The Four of Us (59 page)

‘No. Kiki rides a Harley Davidson and I rather baulked at borrowing that.'

‘I'm not surprised!' Ecstatically, Lucy dragged her across the pavement to where her companion, looking amused, was waiting to be introduced.

‘Jon, my Mum. She'll want you to call her Primmie, not Mrs Dove. Mum, Jon. Jon's a medical student. We met on the steps of the public library in San Diego when the bag I was carrying collapsed and my books toppled everywhere.'

‘I've very pleased to meet you, Jon,' Primmie said, shaking his hand and liking the steadiness, as well as the good humour, that she saw in his eyes.

‘It's great to be meeting you, Mrs … Primmie. On the flight over, Lucy talked non-stop about your adventure in leaving London for Cornwall. I've got confused between people and animals, though. Is Maybelline your friend who lived in Paris for years? And is Kiki a person, or a cow?‘

Knowing very well that Geraldine would have replied that Kiki was a person and, quite often, a cow as well, Primmie kept a straight face with difficulty. ‘She's a person,' she said to him as he loaded Lucy's and his rucksacks into the Ferrari. ‘And Maybelline is a cow. My friend who lived in Paris for many years is Geraldine – she's at Ruthven now, waiting to meet you. The friend who is getting married on Saturday is Artemis.'

‘Great. Got it,' he said affably, piling into the rear of the Ferrari with Lucy. ‘What a fantastic car. I didn't expect to be met by a Ferrari. I thought all Brits drove Minis.'

The next couple of hours were sheer bliss for Primmie, because Lucy was over the moon at everything she saw.

‘Ruthven's a wonderful house, Mum. Fantastic. When I think of Millie trying to persuade you to sell it, sight unseen, I could weep.'

‘Well, fortunately, selling was never an option I had. It didn't look quite as wonderful when I first moved in, though. Its present splendour is all down to Geraldine. She had the patio laid, so that we could eat in comfort outside in the summer, and she paid for the barn to be made into living accommodation.'

‘And is this where Jon will be sleeping, until the children arrive?' Lucy asked, viewing the sky-blue painted walls and the shining oak floor of the barn's dormitory with approval.

‘Yes. When he and Geraldine have finished chatting about San Diego – and I have to say that until ten minutes ago I'd no idea Geraldine was so familiar with San Diego – he can bring his rucksack over here and make himself at home.'

‘Gosh, Mum. I feel at home already. The Lizard reminds me of New Zealand. Everything is so green and open and clean. I love the way it's nearly separate from the rest of Cornwall and the way it's entirely different to the rest of England.'

‘I love the sea best,' Primmie said, aware, not for the first time, that her youngest daughter was a kindred spirit, ‘… being able to hear it at night, in winter, when there are gales, being able to see the sun glinting on it in summer, from the garden. Matt says that the coastline for miles on either side of Ruthven's cove is very much as it was a century ago.'

‘All thatched cottages nestling around tiny harbours?'

Primmie nodded. ‘And fishermen still bringing in hauls of pilchards – which is what Matt still does occasionally.'

‘And you're happy, Mum? Really in love with him? Just like you were with Dad?'

Primmie took hold of her hand. ‘Yes,' she said gently. ‘It's real love, to last down all the days, just as it was with your dad. And please don't think that my being in love again – which is an absolute miracle to me at my age – is taking away anything from the love I had, and will always have, for your Dad. Matt knows that Ted is locked away in the safekeeping part of my heart, and he wouldn't want it any other way.'

In perfect harmony they walked out of the barn. ‘I'd like to see the church next,' Lucy said as Jon showed no signs of tearing himself away from Geraldine and joining them. ‘Did Artemis have to get some kind of special dispensation to be able to be married in it?'

‘No. It's still a working church – if that's the right terminology. There are five churches in our local vicar's benefice. Regular services are held on a rota basis in the other four churches, but because our church is so isolated from the rest of the parish, services are only held once every three months or so.'

‘And is it where you and Matt will one day get married?'

They had begun walking down the track, towards Ruthven's gates. ‘Yes,' Primmie said, ‘When we've found Destiny.'

And she began telling Lucy of how close she believed that day was.

The next arrivals, on Thursday morning, were Joanna, Josh and, much to Primmie's amazement and delight, Millie.

