Archive of Our Own

The news that Dr Bruce Meredith was to be married would have been impossible to keep secret, had the parties concerned been trying. That they were not particularly trying only exacerbated the fact that it went round the village of Glen St Mary at a speed that would have embarrassed the average forest fire.

Di McNeilly heard it while eyeing bolts of fabric in Douglas and Flagg. She was fingering blue gingham for Miss Abby  with one hand and leaning on the polio-necessitated crutches that were now a staple of a walk to the shop when she heard about it. From Irene Howard, no less, and all while  wondering if blue gingham was too like curtains for her daughter's sartorial tastes.

Quite distinctly, Irene Howard  said, 'Of course she isn't good enough.'

Di's ears pricked, not because Irene Howard was anyone to take seriously, but because where Irene went, misinformation generally followed. In this instance, also following was Olive Drew, formerly Kirk.

Said Olive Drew-Kirk, 'A Crawford! Of All people! The Merediths will be devastated.'

'They had such lofty expectations,' said Irene.

It was at this point that Naomi Blake, now Arnold appeared at Di's elbow and said two things. Firstly, that Abby would never wear the blue gingham and to get green instead, and second, 'I don't recall that Olive has much cause to be snobbish.'

'No,' said Di. 'to hear Susan tell it, she married completely the wrong kind of Drew.'

'There are reputable Drews?' asked Naomi, who even upwards of ten years later was still regarded by locals as a mere visitor to the Glen. It was Di's personal opinion though, that a stranger would have not known this to talk to her. Certainly re the subject of Drews and Crawfords, reputability to be determined.

'Susan thought there were,' said Di. 'Cornelia didn't agree, but thought there were reputable Crawfords.'

Here Miranda Milgrave emerged from the ribbon display, hands full of pink hair ties, and said, joining them, 'It's all moot because Margaret Crawford is only a Crawford by marriage. She's one of the Clows, and one of the posh ones, because she's related to the Lowbridge Parkers on her mother's side.'

'Go back a minute,' said Di, 'she married a Crawford?'

'It must have been…'Miranda Milgrave wavered, then, seeing an approaching Betty Meade of olden days, flagged her down with one wildly gesticulating arm. The ribbons waved like flags.

'Betty!' said Miranda, triumphant, 'you'll remember. When did Margaret Crawford marry her Robert? What year?'

'Oh goodness,' said Betty, 'that must have been…How old's the baby? Maggie must have got him for her trouble practically on her wedding night. The talk that caused! Practically no one would believe the poor girl when she said he was conceived after the marriage.'

'You still haven't explained,' said Di, because she was not particularly convinced the Rev Meredith would endorse the committing of bigamy, be it within his family or elsewhere, 'the marriage bit. Never mind the baby.'

'Well, let's see, if wee Bertie is three last month…Must have been '36.' This was from Betty.

Miranda clicked her fingers and said authoritatively, 'That's right. Because '37 was that terrible boat collision that killed Robert Crawford and the rest of the crew – Joe talked about nothing else for weeks, I can tell you. And the nightmares it gave the children! I had to check underwater for boat pieces every time they went swimming…'

Well, thought Di, as Miranda talked on, at least that accounted for Margaret Crawford's marital status. She thought the others might have led with the unfortunate Robert's demise.

Across the aisle, Irene was saying, 'Do we actually know whose baby it is?'

'I was wondering too,' said Olive, 'because that Bruce Meredith took to it awful quick, if you ask me. That's not normal.'

'He was sick,' said Miranda, authoritatively and in a voice that carried. 'Poor wee lad. Months of colic, or something.'

'Poor Maggie, you mean,' said Betty. 'And I thought it was his ears? Nearly ran poor Bruce off his feet with house calls, either way.'

Di sympathised. Shirley's lad had had terrible ear trouble as a baby. It had about done in both parents. Olive, across the way, was heard to agree conclusively with the abnormality of developing an attachment to other people's children. This was possibly, if you listened to Naomi, because Olive wouldn't have known how to attach herself to her own children if forced to contemplate the issue for a fortnight.

Di thought of Ken with a young Jims, though of course that had been before all that stuff had come out about – well, anyway. It had been before. He'd been that proud of teaching him to shave, Di remembered. And of Jims on that bicycle...A ninth birthday gift, shockingly green, and Ken bragged from the Glen way out to Charlottetown about his boy being the best cyclist since the bicycle was invented.

