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'Thanks, Clay,' Jeff said, smiling his usual rather wan smile, although Clay detected that he looked a little more animated than usual and hoped that Dawn was the cause.

Jeff Willoughby was a slight, shortish man, going prematurely bald, with the kind of face that one forgot when not actually confronted with it. A very good surgeon, a good communicator with patients, he was the sort of man who made little impact in private life.

'Let me introduce you to my fiancée,' Jeff was saying, as Clay mused about the other man's private life. 'Dawn Renton. Perhaps you know each other?'

That was the understatement of the year, Clay thought as he tried to prevent his jaw from dropping. Sometimes dreams did come true. Dawn was unlikely to create any vibes for him now.

As he transferred his gaze to Dawn, inclining his head in acknowledgement, he noted that she was staring at him in a rather fixed way, not batting an eyelid, a smile on her lips which, he didn't doubt, was forced. He detected a mild air of triumph in her demeanour.

'Well,' he said, avoiding any hint of how well he knew Dawn, 'congratulations are in order again. When is the wedding to be?'

'As soon as it can be arranged,' Dawn said, linking her arm through Jeff's in a possessive gesture, leaning against him. Clay noted a sudden flush on the other man's cheeks, and a certain darkening of the pupils, and he found himself wondering again whether the man had ever been to bed with a woman...before Dawn. No doubt he had received a very quick, dramatic and evidently overwhelming awakening.

Clay took a step back. 'I hope you'll both be very happy,' he said, and meant it.

As it turned out, he was called into the hospital on Friday evening for half of the night, then for a good part of Saturday. Exhausted, he slept late on the Sunday, only checking the messages on his answering machine as he prepared a late brunch for himself. Any urgent messages would come via his pager.

There was a message from Sophie to say that she had called him several times without success and that she would be away on Saturday. On impulse, Clay decided to go over to Sophie's house, without calling first, when he'd eaten. The longing to see her put everything else from his mind.

It was a cold, clear day, the sort of day that threatened serious winter, where one's breath left clouds of vapour in the frigid air. The drive to Sophie's place took about fifteen minutes. When he knocked on the door there was no reply and the house had a slightly forlorn, unoccupied air about it that left him a little puzzled and oddly disturbed as he walked around to the back of the house and peered in through the kitchen window, then knocked on the back door. All the doors were locked. Feeling momentarily at a loss, he decided to call Sophie's mother on his cellphone.

'Oh, hello, Clay, it's nice to hear from you. How are you?' When Sophie's mother's welcoming voice answered, he felt himself relax, realizing then that what he'd been feeling in the last few minutes had been fear, and an odd realization that he didn't know exactly where Sophie was...and it mattered. It mattered like hell.

There was a feeling of urgency, that he'd left some things rather late. Too late? He shifted uneasily from foot to foot in the freezing garden at the back of the house, the instrument in his hand the lifeline to the most important connection in his life.

'Sophie went to Ottawa for the weekend,' her mother was saying. 'There's a reunion there of her high school year...it's on for the whole weekend. She's been staying with a friend...she hasn't seen him for years.'

'Him?'

'Yes. It was really funny how it happened, Clay. She met him in a bookshop in Gresham. He's in computers, a real whizz, apparently, and he persuaded her to go to the reunion and stay with his family. Of course, she knew about the reunion but hadn't intended to go. I suppose if you hadn't been working, Clay, she wouldn't have gone.'

'When is she getting back?' he said, his throat tight.

'Late this afternoon, by train.'

'Could I meet her at the station? I'd like to.'

'Oh, she'd love that, Clay, in this cold. Come over here for a cup of tea. You've got plenty of time before the train gets in.'

'I'd like that,' he said, relief flooding over him. Perhaps he'd started to take Sophie for granted. In reality, she was perfectly free to see other men. Perhaps an old school mate didn't qualify as another man, but he was disturbed in a way he hadn't thought possible.

'I don't think I like him much, he's a real nerd,' Mandy announced when they were in the cosy kitchen of Lavinia Clement, Sophie's mother. The little girl pronounced the words solemnly between sips of hot chocolate as they all sat at the kitchen table, while the grown-ups drank tea.

Lavinia, a petite, grey-haired version of Sophie, shot Clay a subtle, significant look. They had been talking about the 'old school friend', whose name was Sebastian Prender. 'Little children can be very perceptive, can't they?' She smiled at Clay. 'And unwittingly rude. I'll have a few words about that later. Mandy was with Sophie when they met Sebastian in the bookshop.'

'I see,' Clay said, smiling back, feeling more relaxed in this cosy atmosphere, with the warm tea lying comfortably in his stomach.

Not to be deterred, the child continued her verbal meanderings. 'I like you, Clay,' she said, 'not that Sebastian guy. He talks too much, all about himself, and he didn't even look at me. He kept staring at Mummy.'

'That's "Dr Sotheby" to you, Mandy,' her grandmother said, while Clay grinned.

'He doesn't mind if I call him Clay,' the girl said.

Clay shrugged. 'We like each other,' he said.

Later at the railway station in downtown Gresham, Clay strode quickly through the vast entrance hall and down another wide corridor towards the platform for the arrival of the Ottawa train, expectant and oddly nervous, with only moments to spare. Already, arriving passengers were streaming through the entrance gate, most of them shrugging into heavy jackets in preparation for the cold they would encounter outside.

At first she didn't see him as he stood to one side to wait for her. Wearing a long black coat, black boots and a red scarf wound several times round her neck, she seemed to Clay to look like a waif he had come to rescue, and his heart leapt with a feeling that he knew was love.

