One Night at the Château

Chapter 3

3

Lismay

1985

The next afternoon, Piers and Lismay rolled into Barles, the village perché where Jeanne and Dougie’s house was hidden away. They navigated their way through the winding narrow streets as the last of the sun warmed the stone walls into a dusty dark pink, the houses thrown around with no apparent planning, haphazard and higgledy-piggledy, with hidden doorways and stone staircases that led who knew where.

And then, there it was, four storeys high, tall and thin, originally built to house the cattle beneath and the humans above, though the stable had long since been converted to a kitchen. The housekeeper, Madame Quelle Horreur, was on the doorstep to greet them, alerted by Jeanne. She must have been training her binoculars on the road into Barles to be so ready for their arrival. She kissed them each on both cheeks, rattling off a barrage that included welcome, instructions and exclamation. Piers and Lismay had rusty school French, but they nodded with enthusiasm, echoing each other with oui and bien s?r and merci .

Jeanne had nicknamed her Madame Quelle Horreur because her surname was unpronounceable, and her battle cry was just that: quelle horreur , delivered with a throwing up of her hands and a rolling of her eyes. She was dressed in a very tight tweed skirt, a satin shirt and high-heeled court shoes that rang out on the stone of the floor as she ushered them in and showed them the provisions she had picked up: a baguette, a slab of creamy butter, saucisson , olives, tomatoes and some goat’s cheese, as well as fresh coffee beans and a bottle of rosé.

‘ Vous êtes très gentille ,’ Lismay told her.

‘ Une ange ,’ Piers said, and she blushed to be called an angel, handing him the keys and waving goodbye.

As she left, leaving a trail of scent more suited to a courtesan than a housekeeper, they looked at each other and sighed with the particular joy that comes from arriving somewhere you know and love. This house was almost like a second home, for Jeanne and Dougie always treated them like family. It was strange, though, being here without them and Connie and Archie and all their friends, for the house was always packed to the rafters, with bodies tucked away in all corners in bunks and on futons and sofa beds.

Lismay looked around the kitchen, with its stone walls and tiled floor, the open shelves with Provencal crockery piled high and yet again felt a surge of gratitude to Jeanne, for she was right. This was the perfect place for them to be. Somewhere familiar and comforting yet also a refuge. They hadn’t really had the chance to discuss their news properly. The MG was far too noisy to have any kind of proper conversation, and Piers had fed cassette tapes relentlessly into the player – Dire Straits, The Police, Elvis Costello – which she knew was his way of saying he didn’t want to talk about what had happened. The knowledge that they would have to hung between them like an unopened suitcase.

She knew it would be up to her to broach it. She knew he had folded the news up and tidied it away into the back of his mind where, as far as he was concerned, it could stay for ever. But that wasn’t fair on her. He might not have choices. But she did.

She was too tired to address it now. That was the whole point of coming here, having time and space. It could wait. Piers was unfolding all Madame Quelle Horreur’s packages, sampling the olives, sniffing the cheese, laying them all out on a board reverentially.

‘This is a feast,’ he said. ‘A banquet. God, I love this country. Any idea where the corkscrew is?’

She knew exactly where it was. In the table drawer, along with the red-and-cream-striped napkins. Moments later, he sloshed three inches of pale pink wine into two glasses and passed her one.

‘To us,’ he said. He took a massive swig, gulped and looked her in the eye properly for the first time since they’d left Fulham. She could see he was trying not to cry again. She rushed over and wound her arms around his neck, her glass still in her hand, squeezed him as tightly as she could. She knew how much pain he was in, and she wanted to take it away from him. Yet she didn’t know what to say.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ was all she could think of. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

How easy that was to say. It was harder to believe. Of course it mattered.

He stepped away from her, out of her embrace, raised the glass to his lips again to drink deep and grabbed the bottle to top himself up.

‘I’m bloody starving,’ he said. ‘Is there a bread knife?’

All they’d had to eat that day was a couple of stale croissants at the cheap hotel they’d stayed in en route. They devoured nearly all of Madame Quelle Horreur’s offerings, tearing at the baguette greedily, slathering on the butter, piling on the cheese and the charcuterie and devouring the salty, herby olives.

