‘What’s going on?’ she asked.

He took her hand and led her into the dining room, where the table was set for the meal, and beside her place were the roses. She walked across slowly and picked them up without speaking, then began to read the card that was with them.

‘The flowers are beautiful.’ She smiled. ‘I’ll go and get a vase.’ Without further comment she left him standing there, while she went to the pantry where her mother kept such things on the top shelf.

He watched in silence as she arranged the flowers, and, with weddings very much on the agenda, he had a vision of her walking towards him down the aisle of the village church, in a dress of rustling ivory brocade and carrying cream roses.

In that moment he knew that was what he wanted. Kate in his life for ever.

Abigail Gordon loves to write about the fascinating combination of medicine and romance from her home in a Cheshire village. She is active in local affairs, and is even called upon to write the script for the annual village pantomime! Her eldest son is a hospital manager, and helps with all her medical research. As part of a close-knit family, she treasures having two of her sons living close by, and the third one not too far away. This also gives her the added pleasure of being able to watch her delightful grandchildren growing up.

Recent titles by the same author:

A SINGLE DAD AT HEATHERMERE

A WEDDING IN THE VILLAGE

CITY DOCTOR, COUNTRY BRIDE

THE VILLAGE DOCTOR’S MARRIAGE

COMING BACK FOR HIS BRIDE

A FRENCH DOCTOR AT ABBEYFIELDS

Country Doctor, Spring Bride

Abigail Gordon

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my friend Elizabeth McInery

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ONE

THE longing to be back with someone who loved her was so strong that Kate Barrington could almost taste it as she drove through the last few miles of the countryside where she’d been brought up.

She wanted to feel her mother’s arms around her. To be back in her bedroom beneath the eaves of Jasmine Cottage so that she could weep away the anger and feeling of betrayal that had been with her over the past few days.

She was feeling as low as she’d ever felt in her life. Mentally because the wedding that she’d been dreaming of was not to be, along with the relationship that went with it, and physically because she felt ill.

It had come upon her the night before. Aching limbs, high temperature and vomiting, which had made her even more anxious to leave the southern counties where she’d been based for the last two years. There was nothing to keep her there any more. The job had folded at the same time as the wedding plans.

As she pulled onto the drive of the old stone house, loosely described as a cottage, with its four large bedrooms and spacious downstairs accommodation, Kate’s mood was lifting. Here she was hoping to shut out some of the unhappiness that had erupted into her life. Any second the door would be flung open. Her mother would be there with arms outstretched and nothing would seem quite so bad.

She’d left a message on the answering-machine the night before to say she was coming home, and thought if there wasn’t a fatted calf to greet her there would at least be some of the good home-cooked food that she’d missed so much while she’d been working away.

As she began to heave her cases out of the boot she saw that the door remained closed and the house had an empty look about it. Her heart sank. Where was her mother? she thought fretfully as her head throbbed and she shivered in the afternoon of a chilly autumn day.

If her mother had received her message she wouldn’t have budged an inch. She had been begging her to come home ever since she’d split up with Craig. But there’d been as much to do in cancelling a wedding as there’d been in organising one, and she’d only just finished tidying up all the loose ends.

The house felt cold when she went inside and Kate wondered if it was because the heating wasn’t on, or if it was the chill of disappointment that was getting to her. Whatever it was, the empty rooms were telling their own tale. Her mother was not there, and after coaxing the central heating boiler into life, Kate switched on an electric fan heater in the sitting room and lay on the carpet in front of it to get warm.

As she gradually thawed out, her eyelids began to droop and just as she had decided that the sensible thing to do was to go to bed with a hot-water bottle, fever and exhaustion took over and she fell asleep.

She awoke when the light was switched on and as she lay with her eyes closed against the sudden brightness, Kate heard a deep voice say in surprise, ‘So what have we here?’

It didn’t have her mother’s lighter tones, and with eyes bright and cheeks burning with a temperature that was still rising she sat upright and found herself gazing up into the dark hazel eyes of a man dressed in a smart suit, with shirt and tie to match.

‘Who are you?’ she croaked. ‘Where is my mother?’

He gave a quirky smile. ‘One thing I am not is the reincarnation of Jack the Ripper, so there’s no need to look so alarmed. Your mother is fine. That is presuming that you are the prodigal daughter. I’m Daniel Dreyfus and I’m staying here for the time being.’

‘As a guest or a lodger?’

‘I’m lodging here.’

‘But why? Mum isn’t in the habit of taking in lodgers.’

‘So I believe, but she took pity on me. I’ve recently moved into this area and am having a house built. I needed somewhere to stay until it’s ready to move into and there was nowhere available, so your mother made her kind offer.’

This was all she needed, Kate thought from her sitting position on the carpet. She was in no fit state to be coping with strangers. She’d come home seeking solace and had arrived with a virus of some sort. Her mother wasn’t there and this stranger was living in the house.

‘Where is my mother?’ she asked.

‘She’s been called away because of an urgent message yesterday afternoon to say that your grandma has been taken ill. She set off immediately and wasn’t here when you left your message last night. I only picked it up myself this morning, but you were already on your way when I tried to get in touch.’

‘What’s wrong with my gran?’ she asked anxiously.

‘Her heart, I think. Don’t worry, she is recovering well. Your mother and I didn’t have much time to talk. She phoned me at the surgery and asked me to hold the fort at this end. She had no idea that you were on your way.’

‘What were you doing at the surgery?’ she questioned, irritable now she was reassured that her mother and grandmother were OK. ‘Are you sick? I’m fighting off some sort of bug of my own, so I can do without any other germs coming my way.’

The quirky smile was back. ‘I work there. I’m the village doctor. Peter Swain, who was there before me, has retired. I took over the practice three months ago after a stint in the Middle East.’

What next? Kate thought wretchedly. Everything was going wrong. The really big catastrophe being Craig breaking off their engagement because he’d said he didn’t want to be tied down, and then her finding out he was having an affair with her flatmate. She supposed she’d been too trusting and should have seen it coming, but it didn’t hurt any less.

Then she’d picked up this virus thing. She who was never ill from one year’s end to the next. Her gran was poorly too. It seemed as if it was her heart again. And to cap it all, this lodger person who was acting as if he owned the place was a doctor. She could do without that.

‘I hope you’re not using my room,’ she said ungraciously, and began to get unsteadily to her feet.

‘Of course not,’ she heard him say smoothly, and that was the last thing she remembered.

Daniel caught Kate as she crumpled and was immediately aware of the fever in her. When he swept her up into his arms she lay limp and unresisting and he thought that with her short, spiky blonde hair and over-bright blue eyes, which were now closed, Kate looked nothing like her mother.

