‘I’m ready.’ Fi was feeding long blades of grass to Marguerite and Coquelicot, but it was probably wise to head for the shade of the lemon trees closer to the cottage. She could feel the heat of the sun softly scorching her fair skin. ‘Have you got some sunscreen on, Ellie?’
‘I’ll stay in the shade as soon as we’ve got everything we need out of the cellar.’ Ellie was draping a muslin wrap over the Moses basket that was tucked in beside the trunk of a lemon tree to get maximum shade. ‘Julien thinks my freckles aretrès mignon, but I’ve got more than enough already.’
Pascal was lying beside the basket, his nose on his paws, one ear up as he stayed alert for any protection that might be needed from a fly or a bee.
‘How long will Bonnie sleep?’ Fi asked.
‘Long enough, I hope. This is just a trial run for the first design, so we’ll use the smallest frame. It shouldn’t take too long.’
Mike the builder, who had helped with the renovation of La Maisonette, had apparently been delighted to help make the frames Ellie had requested for paving-stone moulds. She showed them to Fi when they went into the cellar.
‘Look… they’ve got screws in these two corners. When the concrete is set, I undo those and it’ll be easy to lift the frame off.’
‘What about the bottom?’
‘That’s what that sheet of plywood over there is for. Could you bring that out, please? And the bucket of sand beside it with a plastic sheet on top. I’ll get the pebbles and tools.’
They took everything outside into the fragrant shade of the lemon orchard. Ellie tipped the bucket of flat, round and oval stones out onto the ground beneath the tree next to where Bonnie was sleeping.
‘We need to sort the coloured ones into similar shapes and sizes. Different piles for the grey ones.’
It felt like a game. As though they’d stepped back in time to when they were little girls and playing together on a summer’s afternoon. One sister was missing, but Laura wouldn’t have wanted to do something as frivolous as play with a pile of pebbles in those days. She wasn’t doing something this enjoyable today, either.
‘I wonder how Laura’s getting on,’ Fi said aloud.
Ellie was starting a pile of the smallest grey stones. ‘Shewasnervous, wasn’t she?’
‘I’m glad she’s taking Noah and Lili with her. Mam said that Dad cried when he saw a photo of Lili because it looked so like how he could remember Laura when she was little.’
‘Is Mam up there today, too?’
‘Of course.’ Fi smiled. ‘She hasn’t missed a day since he came out of hospital, has she? And that’s what… two weeks ago now?’
‘Closer to three. It’s been a week sincewewent up to see his studio.’
They were both silent for a moment. That had been another emotional meeting with their father and they’d both been crying on the drive home, but a new connection was being formed for the children who’d been too young to really remember their father and an old one rediscovered for a father who’d forgotten he had children. There was a long journey ahead for them all but the door was slowly being opened to allow Gordon Gilchrist to be part of his family again, if that was what he wanted in his life. None of it could be rushed. They were going to have to take this one step at a time – a bit like how she and Ellie were tackling their first attempt at making a mosaic pebble paving stone today.
Ellie put a frame onto the plywood that she’d covered with the plastic sheet and tipped sand into it. She handed a plastering trowel to Fi.
‘Have a go at smoothing it out,’ she instructed. ‘It needs to be a thin layer because we don’t want the stones to poke out far enough for people to stub their toes.’
‘Sometimes I don’t know where the time’s going,’ she said, as she watched what Fi was doing. ‘Bonnie’s four months old all of a sudden and she thinks being able to roll over is the funniest game ever, which is adorable and I want to enjoy every moment of it but it feels like I’m going to turn around and she’ll be ready for school.’
‘Time flies when you’re having fun.’ Fi smiled. ‘And slows down when you’re not. One of life’s meaner tricks. Take lots of photos.’
‘I am. And that reminds me…’ Ellie dusted sand off her hands and pulled her phone from the pocket of the pinafore-style apron she was wearing. ‘I need to find the photo of the pattern I thought we could use today.’
She glanced up from scrolling photos a moment later, however, her eyebrows raised. ‘You seem to be enjoying yourself at the moment. Did I see you going off with Christophe again yesterday afternoon?’
‘We just took Heidi for a walk.’
‘Hmm… and didn’t you “just go for dinner” in Menton again a few days ago?’
‘I did.’ Fi let her breath out in a sigh that was a groan of pleasure. ‘You wouldn’t believe how good a cook Nonna is. She made a mushroom lasagne that wasthemost delicious thing I’ve ever tasted. I’m going to ask her to teach me how to make it.’
‘Sounds like she’s recovering well. She not about to drop dead any time soon, is she?’
‘She could,’ Fi countered. ‘She’s got a dodgy ticker now. Christophe and his mum are still really worried about her.’