From there it was easy to move on to thoughts of Jem and Faith with Kitty and Shirley's comfortable ease around Mharie McNeilly, who was only his sister-in-law but so very young that she was more like a cousin to her nieces and nephews than she was an aunt. Di paid for the green gingham, adding some white ribbon to the purchase at the till for good measure and was forced to conclude that what actually wasn't normal was the high degree of cattiness rampant in Miss Howard and her coterie of hangers-on.

The news came to Kingsport by letter, because naturally Glen St Mary could talk of nothing else, and that meant neither could Ingleside.

'Poor Alice Caldicote,' said Faith, who had dodged that evening's bridge four on the basis of exactly this letter, 'is sick to death of people apologizing to her about the fact she is not marrying a man she has no desire to marry.'

There was a lag as the others attempted to parse this sentence. Judith Carlisle got there quickest and laughed heartily.

'I remember Alice,' said Geordie. 'She was the one always on your brother's arm, Faith?'

'That's the one,' said Jem. 'Used to help Bruce doctor to Chinatown in their out-of-class hours. Talk about eclectic hobbies.'

'Jem!' said Faith.

'Not what I meant,' said Jem. 'I'm sure it was noble work and all that. But even I had hobbies, is all. Even you did.'

'If you count solving murders and heart surgery on nieces as hobbies,' said Faith. 'Oh, and raising two children in the off-hours.'

'Mum!' in chorus from aforementioned children, who were presently embroiled in the herculean labour of bathing a reluctant Dog Tuesday.

'You had hobbies,' said Mara Blythe and swatted playfully at Faith's arm with her hand of cards. 'I seem to remember advising on some of them.'

'Stop!' again in chorus from the kitchen gremlins. Tuesday howled commiserations.

'Alice,' said Faith for the sake of her children's nerves, 'is the Glen's District Nurse now. Has been for years, and the Glen's been trying to marry her off to my brother at least as long.' 

'Which of course,' said Jem and grinned wickedly, 'you have never been complicit in, darling.' 

Faith looked indignant. Jem very carefully did not catch his wife's eye. The Carlisles laughed heartily. 

'What no one has said yet,' said Shirley from beside his wife, 'is who Bruce Meredith is marrying, if not Nurse Caldicote. I'd ask for the particulars of why the Glen cares but I think we can take that one as read.'

'Surely,' said Faith, 'after the interference it ran with your marriage…'

'Don't remind me,' said Mara and advanced a bid Faith could not follow in the bridge affair. Neither could Teddy Lovall, obviously, because he looked up from chess with Jem to ask, 'Was that a good thing?'

'The marriage?' said Shirley, deliberately, Faith suspected, playing obtuse. 'Much better than good.'

'Stop!' wailed the put-upon gremlins in chorus.

Geordie tried to answer the question earnestly, and Faith, because she had long ago lost the plot of the bridge game, stuck to things she could properly understand. Consequently, she was in the middle of explaining the short and unfortunate history of one Maggie Crawford when Dog Tuesday leaped ill-advisedly from the sink, showing a striking disregard for his elongated back, and ran sopping and sudsy into the living room. To top the routine off he dived, damp and dripping onto Faith's knees, and began kneading her the better to settle in a disgruntled doughnut of sad sogginess.

'Of course,' said Faith to Tuesday and the growing patch of damp on her skirt, 'I see now how you have made that spot different in exactly the same way it was before.'

'Poor Tuesday,' said Jem. 'Non-consensual bathing is really too much for a fellow to bear.' But he didn't stop Helen advancing with her towel either, Faith noticed, so he obviously knew what was good for him if Tuesday did not.

'Will we get dresses for the wedding?' asked Helen as she towelled Tuesday. 'And can mine be longer, and no smocking? Please?'

Clever, Faith thought, to ask with the ranks of adults massed like this, because it easily halved the potential for disagreement.

'No,' said Jem with more vim than was strictly necessary, and who also, so far as Faith could judge, knew nothing of women's fashion. Neither did Geordie Carlisle, nor Teddy nor Shirley either, but they all chorused their agreement. Judith rolled her eyes and Faith raised her eyebrows. Mara said, 'We'll talk about it in the making up, shall we, lamby?'

Helen beamed.

Jem said, 'Don't you dare. I know how this goes. What Helen does, Sophy does, and Soph really is too young – '

'Teddy's hardly the only one that can wrangle gremlins,' said Mara unconcerned. 'I'll manage Sophy.'

