Two Weddings and a Baby (30 page)

‘I should hope so,’ said Gloria, as Tamsyn leant her head on Laura’s shoulder. There they all were, Ruan’s women, brought together in this moment, and suddenly Tamsyn felt the force of how much she had missed her close bond with her brother more strongly than ever. As soon as there was a moment during this wonderful day, she had to find him and make things right between them.

‘Put some clothes on and pop Mo in a sling,’ Keira whispered to Tamsyn as Gloria helped Alex take the dress off. ‘We’re going out on a ramble to pick some wild flowers for Alex’s bouquet and the headdress. I saw some lovely Sheep’s Bit and Spring Squill, stunning Sea Carrot and, best of all, some Kidney Vetch.’

‘We’re talking about a bridal bouquet here, aren’t we?’ Tamsyn asked her. ‘Not some sort of stew?’

‘I’ve been doing my research,’ Keira told her happily. ‘It’s been wonderful, and I even got the boys in on the fun. We’d find a plant or flower and then search for it in our book. My absolute most favourite is Sea Campion. It’s so pretty and delicate, it will look wonderful against Alex’s hair.’

‘I want to come,’ Tamsyn said. ‘But Mo’s due a feed.’

‘You girls go. I’ll feed her,’ Laura offered. ‘Such a darling little poppet, and I’ve hardly had a chance to know her.’

‘You know you have your own flesh-and-blood grandchildren, right?’ Keira said. ‘Two of them.’

‘Yes, and I love them very much,’ Laura said, cooing at the baby, ‘but little Mo here doesn’t talk back or make constant jokes about poo.’

‘This may be the last feed I give her,’ Tamsyn said, sitting down rather suddenly. ‘Oh, do you know, I think I’m going to cry.’

Her shoulders shaking, she held Mo close to her, kissing away her own tears from the baby, pouring as much love as she possibly could into one moment, so that perhaps even years from now, just a small trace of the days she had spent with Mo might remain hidden away somewhere in Mo’s memory.

‘I’ll fetch her bottle,’ Keira said. ‘We can wait for you, and then you can bring Mo out with you in the sling. She’ll love the Rock Sea Spurrey.’

‘Can I just say, in a hackneyed attempt to cheer you up,’ Cordelia said, looking at her bridesmaid dress, ‘you’ve not done half bad with these dresses either. They aren’t too hideous, they will suit each of us and I like the way that they all go together but that none of them is the same. You are fairly talented, as it turns out.’

‘Affirmation from my family at last,’ Tamsyn laughed, wiping the tears from her eyes. She’d made the bridesmaids’ dresses out of a variety of ballgowns in the attic, all in complementary hues of deep blue. Each dress was slightly different to flatter the different figures of Lucy, herself and her sisters, but they were clearly a set. ‘Well, it’s a good job you think I am not too bad at this stuff.’

‘And why’s that?’ Laura asked her.

‘Because I’m coming back to Poldore for good,’ Tamsyn said, before her mother engulfed her in a hug.

It was beautiful on the hill above the meadow, the day was warm, the sky a bright, clear blue that exactly matched the colour of Alex’s dress.

‘So tell me what was it about the handsome, sexy vicar, with the enormous free house, that made you decide you wanted to hand your notice in, dump that French bloke and come back to Poldore?’

‘This isn’t about Jed,’ Tamsyn said, and that was mostly true. Her heart was talking to her, telling her what it needed to be happy, and although Jed could be a vital part of that, he wasn’t essential. The essential part was the heart-pounding, nerve-shredding joy she had experienced in every stage of making Alex’s dress, of doing what she simply loved. ‘I think I needed to get out of Paris and away from Bernard to get some perspective on what my life was really like there. I thought I was going places both in my job and with Bernard. But I was never going to be the sort of designer who fits into that world. I wanted to be, but it’s just not where my heart is. And you have to be where your heart is, don’t you?’

‘But you hated it here when we were growing up,’ Keira said, as she collected some long-stemmed purple flowers which she assured them were called Thrift to the growing bunch of bright, optimistic daisies. ‘Ever since you got hormones, you wanted to leave. I don’t know why. I didn’t want to leave, not ever.’

‘You did, though,’ Tamsyn reminded her. ‘You got married and left.’

‘Yes,’ Keira sighed, tucking a little yellow buttercup behind her ear, shading her eyes as she watched her boys racing into the distance, their sights set on a hill they planned to roll down. ‘I fell in love and followed my heart, and now here I am, attending my brother’s wedding alone, while my husband works on the other side of the world.’

