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‘That wasn’t what I meant,’ Dorothy persisted. ‘I was thinking about you and Andreas—about you making your peace with one another.’

Anna looked down at her clasped hands. ‘Maybe we’ve done that,’ she said, ‘or perhaps we just don’t want to argue any more.’ Her voice was not quite steady. ‘We’ve come a long way, Mama, in understanding, at least.’

‘And what have you discovered?’

‘That—perhaps we can be friends."

‘Is that enough?’

‘It is—as much as I can expect. Oh, Mama, I don’t want to talk about it yet. I can’t bear to talk about it.’

Dorothy put out her hand. ‘Take your time,’ she said gently, ‘but come to me if it gets too hard.'

‘I promise I will.’ Anna brushed the hair back from her forehead. ‘And now, what about a walk? Down across the garden will do.’

‘I can manage farther than that,’ Dorothy declared proudly. ‘We’ll go as far as the cottage and back.'

‘Do you still want to go there to stay eventually?’

‘Not just yet, but perhaps before the twins come home. Helena will want her family to herself.'

‘I thought you were getting on very well.’

‘We are, but I don’t want to intrude for too long. I’d be happy at the cottage with someone to look after me for a while. Then, in the winter, I can come home.’

They walked across the estate, down through the orange groves where late blossom and ripened fruit hung together on the trees, and past the vines to the carobs and olives on the slope of the hill. It was a lush picture, tended carefully by father and son with their hopes firmly rooted in the future. They saw Nikos and Kypros talking to the prospective buyer of the lemon crop, but Andreas appeared to have gone his own way, probably doubling back to the house through the vineyard or even climbing the hill for a better view of the valley below.

Andreas was first back at the house, settling himself on the loggia to await their return, his thoughts busy in the past as he looked down to the river with the tall poplars growing along its banks.

‘Ah. You have returned,' Helena said as she came from the house to join him. ‘Have you left my husband and son bargaining? They are so wrapped up in the work of the estate,’ she went on without waiting for his answer, ‘and Nikos has made us very proud. He is a good son and all this will one day be his.’ Her gaze swept across the lush land on either side of them ‘It is a prosperous estate, as you can see, and an excellent inheritance. All he needs now is a suitable wife.’

She paused, and after a moment Andreas enquired, ‘Have you someone in mind?’

‘Anna would be my choice,’ Helena said determinedly. ‘She is the sort of girl he needs, sensible and of a good background, and we are definitely encouraged by what we see. They are
very
fond of each other. In fact, I would say they are in love.’

He thrust his hands deep into his trousers pockets, not trusting himself to speak immediately.

‘Of course,’ Helena said, ‘we must leave them to make their own decision, but I think the result is inevitable. Anna knows how comfortable her mother would be here—we have already offered her a cottage on the estate—and she certainly has her mother’s interests at heart. Not that I would force the issue, of course, but it would solve a great many problems all round.’

‘Anna may wish to keep the hotel,’ he pointed out.

‘That wouldn’t be necessary or desirable,’ Helena informed him. ‘She would have a full and contented life here.’

‘Certainly a full one,’ he agreed. ‘Do they intend to become engaged?’ Helena considered the question for a moment before she answered him deliberately, ‘In the very near future, I would say. Neither of them must want to wait and Anna knows that we will welcome her into our family with open arms and a great deal of pride.’

‘If pride comes into it,’ he said coldly, ‘I think you are right about Anna. She will make a good daughter-in-law. And now, if you will excuse me, Kiria Masistas, I’d like to take a look at my car. It was behaving badly on the way over from Prodhromos and I don’t want to break down on our way home.’

‘Ask one of the men to help you,’ Helena advised. ‘They know quite a lot about cars.’

All the way back to Limassol Andreas was unusually quiet, sitting behind the steering-wheel with a grim look on his face and totally uncommunicative as they passed through the little villages on the hill roads and came to the plane where the orange groves lay peacefully behind their screens of poplars, their golden fruit bright in the setting sun. In field after field the rich red soil had given of its bounty and already another crop was being planted in its place.

‘Do you wish me to come in and see that everything has gone according to plan?’ Andreas asked as they neared their destination.

