty because people can love twice, but differently. Uncle Nathan and Aunt Julia are living proof of that.’

‘Well, it’s your turn first, Tatty. Are you excited?’

‘N-no. Not starry-eyed, breathlessly excited. More a warm sort of contentment and having someone at long last I can trust and who will always be there for me. And of course, it’ll be good going to bed with him,’ she said without so much as the blinking of an eyelid. ‘With Tim it was a kind of snatched, there’s-no-tomorrow loving. Things are different, now the war is over. We can plan ahead; have kids. And kids I said. Not an only child, fussed over by its mother and not wanted by its father. How many will you and Lyn have, Drew?’

‘Haven’t a clue.’ He laughed, disarmed by her frankness. ‘Lyn wants children, though. She told me so.’

‘Good. That’s settled, then. And you are both to come to my wedding. It’ll be the week before Christmas. No formal invitations, or anything. That okay?’

‘Accepted soon as asked. There’s Bill, crossing the yard.’

‘Mm. He’s an old love. Doesn’t want to sleep with me before we are married on account of someone getting his mother pregnant then shoving off and leaving her. Very puritanical, in some ways. So I told him that that being the case, he could stay in his studio over the stables till the wedding. He’ll be wanting a hot drink. Let’s go to the kitchen. Karl will have the kettle on the boil. And forgive me for blethering on, Drew, but I’m very happy this morning. Suddenly, it’s all happening for the Suttons.’

‘The young Suttons. For the Clan.’

And they smiled into each other’s eyes, because they understood each other and the way things were for them. And that it was going to be fine.

Lyn Carmichael sighed and laid down her pen. Already she had sent a cable to Kenya then bemused, still, had taken her place behind the hotel reception desk without a word to a soul. But it would all seem right when she had written to her parents, she told herself; had written it word for word so she could read it out loud and know it really had happened.

She sighed again, wriggled herself comfortable in Auntie Blod’s sagging old chair that stood beside Auntie Blod’s fireplace in the cottage she had left two years ago. And now that thick-walled little house was Lyn Carmichael’s, or would be in eleven years’ time, when she had paid off the mortgage. Four hundred pounds she had paid for it and nothing in it had changed, except that with the war over it had been wired for electricity. So she had stored away her oil lamps and promptly put her name on waiting lists for everything and anything that would plug in. A vacuum cleaner, a cooker, a toaster, a fridge and – there was posh! – a washing machine. And this far, she had been able to buy nothing to plug in, though she was climbing the lists nicely, she was assured, when every once in a while she checked.

Yet soon she would have no need of such things. Soon, by summer probably, she would live at Rowangarth; have no need for the little four-roomed cottage. And that would be a pity, because she loved the safe, warm little house.

How many rooms at Rowangarth? She had no idea. Fourteen bedrooms, she thought, if you counted the attics. And loads of bathrooms. More than three hundred years of Sutton history, too. Being a Sutton was going to take a bit of living up to. Kitty would have taken it in her stride, because she had been born a Sutton; been used to living in a big house and having money. Loads of it and even more when Clementina Sutton, who once lived at Pendenys Place, died. Apart from Denniston, half her fortune had gone to Kitty’s father, Albert; the other half to Nathan, parish priest of All Souls and married to Julia. Happily married.

Lyn longed to hear from Drew. Pity there was no phone, here. Auntie Blod had never bothered, so that was something else Lyn was on a waiting list for. Not that it mattered much now, and Drew might ring her at work tomorrow if he could remember which duty she was on. She hoped he would. Just to hear him say, ‘Hi, Lyn,’ might rid her of the peculiar feeling of being suspended between delight and disbelief, because being engaged to Drew Sutton took a bit of getting used to. She had been sure enough about things this morning when they had kissed goodbye at York station. She had closed her eyes and clung to him and not cared at all who saw them. His lips had been warm, his kiss firm and lingering. It had been all right this morning, yet now she was alone, and desperately longing for bed.

Yet first she must finish her letter – the most important one, she supposed, she had ever written – and seal it in the pale blue airmail envelope ready to take to the post office to be stamped and sent flying on its way.

So having picked yourselves up from the floor, isn’t it the most marvellous news? Drew asked me to marry him and of course I said yes. Everyone was wonderful about it, Daisy most of all. I am to wear her beautiful wedding dress and be married at All Souls by Drew’s Uncle Nathan. Sometime in the summer, I think it will be, with you to give me away, Dad. I can’t wait for you both to see Rowangarth and as soon as we have fixed a date, you must put a big red ring around it on your calendar.

She laid down her pen again. This was not a letter from a young woman crazy with joy, because there was no joyousness in her words. Relief, more like, and gratitude, yet overshadowed by the niggling remembering he had said those words before to Kitty, and that he said, ‘Marry me, Lyn’ without saying he loved her.

