One Day in May - Catherine Alliott [84]
He got to his feet to wring the patron’s hand. I was staggered. This was his local? Of all the bars in all the world and I’d strolled into… He and Pierre were chewing the fat now, in quick-fire French: it gave me a moment.
‘How far away is your house then?’ I managed to keep my voice light and neutral as he sat down again, keen to get to the bottom of this.
‘About five miles in that direction.’ He jerked his head. ‘It’s an old farmhouse in the foothills of the Camiole valley, quite tucked away.’
‘But I thought you lived in London?’
‘I do, as a rule. My, you know a lot about me, Hattie. You’re not stalking me, are you?’ he grinned. ‘Haven’t seen you for years and first you turn up at my patch in Buckinghamshire and now here.’
I opened my mouth to protest, astounded. ‘Your patch! Little Crandon is very much my sister’s patch, actually! And this, I’ll have you know, is my patch. My antique fair, which I come to every year, have done for the last six!’
‘Except last year.’
‘Yes, except last year,’ I said, surprised. ‘We missed it. But how did you—’
‘I saw you here the previous year. Didn’t quite have the nerve to speak to you. Last year I looked for you, but you didn’t pitch up. Thought I’d try my luck this time.’
I stared. His narrow dark eyes were steady, but I couldn’t read them.
‘So, in fact, you’re stalking me.’
He gave a soft laugh. ‘If you call stalking looking out for you once a year at a popular local fête, which I’d frequent anyway, then yes, I suppose. I wouldn’t call it terribly committed tailing.’
‘And yet, when I saw you the other week, you didn’t seem particularly…’
‘Friendly? No, but then I was startled to see you out of context. Didn’t have my speech ready, as I would have done here. Also, there were people around.’
The waiter came with our drinks and two plates of saucisson. I watched as Hal exchanged a few more fluent words with him, smiling the while. Yes, Laura was right. Very attractive. He’d filled out a bit. And his eyes seemed less intent and probing: there was more light to them, more confidence. Which came with age, of course.
‘Your speech?’ I said as the waiter departed.
‘I… want to apologize. For what I wrote all those years ago. And also for my silence afterwards. The ball was firmly in my court to make amends. We were friends, good friends, for years, and I… had no right to judge you like that. I’m sorry.’
It was a simple, upfront, heartfelt little speech and, as such, affecting. Disarming, even.
‘You had every right,’ I said slowly. ‘I behaved very badly. To you, to Letty…’ I felt myself blush under his gaze. ‘You had every right, Hal.’
There was a silence. It seemed to me we travelled back in time together within it.
‘You were young,’ he said at length. ‘You made a mistake.’
Funny. Even after all these years, I never regarded Dom as a mistake. Wouldn’t have had it differently.
‘I was young,’ I agreed, ‘but you were justifiably angry.’
‘At the time maybe, but not six months, a year later. Not sixteen years later, certainly. Friends forgive, make up. I’ve always regretted not doing that.’
‘But as time goes by it becomes more difficult. I can see that. It’s nice to see you, Hal.’
It was. And as we smiled at one another, relieved to have got that out of the way, I realized I’d missed him. He had been my best friend, but I’d blocked his memory for years. It had hurt, at the time, losing his friendship, but not as much as everything else was hurting. I’d been so in love with his brother, it had seemed small beer in comparison. Losing Dominic, or rather not being able to have him, had been all-consuming. But as we chatted now, about old times, recent times, so much in between, the value of what we’d once shared, of what is, after all, a rare and precious thing, a friendship between the sexes without the sex, I felt something within me, some warmth I’d missed return. It was as if a battered old coin was being gently polished and burnished, recovering its gleam.
After a bit we were tumbling over our words, couldn’t get them out quickly