Lovers and Newcomers by Rosie Thomas Read Free Book Online

jar he experienced a moment’s difficulty with fitting the lid on the grinder, then pressed the button as gingerly as if he expected the machine to detonate.
    Polly read out over the clatter, ‘Erasmian fool, M 37, seeks warm-hearted man, London or Cambridge, to explore gravity and grace. Downhill skiing champion preferred.’ Colin shuddered. Amos stared briefly at them over his shoulder.
    ‘Is there any milk?’ he asked Miranda.
    ‘Have a look in the fridge.’
    By the time he had produced two cups of coffee and set one down in front of Miranda, the other three had got up and were preparing to leave.
    ‘Might have a drink at the pub,’ Colin said, winding a scarf of Indian silk around his neck.
    The kitchen was quiet after they had gone.
    ‘Why do I suddenly feel like the butt of some incomprehensible joke?’ Amos said abruptly into the silence.
    Miranda thoughtfully drank some coffee, then replaced the cup in its saucer.
    ‘Do you?’
    ‘It reminds me of when we were students. It’s all coming back to me. I was forever arriving a crucial minute too late, after the decision had been made or the punch line delievered. Have I spent getting on for forty years demonstrating that I am not some egregious hanger-on, only to step back into a room with all of you in it to feel a callow nineteen all over again?’
    The corners of Miranda’s mouth lifted. ‘I don’t know. But isn’t it rather good, in its way? Rather rejuvenating?’
    He stared at her, trying to work out whether he was being teased.
    ‘No, I don’t think so.’
    Miranda made herself be serious. ‘You’re not going to regret moving up here, Amos, are you?’ She didn’t want any of them to regret the decision, not even for a moment.
    ‘Katherine loves it.’ Amos’s expertise in deflecting questions was considerable. ‘Even in the car when we were driving up, I noticed how gleeful she was. She likes the life here better than living with me in London, that’s quite obvious. She seems happier now than at any time since the boys left home.’ He added, ‘Of course, I’m glad about that.’ His big hands, lightly clasped, rested on the table.
    Miranda stood up and came to him. She put her arm over his shoulders and Amos flinched, just perceptibly, as if he feared what might happen next.
    ‘What about you ?’ she murmured.
    ‘I want to get my house built.’
    ‘Yes. But what do you feel about being here at Mead, with the rest of us? We did all that talking about money and business and land and security and contracts, but I don’t think we – or you – did much more than mention the communal aspects.’
    ‘It’s a business arrangement, isn’t it?’ Amos said briskly. He ducked his head from beneath Miranda’s chin.
    Miranda stood upright. Her expressive face showed the depth of her conviction. ‘But I want it to be more than that. For me, for Mead, for all of us. I want it to be about faith, and friendship, and the way that those values outlast, survive longer than marriage. Children grow up and go. Partners die, or leave, or whatever they do. What have you got left that means more than what we have here, the six of us?’
    ‘How about work? Call it achievement, if you prefer. Hindsight, that’s always a gift. Wealth, even, if you like. Quite a number of significant things, anyway.’
    She slid her narrow hands into the back pockets of her trousers and paced away to the dresser.
    ‘I was thinking more emotionally.’
    He widened his eyes in a show of amazement. ‘Really? You were, Mirry, of all people?’
    ‘Stop it, Amos. You said a minute ago that you felt unnerved by being with us again. That’s an emotional response. It’s an acknowledgement that we do have something significant here, between us all, old friends.’
    Her eyes met his. The lids drooped and there were fans of wrinkles at the corners but otherwise her face was not much altered by the years. Miranda had always been a beauty. As far as Amos was concerned she was