One Christmas Morning: A perfect Christmas treat!

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‘Pretty girl, but terribly lonely. Do ask her, old man. She needs to get out.’

Putting down the card with a shudder, Laura tried to think about supper. Deciding she was too tired to cook or even set a place for herself, she kicked off her shoes, grabbed four more chocolate biscuits out of the jar and trudged upstairs to run a bath. In London she’d always kept her flat scrupulously clean, just in case John decided to pop in unannounced. Here she thought nothing of dropping her clothes in a heap on the bathroom floor and leaving a trail of biscuit crumbs on the stairs. No one was going to see the mess, any more than anyone was going to see her unshaven legs and woefully unpedicured toes, or the small but definitely there roll of fat that had formed around her middle like a flotation device. Saving me from drowning in heartbreak, thought Laura. Then she thought how much fatter she’d be if she were still pregnant – she’d be almost ready to pop by now – and had to splash water on her face to stop herself from crying.

Five minutes later the bath was ready. Sinking her aching limbs into the hot, lavender-scented bathwater, Laura exhaled deeply, relaxed for the first time all day. Dangling her hand over the side of the bath, so Peggy could lick the chocolate from her fingers, she thought idly about Gabriel Baxter and Lisa James – Joseph and Mary. They were probably back at Gabe’s farm, having wild sex right this minute. For a split second Laura felt a pang of envy. Not because she had the slightest desire to sleep with Gabe, but because, since John and losing the baby, she hadn’t the slightest desire, full stop. She was only twenty-eight. But there were days when she couldn’t imagine ever being sexual again.

‘I’m turning into an old woman, Peggy.’

The pug snuffled dismissively. Or perhaps it was supportively. Peggy did a lot of snuffling. Lying back, Laura immersed her whole head in the water, allowing her dark curls to spread out around her like a mermaid’s locks, luxuriating in the warmth and peace. When she sat up again, the phone was ringing.

‘Goddamn it.’ She contemplated not answering. It was probably just that old pervert Harry Hotham, trying to pin her down for a dinner date. Disgusting old goat. But years spent in the cut and thrust of a TV studio had left her congenitally incapable of leaving telephones to ring. Pulling herself up out of the bath like a Kraken, dripping lavender water all over the oak floorboards, she skidded down the corridor into her bedroom. Just as she was about to pick up the phone, the answer machine kicked in. She heard her own voice played back to her.

‘This is Laura. Please leave a message.’

God, I sound awful. So depressed! I must remember to do a perkier version in the morning.

‘Laura, hi. This is Daniel.’

She froze. Daniel. Daniel Smart? Daniel Smart was an old flame – a very old flame – from her student days at Oxford. Head of the Boat Club, and president of OUDS, the prestigious university dramatic society, Daniel had always been destined to do great things. They’d had a fling in the Christmas of Laura’s second year – they’d actually spent the holiday at Fittlescombe, in the cottage at Mill House, the year before Laura’s parents sold it. When the romance fizzled out, Laura had been briefly heartbroken. But it all felt like a lifetime ago now. Last she heard, Daniel was a wildly successful West End theatre producer. Married. Happy.

‘Look, one of our old Oxford lot told me you were in Fittlescombe.’ He laughed nervously. ‘I know I shouldn’t. But I came over all nostalgic. Anyway, probably silly of me. I just thought I’d get back in touch, see how you are.’

Laura sank down on the bed, shivering. In her haste, she’d forgotten a towel. The Aga kept the kitchen warm, but what little central heating there was upstairs at Briar Cottage all seeped out through the warped and rotting windows. Laura’s bedroom was as cold as any polar base camp. Pulling the knitted bedspread off the bed, she wrapped it around herself.

‘Well.’ Daniel laughed again. ‘If you do want to call, I’m on 07891 991 686. But if not, and you think I’m a complete lunatic, I quite understand. I probably am. Love anyway. Er … bye.’

There was a click. Laura stared at the red flashing light in the answer machine for a long time, too stunned to move.

Daniel. Daniel Smart had called her! Tracked her down, here of all places. As if that weren’t bizarre enough, he’d sounded so awkward. Almost shy. The Daniel Laura remembered was supremely confident. Never in a million years would he have left her a message like that back in the old days. She, Laura, had been the nervous one, the one who couldn’t believe her luck that the likes of Daniel Smart might be interested in her.

Maybe he’d changed. Maybe time had softened him.

Perhaps Daniel Smart had also been through some tough times. Like me.

Laura pulled the bedspread more tightly around her and, quite spontaneously, smiled.

Perhaps, at long, long last, her luck was about to change.

CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_ff19625a-6821-564b-9fec-37d7f9fb7ccd)

‘No, no, no and no. I am not spending four thousand pounds on a lump of ice.’

Rory Flint-Hamilton pushed aside his boiled egg bad-temperedly. It was too early for this nonsense.