‘Bed!’ she said out loud. She was weary for sleep. Today had started early with the five o’clock jangling of the alarm and she had travelled home by train then hurried to the hotel to take her smiling place behind the reception desk. It was past eleven, now; had been dark these past two hours. Her eyes pricked with tiredness. Very soon, her cablegram would arrive in Kenya. The letter could wait until tomorrow. One day more would make little difference.

She got to her feet, placed the guard over the fire, checked the front and back doors, then walked slowly upstairs to the little room with the sloping ceiling and the fat feather mattress that called her.

She slipped out of her clothes, leaving them to lie where they fell and wriggled into her nightdress. Then, without washing her face, even, she pulled back the cover to slip into bed.

And next morning when she awoke, she could not remember switching off the bedside lamp. Nor whispering goodnight to Drew.

‘Of course, Tilda,’ Mary Stubbs remarked, ‘Mr Catchpole is sure to do the florals – for the wedding, I mean.’

‘Well, of course,’ Mrs Sidney Willis, nee Tilda Tewk, conceded. ‘I grant you there’s no one in the Riding to touch Jack Catchpole when it comes to bouquets and sprays and buttonholes.’ She almost included floral tributes, but decided against wreaths when weddings were the topic under discussion. ‘My Sidney would be the first to acknowledge it, him being Parks and Gardens before he took over at Rowangarth. But he is an expert on orchids and will see to it that all’s well in the orchid house in time for the wedding.’

Rowangarth’s famed collection of orchids was back to its pre-war glory now it was no longer considered unpatriotic to heat the orchid house, which they had done with unrationed logs and a sneaky shovel or two of craftily acquired coke, when no one was looking.

‘There’ll be Tatiana’s wedding to consider, an’ all,’ Mary reminded. ‘Quiet wedding or not, the lass will want her bouquet and the guests,’ such as there would be, she thought not a little ungraciously, ‘are going to want sprays and buttonholes.’

‘Sidney has the matter in hand. He says there’ll be chrysanths in plenty, but little else for Mr Catchpole to work with. Mind, the church’ll be decorated for Christmas.’

What would be lacking in florals, Tilda considered, would be more than compensated for with holly and ivy.

‘But Tatiana isn’t having the church. She wants the Lady Chapel,’ Mary felt bound to point out.

‘My husband is well aware of the fact. He’ll be decorating the chapel for Christmas, an’ all. I shouldn’t wonder if he doesn’t pot up a little spruce – for Tatiana, I mean. Would be nice for her to have a tiny tree, he said. Tastefully decorated, mind.’

‘I wonder why the lass wants such a quiet do. It isn’t as if she has to get wed,’ Mary frowned.

‘As long as her Uncle Nathan says the words over them, Tatty won’t care what she’s wearing or that the chapel will be as cold as charity and there’ll be few presents.’

‘I’m bound to agree with you there,’ Mary conceded, she rarely agreeing with Tilda on debatable points if only to remind that she was Rowangarth’s parlour maid when Tilda had been but a kitchen maid. ‘But the lass has money enough in her own right, so her won’t worry overmuch about wedding presents. Her grandfather saw to it she wasn’t left short. And that grandmother of hers left Denniston House to her don’t forget, and the contents, though what made the old cat do such a thing I’ll never know.’

The late Clementina Sutton of Pendenys was never noted for her generosity; rarely made a kindly gesture.

‘Probably did it when she was half sozzled. She hit the bottle hard after her precious Elliot died. Folk reckoned he’d had a drink or two an’ all when he crashed his car and went up in smoke. Was seen in the Coach and Horses in Creesby with a woman who wasn’t his wife, though talk had it he left alone, later, an’ him so fuddled with drink that he couldn’t crank up his car.’

‘Well, he’s gone now, so don’t speak ill of the dead in my kitchen, dear.’ Tilda felt it necessary to remind Mary from time to time that she was now Rowangarth’s cook, and happily – thankfully – married to Rowangarth’s head gardener.

‘Wasn’t speaking nothing but fact.’ Undaunted, Mary set the kettle to boil. All Creesby and his wife knew what a wrong ’un Elliot Sutton had been. Indulged by his mother until he thought he could do no wrong. And when his wrongdoings sometimes surfaced, the foolish Clementina straightened things out, because most folk – even those badly done to – had their price. ‘They won’t be wanting tea upstairs. The Reverend has gone to see the Bishop and Miss Julia is at Keeper’s – talking weddings, no doubt. Her went to the bank, yesterday, and we all know what about. Drew’s girl will be choosing a ring, I should think. I’ve often wondered, Tilda, what became of Kitty’s ring. Opals and pearls, she chose, and may I never move from this spot again if I didn’t think at the time that opals were bad luck and pearls brought tears.’

