Sunday morning continued mild with a slight breeze. The air was very clear today with a brilliant, sparkling quality. In the garden at Claremont the birds darted about with manic frenzy, calling, challenging, swooping and dipping, snatching up broken twigs, old grass, downy feathers.
Inside the house activity was a good deal less frenetic. Howard and Judith were both up – it was almost eleven – and were making a languorous onslaught on the debris of last night’s dinner-party; Judith had made a start on the washing-up.
Howard was in the drawing-room. He confined his assistance to emptying ashtrays, plumping up cushions, picking up scattered petals from flowers that had failed to survive the evening. He paused by a window to twitch the long brocade curtains into place. Sunlight illumined distant stretches of farmland, wooded tracts still winter-dark. But he scarcely glanced at the view he had seen all his life.
He went along to the kitchen, fragrant now with the smell of freshly-made coffee. Judith was at the sink, rinsing a stack of plates under the tap. Howard poured the coffee, strong and reviving. Judith pulled off her rubber gloves and took an invigorating mouthful.
On a shelf near the kitchen door the telephone rang suddenly. Howard crossed the room and lifted the receiver. ‘Oh – hello,’ he said after a moment. ‘How are you now? Feeling better?’ He put a hand over the mouthpiece. ‘Aunt Harriet,’ he said. Judith set down her cup. ‘That’s good,’ Howard said into the phone. ‘Yes, Judith’s here, I’ll hand you over.’
Aunt Harriet – Mrs Fiske – was Judith’s godmother, aunt merely by courtesy title. She lived in a village some sixty miles to the north of Cannonbridge; she was the widow of a wine importer. In a few days she would be celebrating her seventieth birthday. She had intended to give a dinner-party in honour of the occasion but two or three weeks ago she had taken to her bed with ‘flu, she had been very unwell. She had been forced to cancel the dinner-party, but now it seemed it was on again.
‘Yes, of course we’ll come,’ Judith told her. ‘We’ll be delighted.’ Howard pulled a face. ‘I’ll come over a day or two earlier,’ Judith added. ‘If that’s all right with you. Thursday morning?’ The dinner-party was on Saturday. ‘Howard can drive over after work on Friday.’ She glanced up at him and he moved his shoulders to signify grudging acquiescence.
By Tuesday evening it was beginning to turn cold again. The forecast was for overnight frost and an easterly wind in the morning. Gavin sat opposite Charlotte Neale in the well-appointed dining room of the Caprice, a restaurant renowned for its cooking, situated half a mile out of Cannonbridge.
‘Do have something else,’ Gavin urged her when she had finished a rich creamy dessert. ‘Some cheese? Fruit?’
She shook her head. ‘No, thanks, just some coffee.’ She glanced up at the clock. ‘I don’t want to be much later.’
As they drank their coffee she chatted about the friend she was going to stay with in Switzerland. She was looking forward to some skiing. ‘There’s still plenty of good snow,’ she said, smiling with pleased anticipation. She showed not the slightest sign that she would miss him.
He stirred his coffee, feeling a little melancholy. Don’t rush it, he warned himself again, don’t spoil it before it starts. He looked at her across the table; the lovely heart shaped face; thick flaxen hair, taken up this evening into a casual knot on top of her head; peach skin; eyes the soft deep blue of lobelias.
But it wasn’t just her looks, it was her attitude, her whole approach to life. Open and direct, no come-ons or put-offs, no airs and graces, no coquettish nonsense. No past, no complications.
He raised his cup to his lips. At the back of his throat he could feel an unpleasant roughness. He knew the feeling of old. Oh hell, he thought, I believe I’m getting Mrs Cutler’s cold. She had appeared at Eastwood as usual that morning but she had looked flushed and unwell. ‘I do feel pretty rotten,’ she said when he questioned her. ‘If I don’t come tomorrow it’ll mean I’ve decided to have a day or two in bed. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’ As he’d left for work he’d heard her coughing and blowing her nose.
The air was sharp as he drove Charlotte back to Berrowhill. ‘I won’t ask you in,’ she said as she got out of the car. ‘They’ll only start talking to you, and I want to get to bed.’ The sky was thickly clustered with stars. From the stables came the stir of horses, the voice of a stable lad.
Gavin walked with her to the door. ‘Write to me,’ he said. ‘Let me know how you get on.’
She made a little face. ‘I hate writing letters.’
‘You could phone.’
She moved her shoulders.
‘Don’t forget me,’ he said. As he bent his head to give her a light kiss he gave a sudden violent sneeze. She jumped back.
‘I’d rather you didn’t kiss me,’ she said with energy. ‘I don’t want to start my holiday with a streaming cold.’
By Friday morning Gavin’s cold was turning feverish. Mrs Cutler hadn’t shown her face at Eastwood since Tuesday, she was presumably nursing herself at home in her cottage.
It was a raw, chilly morning. Gavin shivered as he came out of the house and walked to the garage, although he had wrapped himself up with care. I’ll be glad when today’s over, he thought as he drove into Cannonbridge. Not only was there the usual list of appointments in the morning and the weekly meeting in the afternoon, but, worst of all, he had to attend a dinner in the evening over at the Northgrove Hotel. Northgrove was a small township which stood at the apex of a triangle with Cannonbridge and Martleigh at either end of the base line; it was roughly equidistant from both places.
The dinner was being given by the Northgrove Chamber of Commerce and was typical of many functions Gavin attended in the course of a year. In the ordinary way he didn’t dislike these occasions; sometimes they were quite enjoyable. But to sit through one feeling as he did now – not a cheerful prospect.
He walked slowly up the front steps of Elliott Gilmore and into the building. His head felt woolly and his legs far from steady. It was beginning to seem a good deal more like ’flu than a cold. He had breakfasted on black coffee and aspirin and he intended to repeat the dose throughout the morning. The thing is to buckle down to work and forget about how you feel, he told himself bracingly as he went into his office. With luck the aspirins would have some effect and by evening he would be feeling less like death warmed up.
By midday, when he terminated his last appointment as speedily as he could without overt rudeness, he was feeling very poorly indeed. ‘You don’t look at all well,’ Miss Tapsell said with concern as she removed yet another empty coffee cup from his desk. ‘I really think you should give in and go home to bed.’ He began to shake his head. ‘I’ll phone Mr Howard and Mr Roche,’ she said with resolution. ‘I’ll explain that you’re not well, you’ve had to go home, there won’t be a meeting this afternoon. They won’t mind. There’s nothing urgent on the agenda, it can all stand over till next week.’
He looked up at her. ‘It’s this dinner at Northgrove. If I go to bed now I’ll never be able to force myself to get up again this evening.’ At the thought of having to struggle into a dinner-jacket and drive over to Northgrove, sit through an interminable meal and endless speeches, he could have dropped his head into his hands and groaned. ‘I can’t cry off at such short notice.’
‘I shouldn’t let that worry you,’ Miss Tapsell said robustly. ‘Either Mr Howard or Mr Roche will go in your place, I’m sure of it.’
‘I know Howard can’t go,’ Gavin said. ‘He’s going away for the weekend. He’s joining his wife at her godmother’s, he’s driving over there this evening, it’s all arranged. He mentioned it on the phone yesterday.’
‘Then you can ask Mr Roche, I’m sure he’ll go. Shall I ring him now?’
‘I’d better speak to him myself.’