'She won't even notice she's being managed,' said Judith. 'You watch.' Then she bid or played a trick or some other bridge nicety that was beyond Faith. Jem grumbled something about Kitty taking his part, and how she would have done so had she been here.

'Mm,' said Faith, 'that's right. Kitty was all about babying our gremlins and not at all for inculcating independent thinking.'

'We'll have to call her, obviously,' said Jem.

Geordie Carlisle laughed outright. 'To talk Helen out of a grown-up gown at 17? I shouldn't think it likely.'

'Hardly,' said Judith. 'To tell her about the wedding, my love, and will she be coming. I take it she's been counted in the invitation?'

'Always,' said Faith. Geordie only ahhed enlightenment. 'Though of course,' said Faith to Jem, 'you'll have to reassure her no one wants her to cover the story.'

'Kitty?' said Teddy with a shake of his head. 'She'll cover it anyway. Just you watch.'

'We've got to go, I suppose,' said Ken Ford to his wife, who was presently examining a wedding invitation, return address the New Manse, Glen St Mary.

'Mm,' hummed Rilla. 'So that will mean a new frock for Sissy – ' cue groaning from the young woman in question, 'and…' But here Rilla broke off to groan herself. She buried her face in her hands and said from behind her fingers, 'Fancy our chances of getting Lissy into something smart for the occasion?'

'Aunt – ' began one of the boys but the others stopped him. The aunts were no longer acceptable breakfast table conversation. They were doubly unacceptable as pertained to wedding talk. This realisation opened up a whole other quandary.

Little, fearless Sissy, who baulked only at the prospect of dresses and ruffles, was the one to broach it. Never mind the No Trespassing sign stamped clearly across both parents' faces.

'Will Jims be there?' she asked with all the zeal of a besotted younger sibling. 'I know he couldn't make Christmas because of work, but it's a summer wedding, so maybe…'

Rilla looked at Ken, who looked back at Rilla, who in turn looked at baby Lissy, mentally eying her up for possible infantine dress patterns.

'We haven't seen him in ages and ages,' said Sissy, undeterred. 'And he was always friendly with Bruce.'

And didn't that just put a whole other colour on it, thought Rilla uneasily, knowing what they knew now. Not for the first time she cursed the unthinking colleague of Ken's that had dropped them all unceremoniously into the mire. If only, she thought, looking now at Ken, who looked ever more exhausted by the second, he had kept quiet. If only someone had stopped him. If only he hadn't gone to look up Jims…If only it were possible to continue looking the other way. If only…if only…if only.

'Out,' said Ken to the cherubs. 'The lot of you. Go on. Mops needs a run and – '

'But is Jims coming,' said Sissy. 'I want to know!'

'Sis,' said Anthony in warning tones. Rilla watched as he got a hand on her shoulder and shepherded her clumsily out of the dining room. Vaguely Ken heard their clattering in the hall, the scrabbling for shoes and leads and toys. Liam doubled back and swept Lissy up into his arms.

'We'll take her in the pram,' he said. 'No bother.' Rilla waved her thanks.

'We'll just go down to Chorley Park,' Anthony called indistinctly from the hall.

There was a bang as the front door closed followed by a rattle as the screen door swung open and then shut again after it. Mops barked gleefully. Alone, Rilla said to Ken, 'Sissy's not wrong. We've got to do something about Jims.'

'And you're suggesting playing at happy families for…what? A weekend? A summer?'

'It might be nothing,' said Rilla. 'Work might not be able to spare him, anyway.'

'Or he'll say it can't, which comes to the same thing,' said Ken. 'Which, as I think of it, is probably better for Sissy.'

'Probably,' said Rilla. 'She'd only get attached all over again. You don't think…I mean, it might look odd. And you know what Dad is like about getting everyone together. If Jims isn't there he'll poke and prod until he's satisfied with the why not part of the explanation. I can't face that, either.'

'Might be worth filling him in,' said Ken. 'Always supposing that bloody pet reporter of your brother's hasn't beat us to it.'

Rilla shook her head. 'I did not,' she said, 'bring up a war baby by hand so that my father and brother could condemn him for…'but she couldn't finish. Couldn't bear to. 'Anyway, it's good odds Miss Forster has told them. She's hardly the sort to sit on her hands.'

'No,' said Ken grimly. 'I expect you're right, more's the pity. But about Jims…'

'He saved Sissy,' Rilla said. 'That ought to count for something.'

