Miriam began to cry. Anne set her coffee cup down and knelt in front of her daughter, taking Miriam’s hands in her own and shaking them gently. ‘Ring him,’ she urged. ‘Or at least see him when he gets back. Tell him you believe in him.’

‘But do I trust him? Like you trust George and women should trust the man they’re with? I love him so much it scares me.’ Miriam sniffed. ‘I’m not brave like you.’

‘Oh, yes, you are.’ Anne held one of Miriam’s hands against her cheek for a moment. ‘Believe me, I know.’

‘I want to believe it too but I’m not sure, that’s the truth of it. And I need to be sure.’ Miriam shook her head, her eyes downcast. ‘Besides which, I think Jay’s had enough. And you don’t know him like I do. Once he’s made up his mind about something there’s no going back. No second thoughts. That’s the sort of man he is.’

‘He made up his mind he wanted to marry you,’ Anne pointed out gently. ‘Doesn’t that count for anything?’ She stood up, hugging Miriam briefly before she said, ‘Coffee’s all very well but for the very important moments in life there’s nothing like a really robust red. I’m going to open a bottle and we’ll have lunch here; I’ve got a couple of steaks and salad and a wicked chocolate mousse waiting to be eaten. How does that sound?’

‘It was your and George’s dinner,’ Miriam guessed.

‘George would love to take me out tonight instead—he’s always suggesting we eat out more.’ Anne hugged her again. ‘And don’t beat yourself up too badly, sweetheart. You’ve got quite a bit to come to terms with; don’t rush it. If Jay is half the man I think he is, he’ll wait. He loves you.’

CHAPTER TEN

MIRIAM often brought her mother’s words to mind over the next couple of weeks.

She had been in a state of feverish anticipation when Jay was due to return to the UK, part of her hoping he would contact her and demand they meet, the other part knowing she was still no nearer to being able to say to him that she trusted him absolutely. And with things having gone this far, she knew nothing else would do for Jay.

As it was, the deadline she had set for herself came and went, along with the atrocious weather. With the mercurial ability of the English climate the second week of December was unseasonably mild, the blizzards of the first week a distant memory. If it wasn’t for the fact that all the trees were bare and the calendar stated they were in December, folk could have been forgiven for thinking it was early October.

And Jay didn’t call.

Miriam shopped with Clara for the clothes and accessories they needed for their Christmas break, wrote endless Christmas cards and made sure any gifts were taken care of by way of seasonal hampers being delivered. She couldn’t face bein

g in the midst of harassed Christmas shoppers this year. Pathetic, she knew, but with every minute that passed with no contact from Jay she just wanted Christmas to be over. In fact she was wondering why she had ever thought the season was such a great time.

Her mother was—amazingly—incredibly tactful in the midst of it all. She didn’t ask after Jay once, although she must have been dying to know what was happening, and was positively encouraging about Miriam’s skiing holiday with Clara. Because this reeked of maternal pity it didn’t particularly hearten Miriam, but it did take a bit of the heat off. Especially regarding Great-Aunt Abigail.

Three days before Christmas Eve it began to get markedly colder. Colleagues at work who were normally cynical and cool talked excitedly of a white Christmas and every time Miriam turned the radio or TV on the latest pop song—‘Christmas Every Day of the Year’—seemed to burst forth. Even the worldly-wise Clara was infected with the festive bug, or maybe it was just her relationship with Brian, which was going from strength to strength, that had Clara humming carols and buying a tree for the lobby of the house. Miriam helped her friend decorate it with tinsel and baubles, laughing her first genuine laugh for days when instead of a fairy for the top of the tree Clara produced a somewhat scary-looking scarecrow complete with red Father Christmas hat.

‘Can’t be too traditional, now, can I?’ Clara grinned. ‘Got my reputation to think of. Cool, eh?’

‘Dead cool,’ Miriam agreed affectionately. ‘Although why you’ve gone to all this trouble when we aren’t going to be around for Christmas, I don’t know.’ They were due to leave early morning on Christmas Eve and be away for nine days.

Clara reeled off the names of the other occupants of the house. ‘They’ll enjoy it,’ she said, a holy glow of magnanimity surrounding her. ‘It is the season of goodwill to man after all.’

‘True.’ Miriam smiled as she looked at the sweet-smelling tree with its ridiculous topknot but her heart was aching. It was getting worse, not better, this gnawing yearning for Jay. The heaviness in her spirit was weighing her down, making everything an effort, the more so because she was now questioning how he could have cut her out of his life so completely if he loved her as he said he did.

It was unreasonable, she told herself sternly. Totally unreasonable in view of all she’d said to him. She was the one who had sent Jay away, who’d insisted there was no hope for them, so why would the poor man attempt to see her again? She was asking too much. Probably she had always asked too much of him and with women throwing themselves at his feet Jay didn’t have to put up with a nutcase who had all manner of hang-ups cluttering up her psyche. No, she couldn’t in all honesty blame Jay for deciding enough was enough and moving on.

But she did.

She could always pick up the phone and call him. This was another thing she told herself constantly, but somehow, in spite of now knowing she had been wrong about her mother all those years, the thought of laying herself wide open was beyond her. Which probably meant she still had some gremlins to get rid of, she admitted miserably. No, not probably. Absolutely definitely. And so the endless soul-searching continued.

The day before Christmas Eve saw the first light snowfall, just enough to provide a frosting on the bare trees and rooftops and send already excited children into a frenzy of anticipation. As it was the office Christmas party in the afternoon little work was done, the firm winding down for a Christmas break which extended to the day after New Year’s Day.

Miriam had a couple of glasses of wine and some nibbles, joining in the chatter and laughter and pretending an excitement about her holiday she didn’t feel for the sake of social intercourse. She had been doing the same with Clara for the last couple of weeks, not wishing to spoil her friend’s anticipation just because of how she was feeling.

By the time she left the centrally heated confines of the building for the London streets it was bitterly cold and the smell of frost was in the air. The pavements were crowded with Christmas shoppers carrying laden bags and parcels, everyone intent on their own business and seemingly devoid of any Christmas spirit if the pushing and shoving was anything to go by.

She’d had her fill of city life. As the thought hit, Miriam realised it was in the form of a revelation. She’d had years of living and working in the metropolis and it had been great at first, stimulating and exhilarating, even if her job was fairly predictable. But did she really want to fight her way through a stream of people every morning and again at night for the rest of her life whilst living in a concrete jungle?

A harassed mother with a toddler hanging on to the side of the pushchair and a snotty-nosed baby crying its head off passed her, the woman’s shopping bag bumping into her with enough force to cause her to stumble. The woman marched on as Miriam looked, barging her way through the crowd as she used the pushchair almost as a weapon to clear the way in front of her.

But this was Jay’s world. This was where he functioned, where he wanted to be, right in the heart of the pulsing city. His apartment was proof of that. And there was nothing wrong with his choice; it wasn’t bad. But it wasn’t what she wanted any more.

The thought was incredibly disturbing but one she realised she had been coming to for a long time, probably from the first day they had split. Loving him as she did, she had fitted into the hectic social whirl of dinner parties and entertaining, and to be fair she had enjoyed it some of the time. But now, although she didn’t want to live as a hermit, she needed something different. Grass, trees, fields. A small market town perhaps. Somewhere where she could get a good job and maybe wake up to the sound of birdsong rather than the roar of the city streets, smell fresh air and woodsmoke rather than traffic fumes.

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