By nine o’clock, they were ready for bed. They slid in between heavy linen sheets that smelled of lavender. Lismay felt sleepy, melting into the comfort, edges blurred by the rosé. Suddenly she longed for the feeling of Piers’s body on hers, tangled limbs and languid kisses, the luxury of physical escape. She rolled against him, slid her leg over his, put her hand on his waistband and tugged it teasingly as she nuzzled his shoulder. But he lay there like a log, not moving, his back to her. She knew he was awake. His breathing was too measured. He was too tense. She’d never known him pretend to be asleep before. She hesitated, not sure whether to persevere.

She decided he must be tired from all the driving. She planted one final, gentle kiss on the back of his neck, extracted her hand and instead put her arm around his waist to hold him tight, her leg still slung over him. Much as she longed to make love, her overwhelming urge was to protect him. Her sweet, darling husband.

The last thing she remembered as she drifted off was his hand finding hers and holding it tight. They slept with their fingers entwined, him curled into her, until the morning light crept into their room at dawn.

Lismay was woken the next morning by the rich scent of coffee floating up the stairs. She touched the imprint of Piers’s head on the pillow, thoughtful, then rolled out of bed and headed down to the kitchen where he was laying out fresh croissants, their yeasty deliciousness filling the air and making her stomach rumble.

‘You’ve been to the bakery already?’

‘I have.’ He looked at them proudly. ‘I was going to bring you breakfast in bed.’

‘I’d much rather have it outside on the terrace.’

‘It’s still pretty nippy. But you’ll be fine if you stick a jumper on. Shall I bring everything out on a tray?’

‘Perfect.’

There was a tiny terrace at the back of the house. Because of its position, high up in the town, it looked down over the rooftops of Barles, their curved tiles like drainpipes in a palette of pink, russet and terracotta. The soft mellow stone of the houses held shuttered windows and distressed wooden doors, painted in pale greens and blues. Some walls still displayed ghostly words from their former incarnation as a pharmacie or patisserie . Everything felt ancient, with crumbling pillars and archways and cobbles and stairwells, softened by the dark green shadow of a cypress tree or a spray of rambling ivy.

As they ate, they watched Monday beginning to unfold. Cars making their way through the winding streets, children heading to school, chairs being laid out on the pavements. And beyond that, the orchards and vineyards of the Luberon spread out with tiny villages in the foreground and the splendour of a larger town in the distance, edged with cedar.

‘Absolutely magnificent.’ Piers drank from his coffee cup as he surveyed the view, nodding his approval. ‘This was a bloody good idea.’

It was almost as if they had planned to come here all along, rather than doing a dawn flit after bad news. Lismay was confused. She supposed this enthusiasm was better than Piers being plunged into gloom, but she felt as if their trip to the consultant had never happened. She wanted, desperately, to talk it over. She wanted reassurance that their marriage was strong enough. Was enough . But the words stuck in her throat.

‘I don’t know why we don’t live here,’ Piers went on. ‘The French are so civilised. They’ve got all their priorities right. I mean …’ He picked up a croissant. ‘Look at this. You can’t get this in England. English croissants are like …’ He made a face while he struggled for a description. ‘Bath sponges.’

His words were tumbling over each other, as if someone had pressed fast forward on a cassette player. Lismay chewed the inside of her lip. She had so much to say. So many feelings she wanted to express. But she could sense from his garrulous chatter that he didn’t want her to bring any of it up. So she picked up her coffee, smiled brightly and said:

‘What do you want to do today?’

He spread out his arms to indicate the landscape behind them.

‘We don’t need to do anything. Just be . Look at it!’ He gave a sigh of satisfaction. ‘Though I do need to go and find a fax machine. They’ve got one at the immobilier .’

‘Ah,’ Lismay teased him, ‘are you sure it’s the fax machine you’re after?’

Whenever they were here on holiday Piers made frequent trips to the estate agent to receive and send faxes from and to the office. He’d cheerfully admitted to a crush on the tiny, terrifying Yvette who ran the agency, and always came back armed with house details that he pored over with longing.

