Rosamunde Pilcher - September

Violet found herself assailed by a helpless rage that seemed to surge up from the soles of her feet and, reaching her cheeks, burn them red. Rage at Lottie's impertinence, and helplessness because Lottie was, after all, only voicing what all Alexa's family, obscurely, feared.

She said, "Alexa is very pretty and very dear. The fact that she is also independent has nothing to do with the friends she chooses."

But Lottie either ignored or missed the snub. She gave a little laugh, tossing her head. "I wouldn't be too sure about that. And coming from London, too. Lot of money grubbers. Yuppies," she added with some force, saying the word as though it were dirty.

"Lottie, I don't think you know what you're talking about."

"All these girls are the same. Always were, see a handsome man and they're away like a bitch in heat." She shivered suddenly, as though the excitement of the thought had reached every nerve-end of her gangling frame. Then she put out a hand and closed it over Violet's wrist. "That's another thing. Henry. See him about the place. He's small, isn't he? Comes to Edie's and never says a word. Looks funny to me sometimes. I'd worry if I were you. Not like other little boys…"

Her bony fingers were strangely strong, the grip viselike. Violet, repelled, knew an instant of panic. Her immediate instinct was to prize the fingers loose, get to her feet and escape, but just then a girl walked by pushing a child in a buggy, and common sense came to Violet's rescue. The panic, the annoyance faded. It was, after all, just poor Lottie Carstairs, to whom life had not been kind, letting her sad, sexual frustrations and her rambling imagination run away with her. And if Edie could stand having her cousin to live with her, surely Violet could cope calmly for a single afternoon.

She smiled. She said, "It's good of you to be concerned, Lottie, but Henry is a very ordinary little boy and sound as a bell. Now…" She shifted slightly, glancing at her watch, and felt Lottie's fingers loosen their manic grip and slip away. Violet, unhurried, reached for her handbag. "… I think it's time we went and found somewhere pleasant to have our tea. I'm feeling quite peckish. I fancy fish and chips. How about you?"

As Isobel, worn out with the daily demands of her busy life, retreated from time to time to the linen room, so her husband found solace in his workshop. This was in the basement of Croy, an area of stone-flagged passages and dimly lighted cellars. The old boiler lived down here, a brooding, smelly monster that looked large enough to drive a liner, and demanded constant and regular attention and enormous quantities of coke. As well, one or two other rooms were still employed-to store unused china, unwanted items of furniture, the coal and the logs, and a much-diminished wine cellar. But mostly, the basement stood deserted, hung with cobwebs and invaded each year by families of field mice.

The workshop was next door to the boiler room, which meant that it was always pleasantly warm, and it had large windows, barred like a jail's, which faced south and west and let in sufficient light for cheerfulness. Archie's father, neat with his hands, had set it all up, with heavy benches, racks for tools, vises, and clamps. And it was here that the old man had liked to potter, repairing his children's damaged toys, dealing with various inevitable breakages that occurred about the house, and concocting his own salmon flies.

After he died, the workshop had stood empty for some years, unused, neglected, and gathering dust. But when Archie came back to Croy after his eight months in hospital, he painfully made his way down the stone stairs, limped the length of the echoing passage, and took repossession. The first thing he saw as he entered the room was a broken balloon-back chair, its back legs shattered by the weight of some corpulent occupant. It had been brought down to the workshop before old Lord Balmerino died. He had made a start on its repair but never finished the job, and the chair had been left, forgotten and untended, ever since.

Archie stood and looked at the forlorn piece of furniture for some time. Then he shouted for Isobel. She came. She helped him sweep away the dirt and the cobwebs and the mouse droppings and the drifts of old sawdust. Scuttling spiders were sent packing, as were solidified pots of glue, piles of yellowed newspapers, ancient tins of paint. Isobel cleaned the windows and somehow forced them open, letting in the sweet fresh air.

Meanwhile Archie, having wiped and oiled all the fine old tools, the chisels and hammers, saws and planes, replaced them in orderly fashion in their racks. With that done, he sat down and wrote out a list of all that he needed, and Isobel went into Relkirk and bought it for him.

Only then was he able to get down to work and finish the job that his father had started.

Now he sat at that same bench, the afternoon sun slanting through the top half of the window, and finished priming the carving he had been working on, from time to time, over the last month or two. It was about ten inches high and depicted the figure of a girl sitting on a boulder with a small Jack Russell terrier leaning against her knee. The girl wore a sweater and a kilted skirt, and her hair was windblown. It was, in fact, Katy Steynton and her dog. Verena had given Archie a photograph of her daughter, taken up on the moor last year, and from this he had made the drawings for the carving. With the primer dry, he would paint it, reproducing as closely as possible the muted colours of the photograph. And then it would be given to Katy as a twenty-first birthday present.

It was done. He laid down the brush and leaned back in his chair to stretch the aches out of his limbs, and assess his creation over the top of his half-moon spectacles. He had never before attempted the complications of a sitting figure, and a female one at that, and was inordinately pleased with the way it had turned out. Girl and dog made a charming composition. Tomorrow he would paint it. He looked forward with some satisfaction to applying the final touches.

From upstairs, he heard the faint sound of the telephone ringing. It was only just audible, and for months he and Isobel had been talking about the sense of installing another bell in the basement so that he could hear the sound more easily, should he be alone in the house. But they had done nothing about this and he was alone in the house now, and wondered how long the telephone had been ringing, and if there was time for him to make his way upstairs and pick up the receiver before the caller, losing heart, hung up. He thought about ignoring it but the ringing continued. Perhaps it was important. He pushed back his chair and made his slow way down the passage and up the stairs to answer the wretched instrument. The nearest receiver was in the kitchen and it was still ringing shrilly as Archie crossed over to the dresser and picked it up.

"Croy."

"Dad!"

"Lucilla!" His heart leaped with joy. He reached for a chair.

"Where were you? The phone's been ringing for hours."

"Down in my workshop." He settled himself, taking the weight off his leg.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Is Mum not there?"

"No. She and Hamish have gone blackberrying. Lucilla, where are you?"

"I'm in London. And you'll never guess where I'm ringing from. You'll never guess in a thousand years."

"In that case you'd better tell me."

"The Ritz."

"What the hell are you doing there?"

"Staying the night. And then we're driving up tomorrow. We'll be home tomorrow night."

Archie took off his spectacles; he could feel the grin of delight spreading over his face. "Who's 'we'?"

"Jeff Howland and me. And… wait for it… Pandora."

"Pandora?"