The French Gardener(32)

“I’m afraid he’s avoided the saucepan by becoming a friend. He gets taken out in the carriage and to show-and-tell on Fridays, if he’s good.” Jean-Paul’s face melted into a wide smile that infected the children. Poppy ran out to fetch Monty and the boys grinned up at him, their shyness evaporating in the warmth of the Frenchman’s charm. Ava was intrigued by how easily he was able to switch it on and off, one moment arrogant, the next charming and friendly.

Poppy returned with a very large dark green marrow. Ava decided it wouldn’t be appropriate to repeat the quip her husband had made on learning that his daughter took it to bed: “That’s setting her up for an awful disappointment when she’s older.” Jean-Paul took Monty and weighed him in his hands.

“He’s very heavy for a baby,” he said to Poppy.

“He’s not a baby,” she replied stridently. “He’s a marrow!”

“But of course. A baby marrow.” Jean-Paul looked a little alarmed. Poppy took the marrow back and cuddled it.

“He’s shy. You frightened him,” she accused.

“Shall we show Jean-Paul around the garden?” Ava suggested hastily. “You can show him your hollow tree,” she said to the boys. Angus looked delighted, Archie less so. He wasn’t sure he wanted a grown-up, a strange grown-up, coming to their secret camp.

“Come on, Angus,” he said to his brother, tearing off before the adults had a chance to follow.

“They have much spirit,” said Jean-Paul, folding his arms.

“Why don’t you put on some boots and a coat? It’s been rather wet lately.” Jean-Paul returned with a pair of leather boots and sheepskin coat. “You don’t expect to garden in those, do you?” she asked.

“Of course.”

“But they’ll be ruined.”

He shrugged and pulled a face as if he didn’t care. “I can buy a new pair.”

“Gracious no! Go into the cloakroom and see if there’s a pair that fits you. No point wasting good boots when you don’t have to. As for the sheepskin, that’s beautiful, too. Don’t you have a scruffier coat?”

“No.”

Ava sighed and bit her tongue. She didn’t think her husband would thank her if Jean-Paul left before he had even stayed the night. She took a deep breath, gathered her patience and told him that they would go into town and buy him boots at least. “Tell me one thing, Jean-Paul,” she began, knowing that now probably wasn’t the best time to ask him, but unable to wait. “How much gardening have you done?”

He shook his head and grinned. She felt her annoyance fizzle away, disarmed once again by his improbable smile. “None.”

“None at all?” She was aghast.

“I have watched my mother in the garden all my life. But I have little practical experience.”

“Do you want to learn?”

“Of course. The gardens at Les Lucioles are also my inheritance.”

“I don’t have the time for someone who doesn’t want to be here.”

“A year has four seasons. We are now in autumn. I will leave at the end of the summer taking away everything that you have taught me. I will be very rich.”

“And I get a spare pair of hands,” she said, wondering who would gain more from this unlikely partnership.

“I hope so,” he replied, his face breaking into a smile again. “I hope to leave you with something special, too.”

They walked out to the terrace. Made of York stone and cobbles and surrounded by vast urns of plants and clumps of alchemilla mollis, it extended up a stone path planted with thyme and lined with balls of yew, now as ragged as dogs’ coats that have been allowed to grow wild. The stones were dark and damp from dew, the grass glistening in the orangey-pink light of late afternoon. At the end of the thyme walk, beyond the old dovecote where a family of pigeons now resided, they could see a field of cows. In the woods beyond were beech and hazel trees, beginning to turn yellow and scatter the ground with leaves. The air was smoky from the fire Hector had lit in the hall and a chilly breeze swept in off the sea a few miles south of Hartington. Jean-Paul put his hands in his pockets and gazed around him. “It’s very beautiful,” he said in a quiet voice.

“Thank you,” Ava replied. “I like it.”

In that milky evening light it acquired a melancholy beauty. The summer was over, the foliage dying, the evenings drawing in, the air colder and damp, the sky streaked with crimson and gold, intensifying as the sun sank lower into the pale blue sky. She loved autumn more than summer because of its sadness. There was something so touching about the wistfulness of it, like old age from the ripe perspective of youth.