‘Yvette would be cross if I didn’t go and see her.’ Piers waved his knife at Lismay. ‘And there’s a big brief coming in this morning. I told Alistair to fax it over. I’ll have to do a bit of brainstorming later.’

Piers didn’t really know how not to work, but Lismay never minded because he didn’t make a song and dance about it. His brain was always firing, and it was best for him to have somewhere to put all his ideas or it led him into trouble. She sometimes thought how exhausting it must be, all that fizzing and whirring, but he thrived on it. She didn’t try to keep up. She just gave him his head.

‘We should go out for lunch,’ he was saying. ‘I’ve got a craving for lapin au moutarde . What do you think?’

Lismay gazed at a small black cat cleaning itself on the top of a wall. She was supposed to pretend that this was a normal holiday.

‘Sure. Why don’t you do what you need to do and I’ll go ahead and get us a table. At L’Epic ?’

‘Perfect. Might see if I can go and get a paper and a packet of Disque Bleus .’

Lismay tried not to raise an eyebrow. They had both given up smoking on the consultant’s advice while they were trying. Was this Piers’s way of saying that was all in the past? That he was reverting to his former sybaritic self?

‘Is that a good idea?’ she asked. ‘You did so well, giving up.’

‘Oh, I just want the odd one. After dinner. And only in France.’

‘It just seems a shame, after all the effort of—’

‘Don’t spoil my fun.’ He said it with a grin, not sulkily, so what could she do?

‘I’d better get dressed,’ she said instead, standing up and brushing the croissant crumbs from her lap.

L’Epic was in the square in Barles, opposite the church, tucked away behind a row of lime trees. In the front were counters selling cheese and charcuterie, and behind that was a glass room with rickety tables and chairs rammed close together and an uninterrupted view over the Luberon. She managed to get their favourite table, the one in the corner at the back. She was able to relax for the first time since they’d got here, for she wasn’t going to broach anything over lunch, in public, so she might as well enjoy herself. Maybe they could chat this evening? Light a fire in the big old fireplace, for the evenings were still crisp and cold, and curl up on the sofa and go through everything. Reassess their life plans.

She should go back to work. Proper work. She’d been working in an auction house before the consultant had suggested she take it easy. Not one of the posh ones, like Sotheby’s or Christie’s, but a small family-owned one specialising in upmarket house clearances. She did everything from photographing lots to cataloguing to displaying things to best effect in the sale room. You never knew what you might come across, and there were so many stories in all the possessions that came in by removal van, and she loved seeing who bought things and wondering what they would do with them. But it had been quite hard physical work, and a lot of pressure when there was a sale on, so she’d handed in her notice. Instead she’d done a couple of days a week for a friend with a stall in an antique market in Chelsea, selling diamanté earrings and bits of pretty china.

What should she do now? Where should she start looking? She didn’t have much in the way of qualifications or experience, but she had a good eye and a good way with people. Maybe Piers would help her with her CV. She needed a project. Something to take her mind off—

‘There you are!’ Piers was in front of her, beaming. He was holding a sheaf of papers in his hand as he flopped onto the chair opposite. ‘Have you ordered? Is the rabbit on?’

‘Oh. I haven’t looked.’ She picked up the menu. ‘Yes. It’s on. Do you want a starter? I think I’ll have an omelette. Boring I know but—’

Piers wasn’t really listening. He put the papers he was holding down on the table. ‘You’ll never guess what Yvette showed me. I reckon this could be the answer to everything.’

‘To everything?’ Lismay smiled and pulled the papers towards her.

As she expected, it was a set of property details. Piers often came back with something tempting Yvette had waved under his nose. She peered at the blurry black-and-white photocopy.

No. It was more than a house. Underneath it read:

CH?TEAU VILLETTE.

This was something else.

‘A chateau?’ She laughed. ‘Are you mad?’

‘No! It’s an absolute bloody bargain. The family want a quick sale so it’s on for next to nothing. We’re going to look at it this afternoon.’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Of course we are.’

It was one of Piers’s favourite holiday pastimes, looking at property they had no intention of buying. Lismay had lost count of the number of g?tes and pigeonniers they’d been to view but there was always something not quite right. A dodgy septic tank or a neighbour dispute. So they’d never taken the plunge.

