I had been planning on this being the final chapter, but discovered that I can't quite let this go for the moment. Please excuse my indulgence in sending Harry and Ruth to Chamonix - one of my favourite places on earth. Thank you as always for your reviews and the support that keeps me writing. CA.
Another light dusting of snow had fallen overnight, as Harry woke up on what was a beautifully sunny morning, and gazed in wonder at Ruth's sleeping form. Today was the day, when for better or for worse, his destiny and hers would be set in stone. Lunch in an unpretentious restaurant where the locals ate, would be the perfect place to break the news and to watch her reaction. That and remove the final millstone that still lingered, as he drove them into a town that had barely changed in the years since he'd last been there. Cafés and restaurants and a sprinkling of small shops, designed to lure the tourists into spending their money on something that they didn't need, but at its heart was still a town that for the most part of the year concentrated on its greatest asset. A quiet haven with a winter sports opportunity of a lifetime. Not that he was planning on donning his skis or walking for the miles that he'd been forced into when he'd come there as a young army officer, on what had been deemed a strength building exercise, designed to make him and his fellow officers into men. No, he was way past that. It was the lure of the mountains and a trip in a cable car across into Italy, if Ruth could be persuaded that it was safe. That and the fresh air and the silence, particularly at night, which had never left him and seen them both sleeping far later than they usually did.
Other than when they'd been loosely speaking at their various homes, both of them had been required to look the part. In his case, to wear suits and ties, knotted with precision, countless of them that he'd collected over the years. A symbol of what everyone expected him to be, only to be ripped off at the first opportunity. Whereas now, dressed in the clothes that he'd insisted they'd need to keep warm and, in his case to blend in, he could barely take his eyes off Ruth. In a warm padded jacket, what he considered to be proper boots and a scarf and bobble hat that matched her eyes, she was walking alongside him, happily chattering away at twenty to the dozen.
'I never believed that I could ever feel this happy,' she'd told him the previous evening, as they'd stood in front of the window and gazed at the star filled sky, raining down on mountain tops that had disappeared into the darkness.
He'd wrapped his arms tightly around her and her head had been nestling back against chest. The warmth of the fire and the extraordinary completeness of the moment, lulling them towards sleep.
That he'd made his decision and so unlike him had gambled rather than fitted all the pieces together, he deemed worth the risk. As long as he was patient and put his case across prepared to be rejected, which if it was he'd think again. He'd told her that he wanted a new life with her and she'd jumped at it, but this wasn't MI5 where he could orchestrate something where people were expected to jump through hoops, no matter what the consequences. This was real life, up front and personal, and the guns that he'd held at people's heads both real and metaphorically speaking that had changed people's lives for ever, had to be made silent.
'How about a swim?' interrupted his thinking, as Ruth stopped his thought process on the small bridge that crossed the river, gazing down into the roaring torrent that thundered down from the mountains, a look of bemusement on her face and clearly aware that he'd drifted off. It wasn't the first time that he'd been tempted to comment that she'd have made a damn good spy and it probably wouldn't be the last. She was far better at reading people than he'd ever been. He'd lost count of the times that he'd jumped to a conclusion and regretted it and as far as women were concerned and in Juliet's case in particular, he'd been bloody clueless. Shake her out of his system and he could really move on. He needed to tell someone the truth about his relationship with her and he wanted that person to be Ruth.
'Lunch,' he suggested, rejecting Ruth's joke of a swim and taking her hand, as they turned in the direction of the main street and away from the freezing cold water, that despite his own warm coat made him shiver. Another why is that I wonder? Until he realised that he needed to pee.
'You can't be held accountable for the entire world's population Harry, it's full of people like Juliet. Believe you me I've met plenty of them over the years,' was Ruth summing up, as they sat in a small restaurant, where she'd the chosen fish and he was eating steak frites. His favourite meal given the chance to enjoy it. 'Power, the desire to control who you're with, is inborn in some people Harry. Divorces aren't only about money or infidelity. Think back to your school days, there has to have been a teacher that was a bully, I know there was at my school. Mr. Roberts who taught science, I was terrified of him. I know that this doesn't compare, but I bet Juliet was born to be a Mr. Roberts. We all make mistakes Harry, it's how we deal with them that counts. Given the chance, a powerful woman can be far more dangerous than a powerful man. The weaker sex is just a myth Harry, other than in my case of course,' was said as she stretched her hand across the table in an attempt to get him to change the subject and before his meal got cold, with a smile that he would willingly have died for.
