Pausing at the small Georgian desk, Patsy picked up a large envelope and walked back to the sofa, where she sat down next to Meredith.
“Ian Grainger, the owner of Heronside, is rather proud of the pictures. He took them himself, last spring and summer.” So saying, she handed the envelope to Meredith, who pulled out the photographs eagerly.
After a few seconds spent looking at them, she turned to Patsy and said, “I’m not surprised he’s proud of them. The pictures are beautiful. So is Heronside, if these are anything to go by.”
“Very much so, Meredith. In a way, the photographs don’t really do the inn and the grounds justice. There’s such a sense of luxury in the rooms, you feel pampered just walking into one of them. The whole inn is very well done, lovely antiques and fabrics, and I know you’ll like the decorative schemes, the overall ambiance. As for the grounds, they’re breathtaking, don’t you think?”
Meredith nodded, shuffled through the pictures again, and picked one of them out. It was a woodland setting. The ground was carpeted with irises and rafts of sunlight slanted down through the leafy green canopies of the trees. Just beyond were brilliant yellow daffodils growing on a slope, and, far beyond this, a stretch of the lake could be seen—vast, placid, silvery, glistening in the sun.
“Look, Patsy,” Meredith said, and handed it to her partner. “Isn’t this gorgeous?”
“Yes, and most especially the slope covered in daffodils. Doesn’t it remind you of Wordsworth’s poem?”
Meredith stared at her.
“The one about the daffodils. Don’t you know it?”
Meredith shook her head.
Patsy confided, “It’s one of my favorites.” Almost involuntarily, she began to recite it.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
“It’s lovely,” Meredith said.
“Didn’t you learn it at school?”
“No,” Meredith murmured.
Patsy went on. “I like the last verse best of all. Would you care to hear it?”
“Please,” Meredith replied. “You recite poetry extremely well.”
Once more Patsy launched into the poem:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
“It’s really beautiful,” Meredith said, smiling at her. “It’s very peaceful . . . serene.”
“That’s how I feel about it.”
“I think I’ve heard that last verse before. Somewhere. But I’m not sure where,” Meredith murmured. “Not at school, though.” For a moment or two she racked her brain, but try though she did, she could not remember. And yet the poem had struck a chord in her memory, but she was unable to isolate it. The fleeting memory remained elusive.
Patsy remarked, “Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of the inn near Ripon. The Millers, who own it, did have a few photos, and they were very good, too. Yet somehow they didn’t quite capture the spirit of the place, its soul. So I decided not to take them. You’ll have to judge it cold when we get to the site.”
“That’s no problem.” Meredith looked at her closely. “But you do like Skell Garth, don’t you?”
“Oh yes, Meredith, very much, otherwise I wouldn’t be dragging you there,” Patsy quickly reassured her partner. “The setting is superb, the surrounding landscape awe-inspiring, picturesque actually. And from the inn there’s a most fabulous view of Fountains Abbey, one of the most beautiful ruins in all of England. Yes, Skell Garth is a unique place.”
“Skell Garth,” Meredith repeated. “You know, when you first mentioned it, I thought it was such an odd name.”
“I suppose it is. Let me explain. The Skell is a river that flows through Ripon and through the land on which both the inn and the abbey stand. Garth is the ancient Yorkshire word for field, and many of the local farmers still refer to their fields as garths.”
“So the name actually means the field of the river Skell. Am I correct?”
Patsy laughed, delighted with Meredith’s astuteness. “You’re absolutely correct! I’ll make a Yorkshirewoman of you yet.”
The two friends and partners sat talking about the inns for a while as they sipped their white wine, and then they moved on, became involved in a long and involved discussion about their business in general.
It was Patsy who brought this to a sudden halt when she jumped up, exclaiming, “Oh my God! I smell something awful. I hope that’s not our lunch getting burnt to a cinder.”
She flew out of the sitting room and ran downstairs to the kitchen.
Meredith charged after her.
Patsy was crouching in front of the oven, looking at the roast, poking around in the pan with a long-handled spoon.
“Is it spoiled?” Meredith asked in concern as she walked in.
“Fortunately not,” Patsy said, straightening. She closed the oven door and swung to face Meredith, grinning. “A couple of potatoes are singed around the edges, but the lamb’s okay. It’s the onions that are a bit scorched. They’re black, actually. Anyway, everything’s ready, well, almost. I hope you’re hungry, because I’ve cooked up a storm.”
“I’m starving. But you didn’t have to go to all this trouble, you know, I was quite happy to take you out to lunch. Or have you come to the hotel.”
“I enjoy doing this occasionally,” Patsy assured her. “It reminds me of my childhood growing up in Yorkshire. And anyway, Meredith, it’s not often you get a traditional English Sunday lunch, now, is it?”
Meredith chuckled. “No, and I’m looking forward to it.”
CHAPTER FIVE
It was a windy afternoon.
A few stray leaves danced around her feet, and her full-length cream tweed cape billowed occasionally as she walked briskly through Green Park.
Meredith did not mind the wind. It was sunny, and this counteracted the sudden gusts, the nip in the air, and she was glad to stretch her legs after sitting so long over lunch with Patsy.
