The French Gardener (35 page)

“It is not me,” Jean-Paul said softly. “I wish I could take credit, but I can’t. It is the magic in the garden.”

“The magic didn’t come all by itself. You put it there.” She felt herself blush.

“The magic was always there, Miranda, I just brought it back to life.”

She took a deep breath. “You’re an incredible man, Jean-Paul. You’re wise, you’re kind, you’re adorable with the children. You’re there for me, too. I’ve come to rely on you. In fact, I’m falling in love with you.” He didn’t reply, but put his arm around her shoulders and held her close.

“Miranda, you’re not in love with me. You’re confused.”

“I’m not. I think I fell in love with you the day Storm brought you home.”

He took a moment to find the right words to avoid hurting her. “You know I cannot love you back. Not in the way you want me to,” he said at last.

Miranda felt the sudden rise of tears and tried to blink them away. “You can’t?”

“I love you as a dear friend. But I will always love another. No one can ever take her place in my heart. She has it for always.”

“Who is she?”

“Someone I knew a long time ago. She was married with children. We suffered an impossible love.”

“She stayed with her husband?”

“She wouldn’t leave her children for me. Her love for them was deeper. It was the right thing to do. It was a long time ago. Another life. I was young. Now I am old.” He chuckled at his own foolishness. “I have given her every year of my life since the day we parted almost thirty years ago.”

“You never tried to move on?” Miranda was astonished by such devotion. “I didn’t think people loved like that in this day and age.”

“When you love like that, you cannot move on. No one could compare to her. She spoiled me for anyone else. I had lived a great love affair, nothing less would do.”

Miranda felt she had heard this story somewhere before. Suddenly she grew dizzy with the realization that the secret scrapbook that had so captured her imagination had possibly been meant for him. Had Ava Lightly loved Jean-Paul? “How long did your affair last?” she asked carefully.

“A year,” he replied. Now she was certain. But what did M. F. stand for? She would have to read through the book again to find the answer.

“What was she like?”

“She was unique, eccentric, funny and sweet. A talented gardener. Someone who appreciated nature. She taught me all I know.”

Miranda hurried into the house. The scrapbook was so fat, with so many pages. If Jean-Paul was indeed M. F. then it was no coincidence that he had come to work in her gardens. It was no coincidence that he had resurrected the gardens the way Ava Lightly had planted them. He had known every inch of the estate because he had worked in it with her. He had painted the picture of the cottage garden. He had come back to find Ava, but found Miranda and her family instead. That’s why he had looked so sad. Ava hadn’t waited for him
as she had promised. Then why had she left the scrapbook in the cottage? Why hadn’t she simply sent it to him in France?

She flicked through the pages searching for descriptions of M. F. Now she had made the connection it all began to fit into place like a blurred vision moving into focus. At last she found the sentence that gave him away:

That night Miranda refrained from writing her own novel and settled into bed with a cup of soup. She wanted to finish the scrapbook. She wanted to know what happened in the end. She turned the pages until she reached the place where she had left off and impatiently resumed.

Jean-Paul sat in his sitting room contemplating the empty château with a sinking heart. He couldn’t stay at Hartington forever. He had done what he had set out to do: revive the gardens as Ava would have wanted. He had no idea where she was and a part of him was too afraid to find out. She had left without a word, that was all there was to it. Almost three decades had passed without a murmur of reassurance from her. She had moved on with her life and he had returned to France to take over the vineyard as he had had no choice but to do.

He had gone home to lick his wounds and throw himself into his new life. His mother had dedicated herself to introducing him to all the respectable, beautiful French women she could find, but none impressed him. His heart was numb and there was no one who could rouse it. Antoinette longed for grandchildren, but Jean-Paul was firm in his determination to remain true to Ava, even though Ava was unable to remain true to him. His mother begged and implored him to marry for convenience, in order to leave the château to a
child of his blood, but he refused. If he married it would be a betrayal. Ava remained married because she had no choice. He did and he chose not to. He did not remain celibate. He was a man with needs, but they meant nothing; soulless encounters that came and went like shadows in the night.

It was his mother’s death that propelled him to return to Hartington. He had looked after her as a devoted son, but once free he did what he had waited twenty-six years to do: find Ava and bring her back. But life is not a storybook with a happy ending. If he expected her to be waiting for him in the cottage, he was disappointed. What good would it do to search the country for her? That chapter was closed.