That he could never tell her the full extent of what Juliet had done, but that it was sufficient for her to know that she'd been instrumental in his friend Clive being murdered, she'd accepted. Born out by what followed. That and the fact that she had no idea as to what he was leading up to. Why would she?
'If I intend living with a spy then I have to accept the rules that come with it,' not only made up his mind that this was the right moment, as reckless or otherwise and without preamble, he returned her smile and told her that he'd resigned.
'Have you really thought this through?' was masked out by the chatter of the other diners, as Ruth looked incredulously at a copy of the letter that he'd left with Adam to take to the Home Secretary.
'I've thought of little else since the moment I met you and I meant what I said Ruth, I want permanent. You know as well as I do that that I've spent the most of my life lying to the one person that I wished I didn't have to. Well not this time. If we're going to make our relationship work it needs to be open and honest, without you second guessing all the time and wondering if I'm going to be coming home and when I do if I'll be in one piece. I love you Ruth, so much so that I'll never find the words that will be adequate to tell you just how much. Do you know I actually ache for you when I'm not with you?'
Ruth did, but now that Harry was on a roll and wasn't talking about his work and in particular Juliet Shaw, she was happy for him to continue. She knew exactly what he meant. She'd lost count of the times that he'd walked out of the house and she'd been scared stiff that she'd never see him again. It would be easy to tell him to stop overthinking things and to get to the point, but she knew as clearly as the sun came up each morning that he needed to get through this in his own time. Harry wasn't one to be rushed. At least not with her.
Had he told Catherine what he was planning? she doubted very much. What would he do with his time whilst she was at work and where did he plan on them living, in her house or his? Were questions that were bouncing around in her head like a packet of ping pong balls that someone had dropped, as the waiter interrupted them by asking if they were ready for their coffee.
'Whatever we do, I can't lose touch with Jacob,' was her greatest concern and came out almost as a plea as he stilled her hands and told her to look at him.
'Ruth I'm not a complete idiot, I know how important Jacob is to you and I would never suggest anything that would change that, so just hear me out and then tell me what you think. We both know that Sophie's really struggling. She's never going to admit it and she may need some persuading, but I saw it in her drawn face and tired eyes when I saw her the other day. I've been there time and time again and it will break her eventually, believe you me. She's a qualified theatre sister isn't she, which means that she can work anywhere and so can you come to that. How about we throw caution to the wind just for once. Move away from London, I don't much care where, you can choose between the two of you. Wherever it is I'll have time on my hands and I can look after Jacob rather than Sophie having to paying for a child minder. We get on don't we, me and the little man, what do you think?' Was quite a speech, by which time Ruth had forgotten the rest of the conversation and was asking him if she could borrow his handkerchief.
They were still sitting there long after all but two of the other customers had left. The waiter discreetly waiting in the wings to clear their tables. The other couple at their usual table, it was where they came for their lunch these days. Why bother cooking when you could eat out and didn't have to pay? It passed the time too and they had plenty of that on their hands.
Curious as to who Harry and Ruth were, because they clearly weren't locals, they continued to watch them as their coffee arrived, as did theirs. Absorbed in each, almost to the point of ignoring their food after whatever it was that the man had said, surely couldn't have been bad news? The woman had reached across the table and was holding his hand and her eyes had barely left his and he was smiling, or at least now he was. Had he proposed marriage to her or perhaps they'd just got married and were here on their honeymoon? They were clearly in love with each other and this was new this love. That and irreversible.
They'd spent their married life knowing how that felt. Special and precious and not to be squandered, no matter what life had thrown at them.
'She's lovely, I'd have left you for her given half a chance,' the elderly man told his wife of more than fifty years as their waiter sat down. A twinkle in his eyes not dissimilar to Harry's that were firmly fixed on Ruth, who for the first time in his life was totally unaware that he was being watched.
'Yes, he's definitely said something to her to produce those happy tears,' their son told them, having watched his parents playing the same game as they did virtually every day now. 'If he was leaving her, she wouldn't have just told him that she loved him, the lucky bugger,' he told them.
He hand time on his hands as well. His shift was over until the evening and it was good to spend some down time with his mum and dad, before he drove them home.