But it had been fun to visit with her old friend and partner, and to catch up on everything, both business and personal. Also, Meredith always enjoyed going to Patsy’s little doll’s house, which is the way she thought of it. Situated in a mews in Belgravia, the house had four floors; it was charmingly decorated, very much in the style they used in the inns. This was a lush country look, which was built around good antique wood pieces, a melange of interesting fabrics skillfully mixed and matched, vibrant colors carefully coordinated to each other plus a selection of unusual accessories.
As Meredith walked on, her thoughts settled on Patsy, of whom she was extremely fond. It was her New York banker, Henry Raphaelson, who had introduced them in 1984. Henry had known Patsy from her teenage days, since he had been for many years a close friend and business associate of her father’s, until his death a merchant banker in the City.
Patsy and she had taken to each other at once, and, after several constructive meetings, they had decided to go into business together, opening a London office of Havens Incorporated.
In the ensuing years Patsy had been good for the company, a great asset. She was as solid as a rock, hardworking, dependable, devoted, and loyal. While she was not as visionary or as imaginative as Agnes D’Auberville, Patsy more than made up for these minor shortcomings because she was loaded with common sense. Also, her talent for public relations had worked well for Havens. There wasn’t a hotel in England that received as much publicity and press attention as Haddon Fields in the Cotswolds, and all of it was positive. In fact, they had never had a negative write-up in the entire ten years the inn had been open.
When Meredith had expressed an interest in opening a hotel in France, Patsy had taken her to Paris to meet Agnes D’Auberville. The two young women had attended the Sorbonne at the same time, which was when they first met, and they had been good friends since those youthful days in Paris.
Agnes, like Patsy two years earlier, had been looking to invest inherited money in a business she could be involved in on a full-time basis. And so she had jumped at the chance to open a Paris branch of Havens Incorporated, and had plunged enthusiastically into the creation of the inn situated in the Loire Valley.
Meredith and Agnes had found the Château de Cormeron, which stood on the banks of the beautiful Indre River and was in the center of the Loire Valley. After purchasing the château, they had spent almost a year getting it into proper shape and turning it into an inn. Many of the rooms had needed new floors, some new ceilings; they had had to install central heating and air-conditioning; almost all the plumbing had to be replaced, as had the wiring. Once this had been done, they had set about decorating it in the appropriate style, mostly using French country furniture, wonderful old tapestries, luxurious traditional fabrics, and unique accessories culled from local antique shops.
They had put a tremendous amount of energy, effort, talent, and money into its remodeling and re-decoration, but the transformation was so stunning, they both knew it had been well worth it.
And much to their gratification, it had proved to be a tremendous success as a small hotel. Château de Cormeron was close to many of the great châteaux of the Loire, such as Chinon, Chenonceaux, Azay-le-Rideau, Loches, and Mont-poupon, all open to the public and especially popular with foreign visitors.
Well-heeled tourists gravitated to their charming little Château de Cormeron, seeking its luxury, comfort, and superlative service, which was becoming renowned, its bucolic surroundings, and its proximity to so many famous châteaux. And the fact that the hotel boasted one of the finest restaurants in the Loire region did it no harm.
Agnes D’Auberville had become as good a friend as Patsy, as well as a most dependable business partner, and all three women enjoyed a good relationship.
Patsy, like Meredith, was divorced with two children, twin boys of ten who were away at boarding school. Agnes, who was thirty-eight, the same age as Patsy, was married to Alain D’Auberville, the well-known stage actor, and they had a small daughter, Chloe, who was six.
I’ve been lucky with them, Meredith thought as she completed her circle around Green Park and went out into Piccadilly. We all balance each other very well, and they’ve both done a great deal to make Havens work in Europe, been instrumental in its success.
Drawing alongside the Ritz Hotel, she stood at the curb, waiting for the lights to change. Once they did, she crossed Piccadilly and headed back to Claridge’s on Brook Street.
Meredith had always liked walking around London, and she was thoroughly enjoying her stroll, feeling invigorated by the brisk air and the exercise. Turning down Hay Hill, she went up into Berkeley Square. But as she traversed it, she couldn’t help thinking that the little park in the center looked a bit bleak today, with its bare trees and patches of dirty snow on the shriveled brown grass.
On the other hand, she took great pleasure in looking at the lovely old buildings in Mayfair, which was the one area of London she knew best. She had been coming here for twenty-one years, ever since her marriage to David Layton in 1974. Twenty-three she had been at the time, and so young in a variety of ways; yet in others she had been rather grown up.
England had made a lasting impression on her. She felt comfortable on its shores, and she enjoyed the British people, their idiosyncracies as well as their good manners and civility, not to mention their great sense of humor.
David Layton had been a transplanted Englishman, living and working in Connecticut when she met him. After their wedding at Silver Lake, he had brought her to London to meet his sister Claire, her husband, and children.
Meredith had liked David, and she had loved him well enough to marry him, and she had felt regretful that their marriage had foundered. Their genuine attempts to make it work had come to nothing, and in the end divorce had seemed to be the best, the only, solution.
