37. The Long Way Home

'It sounds heavenly,' Marjory breathed, her knitting lying forgotten in her lap. She had been treated to the (heavily) edited highlights of Audrey's London weekend, and while Marjory was truly happy that her best friend had found such unequivocal happiness, she couldn't help but think of what might have been.

The memory of that single chaste kiss was something that she cherished, but she had to admit that there had never really been a contest: Richard had shown no true interest in any woman apart from Audrey since he had arrived at Grantleigh.

Even so…

'You will be Maid of Honour?'

Marjory flushed pink. 'Oh gosh, yes! Thanks, Aud. Who's going to be Best Man?'

'I don't know, but possibly Richard's brother-in-law, Michael.'

Richard could at least get himself a Best Man who was single, Marjory thought, gloomily. She rallied.

'What's he like?'

Audrey thought back to Sunday lunch and smiled. 'Very nice. I think he's some sort of civil servant.'

The sister-in-law had also seemed very nice, Marjory recalled, and clearly very fond of Richard. An instant family, and a far more inviting one than Audrey's own. It wouldn't be like last time. Audrey wouldn't be spending most of her time inventing jobs for herself in order to avoid her husband's company. She wouldn't have the need, or the desire, for an old friend to be a distraction and a confidante. Richard would take that place, and for the first time jealousy was directed towards him. They would have each other and that was the way it should be – but she wouldn't be needed anymore.

'I'm worried about Marjory,' Audrey said later, cradling the receiver in her hands. With her eyes closed, she could almost imagine that he was there with her.

'What's happened?'

'Oh, nothing. She just seems very down, that's all. It isn't like her.'

'It's understandable, I suppose. With the wedding. She might see it as a loss.'

Audrey's eyes popped open; she straightened in her chair. 'Why, of all the big-headed..! You really imagine that we women have nothing more in our heads than to be moping around after you-'

'I meant losing you!' He practically bellowed it down the phone.

'Oh.' Audrey sat back again. 'But that's ridiculous.'

There was a long, pointed silence. Audrey sighed. 'You might be right.'

'Of course I am.'

She rolled her eyes. 'You really are big-headed.'

He laughed.

The leather of the big chair in the study creaked as she settled into it again and her eyes drifted closed. 'I really wish you were here.'

An impatient breath was blown out. 'I wish so, too. Where are you right now?'

'The study. I thought in these sort of conversations you're supposed to ask what I'm wearing.'

'If the answer isn't a tweed skirt and a sweater, I'll be disappointed.'

Damn him. 'It isn't a sweater, it's a blouse,' she said, with a touch of the hauteur that her interlocutor always found wildly distracting.

'Mm, all those buttons… Of course, ideally it would be you in your jodhpurs.'

'That is strangely specific.'

'It's what you were wearing when you helped me buy the horse. We ended up back at the manor.'

Audrey grimaced. 'I looked an absolute fright.'

'You looked spectacular. I realised then that I could easily fall in love with you. I've been falling ever since.' A velvet warmth in his voice that she could sink into. She missed him. He wasn't that far away but it was like a pain. How much more would it hurt to miss someone who was on your doorstep…

'You're still thinking about Marjory, aren't you?'

Audrey let out a breath, sat forward, elbows propped on the desk, studied the fine grains running through the wood. 'Yes. I'm sorry.'

'Don't be. I come with a mother, you come with a Marjory. We both have, as they say, baggage.'

He face wrinkled, horrified. 'Who on earth says that?'

'Americans, mostly.'

'I should have known,' she said flatly.

Amusement coloured Richard's voice and she could imagine the spark in his eyes. 'What do you have against Americans?'

'They're just so … American.'

'Eloquently put.'

'Oh, shut up.'

She heard an answering chuckle.

'I hate to think of her feeling pushed out. And that cottage is falling down about her ears.'

Another pause and then: 'I know I'll probably end up regretting this suggestion…'

Audrey gripped the receiver. Sharing the manor with Mrs Poo was one thing, but if he was about to say they should offer Marjory a home-

If life had worked out differently, then maybe. Audrey tried to cut him off but Richard ploughed on.

'It's your decision, of course, but you could sell her the lodge at a reasonable price.'

'Oh.'

'It's in a better state of repair these days.'

Audrey sniffed. 'I managed to have one or two things done.'

'You got an entire new roof. Not to mention all of the other things in that contract you got me to sign.'

'It isn't my fault you didn't read it first.'

He sighed. 'I'm too trusting, that's my trouble.'

'You're too full of nonsense,' she said firmly. And then added, 'But it might not be the worst idea.' Something to think about, at least. Audrey settled back in the chair again. 'Are you at the flat?'

'No, still at the office. I have a call to New York in an hour.'

'And what are you wearing?'

A low laugh in her ear.'The businessman's armour – a three-piece suit.'

'Mmm. All those buttons…'

'Have you decided what you're going to do with this place, yet?'

Sonia had arrived to oversee the safe removal of Maria's possessions and their dispatch to Grantleigh.

'No, not yet.' Richard handed her a drink and sat beside her on the sofa. 'It would be handy to have somewhere in London, but it's a bit big for a…'

'Pied-à-terre,' Sonia said, with an air of nonchalance.

'Show-off.'

She grinned at him over the rim of her glass and then looked about the room with a critical eye. 'You could always rent it out – you'd probably make more out of it that way than by selling it.'