‘I can understand why you wanted to leave,’ Cordelia said. ‘You had to go out there and see the world, and get experience and stuff. I need to do that too, I know I do. Once Brian and I have finished my album, that’s it. I’m packing up and going to London, or LA maybe. It’s not wrong to want to follow your dreams, and see the world, and have a million lovers if you feel like it.’

‘I don’t know about a million,’ Keira said thoughtfully, pausing to look out to sea, where the clear blue horizon was punctuated only by the sails of a little white boat. ‘Sounds awfully tiring. One; I could do with one lover.’

‘Keira!’ Tamsyn exclaimed. ‘And you a married woman.’

‘It wouldn’t be so bad if I actually spent time with my husband,’ Keira said. ‘I don’t suppose I want a lover, just quality time alone with the man I married.’

‘Well, I don’t really want any lovers,’ Cordelia said. ‘Not until I’ve made my mark on the music industry, then I shall have many and they shall all be incredibly cool, talented people, and I shall discard them, like they are so much … stuff.’

‘Do you think that it’s the right decision to come back here and launch a business?’ Keira asked Tamsyn. ‘Because, you know, Cornwall is pretty far to come for a fitting.’

‘Don’t you worry,’ Tamsyn said, tapping the side of her nose. ‘I’ve got plans. I’ve got plans that are going to make them come from far and wide.’

‘And if a certain sexy vicar
does
seem like he might be on the menu …?’ Cordelia asked with a cheeky wink.

Tamsyn wavered; there was so much uncertainty about what was or was not happening between her and Jed, it was probably much simpler not to even think about it. After all, they had time now; if he still wanted it, if he listened to all the people that cared about him and stayed in Poldore. They had all the time in the world to get to know each other and work out if a man of God and a woman of … shoes could really find enough common ground to have a relationship.

‘Oh no, is that rain?’ said Tamsyn, and even as she held out her hand to check, one of the little purple clouds that had billowed on the horizon was now drifting over them, showering them with cool, gentle rain, even though the sunshine was still strong and warm.

‘It’s going to rain on my wedding day, isn’t it?’ Alex exclaimed gloomily.

‘No, look!’ Keira pointed at St Piran’s, nestling amongst the houses, and arcing over the spire was a perfect rainbow that seemed to begin at the tip of the spire and finish somewhere over Castle House.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Tamsyn said.

‘It’s a sign, I think,’ Cordelia said to Alex. ‘And I totally don’t believe in all that bull.’

And as Tamsyn thought about last night, and the song they had sung to Mo while they had been waiting for news of her mother, she knew suddenly what she had to do, and it was something that couldn’t wait.

‘Here,’ she put her armfuls of flowers into Cordelia’s arms. ‘I’ve got to go.’

‘Go where? We’ve got to get dressed and get ready for a wedding!’ Keira shouted after her.

‘Yes, but not yet. We’ve got a couple of hours, right?’ Tamsyn turned round, taking a few backward steps.

‘Two hours, maximum!’ Alex insisted.

Tamsyn waved in reply, and broke into as fast a walk as she could manage with Mo in the sling, as she headed back down to Castle House, knowing that there wasn’t a moment to lose. This was a union that had to happen sooner rather than later, or it might never happen at all.

It hadn’t taken Tamsyn too long to persuade Sue to lend her the keys to her battered old Volvo and find a car seat that would fit Mo. After Rory had fitted it for her, she strapped the little girl in and drove to the hospital, much slower than she would have normally have driven anywhere, particularly in the free-for-all that was Paris. But she was suddenly gripped by the weight of responsibility of having another human life to take care of.

The ward Catriona was on was easy enough to find, but before Tamsyn got to her, she saw Tess.

‘You’ve brought her,’ Tess said, looking at Mo, who was securely strapped to her chest.

‘Yes,’ Tamsyn said. ‘I don’t think there’s any more time to waste, do you? I think that if Catriona’s up to it, we should get mum and baby together. They’ve already been apart too long. The sooner they are together, the sooner they can bond.’

‘There’s a lot to determine first,’ Tess said. ‘We haven’t had a proper chance to assess Catriona’s physical and mental health, to see her living conditions, to make sure that she is capable of taking care of a baby. She left her out in the middle of that storm, Tamsyn. It’s not as simple as “Never mind, here’s your baby, off you go”.’