He carried her upstairs and opened the door of a bedroom that had been shut ever since he’d moved in. Pushing it back with his foot, he walked across to the bed and laid her gently on top of the covers. Then he went to forage in the top of the wardrobe for a blanket to put over her.

Kate was coming out of her faint and found herself in the same situation as before, looking up at him from a horizontal position. ‘What happened?’ she asked weakly.

‘You fainted. So I carried you up here and laid you on the bed.’

She groaned. How embarrassing! What next?

‘I want to check you over as you are certainly far from well. I’m going to get my bag out of the car so don’t move,’ he ordered.

If she hadn’t felt so ghastly Kate would have argued. As it was she just lay there limply and waited for him to come back.

‘How long since you’ve eaten?’ he asked as he took her temperature.

‘Er…yesterday.’

‘No wonder you’re feeling weak.’

‘I kept vomiting.’

‘Mmm. I see. Have you had this sort of thing before?’

‘No. Never.’

‘All right. So if you can manage to get undressed and slide under the covers, I’ll go and sort out a hot-water bottle, a cup of tea and some toast. We’ll see if you can keep that down, and then we’ll try some paracetamol to bring your temperature under control.’

When he came back upstairs Kate was under the covers and shivering. She hugged the hot-water bottle to her thankfully. As she was sipping the tea and nibbling on the toast the phone in the hall downstairs rang and as he went to answer it she called after him, ‘If it’s my mother, don’t tell her that I’m sick. She will have enough to cope with, looking after my gran.’

It wasn’t her mother. The call was from Jenny Barnes, the mainstay of the reception desk at the surgery.

‘Is everything all right, Dr Dreyfus?’ she wanted to know. ‘The waiting room is full and Dr Platt keeps sighing.’

‘I’ll be there in a few minutes,’ he told her. ‘I came back to get a medical book and found someone here who is not at all well.’

‘You don’t mean Ruth?’

‘No. It’s her daughter, who’s arrived home unexpectedly and has a virus of some sort.’

‘You mean Kate is back?’ she exclaimed. ‘She was a locum here for twelve months before she moved into hospital work. She’s a sweetie.’

‘Not at the moment she isn’t,’ he told her dryly as it registered that they were both in the same profession and she hadn’t thought to mention it. In fact, she’d looked more put out than ever when he’d told her that he was in charge of the village practice.

‘I’m needed at the surgery,’ he told Kate when he went back upstairs and found her dozing after managing to get the tea and toast down. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can and in the meantime stay put. I’ve brought your mobile up and have put it on the bedside table so that you won’t have to get out of bed if your mother does ring.’

He paused in the doorway. ‘Have you taken the paracetamol?’

‘Yes,’ she said meekly, and wished he wouldn’t be so doctorish. Her heart was bruised and hurting. She didn’t want to be taken over and organised. She wanted to be comforted. But this Daniel Dreyfus person wasn’t to know that, and when he came back she would remember her manners and thank him for looking after her. Someone, somewhere must be on her case to have sent a fellow doctor to her in her hour of need.

A tear rolled down her cheek but he wasn’t there to see it. The man who’d taken over the village practice and moved in on her home ground was halfway down the stairs and wishing that Miriam Platt, the other GP at the surgery, would cheer up.

He’d inherited the fifty-year-old widow with the practice. Peter Swain, who was now retired, had asked him to keep her on, and he’d agreed to do so unless for any reason he found her unsuitable. She was a good doctor, but personality-wise she was depressing. The slightest thing to go wrong had her sighing and he wished she would lighten up.

Miriam worried him. He wished she would talk to him. Tell him why she was always in such low spirits. The practice revolved around the two of them and if she had any problems that he could help with, he would be only too pleased.

He was aware that they needed another doctor, that they were short-staffed, and that his absence this afternoon wouldn’t have gone down well with Miriam. But he couldn’t have left that poor girl in the state she was in. For one thing, he liked Ruth Barrington. She was a pleasant, kindly woman, and for her sake as much as anything he’d stayed to sort her daughter out.

Ruth had been asked by her old friend Peter if she could accommodate the new doctor until his house was ready. She’d agreed and he was enjoying some good food and the pleasure of living in Jasmine Cottage for the time being.

He’d known that Ruth had a daughter somewhere and had sensed that she was concerned about her in some way, but she hadn’t said why and he hadn’t expected her to confide her anxieties to a stranger.

And now the daughter had appeared. Whether she was back for good, or just visiting he didn’t know. But Kate hadn’t been overjoyed to find him established in her mother’s house, even though he’d explained that it was a temporary arrangement.

He was approaching the surgery where Miriam was moaning and patients were waiting to be seen, so she was going to have to sort herself out until his working day was over.

‘So is Kate all right?’ Jenny asked the moment he appeared.

‘No. Not really,’ he told her. ‘I would say that it’s some sort of virus she’s got, and as we all know it is usually a case of keeping the temperature down and letting it run its course.’

‘Does Ruth know she’s poorly?’ Jenny asked, not letting go until she had the full story.

‘She’s at her mother’s in Newcastle-on-Tyne. The old lady has been taken ill, too. So I’m in charge at this end.’

As she passed over the notes of those who had come to consult him, Jenny said, ‘Is there anything I can do to help with Ruth being away?’

He smiled, admiring how the villagers were always ready to rally round when needed. No one would be left to suffer alone in this place. He was amazed at the community spirit, but he had a feeling that on this occasion the patient would want to be left alone.

‘Er…no, not at the moment. Thanks just the same,’ he told her. ‘Kate just seems to want to sleep.’ With that, he went into his room and buzzed for his first patient before Miriam had a chance to cast her frowns upon him.

As he waited, he recalled how the local people had been wary of him at first. Peter had been their doctor for as long as some of them could remember. But they’d had time to get to know him and now they had his measure, knew him to be competent and briskly kind.

If any of the women patients wondered why such a presentable member of the opposite sex had arrived in their midst with no obvious family ties, they were left to ponder. Daniel was like his landlady. He kept his own counsel in matters close to his heart.

Patients came and went, some only mildly suffering, and others in dire distress. Now Millie from the chemist’s was sitting opposite him. She was fighting breast cancer and needed a mastectomy because it had come back in a more serious form after a long remission.

‘Would I have a better chance if I had them both removed?’ she asked anxiously.

‘Only the oncologist can advise you on that, Millie,’ he told her gently, ‘and remember there is a chance that having the one mastectomy might be sufficient to give you a clean bill of health for a long time, maybe even permanently.’

‘And it might not,’ she reminded him. ‘I’d rather go the whole way now, instead of wishing I had.’

‘Have they given you a date?’ Daniel asked.

