A Hopeless Romantic Part 12

"Lovely house," said Lady #1, simpering and holding a bag from the gift shop.

"What a lovely day out, my Lord," said Lady #2, who had a wicker basket under her arm that was crammed to the gills with jams and marmalades with the Chartley logo on them.

Charles held up his hand in a gesture of thanks. "I'm so glad you've enjoyed yourselves," he said simply. "Do hope to see you back here sometime."

Nick nodded. "Thank you for coming," he said. "It's wonderful you came, isn't it, Charles?"

"Oh, thank you, Lord Ranelagh," said Lady #3 as Charles smiled politely at them, and they all dissolved into the near-hysterical yet deferential giggles that affect the British public only when confronted with the Royal Family or members of the aristocracy or people like Judi Dench or Joanna Lumley.

"Thanks again," said Nick, steering Charles gently but firmly away from them.

Charles pulled his cuffs down from his tweed jacket, and smiled at Laura. "Lovely to meet you," he said. "Enjoy the rest of your holiday."

"Thank you," said Laura as he drifted away. "I..."

"So," said Nick, turning back to her. "Will I see you tonight, then?"

He looked at her intently, and Laura felt herself losing her nerve. "Well-" she began.

"Look," he broke in, "shall we make an agreement? I'll be in the bar at eight. I normally am, in any case. So if you're there, you're there."

Laura didn't want to disappoint him, but she told herself it didn't seem as if he'd really mind that much either way. "Cool," she said. "I'm not sure what I'm doing for the rest of the day, anyway. So I'll see. Thanks."

"Well, Laura. I hope the rest of your day here is enjoyable. Thank you for coming. Apart from the low point of nearly burning down the house and its grounds, you've had a good time, I hope?"

He was already turning away, withdrawing. Laura said honestly, "Well, Nick-I know this isn't really your business, but since you ask-actually, I haven't had a very good time, to be honest. It's not much fun here, not for me, anyway."

Nick stopped and turned around. "What?" he said sharply.

Laura twisted the camera strap around in her hands. "It's just-well, it could have been better."

"Could have been better?" he said, incredulous.

"Yes," Laura said firmly. "It's a stately home, I know that. But it's a day out for most people. That's really important, you know? You can't just expect them to have to negotiate with two lunatics having s.e.x in the ticket kiosk to get in, and then charge them a vast amount of money for the privilege of seeing some second-rate paintings in a few dusty rooms, and then round it all off with some rock-hard, stale scones in the cafe. On their precious holiday. I really don't mean to be rude, I'm sure Charles is lovely, he seems very nice and it's wonderful for you that you live here and everything. But since you ask, no, I haven't had a good time."

Nick flinched as she finished, as if someone had thrown cold water at him. "Well, thank you for that," he said after a while.

Laura bit her lip. "I'm sorry. But you did ask. Look-I've got to go now. Oh, h.e.l.l, look, there's my mum. She can't meet you, she'd want to meet Charles, too, and that'd be like suicide. Bye, Mr. Nicholas Whatever-Your-Name-Is. Thanks, sorry about everything. I've been so rude, I can't believe it."

"Don't worry," Nick said. He took her hand. "By the way, Nick-it's short for Dominic, which I hate. You haven't been rude. You've been very interesting. Incredibly interesting, in fact. Enjoy the rest of your holiday, Laura. If I don't see you."

"Thanks, Nick-Short-for-Dominic," said Laura.

Nick touched his hand to his forehead and made a mock salute. He smiled at her politely, slightly formally. "Take care, anyway. Bye."

In the car on the way back, Laura was silent as Angela and George chatted enthusiastically about the things they'd seen, what they'd done, and the postcards and tea towels they'd purchased.

"What a beautiful house. I mean, one room after the other, so beautiful. You missed the picture gallery, Laura. It was-well, beautiful. All of it was! How do you live there, I wonder? It must be strange. Mustn't it?" Angela gabbled, like a six-year-old after eating too much candy.

"I agree," said George, taking a corner slowly. "A strange life, living there. I was talking to-harrumph-I was talking to Marjorie, that very nice lady in the shop. She was telling me the marquis is there full-time now. He hardly ever goes to London anymore. On that estate, day after day. He knows them all by name, ever such a nice chap these days, apparently."

"Of course," said Angela. "Yes, of course. He was the one who-"

"Yes," said George. "And his sister. One of them."

