Rosamunde Pilcher - September

It was as though Pandora had ceased to exist, was already a ghost.

There was no point in asking why, because it was patently obvious. Croy belonged to Archie and Isobel, and to keep the place going as a viable proposition, every room must be put to good use. And Pandora had given up any claim to it by the simple act of going away and never coming back.

Standing there, she thought of those last miserable weeks when she had been beyond herself with an unhappiness that she was not allowed to talk about. Misery had made her cruel, and she was cruel to the two people she loved most in the world; snapping at her father, ignoring her mother, sulking for days on end and generally making their lives a misery.

In this room, she had spent hours lying face downwards on her bed with her record player churning out, over and over again, the saddest songs she knew. Matt Monro telling some female to "Walk Away." And Judy Garland tearing her guts out with "The Man That Got Away."

The road gets tougher, It's lonelier and rougher, With hope you burn up, Tomorrow he will turn up…

Voices.

Darling, do come and eat some lunch.

1 don't want any lunch.

I wish you'd tell me what's troubling you.

I just want to be left alone. It wouldn't be any good telling you. You'd never understand…

She saw again her mother's face, confused and dreadfully hurt. And was ashamed. At eighteen, I should have known better. I thought that I was adult and sophisticated, but the truth was that I knew less about life than a child. And it took me too long to find out.

Too long, and too late. All over. She closed the door and went back to her unpacking.

Dinner was over. They had sat, the six of them, around the candle-lit table, and eaten their way through Isobel's lovingly prepared celebratory meal. If she had not exactly killed a fatted calf, she had gone to great pains to produce a suitable feast. Cold soup, roast pheasant, creme brulee, and a splendid Stilton, all washed down by the best wine that Archie could bring up from his father's depleted cellar.

Now it was nearly ten o'clock, and Isobel, with Pandora in attendance, was in the kitchen dealing with the last of the washing-up-the pots and pans, the ivory-handled knives and vegetable dishes too large to fit into the dishwasher. Pandora was meant to be helping, but after drying up a knife or two and putting three saucepans into the wrong cupboard, she had laid aside the tea-towel, made herself a mug of Nescafe, and sat down to drink it.

Conversation during dinner had been non-stop, for there was much to hear and much to tell. The adventure of Lucilla and Jeff's bus journey down through France from Paris; their Bohemian sojourn in Ibiza; and at last the bliss of Majorca and the Casa Rosa. Isobel's mouth had watered, hearing Lucilla's description of the garden there.

"Oh, I would love to see it."

"You should come. Lie in the sun and do nothing."

Archie laughed at this. "Isobel lie in the sun and do nothing? You must be mad. Before you could blink, she'd be bottoms up in the flower-beds, tearing at weeds."

"I haven't got any weeds," said Pandora.

And then, home news. Pandora was avid for every scrap of gossip. The latest on Vi, the Airds, the Gillocks, Willy Snoddy. Did Archie still hear from Harris and Mrs. Harris? She listened with some dismay to the saga of Edie Findhorn and her cousin Lottie.

"Heavens! That ghoul. Don't say she's come back into our lives. I'm glad you warned me. I shall take pains to cross the road if I see her coming."

She was told about the Ishak family, exiled from Malawi and arriving in Strathcroy with scarcely a penny between them.

"… but they had some relations in Glasgow who'd already managed to do quite well for themselves, and with a bit of financial help from them, they managed to take over Mrs. McTaggart's newsagent's shop. You wouldn't recognize the place. It's a proper supermarket. We didn't think they'd last, but we were all mistaken. They're as industrious as ants, never seem to close their shop, and business booms. As well, we like them. They're all so helpful and kind."

And so on to the Balmerinos' slightly grander neighbours, which meant anybody living within a radius of twenty miles: the Buchanan-Wrights, the Ferguson-Crombies, the new people who had come to live at Ardnamoy; whose daughter had married; whose unlikely son had become a money-broker in the City and was coining millions.

No detail was unimportant. The only topic that was never brought up, as though by tacit agreement, was Pandora and what she had been doing with herself for the past twenty-one years.

She did not mind. She was back at Croy and for the moment that was all that mattered. The wayward years faded into unreality, like a life that had happened to another person, and surrounded by family she was happy to consign them to oblivion.

Sitting at the kitchen table, she sipped coffee and watched Isobel at the sink, scouring the roasting pan. Isobel wore red rubber gloves and a blue-and-white apron tied over her tidy dress, and it occurred to Pandora that she was an exceptional woman, peacefully labouring away and quite unresentful of the fact that the rest of her family had taken themselves off, and she was left to clear up the detritus of the meal by herself.

For, after dinner, the others had all dispersed. Archie, excusing himself, had gone down to his workshop. Hamish, with the promise of financial reward, had agreed to take advantage of the long evening light and mow the croquet lawn. He had gone to do this with good grace, and Pandora was much impressed. What she did not realize was how impressed Hamish had been by her. An aunt to stay was not an exciting prospect. Hamish had visions of a Vi-type person with grey hair and laced-up shoes, and had received the shock of his life when he was introduced to Pandora. A stunner. Like a film star. Over his pheasant, he entertained fantasies of showing her off to the other seniors in his class at Templehall. Perhaps Dad would bring her over to watch some match or other. Hamish's stock with schoolmates would go sky-high. He wondered if she liked rugger.

Isobel, I do love Hamish.

"I'm quite keen on him myself. I just hope he doesn't grow too enormous."

"He's going to be divinely handsome." She took another mouthful of coffee. "Do you like Jeff?"

Jeff, predictably sated by two weeks of female company and unaccustomed gracious living, had wheeled Lucilla down to the Strathcroy Arms for a restoring jar of Foster's lager downed in comfortably masculine surroundings.

"He seems really nice."

"Terribly kind. And all through that long drive, he never once lost his patience. A bit laconic, though. I suppose all Australians are strong and silent. I wouldn't really know. Never met any others."

"Do you think Lucilla's in love with him?"

"No, I don't think so. They're just… that awful phrase… very good friends. Besides, she's terribly young. You don't want to start thinking about permanent relationships when you're only nineteen."

"You mean marriage."

"No, darling. I don't mean marriage."

Isobel fell silent. Pandora decided that she had, perhaps, said the wrong thing and cast about for a more amusing and less touchy topic. "Isobel, I know who you haven't told me about. Dermot Honeycombe and Terence. Are they still running the antique shop?"

"Oh dear." Isobel turned from the sink. "Didn't Archie tell you in one of his letters? So sad. Terence died. About five years ago."

"I don't believe it. What did poor Dermot do? Find himself another nice young man?"

"No, never. He was heart-broken, but faithful. We all thought he might leave Strathcroy, but he stayed; all by himself. Still running the antique shop, still living in their little cottage. Every now and then he asks Archie and me over for a meal, and gives us tiny helpings of frightfully dainty food with amusing sauces. Archie always comes home starving and has to be given soup or cornflakes before he goes to bed."