Imperceptibly Ken nodded. 'It still wouldn't work though. And the tears when inevitably we all went our merry ways again…I can't face it.'

'Nor can I,' said Rilla. It hurt, of course, but it was safer, really. For all of them.

The invitation arrived in Struan3 later than it should because of the snow that year. Mandy found it in their letter box as she came up from the pond and read it in the shade of the porch, with its overhanging roof, while the little girls danced around her.

'Will it be as grand as Lord Harrington's wedding?' asked Bea. This was the much-discussed, well-beloved detective of their mother's creation. His ongoing courtship of one Beatrice Worthing had been a subplot of the series for years now.

Said Hattie, 'And will Mummy do us special frocks?'

And, Mandy wondered, but did not ask, will we end up going? She thought probably not. Weddings meant bells, and bells meant one of Dad's bad spells, and anyway, he was getting quite a name for painting Struan in all it's seasons. There would no doubt be any number of requests he would want to try and honour. Besides, Mandy wasn't sure she wanted to go. Not just because of Dad and the bells but because Mick was here, and Aunt Poppy was nearby, and now Mandy was older she could make that trip alone whenever she wanted. She was old enough too to idle long afternoons away watching the ponds and…Bea brought her back to earth.

'And will there be dancing?'

'Rabbit,' said Mandy, 'the last wedding in our family happened before Miri and I were old enough to remember.' Then, because two little noses were scrunched up in confusion, she stuffed the letter under one arm and swung both girls awkwardly up in her arms and said, 'You remember Miri. She's my twin, Hattie, like Bea is yours. And her hair is brown like Bea's.'

'Not a bee!' said Beatrice.

'Rabbit, then,' said Mandy and nudged the door open with the lift and twist of an ankle. 'But if we do go,' nuzzling Hattie's ruddy-haired head, 'you can bet there will be dancing.'

'And you'll dance with Mick Challow?'

Mandy laughed and set the girls down on the floor. 'I don't think he's going, darlings. I'll dance with you, shall I? Dashing White Sergeant?'

Squeals of glee from the little girls. Mandy shook her head and set the letter on the mantle, where it would get noticed and where little girls with absent minds and impish fingers couldn't get hold of it.

But they were going. Mum and Dad agreed on that over dinner. Mandy said once, 'But the wedding peel – '

Dad only said, 'Oh, we have ways and ways around that, don't we, Angel?' and gave Mum a look that made Mandy's insides squirm. But it was nice, too, seeing them like that, because Mandy knew not all parents were sentimental like this. Now Dad was twining a hand around Mum's and kissing it, and that made her stomach twist, too. But she knew the Christopherson boy at the school would have given his eye teeth for a scene like this, and that a younger Jims would have, too, so she didn't protest the way the little girls did. She just smiled the secretive, indulgent smile of a young woman beginning to navigate love herself and deigned to be tolerant about it.

Afterwards, she called Jims. She thought somebody ought to.

'Miss Witch,' he said. He sounded delighted. That was nice, too, because she'd had the letter with his new address, and the separate one for Tom too. So she knew life was not all smooth sailing.

'What are you trying to do, bankrupt the Wandering Merediths?'

'Pass on news about a wedding,' said Mandy. 'I take it you're not coming.'

There was a pause in which Mandy counted the heartbeats. Finally, regretfully, but succinctly, 'No. Better not chance it.'

'Of course,' said Mandy. 'Though if you did, you'd be safe with us. The people we've rucked up against over the course of Dad's painting…'

She did not elaborate. She could picture the quirk of Jims lips as he said, 'Take all sorts, do you?'

'It's been known. Funny thing, because it's not what strangers would expect of us.'

'No,' said Jims, agreeing easily. 'Elsewhere in breaking news, the Pope is Catholic and elephants have wrinkles. I don't know how to tell you, Miss Witch, but nothing your family has ever done is on record as obvious or expected.'

'Touché.'

'Anyway,' said Jims, 'I won't hold you up. But if you see them, kiss the Cherubs for me, will you?'

'If they'll let me,' said Mandy. She wound the telephone cord around her fingers.

'They will if you say it's from me. And if not, well, the rest to Mick, yeah?'

There was no good riposte for this. Mandy tried valiantly to compose one for fully five seconds before succumbing to the expense of the call. She settled on the expected instead, just to be contrary.

'Love you,' she said.

'And you to,' said Jims. 'Always, Miss Witch.'

'To the moon and back.'

The line went dead.