‘I’m serious, Lismay. I’ve got a feeling .’ He picked up a piece of baguette and began to chew.

Piers had a very good gut. It was why he was so good at his job. Somehow, he knew exactly what was needed when he worked on a campaign. Where other people would analyse statistics and predictions and sales figures and demographics, he knew instantly how to reach the target market. So when he said he had a feeling, everyone paid attention.

Lismay was wary.

‘What on earth would we do with a chateau?’

‘It’ll all make sense when you see it.’ Piers picked up the menu. ‘Now. Duck rillettes to start – or is that too rich, if I’m having the rabbit?’

Lismay was determined not to fall for Piers’s latest fantasy. Of course she was grateful for his boundless enthusiasm. He could easily have fallen into a slump and become morose and gloomy after the diagnosis, but his Tiggerish nature had won. Doubtless he was going a little too far with this foray, but she’d go along with it for the time being. She would just have to look around politely and, with any luck, the downside would become apparent and do the work for her. At that price, the chateau was bound to have something terribly wrong with it.

She smiled to herself as Piers waved the waiter over. He looked so much better than he had done on Friday night. Positively carefree.

‘Shall we have a bottle of something lovely?’ he said, waving the wine list at her.

As they headed out of Barles after lunch, the mid-afternoon sun was doing everything it could to make this little corner of Provence look perfect. The vines in the fields were flourishing, boasting fresh, bright green leaves. The earth was a rich pinky-red, not yet baked dry by the heat of summer. In a paddock, white horses pranced and bucked with abandon. There was promise and excitement in the air; anticipation of great things to come. The sky was cloudless, and the blue seemed to go on forever as they drove along a narrow road that twisted and turned and rose and fell like a rollercoaster. Occasionally they passed a tractor or a battered Citro?n. Twice they had to swerve for an over-excited dog that shot out from a farmyard.

‘God’s own country,’ sighed Piers.

Lismay had to admit that the countryside was exquisite. It was as if someone had been sent on ahead to place blossoming apple trees in an orchard, to pop a splendid cockerel on a barn roof, to build a tiny stone bridge over a sparkling river. She tried to remain impassive and not be seduced. She looked down at the details: three pages of closely typed description, some of which she could decipher.

‘How big’s a hectare?’ she asked Piers.

‘A couple of football pitches,’ he replied.

Lismay wasn’t sure that helped. She had never lived anywhere with any land to speak of, so she wasn’t used to visualising acreage. She squinted at the map, for she was supposed to be giving him directions.

‘I think it’s at the bottom of this hill,’ she said, as they descended into a tree-lined valley. Everything seemed to dissolve into an impressionistic blur as a soft breeze hurried them gently along. And then in front of them were two tall pillars in stone the colour of runny honey and a set of elaborate wrought-iron gates leading to a wide, winding drive flanked by plane trees.

Lismay felt her tummy turn as something washed over her. Was it just the thrill of expectation? Or something more momentous? She’d only felt it once in her life before. Butterflies coupled with a rising pulse rate took her back to the moment she had first spotted Piers in the White Horse, when she’d known he was the one for her. She wondered why she was feeling it again, as Piers gunned the car down the drive, turned a corner and there, there it was, the Chateau Villette, basking sleepily in the sunshine, as dear and familiar as an old friend even though she’d never clapped eyes on it before.

It wasn’t enormous or overbearing, just … comfortable, with a symmetrical frontage in pale dressed stone, a perfect square with a plump tower on either side. There were floor-to-ceiling windows on the ground floor, with deep sash windows on the second, flanked by wooden shutters painted a blue so pale it was almost white. A terracotta roof held tiny dormers, peeping anxiously down. Everything was faded, peeling, overgrown, crumbling. Sprouts of grass grew through the cracks. Ivy and wisteria scrambled in a frenzy over the stonework.

Lismay had been planning on reacting with polite disinterest. But all she wanted to do was step inside the chateau’s embrace. She sat back in her car seat, overwhelmed, and saw Yvette walking towards them with a smile, her little Renault parked in the shade of a cypress tree by the circular fountain.

‘Are you all right, darling?’ asked Piers, perturbed by her silence.

