Vacation with a Commanding Stranger

‘Well, I was completely wrong about him,’ Gale told her. ‘He’s really the most wonderful man…I can’t tell you how good he’s been. All those things I said about him…I couldn’t have been more wrong. He wasn’t trying to drive George and me apart at all…he was trying to keep us together. He’s totally against divorce.’

‘You mean he’s totally against other people’s,’ Livvy suggested drily.

‘What?’ Gale looked perplexed.

‘You told me that he was divorced…’

‘Oh, yes… Well, I was wrong about that, too. Poor man, it seems that his wife actually tricked him into marrying her by pretending that she was pregnant… It was all a complete fabrication she had hatched up to get at her married lover after they’d quarrelled. It’s no wonder it made him bitter.

‘Oh, Livvy, I can’t tell you what a relief it is to know that George still loves me. It hasn’t been easy, I admit. Finding out how close I’d come to losing him, learning that he was…attracted to someone else.’

She bit her lips, her eyes bright with tears. ‘Thank God it never got any further than that. Thanks to Robert. If he hadn’t acted so quickly…sent George abroad so much…

‘I misjudged him totally, you know.’

Livvy stifled her irritation. She was glad for Gale, of course she was, but she was getting a little tired of hearing her cousin sing Robert Forrest’s praises.

‘You should have got in touch with us, you know. I was worried about you and Robert…’

‘I only got back last night, Gale, and I’ve got stacks of things to do. I’m delighted to hear that you and George have sorted out your differences and that Robert Forrest is such a wonderful, caring human being, but right now…’

Gale’s eyebrows rose.

‘Well, if that’s the way you feel, I suppose I’d better go. What I actually came round for was to tell you that George and I are having a small party on Saturday. It’s our wedding anniversary and… You will come, won’t you…?’

A party was the last thing she felt like, Livvy acknowledged, but she knew that Gale would nag and persuade her until she gave in and agreed to go.

‘All right, but I shan’t be able to stay long. By the way,’ she added as her cousin finished her coffee and stood up, ‘I take it that you and George have sorted out your differences over the farmhouse?’

What was she doing? Livvy asked herself silently. The night she had left him she had sworn that she was putting Richard out of her life, her thoughts, her heart forever, and yet here she was breaking that vow already. It wasn’t really the farmhouse she wanted to ask Gale about… It was the man who had shared it with her.

‘Oh, yes. It was all a misunderstanding really. George never intended to sell the place. I was furious with him about it at first, but once he’d explained and Robert…’

Robert, Robert, Robert… Here she went again. In George’s shoes, she would begin to feel rather worried about the amount of times Gale included his boss in her conversation and her obvious admiration for him, Livvy reflected irritably.

‘Of course, Robert will be there at the party,’ Gale was telling her now.

‘Wonderful. I can hardly wait to meet him. Suppose I’ll recognise him by his halo. He will be wearing it, won’t he?’ Livvy asked her grittily.

Gale was avoiding looking directly at her.

‘You’ve changed,’ she accused her, her eyes clouded, and for the first time in her life Livvy recognised uncertainty in her cousin’s expression. ‘I…you know I’d never do anything to hurt you, don’t you? That I’d always have your best interests at heart? After all, you are family, and not just that—’

Livvy sighed, recognising all the signs that Gale was about to deliver one of her lectures.

‘Tell me about it on Saturday,’ she interrupted her firmly, ushering her towards the door and opening it very pointedly for her.

* * *

She must have been mad to agree to go to Gale’s party, Livvy reflected tiredly as she dried her hair and stared grimly at her reflection. Would other people recognise, as she did, how much she had changed? Would they too see the shadows clouding her eyes, the vulnerability of her mouth, the effect all the sleepless nights and pain of loving Richard had had on her?

They were having an early autumn, the leaves already turning and starting to fall. This morning there had been mist on the fields and the sun, which was shining now, had the pale yellow clarity that said the season had changed.

Livvy discarded the idea of wearing anything summery; it might reveal too clearly how much weight she had lost, and the last thing she wanted was Gale giving her a lecture about it.

Instead, she put on a favourite knitted suit in a soft pale peach. The ribbed top was loose and comfortable, the skirt neat and straight, and although she might be aware that the waistband of the skirt was loose, and that there was more room inside the jumper than there had been, no one else would do so…

Not unless they touched her, that was. But then there was no one in her life close enough to her who was likely to do that, was there? No lover…no partner…no Richard to take hold of her arm and notice its thinness, to place his hand on her waist and recognise how narrow it had become.