Miranda began to cry. The end of the book was more tragic than she had imagined. Ava had kept the cottage a shrine. That was why the table was still laid for two; the only way she could prove her loyalty to him was to leave the place exactly as it was. She remained married, raised her children and continued as before, yet the cottage stood as testament of her love for him.

Miranda was surprised to read that Ava had had another child as she had contemplated before the affair with Jean-Paul began. It was another tie to keep herself from leaving. Peach tied her to the nursery and restrained her from bolting.

Miranda was stunned. She reread the last paragraph through her tears and realized that Peach was Jean-Paul’s child. The child he had longed for. The child he didn’t know he had. She was overwhelmed by the gravity of the secret she now held in the palm of her hand.
What am I to do
? She shuddered at the prospect of telling him that she had had the scrapbook all this time. Would he curse her for removing it from the cottage? Would he understand that she couldn’t have known it was left there for him? How would he react when she told him of the table laid for two, frozen for twenty-six years, exactly as he had left it? Would he ever forgive her?

The following day Miranda telephoned Henrietta to explain the plans for the weekend. Henrietta was beside herself with excitement. She hadn’t told Miranda about Jeremy. They had spent the evening together that Saturday at the fund-raising party in the town hall. Since then he had frequently called in at her shop. Sometimes she had been with Troy, and Clare had reported his visit. “It’s him again,” she’d say with a wry smile. “Why doesn’t he just ask you out?” Henrietta didn’t know why he didn’t ask her for dinner. Perhaps he was shy. Perhaps he just wanted her friendship. She couldn’t imagine someone like Jeremy falling in love with her. Maybe he just felt sorry for her. Clare rolled her eyes. “No wonder you’re still single,” she said, not intending to be unkind. “You should have more confidence in yourself. Thanks to Susannah and Trinny you’re actually looking rather hot these days!”

After Miranda had booked the Berkeley Hotel she set about finding out where Phillip and Ava Lightly had moved to. She contemplated asking Mrs. Underwood or the vicar, but then she was struck with a better idea. She’d call on the post office
under the pretext of having received a package for Mrs. Lightly. Surely, when they moved they had left a forwarding address.

The excitement of unraveling the mystery of Jean-Paul and Ava Lightly’s secret world distracted her from the ghastliness of her own marriage breakdown. Far from feeling rejected by Jean-Paul, she felt compassion. Her love for him paled beside the blaze of Ava’s. She would recover. Ava never did. Her heart bled for them both. If she could bring them together again, after all this time, he would forgive her for having kept the scrapbook.

She marched into the post office that was housed in the shop owned by Fatima’s son Jamal.

“How are you, Jamal?” she asked breezily.

“Very well, thank you.”

“Your mother’s a star.”

“I know. She’s a good worker, like me.”

“I can see that. You run this place all on your own?”

“With a little help from my wife.”

“Of course. Get the whole family working. Cheap labor!”

“Indeed.” He chuckled. “What can I do for you?”

“I’ve a favor to ask you.”

“Go on.”

Miranda tried not to look nervous. She wasn’t used to being underhand. “I have received a package for Mrs. Lightly. It has no return address on it and I don’t want to open it.”

“Of course. Would you like me to send it to her?”

“I thought I’d telephone her, actually, and ask whether she’d like to see what I’ve done to her gardens. She can pick up the package. It’s rather large, too large to post.”

“I see. Not a problem. Let me have a look for you.”

He turned and searched among a shelf of old gray files all neatly labeled alphabetically. When he found the right one, he pulled it down and opened it. Miranda’s heart thudded at the anticipation of getting closer to the woman whose love story
had so fascinated her. At last he found it. “She lives in Cornwall, somewhere called Pendrift. Shall I write it down for you?”

“Yes, please.”

“There’s a telephone number, too. They were a very charming couple. We didn’t see much of Mr. Lightly after he fell ill, but Mrs. Lightly came in regularly to send letters and buy the odd thing she’d forgotten at the supermarket.”

“I look forward to meeting her,” said Miranda, taking the piece of paper.

“Oh, you’ll enjoy her, she’s very funny.”

