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‘Alors, if you wish a task to perform,’ Andre went on as if she hadn’t spoken, ‘then you can come down and make me some coffee and we can drink it while we talk.’
She said quickly, ‘I don’t want any coffee—and I need to tidy my room.’
The firm mouth twisted. ‘Even though we both know that there are things to be said? Questions still to be answered?’
She forced a smile. ‘Even so. I—I don’t want to make more work for Madame Rameau.’
There was a silence, then he said quietly, ‘As you wish. Then we shall meet again at lunch, a midi et demi.’
As soon as he’d gone, Ginny got out her mobile phone and keyed in the Welburns’ number. To her surprise, the call was taken not by the housekeeper but Jonathan, who seemed equally astonished to be hearing from her.
‘Where on earth are you?’ he demanded.
‘In France,’ she said over-brightly. ‘Visiting Andrew’s other family.’ Which, she hoped would confer a kind of respectability on the trip. She paused. ‘But there’s rather a snag. I need to speak to Mother and Cilla fairly urgently and I can’t remember the name of their hotel. Can you remind me?’
‘Your solicitor has already asked me, and I have no idea.’ There was a chill in his voice. ‘Your sister left me a message as brief as it was uninformative. And Mrs Pelham says that neither Cilla nor your mother took their phones. So we’re all in the dark.’
Ginny said uncomfortably, ‘I think it was all last minute and very rushed.’
He said bluntly, ‘I’m afraid I don’t find that much of a consolation. Not when Cilla and I are due to be married in a few months. But it seems on a par with everything else that’s been going on. Now you must excuse me. I’m on my way out.’
Ginny sank down on the edge of the bed, staring at her phone as if it might grow teeth and bite her. Because this was certainly not the response she’d expected.
What on earth had possessed her sister to put herself out of touch and out of reach on the other side of the world? And from her fiancé of all people?
Everything else that’s been going on...
The words had an ominous ring about them, she thought, recalling Jon’s open discontent at the dinner party.
Of course Andre had never actually admitted having an intimate liaison with Cilla. But nor had he denied that their mutual and very public attraction over dinner had continued in private, she thought, sinking her teeth into her lower lip.
But how could Cilla—when she loved Jonathan?
Maybe she couldn’t help herself, said a small annoying voice in her head. Just like you.
She sighed and put her phone back in her bag. If there were to be many more calls to England, she would need to top it up with money as well as recharge the battery.
But maybe that wouldn’t be necessary if, as she hoped and prayed, she would soon be on her way back to a new life and a worthwhile career. If Andre kept his part of their bargain.
And as long as she didn’t have to keep hers...
She looked down at herself. Pressed a hand against the flatness of her abdomen, telling herself that everything would be all right and she had nothing to worry about. That Fate wouldn’t play her such a dirty trick.
Telling herself, too, that she needed to stop brooding and find something else to occupy her mind.
She’d offered an obvious fib about her room, which was already immaculate, so she retrieved the thriller she’d bought at the airport, stretched out on the bed and began to read, keeping an eye on her little clock as she did so.
When she presented herself punctually in the kitchen, she found the meal more than lived up to its promise, the chicken falling off the bone and the vegetables perfectly cooked in the rich and subtly flavoured sauce.
To her own astonishment, Ginny ate every scrap of the generous portion she was given and still found room for a large slice of tarte tatin under Madame Rameau’s indulgent gaze.
In faulty but robust English, she informed Ginny that she was too thin. That a breeze of the most small would carry her away, enfin, and a man liked a woman that he knew he was holding in his arms.
And no prizes for guessing what man she was referring to, thought Ginny, avoiding Andre’s sardonic glance across the table, and furious to find herself blushing again, as if she was going for some all-time record in embarrassment.
When the meal was over, Andre said, ‘I have to go back to Dijon this afternoon, Virginie, so there is no need for you to hide away in your room again. Clothilde, who believes you need rest, has lit the fire for you in le petit salon, which you will find more comfortable.’ He paused. ‘Also some of my mother’s books are there. Please choose anything you want.’