"Of course, there's three, isn't there."

"Yes, of course."

"Of course what?" Laura broke in, unable to contain herself anymore.

"We-ell," said Angela. "Yes-hrrm. Audrey-that's the very nice lady who was in the toy soldier display. Well, she said there was a time they were all very worried about him. The young marquis, I mean. Before his father died, the old marquis. Quite wild, apparently, when he was younger. Drink. Drugs. Women. You know, all sorts. And the sister, too. Rose. She had to go to a clinic, a rehab clinic, to sort herself out. This was after the mother left, you know. She went quite wild-and of course Audrey wouldn't have felt it appropriate to tell me, naturally."

"What do you mean, drink, drugs, women?" Laura said. "That doesn't really mean anything these days, you know. I mean, we've all-well. So he went clubbing a few times and got p.i.s.sed. Big deal."

"Oh, no," said her mother, shaking her head sorrowfully, as if the Marquis of Ranelagh were the son of one of her friends from Harrow. "Really went off the rails. Few years after his parents split up. Well, poor boy, he was only eleven when it happened. It was awful. All over the papers. Well, some of the papers. Not the Guardian, naturally."

Laura couldn't work out if this was a veiled criticism of the Guardian for not having its reporting priorities right, or of her for reading a paper that did not concern itself minutely with the lives of the aristocratic, rich, and famous. So she said nothing, but a pang of sympathy for Charles shot through her. Poor Charles, poor thing. To have that everywhere, your family's misery, picked over by vultures and people who didn't know you, who made up their minds about you-it must have been b.l.o.o.d.y.

"Well, he seems okay now," she said in a neutral voice.

"Yes, lovely man, apparently," Angela said happily. "Audrey was telling us-he's Going Out with a very nice young girl. Cecilia Thorson. Her father is some Swedish millionaire. Very grand. Married to one of the Inghams, Lady Tania."

Laura rolled her eyes. She couldn't care less, she really couldn't. Even her old self, pre-purge, was completely uninterested in the lives of socialites and which posh person was s.h.a.gging which other posh person. Maria the simple nun and Captain von Trapp-now, that was interesting. Had been interesting, rather.

"That's been in the papers, too, I remember now," said Angela. She swiveled round in her seat and lowered her voice, as if there might be a Daily Mail reporter hiding in the glove compartment. "I hear it's serious. They're all hoping she's-well, The One! You know!"

"Ooh, goody!" said Laura sarcastically, but it was wasted.

"Yes!" said Angela, nodding.

"So, when are the Sandersons arriving?" Laura asked, deftly steering the subject away.

Angela folded her hands in her lap. "Early Sat.u.r.day, I think. Your grandmother was going to call them today to confirm who's staying and how long, that sort of thing."

"Are they definitely coming?" Laura said childishly.

"If you mean Lulu and Fran, yes, they definitely are," Angela said sternly. "And very nice it'll be, too. Yes. Annabel's bringing pudding, that's very kind of her."

"Is Robert coming?" George asked suddenly.

"Yes, of course he is!" Angela said.

"Oh," said George.

"Look, you two," said Angela as the car turned into Seavale and the wheels crunched slowly over the sandy stone path, "stop being childish. Yes, you, George," she said to her husband, who had opened his mouth to object. "It's Mum's day, and we'll all have a lovely time, and it'll be great. Besides, Cedric Forsythe's coming up, and he's bringing Jasper."

"Oh, great," said George, cheering up. Beneath her father's staid exterior, Laura had long suspected, there lurked the heart of a true romantic. He loved the old-British glamour of Mary's neighbors in the apartment block. Especially that of Cedric Forsythe, who had starred in George's favorite film, When Victory Comes, a stirring black-and-white epic about our boys in the Second World War. Cedric Forsythe was dapper, polished; at least, his onscreen persona was. The cinema Cedric smoked panatelas and wore silk dressing gowns; he raised his eyebrow as he talked-but he could still shoot a d.a.m.ned Boche at fifty paces and knew how to pull a plucky WAAF from a sinking boat, sling her over his shoulders, and swim four miles back to sh.o.r.e. In short, everything George Foster dreamed of being, but had long accepted was not his lot to be.

"I just hope it's what Mum wants," Angela said anxiously.

George flashed a smile at his daughter in the rearview mirror. Her frown lifted momentarily, and they shared a conspiratorial grin.

chapter seventeen.