‘I understand that,’ Tamsyn said. ‘But it’s not like Catriona is a drug addict or a drunk. She’s a woman of faith, who’s recently lost her mother. And something happened to her that she hasn’t been able to face. She was desperate and low, frightened and confused. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve a chance to be a mum, does it?’

‘No,’ Tess said, ‘of course not. But you can’t go in there and tell her you’ve brought her baby back and that’s that. There are steps, there are procedures. I promise you, I want them reunited as much as you do, but this time you have to understand that it will be me who is overseeing this process.’

‘But I can take Mo in to see her?’

‘Well, what kind of person would I be if I said no?’

Jed was sitting next to Catriona, his hand over hers, their eyes both closed in prayer. A thick growth of stubble now coated his chin, giving him a rougher quality, which, with his dark-golden hair falling over his eyes, did rather suit him. From where she was standing, Tamsyn couldn’t hear the words he was gently murmuring, but she felt like she should close her eyes too, and so she did, finding a moment or two to think back on the last few days. It seemed like years ago that she was accusing him of being Mo’s father, and now, Tamsyn couldn’t imagine how she had ever thought that. Somehow she had come to know the man in the span of those few days, and he was a man she wanted to know better. It was Mo who decided it was time to make her presence felt, announcing herself with a yowl.

‘Tamsyn.’ Jed’s smile was so sweetly warm when he opened his eyes, that she wondered how inappropriate it would be to simply rush over and hug him right now. What would he say, she wondered, if she mentioned that the very thing she wanted to do most in the whole wide world was to lie down on a big bed with him, rest her head on his chest and go to sleep?

‘I’ve brought Mo,’ Tamsyn said, rather stating the obvious, ‘for a visit. I thought you might like to see her, Catriona. To hold her for a while.’

Catriona pulled herself up a little in the bed, gripping at the sheets and drawing them towards her.

‘I’m not sure,’ she said uncertainly.

‘Well, you don’t have to,’ Tamsyn said breezily, sitting down on the other visitor’s chair, her eyes meeting Jed’s for a moment. ‘We can just talk, catch up for a bit. I’m glad to see you’re looking better,’ she told Catriona. ‘You’ve been through a lot.’

‘I’ve been stupid,’ the older woman said, being careful not to look at the baby. ‘Mother would be turning in her grave if we hadn’t had her cremated. She said to me, “Catriona, I want to be cremated. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life turning in my grave”.’

‘Well, Mo is doing fine,’ Tamsyn said. ‘She feeds really well, has settled into a routine quite quickly, which my mum keeps telling me is more than any of us ever did. She likes to look around, and she really likes dogs and people singing to her. Yesterday lots of us sang to her, at least half the town. She liked that a lot. She loves cuddles, and I think she smiles, although my mum and my elder sister say she’s too young to actually smile. She certainly smiles with her eyes.’ Tamsyn looked down at Mo, who, freed from the sling, was propped up in the crook of her arm, her dark eyes focused on Catriona as if she were thinking, ‘I know you from somewhere …’

Catriona shook her head, turning her face away.

‘Cat,’ Jed’s hand remained in Catriona’s. ‘Can you tell us what happened? When it happened, why you didn’t come to me, talk to me? You know I would have helped you.’

‘Mother died,’ Catriona said. ‘You were there when she died, Jed. You know what a very long time it took, how ill she was. I know that everybody felt sorry for me, like she was a burden. “Poor old Catriona Merryweather, she’s nearly fifty and she’s never had a life.” I know that’s what they all thought, that I was sad and pathetic still living with Mother, and she could be difficult. We all know that she could be difficult.’

‘She was a character.’ Jed smiled. ‘But she was also one of the kindest people I have had the pleasure of knowing.’

‘It was hard for her, losing Dad so young, but she never talked about him. It was always just us. She used to try and get me to go out into the world, to meet more people. She never forced me to stay at home with her, to be her carer. I told her I had enough to be happy. I was happy to live with her, to work with you, Jed. I had my faith, my work, my friends. I had everything I needed.’

‘It must have been very hard losing her,’ Tamsyn said.

‘I was lost.’ Catriona turned to face Tamsyn, still keeping her eyes away from the baby. ‘And so lonely. I know it was her time to go. She was ill; she’d had a good life. And yet I felt angry, bitter. I couldn’t understand why she’d been taken from me.’ Catriona frowned. ‘I loved her so much. I made her too much a part of my life. I didn’t know how to be on my own.’