Yes, you are, Leon thought. My girl has truly met her match. That’s why she didn’t let go of him. She knew she’d never find another.

‘I dare say you’ve thought a bit about this moment,’ he said. ‘Asking for my daughter’s hand in marriage – wondering how I’d take it, eh?’

Gerhard smiled. ‘A bit, yes . . .’

Leon grinned. ‘Me too. I had a long list of questions for you. Don’t think there’s any need for them now.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

Leon’s expression grew serious. ‘A lot of people here in Kenya lost family, men they loved. Some may give you the benefit of the doubt, but most won’t. It won’t be easy. Not for you, not for anyone . . .’

‘I imagine not.’

‘But Saffron loves you with all her heart, I have no doubt of that.’ Leon gave a knowing chuckle. ‘That’s the only way we Courtneys do anything – flat-out, way over the limit.’

‘I knew that from the moment we met,’ said Gerhard. ‘When Saffy came flying off the Cresta Run and landed in the snow at my feet.’

‘Ha! That’s my girl! And now I also have no doubt that you love her too – and that you’re nothing whatever like your father.’

‘That’s true, for sure. I have spent my entire life trying to be nothing like my father.’

‘Then I would be delighted, and proud to welcome you into our family, Gerhard. I ask no more than, love my girl and make her happy. As long as you do that, you will have my friendship, my support and my help if ever you need it. And if you don’t . . .’

Leon let the words hang in the air for a moment, then summoned a waiter.

‘Be a good chap and send a message to Mrs Courtney. She’s in the garden with my daughter. Tell them that it’s safe to return to the table.’

‘We stopped off in Nairobi to get our marriage licence and we had the service a few days later in the chapel at Lusima,’ said Saffron.

‘The choir were workers from the estate,’ Gerhard said. ‘I thought the choirs in Bavaria were good, but my God, those African voices . . . It sounded like angels singing.’

‘Of course, that was when my darling husband discovered that he actually had two fathers-in-law, not one—’

‘Oh, but that’s too much, even for you, darling!’ laughed the sixth member of the party, Brigadier Gubbins’ former secretary Margaret Jackson.

‘No, it’s true,’ Gerhard assured her. ‘Lusima is huge, more than one hundred thousand acres.’

‘Much more,’ Saffron murmured.