‘Neville couldn't come,' Joanne said, referring to her husband, ‘and so Millie said she'd come in his place. She and Alan are at sixes and sevens again and I think she wanted to do a mysterious disappearing act for a few days, in order to make him think she might have someone else in her life. Which, for once, she hasn't.'

Primmie didn't care about Millie's motives in being at Ruthven. As far as she was concerned, Millie was there, and that was all that mattered.

‘But the house is huge, Mum. And is all this land yours? The orchard and the field with the donkey in it and the other field, with the cow and the hens?'

Looking round her, dressed in teetering high heels, an above-the-knee black skirt with a side split and a silky, T-strap purple top, Millie's bewilderment was pitiable. ‘And your friends … You never told me you had rich and famous friends, Mum. Alan would have come if he'd known he'd meet Kiki Lane here. He loves all those old disco numbers from the seventies. And how you could have the use of a Ferrari, and not tell me, is just unbelievable. Do you know how much those cars cost? Your friend Geraldine must be a millionairess.'

‘Close,' Primmie said, resolving not to let Millie know just how Geraldine had come by her wealth. ‘Let's go down to the paddock and give Ned some carrots and, after that, I'll introduce you to Maybelline.'

As Lucy had no intention of allowing Millie to share the barn dormitory with Jon, Francis obligingly agreed to do so, moving out of the front guest bedroom, so that Millie could move into it.

‘And when the Claybourne children arrive, I'll book into the Tregenna Castle Hotel,' he said to Primmie, looking extremely dapper in the chinos and coffee-coloured cotton shirt that were part of the wardrobe he'd returned from Paris with.

‘Good. It means you'll be able to keep an eye on Josh, Orlando and Sholto. They arrive tomorrow, and when they were last here it took Calleloe's young single female population weeks to settle down to normality.'

‘But if Sholto now has a steady girlfriend, why hasn't he brought her with him?' Artemis asked Orlando minutes after Sholto's and his arrival. ‘He must know that I'd love to meet her.'

Her eldest son, who had driven straight from a board meeting and was immaculate in a grey Savile Row suit, Turnbull & Asser shirt, silk tie and handmade shoes from Lobbs, looked desperately uncomfortable.

‘You have met her,' he said, as Sholto, who had hared off to the Tregenna Castle Hotel bar on a quest for coffee for Artemis, showed no signs of making an early return. ‘Sholto's nervous of telling you her identity, though. He thinks you might go through the roof when you're told.'

Artemis looked at him blankly. ‘Go through the roof? Why on earth should I do that? I'd love you both to have steady girlfriends.'

Orlando fiddled with one of his cufflinks.

‘He's dating Serena,' he said baldly. ‘Sorry, Ma. But there it is. They've been inseparable for months now.'

Artemis stared at him.

‘Serena,' he said again, just in case she hadn't cottoned on to whom he was speaking about. ‘Serena Campbell-Thynne.'

‘Yes. I heard you the first time.' Her voice was absolutely calm, her face expressionless.

In rising panic, Orlando waited for hysterical waterworks. They didn't come.

With every atom of her energy Artemis was forcing herself to assimilate the appalling news sensibly and rationally. The first point she was struggling to bear in mind was that if her youngest son wanted to shack up with his late father's mistress it was, after all, up to him. At this stage of the game, nothing she could say or do would make any difference. He was over twenty-one, of sound mind – though she now had a private opinion on that score – and financially independent. The second point, the most important point, was that she was marrying her beloved Hugo in the morning and she was going to allow nothing to spoil their wedding day,
nothing
. And that included Serena Campbell-Thynne. And the third, and last, point, was that at least Sholto had had the sense not to bring the family tart with him.

She wondered if she might, one day, have to accommodate herself to having Serena as a daughter-in-law and decided that, if such a dark day ever dawned, she would simply ride with it and make the best of it. Serena had, after all, been unknowingly responsible for turning her life around. Without Serena, Rupert would never have wanted a divorce – and if he had never wanted a divorce, she would never have driven in need of refuge to Primmie and to Ruthven. And if she hadn't done that, she would never have met Hugo and Hugo was, undoubtedly, the love of her life.