‘No. Not yet, but they’ve told me it will be soon. I wanted a word with you first before I approached them about a double mastectomy.’

‘It is a difficult decision for you to make.’

She shook her head. ‘Not really. If it gives me a few more years, it will be worth it.’ She gave a watery smile. ‘At least I won’t feel lopsided.’

‘So what does your husband say, Millie?’

‘All he cares about is that I get better.’

‘So have a word with the oncologist and see what he says.’ Daniel advised patiently.

‘It’s a she,’ Millie explained.

‘Fine. You may find it easier to explain your feelings to another woman.’

As the numbers in the waiting room dwindled and the clock ticked on, Daniel wondered how his patient at Jasmine Cottage was feeling. She was far from well and somewhat disgruntled, but he sensed that her disappointment at finding her mother missing was mostly to blame for her lack of cordiality, as well as discovering that she hadn’t got the house to herself.

But she couldn’t have it both ways. At least he’d been there to look after her when she’d fainted and afterwards. And if she wasn’t happy about him staying at Jasmine Cottage, he would have to keep a low profile while she was there and hope that it wouldn’t be for long.

‘I’m sorry I was delayed earlier,’ he said to Miriam as they were clearing up at the end of the day. ‘Ruth’s daughter arrived home unexpectedly and she wasn’t at all well. She fainted and I couldn’t leave her until I was sure she would be all right.’

‘I see,’ she said distantly. ‘It was just that we were rather busy.’

‘Yes, I know. We need another doctor and I’m going to sort it the first chance I get.’

He didn’t know how at that precise moment, but there were always young graduates keen to go into general practice, or more experienced doctors needing to relocate for family or other personal reasons.

It had been hectic since he’d taken over, but now everything was settling down and with another doctor in the practice he might find time to explore the Cheshire countryside.

One of the best things to happen to him since he’d become part of the rural community had been staying at Ruth Barrington’s. He’d bought a piece of land down by the river and was having a detached house built on it. But it was going to be a matter of months before it was ready, and while that was going on he was happy and grateful to be based at Jasmine Cottage, or at least he had been until today.

It was half past six when he pulled up on the drive and as he let himself in there was no sound coming from anywhere in the house, so it seemed as if Kate might be asleep once more.

He knocked gently on her bedroom door and when there was no reply he pushed it open slowly. The bed was empty and he could hear the shower running in the en suite, so it seemed as if she was feeling better. But what had he advised? He’d told her to stay where she was. If she’d fainted in the shower it could have had serious consequences.

However, it appeared that she hadn’t as at that moment she appeared draped in a towel, with feet bare and hair flat and damp against her head.

When she saw him standing there she clutched the towel more tightly around her and said defensively, ‘I know what you said, but I felt so hot and sticky, and I’m not feeling so bad now. Whatever I’ve picked up must have reached its peak when I fainted.’

He shrugged. ‘If you say so, and as we are both in the same line of business, I’m sure you know what’s best for you, so I’ll leave you to it.’

‘Don’t go,’ she said quickly.

‘Why? I’m hungry. Your mother told me to help myself to whatever I found in the fridge or the freezer. So I’m about to investigate. You can join me if you like, but don’t feel you have to.’

‘Would you just let me get a word in?’ she protested, and he became silent.

‘I want to apologise for my rudeness when you found me asleep in front of the heater, and also to say thanks for looking after me when I fainted. I don’t usually behave in such a manner.’ She sighed. ‘My excuse is that I’ve just had to cancel my wedding. Over the last few weeks I’ve been going through the process of calling it off and it has been a distressing nightmare. But it is done now and I’ve come home to live for the time being.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ he said quietly, and wondered what she would say if he told her he knew the feeling. But there were lots of different reasons for calling weddings off, and he could bet that his wasn’t the same as hers. ‘Was it to take place here in the village?’

She shook her wet blonde head. ‘No. My fiancé wanted us to be married abroad in St Lucia.’

‘So a lot of your friends here would have been disappointed.’

‘Yes. It wasn’t my idea. But I was in love and…’ She tailed off.

‘Quite so,’ he said, and turned to go. The conversation was bringing back painful memories that he could only cope with when he was alone.

‘I’ll put some clothes on and join you shortly, if that’s all right,’ she said hesitantly, with the feeling that she’d said the wrong thing again, but this time she didn’t know what it was.

‘I said it was, didn’t I?’ This time he did go, down the stairs and into the kitchen.

He was putting two plates of fish pie, peas and new potatoes on the table when she appeared hesitantly in the doorway, wearing a pink long-sleeved top and worn blue jeans, her blonde hair now dry. He had been feeling rather guilty about the way he had spoken to her upstairs and, seeing her now, looking so wary, he offered her a smile.

‘Come and sit down,’ he said, hoping he sounded more friendly. ‘Did your mother phone while I was out?’

She relaxed a little, came in and sat down. ‘Yes. Just after you’d gone. She was surprised to know I’m back home and sorry she wasn’t here to greet me. Gran has had a quite severe angina attack and at the moment is in hospital. So Mum won’t be returning until she is sure that all is well with her, and if there is any doubt about it she’s going to bring her here to live. It’s handy, having four big bedrooms.’

‘Yes. Especially when one of them is being occupied by the lodger,’ he commented dryly. ‘Did you tell her that we’ve met?’

‘Er…yes. She seems to think very highly of you and even more so after I told her how you’d looked after me.’

He nodded imperceptibly and for a while they ate in silence, both enjoying the tasty meal. Then Daniel spoke again.

‘So why didn’t you tell me that you’re in medicine too?’

Kate shrugged. ‘At the moment that’s in the past. I was a doctor in A and E at a hospital down south. We both were. Craig, my fiancé, worked there too. But a few weeks ago the unit was transferred to another area where they had their own staff waiting to take over, which left some of us without jobs. I could have moved to another department, I suppose, like he did, but I left as a protest at the closure of a busy A and E centre.’

‘So it would seem that life hasn’t been treating you very well of late.’

‘No. It hasn’t. I wasn’t the one who called off the wedding. He had been the one keen to get married. Then suddenly he didn’t want to be tied down…to me, that was. He’d switched his affections to my flatmate.’

‘I’m sure that you must feel you’re well rid of him.’

She smiled, showing even white teeth, and he thought how it transformed her face. So far she’d been scowling most of the time, but now he was seeing her as someone who would be quite something if she smiled more…in spite of the hairstyle.

‘I didn’t at first. That kind of thing makes one feel so unwanted and unlovable, but I’m getting there.’

‘I’m sure you are,’ he said with a smile of his own, and thought that this girl had some spirit. It was a shame that some low-life had tried to quench it. “Perhaps when you are fully recovered we can drink a toast to your continuing return to good health and a future spent with people who won’t let you down?’