Miranda couldn’t wait to telephone Ava. Suddenly the scrapbook was coming to life, the characters materializing before her like resurrected ghosts, the love story leaping off the page. Once at home she listened to her messages. There was one from Lottie confirming that David was coming down for the weekend to see the children. She wondered what he was going to do with them for two days and decided to book Mrs. Underwood to cook and put Jean-Paul on standby in case he slunk off to watch telly and left them on their own. Fatima was in the hall, cleaning the floor; Mr. Underwood stood in the doorway enjoying a long coffee break, telling her about the sudden plague of moles that was ruining the lawn. The sunshine lit up the terrace and thyme walk like a beautiful stage and Miranda stopped for a moment to admire it as she walked through the hall to her study.

She closed the door and sat at her desk, deliberating what she was going to say. She decided to introduce herself and invite Ava to see the gardens. The plan was to get her to Hartington where she would find Jean-Paul. She would give him the scrapbook and admit that she had taken it without knowing why it had been put there in the first place. Confidently she dialed the number. It rang for a while. Just before she hung up in disappointment, a woman’s voice came on the line. “Hello?” Miranda plunged in.

“Hello, am I speaking to Mrs. Lightly?”

There was a long pause. Miranda looked down at the piece of paper and wondered whether, in her excitement, she had dialed the wrong number. “Who’s speaking?”

“My name is Miranda Claybourne, I live at Hartington House…”

The woman’s voice softened. “I’m afraid my mother died two years ago.”

Miranda was shocked. “Ava Lightly is dead?”

“Yes.”

“And Mr. Lightly?”

“My father’s getting on a bit, but he’s well, thank you.”

“Am I speaking to Poppy?”

“No, I’m her sister, Peach.”

Miranda’s mouth went dry and she frantically tried to think of something to say. “I’m so sorry about your mother, Peach. I’ve heard so much about her, I feel I know her. She was so popular here in Hartington. When we moved all anyone could talk about were her incredible gardens.”

“They were her passion. It was very hard for her to leave.”

“Forgive me for asking, but I’ve been so curious. Why did she go?”

“Dad had a stroke and couldn’t cope with the stairs. She looked after him single-handedly. She had no choice. I think it broke her heart.”

“I’m sure it did. You see, I’ve brought the gardens back to life. I wanted to do that for her. When we moved in they had gone to seed. They needed a lot of work. I felt it was my duty to bring them back to their former glory, for her.”

“That’s so sweet of you. She’d have loved that.”

“I didn’t do it on my own. I enlisted the help of this wonderful Frenchman called Jean-Paul de la Grandière.” As Ava expected, there was a long pause. “He seemed to know what I wanted. I rather left it to him, actually. Anyway, they’re
really wonderful now. If you’re able I’d love you to see them. You can always come and stay. After all, it was your home.”

“It was my home for twenty-three years,” she said hesitantly. “I loved it, too.”

“Please come.”

“I don’t know…” Miranda heard a man’s voice in the background. “That’s my dad. I’ll tell him you called. He’ll be grateful. We all loved Hartington House.”

Miranda put down the telephone and sat back in her chair. So, Ava Lightly was dead. She felt as sad as if she had really known Ava. The disappointment was overwhelming. For almost a year she had lived Ava’s story while her own had unraveled around her. Ava had kept her going. Now there was nothing left but ashes. Her heart bled for Jean-Paul, blindly groping through those ashes, wondering why they felt so cold.

For surely he didn’t know she had died. Why had he returned to Hartington if not to find her as he had promised he would? Perhaps Ava had left the scrapbook there because she knew she was dying. She wanted him to know that she had kept her side of the bargain. Miranda sighed in confusion. It didn’t add up. Why didn’t she just send it to him? Why didn’t she telephone and tell him she was ill? Why didn’t she make an effort to see him before she died, rather than leave the scrapbook in the cottage at the mercy of the new family who would come to live there?

Miranda was sad that Ava would never see what she had done to the gardens. All that was left was the scrapbook and the awful truth she was now going to have to tell Jean-Paul. She got up and went out to the cottage garden to sit beneath the mountain ash and think. There was no reason why she had to tell him immediately. She could put it off. Wasn’t it kinder to Jean-Paul? While there was life there was hope. She’d pick her moment carefully.