lamps and heavy silver cutlery. Finally back to the hotel and supper, passing a bottle of Provençal rosé over plates of heaped frites. Those were the days, and Finn and I were content to let Eve direct them, because the nights were ours.
“Have I mentioned,” I asked one night, my head against Finn’s arm, “that you look absolutely jaw dropping in a three-piece suit?”
“Aye, you have.”
“It seemed worth repeating.” I leaned over to tip out the last of the wine we’d brought up to bed. I was completely naked, no longer even slightly self-conscious in front of him as he lay with his hands clasped behind his head, admiring me. “When do we get the Lagonda back?”
“Maybe another week.” Upon learning we’d be in Grasse awhile, Finn made arrangements to have that elusive leak repaired. He telephoned every other day to check on his precious car like an anxious mother.
“You need a new car, Finn.”
“You know what a new car costs these days, what with the wartime metal drive?”
“Here’s to the Lagonda’s health, then.” I passed him the mug we were using for a wineglass. “I wouldn’t mind driving around Grasse instead of walking everywhere. My feet hurt, and I was counting on a few more months before I get enormous enough for aching feet.” As soon as we’d arrived in Grasse, my morning sickness had dropped away, and so had my perpetual draining tiredness. I didn’t know if it was the flower-scented breezes or all the lovemaking or just that the Rosebud was into her fourth month now, but suddenly I felt marvelous, full of boundless energy and ready for anything—even the endless walking all over Grasse. But I still missed the car.
Finn drained the last of the rosé, then wriggled around so he was sitting with his back against the footboard. He started massaging my toes under the sheet, and I wriggled pleasurably. The night was warm, we had all the shutters open and the smell of jasmine and roses drifted in. The lamplight encircled the bed, turning it into a ship adrift on a dark sea. By agreement we didn’t talk about René here, or the war, or any of the terrible things that had happened because of either. The nighttime hours belonged to happier conversations.
“Wait till you’re eight months in,” Finn predicted, massaging my arches. “That’s when the feet really start to hurt.”
“What would you know about eight months in, Mr. Kilgore?”
“Watching all my friends’ wives. I’m about the only one not hitched—first thing most of my mates in the 63rd did once they got home was knock up some girl and marry her. I’m a godfather at least three times over.”
“I can just see you standing over a font with a screaming armful of lace!”
“Screaming? Never. Babies like me. Go right to sleep the minute I pick them up.” A pause. “I like bairns. Always wanted a few.”
We let that hang in the air a moment before tiptoeing around it. “What else do you like?” I asked, giving him my other foot. “Besides Bentleys.” Last night he’d read aloud out of his motoring magazine the entire mechanical rundown of the Bentley Mark VI, aping my American accent outrageously as I pummeled him with a pillow.
“A man with a Bentley has everything he needs, lass. Except maybe a good garage to keep her in fighting trim. The one that’s got the Lagonda now, they’re good.”
I tickled his chest with my toes. “You could run a place like that, you know.”
“Got to be good with more than cars to run a garage.” He made a rueful face. “You know me. The bankbook would end up under an oil can and you’d never read the check stubs for engine grease, and soon the banks would own it all.”
Not if I were the one keeping the books . . . I didn’t finish the thought even to myself, just released it gently and told him instead about the Provençal café I remembered so well, how that long-ago day had made striped awnings and Edith Piaf and goat cheese sandwiches my idea of heaven on earth. “Though an English breakfast should be featured. In the ideal café, that is.”
“Well, I do a braw one-pan fry-up . . .”
We both knew what we were doing here, during these lazy nighttime conversations. We were outlining a future and tentatively, almost fearfully, starting to sketch each other into it, then backing away from the unspoken with half smiles. Sometimes the night brought bad