‘Hmm. That would be lovely. So maybe you could tell me what’s happening at the surgery? Peter Swain has gone now, hasn’t he?’

‘Yes. But Miriam remains and I think she disapproves of me.’

‘Why, for goodness’ sake? Though thinking back to when I was there, it didn’t take much for her to start sighing and rolling her eyes.’

He laughed. ‘Nothing has changed, except that I’m in charge now and as new people are moving into the area our list of patients is getting bigger all the time.’

‘Yes, it will be,’ she agreed. Suddenly a wave of tiredness swept over her. Getting to her feet, she said apologetically, ‘I think that maybe I left my bed a bit too soon. I’m not going to faint again,’ she told him as he eyed her in concern. ‘I just suddenly feel very tired.’

‘That will be the after-effects of you having had such a high temperature. Do go back to bed by all means and I’ll look in on you later to make sure you are all right. We can have the wine another time.’

She nodded and got up from the table, pausing in the doorway. ‘I’m sorry I’m being such a drag, Dr Dreyfus,’ she said.

He smiled. ‘The name is Daniel, and none of us can help being ill at some time or another, as we doctors well know, so don’t give it another thought. You’re probably run down after all the stress you’ve been under, and would have thrown the virus off at another time.’

As she went slowly up the stairs, Daniel was again wishing he hadn’t been so brusque with her when he’d come back from the surgery. On closer acquaintance, Kate seemed all right.

Before he settled down for the night himself he went to check on her and found her sleeping peacefully. Her forehead was cool, her pulse regular, and as he moved away from the bed she turned in her sleep and murmured the name of the man she’d been going to marry, which made him wonder if she really had written him out of her life.

When he woke up the next morning he could smell bacon grilling and when he went downstairs Kate was setting the table for breakfast.

‘My turn,’ she told him as toast popped up in the toaster and the kettle came to the boil.

‘So am I to take it that you are feeling better?’ he asked.

‘Mmm. Much. I’m going to start unpacking when we’ve had breakfast and I’m going to put the washing machine on, so if you have anything that needs washing, leave it out.’

‘And what are you going to do after that?’

‘Take a wedding dress to the charity shop in the village.’

‘Surely someone else could do that for you. It’s bound to be painful. I’ll take it for you if you like.’

She was staring at him in amazement, unaware that for him it would not be the first time. But on a previous occasion the dress hadn’t been despatched with such haste and it had been returned to the shop from where it had been bought.

‘I can’t let you do that,’ she protested. ‘Mrs Burgess, who’s in charge of the place, would have it on the grapevine almost before you’d left the shop that you had brought in a wedding dress. What interpretation she and her helpers would put on that, I shudder to think.’

He was laughing. ‘So why don’t we set them a puzzle?’

‘If you’re sure.’

‘Sure I’m sure, but are you sure that you and what’s his-name, Craig, aren’t going to get back together?’

‘That’s not going to happen,’ she said flatly. ‘I’ve learnt my lesson. From this day forward I will only ever marry someone who can’t live without me, and I can’t live without him. And if I never find him I’ll stay single. I think I was in love with love more than I was with Craig.’

‘So where is the dress?’

‘Upstairs in a big box. I’ll go and fetch it.’

He must be insane, Daniel thought wryly after she’d gone to get it. Offering to take her brand-new wedding dress to the second-hand shop. It would be like turning the knife in him again, and what would Ruth think when she came home? That he ought to mind his own business. Or that he should have suggested to Kate that she sell it, being currently unemployed.

Why was he getting involved in her affairs anyway? They’d only met the previous day and hadn’t exactly hit it off to begin with. He had enough to concern himself about without worrying over a jilted bride. Running the practice and keeping an eye on the builders working on his house down by the river, for a start.

But there was something about Kate that was reaching out to him and it wasn’t because she was his type. Far from it. Lucy had been his type, but the after-effects of a brain tumour had taken her from him only days before their wedding, so he did understand how it felt to have one’s future wiped away. In his case it had been the cruel fates that had broken his heart, not a cheating partner.

Kate was back with the box that had the dress in it. Ashen-faced but determined. As he took it from her she said, ‘Thanks for taking it. I seem to have been putting on your good nature from the moment we met, and I know I’m pushing it, but I wonder if I could ask one more favour of you.’

‘It depends what it is.’

‘From what you were saying last night, it appears that you could do with another doctor in the practice. I have worked there before, and I do need a job.’

As soon as the words were out she wished she could take them back. His expression said it all. She was pushing it. Pushy was how she was coming over to him. She could tell.

‘I’ll have to think about it,’ he said levelly. ‘It is something I’ve been considering, but I’m not sure if I’m quite ready to act on it.’ And carrying the big cardboard box in front of him, he went and got into his car and at the bottom of the drive pointed it in the direction of the charity shop.

CHAPTER TWO

WHEN he’d gone, Kate slumped down on to the sofa and gazed bleakly into space. Whatever had possessed her to ask such a thing of him on such short acquaintance? Had she expected him to jump at the chance of employing her when he had no way of knowing how proficient she was?

Having worked in the practice in the past, she had the experience, but Daniel hadn’t seen her in action. It wouldn’t be easy to look him in the eye when they next met. She’d been on the receiving end of his good nature since the moment he’d found her on the carpet in front of the electric heater. He’d even offered to take the wedding dress that she hoped never to see again to the charity shop, and now he must be thinking she was taking advantage.

The day stretched ahead, long and miserable, and she wished her mother was home to offer comfort.

That was a bolt from the blue! Daniel was thinking as he drove towards the main street of the village, Ruth’s daughter asking to be taken into the practice. It had taken him by surprise and he’d fobbed her off, thinking as he did so that Kate wasn’t backward at coming forward. He supposed that her life was in turmoil at present and she was seeing a job at the practice as a means of sorting out one part of it at least.

But when he took someone on it was going to be done properly with an in-depth interview, references and the rest. Not after a cosy little chat with his landlady’s daughter. And if she was the right person for the job, then he would hire her. However, he also knew that the thought of working with Kate had unsettled him more than he wanted to admit.

After he’d lost Lucy he had decided that love and pain walked hand in hand and he couldn’t go through that terrible kind of loss ever again. It was a defeatist attitude. He knew it. But it was why he steered clear of women and relationships. He didn’t want Kate becoming any more entangled in his life than she was already.

The charity shop where Mrs Burgess ruled the roost was looming and, parking outside, he picked up the big cardboard box and went in. When he laid it on the counter and opened the top flaps of the box, there was a flurry of interest amongst staff and early morning customers alike, and someone said, ‘It’s beautiful. Just look at the lover’s knots along the scalloped hemline. Who did it belong to?’

