After that she was busy taking her exams. Lorenzo called TransGift, an organisation that would arrange for flowers to be sent from a New York florist. He dictated the card, ‘With love and best wishes, Lorenzo,’ and ordered it to be sent with a huge bouquet of red roses.
But as soon as he hung up he though, Hell, no!
He called TransGift back and changed the roses to pink. ‘And the card should read “With best wishes, Lorenzo.”’
‘Not “love”?’ the receptionist asked.
‘Not love.’
He replaced the receiver and sat brooding. Perhaps pink was still going too far.
He called back. ‘Yellow,’ he said. ‘And the card should read, “Best of luck with your exams”.’
‘I’ll do that for you, sir.’
But ten minutes later the doubts struck again. Yellow was a dangerous colour. He grabbed the phone.
‘Yes, I’ve sent it through,’ said the exasperated receptionist. ‘But I’m in time to cancel it.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘TransGift is a very efficient organisation, sir. If you’re having trouble with flowers, can I interest you in a teddy bear instead?’
‘You do teddy bears? Great!’
‘What expression would you like on his face? Romantic, macho, silly grin?’
‘Silly grin. And a sash saying “Good luck”. No card.’
When he put the phone down he felt as exhausted as if he’d put in a full day’s work.
Helen telephoned him that evening. ‘Thank you,’ she said.
‘He arrived then?’
‘Yes, he arrived, and so did-’
‘I thought of sending flowers,’ he hurried on, interrupting her in his urgency to make matters clear. ‘But flowers die. You’ll be able to keep him, and every time you see him looking daft you’ll think of me.’
‘Well, that’s true,’ she said amused.
‘Did you get flowers from-anyone else?’
‘Erik sent me red roses, but like you say, they’ll die.’
‘I’m sure they’re superb red roses,’ he said, trying not to sound as nettled as he felt.
‘The very best,’ she assured him, ‘bought from the hotel shop which will give him an enormous discount. I prefer Gigi.’
‘Gigi?’ he echoed, pleased.
‘Well, you can’t call a bear Lorenzo, can you?’
‘It’s not a bear’s name at all,’ he agreed solemnly. ‘Anyway, the best of luck with your exams. Let me know how you do.’
When she’d hung up Helen sat looking thoughtfully at Gigi, who grinned foolishly back at her. He was five inches tall, covered in soft golden fur, and beautiful. She pressed her lips against him, then set him down beside the yellow roses that had preceded him by ten minutes.
Next to them were pink roses, and behind them a bouquet of red roses that cast Erik’s into the shade. Laid out on Helen’s desk were the three cards that had come with them.
TransGift weren’t quite as efficient as they claimed.
The exams lasted three days and were gruelling. Helen was well grounded in all aspects of hotel management, both theoretical and practical, and she approached the first test with confidence. But it was much tougher than she’d expected and at home, that evening, she let out a long breath of dismay. From his new home on her dressing table Gigi regarded her with sympathy.
‘You’re coming with me tomorrow,’ she told him. ‘I need you.’
Strangely, the next day, she felt full of renewed confidence. Of course it was superstition to imagine that Gigi’s presence in her bag was making any difference, but she sailed through the most difficult questions, and knew she was doing well.
When it was all over Erik said mysteriously, ‘I’d like to take you to dinner next Monday evening. The Jacaranda, all the trimmings.’
‘Have you come into a fortune?’ she asked, astonished. ‘The Jacaranda costs the earth just to go in the door. I’m honoured, but why not eat here at a discount?’
‘Because a discount meal isn’t good enough for what I have in mind,’ he said firmly. ‘There’s something I particularly want us to talk about.’
This was worrying. Obviously Erik wanted to move their relationship onto a more intense plane, but she wasn’t ready for that, and she couldn’t think why. He was exactly the kind of man she’d always planned to marry, solid, reliable, not Italian.
At the other end of the scale was Lorenzo, light-hearted, probably unreliable, disgracefully Sicilian, but with a wicked ability to chime in with her mood, and a pair of merry blue eyes that seemed to get between her and Erik.
Which was nonsense, because they were just buddies. To prove it she told him about the planned evening in her next email. He responded at once.
‘He’s taking you to the Jacaranda? Boy, this must be some occasion!’
‘So you’ll be engaged to Erik in a few days?’
To which she replied with a frosty,
On the night she dressed up and he kissed her hand, smiling his approval. There were flowers on the table, and Erik’s first action was to bring out a black box, with Cartier’s on the lid.
‘Open it,’ he said, pushing it across the table to her.
The box contained a gold chain and locket. Helen regarded it with awe and dismay.
‘Erik, I can’t-’
‘Wait, let me say my piece. I want you to have this for two reasons. The first is congratulations. You’ve done brilliantly in the exams. You’ll hear officially in a couple of days, and I’ve put in a bid to have you assigned to me. The second is-well, it’s rather difficult but there’s been something I’ve been meaning to say to you-I’ve even thought maybe you guessed-well, anyway-’ he took her hand between his ‘-here goes-’
She let him keep hold of her hand and heard him out in silence. With every incredible word her happiness grew. They spent a wonderful evening together, and by the time they left she was wearing the gold chain around her neck and a smile on her lips.
When she checked her computer that night Lorenzo was there, ready and waiting.
‘So are you going to marry him?’
To which she replied simply,
Lorenzo considered that word for a long time. It told him nothing beyond the simple fact, and whatever had happened at the Jacaranda must have been more than the simple fact.
Friends told each other things, didn’t they? She would tell him everything, if he just waited. Showing curiosity would be fatal.
So he carefully didn’t ask. And she didn’t tell. And after a week he realised, with deep frustration, that she wasn’t going to.
CHAPTER FIVE
LORENZO sent Helen another little bear to congratulate her on her exam results. She thanked him, but then they were both submerged in work and the correspondence faded for a couple of weeks. He took it up again because he had big news.
‘Just got back from a wedding,’ he wrote. ‘Angie and Bernardo finally tied the knot in Montedoro. He was going crazy because she wouldn’t say yes, so in the end he asked Mamma for help, and we all turned up at Angie’s front door and told her it was her wedding day.’