T here was a message on Laura's phone when she got back to the house: "h.e.l.lo, Laura. It's Jo. We-I miss you. Hope you're okay. Hope Norfolk's good-what you needed. Listen, give me a call. Wanted a chat. Just wondering if you're on for drinks on Sunday. Me and Hil. Hope so."

Laura had deliberately left the phone behind that day, afraid of the power it had since Amy's text message had disturbed the equilibrium of her day. The phone was her link with her life back in London, and she was still of two minds about it all. She missed it; she just wanted to be back in the pub with Yorky and Jo and Simon and all of that. And because she couldn't see the way to do it, while she was here in Norfolk being treated like a ten-year-old, she'd behave like one, renounce all responsibility for her other life. She texted Jo: Drinks would be great. Looking forward to it. Hope yr OK. Love L.

She brushed her hair, and thought about what had happened at Chartley Hall. How embarra.s.sing that was, to have nearly set fire to a whole estate. Stupid her. An involuntary smile crossed her face, though. It had been funny-the aftermath. Even though Nick had been, well, really quite odd, there was something she liked about him. She tried to a.n.a.lyze it. Basically, what she liked was that she could talk to him. And enjoy it. She felt, in a funny way, as if she could say what she liked to him and he wouldn't care. That was the great thing about strangers. Especially quite handsome strangers. She smiled at the memory. Ah, well. Nice of him to ask, but-she couldn't go. She wasn't here to go out drinking with strange but hunky farmhands. She was here to...get a life.

Outside on the terrace, George was fetching sherry for Angela and Mary as Laura joined them to watch the sun set.

"No, it was a lovely day," Angela was saying. "We had a wonderful time, didn't we-Ah, there's Laura. Didn't we, love?"

"Oh, yes," said Laura, handing the bowl of crisps to Mary and sitting down in one of the old wooden reclining chairs. "It was marvelous. There isn't a tea towel left in that gift shop, is there, Mum?" She stretched and yawned as her father handed her a sherry.

"No, there isn't. Wait till Sat.u.r.day, you'll see," Angela said to her mother, nodding significantly. "Now, talking of your birthday-"

"My birthday present is a tea towel?" said Mary in rigid accents, sitting upright.

"What?" said Angela.

"It had better not be," said Mary. Laura stood up and wandered over to the edge of the terrace to look out at the sea.

"Of course not," said Angela impatiently. "I was joking, Mum. I'm not that bad, you know, that I'd buy my own mother a tea towel for her eighty-fifth birthday. Come off it," she finished rather bossily.

"No," said Laura mischievously. "Wait till you see the book of postcards they've got you. The first Marquis of Ranelagh, 1578. The seventh marquis, 1886."

"Not true," said George, but he was smiling in recognition. "Here, I did get a collection of postcards, though, you're right." He held out a small paper bag to Laura, who came over to collect it.

"Actually, you'll see," he said, taking out the postcards and showing them to her. "The seventh marquis was a great man, it's strange you should pick him. In 1880, he inherited the t.i.tle from his father, you know."

"Right," said Laura, grinning. "I'll never make the same mistake again." She wanted to add, "I met the Marquis of Ranelagh today," but she knew it would prompt more questions than she wanted.

"I should hope not," said George, but then slightly ruined the moment of levity by clearing his throat and saying seriously, "Look at him, Laura. He was a very extraordinary man, the seventh marquis." He fumbled amongst the postcards as Laura stood over him, a sinking feeling washing over her. "Here we go. He was young, you know. And he did all these amazing things. This was all in the nineteenth century. He put proper drainage in the estate, overhauled the workers' cottages, all of that. He built the pub in the village, most of the cottages there, too. He added on the South Wing at Chartley. He's the one who collected first editions-he bought all the Jane Austens in the library. And he married his childhood sweetheart. But she died-it was terrible. Cholera. He never forgave himself. Dominic, seventh marquis. Amazing chap."

He handed Laura the postcard, and she took it, interested despite herself. There, in tight breeches, a viciously tailored jacket, and a top hat, standing rather stiffly against a country backdrop with Chartley in the distance, was the portrait of a young man, dark hair elegantly coiffed, dark eyes friendly and amused. He was smiling, holding a book in one hand, his expression relaxed and at odds with his formal stance. Laura stared at it. It was a very immediate portrait; the young man could be someone you'd walk past on the street today. He even looked vaguely familiar.