‘With respect, Mr Flint-Hamilton, it’s hardly a “lump”. This would be a life-size, intricately carved statue of Eros. It would make a spectacular centrepiece for the hunt ball.’

‘I daresay. But the next morning it’ll be a four-thousand-pound puddle. I’m not the Aga Khan, you know, Mrs Worsley. We’ll have a nice vase of flowers like we usually do. Ask Jennings for some roses and whatnot.’

The Furlings housekeeper knew when she was beaten. It was the same every year. Mr Flint-Hamilton wanted to do everything on a shoestring, grumbling and moaning about the expense of the ball like Fittlescombe’s own Mr Scrooge. But somehow, thanks in no small part to Mrs Worsley’s ingenuity, they always pulled off an event to be proud of.

While the housekeeper cleared away his breakfast, Rory Flint-Hamilton gazed out of the window across Furlings Park. It was a vile day, grey and drizzly, with a vicious wind whipping at the bare oak trees and flattening the sodden grass. But Furlings’s grounds still looked magical, a carpet of vivid green spotted with deer that had lived on the estate for as long as the Flint-Hamilton family themselves.

Rory was in his early seventies but looked older. Tall and wiry, he walked with a stoop and sported a shock of hair so white it almost looked like a wig. His eyebrows were also white and grown out to an inordinate length, something Rory was secretly proud of, curling them with his fingers the way a Victorian magician might have twirled his moustache. Since his much younger wife, Vicky, had died five years ago in a car accident, Rory had aged overnight, embracing old age like a young man rushing into the arms of a lover. Rory and Vicky’s only child, their daughter Tatiana, was living in London now and rarely came home. There was no one to stay young for, no one who cared whether or not Rory went to bed at nine every night and spent entire afternoons eating fudge and watching the racing on television. He was increasingly reclusive, and so the Furlings Hunt Ball was the one time of year when Rory Flint-Hamilton was forced to engage with the outside world. He always dreaded it. This year, thanks to Tati’s behaviour, he was dreading it more than most.

Once Mrs Worsley had left the room, he reopened the offending page of the Daily Mail. Once again, his daughter was in the gossip pages. This time she was accused of stealing the husband of a minor member of the Royal Family and cavorting with him at a nightclub in Mayfair. The pictures of them together turned Rory’s stomach. The man was old enough to be Tati’s father and looked a fool in jeans and a silk shirt unbuttoned to the chest. As for Tati’s skirt, Rory had seen bigger handkerchiefs. It was clear from the photograph that Tati was very, very drunk.

She’s twenty-three, for God’s sake; she’s not a teenager any more. When is she going to grow up?

Rory Flint-Hamilton was not a demonstrative man. But he loved his daughter deeply, and hated watching her throw away her potential and talents on an empty life of partying as she dragged the Flint-Hamilton name through the mud. He also took his role as custodian of Furlings very seriously. He wasn’t going to live for ever. The thought of handing the estate down to Tatiana filled Rory with a fear so acute, it was hard to breathe.

Folding up the newspaper and putting it under his arm, he got up and shuffled slowly out into the hall. A long, marble-floored corridor lined with Flint-Hamilton family portraits led to what had always been known as the ‘Great Room’, a vast, galleried ballroom with eight-foot sash windows affording a spectacular view of the Downs. In only six weeks’ time, this room would be filled with noise and laughter, bedecked with dark-green holly, blood-red berries and plump, white mistletoe. A towering Christmas tree, cut from the estate’s own woodland, would sparkle beneath the light of the chandelier. Furlings would come back to life, for one night only, the huntsmen in their cheery red coats, and the rest of the men in black tie, with the women dressed to the nines in ball gowns and jewels, clattering across the marble in their high-heeled shoes like a troupe of tap dancers.

Vicky would have outshone all of them.

As for Tatiana, who looked so like her mother it was painful … Rory Flint-Hamilton closed his eyes and said a silent prayer. Please let Tati behave herself. I couldn’t face another scandal. Not here.

He would send her an email today, telling her in no uncertain terms that her married duke was absolutely not welcome. The rest of the world may have gone to hell in a handbasket. But the Furlings Hunt Ball would remain a bastion of tradition and propriety. Rory Flint-Hamilton intended to make sure of it.

* * *

Daniel Smart gazed out of the train window, sipping his disappointingly watery hot chocolate and glad he was in the warmth of a first-class carriage and not outside in the cold and wet.

The last time he’d been to Fittlescombe, he’d been in his final year at Oxford. It was at Christmastime, and he remembered how struck he’d been by the beauty of the village, blanketed in snow, the flint cottages nestled tightly together beneath a crisp, bright-blue winter sky. He and Laura Tiverton had been lovers then. They’d spent a joyous holiday together in the gardener’s cottage at Mill House, making love by the fire and drinking mulled wine and going for long, romantic walks in the snow.

Christ, that was a long time ago.

