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He nodded ruefully. ‘I see that now, but I’m not a great talker, I’m afraid, that’s why I’m happy in my job. I don’t mind being alone for hours with nobody to talk to but my trees.’
Groaning, Dylan said, ‘I think I’m more jealous of those trees than I was of Suzy! I know you love them more than me!’
‘I don’t love anything or anybody more than I love you, Dylan!’ He let his mouth slide down her neck and she heard his breathing quicken, roughen. ‘Oh, darling. . .you smell so wonderful.’ His lips softly caressed the curve of her breast; he laid his cheek against the aching fullness their baby had just been enjoying.
Her fingers stroked his thick, warm hair which clung to her skin as if magnetically attracted. Little Ruth had fallen asleep, her head in the crook of her mother’s arm, her pink lips parted in a little smile. Dylan looked down at them both, her husband, her baby, both lying against her, drifting off to sleep, and closed her own eyes with a contented look. For the first time for ages she was really happy.
Ruth woke her, and Ross, when she arrived a few minutes later and came into the room after tapping and getting no answer.
Ross sat up hurriedly, flushed and yawning. ‘Sorry, I must have fallen asleep.’
Hurriedly, Dylan buttoned her nightdress bodice again with one hand while she held the baby with the other.
‘All three of you were asleep. You’re obviously dead tired,’ Ruth said, amused. ‘Ross, I’ve made up a bed for you in the little room across the landing; I put a hot water bottle between the sheets to warm up the bed for you. Off you go and get a good night’s sleep.’
He stood up, stretching with a yawn. ‘That sounds wonderful. I hardly slept at all last night, or the night before—I must be running on the last of my adrenalin.’
‘I’m sure you are,’ nodded Ruth. ‘Give me the baby, Dylan. She can sleep in the room with me, downstairs, then I can change her or give her a bottle, if she wakes up during the night. I want you to try and sleep again, but if you need me all you have to do is yell. I’m a light sleeper; I’ll hear you.’
‘You can leave her here. I can cope—I’ll have to once I get home with her,’ Dylan protested as Ruth picked up the wicker basket.
‘No, after all the effort of the birth you need a good rest. Doesn’t she, Ross?’
‘Yes,’ he obediently agreed. ‘Ruth’s right. Goodnight, darling. See you in the morning.’
Giving her a kiss on top of her head, he went out, and Ruth took the baby very carefully, trying not to wake her. As she laid the child in the wicker basket little Ruth stirred, frowning petulantly, grizzled a little, then yawned and went back to sleep as Ruth carried her out of the room.
Ruth slept fitfully that night, woken up several times by the crying of the baby. At first light she was up, walking the kitchen floor, with the baby over her shoulder, red-faced and hiccuping with wind after a bottle, the tiny fists clenched and flailing impotently.
‘Shhh...shhhh...’ soothed Ruth, patting the baby’s back, and when that didn’t work tried singing a lullaby she remembered from her own childhood, although she only remembered some of the words. She filled in the rest with humming wordlessly, and the baby quietened, listening.
‘That isn’t a bad voice. You should be in the church choir,’ Henry said from the door, making her jump and swing round to face him.
He had washed and shaved, brushed smooth his white hair and was clear-eyed and smiling, a warm blue sweater she recognised as one of her own worn casually over the shirt he had worn yesterday. Seeing her look at it, he grinned. ‘You don’t mind my borrowing this, do you? I was cold when I first got up.’
‘Of course not. I?
??m amazed it fits you so well—you might as well keep it. I never wear it, but it suits you.’
‘Well, thank you, and a Happy Christmas!’
‘Oh, my God, I’d forgotten it was Christmas,’ she groaned, horrified by the lapse of memory.
‘How could you forget that with a Christmas baby in your arms?’ he teased, laughing. ‘And a house full of Christmas guests! What are you going to give us all for lunch today? I don’t smell a turkey cooking in the range, and there’s no sign of a Christmas pudding waiting to boil!’
Ruth grimaced at him. ‘I wasn’t intending to bother about Christmas. There’s no point when you live alone.’
Henry gazed at her, face becoming serious. ‘I know how you feel. I didn’t bother to make any preparations, either. I sent a few cards and bought a few presents, but I didn’t bother to put up decorations or a tree. I had any number of invitations.’
Yes, thought Ruth a little acidly, he didn’t need to tell her that. She could imagine who from! There were several women without a man in the village who had their eyes on him; he was still very attractive, despite his white hair, rugged, forceful. An eligible divorcee with a nice house of his own and plenty of money, he had no need to spend Christmas alone.
There had been no such invitations for her. Who wanted a dull, greying old spinster hanging about over the festive season, when families came together again and people tried to forget all their worries, to shut out the rest of the world, have fun and be happy?
‘Whose invitation did you accept?’ she asked, aware that the baby had fallen asleep over her shoulder, the small body heavy in that wonderful abandonment which could be so touching.
‘Yours,’ Henry murmured, looking amused.
Her eyes widened. ‘I didn’t invite you!’