‘I reckon it went with her to her grave. Miss Julia wouldn’t want it back – not if every time she opened that box and saw it, it reminded her of Kitty. She loved that lass.’

‘A right little minx, but no one could help loving her. And so beautiful. Her and Drew would have had lovely bairns.’

‘Lyndis is beautiful, an’ all. Kitty’s opposite, in fact. Maybe as well,’ Tilda sighed. ‘And there’s cherry scones left over from the christening in the small tin. They’ll be past their best if we don’t eat them soon.’

Tilda sat in the kitchen rocker and closed her eyes and thought about how it had once been in Lady Helen’s time when that lovely lady, God rest her, came out of mourning for her husband and gave her first dinner party in three years. A simple meal, yet Mrs Shaw – once Rowangarth’s cook and God rest her, too – had been days and days preparing and cooking and garnishing so that everything might go well at her ladyship’s first timid footsteps back into society.

Well, now there would be Drew’s wedding, and with food not nearly so hard to come by Tilda Willis would be able to show the folk hereabouts how well Mrs Shaw had trained her up to the status of cook. Mrs Shaw’s standards, Tilda thought smugly, would be maintained as that dear lady would have expected.

‘Butter on your scone, or jam?’ Mary interrupted the reverie.

‘I think it might run to butter – though only a scraping, mind.’ Butter was still rationed. ‘And I’ll have the first pouring, please.’ Rowangarth’s cook did not like her tea strong. ‘And don’t forget Miss Clitherow. Jam and butter on hers.’

‘Very well.’ Miss Clitherow had come to Rowangarth as housekeeper when Helen Stormont married Sir John. Old, now, she spent her days in a ground-floor room, dozing and remembering – and being grateful to Miss Julia and young Sir Andrew for letting her live out her time with the family she had served through good times and bad. And through two terrible wars, an’ all. ‘Jam and butter it is, poor old lass.’

Yet she still had her wits about her, Mary was forced to concede, in spite of being nearer ninety than eighty and a little unsteady on her feet.

‘And there’s Drew, an’ all,’ Tilda reminded.

‘Sir Andrew,’ Mary corrected primly, ‘is at Foxgloves, with Daisy. Be talking about the wedding, I shouldn’t wonder. I suppose there’ll be nothing, now, but wedding talk. Wonder when it’ll be?’

‘Your guess, love, is as good as mine, though I hope they’ll wait for summer.’

Summer, Tilda thought. A June wedding and Rowangarth garden in all its glory. Flowers everywhere, warm sunny days, a marquee on the lawn and the special white orchids flowering. And herself rushed off her feet and loving every minute of it.

Tilda Willis was a very happy and contented woman. She’d had a long and anxious wait, mind, but Mr Right had turned up in the form of an Army Sergeant who was guarding whatever went on at Pendenys during the war, though no one would rightly ever know, she sighed. But yes. A very happy woman.

‘I phoned Lyn, last night. Managed to catch her before she went home from work.’

‘And does she still love you, bruv?’ Daisy smiled. ‘It’s still on, then?’

‘Love me? I – I suppose she does. Actually, Daiz, I didn’t ask.’

‘Didn’t ask, you great daft lummox; didn’t tell her you loved her?’

‘Actually – no. But she knows I do.’

‘Maybe so, but a girl likes to be told. Often!’

‘Sorry. Just that it’s going to take a bit of time getting used to it. It happened so suddenly. One minute I was escorting the lady home and the next, there I was, engaged.’

‘Hm.’ That hadn’t been Lyn’s version, Daisy considered, but what the heck? ‘She’ll have written to you?’ Letters could say more than words.

‘She has. In the post. I should get it tomorrow. And she’s written to Kenya, too. Sent a cable first, of course.’

‘I wish she was on the phone. I’ve got to wait for her to ring me. There’s so much we have to talk about.’

‘Then it’s going to have to keep till Friday, Daiz. That’s when she’s coming. Lyn was owed a shift by one of the other receptionists, so she’s called it in. I’ll be meeting her at York in the afternoon. Mother is going to the bank to get the rings out, on Thursday. Reckon we’ll both feel a bit more engaged when Lyn has got a ring on her finger.’

‘So you don’t feel very engaged at the moment, Drew?’

‘Of course I do. Only it’s like I said, everything happened so suddenly. I still can’t believe it – that I was so long in asking her, I mean. But we can talk about things at the weekend. It’ll work itself out.’

‘Yes. When you’ve had time to get used to it! But Lyn’s had all the time in the world to get used to it, as you say. The girl has been in love with you since the year dot! What’s the matter with you, Drew Sutton? Why aren’t you throwing your cap in the air? You aren’t having second thoughts, because if you are –’ her narrowed eyes met his across the kitchen table ‘– then all I can say is …’

‘Daisy, I am not having second thoughts! I’m going to marry Lyn, only it’s a bit up in the air at the moment. But we’ll talk about the wedding and by the time Lyn goes back to Llangollen, she’ll have a ring on her finger and we’ll have fixed a date.’

