The Wedding Day

by Catherine Alliott

  ‘It was pretty though, wasn’t it, Matt?’ I breathed. ‘Everyone said so, and everyone said how heavenly it looked inside, full of harebells and cow parsley and red campion … You know Rosie and I were up at dawn collecting all those flowers? They wouldn’t have lasted overnight.’

  ‘So I gather, although most brides would have let a florist do all that work, with proper hot-house flowers, but not my bride. Oh no, hot-house flowers weren’t good enough for her. She wanted the church to look like an extension of the hedgerow, without a carnation in sight.’ He shook his head ruefully. ‘I had no idea you had such firm views on wedding etiquette.’

  I leaned forward eagerly. ‘But I knew exactly how everything should be today. Right down to the Provençal tablecloths in the marquee and the chocolate sponge inside the wedding cake and the jars of poppies on the tables – which I hope Clare remembered to bring.’

  He regarded me a moment. Smiled. ‘Good. I’m glad. That’s how it should be. Oh, and the other reason I knew about those darn wild flowers was because you woke me at dawn to tell me you were off to collect them. Remember? And I grunted and swore about being woken so damn early?’

  I smiled. ‘Sorry. Just thought I’d better tell you in case you woke up and thought I’d done a bunk.’

  ‘Now that,’ he admitted with an eyebrow cocked, ‘didn’t even occur to me. Too arrogant, you see. No, I just woke up and thought: My, what a lucky girl that Annie O’Harran is, to be marrying a – Oof.’ He doubled up in mock agony as I aimed a gentle toe in his groin.

  ‘Sorry, honey,’ he gasped. ‘I’ll just row a little faster, shall I? Keep to your tight schedule?’

  ‘We’re nearly there,’ I said excitedly, sitting up straight as the little blue boat drifted towards the shore. ‘Oh Matt, this is so special, isn’t it? And look, Tod and Flora have even decorated the beach!’

  He turned round to glimpse the buttercups and poppies strewn across the shore. Grinned. ‘I wondered what those two were up to this morning. How’s the banner up close?’

  I gazed up at Taplow House, the roof of which was just visible behind the trees, and across which Tod and Flora had strung a banner – climbing through an attic window to do it whilst Matt and I, horrified, had yelled from the garden below, ‘Come down NOW!’ – which read: ‘Congratulations Matt and Annie.’

  I smiled. ‘It’s brilliant.’ I gazed above it to the cloudless blue sky, feeling the breeze in my hair. ‘And the weather held, didn’t it? And everyone said September could be so dodgy –’

  ‘And that the heavens could quite conceivably open and drown us in our cross-channel voyage, but not my dear wife, who had the day planned to such a tee, that I for one sent a silent prayer up to the Almighty to keep those rain clouds at bay and not spoil her big day.’

  ‘Our big day,’ I breathed. ‘We’re here.’

  Matt hoisted in the oars, taking care not to crush the flowers and streamers I’d decorated the boat with that morning, and we drifted into the clear, glassy shallows.

  Happiness and excitement bubbling up within me, I held on to the sides as Matt, looking ludicrously handsome in his morning coat, trousers rolled up to the knees, jumped out and waded the last few feet, pulling us up the beach. He held out his hand to me as I stood up and our eyes locked for a second.

  ‘I’m not sure whether I’ve mentioned this,’ he said, ‘but you’re looking rather lovely today.’

  ‘Thank you.’ I smoothed down the vintage cream dress shyly. Glanced up. ‘You hadn’t peeked and seen it, had you?’

  ‘I most certainly had not.’ He helped me out. ‘Flora told me it was in the closet in her bedroom along with the rather fetching grey number she’s wearing today, but that if I so much as set foot in her room I’d be on the first ship back to the colonies.’

  ‘I found it in an antique shop in Helston.’

  ‘Of course you did. No spanking new designer labels for my wife. Only the best bit of tatty old lace.’

  ‘Less of the tatty or you’ll definitely be on that ship – Oh, listen, Matt. I can hear them!’

  We paused for a moment as we tied up the boat and listened to the muffled voices above us. The rest of the wedding party had gone on in a procession of cars inland, whilst we’d rowed across alone, seen off from the shore by only Flora and Tod, who’d waved and jumped up and down before beetling back to the cars, determined to beat us.