"Take it," said her father, and Laura put it between the pages of The Nine Tailors, which she'd brought with her to the terrace.

"We'll look at the rest later," said George. "All very interesting."

"Oh, yes," said Angela. "Ooh." She clapped her hands, and turned to Mary. "Now, then. I want to buy the meat for the barbecue tomorrow or Friday. What special requests do you have, Mum? It's your birthday."

"Chicken hearts," said Mary promptly.

"What?" said Angela.

"Chicken hearts. We used to have them when we were living in Brazil, you know. Xan loved them."

"Okay," said Angela, in a tone that said clearly, I will say yes now, but we ain't getting no chicken hearts. "But, some burgers? Chicken drumsticks, as well?"

"Don't mind, really," said Mary, slapping her hand down on the wooden arm of her chair. "Honestly, love, I really don't care. The main thing is having all my family there. It'll be so lovely. Annabel's making some amazing cake thing. It sounds fantastic."

"Great," said Annabel's stepsister, slightly icily.

"It will be lovely to see Lulu and Fran again, won't it?" Mary said. "And Simon will be back then, won't he?"

"He will," said Angela. "Well, I hope so." A frown crossed her face as George shifted in his seat and said, "Harrumph." Simon was not exactly renowned for his reliability, nor indeed for his communication skills when away. Although this time he had been quite good-they'd all had postcards, and the usual long e-mails detailing people and places that meant little or nothing to Laura, but seemed to give her parents and Mary no end of pleasure, since they kept rereading them out to each other.

Laura feared for her mother if he didn't make it back in time. She knew that in some small part of her mind, Angela had obviously, fervently, envisaged a scene where Simon strode in, tall and tanned and charming, with a lovely poncho-style present for his grandmother, greeted his family and aunt, and was a general hero for coming all the way back from Machu Picchu just for lunch, whilst skeletal Lulu and heavy-thighed Fran looked on and contributed nothing, and Annabel had to concede that, yes, for once, the Fosters had won this round.

Laura changed the subject. "What's for supper? Anything I can do?"

"No, it's all ready," said Angela. "Some salady things, I hope that's okay. Something simple so we could eat by eight." She turned to her mother and smiled brightly. "Mum, you must be tired after all that gardening today-you've really cleared it all out, haven't you? It looks marvelous, I must say."

"Thank you, darling," said Mary. "Good-o."

"Yes, yes," said George amiably, picking up the thread of his wife's conversation. "I'll give you a hand tomorrow." He paused, and rubbed his hands together. "Sooo. Tomorrow. Where shall we go, dear? I thought the windmill at Moxham might be nice. What do you think?"

"Well," said Angela excitedly, "we could try for the Seekers Tribute Band in the evening, couldn't we?"

"Yes, we must!" said George. "Tasks for tomorrow, Angela! Now, let's get the guidebook and decide what to do tomorrow, eh?" He loped over to the table and picked up the guidebook. "Hm."

He bent his head in concentration, as Angela looked happily out to sea and Mary downed the rest of her drink. Laura glanced at her watch. It was seven-fifty. She looked up, out across the lawn. The sun was crowning the sea, casting long golden shadows across the water. It was very still. Suddenly she stood up.

"I'm going out," she said.

Her parents looked up at her, bewildered.

"What?" said Angela. "Where? Going out where?"

"Just out," said Laura. "Can I take the car?"

"Er-no!" said George. "You can't suddenly announce you're taking off just before supper. Where are you going?"

Laura bit back a sharp reply, and instead said, "Sorry. I just want a drive. Someone I used to work with-well, she lives up here. Naomi? Do you remember her?" Her parents' faces were blank. "She works for the Wetlands Trust now. Well, I got a text from her earlier. She's over at the George. I thought I might join her for a drink, but it's rude of me to leave without having supper"-she plowed on, aware she was laying it on a bit thick but hoping against hope it'd work-"so perhaps I shouldn't go, you're right. I just fancied a bit of a change, getting out, seeing some friends."

Laura's parents looked at each other, and Laura held her breath. She knew they were thinking, She's been through a bad time. Not sure how bad. But something's not right. Perhaps this is a good thing. Young people ought to get out and about on holiday. Shouldn't they?

They must have managed to convey these thoughts to each other by ESP, because they nodded at each other at the same time. George produced the car keys and dropped them reluctantly into his daughter's hand.