26 July 1960

"Christopher," Jean murmured into the telephone, leaning back against the chair tucked away behind Lucien's desk. He had encouraged her to make this call from the privacy of his study, and she was grateful to him for it, for the chance to speak to her son without an audience. The conversation wasn't going at all the way she'd hoped, and she didn't want anyone to see the frustration written all over her face.

"I'm just trying to understand, mum," Christopher said slowly, his voice coming tinny and annoyed through the receiver. "It just seems so sudden-"

"We've been engaged almost two months now," Jean pointed out stubbornly. For a moment she felt as if she could hear Christopher grinding his teeth through the phone.

"I know," he said. "And I'm happy for you, mum. The Doctor is a good man and I think you'll be good for each other. But next month? I just don't see how we can manage it. I'd have to put in a request for leave, and Ruby's still a bit delicate, and Amelia's teething."

Jean sighed, her frustration giving way to disappointment as she realized that he was right. It was a long bus ride from Adelaide to Ballarat, and a lot to ask of her son's little family. But she wanted, so much, for her sons to be in attendance, especially Christopher, that sure, steady, serious young man with a heart so like her own. For a moment she considered asking him if he couldn't just come on his own, but she knew he would not consent to leave Ruby alone, and she could hardly blame him.

"It's all right, sweetheart," she told him sadly, one of her hands coming to rest idly against her stomach. She wasn't showing, yet, but still she knew now there was another child nestled inside her, that soon she would have to tell Christopher he had another little brother on the way. For one mad instant she considered telling him there and then, but she bit her tongue, remembering the promise she and Lucien had made to keep this secret to themselves for as long as they could. "I knew it was unlikely, I just wanted to ask."

"Are you sure you can't put it off, just a few more months? Maybe when Amelia's a bit bigger, we could-"

"Maybe you could come for Christmas," she interrupted, changing the subject hastily.

There was a startled silence on the other end of the line, as if Christopher had seen through her cheerful tone and recognized her dogged instance that the wedding carry on as planned for August.

"Maybe," he agreed half-heartedly.

"Have you spoken to Jack?"

Christopher sighed, and she knew before he spoke that the answer would be no.

"Bloody hell, Lucien, next month?" Matthew grumbled.

Lucien laughed, leaning back against his chair, feet propped up on the desk and a glass of good whiskey clutched in his hand. After Jean had finished her phone call to Christopher - and escaped to the sunroom with her chin held high and tears in the corners of her eyes, despite her insistence that everything was fine - Lucien had taken her place, and rung his dear friend.

"No time like the present," he said jovially. "I know they've got you locked up there in Melbourne, but do you think they could spare you for a few days? I would very much like for you to come, if you could."

"I'd like to see them try to stop me," Matthew said darkly.

"Good man," Lucien laughed again. Though he had plenty to worry about his heart was lighter than it had been in years. Yes, he was worried about Jean, worried about her health, the baby, whatever Christopher had said that so upset his mother, but she was going to be his wife, soon, and they were inviting friends to their wedding, and he would not let doubt spoil this lovely moment.

"Do you think you could manage to stand for an hour or two? I'm told I need a best man, and I would quite like for it to be you."

There was another job he had in mind for Matthew Lawson, when the time came, a very important title he wished to bestow upon the grumpy former Superintendent, but he had decided to wait to make that request until after the baby was born. All in due time, he told himself.

"Well," Matthew said, no longer grumpy but pleased indeed at the prospect. "For you, Lucien, I'd be happy to."

They did not often go in for sentimentality, Lucien and Matthew, but they had come to rely on one another, to trust in one another, most completely, and Lucien counted Matthew his closest friend in all the world. It would mean a great deal to him to have Matthew standing beside him on the day he was wed, and he found his voice choked by a sudden rush of emotion.

"Bravo," he said in an unsteady voice.

There was a long pause, as both Matthew and Lucien shifted in their seats, made suddenly uncomfortable by the fondness they'd both just displayed for one another. It was Matthew who finally broke the silence.

"What's she doing marrying a miserable old bastard like you anyway?"

1 August 1960

"It would mean so much to me if you could come," Jean said earnestly. She was once more perched on a stool in the hospital morgue, her back turned firmly to block out the sight of the body laid out on the sterile steel table in the center of the room. The smell of the place - antiseptic and bleach, thankfully, not death and decay - was enough to turn her stomach, but she was determined to make this invitation in person.

