“Thank you!” said John. He pushed her door closed and leaned in through the open passenger window to pass the driver a ten-pound note. Then he stood back, raising his hand once as the taxi pulled away.

—

Annie climbed into bed, still all a-fluster, and flicked off the lamp. She leaned across to the drawer in her bedside cabinet and pulled Mr. Knightley from his wrappings. But it wasn’t Mr. Knightley’s image that filled her mind as she shimmied down beneath the bedclothes and closed her eyes.

Chapter 70

Annie woke up the next morning with more than a smidge of a hangover, which she doused liberally with coffee and carbohydrates before taking herself for a walk along the promenade at seven a.m.

Ely’s fishing boat was already out on the water, which today was a dark navy blue, the swell languid, making the waves look thick and syrupy. The weather had changed; she could smell the cold. There was a permanence about this chill, as though a deep elemental shift had caused the very fabric of the air to evolve into a new, harsher creature. Winter had arrived. As she walked, shrouded in the frosty morning mist, her thoughts returned again and again to the previous evening, and she found herself smiling in spite of the bitter breeze.

By the time she opened the kiosk at eight o’clock, she had frozen out the muggy head and felt almost human—coffee would sort the rest. Saturday mornings were her busiest at the kiosk.

Billy arrived at twenty-five past, looking rosy-cheeked and windswept. He was shy and ill at ease—despite Annie doing her best to make him feel relaxed—and it was making him clumsy. He dropped a cup within the first ten minutes of his shift and seemed to trip over every chair leg as he stumbled about the café, getting it ready for opening. Annie felt sorry for him; she could see he wanted to make a good impression, but his nerves were sabotaging his efforts. His complexion swung between deathly pale and blotchy red, depending on the degree of his errors. But despite this, or maybe because of it, the customers took to him instantly. He pulled faces to make the children laugh, charmed the older customers with his attentive manners, and brought out the maternal instinct in every woman over twenty-five.

“Relax,” said Annie, when his shaking hands put more coffee in the saucer than in the cup. “You’re doing really well. All these little errors will stop as soon as you calm down.”

“I’m sorry,” said Billy, his cheeks blotching scarlet instantly. “I just really want this job.”

“Well, you’ve got the job. So there, now you can stop panicking and concentrate on getting the hang of the place.”

“I’ve got the job?” Billy’s surprise was palpable.