Over dinner, Mouse explained how his former career as an architect meant he wouldn’t have to pay anyone else to draw up the plans for the renovation works at High Weald. His vivid green eyes lit up as he spoke about taking the house into the future, and I suddenly realised that he loved it, too. Seeing the passion he must have once possessed reignited, I felt the trickle in my own heart begin to pour out like a tap turned onto full.
‘Before I forget’ – he reached into his dinner jacket and pulled out a familiar jewellery box – ‘I just got this back from Sotheby’s. It is indeed a Fabergé, commissioned by King Edward VII himself. It’s worth a great deal of money, Star.’
He handed it to me, and I took out the little figurine, marvelling at how Flora MacNichol herself had once cherished it, and the journey she had been on.
‘I’m not sure it really belongs to me.’
‘Of course it does. To be honest, I presumed Teddy had pawned the figurine years ago. He certainly did that with other family treasures. However you came by it, you are Teddy’s great-grandchild. It’s your legacy, Star . . . You know, I’ve been thinking more and more about the past,’ Mouse said, looking at Panther sitting in the palm of my hand. ‘And I understand what Archie was trying to do when he took Teddy as his own son . . . the trauma that he experienced during the war . . .’ He shook his head. ‘Whatever the consequences were, he wanted to atone for all the random death and destruction he’d seen, by passing on the gift of High Weald to the offspring of an unknown soldier. Just as I hope I can atone by renovating it for Rory.’
‘Yes. I think it was a beautiful thing to do.’
After dinner, he led me back up to our suite.
‘Right,’ he said, as we entered it, ‘I’ll say goodnight then.’
I watched him as he took off his jacket in the sitting room. Then I paused and walked over to him, stood on my tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek.
‘Goodnight.’
‘Can I hug you?’ he asked, his breath on my skin.
‘Yes please.’
As he did so, I felt a sudden stirring inside me.
‘Mouse?’
‘Yes?’
‘Could you kiss me?’
He tipped my chin up to him and smiled.
‘I think I could manage that, yes.’
When we woke the next morning, the glorious Lakeland surroundings had opened up like an unwrapped present through the windows of our suite. We spent the day exploring, visiting Hill Top Farm, Beatrix Potter’s old home and now a museum, then driving on to find Wynbrigg Farm, Flora’s home, where she’d suffered so many years of loneliness. And I squeezed Mouse’s hand extra tightly, glorying in the fact that I had so narrowly avoided her fate.
Back at the hotel, we walked through the trees by Esthwaite Water, and saw a lark gliding through the mist over the lake as the sun set. Our noses pink with cold, we stood hand in hand and looked at the absolute serenity of the view, its beauty rendering us both silent.
That evening, we went to the Tower Bank Arms, the local pub where Archie Vaughan had originally stayed when he’d come to visit Flora.
‘Perhaps I should have checked in here, like he did.’ Mouse gave me a wry smile.
‘I’m glad you didn’t,’ I replied, and realised I meant it. Although I had left Mouse to sleep alone after the kiss, I’d lain there, feeling a delicious tingle racing through my body. And knew that with time – and trust – I’d get there. In fact, I might even enjoy the journey.
Checking out of Esthwaite Hall the following morning, Mouse drove us to the Langdale Valley, and we took a walk through the majestic mountain pass.
A thought suddenly occurred to me. ‘Mouse?’
‘Yes?’
‘What’s your real name? I know it begins with “O”.’
His lips curved into a wry smile. ‘I thought you’d never ask.’
‘Well?’
‘It’s “Oenomaus”.’
‘Oh my God!’
‘I know. Ridiculous, isn’t it?’
‘Your name?’
‘Yes, that as well, of course – blame my Greek mythology-obsessed dad – but I meant the coincidence. According to the myth, “Oenomaus” was married to “Asterope” – or some stories say he was her son.’
‘Yes, I’ve heard the legends surrounding my name. Why didn’t you tell me before?’
‘I asked you once if you believed in fate. You said you didn’t. Whereas I knew that day when I first set eyes on you at High Weald, and heard what your real name was, that we were destined to be together.’
‘Did you?’
‘Yes. It was written in the stars,’ he teased me. ‘And it seems you have father and son at your feet.’
‘Well. I hope it’s okay if I still call you “Mouse”?’
And then the sound of our joint laughter rang through the Langdale Valley as Oenomaus Forbes, Lord Vaughan of High Weald, hugged me to him tightly.
‘Well?’ he said.
‘“Well” what?’
‘Will you come back to High Weald with me tonight, Asterope?’
‘Yes,’ I said without hesitation. ‘Remember that I’ve got work tomorrow morning.’
‘Of course you have, you old romantic. Right then,’ he said, releasing me and taking my hand. ‘It’s time for us both to go home.’
CeCe
December 2007
Camellia (Theaceae family)
46
I sat at Heathrow airport waiting for my flight to be called, watching the other passengers walk by me, chatting to their kids, or their partners. Everyone looked happy – full of expectation. And even if they were travelling by themselves, I reckoned they probably had someone waiting for them at their destination.
I had nobody any longer – either here, or there. I suddenly felt for all those old men I’d seen sitting on benches in London parks as I’d walked to and from college. I’d thought they were enjoying the company of life passing by them in the winter sunshine . . . but now I realised how much worse it felt to be alone in a crowd. And I wished that I had stopped to say hello. As I wished someone would stop and say hello to me now.
Sia, where are you?
I wish I could write down what’s in my head and send it to you, so that you could read the things I really feel. But you know the words come out wrong on the page – it took me forever to write that letter I left for you at the apartment and it was still rubbish. And you’re not here to talk to, so I’ll just have to think it all to myself in the middle of Terminal 3.
I thought you would hear my cry for help. But you didn’t. All these weeks I’ve watched you drift away from me, and I’ve tried so hard to let you go. To not mind you leaving me all the time to see that family or how irritated you’ve been with me, like everyone else is.
With you, I could always be myself. And I thought you loved me for it. Accepted me for who I was. And what I tried to do for you.
I know what others think of me. And I’m not sure where I go wrong, because it’s all here inside me – the good stuff, like love. And wanting to care for people and make friends. It’s like there’s a trip switch between who I am on the inside and what comes out on the outside. By the way, I know that would be a bad sentence because it has two ‘outs’ in it, and you used to correct word repetitions in my essays before they went to the teacher.