‘I don't want a discussion of this when Sholto comes back with coffee,' she said, rather as if her thoughts were already on other things – which they were. ‘Later on, when I'm no longer with you both, you can tell him that you've told me. I think he could have looked further afield for a girlfriend, but there you are. It's his choice. Now, about tomorrow, you are au fait with everything that will be expected of you, darling, aren't you? It's not every son who gives his mother away in marriage.'

Orlando resisted the temptation to check his forehead for beads of perspiration, said he was completely au fait with his duties and wondered if Sholto was going to have the sense to bring a couple of large brandies back with him.

‘You obviously behaved with wonderful cool, Temmy,' Kiki said that evening, when, with Primmie and Geraldine, they had a pre-wedding supper at Ruthven.

All the men were in Calleloe, enjoying a stag night that Matt had faithfully promised would not be too wild – or at least not where he and the groom were concerned. Joanne, sensitively aware that Artemis would probably like to spend her pre-wedding evening with only Kiki, Geraldine and Primmie, had taken Lucy and Millie into Penzance for an Italian meal.

‘I did rather surprise myself,' Artemis confessed. ‘But then, a second before I threw the greatest wobbly in the world, I suddenly thought: does it matter? Sholto's quite able to take care of himself. If what he wants in life is Serena, then that‘s his affair. And she did actually do me a very good turn. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't be marrying Hugo.'

Primmie collapsed into giggles, Kiki cracked with laughter and Geraldine chuckled, saying, ‘That's pragmatism on an almost French scale, Artemis. I couldn't do better myself.'

‘Everything is all absolutely, perfectly, wonderfully organized for tomorrow, isn't it?' Artemis said, turning her attention to a subject that really mattered. ‘I know the church is looking magnificent, because I went there on the way here. The flowers are breathtaking, Primmie. It's a veritable bower of lemon and white.'

‘And as Hugo has made all the arrangements for the reception, down to the last detail, you don't have a thing to worry about,' Primmie said, lifting a bottle of champagne from an ice bucket. ‘Especially as the Tregenna Castle Hotel is well known for the immaculate smooth-running of its functions.'

‘And Brett booked the bus that is to take everyone who hasn't a car from the church to St Ives,' Kiki said. ‘And if you're thinking of opening that champagne yourself, Primmie, don't. Give it to someone who has the experience. Geraldine or me.'

‘And the cake?' Artemis said, too anxious about the arrangements for her big day to take offence at being judged as inexpert as Primmie where the opening of champagne bottles was concerned. ‘It has
six
tiers. Do you think the caterers are going to be able to transport it safely?'

‘Relax, Artemis,' Geraldine chided. ‘Tomorrow is going to be flawless. Now, have you all got your champagne flutes at the ready?'

As the three most important people in the world to her nodded their heads, she released the cork with a wonderfully festive bang and poured the fizzing contents of the well-chilled bottle into their proffered glasses.

‘A toast,' Primmie said, raising her glass high. ‘To Artemis and Hugo.'

‘No.' Artemis's free hand flew high to forestall them. ‘There will be lots of toasts to Hugo and me tomorrow. Tonight needs a different toast.'

Not about to argue with her, Primmie, Kiki and Geraldine waited, glasses raised.

‘To the four of us,' Artemis said, her eyes aglow, her face radiant.

‘To the four of us,' they all said in heartfelt unison.

It was, Primmie thought, as they clinked glasses and drank, a moment never to be forgotten. A moment when they were all deeply aware that, though they had lost each other once, nothing in the world would make them lose each other again.

The next morning Primmie was awake by six o'clock as usual. Before she did anything else she pulled back the curtains to see what kind of a day it was going to be. There had been plenty of April showers over the last few weeks but now, the 1st of May, the early morning sky was crystal clear, promising a cloudlessly warm day.

Her relief was vast. Artemis may have coped with almost unnatural calm over the news of Sholto's relationship with Serena, but she would never have taken rain in her stride on her wedding day.

Quietly, so as not to disturb Geraldine, she dressed in a comfy corduroy skirt and, to combat the dawn chill, a polo-neck sweater. Artemis's wedding day or not, there were daily tasks that couldn't be skipped. Her animals had to be fed and Maybelline and Black-Hearted Alice milked.