"Oh!" Alice said, sounding somewhat surprised. She had been staring through the microscope at the far end of the counter as Jean spoke, but now she raised her head, her expression incredulous but not displeased. Jean smiled softly, trying to appear encouraging. This was not exactly the reaction she'd expected, but then Alice so rarely behaved in a way that Jean expected, and she found such unpredictability refreshing.

"It's just, I would have thought you'd only want friends and family there," Alice told her.

"You are our friend," Jean insisted. "In fact…" she hesitated just for a moment. It felt strange, the request she was about to make of Alice, but it felt right, too. She had come to the decision the day before, and she was eager to plead her case. "I was hoping you might stand with me, at the ceremony. Be my maid of honor."

Alice looked at her askance, as if Jean had just started speaking another language altogether, and she rushed to explain herself.

"You see, Alice, I've quite enjoyed talking with you, these last few weeks, and I want to have some with me who supports me. My sister and I get on well enough but she…" she's a judgmental cow, and I can't trust her with anything. "Well. She's not a good fit." And the ladies from the sewing circle, always saying one thing and meaning another, I don't want them with me, either. "I would have asked Mattie, but she's all the way in London, and she won't be able to come home for the ceremony." But, God willing, we may see her for Christmas, and that's good enough for me. "You've been so kind to me, and...well, I would appreciate having you with me."

Alice Harvey was not one given to big displays of emotion, and she did not burst into tears or a wide grin, did not throw her arms around Jean's neck. She only smiled, gently, and nodded her head.

"If you want me there, Jean, then I would be...honored to stand with you."

"Good," Jean said, a bit thickly. Alice might have been stoic and reserved but Jean was finding herself flung from one end of the emotional spectrum to the other so quickly she could hardly keep up. Blinking rapidly in an effort to stop her tears she smiled tremulously at Alice.

"Thank you," she said, reaching across to give the doctor's hand a gentle squeeze. "Matthew will stand for Lucien, and it will be such a comfort to us to have you both there."

"Bloody hell, Lucien, you don't waste any time, do you?" Frank laughed, leaning back in his chair. For the first time in days the station was quiet enough for Lucien to offer his invitation to the Superintendent, and though he was getting a bit tired of hearing that same question, he still smiled. No, they weren't wasting any time at all; only three months before he'd gone tearing after Jean's bus in the street, and now they were engaged, set to be wed in just a few weeks' time, with a baby on the way. Yes, life was changing rapidly all around him, so quickly that at times he felt he could hardly keep up. In effort to keep his mind from becoming too consumed with thoughts of the future and all the many questions they still had yet to answer he chose instead to focus on the wedding; if they could just get through that part, somehow he felt everything else would be all right.

"No time like the present," he said, for what felt like the hundredth time.

Frank grinned at him, lazy and self-assured as a cat sunning itself beneath a window. It was Frank, after all, who had encouraged him, told him in his own roundabout way to get a move on, and he wondered if Frank was remembering that conversation now.

"I'll be there," Frank said, rising to shake his hand. "Congratulations, Lucien," he added in a somewhat more serious tone. "She's a wonderful woman."

"Yes, she is," Lucien agreed heartily.

With his business done he turned away, and very nearly walked straight into Bill Hobart.

"Bill!" he cried jovially. "Wonderful to see you."

Bill looked him strangely, taken aback by his sudden enthusiasm, and Lucien barrelled on, bolstered by the good cheer that had filled him as a result of his brief conversation with Frank.

"Tell me Bill, are you free on the 27th of August? Around say 3:00 in the afternoon?"

"Why?" Bill asked warily, watching him through narrowed eyes.

"I'm getting married, and I'd quite like for you to be there."

Lucien couldn't help but laugh at the look of bewilderment on Bill's face, and he reached out to clasp his shoulder. "Bring a girl, too, why don't you," he added, and then he was off, laughing again as he heard an utterly gobsmacked Bill ask Frank "who the hell would want to marry him?"

3 August 1960

"Oh, Jean, that's wonderful!" Emily crowed delightedly. Nancy chimed in her agreement, though Evelyn Toohey looked faintly scandalized upon hearing that Jean not only intended to marry her employer, but that she intended to do so in just three weeks' time. Emily and Nancy had joined the sewing circle the year before; Ceila had divorced her husband and moved away to start a new life with her baby, and Dorothy hardly ventured from her house these days. The new additions were nice enough ladies, and Jean appreciated that they did not seem to think it so very strange, that she should be marrying Lucien.