  We held hands as we walked along the beach and then up through the wood, following the familiar, winding sandy path to the top. As we emerged through the trees into the sunshine, I saw that someone had thoughtfully raised the sides of the tiny candy-striped marquee by the terrace, revealing the legs of the guests inside, who, for a small clutch of people, were making a great deal of excited chatter. There were children all over the lawn, scampering about with our newly acquired hairy dog, and as Giles, my nephew, spotted us and darted inside the marquee to report, I felt a knot of excitement grow in my stomach. A great cheer went up as everyone came out to greet us: champagne glasses were raised high as we approached, and then the throng parted and they roared us in. Blinking and laughing foolishly, I kissed Rosie and Dan, who were at the front, then Clare and Michael, who were whooping and clapping loudly behind, then more friends – some down from London who were staying in bed and breakfasts – and our windsurfing vicar, who’d astonished Matt and me a few weeks ago after our banns had been read by changing into a wetsuit and surfing home. I spotted Mum at the back, raising her glass and blinking madly, and remembered how in church she’d been unashamedly dabbing away with her hanky as Matt and I had taken our vows. I blew her a kiss. Matt’s parents were here too, over from the States and staying with Louise and Tom. Everyone wanted to pump Matt’s hand and kiss my cheek as we came through.

  Matt’s father, an extremely tall, rather distinguished-looking academic who still lectured occasionally at Princeton, was the first to claim me, whisking me away while Matt went to see my mum.

  ‘So, congratulations are in order on all sorts of fronts, I gather,’ he said, twinkling down at me from his very great height. ‘Firstly for looking like the most handsome couple I’ve seen in a long time, but also for becoming people of property. I understand from Gertrude over there that a little transaction is about to take place?’

  I smiled over in Gertrude’s direction, where, elegant in a long biscuit linen coat, with dramatic feathers looping from a tiny hat perched on the back of her head, she chatted to Flora.

  ‘Well, she’s been wanting to sell it for some time. She feels she’s too old to hang on to it any longer, and since Matt’s been offered the head of psychiatry at Exeter – well, we’ve got to have somewhere to live and frankly we can’t think of anywhere nicer.’

  ‘Oh sure, it’s a peach of a place. But all year round? Winter too?’ He gave me a quizzical gleam as he regarded me over his half-moon glasses. ‘Matt grew up on the ocean so I don’t doubt his enthusiasm, or Tod’s for that matter, but I have to tell you, January will be pretty bleak when the storm clouds gather and the wind whips around this place.’

  ‘Oh, but I can’t wait! The bleaker the better. I can’t wait to see this house out of season, when the waves are beating against the rocks down there and the spray comes right up to the windows. I love that feeling of being safe and warm inside while the sea whips up to a frenzy outside.’

  He smiled. ‘I’m with you there. Given the choice it’s how I’d live all year. There’s nothing quite like waking up to the sound of the sea breaking on the shore in the morning.’

  ‘And I won’t be remote and lonely at all, because Rosie and Dan are just around the corner, and Louise and Tom too.’

  ‘Whose boys, I gather, are something of a hit with your daughter?’

  I laughed. ‘Well, the middle one’s certainly made an impression.’ I turned to look as Flora chatted animatedly to a lanky blond fourteen-year-old, who was scratching his leg shyly and blushing.

  ‘And of course they’re all going to be at the same
school,’ said Louise, overhearing and coming up to offer her congratulations. She kissed my cheek. ‘My boys can’t wait till next term to swagger into class with Flora.’

  ‘Well, I can assure you the feeling’s mutual. It’s a dream come true for her, really. Not only to be going to a mixed school but to have Tod and the cousins there too.’

  ‘And Tod’s happy?’ she asked. ‘I mean, to be staying here?’

  ‘Oh definitely. He was desperate to get away from Cambridge, but quite content not to go back home for a bit. He wants to go to university in the States, but he’s happy to have a few years at school in England first. As long as he’s with his father and by the sea, he’s fine.’

  ‘And you, my dear, you’re happy?’ Gertrude drifted up as Louise moved away. She kissed me, and her grey eyes were kind and quizzical. ‘You certainly look it.’