Yes, he loved this woman. He had feared that he would lose her. Now he knew, in those few moments, what he had been waiting for most of his adult life. At last, in this mundane place which seemed to take on a magical air, he'd found out what it was to want to give himself...permanently, to be with someone, to never let her go.

Sophie walked with her head bent, looking at the ground. When she came close to him he could see that her face looked pale and tired, the expression serious, and he wanted to kiss her, to kiss away that tiredness, to ease some of the responsibilities that she had in her young life. He wanted to tell her that he loved her.

'Sophie!'

The look of surprise and joy on her pale face was something he'd been waiting for. His heart seemed to melt as he found himself grinning that inane grin that seemed to be impossible to suppress when he was with her. Swiftly he walked up to her, seeing only her in the milling crowd.

'Clay! Oh, it's so good to see you. And just when I was thinking how lovely it would be if someone could meet me. It's so cold. How did you know I was coming?'

'Your mother told me,' he said, as he drew her to one side, away from the crowd. Taking her overnight bag out of her unresisting fingers, he enveloped her in a hard embrace, feeling her arms go round him. 'Thank God I didn't miss you.'

'I'm so glad you came,' she said, her voice muffled by his coat as he hugged her against his chest.

'Did you have a good time in Ottawa?' he forced himself to ask, when he really wanted to ask about Sebastian Prender and what he meant to her, if anything.

'It was lovely to see all my old classmates—we couldn't stop talking. But it was spoiled for me because I kept thinking about you...about how much I was missing you.'

Clay decided not to mention the nerd. 'Good,' he said, crushing her so tightly against him that she could scarcely breathe. 'I love you...I love you to distraction. And don't go away from me again without telling me first, otherwise I shall go stark, staring crazy.'

She was laughing then, putting her hands up to hold his face, to pull him down to her so that she could kiss him. 'I won't,' she said. They kissed, oblivious to the passers-by. 'I wasn't sure exactly how you felt about me. I could only hope.'

'I'm a bit thick, a bit slow, when it comes to some things,' he said.

With his arm around her, and carrying her bag, they walked out of the station into the cold winter evening. Something had happened, something momentous, and he didn't want the evening to come to an end. 'Shall we go out to eat?' he said. 'I'm starved, and I expect you are, too.'

'Yes, please,' she said, her voice light with happiness. 'Clay, let's go to Guido's—that place we went to on the blind date.'

'Sure,' he said. She put her arm around his waist and they strode out rapidly to keep warm to where he had parked his car. 'I sure didn't want to go on that date.'

'Neither did I,' she said. 'With you.'

They both started to laugh at the same time, unable to stop for long moments, the tears of relief running down their faces. 'What idiots we were. All those boorish things we said to each other!' she said. 'Why didn't we just relax and accept the inevitable?'

'I don't know.' Clay kissed her, cupping her face in his hands. 'You're freezing,' he said. 'Come on. This time it's not blind, Sophie. My eyes are wide open.' Suddenly he was very serious, more serious than he'd ever been in his life.

When Guido had seated them at a table, had stopped fussing over them and had brought them each a small complimentary glass of brandy as an antidote to the cold, they found themselves alone. As they smiled at each other across the narrow expanse of the table, Clay took both Sophie's hands in his and raised them to his lips. The time had come for courage, an end to procrastination and taking her for granted. Battening down an uncharacteristic nervousness, he raised his eyes to hers.

'I'm addicted to work,' he began hesitantly, 'which I will try to change somewhat. I can be rude at times and impatient... I'll try to change that, too...if you think you can live with that? On my good side, I like kids... I want kids, I can cook, do laundry...'

She nodded, wordless.

'Contrary to popular sentiment at the hospital, I don't think I'm God's gift to women,' he went on. 'In fact, I'm really a rather humble sort of guy, deep down. I'm grateful for the opportunities that fate has given me...'

By now Sophie was grinning.

'What I'm trying to say is... Will you marry me? Please.' He finished with a rush, his heart beating with fear that she might say no, so he gripped her hands tightly, waiting for her reply. Slowly she moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue, looking at him consideringly.

'I'm not very good at going down on my knees to beg,' he gabbled on, 'but I will if necessary. And I'm afraid I haven't got a super antique ring in my pocket that I can flourish under your nose and say it belonged to my great-great-grandmother and
I
've just been waiting to give it to the woman of my dreams...'

Sophie detached one of her hands from his grasp and placed it over his mouth. 'Shush,' she said, smiling, her eyes strangely light. 'Tell me again that you love me.'

'I love you,' he said fervently, leaning close to her. 'It's like a fever, for which the only cure is to make you my wife.'

Guido came back at that moment. 'You like the wine now, sir?' he asked with a bow.

'Um...er...I...' Clay said.

'We'll have it later with the meal, please,' Sophie said. 'Could we have a half bottle of champagne for now? The Veuve Cliquot would be lovely, if you have it.'

Guido bowed low and reverently.
'Si, senorita,'
he said.

They grinned at each other across the table. 'Does that mean what I think it means?' he said softly.

'I rather fancy being married to a tiger,' she said, 'but not any old tiger. Yes, Clay Sotheby, I will marry you. Yes, please.'

'If you'll forgive the cliché, my darling, I'm the happiest man alive,' he said. 'There's one thing I have to be sure of.' He leaned even closer to her. 'Is the chemistry right?'

'Explosive,' she said huskily.

'Later, perhaps we...'

'Yes...'

Guido was back at their table with the champagne, where he expertly twisted off the wire and eased off the cork, which made a satisfying pop. 'The best for the best,' he said, pouring the pale yellow liquid. 'Not blind now, eh! I wish you great happiness,
senor
and
senorita.'

'Thank you,' they said in unison, as they raised their glasses to the evening ahead and to the tantalizing future that lay before them.