He nodded. ‘Do you think,’ again he paused, ‘do you think you ride too much, my dear?’
‘Ride too much?’ She pushed her chair back abruptly and stood up. Standing as they were, side by side, she was a good two inches taller than he. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, maybe it is bad for you to go thundering around the countryside every day the way you do. And yet again yesterday you went out unescorted in spite of my express instructions –’
‘Instructions!’ she echoed, her voice rising. ‘You do not instruct me what I may and may not do, Henry.’
‘But I am your husband, Emily. It is my duty to look after you and make sure you are not too headstrong. Your father said you needed a firm hand.’ He looked unhappy as he stared past her, unable to meet her eye.
‘My father may have used a firm hand,’ she retorted. ‘You may not. If I wish to ride alone, I shall.’ She threw down her pen and swept past him towards the door. ‘In fact I shall go and ride this morning.’
‘But my dear –’ he protested.
She did not choose to hear him. Pulling open the library door she swept out into the hall.
‘– we have company for luncheon,’ he went on softly, his voice lost in the empty room. He moved closer to the window and stood staring out. The tide was high. In spite of the sunlight up here illuminating the fields and woods, a hazy mist was forming over the water and he could see what looked uncommonly like a Viking longship forging slowly through it, heading up-river towards Woodbridge. He frowned for a moment, puzzled and strangely uneasy as he studied the single short mast, the broad curved sail, the banks of oars, then he smiled, nodding, pleased at the distraction. It must be some new vessel belonging to one of his neighbours. He stared at it until the fog closed in and swallowed the image as though it had never been.
‘Where the hell were you?’ Ken strode into the kitchen and confronted Zoë as she put the last of Leo’s vegetables into the bottom of the fridge.
‘I walked over to see our new neighbour. He came back this morning.’
Ken swung to stare out of the window, following her pointing finger. ‘The Old Forge?’
She nodded. ‘Nice man. He gave me those flowers from his garden.’ She pointed to the vase on the centre of the table.
‘I wanted us to go sailing.’ Ken had already lost interest.
‘We still can. It will only take me a minute to change.’ She manfully ignored the sinking feeling in her stomach. It had developed into a quiet day with mellow sunlight playing on the water. It would be lovely on the boat.
‘It’s too late now.’
‘Why?’
‘If you’d come when I rang we would have had time to get down-river and back.’ Ken was a small wiry man, still handsome, with sandy hair and grey-green eyes. His face, cheeks windblown and threaded with small red veins, was a picture of discontent.
‘We still have.’ Zoë watched as he washed his oily hands at the sink. ‘Give me two minutes, then I’ll throw a baguette and some brie and salad into a basket and we can be down on the boat in less than half an hour and have a picnic.’ She was already opening the door of the fridge, taking out the cheese. She changed the subject, her voice deliberately casual, trying to diffuse his irritation. ‘Did you see the Viking ship go up-river? It was incredibly beautiful. With a huge billowing sail. They must be having some sort of regatta in Woodbridge.’
‘If they are I haven’t heard about it.’ He was drying his hands now. He was going to let her persuade him but he was going to make her work at it. ‘You can’t have seen a boat go up-river though. There isn’t enough water for anything with any draught to it. The tide has only just turned.’
She didn’t argue. Having thrown the picnic together, she ran upstairs to grab a jacket and pull on her sailing shoes.
It was lovely on the river, she had to admit it. The gentle breeze was against them and Ken didn’t bother to raise the sails as the engine purred smoothly into action and they made their way slowly down the main fairway, past the saltings, past deserted anchored yachts, past the crowds on the terrace outside the pub at Waldringfield, the tables shaded by blue and white umbrellas, then on down round the bend.
‘What was he like?’ Ken said at last. He was sitting back, his arm over the tiller, squinting at the glare on the water.
‘Who?’
‘Our neighbour.’ He glanced at her.
‘Nice enough. A bit prickly to start with.’ She described him.
‘I remember Steve telling me about him. He was messing about with some sort of metal working and he wasn’t wearing a face guard. Something exploded.’ Ken leaned forward and helped himself to another crusty sandwich. Zoë had made a pile of them in the cabin as they’d headed down-river.
‘Rosemary didn’t say.’
‘Stupid woman.’ It seemed a general comment rather than a criticism of her capacity to gossip. ‘You know what she’s doing?’ He threw a piece of crust overboard. ‘She’s involved with some group of walkers, taking on the local farmer about rights of way. Steve says it’s a nightmare. He loves walking but it’s anything for a quiet life with him; she’s the one. She wants the path to take some short cut across a field and all the locals are up in arms. Stupid woman!’ He repeated the phrase with some gusto. ‘If you’re going for a walk from nowhere to nowhere, for the sake of just going for a walk, why would you want to take a short cut, for heaven’s sake?’ He narrowed his eyes, adjusting the course slightly to pass another boat coming upstream under sail.
‘She strikes me as being a bit of an obsessive,’ Zoë said. She climbed out of the cabin and sat down opposite him.
‘Typical childless woman!’ Ken snorted. ‘Needs something to keep her occupied.’
‘Does that go for me too, then?’ Zoë didn’t look at him. ‘My need for a job to keep me occupied.’
Ken looked startled. For a moment he didn’t reply. ‘We agreed we didn’t want kids, Zoë,’ he said at last, his tone heavy with reproach. ‘It was a joint decision.’
‘Was it?’
He didn’t reply.
The water slid by gently, smoothly, an opaque green-brown beneath the blue of the sky. The saltmarsh at this stage of the tide was indented with narrow creeks and channels in the mud. On the bank opposite she could see the trees coming down to the water’s edge, the leaves beginning to turn to red and gold. Seagulls were diving into the tide edge, their screaming the only interruption to the peace save for the gentle ringing of the wind in the halyards and stays. She squinted up at the burgee flying at the top of the mast. In a moment of devotion when they were first married she had made it for Ken, stitching the little flag with her own hands. He threw another piece of crust overboard and Zoë saw with some alarm that something invisible seized it almost at once and dragged it down beneath the water. A stronger gust of wind sent ripples all around them and she shivered.
‘My lady, your husband said one of us should go with you.’ Pip, the boy who had saddled Bella for her, did his best. ‘What if you should fall?’
‘I won’t fall.’ She gathered the reins and gestured at him to help her mount.
The boy shrugged. It wasn’t his job to argue with her ladyship. He watched as she settled into the saddle, let go of the rein and leaned back against the wall, whistling,