‘I don’t think there’s any need.’ She felt hurt and neglected. ‘Thank you for taking me to the Masistas’. It’s been a very long day.’

When she reached her own room there were tears m her eyes, tears of hurt and disappointment, but what was the use of crying for the past? She had the future to look to and the decisions she had to make would be considered with that in mind.

Determinedly she closed her bedroom door, telling herself that nothing else mattered but her mother's happiness and her own ability to cope.

She
saw her mother again the following weekend, but it was Nikos who came to drive her back to Stroumbi. He was in high spirits, having worked hard to bring in a considerable harvest, shipping much of it direct to their agents in Great Britain, and his father was proud of him.

‘I have a surprise for you,’ he said helping her into his car.

‘Tell me,’ she encouraged him.

‘Not likely! It’s a deadly secret at present but you won’t have to wait too long after we get home.’

Home to the estate, he meant, already including her in his personal background.

‘Nikos,’ she said carefully, ‘if it has anything to do with family—an intimate celebration or anything like that— I’m sure it would be best if you counted me out. I could spend the day quietly with my mother if you have arranged something away from the estate.’

‘We will be going away and your mother is coming with us so don’t go on arguing. The trouble with you is that you can’t wait for a surprise!’ he added lightly.

‘But it is intriguing, Nikos, to say the least,’ she laughed, ‘and I’m naturally curious.’

‘It’s a sort of a celebration.’ He wasn’t very good at keeping secrets. ‘You’ll be happy to go.’

‘Oh? Well, in that case, I accept. Where are we going?’

‘One of your favourite spots.’ He glanced at her sideways. ‘Somewhere you’ve been often enough before.’

‘I can hardly wait!’

She was determined not to ask any more questions, suspecting that Helena had made the arrangements, whatever they were.

‘Are the twins at home?’

‘Not yet. They don’t break up till the end of June.’

‘No—I remember you saying.’

So it couldn’t be a birthday celebration, at least not for his sisters.

It rained a little as they approached the mountains, fine, refreshing rain shimmering on the orchard leaves as the sun hid behind a gigantic cloud ahead of them.

‘Have you thought about what I said?’ Nikos asked as he negotiated a sudden bend in the road.

‘About going to wherever you are going?’

‘No, not that. About marrying me in the near future.’

They were winding up a steep hill with a monastery on the horizon and a deep river valley falling away to the plain below.

‘I’ve thought about it, Nikos,’ she answered slowly, her eyes on the level stretch of cultivated land beneath them, ‘and I know it can’t be in the near future, if at all. I’m sorry,’ she hastened to apologise, ‘but I have so many other decisions to make, so much to resolve before ’

‘Before you can think of your own happiness?’ he broke in
_;

‘I didn’t mean that. What I was trying to say is that— I’m not ready for love yet.’

Another love, she meant, if that could ever be.

‘I know there’s someone else and I think it’s Andreas.’ He was fully convinced now. ‘But that’s all gone by the board, hasn’t it? He’s definitely not for you and it would be better if you forgot all about him.’

‘I know.’ She turned her head away, looking towards the mountains. ‘But you told me you didn’t want second best, Nikos, and that would be the way it would be. I can’t let you go on hoping like this, planning for a future that could be perfect for you with the right wife.’

‘You could be that wife.’ He swung the car into the long stretch of main road before Stroumbi. ‘There’s nobody else I want, though I suppose I can’t go on waiting for ever. There’s also your mother to consider,’ he added pointedly. ‘She could be happy in our family circle for the rest of her life.’

That was unfair, Nikos!’ she cried. ‘I think about her comfort and happiness all the time, as you know very well, but if she thought I was making—sacrifices, it wouldn’t help at all. I’m being terribly blunt,’ she added gently, ‘but it wouldn’t be fair to lie to you about how I feel.’

He frowned at the road ahead. ‘We’re in a dreadful muddle,’ he admitted. ‘I still want you and you haven’t had time to think straight, so I can still go on hoping, I guess. It’s something I’m quite good at, by the way, so don’t try to persuade me otherwise.’

‘I wish I could,’ Anna sighed. ‘It’s so unfair, Nikos!’

'Let me be the judge of that.’ He turned his head to smile at her. Today we are going to enjoy ourselves in spite of all you have just said.’