‘Yes. Yes.’ She fanned herself with the particulars and opened the car door.

‘ Bienvenue ,’ said Yvette, chic in yellow tweed, ready to do her spiel, ‘to the Chateau Villette.’

Yvette and Piers locked eyes, and for a moment Lismay wondered if this was some kind of plot, if the wine she had drunk at lunch had contained some kind of drug, and they were going to bamboozle her into agreeing to buy it. She felt light-headed as she circled the fountain and stood at the foot of the stone steps that led up to the front door. She shut her eyes and breathed in. There was eucalyptus and lavender and rosemary in the air, but also something lighter she couldn’t identify, some kind of blossom. She imagined waking up to this smell every morning. It was intoxicating.

‘Shall we go inside?’ asked Yvette.

Lismay nodded, knowing that once she had stepped inside, that would be it.

The entrance hall was flooded with light, a wide wooden staircase curving upwards like a question mark from the black-and-white tiles. From there, Yvette led them through to a drawing room with a beamed ceiling, herringbone parquet floor and a carved stone fireplace as tall as Piers. To the left was a dining room, and through that was the kitchen, also with an enormous inglenook fireplace, and behind that a warren of larders and storage rooms. Each tower had a round room, one a library, the other a music room. Upstairs there were six bedrooms, and above that an attic.

‘It’s quite cosy’ said Piers cheerfully. ‘For a chateau.’

Yvette glanced at him. ‘It has been a family home for this century and last. But there is room for many guests.’ She smiled. ‘Napoleon’s sister Pauline would meet her lovers here. Or so they say.’

They were in the master bedroom, looking out over the grounds at the front. Lismay could imagine Pauline leaning out of this very window, watching as her lover cantered his horse up the tree-lined drive, knowing she was safely hidden from prying eyes.

‘I will let you walk around. I will wait for you outside,’ Yvette melted away.

‘What do you think?’ asked Piers as soon as they were alone.

‘It’s wonderful.’ Lismay looked up at him. ‘But what on earth would we do with it? It’s far too big for a holiday home, even with all our friends stuffed in it.’

Piers’s eyes were shining. She’d seen them like that once before: when he’d turned to her at the altar and first seen her in her wedding dress.

‘It wouldn’t be a holiday home. It would be our home and our business.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘We could do B and B. Very posh B and B. I mean, who doesn’t want to spend a night in a chateau?’ He was talking fast again, his words tumbling out. ‘But we’d make it all very relaxed. Not all stiff and formal. All very comfortable and top-drawer – decent sheets and all that. But fun. Everyone round the table for dinner. Masses of wine.’

Even as he was speaking, Lismay could picture what he was describing. And he was right. As soon as they’d turned into the drive, she’d longed to step into the Chateau Villette as if it was hers, live the chateau lifestyle. Waft down the stairs in evening dress, drink a glass of champagne in the drawing room with the French windows open, sit at a candlelit dinner with guests. She stared at her husband in admiration. How did he do it, she wondered? Have such an incredible imagination and such vision?

She could already see the advert in the back of Country Life . The bookings would flood in, she was sure of it. She wanted to book in herself, just from his brief description.

‘But how can we afford it? I know it’s cheap by chateau standards, but it needs a lot doing to it. And we’d have to kit it out. Curtains, bedding, furniture, china and glasses …’

She could see the dream disappear already. Of course it was a wonderful idea, but it was a fantasy.

‘We’ll sit down tonight and do a business plan. We can make it work.’ Piers had gone from over-excited to exacting. He was a visionary, but he always had his eye on the numbers. No one could accuse him of being unrealistic. He was good with money. It was a rare combination, to have imagination but also the ability to budget, to make a profit. ‘What do you think, my darling? It could be the most exciting adventure.’

Lismay gazed out of the window. From her vantage point, she could see a glimpse of a dovecote and a long, low barn.

‘I think it’s the most wonderful idea I’ve ever heard,’ she replied. ‘But it has to make sense. For both of us. And we have just had a bit of a shock, so it might not be the best time to make a rash decision.’

He frowned slightly as he considered her words, but he didn’t comment. Instead, he took her arm.