So much had happened since that Christmas. Daniel’s career had taken off spectacularly. He now had two West End plays under his belt and a third in production. He’d got married to Rachel, had two little boys, Milo and Alexis. And now, at thirty, he was getting divorced, painfully and expensively. As the train clattered on through the Sussex countryside, he wondered whether Laura’s life had been similarly eventful in the eight years since he’d seen her last. He’d been nervous, leaving her a voicemail, afraid he’d come across like a stalker or a weirdo. But, when she’d returned his call the next day, she’d sounded so happy to hear from him, so warm and welcoming, that all his fears evaporated. She’d immediately suggested meeting, and didn’t flinch when Daniel proposed that, rather than her coming to London, he would jump on a train to Fittlescombe ‘for old times’ sake’. Her voice hadn’t changed at all, and instantly took him back to those happy, student days. Rather ungallantly, he found himself hoping that the same could be said for her figure. Most of the girls he knew at Oxford had turned into serious heifers since college. Then again, they’d all had babies. Laura Tiverton was still unmarried and gloriously child-free.

At last the train pulled up at Fittlescombe station. There was no snow this time, only grey drizzle and a wind that sliced at Daniel’s face like a razor blade as he stepped onto the platform. A lone figure in a thick Puffa jacket, woolly hat and multiple scarves stood next to the ticket office. They were so swaddled in layers of clothing, they could have been male or female, fat or thin, old or young.

‘Laura?’

‘Daniel!’

They hugged awkwardly. Laura looked at his thin sports jacket, worn over a tight-fitting cashmere sweater in duck-egg blue. ‘Aren’t you cold?’

‘Bloody freezing.’ He grinned. ‘Where’s your car?’

He was every bit as handsome as Laura remembered him, tall and fit with thick chestnut hair and eyes the same dark green as the baize on the snooker table in the Balliol College bar.

‘Follow me. It’s a bit of a banger, I’m afraid. I’m between jobs at the moment so I’m, er, economizing.’

Daniel squeezed himself into the tiny Fiat Punto. His legs were so long they practically touched the ceiling. ‘Please tell me you live close by.’

He looked ridiculous, doubled over in the passenger seat. Laura burst out laughing. ‘Five minutes, honestly. I’ll drive fast.’

As they hurtled along the back lanes of Fittlescombe, Daniel’s attention was divided between looking at Laura – he couldn’t assess her figure beneath the enormous coat, but her skin still looked flawless and the dark curls and almost-black eyes were just as he remembered them – and the village itself, picture-perfect despite the awful weather. No wonder so many influential people from the theatre and TV worlds chose to live out here. It was only an hour and a half from London by train, but it was a different world.

It was four o’clock and darkness was already starting to set in by the time they pulled up in front of Briar Cottage. But if anything the twilight enhanced its decrepit charms. Lights blazed cosily from the downstairs windows, and a thin trail of smoke from Laura’s afternoon fire snaked up into the air above the sloping roof.

‘Wow. Pretty. It looks like every writer’s dream. You must be so productive out here.’

‘Oh, definitely,’ Laura lied. It wouldn’t do to sound like a failure in front of Daniel. He didn’t need to know that she’d spent half of this morning watching Deal or No Deal on television and the other half stuffing dirty laundry into drawers and cupboards so Daniel didn’t think she’d become a total slattern. Not that she expected anything to happen between them. Or even wanted anything to happen. It was too soon after John.

Inside, Daniel dropped his overnight bag on the floor and took off his jacket, watching out of the corner of his eye as Laura peeled off layer after layer of clothing. Unwrapped to a pair of black corduroy trousers and a chocolate-brown sweater, she was plumper than she had been at Oxford, but definitely still foxy. Thankfully, at least half of the extra weight seemed to have gone on her boobs.

‘Let me take that.’ She reached for his jacket, opening the hall cupboard, then closing it again quickly when an assorted medley of dirty wellies, scrunched-up coats and dog chews tumbled out of it onto the floor. ‘It’s a lovely cottage but there’s not as much storage as I’d like.’ Laura blushed.

She’s still sexy, thought Daniel.

‘We’ll hang it in your room. Come on up.’

Following her up the narrow cottage staircase, admiring the curve of her bottom in the slightly too-tight cords, Daniel found himself being led into a low-beamed back bedroom. A small double bed with a chintzy eiderdown took up most of the room, with a small mahogany wardrobe propped up next to the window and a tiny bedside table the only other furniture.

‘If you’d like a bath, it’s across the hall. There are fresh towels in the cupboard. I thought we’d go to the pub for supper later. Might be a bit more jolly than staying in.’

In fact Laura had intended cooking at home, but the Moroccan lamb tagine she’d spent most of yesterday preparing was now a charred mess glued to the bottom of a casserole. Even Peggy had turned her nose up at the remnants of her mistress’s abortive culinary efforts. The Fox’s steak-and-kidney pie beckoned.