‘An acquaintance,’ he explained, having no desire to depart from the truth.

‘It looks as if it’s never been worn,’ someone else said, and he shrugged noncommitally and wondered if Kate was making a mistake in getting rid of it so fast, though he understood that the dress was a reminder of how her hopes and dreams had been shattered.

Leaving them still admiring it, he drove to the surgery, intending to forget the jilted bride for a while as he concentrated on the needs of his patients.

As he was passing through Reception Jenny collared him, wanting to know how Kate was. ‘Improving,’ he told her. ‘But I’ve told her to stay put and keep warm.’

Later on in the morning Mrs Giles brought her young son in for Daniel to see. The child was jerking his neck uncontrollably and his mother said anxiously, ‘I’ve brought Billy to see you because of his neck.’

Daniel was on his feet and round their side of the desk before she’d finished speaking.

‘How long has he been like this?’ he asked, observing the neck movements keenly.

‘He had a really bad sore throat last week,’ Linda Giles said uncomfortably, ‘and then he started twitching. His brothers and sisters keep laughing at him. But I thought I’d better bring him in to be looked at.’

‘It is a good job you did,’ he told her as he gently examined her son. ‘Why didn’t you bring him into the surgery when he had the inflamed throat?’

She shrugged. ‘I gave him some Friar’s balsam on a spoon with some sugar and it didn’t seem as bad after that.’

Daniel frowned. ‘Friar’s balsam is a very old remedy, and in some cases is sufficient to clear up a sore throat, but what your son had would have been much worse than that,’ he explained. ‘He should have been seen by a doctor.’

The Giles family lived in an old tumbledown house at the top of the road that led to the circle of peaks that surrounded the village. There were five children in all and though Linda Giles did her best she never seemed to be on top of things.

‘Why? Is it the sore throat that’s making him twitch?’ she wanted to know.

Daniel nodded. ‘It could be.’ Turning to Billy, he said, ‘Can you hold your hands out in front of you for me, Billy, like this?’ He showed him, with palms facing downward.

The child, who seemed to have a better idea of what was going on than his mother, obeyed, and Daniel saw what he didn’t want to see. The fingers were curling backwards, and he knew he was seeing a case of Sydenham’s chorea.

‘Have you ever heard of St Vitus’dance?’ he asked Mrs Giles. ‘That’s the common name of the illness that I think your son might be suffering from, which is rheumatism of the central nervous system. It’s hardly heard of in this day and age but it can occur very rarely. I’m going to get Billy seen by a neurologist as soon as possible to see if I am right. In the meantime, take him home, put him to bed, keep him warm and give him the antibiotics that I’m going to prescribe for his throat.’

‘I can’t take him home. I’m on school dinners,’ Linda protested. ‘I’ve been taking him with me while he’s been poorly.’

‘Forget school dinners until he has been seen by the neurologist,’ he told her firmly. ‘The only thing that will stop the body movements getting worse is bed rest and sedation and I am not going to prescribe anything like that until a firm diagnosis has been made. So please do as I say.’

At last Mrs Giles seemed to realise the seriousness of the situation and she took Billy’s hand in hers and led him out of the surgery. Daniel sighed and hoped that she would do as he had said.

He rang her later in the morning and told her he’d arranged an appointment with a neurologist for the following day. ‘It will be a home visit,’ he told her. ‘He will be coming to the house so don’t let Billy out of bed until he’s seen him.’

‘Oh!’ she wailed. ‘Does he have to come here? I haven’t had the chance to put the vac round for days what with one thing and another.’

‘Don’t worry. He’s not coming to look at the house. He’s coming to see Billy,’ he said. And I’m pretty sure I know what he will say, he thought as he said goodbye and put the phone down.

He’d told Billy’s mother that the neurologist wasn’t going to be looking at the house, but damp living conditions and poor nourishment would be noted.

When they were getting ready to leave at the end of the day he said to Miriam, ‘What experience do you have of Sydenham’s chorea in a patient?’

She was reaching for her coat and collecting her belongings, anxious to be gone, and she replied, ‘So far, none. I’ve heard of it, of course.’ And before he could explain that he would like to discuss little Billy’s case with her, she was off.

When he arrived back at Jasmine Cottage, Kate was ironing the clothes that she’d laundered earlier in the day and he said with a frown, ‘You don’t have to do mine. I’m quite capable of ironing my own things.’

‘Yes. I’m sure you are,’ she told him, ‘but you are not going to tell me that my mum doesn’t do your ironing. I know her too well for that.’

‘Yes. Ruth does do my washing and ironing. It was part of the deal when I moved in.’

‘And so I’m taking her place.’

‘So it would seem,’ he commented dryly.

This sort of domestic scene was the very thing he wanted to avoid, he thought as he went upstairs to change out of the suit he’d worn at the surgery.

He didn’t want this forced intimacy to become too cosy.

To begin with, Kate was too forthright and pushy. The absolute opposite of how Lucy had been. She had been gentle and amenable, with long silky hair and a piquant face. Life without her was an empty thing. Yet the woman downstairs ironing his shirts wasn’t to blame for that. It was just that he didn’t want any more complications in his life than he had already.

There was the business of her mentioning the vacancy at the surgery. The more they were thrown together the more she might see it as a reason for him to offer it to her, and he wasn’t going to be manipulated.

They had a meal of sorts. Eating together at the kitchen table, pizza and a fruit flan that Ruth had put in the freezer. Short of being downright rude there was no way he could have avoided it. But once they’d cleared away he said, ‘I’m going upstairs for a while to unwind. If I don’t see you later, sleep well.’

Once in his room he lay down on top of the bed and picked up a book that he’d half read, but he couldn’t settle into it. He felt restless and it was all because of Kate downstairs, who, if she had something to say, came out with it.

She had barged into his life just a short time ago and ever since he’d felt as if his organised existence was being threatened. Yet Kate was vulnerable too in her own way. Trying to cope with being surplus to requirements for some low-life who had strung her along. She didn’t deserve that.

She’d got the message, Kate thought when he’d gone. In a roundabout sort of way he was telling her to keep her distance. That enough was enough, and she couldn’t blame him.

If she needed employment it was up to her to look for it instead of expecting it to be handed to her on a plate. But she was going to have to move out of the area if Daniel didn’t want her in the practice.

She glanced through a magazine, watched some television half-heartedly, and finally decided to go to bed for lack of anything else to do. The days were stretching ahead emptily and she wished that Gran was better and her mother was home.

Ruth had never liked Craig. She’d thought he had a wandering eye and sadly she hadn’t been wrong.

They’d drifted into a relationship, working long hours together, snatching quick meals. Talking shop sometimes, and at others letting the close environment they worked in shut out everyone else, so that it had been as if there had only been the two of them.

