Towards Sunset (third edition)

  *****

  One morning, a few days after the wedding, Alison awoke in tears, to Nicholas’s consternation. “What’s the matter, love?”

  Alison snuffled for a while, then came to herself. “Sorry, dear, it’s nothing really. I just had such a sad dream.”

  “Tell me. As much as you can remember. Get it out of your system.”

  “It was like looking into one of those paintings you told me about, only people were moving. Two of them were walking along paths in a forest. They got glimpses of each other through the trees and I knew they wanted to come together and I desperately wanted them to, but between the paths was a tangle of briars and creepers that barred the way. And then they came to a place where the paths were so overgrown that they had to pick their way carefully and didn’t notice that there was nothing between them but a hundred yards of brushwood. I tried to call to them that they could easily get through it, but no sound would come. After that the paths moved apart and they saw each other less and less often, but they couldn’t go back, only forward. And then the man came to a great plain of bare rock that he had to cross, and he went on for days and days, and at first there were streams of clear water, and then only dirty puddles, and then nothing at all, until at last he just sat down in despair, and that was the end.”

  She subsided into tears, and Nicholas cuddled her. “There, there, it was only a dream. It’s over now.”

  “But what does it mean?”

  “Probably nothing at all, at least nothing beyond your own mind. Perhaps you were thinking what might have happened if we hadn’t been able to come together. But we did get through that brushwood. Someone did manage to call to us – Cedric putting in a good word with their lordships, perhaps? Who knows? Whoever it was, we should be grateful.”

  After a few minutes he had another thought. “Cedric and Alice are very fond of you, aren’t they?”

  “Yes, and I of them.”

  “They’re bound to miss you.”

  “I suppose they will. Why?”

  “I’ve been thinking. You remember that painting of you that I started?”

  “Yes, but what about it?”

  “Well, it isn’t very good, but I could work it up a bit. Do you think they’d like to have it? Nowhere near like having you back with them, but better than nothing.”

  “Oh, Nicholas, what a lovely idea! I’m sure they’d be delighted.”