"I know it's short notice," she added, somewhat apologetically, and to her horror she saw Nancy raise her eyebrow mischievously.

"Just couldn't wait, could you, Jean?" Nancy said. She meant well, Jean knew, but the insinuation was an unpleasant one, and she was beginning to worry that Mrs. Toohey was in danger of having a stroke right there at the table.

"Well," Jean said, trying to sound dignified, "second marriage for both of us. I already live here. We didn't see any need to make a big fuss."

"Has he been married before then, your Lucien?" Emily asked. Though they were at that very moment gathered around Lucien's kitchen table with their work forgotten in front of them the truth was that Jean did not often speak of Lucien to the ladies. They knew, of course, that she'd decided to move to Adelaide, and that she had abruptly changed her mind and returned not long after, but they had no idea what had transpired between Jean and her intended. Many times she had wondered if she ought to tell them more - they were her friends, after all - but she had, as always, chosen to bite her tongue, and kept her feelings to herself. Which had led directly to Emily's deeply uncomfortable question.

The air in the room seemed to shift, and Jean took a deep breath, trying to find a way to break the tension.

"Yes," she said softly. "He lived in Singapore, before the war. He was captured when the Japanese invaded. His wife was killed, and his daughter was taken to an orphanage."

Though so many years had passed it was still terrible to even think about, the horror that Lucien had endured, the disaster that had befallen his family. Though she had not seen them Jean had felt the ridges of the scars that laced his back beneath her fingertips, and that alone had been enough to break her heart afresh. Her words had a similar effect upon the other ladies at the table, for they all appeared shocked and somewhat saddened by the news. No one seemed to know quite what to say, until Evelyn reached across and laid a gentle hand on Jean's forearm.

"Thank goodness he found you, then, dear," she said. "We'll all be there, won't we, ladies?"

And thus the sorrow of a moment before dissipated beneath a sudden rise of chatter as they discussed the arrangements for the flowers and Jean's dress and all the fun that was to come.

"Haven't seen you here for a while, Lucien," came a rumbling voice behind him.

Having been kicked out of his kitchen by the arrival of the sewing circle ladies Lucien had taken himself off to the club for the first time since discovering that Jean was pregnant. He felt a heavy hand settle on his shoulder, and turned his head to find Patrick Tyneman standing behind him, drink in hand.

"Patrick," he said by way of greeting. "Join me, won't you?"

Patrick eyed him warily for a moment, as if he were wondering what sort of trick Lucien might be trying to play, but in the end he agreed, folding himself into the adjacent chair with a sort of grace that was surprising in one so portly.

"I trust you're doing well," Patrick said.

"Never been better," Lucien answered truthfully. "I don't know if you've heard, but Jean has agreed to marry me."

For perhaps the first time in their entire acquaintance, Patrick Tyneman smiled at him. "Yes," he said, with a sly sort of smile. "I had heard something to that effect. Can Susan and I expect an invitation?"

"As a matter of fact, I'd like to offer you one right now. The wedding is the 27th of August, at 3:00 in the afternoon, if you're available. We're not bothering with formal invitations, given the time frame."

"Bloody hell, Lucien," Patrick said, shaking his head.

"There is nothing you can say to me that I haven't heard a hundred times already, so please, spare me the lecture," Lucien said, raising his hands as if in defeat. Yes, things were moving quickly, yes they would be the talk of the town for weeks to come, but Lucien knew in his heart they were doing the right thing for all three of them.

"I'll just say congratulations, then," Patrick said. He raised his glass, and Lucien clinked his own against it softly before they each took a long drink.

"She's a wonderful woman, Mrs. Beazley," Patrick continued after a moment. "I got to know her quite well, when she worked for your father. You're a lucky bastard."

"You don't know the half of it," Lucien told him earnestly. Yes, he was a lucky bastard indeed, lucky to have the love of a beautiful woman, lucky to have a second chance at raising a family, mercifully lucky that they were well, and whole, and on the way to a wedding that would usher in a new phase in both their lives. May it be a happy one, he thought as he took another drink.