I agreed. ‘He doesn’t answer questions well, at any rate. He’d likely say he bought it at a car boot sale.’ He’d say it with a straight face, too, I thought. My father was a charming liar when he chose – a trait that he’d acquired through his lifetime in the diplomatic corps. I’d learned the trick of it myself, these past few years.
‘He says,’ my cousin informed me, ‘you ought to ring him more often.’
I looked up, eyebrows raised. ‘I ring him every month. He is in Uruguay, you know – if we talked any more frequently I’d drain my savings, such as they are.’
‘I know. I just think he worries about you, that’s all.’
‘Well, there’s no need.’ I flipped the coin over to study the reverse. ‘You’ll be off to France then, I expect, to do more research?’
‘Yes, at the end of the month.’
‘Just in time for the wine harvest.’
‘Precisely.’
I took a sip of tea and sighed. ‘I’m envious, I really am.’
‘So come with me.’ He dropped the comment casually, then slid his eyes sideways to watch my reaction.
‘Don’t be daft. You know I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘Some of us,’ I explained mildly, ‘do work for a living, you know, and I can’t just pick up any time I like and leave.’
‘Give over,’ was my cousin’s blunt response. ‘You work for my dad, for heaven’s sake. I’ll not believe that Braden Glass would fall to pieces if you took a fortnight’s holiday. Surely Dad or Jack could answer their own telephones …’
‘And then there’s the house to think of,’ I went on stubbornly. ‘I’m supposed to be looking after it for Daddy, not leaving it unattended so some burglar can break in and strip the place.’ I saw his unconvinced expression, and I frowned. ‘Look, I’m sorry if you think I’m boring …’
‘It’s not that you’re boring, exactly,’ Harry corrected me, ‘it’s just that you’re not very exciting. Not any more. Not since …’
‘This has nothing to do with my parents’ divorce. I’m just getting older, that’s all. Taking some responsibility.’
‘There’s responsible,’ said my cousin drily, ‘and then there is responsible. Mother tells me it’s been six months since you so much as stopped in at the pub for a drink.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘The curse of living in a small community. What else does your mother tell you?’
‘That she hardly ever sees you smile, and that last month in London you walked straight past the fountains in Trafalgar Square without tossing in so much as tuppence.’
I looked down. ‘Yes, well. Only tourists throw coins in fountains.’
‘That never used to stop you.’ He set his empty teacup on the table at his knees. ‘Which reminds me, may I have my King John coin back? Thanks. You might have stopped believing in good luck pieces, Emily Braden, but I haven’t. I’d rather lose my right arm than this little chap. So,’ he said brightly, tucking the silver coin safely back into his pocket, ‘that’s settled, then. You’re coming with me to Chinon.’
I shook my head. ‘Harry’…’
‘Cheap flights right now, out of Heathrow, but you’ll have to book this week I think. Dad says the end of September would be fine with him, just so he knows …’
‘Harry …’
‘And I’ve found the most wonderful hotel, sixteenth-century and right on the main square, with a view of the castle.’
‘Harry,’ I tried again, but he’d already pulled out the brochures. The photographs made Chinon look like something from a childhood dream – pale turreted houses and winding cobbled streets, with the castle rising like a guardian from the cliffs against a lavender sky, and the river Vienne gleaming like a ribbon of light at its feet.
‘There’s the tower where Isabelle would have waited out the siege,’ Harry said, pointing out a narrow crumbling column at the castle’s furthest edge. ‘The Moulin Tower.’
I looked, and shook my head with an effort. ‘I can’t come with you.’
‘Of course you can.’
I sighed. My cousin had the rare ability to solve the whole world’s problems single-handed. My father did that too, sometimes, and my Uncle Alan. At the moment, I sensed I was the victim of a triumvirate of conspiracy. I hadn’t changed that much, I reasoned … had I? It was just that when one’s parents, after thirty years of marriage, chose to go their separate ways, it made one view life rather more realistically. So what, I asked myself, was wrong with that? So my parents’ happy marriage hadn’t been so happy after all. So love was never meant to last for ever. It was better that I’d learned that lesson young, instead of making their mistakes all over again.
And I didn’t carry any bitterness towards my parents. A little disappointment maybe, but no bitterness. My mother was … well, she was just my mother – vibrant, headstrong, independent. Every now and then she sent me postcards from Greek ports or Turkish hotels or wherever she and her latest boyfriend were at large. And Daddy … Daddy went on working as he always had before, only now instead of his London office he had his office at the British Legation in Montevideo. He’d hardly seemed to notice the divorce.