  ‘Oh I am, and I can’t thank you enough for coming, Gertrude. It means so much to me, it really does. I thought, well, after David …’

  ‘That I’d never speak to you again?’ She pulled a face. ‘I’m too fond of you and Flora for that, and we all know you did the right thing. David too. He wrote to me recently, incidentally, to say he’s inoculated over two thousand children against measles already and they’re awaiting more vaccines. The infant mortality rate from the disease and the malnutrition out there is appalling apparently.’

  ‘Golly.’ I gulped. ‘How awful. Sort of … puts everything into perspective, doesn’t it? This all seems a bit inconsequential and trivial compared to that.’ I gazed around sheepishly at all my friends and family, laughing and drinking.

  ‘Nonsense,’ she said, patting my arm. ‘I didn’t mean to dampen your day, this has its own importance. And David needed a cause. Some people do, you know. And now he’s found one. Just be glad it’s not you.’

  She gave me a mischievous smile and moved on, picking her way around a group of children on the lawn who were throwing a frisbee about. As Rosie’s eldest leaped up to catch it, he missed, and it sailed over to the herbaceous border where Mum was chatting to Matt’s mother in a patch of sunlight. Mum ducked as it looked about to take her hat off, then squealed thankfully as a man’s hand shot out to grab it. She fell laughing on his arm. He threw it back to the children, caught my eye, and sauntered over.

  ‘Adam.’

  ‘Congratulations, my love.’ He leaned in and kissed my cheek. ‘You did the right thing in the end and married the right man. Bastard.’

  I grinned. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘And thank you, for the invitation.’

  I gave a wry smile. ‘Well, I have to tell you, I deliberated long and hard.’

  He laughed. ‘I bet you did. And Matt, presumably, couldn’t care less?’

  ‘Oh, Matt couldn’t give a monkey’s. The more the merrier was his attitude.’

  ‘There’s confidence for you. And yours was?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Your attitude?’

  ‘Oh, that it would be nice for Flora. And it is.’ We both turned to look across at her, still chatting to Tod’s cousin, her cheeks glowing as she flicked her hair back from her shoulder, looking really rather stunning in her long grey dress.

  ‘We’re going to have to keep an eye on her,’ said Adam as the same thought crossed his mind. ‘Rather too many predatory male adolescents trailing her this afternoon for my liking. They’ll have to be handy with their fists. I’m not having any old Tom, Dick or Harry taking her out.’

  I smiled. ‘I’m sure she’ll use her father’s discretion.’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘And what’s that supposed to mean? I’ll have you know I’m a changed man since I heard about your engagement. Quite laid me low, as a matter of fact, and I haven’t so much as laid a finger on – Ooh, I say. What have we here?’ He stood aside to accommodate a rather voluptuous blonde in a very short skirt and plunging neckline, who was muscling through to congratulate me.

  ‘I know you’re busy chattin’ an’ that, but I gotta kiss the bride at some point, en I!’

  I grinned as she left half of Max Factor on my cheek. ‘Of course you have. Adam, this is Lorraine, Matt’s new private secretary at Exeter Hospital. Lorraine, this is my ex-husband Adam.’

  She turned to him, grinning coquettishly, and dug him hard in the ribs with an elbow. ‘Oh yeah, I heard all about you from Flora. Bit of a ladykiller, by all accounts!’

  Adam puffed out his chest. ‘Well, I wouldn’t say killer exactly. No maiden, to my knowledge, has actually been fatally slain on account of my charms, but perhaps felled at the knees would be a better analogy?’

  She chortled. ‘Funny, ent ya? And my auntie saw you in rep in Truro. Said it was worth goin’ just to see you in tights. Said you fairly blocked out the sun!’ She roared loudly.

  Adam was cheering up considerably now. ‘Well, your auntie sounds like a woman of taste,’ he murmured. ‘Tell me, um, Lorraine. Can I get you a drink? Only you seem to be bereft.’

  ‘Be-what? Oh, yeah. Well they’ve only got champagne see, an’ I get really really bladdered on that, so better not.’

  Adam smouldered professionally. ‘Surely just a little glass wouldn’t hurt? After all, this is a celebration, and we can mix it with a dash of peach juice if you wish? Have a Bellini?’

  ‘Have a what? Ooh, you saucy –! Yeah, orright, go on then.’