‘Let’s have a look at the outbuildings.’

If the inside of the chateau had stolen Lismay’s heart, the grounds made sure she would never get it back. Everything was wild and overgrown, but somehow that made it feel like Sleeping Beauty’s castle, with blossom and wild flowers and tendrils scrambling over everything, and a cocktail of scents mingling in the air. Behind a row of cedar trees was a round pool edged in the same stone the chateau was built from, fed by a natural spring, the water ice cold and brilliant green. A terrace at the back of the house looked out over a tiny lake smothered in water lilies and surrounded by lime trees and evergreen oak. There was a courtyard of useful outbuildings, including a barn once used to dry prunes.

Her head was spinning. How had she gone from the despair of leaving the consultant to standing in the middle of a fairy-tale, with the promise of a new adventure, if only they were brave enough?

‘But why is it so cheap?’ she asked. Not much more than their house in Fulham. It didn’t make sense.

Yvette shrugged. ‘No one in France wants a chateau. They are expensive. Too cold in winter. What do you do with it all?’ She suddenly remembered she was supposed to be selling, not putting them off. ‘But the chateau life is a wonderful life, if you have the courage.’

‘And the dosh,’ joked Piers, shoving his hands in his pockets and staring up at the stone walls. ‘Would they take a silly offer, do you think? It needs a lot of work.’

Lismay put a warning hand on his arm. He was going too fast.

But Yvette looked at him. ‘ Combien? ’ How much?’

Piers shrugged and named a price that was 20 per cent lower than the one on the details. Lismay choked and tried to turn it into a cough. Yvette put her head to one side and pursed her lips. Suddenly, Lismay felt panic that the opportunity was going to slip through their fingers. That Piers had scuppered the deal with his bargaining. And she realised that she wanted this to happen. That she had been swept up in his dream, that she believed it could come true.

At last, Yvette spoke. ‘ On verra. ’

We shall see. But at least she hadn’t said no outright.

That night, they sat on the terrace with a bottle of red wine as the sun set, and spread everything out on the little marble-topped table: the chateau details, a map, and one of the A4 pads of paper that Piers took with him wherever he went to scribble down ideas.

Gradually, a five-year plan began to emerge as his pen raced across the paper. Figures, dates, estimates, lists, contingency, profit-and-loss balance sheets.

‘So you know we’ve got a nest egg?’ he said. ‘The money from your grandparents, and the money I’d been saving for …’ he faltered for a moment – ‘for school fees. I’ve been putting all my bonuses into it. There’s quite a wedge. If we get the price we want we can use that to buy the chateau outright, then extend our mortgage to give us the cash to renovate. You move here and oversee it all.’

‘Just me?’ Lismay felt alarmed.

‘You can do it with your eyes shut. We’ll find the right team. I’ll carry on working and rake in as much money as I can while we do it up.’

‘Oh.’ He really had thought it through. ‘I’m not sure about being here on my own.’

‘I’ll come out every other weekend. There’s a good flight to Nice. And you’ll have a never-ending stream of guests, I bet. Not paying ones at this point. But everyone will want to come and have a gander.’

Lismay nodded, trying to imagine talking to the workmen in French. It had been hard enough in Fulham, when things had gone wrong. But she’d got through it.

‘Then when we’re up and running we can sell the house. I’ll hand in my notice and just do consulting, which will give us a separate income stream while we find our feet. In five years, with a fair wind, we’ll be fully booked and start to make a profit.’ He topped up her wine, grinning at her. ‘What say you?’

Lismay picked up her glass and sat back in her chair. She loved the idea. Of course she did. But they still hadn’t had a chance to talk through the implications of what the consultant had told them. She wasn’t even sure how she felt.

Piers had no options now, in terms of fathering his own child. But she had. There had been nothing during the investigations to suggest she wasn’t capable of being a mother, though obviously that would mean one of two things. The first option was finding a donor, if she wanted to have a child with Piers in the role of father; the second option didn’t bear thinking about. She didn’t want to leave him. That would be cruel. And she loved him, with all her heart. Yes, sometimes he drove her mad with his crazy schemes and unbounding energy – it was hard to keep up sometimes – but where could she find someone kinder, funnier and more loving? So she closed down that possibility.

