Chapter 27
The cottage looked different somehow as they approached – as if Peg was seeing it for the first time – the tiny but perfectly formed front garden which, come summer, would be filled with hollyhocks and larkspur, the bright green front door which always looked so warm and inviting, the deep mullioned windows which gave it such an air of permanence, and the rosy glow of the building itself, all the things which she had fallen in love with on the very first day she and Julian had come to view it.
She stopped on the path, guarding herself against the doubt she expected to feel, the pain of her loss which, during moments like these, always came to the fore.
She waited, but it didn’t arrive, and in its place was a small but growing burble of happiness, and she hugged it to her, precious and so very welcome after such an age without it.
She hadn’t been happy for a long while, she realised. Only fooling herself.
Opening the back door, Peg felt as if she was holding her breath.
She was scared that if she started to breathe normally again, what had passed between her and Henry would be lost. She wasn’t even sure what it was yet, but the thread was there, just as Henry had said it was, pulling them together, tightening their bond.
And it was the most scary and exhilarating thing all at once.
Perhaps that’s what it was – she felt breathless.
And she was certain that Mim would notice. Mim, whose shrewdness was like a weather gauge and could sense any change in the atmosphere, but miraculously she didn’t comment, only asked with concern how Adam and Sofia were faring.
‘Remarkably okay,’ answered Peg. ‘And I think Blanche can expect a call from her daughter very soon. It’s not for me to say why, but I reckon Sofia has quite a few things she’ll want to share with her mum.’
‘Well, thank goodness for that,’ replied Mim. ‘She’s been beside herself with worry.’
Peg nodded. ‘It’s early days, but put it this way: I don’t think the threat of redundancy is the disaster it first appeared to be.’
‘Your family has had quite the ordeal over recent weeks,’ said Mim, turning her attention to Henry. ‘It’s about time your luck changed.’
Henry smiled. ‘You may well be right there, Mim, and who knows, maybe it’s changing as we speak.’ He flicked Peg a glance which made her stomach give a girlish skip. Honestly, anyone would think she was a teenager. She shuddered; she couldn’t think of anything worse.
‘I was thinking I’d make some tea,’ added Henry. ‘But would you mind if I took mine up to my room? The spirit is willing, but the flesh is decidedly longing for a nap.’
‘It’s been quite an afternoon,’ said Peg, turning to face him. ‘I don’t blame you. Are you sure you’re all right? Not overdone things?’
Henry shook his head, smiling. ‘Just tired.’ He paused. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Desperate for a cuppa, but other than that…’ She smiled, shy, at the thought of what might yet pass between them. ‘Shall I bring you up a snack as well? You didn’t have much to eat at lunch.’
‘Can I just pinch a couple of biscuits for now? I think I need sleep more than I need food.’
Peg fetched the tin from the pantry and handed it to him. ‘Take it up with you. If you don’t, I’ll only eat them. I’ll bring your tea in a minute.’
She watched as Henry padded from the room, virtually soundless in his socks, his worn corduroys and bobbly jumper by now a familiar sight.
She was suddenly reminded how out of place she’d felt in Sofia and Adam’s modern, sleek house.
And it was just the same for Henry. But here, in her house, he was the perfect fit.
A few minutes later, she sat down at the table, her tea in front of her, as yet untouched.
A new emotion was clamouring for her attention, and she was having difficulty deciding exactly what it was.
Her head wanted her to believe it was doubt, was still trying to convince her that’s what she should be feeling, but it wasn’t doubt, it was something more restless, something more anxious, more urgent…
Her eyes widened in shock. She was scared.
Not about Henry, or not in the way she thought she ought to be feeling anyway.
She wasn’t scared about having someone in her life again, about making room for him in her life, she was scared of losing him.
Because now, just at the point where she thought her life might be about to change, when fate had brought her and Henry together, and the thread which bound her to him was pulling them closer, that same fate was about to send them in opposite directions again – she moving to be closer to Mim, and Henry moving to be closer to his son.
Her hand flew to her chest, covering her heart as if seeking to protect it.
Her eyes sought out her laptop, still on the table from where Henry had left it earlier.
He’d been in the middle of looking at properties before they had left to go to lunch.
Might he have left a tab open? Had Henry already found the perfect place to live?
