She could plead illness, she supposed, but she was rarely sick, and Keelin and Marie-Claire wouldn’t be impressed with that behaviour. There was nothing for it but to go and pretend that she was enjoying the daft shenanigans that in her opinion were thoroughly unnecessary.

Imelda’s lips tightened as she got her big mixing bowl and began to crumble breadcrumbs from the batch loaf she’d bought. She couldn’t be doing with shop-bought breadcrumbs. They had no substance. She’d use proper bread and make her stuffing the way her mother and grandmother before her had made it, she thought crossly, feeling quite vexed at the prospect of the forthcoming party.

The way everyone went on about Brigid, as though she were a bloody saint! Well, the Reverend Mother was no saint, and she, Imelda, knew that better than anyone. Oh she could tell everyone a thing or two about Sister, who had abandoned Imelda to . . . to . . . slavery – that was the best word for it.

The way people had gone on when she’d left to join the convent had been sickening. ‘You’ll get to heaven quicker, having a nun in the family,’ Aunt Lorna approved when she heard the news. That had pleased their father enormously.

‘God always takes the good ones,’ their grandmother declared, casting a sour eye over at Imelda, who had given her cheek earlier in the day. That was pointed and it had stung. Even now, all these decades later, this was what Imelda remembered of Brigid’s decision to enter the religious life.

The tang of fresh herbs and onion wafting around the kitchen, mingling with the fruity aroma of Christmas pudding boiling on the cooker, soothed her agitation somewhat, so that when Felicity handed her the mug of tea, Imelda was able to accept it with a modicum of graciousness. Tea was the cure for everything, even the difficulties that came with having a saint for a sister and a party to attend in the depths of winter, when she’d rather be under the snug comfort of her own roof, minding her own business.

CHAPTER FIVE

MARIE-CLAIRE

Marie-Claire sat at the table Marc had reserved by the window. Outside, the snow frolicked in silent merriment. Inside, the hum of laughter and chat, the clinking of glassware, and cutlery on china, the delicious aromas from the kitchen, all seemed to mock her unhappiness. This was no place for the low of heart on such a night when the gods and goddesses of Gaiety and Seasonal Cheer insisted on participation. To her, it all seemed very surreal, as though she were living in a parallel universe.