‘I’m not usually such a wet blanket!’

‘I know you’re not, and today will be just splendid.’

He drove on through the mountain villages with masses of wild flowers besieging the narrow, rutted roads and bougainvillaea blazing over ancient walls. Donkeys and wandering goats strayed across their path, while mountain sheep turned to stare at them before they sprang off into the scrub land and disappeared. At Pano Panayia, where the dirt roads fanned down into the valleys, the sun came out again in full strength and Nikos looked up at it with a smile.

‘A good omen,’ he predicted. ‘Everything is going to turn out well, after all!’

A car turned into the valley ahead of them. It was the white Mercedes, apparently heading for the estate.

‘Nikos, what’s going on?’ Anna turned in her seat to look at her companion. ‘Is this what’s been arranged— the Warrenders and Susan and Martha?’

‘Particularly Martha,’ he grinned. ‘It’s her birthday.’

'I didn’t know. Nobody mentioned it ’

‘I told you it was a surprise. They phoned at the beginning of the week asking us to join them, and your mother seemed particularly delighted. She likes Lara, I think, and nobody could resist Martha for very long. She's been on the phone every day since to make sure we haven't forgotten our promise.’

‘Will—everybody be there?’ Anna meant Andreas, surprised that she had not heard from him about the arrangements. ‘Everyone that can come, I mean.’

‘I guess so. It’s going to be quite a party!’

‘You can tell me now where we are going,' she suggested.

‘Oh, well—we’re going on a rather special picnic to Khrysokhou Bay.’

‘So that’s why you told me not to forget my swimsuit?' Anna laughed. ‘I could hardly appear at the baths in the nude.’

‘Aphrodite did!’ he laughed in return. ‘This seems to have been a long-promised event as far as Martha is concerned and she's been looking forward to it. So has Susan.'

‘You like Susan a lot,' she suggested.

‘Oh, she's all right, A bit giggly, but all right. She plays a good game of tennis, if that’s anything to go by, and she hasn’t any ties. She has no family in England, I understand.’ He swung the car through the estate entrance, looking ahead with enthusiasm. ‘Even my father is coming with us,’ he said, ‘and that
must
be an event!’

He drove swiftly after the Mercedes, catching up with it as it slowed at the front of the house where Helena was waiting in a cream woollen suit with a fixed smile on her face, ready to be introduced to Lara and her family.

Martha was first out of the car, skipping round the bonnet to greet Anna and her companion with complimentary enthusiasm.

‘You’re just in time,’ she cried. ‘We’re all ready to go to the beach!’ Lara got out of the Mercedes to shake hands with Helena and Kypros, who had appeared in the doorway behind his wife, while Anna was aware of Philip Warrender looking on from the back seat of the roomy automobile with Susan by his side.

‘I’ll go and have a word with my mother,’ she suggested. ‘I hope this won’t be too much for her.’

‘I don’t think it will,’ Nikos said, ‘but go and see for yourself.’

Dorothy Rossides was coming down the staircase from her own room when her daughter looked up at her to verify Nikos’ statement and there could be no denying the fact that her short stay in the mountains had produced an almost miraculous result. The pallor had receded from her skin and her English wild-rose complexion coloured her cheeks again, like a faint blush. Her hair, not yet turned grey, was the colour of sun- bleached com and the blue-grey dress she wore in defiance of her widowhood complemented her smiling sapphire eyes.

‘Mama, you look radiant!’ Anna exclaimed. ‘Never have I seen such an improvement in anyone in so short a time!’

‘Flatterer!’ Dorothy returned, coming down the few remaining stairs to kiss her. ‘You’ll be telling me next that I don’t look a day over forty!’

‘I wouldn’t go that far!’ Anna laughed. ‘Don’t tell me the mountain air alone has made such an enormous change!’

‘The mountains, and so much else besides,’ Dorothy confessed.

‘Such as?’

‘Oh, things like care and friendship and—and good company.’ The deepening colour in her cheeks was now a definite blush. ‘John has been coming up almost every evening. John Malecos,’ she added as if Anna might not understand.

‘So—you old dark horse!’ Anna met the glowing sapphire eyes with deep understanding in her own, ‘How long has
this
been going on?’