The odd thing was at this troubled time in her life the fates had sent another man into it, and the more she saw of Daniel the more Craig was becoming a shadowy figure. Yet she knew nothing about the GP who had taken Peter Swain’s place in the village’s health centre.

He was far too attractive for the women he met to overlook deep hazel eyes and hair as dark as ebony curling neatly above his ears, yet he was alone and seemingly un-attached.

Surely he must have someone, somewhere who cared for him. A wife or a partner, a mother, or a sister. Or was the house he was having built by the river just for himself?

One thing was sure. She wasn’t going to ask him. She’d already floored him twice in one day by her determination to give away the wedding dress and almost in the same breath asking him about the vacancy at the practice. It was more than likely that he thought she wasn’t exactly broken-hearted if she was job-hunting two days after her arrival and disposing of the dress that must have meant a lot to her at the same time.

She kept her tears for when she was alone in the dark hours of the night. The feeling of not being wanted hurt so much that she had to push it to the back of her mind when she was with Daniel in case she made a fool of herself. The last thing she wanted was for him to feel that she was looking for a shoulder to cry on.

Getting up off the sofa, she began to walk slowly upstairs, having given up on seeing him again before morning, but as she reached the landing the door of his bedroom opened and he was framed there, dressed in a thick sweater and jeans with a sheepskin jacket over the top.

‘Hi,’ he said warily. ‘You aren’t going to bed, are you?’

‘Yes,’ she told him flatly. ‘There doesn’t seem much else to do.’

‘It’s only half past nine.’

‘So?’

She looked pale and lost and he weakened, saying, ‘I’m going down to the pub for an hour. Do you want to come?’

He couldn’t believe he’d said it when the words were out. This wasn’t keeping Kate at a distance. Her expression had brightened but she was hesitating.

‘That would be nice,’ she said, ‘but I hope that everyone doesn’t start asking questions about why I’ve come back to live. I presume my mother will have told some people that I’m engaged and they’ll be curious because it wasn’t someone local, but I don’t want to suddenly be the focus of attention.’ Kate sighed. ‘It hurt a lot to have my trust betrayed. The fact that I won’t be wearing the wedding dress or honeymooning abroad is disappointing, but delightful as those things are, they’re just the trappings of a wedding. It’s knowing that the person you’re marrying can be trusted to love and cherish you that matters. With Craig that was never going to happen, so I suppose I should consider myself to have had a lucky escape, but it doesn’t make the pain go away.’

‘I can believe that,’ Daniel said gravely, finding himself wishing that he knew her well enough to offer comfort. ‘But, Kate, you will have to face the people around here some time, so why not get it over and done with?’

She smiled for the first time since they’d met on the landing. ‘Yes. Why not? At least I’ll have you for moral support.’

‘You will indeed,’ he promised, and thought that it was a long time since he’d felt so protective over anyone, but he wasn’t sure if he wanted it to be like that.

A diversion was called for and, remembering little Billy Giles, he asked her, ‘Have you ever seen or treated anyone with Sydenham’s chorea, rheumatism of the central nervous system?’

She frowned thoughtfully. ‘I know what it is, but I’ve never treated anyone with it. Although I do believe I once saw someone whose life had been blighted by it.’

‘So go and get your coat and make sure that you wrap up warm. It isn’t long since you were ill, so don’t take any chances, and you can tell me about it while we’re walking to the pub.’

Kate nodded and went into her room to quickly get ready while Daniel waited downstairs. Then they stepped out of the house and began the pleasant walk towards the pub.

‘So why are you asking about Sydenham’s chorea?’ Kate asked immediately. ‘You haven’t got a patient with it, have you?’

‘I might have, and it’s very much on my mind. A young boy who from the sound of it has had a severe throat infection, came to see me this morning with his mother. He was making uncontrollable neck movements all the time and I suspect that it is the jolly old St Vitus’ dance as it used to be called way back.’

‘What makes you think so? The twitching of the neck?’

‘Yes, that, and also what happened when I tested him in the same way that a neurologist once did on a patient that I’d sent to him with the same kind of problem.’

‘What sort of test?’ she asked, and he thought at that moment she wasn’t his landlady’s daughter or the jilted bride, she was the doctor first and foremost, tuned in, keen to know. Miriam could take a lesson from Kate.

‘When the boy stretched his hands out in front of him palms down, his fingers curled backwards. I’ve tried it with my hands, and if you try it with yours you’ll find that it is almost impossible to make them do that. So simple, but so illuminating, though I never found out what it actually revealed. But it will be interesting to see what happens tomorrow.’

‘That’s interesting,’ she commented. ‘That someone could be diagnosed in such a way.’

‘I know, but that is how it was then. They may have other ways of making a diagnosis now. So tell me about this person that you saw.’

‘It was a man in a big department store. His whole body was on the go all the time, making exhausting sweeping movements. Some people were laughing at him, but I just felt so sorry for him I could have wept. I thought at the time that it might have been Sydenham’s chorea, but had no way of knowing if it was, short of asking him, and he was having enough to cope with without that. It comes from a streptococcal throat infection, doesn’t it, and poor living conditions?’

‘Yes, and Billy Giles lives in a damp old house. They are a big family and I don’t somehow think they live off the fat of the land, even though the father works on a farm. Immediate and prolonged bed rest is essential to prevent the damage to the nervous system progressing, so I bundled him off home to bed and have arranged for a home visit from a neurologist tomorrow.’

‘I’ll be very interested to know what happens,’ she said. ‘Would it be possible for me to see Billy, so that if ever I do come up against it I will be better informed than I am now?’

‘Yes, of course,’ he said immediately. ‘I’ll be visiting him regularly once it is sorted and I’ll take you with me if you like.’

He was weakening, Daniel was thinking. He knew it. But her kind of enthusiasm was what he was looking for in the practice. Miriam was a good doctor, but he’d never found her prepared to go the extra mile.

‘Maybe you could come down for an interview,’ he said as the pub came into sight, and as her expression brightened he thought that Kate was going to be renewing her acquaintance with the villagers inside The Poacher’s Rest with a bit more sparkle than when they’d left the house.

‘Hello, there, Daniel,’ Michael Grimshaw, the landlord, said when they appeared, and, on seeing who was with him, ‘Kate! Nice to see you. Are you just visiting, or back for good?’

Before she had the chance to answer someone called from across the room, ‘So when’s the wedding, Kate? We’re always ready for a chance to dress up in the village, especially when it’s for one of our own.’

Daniel cast a quick glance at his companion. Was he ever going to be free of the feeling of responsibility he’d had for her from the very moment of their meeting? he wondered. What was Kate going to say to that?