It would have surprised many people, not the least of them Bruce Meredith, to hear that news of his impending marriage had become central to a discussion held in the sun room of a house on Evelyn Road, Singapore. Present in this discussion were Carl, Una and Li Meredith. Also present but not particularly contributing – and these in no particular order – were Puck the monkey, who was munching on peanuts, Nenni the cat, sunning herself under the coffee table, Akela the dog, also asleep, also in the sun, but sheltering under Carl's feet for safety from Nenni, and Iris Meredith. They were drinking tea in the red teabowls, now more than ten years old while simultaneously examining the contents of the letter, where it lay open and exposed on the coffee table.

It had arrived too late, of course. Not by design, but in the current climate, everything coming in by boat got held up.

This did not stop Carl Meredith saying as he scratched at Akela's ears, 'Shall we go?' Beside him Li Meredith said nothing, but her eyes knit together and it was obvious the topic was under deep internal scrutiny. Una watched this with unflinching and unopinioned observation. In the middle of this tableau, little Iris pulled herself upright to coffee table level and helped herself, unsolicited to what was easily her second biscuit. Possibly third. Fourth was certainly not impossible.

'I wouldn't want to cause…'Li trailed off. Less her English, Una thought, more diplomacy as she tried to find a way to articulate how well or otherwise the Glen would take being confronted with Carl Meredith's Chinese wife.

'I think it should be about Bruce,' said Li. 'The wedding. I wouldn't want to spoil that with gossip or – unpleasantness.'

On the other hand, thought Una, the presence of Carl and family would almost certainly forestall the local Glen chatter about Miss Crawford's second marriage, or Bruce's affection for the baby, whose name was…Una pinched the bridge of her nose and came up short. She reached for the letter, scanned it, and the mental switch tripped neatly into place. Bertie, she thought. After his father. Of course.

'You should go though,' Li was saying now, because Una was not, so help her, suggesting that anyone coerce Li into serving as a decoy to the gossip-weave of Glen St Mary.

'And leave you behind?' said Carl, sounding really shocked.

'Well,' said Li, 'Una then. You'd like it – you could catch up with Naomi again. And Di.'

Una thought of it. Pinched again at the bridge of her nose. Little Bruce married. When had that become possible? And not to – well, he'd insisted after all, hadn't he, that Miss Caldicote was only a good friend, honest, really and truly until he was blue in the face. So perhaps, there had been something in that. It was still incredible. Bruce. Married. Nenni came and climbed lugubriously into Una's lap. Una, in turn, stroked Nenni's bespotted back, obliquely aware that she had yet to contribute to the ongoing discussion. To go back to the Glen…And what then, Una wondered? Be ambushed by ghosts? Feel the prick of her conscience for daring to let said ghosts go? It was a disconcerting revelation to come to, there with Bruce's wedding invitation on the table and Nenni thrumming like a motor car on her knee. But somewhere between her work at the Anglo-Chinese School and the evenings in the city with Carl and Li things that had once seemed so important had slipped quietly into oblivion, other things, even sometimes other people, displacing them.

Not Bruce though. Little Bruce. Una remembered as yesterday the long nights she had sat up listening to his prayers for the Belgian babies, the Lusitania passengers, how heavy her nightgown had grown with tears and mucous as he sobbed over Stripey. The thrill of anticipation she felt when he'd toyed with coming to them to do his medical training, and the simultaneous twinge of pride and dismay when instead he went to Kingsport and spent long hours in Chinatown. For Bruce, Una thought, going back might be worth it.

A voice Una was not entirely sure was hers was heard to say, 'I wouldn't want to travel alone.'

'I'm sure we could find someone going your way,' said Carl. 'Or people. Might have to be people, I suppose, given the distance.'

'And going back?' asked Una, because it seemed unlikely that there would be anyone prepared to do the Singapore trip in reverse. Not in the current political climate. Not with the risk of ongoing blockades. Carl hummed. Nenni purred. Iris, somewhere between shriek and exclamation, said, 'Auntie can't go!'

Startled, Nenni leapt from Una's lap and went to sulk under her skirt instead, long tail just discernable below the hem, swishing and bristling with indignation.

'Never mind, Firecracker,' said Una, gathering Iris onto her lap in lieu of the cat. 'Auntie isn't going anywhere.'

Iris, soothed, settled into boneless relaxation against Una's chest, sticky, biscuit-becrumbed fingers wrapped around Una's blouse.

