September

'Nor me. Drive carefully, my darling.'

'Of course.' She sent him a kissing noise down the hundreds of miles of wire, and rang off.

Archie was left sitting on the hard kitchen chair and holding the buzzing receiver in his hand. Lucilla and Pandora. Coming home.

He replaced the receiver. The buzzing ceased. The old kitchen clock ticked slowly. For a few moments he sat where he was, and then got to his feet and went out of the kitchen and down the passage to his study. Sitting at his desk, he opened a drawer and took out a key. Using this key, he opened another, smaller drawer. From this he withdrew an envelope, yellowed with the years and addressed in Pandora's large and immature scrawl to himself, at the Headquarters of The Queen's Loyal Highlanders, in Berlin. The date of the postmark was 1967. It contained a letter, but he did not take this letter out to read because he knew it by heart. Which meant that there was no reason why he had never torn it to shreds, nor flung it on a fire, except that he could not bring himself to destroy it.

Pandora. Coming back to Croy.

From the distance came the sound of a car, growing louder, approaching the house, up the hill from the main road. The noise of its engine was unmistakable. Isobel and Hamish returning in the minibus from their blackberrying expedition. Archie put the envelope back into its drawer, locked it away, disposed once more of the key, and went to meet them.

Isobel had driven the minibus around the back of the house and parked it in the yard and, by the time Archie returned to the kitchen, they were there, his wife and his son, flinging open the door and staggering triumphantly through it, each weighed down by two huge baskets brimming with dark fruit. After a session in the bramble thickets they were both disreputable, dirty, and mud-stained, and looked, Archie decided fondly, no better than a pair of tinkers.

Every time he set eyes on Hamish, he knew a small shock of surprise, because the boy, these summer holidays, had grown like a young tree, getting taller and larger by the day. At twelve, he now topped his mother, and his out-at-elbow sweater was strained across a pair of muscular shoulders. His shirt hung out of his jeans, purple juice stained his hands and mouth, and his abundant corn-coloured hair was sorely in need of a cut. Archie, eyeing him, was filled with pride.

'Hi, Dad.' Dumping the baskets onto the kitchen table, Hamish groaned. 'I'm starving.'

'You're always starving.'

Isobel, too, set down her load. 'Hamish, you've been eating blackberries all afternoon.' She wore her baggy corduroys and a shirt that Archie had long since discarded. 'You can't be hungry.'

'I am. Blackberries don't fill you up.' Hamish was headed for the dresser where the cake tins were stacked. He removed a lid with a clatter and reached for a knife.

Archie admired their harvest. 'You've done frightfully well.'

'We must have picked about thirty pounds. I've never seen so many. We went over to the other sfde of the river where Mr. Gladstone grows his turnips. The hedgerows around those fields are groaning with fruit.' Isobel pulled out a chair and sat down. 'I'd die for a cup of tea.'

Archie said, 'I have news for you.'

She looked up quickly, always fearing the worst. 'Good news?'

'The best,' he told her.

'But when did she call? What did she say? Why didn't she let us know before?' Isobel, alight with excitement, gave Archie no time to answer any question. 'Why didn't they call us from Palma, or France, and give us more notice? Not that I need a moment's notice, it doesn't matter; all that matters is that they're coming. And staying at the Ritz. I don't think that Lucilla's ever stayed in a hotel in the whole of her life. Pandora is ridiculous. They could easily have gone somewhere a little less grand…'

'Pandora probably doesn't know anywhere else.'

'And they're staying over the dance? And she's bringing the sheep-farmer? Do you suppose she actually persuaded Pandora to come? It's so extraordinary, after all these years, that it's taken Lucilla to persuade her. I'll have to get all the bedrooms ready. We'll be quite a house party because we've got that American friend of Katy's coming as well. And food. I think there are still some pheasants in the deep- freeze…'

They were, by now, sitting around the table and drinking tea. Hamish, in famished desperation, had put the kettle on and made this. While his parents talked, he had set the table with three mugs, the tins that contained the cakes and biscuits, and a loaf of bread on its wooden board. As well, he had found butter and a jar of Branston Pickle. Hamish had, just now, a passion for Branston Pickle and spread it on everything. He was, at this moment, engaged in concocting a sandwich, the dark pickle oozing out between two enormous doorstops of bread.

'… did she tell you about Pandora? Did she say anything at all about her?'

'Not very much. Just sounded pleased with life.'

'Oh, I wish I'd been here to talk to her.'

'You can talk to her tomorrow.'

'Have you told anyone else they're coming?'

'No. Just you.'

'I'll have to call Verena and tell her she's got three more people coming to her party. And I must tell Virginia. And Vi.'

Archie reached for the teapot and refilled his mug.

'I was thinking. Perhaps it would be a good idea to ask all the Airds for lunch on Sunday? What do you say? After all, we don't know how long Pandora's going to be staying, and next week's going to be like a three-ring circus with one thing and another. Sunday might be a good day.'

'That's a brilliant idea. I'll ring Virginia. And I'll order a sirloin from the butcher.'

Hamish said 'Yum yum' and reached for another slice of gingerbread.

'… and if it's a fine day we can play croquet. We haven't played croquet all summer. You'll have to cut the grass, Archie.' She set down her mug, businesslike. 'Now. I've got to make bramble jelly, and I'll have to get all the bedrooms ready. But I mustn't forget to ring Virginia…'

'I'll do that,' said Archie. 'You can leave that to me.'

But Isobel, with the great jelly-pan set on the Aga and the blackberries simmering, knew that if she did not share her exciting news with somebody, she would burst, and so found time to call

Violet. At first there was no reply from Pennyburn, so she hung up and called again half an hour later.

'Hello.'

'Vi, it's Isobel.'

'Oh, my dear.'

'Are you busy?'

'No, I'm sitting down with a drink in my hand.'

'But, Vi, it's only half past five. Have you taken to the bottle?'

'Temporarily. I've had the most exhausting day of my life, wheeling Lottie Carstairs around Relkirk and giving her tea. Never mind, it's all over now and I've done my good deed for the week. But I did feel I deserved a large whisky and soda.'

'You certainly do. Or even two large whiskies and soda. Vi, something really exciting has happened. Lucilla rang from London and she's coming home tomorrow and she's bringing Pandora with her.'

'She's bringing who?'

'Pandora. Archie's over the moon with delight. Just think. He's been trying to get her back to Croy for the past twenty-one years and now she's actually coming.'

'I can't believe it.'

'Incredible, isn't it? Come for lunch on Sunday and see them all. We're asking all the other Airds as well, you can come with them.'

'I'd love to do that. But… Isobel, why did she suddenly decide to come? Pandora, I mean.'

'No idea. Lucilla said something about the Steyntons' party, but it seems a fairly feeble excuse.'

'How extraordinary. I… I… wonder what she will look like?'

'No idea. Probably smashing. Except that she's thirty-nine now, so there are bound to be a few wrinkles.