The sparkle had gone as quickly as it had come, but she was totally composed as she announced for the benefit of anyone listening, ‘The wedding preparations are on hold at the moment. We’re spending some time apart, but I will bear in mind that you would like me to be married here when the occasion arises.’

As they sat down with their drinks he murmured. ‘Well done and very subtle. I’m proud of you. That took some pluck. It should give you some breathing space and delay any surmises about the wedding dress for the time being.’

She flashed him a watery smile. ‘Thanks for being with me. It did make it easier. At least I’ve been able to give a hint of things to come.’

‘You have indeed, and now relax for a while, Kate. What shall we talk about?’

The smile was still there. “Sydenham’s chorea?’

‘No. We’ve given that enough of an airing until I have some results on young Billy.’ He sighed. ‘It’s been a week of coming into contact with some very unfortunate people, but of course that’s the doctor’s lot.

‘I had an anxious young woman consult me who is fighting breast cancer and is facing a mastectomy. She’s considering having both breasts removed to give herself a better chance and wanted my opinion.’

‘What did you advise?’

‘That she see the oncologist and get an opinion from her. She is under the hospital and I don’t know enough about her case to tell her what to do, but I could see sense in what she was contemplating.’

‘It makes one’s own troubles seem small compared to that kind of problem, doesn’t it?’ Kate said sombrely.

‘Hmm. But they don’t go away because of it, do they?’

She glanced at him curiously. ‘You don’t come over as having problems Although I do sense that you are alone. Do you not have any family?’

‘If you mean am I married, or in any other kind of relationship, the answer is no.’

‘Amazing,’ said Kate, wondering why such an attractive man was on his own.

‘What do you mean?’ asked Daniel levelly, as he sipped his drink.

‘Just that lots of women would see you as their dream man.’

He laughed, but there was no mirth in it. ‘Really? Well, I’m sure that you won’t get any of those sorts of ideas. Though saying that, I know how the minds of people on the rebound can work.’

As she was about to voice an indignant protest he went on, ‘I’m afraid that my life is not an open book, like yours. Some of its pages will stay closed for ever. Both my parents are dead. I had a fantastic childhood and would have wanted the same for any children I might have. But we don’t always get what we want, do we?’

‘So are the closed pages about your parents?’ Kate asked, rather annoyed about his assumption that she could be some sort of desperate woman on the rebound.

‘No,’ he said abruptly. ‘They are not, and I think we should be making a move. If you can lie in bed in the morning, I can’t.’

‘What about my interview?’ Kate asked nervously.

‘Leave it with me. After the house calls and before the late surgery would be a good time, but I’ll have to check with Miriam so that she will be available to join us. I don’t want to go over her head in this.’

As they walked home in the quiet night beneath a sky full of stars Daniel said, ‘Do you think you might find working at the practice a bit tame after a busy A and E department?’

‘I didn’t before,’ she told him. ‘General practice might move at a slower pace, yet it’s just as challenging in its own way.’

Kate couldn’t help but feel hopeful. But she told herself she wasn’t there yet. There was nothing to say that she was the only person he had in mind for the position, and what about Miriam? Would she want her on the staff?

That night she dreamt about the wedding dress. That she’d gone to the wardrobe and it was hanging there unused and unwanted. In the dream she’d cried out in dismay and Daniel had come dashing in to see what was wrong.

‘You said you’d taken it to the charity shop!’ she’d sobbed.

‘What? The wedding dress? I did!’ he’d cried, and when she looked again it had gone.

She must have been crying out in her sleep because his voice broke into the dream and she woke up. He was outside her door, asking if she was all right. Getting slowly out of bed, she padded across in her nightdress and opened the door.

‘I was dreaming,’ she told him. ‘I’m sorry if I disturbed you.’

‘It can’t have been very pleasant from the sound of it.’

‘It was about the wedding dress. I dreamt it was in the wardrobe and I thought it had come back to haunt me.’

‘Well, we both know that’s crazy, don’t we?’ he said calmly. ‘Go back to bed and I’ll go down and make you a drink. What would you like? Tea, coffee, hot chocolate?’

‘Hot chocolate would be lovely,’ she said awkwardly. ‘I am really so sorry that I disturbed you.’

‘You didn’t. I was reading for a while. Otherwise I mightn’t have heard you. You’re not likely to put a cancelled wedding behind you without bad moments, you know. Just take it one day at a time.’

She nodded meekly. ‘Yes. I will.’

It would have been their visit to the pub that had triggered the dream, she thought when he’d gone downstairs. They’d passed the charity shop on the way and she’d been acutely aware that inside it was her wedding dress.

She gratefully accepted the hot chocolate Daniel soon brought up to her. About to leave, he asked from the doorway of her bedroom, ‘Has your mother been in touch today?’

‘Yes. She rang this morning and sends her regards.’

‘Any signs of her coming home?’

‘Not so far,’ she told him with a feeling that he might be asking for various reasons. One of them being that he would be happy to pass her and her problems back into her mother’s keeping.

‘So your gran is no better?’

‘Mum says she’s improving, but has quite a way to go yet.’

‘The main thing is that she’s recovering. It must be a relief for you both, and now, if you promise not to have any more strange dreams, I’ll go and get some sleep myself, and will see you in the morning.’

‘Thanks once again for putting up with me,’ she said, her blue eyes appealing.

‘Don’t mention it,’ he replied dryly, and went to try and forget her for a few hours.

The next morning he said to Miriam, ‘I’m thinking of interviewing Kate Barrington for the position of a third doctor in the practice, and I’d like you to be there.’

‘Really?’ she said stiffly. ‘Since when?’

‘Since I have found her to be an intelligent and knowledgeable young doctor. Do you have any objections?’

‘If it reduces my workload, no. She has worked here before, you know.’

‘Yes. So I believe. What was she like then?’

‘Young, enthusiastic. Eager to learn, I suppose.’

‘So why didn’t she stay?’

‘The pull of hospital health care where she has been employed until very recently, I believe.’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ he agreed, ‘but I think that Kate has given up on that and wants to be more home-based. So how about I ask her to come in tomorrow after we’ve finished the home visits?’

‘Yes, I suppose so,’ she said in her usual flat tones, and went to start her day.

That was one hurdle crossed, he thought when she’d gone. He had not been sure of how Miriam would react, but it seemed as if Kate had been highly suitable when she’d worked in the practice before, so she was already halfway to being taken on. He just wished that she was of a similar age to Miriam and just as unexciting, then she wouldn’t take over his thoughts so much.

He rang her in his lunch-hour to tell her about the interview time. She’d still been asleep when he’d left, but now she was up and about and happy to know that things were moving.

‘What did Miriam say?’ she wanted to know.