'Oh,' said Carl, 'but surely if you want – '

'Don't force her,' said Li. 'If Una wanted to go she'd make the arrangements.' Over Iris's head the women traded smiles.

'No,' said Carl, 'I realise, but I thought – '

'Well it's nothing to do with the school,' said Li. 'Rev Peach would give her the leave; You must have saved up years of it, Una.'

Una had, too. And the languid summer in the Glen would hardly cut into teaching time anyway. Not so long as the Anglo-Chinese School kept stubbornly running on the same calendar as the British school year.

'If the invitation had come earlier,' Una said, 'then perhaps. But it's a long way for a flying visit, and I don't like to think about what might happen to the Causeway while I'm away – how it might affect getting back. Bruce will understand.'

He would too, Una was sure. It was there in the letter. No doubt her conscience would prick her for not going, but the fact was that the Glen had long since ceased to be home and she had even longer since ceased to martyr her time to other people. Oh, perhaps that was how it had started, Singapore and mission work, but it had long since grown into more than that. Here was home, and family, and if Li and Iris didn't feel safe making the trip, then Una could no more countenance it without them than Carl could.

'We'll send them something nice,' Una said. Li nodded. 'With red in it, for luck.'

Una nodded in her turn; Li had never forgot that gesture of Bruce's, the gift of those red cushions and all they represented. Perhaps, had he settled somewhere bigger, a city perhaps, even Kingsport, then going might have felt possible. But as it was…

Distance avails not, Una wrote back instead, unsure whether she or he would be more surprised by the quotation. I am with you – even so far away. All our love to both of you and best wishes. Perhaps some far-off day we'll sit together again. Until then…

As weddings went, Anne thought, this was a good one. Oh, there'd been the usual gossip over Maggie's baby, and a few caustic comments by the usual suspects – Irene Howard, Olive Drew, the odd stung, would-be-sweetheart – but nothing to write home about. Certainly, Bruce took it in stride, and as far as Anne could judge, so had the young woman. Well, she'd have to, raising a baby like that on her own for all that time, and worrying always that an ear infection might be polio.

No, the young people these days were made of stern stuff, and John Meredith spoke very well up in the pulpit. He was doing double duty, Jo not being there to take the prayers, but those were lovely too. More poetic, because it was John at the helm, but Anne loved poetry and the poetic, so this was no criticism.

Now, in the afterwards she leaned on her cane and watched the spectacle they made. Rilla was laughing on Ken's arm, while nearby Di clucked over baby Lissy. Lissy, all in lace, looked about as happy as one could expect from a lacey infant at a summer wedding, which was not much, and Anne hid a smile. They'd all done it, after all. She thought briefly of Nan's little girls - her first little girls - at Rilla's wedding, and laughed because Mandy and Miri had loved lace about as much as disgruntled Lissy currently was not enjoying it. Then, too, Little Jem, in Leslie's wedding photos…Anne shifted now to watch Jem. He was on the sidelines of the dance floor trying to talk medicine with Bruce and his father. Maggie Crawford, now Meredith took this also in good stride. Then Faith, radiant in red and looking like a rose, said, 'Oh, come on, you,' and that was that. She and Jem were dancing. Maggie, not to be outdone, seized her opening and tugged Bruce along, too.

Gilbert drifted back towards Anne. She tracked his progress, which was leisurely, with a smile there was no need to hide. Formal dress suited him.

'I reckon,' he said as he leaned against the back of her chair, 'we've done well, Anne-girl. What say?'

Outside, Anne knew, Nan and Jerry had slipped away to one of their quiet places. They would be dancing there, she supposed, keeping time to the trees and the last threads of whatever music reached them. Very romantical, her girlhood self would have said.

Immediately present, Amanda Meredith danced with baby Bea, who stood on Mandy's dainty dancing shoes and stumbled her first attempt at a waltz. Mandy gave her a smile like starlight and Bea laughed. Anthony, beside Mandy, had got little Hattie, and they were talking crosswise over the heads of the little girls. Sissy danced with Liam and Shirley with his wife, who still looked two-thirds fairy, even now.

Iain had got hold of Helen Blythe and Christopher had Isobel, and Sophy, so as not to be left out was proceeding to turn these two separate couples into a circle dance of her own creation while they alternated laughter and protest. Alastair McNeilly waltzed his daughter around the room. Everywhere was a glad jumble of crowding, pressing togetherness.

Anne leaned back and touched a gnarled hand to Gilbert's sun-browned one in answer.

'Very well indeed,' she said.