don’t you come over to Caverness tomorrow afternoon and take a wander through the gardens with me? You could stay for a meal. Try again with Josien if you’ve a mind to, although I don’t fully recommend it. You could attempt a civil discussion with Luc. See if you can find common ground that isn’t rooted in the past. Ask his opinion on setting up a distribution arm here for your Australian reds. Make him feel useful. Men like that.’
‘Then what?’ said Gabrielle somewhat sceptically.
‘Then you mention your fiancé.’
‘I don’t have a fiancé.’
‘Not sure you need to mention that.’ Simone started grinning and it wasn’t because of the bubbles. ‘All right, forget the non-existent fiancé. Set the boundaries for your relationship with Luc some other way—but set them nonetheless. Maybe Luc will follow your lead.’
‘And if he doesn’t?’
‘Run,’ said Simone, and kept right on grinning. ‘Damn, I’ve missed you. Here’s to hilltop reunions, restraint when dealing with troublesome men, and laying to rest the ghosts of our past.’
‘Hear hear,’ said Gabrielle and lifted her near-empty not-plastic champagne flute to her lips. Where had all the champagne gone? ‘Restraint, you said?’
‘Civilised restraint,’ amended Simone. ‘Nothing to it. More champagne?’
Gabrielle hesitated. ‘Didn’t you just fill my glass?’
‘They’re very little glasses,’ said Simone sneakily. ‘May I remind you we’re talking Chateau Caverness 1955 here? This isn’t just any old champagne.’
Indeed it wasn’t. ‘All right,’ said Gabrielle, and reached for the magnum with what she thought was a great deal of restraint, never mind Simone’s descent into helpless laughter. ‘Maybe just one.’
CHAPTER THREE
AT FIVE pm the following afternoon, after an evening of laughter with Simone followed by half a day of sleep, Gabrielle drove, yet again, through the entrance to Chateau des Caverness and parked her car in the gravel courtyard next to the servants’ quarters. Ignoring the door to her childhood completely, she switched on her mobile and found the number Simone had keyed into the phone last night.
‘Where are you?’ she said when Simone answered the phone.
‘In the orchard, waiting for you,’ said Simone. ‘And if you’ve waited until now to tell me you’re not coming I’m going to be very very annoyed.’
‘I’m here,’ said Gabrielle. ‘I just didn’t want to walk through three acres of garden looking for you, that’s all. I’m not exactly wearing sensible shoes.’
‘Colour me intrigued,’ said Simone. ‘I thought you’d be wearing something restrained.’
‘I am wearing something restrained,’ said Gabrielle. Her square necked knee-length plum-coloured sundress was very restrained. She’d even plaited her wayward hair and woven it into a heavy bun on top of her head, princess style, and secured it with a thousand pins. She’d followed up with the application of very subtle, very expensive, make-up and only the merest dash of her favourite perfume. She was a walking, talking picture of stylish restraint. ‘Except for the shoes.’
The leather sandals with their delicate straps and flimsy heel were an exercise in idiocy. Idiocy being the word that summed up Gabrielle’s thoughts on accepting Simone’s invitation to tour the gardens and stay for dinner afterwards. Civilised restraint was all well and good in theory. Putting it into practice was hard.
‘Take your shoes off, then, and come around the front way on the grass,’ suggested Simone.
‘That’s not exactly civilised,’ said Gabrielle. ‘It’s a little unrestrained.’
‘Do it anyway,’ said Simone with a snicker. ‘Get all that wild abandon out of your system now so that when you happen across Luc there’ll be none left for him.’
‘You’re making a surprising amount of sense,’ muttered Gabrielle.
‘I always do,’ said Simone as Gabrielle reached the stone wall, slipped off her shoes, and stepped through the archway and into the formal front gardens. There’d been a box-hedge maze in here years ago. A maze that had towered high over her head and had provided endless hours of play for all the children of Caverness; her and Simone as well as Rafael and Luc. To Gabrielle’s delight, the maze was still there, although these days it didn’t tower over her but stood chest high so that a person could see the summer gazebo at its centre.
‘You kept the maze,’ she said into the phone.
‘I kept the maze,’ said Simone. ‘You want to do this tour by phone or are you actually planning to converse face to face?’
‘Picky picky,’ murmured Gabrielle. ‘I brought a few things for the dinner table. I’ll put them on the terrace on the way round. See you soon.’
Sandals in one hand, goody bag in the other, Gabrielle skirted the maze and headed through the formal statuette garden towards the grand entrance to the chateau. Gabrielle’s footsteps slowed when she saw that the terrace was already in use, but then she squared her shoulders and continued on her path. The grey stone steps were cool and hard beneath her feet after the softness and warmth of the summer grass, but she would not linger long, and she did not put her shoes on. ‘Good afternoon, Maman, Hans,’ she said to the seated pair. Gabrielle glanced warily at the third person to complete the tableau. Luc wasn’t sitting and didn’t look as if he had been sitting with the others. He looked as if he’d been simply passing by and had merely stopped for a word. ‘Luc.’
Hans greeted her cheerfully. Josien’s greeting was far more subdued but it was a greeting and Gabrielle felt pathetically grateful for it. Luc said nothing.
‘I’m just on my way to meet up with Simone,’ said Gabrielle, feeling intrusive and out of place. ‘She’s determined to give me a tour of the gardens.’
Josien’s gaze flickered over Gabrielle, taking in her attire and her hair and the sandals hanging loosely from her fingertips, and Gabrielle smothered the impulse to check herself over for dirt and stains. Yes, Gabrielle wanted to reconnect with her mother, but not if it meant becoming Josien’s whipping girl again. This was who she was, the woman she’d grown up to be, and if Josien wasn’t satisfied with her appearance or her behaviour then so be it. Gabrielle took a deep breath, set her shopping bag on the wire table beside her mother, and stood a little straighter. Luc still hadn’t said a word. Okay, so their last meeting had been a little…tense, at times, and maybe he didn’t want her here any more than Josien did, but would it have killed him to say hello? How was she supposed to act civilised if he wouldn’t even afford her that small courtesy?
‘Simone took the gardens in hand a few years back,’ said Luc into an increasingly awkward silence. ‘She’s been focussing on the old orchard area of late. Most of the trees have gone to make way for roses. But not all.’
Gabrielle tucked an escapee strand of hair behind her ear with nervous fingers. Finally, a conversation. She could do conversation. Sort of. ‘It sounds lovely.’ She delved into her grocery bag and withdrew a posy of violets, their delicate scent filling the air as she set them carefully on the table. ‘For you, Maman.