‘She seemed to approve of the idea.’

‘Oh, good! I’ll keep my fingers crossed, then, and, Daniel, whether you offer me the position or not, thank you for being so good to me.’

There was a moment’s silence at the other end of the line and then he said stiltedly, ‘Yes, well, thanks for that. The truth of the matter is that I’ve felt I owed it to your mother to look after you. Ruth has been very kind to me. You are very fortunate to have her in your life.’

When he’d replaced the receiver Kate wondered why she felt as if she’d been warned off. There was no reason why she should, but the feeling was there nonetheless. Maybe it was why Daniel was alone. There was something of the ‘don’t butt into my life’ about him.

Yet he seemed to get on fine with her mother and the villagers seemed to all like him. Perhaps it was just her that he was wary of. But why? She certainly hadn’t got any designs on him. Her heart was bruised and aching from what Craig had done to her. Yet, she thought with wry amusement, Daniel was the only man whose underwear she had ever laundered, though he’d made it clear at the time that he’d rather she hadn’t.

She decided that tomorrow she wouldn’t put a foot wrong. If nothing else, she would get a smile out of Miriam.

CHAPTER THREE

WHEN Kate arrived for the interview Daniel’s first thought was, Wow! The young doctor from A and E was out to make a statement, he decided. With hair brushed into a smooth gold bob, light make-up accentuating her delicately boned features, and dressed in a smart black trouser suit with a white silk shirt and black leather shoes with medium heels, she looked more like a young executive than a country GP. It would be interesting to observe Miriam’s reaction when she saw the prospective newcomer to the practice, he thought. As for himself, he just wished that Kate would stop weakening his resolve, though he had only himself to blame for that. He was the one who’d asked her to come for an interview in spite of not wanting to get too close to her.

But turning up looking so stunning wasn’t going to get her the job. It would depend on how knowledgeable she was about general practice work. How much she remembered from when she’d been employed in the practice before, and most of all how good a doctor she was, though he would only discover that when he saw her in action.

He knew she wouldn’t be short on enthusiasm. There had been nothing lukewarm about her interest in young Billy Giles, who had now been seen by the neurologist and pronounced to be suffering from Sydenham’s chorea.

Kate was that kind of person. He’d discovered in the short time he’d known her that there was nothing negative about her. The disposal of the wedding dress was proof of that, though he still wasn’t sure that she should have been in such a rush, and he hoped that whoever bought it wouldn’t be walking down the aisle of the village church in it.

When he glanced around Reception she was sitting there, waiting patiently for him to call her into his consulting room, but Miriam, who was usually back first from her house calls, hadn’t yet returned and he wasn’t going to start without her.

She arrived in due course. The interview commenced, and as it progressed Daniel knew he would be crazy not to take Kate into the practice. Her appointment would have to go through the usual channels with regard to admin, but he couldn’t foresee any problems there. She was bright, intelligent and should be no mean performer after working in A and E for quite some time.

Even Miriam was smiling. Though that could be for a variety of reasons, self-preservation being top of the list, and maybe she was pleased at the thought of another woman doctor in the practice. He still had concerns about his colleague and wished she would open up to him about whatever it was that was making her so unhappy. Maybe she would confide in their third member once she’d settled in.

‘I’ll be in touch,’ he told Kate when it was over.

She was smiling. ‘In person, or through the post?’

‘As we are more or less living on top of each other at the moment, I think I can safely say it will be in person.’

He could have told her on the spot that he wanted her in the practice, but he had to make sure that Miriam’s smile was because she was in favour of Kate joining them, and that it wasn’t for any other reason.

‘Yes,’ she said when his landlady’s daughter had gone. ‘If you’re happy about taking Kate on, so am I.’

Still in her smart clothes, Kate was walking down the main street of the village about to do some food shopping while she was out. As she strolled along, uppermost in her mind was the interview that had just taken place, and when the window of the charity shop suddenly loomed up beside her she wasn’t prepared for what she was about to see.

Totally unmissable in the centre, with lover’s knots and pristine white satin arranged to the best of their ability by Mrs Burgess and her ladies, was her wedding dress.

She began to shake. All the bottled-up hurt and disappointment was hitting her with full force, and tears that so far hadn’t seen the light of day began to pour down her cheeks.

The shop closed at four o’clock each day when the staff went home to their own devices, so her grief was unobserved from inside. But to Daniel, driving past in answer to a phone call from a home for the elderly a couple of miles out of the village, there was no mistaking the slender figure in the black trouser suit standing in mute distress where someone might come across her at any moment.

He pulled up quickly and was out of the car in a flash. Taking her arm, he said gently, ‘Get inside, Kate. I’ll take you home. But I’ve got to answer a request for a home visit first. They’ve just been on the phone from Furzebank. One of their old folk is really poorly and they’re very concerned.’

She nodded, wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and huddled down in the seat beside him as he drove off. When they reached the gates of a big stone house that had been converted into a home for the elderly, Daniel said in the same gentle tone, ‘Kate, I did warn you that it could be a bit hasty, sending your dress to the charity shop so soon after your return to the village.’

Still without speaking, she nodded again and he thought that the smiling and confident interviewee of not so long ago was red-eyed and hurting and the same concern that he’d felt when they’d walked home from the pub was there.

He wanted to comfort her, hold her close, tell her that one day a man would come along who would love her as she deserved to be loved. Someone who wasn’t wrapped around with memories of the past, and he, Daniel, would envy him.

He hadn’t held a woman in his arms since he’d lost Lucy. That way he was able to keep to the commitment he had promised himself, so he just patted her hand and said anxiously, ‘Promise me you won’t budge while I’m in the home. I’ll try not to be too long but can’t be sure.’

‘I’ll be here,’ she promised. ‘Don’t rush on my account, Daniel. Patients come before personal matters in the life of the GP during surgery hours.’ And when he glanced at her sharply she managed a smile. ‘I know I’m not a GP yet, but I’m hoping.’

It was Elizabeth Ackroyd, the oldest inmate of Furzebank, that he’d been summoned out to see, and when he saw her Daniel’s expression was grave. She had been a highly intelligent woman and still was to some degree in spite of her ninety years.

She had sacrificed the chance of marriage or a career to look after younger brothers and a sister when they’d lost their mother while only young, and she had outlived them all.

Elizabeth had been at Furzebank four years and until recently had been well and happy. Until an elderly widower that she had become very close to had died suddenly and the will to live had left her.

The first time Daniel had been called out to her, he hadn’t been able to find anything organically wrong with her. Helen, the sister-in-charge, had nodded her agreement, and told him that Elizabeth had said to her that she’d found the love of her life seventy years too late, and that she would die of a broken heart.

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