She opened it up, desperate to know how far he had got with his research, but what she saw on the screen made no sense at all.
She stared at the page in front of her, at the sales details for a house she knew well, a house she had been in a very short time ago. Mim’s house.
Heart thudding in her chest, she carried her laptop through into the living room where Mim was sitting beside the fire, drinking her own cup of tea and eating a piece of cake. She set it down on the coffee table and swivelled it towards her aunt.
‘What’s going on?’ she said. ‘Why is your house for sale, Mim?’
Her aunt looked like she’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. But only for a second. Then her expression changed to one of consternation.
‘Oh, honestly,’ she said, tutting. ‘Trust you to spoil the surprise. You were just like that as a child, tearing open tiny corners of your Christmas presents to peek inside.’
‘I did not!’
‘Oh yes, you did,’ replied Mim, laughing. ‘Your mother had to hide them in the loft because she knew it was the one place you were too scared to look. And not just your presents either. Don’t you remember the year when you said “you can open your pyjamas now, Auntie Mim”?’
Peg did remember – they had teased her about it for years. She shook her head. ‘That’s not the point, as well you know. What’s going on, Mim?’
Mim gave her a coy smile. ‘Well, isn’t it obvious? It’s not Henry who’s moving, it’s me.’
‘You?’
‘Yes, me. I’m buying a flat at Athelstone House.’ Mim folded her hands in her lap and gave Peg a triumphant grin.
Peg shook her head. ‘But how on earth did you manage that? You—’
A creak on the stairs behind her gave the game away. ‘You’d better have a good explanation for this,’ she said without even turning around.
‘Actually, it is pretty sound,’ said Henry, moving into her line of sight. He at least had the grace to look a little ashamed.
He took a seat on the sofa, eyebrows raised, and she frowned. Was he mocking her now?
Swallowing, she sat down opposite him and indicated the computer screen. Well… start explaining then.’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake,’ muttered Mim, rolling her eyes. ‘Your generation think you’re the only ones who can organise things, with your laptops and your mobile phones.’
‘To be fair, Mim, we did borrow Peg’s laptop, and we did use my phone,’ said Henry.
‘Don’t split hairs,’ Mim replied. ‘The point is that I can remember Dot’s phone number, her landline number, without the aid of all these fancy gizmos, and she has a key to my house, so—’
‘Of course she does,’ murmured Peg.
Mim ignored her, darting her niece a fierce look. ‘And so I rang her and told her that a nice young man from the estate agency would be calling and she was to give him the key.’
‘And what did he say, this nice young man?’
‘That I have a very desirable property which he thinks will sell quite quickly. He was particularly taken with the garden, apparently.’
Peg stared at her, desperate to find some fault in Mim’s statement, but it was clear she’d been comprehensively outmanoeuvred. ‘But you always said you didn’t like old people. You said that Athelstone House wasn’t your cup of tea.’
‘I don’t like old people. But Blanche isn’t bad, I rather like her.
As for it not being my cup of tea, I was acting, dear.
’ She leaned forward to pat Peg’s knee. ‘Have you seen the place? It’s like Downton Abbey.
They even have a proper dining room where you can order a fancy dinner if you don’t feel like cooking, and they have wine with their meals.
And a lady who comes in and does hair and another one who does nails.
Blanche gets hers done every fortnight.’
‘Does she?’ said Peg, shooting Henry a look. ‘That’s all very well, Mim, but how can you even afford it?’
‘Because my Bernard left me quite a lot of money, dear, which you must remember, because you were the one who sorted everything out for me – the executor thingy, of his will, whatever you called it. Anyway, I’ve had nothing to spend my money on for all these years, so what do you think I’ve done with it? ’
It was true, Peg had been the executor of Bernard’s will, but Mim’s husband had died fifteen years ago. She just assumed… She checked herself. That’s exactly what she had done – assumed. ‘I didn’t think there’d be any of it left,’ she said. ‘I thought you needed it.’
‘What for?’ asked Mim. ‘There’s only been me, and I don’t eat much.
The birds don’t eat much either. So it’s stayed in the bank, in some fancy account or other where the lovely lady who works there said I should put it.
So now there’s rather more than when I started.
And it’s plenty enough to buy a little flat.
I don’t want anything bigger because you know me, dear, and I hate dusting. ’
Peg allowed herself a small smile.