The Country Escape - Jane Lovering Page 0,17

on the table next to mine. ‘I’m sorry? Did I say something?’

‘No, no…’ But the cold finger of memory had stroked its way down my spine like a ghost in this warm, companionable room. ‘No, I was just… anyway, I’d better go.’

‘I’ll walk you to your car.’

He stood up too, tall enough to cause the darts players to shout, ‘Oy, shift over, lanky!’ when his height intruded on their game.

Although the shout was good-natured, Gabriel did a sort of half-hunch, where most men would probably have raised two fingers and shouted back. He scuttled alongside me out of the pub, where the night air met us clear and chilly. ‘Sorry about that.’

‘They were just being idiots.’ I unlocked my car and we stood beside it for a moment. He looked as though he was weighing up the best way to take his leave. ‘Do you need a lift anywhere?’

‘A lift?’ he asked, as though this was the most bizarre suggestion anyone had ever made.

‘Yes, you know, you sit next to me and I drive my car where you need to go. Lift. It’s not an abstract concept.’ I hoped he’d accept, because I wasn’t sure whether I was going to go for the handshake businesslike farewell, or whether a cheek kiss might be more appropriate. Long exposure to Luc and his family, combined with much living in France, had made the cheek-to-cheek double kiss almost automatic, but I had to remind myself that in rural Dorset it probably meant you had to get engaged or something.

He shook his head. The slight, but nippy, breeze was tossing his hair about and he pushed it back with a hand. ‘Yes, sorry, I know what you mean, it’s just that I’m only a couple of miles from home, and the idea of driving that short a distance is odd.’

‘I thought you lived in Bridport?’ I remembered him saying something about it not being easy to find Patrick accommodation because of where he lived.

‘Well, I do, but I’m staying in Christmas Steepleton while I’m doing this location work. With my sister, Thea – she’s got a little flat over her shop. It’s easier than coming in every day on the bus.’

‘Oh.’

‘So, goodbye, then. I’ll come over in a couple of days and bring you the contract, show Keenan the place, that sort of thing.’

I sort of held out a hand and went for a cheek kiss simultaneously. He saw me lean in at the same time as his hand went out, and we ended up punching each other in the ribcage whilst banging our heads together as we tried to pull out of the ‘kiss’ situation without making contact. ‘Ow,’ I said, although it hadn’t been hard enough to hurt.

‘Sorry.’ Gabriel rubbed his chest. ‘That was…’

‘Awkward, yes. My fault, too much French kissing. Oh, no, I don’t mean that, I mean I’ve spent a lot of time in France. I teach French. And my husband was French. Is French,’ I gabbled, trying to cover up the fact that my face was so hot that it was probably summoning help from nearby villages, like a beacon on the cliffs. ‘So, yes. Goodbye.’

I got into the car and drove out of the car park with my window wound down to try to cool my cheeks.

6

A few days later, on a wet and windy day that made Dorset seem a bit less charming and a bit more exposed, I drove through to Bournemouth to buy Patrick a hay net. The orchard was getting muddy, except for the patch at the top of the slope, and I began to worry that he wouldn’t be getting enough food from the remaining grass.

When I drove back, windscreen wipers flailing ineffectually against the rain, there was a car parked in the gateway. Patrick had his head over the gate and was staring at it as though he’d never seen a wheeled vehicle before, and I had to inch past to get my car to its usual resting place near the front gate.

The rain thundered on the car roof. The lane was practically a stream, water cascading down the hill towards the ford and mingling with the leaves that were starting to fall. The whole thing had become a slick surface of brown, interwoven with little rivulets, like a map of the Nile delta done in miniature outside my door.

As soon as I got out of the car, the doors to the other car opened and Gabriel and Keenan came dashing out.