Only one table was occupied. Nan nodded at the couple who'd placed themselves in the bay window overlooking the garden, and after politely inquiring about their night's sleep and their day's plans, she joined Julian at the table he'd chosen some distance away by the kitchen door.
The fact that she never wore make-up put Nan at a disadvantage. Her eyes were troughed by blue-grey flesh. Her skin, which was lightly freckled from time spent on her mountain bicycle when she had a free hour in which to exercise, was otherwise completely pallid. Her lips—having long ago lost the natural blush of youth—bore fine lines that began beneath her nose and were ghostly white. She hadn't slept; that much was clear.
She had, however, changed her clothes from the night before, apparently knowing that it would hardly do for the proprietress of Maiden Hall to show up to greet her guests in the morning wearing what she'd worn as their hostess at dinner on the previous night. So her cocktail dress had been replaced by stirrup trousers and a tailored blouse.
She poured them each a cup of coffee and watched as Julian tucked into the eggs and mushrooms. She said, “Tell me about the engagement. I need something to keep from thinking the worst.” When she spoke, tears caused her eyes to look glazed, but she didn't weep.
Julian made himself mirror her control. “Have you heard from Andy?”
“Not back yet.” She circled her hands round her mug. Her grip was so tight that her fingers—their nails habitually bitten to the quick—were bleached of colour. “Tell me something about the two of you, Julian. Please.”
“It's going to be all right.” The last thing Julian wanted to force upon himself was having to concoct a scenario in which he and Nicola fell in love like ordinary human beings, realised that love, and founded upon it a life together. He couldn't face attempting that lie at the moment. “She's an experienced hiker. And she didn't go out there unprepared.”
“I know that. But I don't want to think about what it means that she hasn't come home. So tell me about the engagement. Where were you when you asked her? What did you say? What kind of wedding will it be? And when?”
Julian felt a chill at the double direction Nan's thoughts were taking. In either case, they brought up subjects he didn't want to consider. One set led him to dwell upon the unthinkable. The other did nothing but encourage more lies.
He went for something that both of them knew. “Nicola's been hiking in the Peaks since you moved from London. Even if she's hurt herself, she knows what to do till help arrives.” He forked up a portion of egg and mushroom. “It's lucky that she and I had a date. If we hadn't, God knows when we might've set out to find her.”
Nan looked away, but her eyes were still liquid. She lowered her head.
“We must be hopeful,” Julian went on. “She's well equipped. And she doesn't panic in a tough situation, when things get dicey. We all know that.”
“But if she's fallen … or got lost in one of the caves … Julian, it happens. You know that. No matter how well prepared someone is, the worst still happens sometimes.”
“There's nothing that says anything's happened. I looked only in the south part of the White Peak. There're more square miles out there than can be covered by one man in total darkness in an evening. She could be anywhere. She could even have gone to the Dark Peak without our knowing.” He didn't mention the nightmare Mountain Rescue faced whenever someone did disappear in the Dark Peak. There was, after all, no mercy in fracturing Nan's tenuous hold on her calm. She knew the reality about the Dark Peak anyway, and she didn't need him to point out to her that while roads made most of the White Peak accessible, its sister to the north could be traversed only by horseback, on foot, or by helicopter. If a hiker got lost or hurt up there, it generally took bloodhounds to find him.
“She said she'd marry you though,” Nan declared, more to herself than to Julian, it seemed. “She did say that she'd marry you, Julian?”
The poor woman seemed so eager to be lied to that Julian found himself just as eager to oblige her. “We hadn't quite got to yes or no yet. That's what last night was supposed to be about.”
“Was she … Did she seem pleased? I only ask because she'd seemed to have … Well, she'd seemed to have some sort of plans, and I'm not quite sure …”
Carefully, Julian speared a mushroom. “Plans?”
“I'd thought … Yes, it seemed so.”
He looked at Nan. Nan looked at him. He was the one to blink. He said steadily, “Nicola had no plans that I know of, Nan.”
The kitchen door swung open a few inches. The face of one of the Grindleford women appeared in the aperture. She said, “Mrs. Maiden, Mr. Britton,” in a hushed voice. And she used her head to indicate the direction of the kitchen. You're wanted, the motion implied.