  ‘Come,’ said Adam, gently guiding her by the elbow towards the drinks table under the apple tree, a smile playing on his lips, a familiar light in his eyes. ‘Come and admire the ripening Coxes. I might even pluck you one.’

  ‘Might you indeed.’

  I smiled at their departing backs and drifted on, nodding and thanking as, all around me, tides of greeting and congratulations flowed; travelling light, the scent of lavender and old-fashioned roses filling my lungs, and always feeling Matt’s presence, glimpsing him occasionally through the throng.

  Clare and Rosie were talking energetically by the huge chocolate cake, and Rosie broke off as I approached, her face alight.

  ‘I was just saying, my only reservation about moving down here was not knowing a soul, but now I’ve got my best friend round the corner!’

  ‘I know.’ I hugged her hard. ‘Except of course I’ll be the one left in London.’ Clare pulled a sour face. ‘I’ll be no-mates Clare.’

  ‘Oh Clare, you’ve got loads of mates,’ I rallied, managing to avoid catching Rosie’s eye. ‘And think how often you can come down now that you’re not working? You can come and stay for weeks in the summer with the children.’

  ‘That’s true,’ she conceded. ‘And lovely for Mum to have you so close by. Now she’s getting older.’

  ‘Lovely for me too,’ I said hugging her as she approached, resplendent in her grey silk suit. ‘Church all right, Mum? Meet with your approval?’

  ‘Ooh yes, love, everything I dreamed of. And you look a picture too, doesn’t she, Ted?’

  ‘Aye. That you do.’ Ted beamed, pink and burly at her side, and looking as if he might go pop at any minute in his ancient, tight-fitting tweed suit.

  ‘Your dad would have been so proud,’ Mum went on. ‘I don’t know what he’d have said about this hat, though.’ She put an anxious hand to her head. ‘Flora made me stick this feather in the side, said it made it, but I’m not so sure myself. And I can just hear your father, Annie. “Marjorie, you look like a chicken.” ’

  ‘Then I’m a lucky man,’ said Matt, coming up beside her. ‘Not many men can boast a spring chicken for a mother-in-law, and a glamorous one at that,’ he added gallantly, making her blush delightedly. ‘But now I fear I must break up the party. Michael and Tom are ready for us, honey.’

  Matt took my hand and I wondered if I’d ever stop getting a thrill up and down my spine every time he called me that. I looked up at him, tall and broad beside me as we moved on air to the top table, where Tom, Matt’s best man, and Michael, who’d given me away, were waiting. Michael raised his glass as we stopped beside him, a huge grin on his
face.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he boomed. ‘I give you … the bride and groom!’

  Glasses were raised and a chorus of voices soared right up to the top of the marquee.

  ‘THE BRIDE AND GROOM!’

  Chapter One

  Somewhere over the English Channel travelling north, closer to the white cliffs than to Cherbourg and whilst cruising at an altitude of thirty thousand feet, a voice came over the tannoy. I’d heard this chap before, when he’d filled us in on our flying speed and the appalling weather in London, and he’d struck me then as being a cut above the usual easyJet Laconic. His clipped, slightly pre-war tones and well-modulated vowels had a reassuring ring to them. A good man to have in a crisis.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I wonder if I could have your attention for a moment, please. Is there by any chance a doctor on board? If so, would they be kind enough to make themselves known to a member of the cabin crew. Many thanks.’

  I glanced up from Country Living, dragging myself away from the scatter cushions in faded Cabbages and Roses linen I fully intended to make but probably never would, to toss attractively around the Lloyd Loom chairs in the long grass of the orchard I would one day possess, complete with old-fashioned beehive and donkey. I turned to my husband. Raised enquiring eyebrows.

  He pretended he’d neither heard the announcement nor sensed my eloquent brows: he certainly didn’t look at them. He remained stolidly immobile, staring resolutely down at the Dan Brown he’d bought at Heathrow and had taken back and forth to Paris, but had yet to get beyond page twenty-seven. I pursed my lips, exhaled loudly and meaningfully through my nostrils and returned to my orchard.

  Two minutes later, the clipped tones were back. Still calm, still measured, but just a little more insistent.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I’m sorry, but if there is a doctor or a nurse on board, we would be most grateful if they would come forward. We really do need some assistance.’

  I nudged my husband. ‘James.’