There was a third possibility. They could adopt. They’d skated over that once or twice, but Lismay could sense Piers wasn’t keen on the idea, and it frightened her too.

They should talk about it all, though. It was too momentous, too important, to brush everything under the carpet. Lismay was aware that the conversation would be more about her than Piers. The first two options, at least, were there because she still had the potential to have a child. Would it be cruel, rubbing his nose in it? Selfish? She didn’t want to crush him by reminding him of what he saw as his failure. But if she didn’t speak now, they would be swept up in something that wouldn’t ever give her the chance to be a mother.

She still wasn’t sure how she felt. She had always assumed she would be one. That she would be a good one. She had always loved looking after her god-daughter, Connie. The little girl came to stay the night from time to time, and she’d treasured every moment. Maybe it was easy, when you knew you only had responsibility for a short time, but she’d genuinely enjoyed it, from breakfast time to bath time. Not everyone enjoyed spending time with kids.

And to have the chance to have children of her own snatched away from her was huge. She had to say something. ‘It’s all going a bit fast,’ she said. ‘I haven’t really had time to think. About everything.’ She felt tears spring into her eyes. ‘About never being a mum.’

Piers looked at her.

‘Oh darling,’ he said. He put his glass down. ‘I’m getting carried away. I know I am. Listen.’ He looked up at the sky for a moment, gathering his thoughts. ‘I’ve let you down. I know I have. Our dream was to have a family of our own. And I can’t make that happen for you now. It’s broken my bloody heart. But whatever you want, whatever makes you happy, we’ll do it. I’m sorry for getting carried away, but it seemed like the perfect answer. A new life for us where we wouldn’t be constantly remembering what might have been. I’d find it very difficult staying in London with all our friends. Though perhaps I’d get used to it … I don’t know.’ He sighed. ‘But if you want to stay in London, and this isn’t your dream, we can talk about what to do. I’m not very brave. I can’t even think about someone else being … the father of your child at the moment. Even if it was ultimately ours to bring up. Or taking on someone else’s child, if that was something you wanted to do. But maybe I could get used to the idea, in time.’ He was getting choked up. ‘And if you want to leave me, I understand. I really do. Because I never, ever want to stop you from being a mum, if that’s what you want.’

He took in a deep breath and composed himself. Tears were streaming down Lismay’s face. She had never loved him as much as she did now. Her funny, clever, brave husband. He mattered to her more than a possible unborn child. They had to stick together, the two of them, for not everyone was lucky enough to have the magic they shared. She knew he would make sure she was happy for the rest of their lives. And she would do the same for him.

And his gut had been right. The Chateau Villette was the perfect answer. They could pour their heart and soul into making it the ultimate escape. It would be an adventure. An exciting new beginning for both of them. She picked up the details and looked at the picture. She could imagine it brought to life. The front door wide open to welcome guests, drifts of lavender on the path, the sound of music. Candlelight, soft beds you never wanted to leave, cast-iron pots full of coq au vin and a cellar full of fine wine.

She knew straight away, through a blur of rosé and the faint trace of wild thyme – or was it rosemary? – that the chateau was going to change their lives. And she supposed that what you didn’t have, you couldn’t miss, so she would stop thinking about babies … children … what might have been, and instead concentrate on what she did have. Wonderful Piers. And an exciting proposition. Something that most people couldn’t have in a million years.

‘So what shall we call it?’ she asked. ‘Our new venture? What about One Night at the Chateau? It sounds dreamy …’ She had a faraway look in her eyes.

‘One Night at the Chateau,’ Piers echoed her, realising she was ready to face this enormous challenge. ‘I love it. It’s different. Perfect for a honeymoon. Or an anniversary. Or a romantic getaway.’

They sat gazing at each other as the moon rose and their bruised and battered hearts began to beat a little louder, a little faster. It was utter madness and the ideal solution, at one and the same time. They could see their future before them. A chateau for both of them. For their families. For their friends. And for all the people they were yet to meet. Where others might see a ruin, a pile of crumbling stone and missing tiles and broken glass, they saw a dream. It was up to them to make it come true.