'That's-' Richard stared at her. 'That's a practical suggestion. From you.'

'Oh!' She struck him smartly on the arm.

'Ow! You're getting very violent as you approach middle age.' He ducked the rain of furious blows Sonia directed at him.

'I'm going to telephone Audrey and tell her just what you're really like.'

'She already knows.'

'And she still wants to marry you?'

'Apparently so.'

Sonia let out a whistle. 'The woman's a saint.'

Richard choked on his drink. 'Given the lives of some of the saints, I'm not sure that's much of a compliment.'

'Yes, some of them were a rackety lot,' Sonia said thoughtfully. She took another sip and observed Richard closely; aware of her scrutiny, his eyes slid sideways and narrowed slightly.

'What?'

'I was just thinking: living in the country has been good for you. You've changed, you know.'

'Oh?'

She smiled. 'Don't worry, not a lot. But you're more … patient. You listen more.'

'Mother always said that you're perceptive – I hate it when she's right.'

Sonia laughed.

'You don't have any choice but to be patient in the country. You'd go mad, otherwise.'

'Well, it suits you. Will it stick, do you think?'

'Being more patient?'

She rolled her eyes at him. 'Being in the country.'

'Oh, I think so.'

There was a sudden tenderness in his expression, a softness in his eyes and she knew he was thinking of his beloved Audrey. He'd been the same way over Anna.

Sonia raised her glass. 'To life.'

He touched his glass to hers. 'To life.'

In the failing light of a golden early autumn evening, the Somerset landscape looked almost preposterously romantic. Undulating green under a rising mist and turning leaves that were burnished in hues of copper and bronze.

On the last rise before the sweep down to Grantleigh, Richard stopped the corniche and took in the landscape. London was a vibrant, exciting place, but it did have a tendency to wear you down. He felt tired right through to the bone. Or, at least, he had until he neared this place. Grantleigh and Audrey. He smiled to himself at the thought of her and headed down towards the manor.

'Bedrich!' Maria Polouvicka descended on her son as though she had not seen him in years. He submitted to her embrace, wrapped his own arms around her. She was tiny, but the vitality flowed through her. For a moment he rested his cheek on top of her head and then looked up when he saw Audrey walking towards them.

She was wearing the navy dress that he had so appreciated her in; her head was held high, the proud lady of the manor, but he saw the faint flush on her cheeks and the glimmer in her blue eyes.

'Audrey.'

He reached for her and they held one another's hands awkwardly while Maria watched them benevolently.

After a moment, Richard cleared his throat. 'Uh, Mother…'

She looked at him, an enquiring gaze, and then threw up her hands. 'You are both so English! There is a saying in old Czechoslovakia: an unwatched egg never hatches.'

Audrey watched her retreating figure and tried to suppress laughter, not entirely successfully.

'I'm thinking of sending her on an extended holiday somewhere very far away,' Richard said with deceptive mildness. 'Like Australia. Or the Antarctic.'

'Don't you dare.' Audrey tilted her head back and looked into his eyes. 'Hello.'

He took her face in his hands and kissed her as though he were getting to know her all over again. 'I've missed you,' he said softly.

'I missed you, too.' She locked her arms around him. 'You must be tired after that drive.'

'You'd think so, wouldn't you?'

Her lips curved and she shook her head slightly. A discreet cough behind them and they moved apart fractionally.

'Oh, hello, Brabinger.'

'Good evening, sir. The car has been unpacked.'

'Ah. Thank you.'

'Will you require any refreshments?'

It was Audrey who answered. 'No, thank you, Brabinger – we'll ring if we need anything.'

'Very good, Madam. Sir.' He slipped out of the hallway with barely a sound. Perhaps noiseless movement was something that they taught in butler school, Richard reflected. Either that, or Brabinger had secretly been a wartime Commando and was capable of killing them with his thumbs.

He wasn't sure he'd be surprised if that were true.

Audrey linked her arm through his. 'Come on. I'm sure you'll want to change before dinner.'

They were almost at the door before Richard realised that she was walking them to his own old room. What must have been her room before – was again now. Unless she was sleeping elsewhere. He followed her in a little uncertainly and then stopped just inside the threshold.

His suitcases had been neatly stacked in one corner, the overnight bag already unpacked and some of the items laid out amongst Audrey's. The room looked much as it had when he had left it, but there were some decidedly feminine touches: the paintings and mirrors had been changed, some of the furniture swapped out for lighter pieces and there was an abundance of flowers.

There was also, he noticed, the pair of Fabergé cups standing on a silver tray, along with a coffee pot.

'This is new,' he said.

'Yes. I thought it went with them rather well.'

It was a more contemporary piece, but it picked out the colours of the two tiny cups. Old and new melded together.

He looked around the room and then met her steady gaze. 'Are you sure about this?'

Her eyebrows rose. 'Don't tell me youhave suddenly turned into a prude!'

'Hardly. But people will talk. I wouldn't want your reputation damaged because of me.'

She shrugged. 'People talk about us anyway. I think they probably have for a long time. Besides, what could they say? That I'm spending my nights with a handsome Czechoslovakian self-made millionaire who is the finest gentleman I've ever known? And whom I love. And whom I'm going to marry. They can say whatever they like.'

His arms slid around her waist, holding her to him. 'Well, when you put it like that…'

Audrey raised her hands, gently tracing the lines of his face with her fingers. 'Welcome home, Richard.'