‘Oh – well – that’s all right, then,’ Daisy conceded. ‘A summer wedding would be lovely. Keth and I planned a summer wedding. The day after my twenty-first birthday it would have been, but for the dratted Army sending him back to Washington without so much as a by-your-leave or a quick forty-eight hours’ leave pass for us to get married. You and Lyn shouldn’t hang about.’

‘Daisy, love, there isn’t a war on, now. There’s all the time in the world for us to make plans. As a matter of fact, I do think a June wedding would be fine. Mother thinks so, too. But it’ll be what Lyn wants. She might want it to be soon – have a quiet wedding like Tatty and Bill are having. Mind, I hope she won’t. Pity no one is allowed to go abroad, yet. A honeymoon in Paris would have been great.’

‘Hard luck, bruv! When Keth and I were married Paris was occupied by Hitler’s lot. We made do with Winchester. But I don’t think where is important. Being together – married – is all that matters.’

‘Agreed. So are you going to put the kettle on? Tilda told me there were cherry scones left over from the christening. You wouldn’t have one left?’

‘I am, and I would. And you can have a couple. You used to adore cherry scones when you were little. I remember Mrs Shaw making them, and you nibbling the scone away till there was just the cherry left in the middle.’

‘You used to nibble too, Daiz. We all did, except Bas. He used to eat his cherry first so Kitty wouldn’t pinch it – and, oh dear …’

‘Yes. Kitty. You said her name, then looked all embarrassed and it’s got to stop. No one should be afraid to say her name, Drew. Kitty happened and she’s still with us because she was one of the Clan. She was a part of our growing up, and nothing can change it.’

‘Granted. And it was fine talking about her, until now. Lyn, I mean.’

‘You think she’ll be jealous? But why should she be? Tatty talks about Tim, still, and Bill accepts it as perfectly normal. Why should Lyn be any different?’

‘Sorry. You’re right, Daiz. Lyn isn’t the jealous sort, is she?’

‘Are you asking me, or telling me? Actually, she could be quite jealous of the Clan. She called it “Your precious Clan”. And once I caught her looking at the photo of us all – the one Aunt Julia took the Christmas before war started. She had quite a funny look in her eyes as if she wanted to be a part of it, yet was glad she wasn’t. Maybe she envied our closeness. Or maybe it was our growing up together. We did have a charmed life, you’ve got to admit it, Drew.’

‘I know. Wonderful days. But surely Lyn can be a part of it, now? Married to me, she’d qualify.’

‘No, she can’t. No one can. Kitty’s leaving it doesn’t mean there’s a vacancy. The Clan was our youth. No one is ever lost to it, and no one can ever join it. Not now. It was something – well, unique …’

‘And precious. When I was overseas and sometimes at sea for weeks on end and the heat unbearable, I’d think about the Clan, and where we used to meet.’

‘Mm. In the wild garden. And in summer we’d lie in the grass under the trees and talk and talk. I used to think about the Clan, too. I remember when Liverpool was blitzed, night after night. Lyn and I were two of the lucky ones. We were three floors underground, and protected by reinforced concrete. The safest place around. But when we saw the devastation it was horrifying, and we all had to shut our minds to it. Thinking of the Clan helped a lot.’

‘So am I allowed to nibble my scone – just one last time?’

‘You are,’ Daisy laughed, glad that they were back on an even keel again. ‘And I won’t pinch your cherry.’

‘Good old Daiz.’ Drew laughed with her, then said, ‘That’s the baby crying. Go to her – she sounds upset.’

‘It’s all right. Probably only just wind. I’ll bring her in and you can put her over your shoulder and pat her back. It’s quite rewarding when you get a burp out of her and you’ve got to learn how it’s done, Drew Sutton.’ She hurried out to return with a red-faced baby who had all at once stopped crying. ‘Ooh, the little madam. She only wanted attention. Here you are. Give her a cuddle.’

And Drew took his goddaughter who felt incredibly small and fragile in his arms and thought about the children Lyn so desperately wanted, and how good it would be, making them together. Tenderly he patted the little back and Mary Natasha nuzzled his neck then obliged with a burp which made him feel immensely proud and think that maybe after all, Lyn could be quite right. Having a baby – babies – might not be half bad.

‘I’ll keep her for a few minutes, get her to sleep for you whilst you have your tea and scone, Daiz.’

And Daisy wrinkled her nose at him and said, ‘Thanks, bruv,’ and thought how very much she loved him – and wanted him to be happy.

As happy as she and Keth.