The one good thing that had come out of this rather dubious and tenuous union was their son, Jonathan. The sad thing was, David never saw his son these days. He had moved to California in the 1980s and had never made any effort to come east to see Jonathan. Nor had he ever invited Jonathan to visit him on the West Coast.
David’s loss, Meredith muttered under her breath. She couldn’t help wishing that things were somewhat different, for her son’s sake at least, though Jon didn’t seem to care that he was so neglected by David. He never mentioned his father.
Being a single parent all those years had been a strain on her at times, Meredith was the first to admit it. But Jon had turned out well, as had her darling Cat. And so it had been worth it in the end . . . the hard work, the sacrifices, the endless compromises, the cajoling, the bullying, and the unconditional loving. Being a good mother had taken its toll on her life, but she was proud of the children. And of herself in a funny way.
Those years of bringing up Cat and Jon alone, plus creating and developing her business, had left her little time to meet another man, let alone become involved with him. There had been a few boyfriends over the years, but somehow her children and her work had intruded, got in the way. Deep down, she had never really minded. Her children had been her whole world, still were.
Circumstances had been right when she had met Brandon Leonard four years earlier. But he was a married man. In no time at all, she had come to understand that not only was he not separated, as he claimed, but he had no intention of ever leaving his wife or getting a divorce. Simply put, Brandon wanted his wife. He also wanted a mistress. Since she was not a candidate for the latter role, she had terminated their friendship, and in no uncertain terms.
Then this past September, on a trip to London, Patsy had taken her to the fancy opening of an exhibition of sculpture at the posh Lardner Gallery in Bond Street.
And there, lurking among the Arps and the Brancusis, the Moores, the Hepworths, and the Giacomettis had been Reed Jamison. The owner of the gallery.
Tall, dark, good-looking, charismatic. The most attractive man she had met in a long time. And seemingly very available. “Beware,” Patsy had warned. When she had asked her what she meant, Patsy had said, “Watch it. He’s brilliant but difficult.” Again she had pressed Patsy, asked her to elucidate further. Patsy then answered her enigmatically. “Save us all from the brooding Byronic hero. Oh dear, shades of Heathcliff.”
Meredith had only partially understood, and then before she could blink, Reed Jamison, having taken one look at her, was in hot pursuit.
Drawn to him initially, she had fallen under his spell; but gradually, over the following months, she had begun to feel suddenly and unexpectedly ill at ease with him. And she had begun to pull away from the relationship within herself.
On his last visit to New York, in late November, she had been turned off. He had been morose, argumentative, and possessive. Furthermore, she had detected a bullying attitude in him, and this had alarmed her.
Tonight she was going to tell him that she could not see him again, that their relationship, such as it was, had come to an end. She wasn’t looking forward to it, but she knew it must be done.
“Why bother?” Patsy had said over lunch earlier. “Have dinner with him tonight. Say nothing. Tomorrow we’re going to the Lake District and Yorkshire. And then you’re off to Paris. Don’t make yourself sick over this. Avoid a troublesome confrontation.”
“I have to tell him it’s over,” Meredith answered. “Don’t you see, he’ll be in my life, pestering me, circling me, until I make it clear I don’t want him anywhere near me.”
“What went wrong?” Patsy asked curiously.
“Reed went wrong. He’s just too complex a man for me.”
“I
hate to say I told you so,” Patsy murmured.
“It’s all right, you can say it, Patsy. Because you did warn me, and you were right about him all along.”
They had then gone on to talk about other things, but now Meredith could not help wondering if maybe Patsy was right. Might it not be infinitely easier simply to have dinner with Reed and say nothing?
Maybe I should do that, she thought as she turned into Brook Street.
“Good afternoon, madam,” the uniformed doorman outside Claridge’s said as she went up the steps.
“Good afternoon,” she responded, smiling pleasantly, and pushed through the door that led into the hotel.
Martin, one of the concierges, greeted her as she crossed the lobby, making for the elevator.
“Meredith!”
She stopped in her tracks, freezing as she recognized the cultivated masculine voice.
Slowly turning, she pasted a smile on her face as she moved toward the man who had called her name. “Reed! Hello! But you’re a bit early, aren’t you?”
He smiled and leaned into her, put his arm around her waist, drawing her closer. He kissed her cheek. “I’m here having tea with friends.” He jerked his head in the direction of the salon, which opened off the lobby, and indicated a group of people at one of the tables. Afternoon tea was being served and a string quartet played.
“Darling, it’s lovely to see you,” he went on, staring deeply into her eyes. “I’ve missed you, but then, I told you that on the phone this morning. I was actually just coming out to ring you up in your room, to invite you to come down and join us, when I saw you heading for the lift.” He took hold of her arm firmly and drew her toward the salon.
Meredith resisted and held her ground, shaking her head. “Reed, I can’t. It’s so nice of you to invite me, and thank you, but there are a number of things I must do before dinner.” Peeking at her watch, she added. “It’s almost five. We’re still meeting at six-thirty, aren’t we?”
“Of course. Unless you want to make it earlier. Look, do join us now,” he pressed, and once more tried to draw her into the salon.