About the Author

  Katie Fforde lives in the beautiful Cotswold countryside with her family, and is a true country girl at heart. Each of her books explores a different profession or background and her research has helped her bring these to life. She’s been a porter in an auction house, tried her hand at pottery, refurbished furniture, delved behind the scenes of a dating website, and she’s even been on a Ray Mears survival course. She loves being a writer; to her there isn’t a more satisfying and pleasing thing to do. She particularly enjoys writing love stories. She believes falling in love is the best thing in the world, and she wants all her characters to experience it, and her readers to share their stories.

  To find out more about Katie Fforde step into her world at www.katiefforde.com, visit her on Facebook and follow her on Twitter @KatieFforde.

  Also available by Katie Fforde

  Living Dangerously

  The Rose Revived

  Wild Designs

  Stately Pursuits

  Life Skills

  Thyme Out

  Artistic Licence

  Highland Fling

  Paradise Fields

  Restoring Grace

  Flora’s Lot

  Practically Perfect

  Going Dutch

  Wedding Season

  Love Letters

  A Perfect Proposal

  Summer of Love

  Recipe for Love

  A French Affair

  The Perfect Match

  A Vintage Wedding

  A Summer at Sea

  A Secret Garden

  A Country Escape

  A Rose Petal Summer

  A Springtime Affair

  A Wedding in the Country

  A Wedding in Provence

  Katie Fforde

  * * *

  ONE ENCHANTED EVENING

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Have you read them all?

  To Desmond, who, after 50 years is still at my side

  Acknowledgements

  My books are never created from only my imagination. I think of a book as an arch. The author may well be the keystone, but they wouldn’t stay in place without all the other people keeping them there. There will always be people I forget to thank but I’m going to do my best!

  Thank you to my particularly supportive and meticulous editor, Selina Walker, and her enormously helpful assistant Charlotte Osment.

  Thank you to my managing editor Laurie Ip Fung Chun and to my eagle-eyed and wonderfully helpful copy editor, Richenda Todd, without whom I would look exactly as stupid as I am. I couldn’t manage without her saving me from huge mistakes.

  Thank you, writing buddies Jo Thomas, AJ Pearce, Judy Astley, Milly Johnson, Bernardine Kennedy, Catherine Jones, Janie Millman, Sarah Steele, Kate Riordan, Mandy Robotham, to name a few.

  Thank you, Bill Hamilton, and the entire team at A. M. Heath for being the best agent and the best agency.

  Thank you to the geniuses in Sales and Marketing. Sarah Ridley, Hope Butler, Claire Simmonds, Evie Kettlewell, Mat Watterson and Lindsey Tan – you’re all brilliant!

  Thank you to all the PR team. Charlotte Bush, Klara Zak, everyone at EdPR.

  Thank you to Meredith Benson and the rest of the audio team.

  Thank you to the creative people who give me such lovely covers, especially Ceara Elliot who does an incredible job.

  Thank you to Helen Wynn-Smith and Annie Peacock from the production team, who make sure everything is running smoothly.

  Thank you to Burleigh Court hotel for telling me about country house hotels.

  Chapter One

  Dorset, Spring, 1966

  Just for a moment, Meg was on her own on the station platform. She had travelled into deepest Dorset and it felt like another world. It was just after two o’clock in the afternoon and everything was very still. She had time to take in the hanging baskets, the tubs of scarlet tulips, narcissi and blue grape hyacinths, the sense of peace. It was an unseasonably hot day for April and waves of heat shimmered above the platform.

  Then her mother, Louise, hurried into view. ‘I’m so sorry I’m late, darling! And thank you so much for coming at such short notice. It was such a relief when you said yes!’ She took Meg into her arms and they hugged each other hard.

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Meg. ‘The moment I said, “My mother needs me,” the manager accepted my notice without question and allowed me to leave straight away.’

  ‘Let me look at you! It’s been far too long since we’ve seen each other. I love your hair like that.’

  Meg ruffled her dark brown locks disparagingly. ‘It needs cutting again really, but keeping it stylish was so time-consuming! Apart from having to keep going to get it trimmed, I was supposed to stick down my fringe and the bits at the side with Sellotape when it was wet and I couldn’t be bothered. Now it’s just curly and does what it likes.’

  ‘It’s very attractive and I like your dress too. The colour brings out the green of your eyes. Though it is quite short.’

  ‘Too short? It’s only just above my knee, not halfway up my thigh.’

  In fact, Meg didn’t have many dresses: she spent most of her time in kitchens wearing chef’s whites and checked trousers or in black dresses with aprons for when she was working as a waitress. When she wasn’t working, she mostly wore slacks, but it was so hot she had felt a dress would be more comfortable to travel in.

  ‘It’s lovely,’ Louise said, not sounding quite convinced. ‘But we’re a bit behind the times in Dorset. Swinging London is a long way away. The only thing that swings here are the church bells.’

  Meg laughed, glad to see her mother hadn’t lost her sense of humour in spite of her worrying new job. ‘I’ve brought my working gear. I don’t want to frighten the horses with my modern ways.’

  ‘Cows mostly.’ Louise took hold of Meg’s case. ‘Good journey? The last bit is so pretty, isn’t it? Are you hungry? I can make you something when we get back, but we should hurry.’

  ‘It’s OK. I ate on the train – sandwiches and leftovers from an event last night.’

  Meg followed her mother, who had set off at quite a lick into the car park which only had two cars in it. Louise stopped by a pale blue Mini Traveller. ‘This is us.’

  ‘Oh, Mum! A Mini,’ said Meg. ‘How dashing. This would be perfectly at home on the King’s Road.’

  ‘I know! Andrew – he owns the hotel – bought it for my use. Purely for practical reasons, of course.’ Louise laughed. ‘I can’t tell you how relieved I am to see you. I couldn’t decide if I was going to murder the chef or he was going to murder me. But whatever, it’s all going to hell in a handcart!’

  ‘I was delighted to have an excuse to leave my job,’ said Meg. ‘I’d got awfully bored with cooking nursery food for rich bankers. This will be the perfect job before I go and work with my French chef.’

  ‘It’s so exciting that you’ve managed to arrange that. In Provence? So you’ll be near Alexandra?’

  ‘That’s right. Antoine, her husband, who’s a count—’

  ‘I hadn’t forgotten!’

  ‘—helped me arrange it after their wedding. It’s going to be terribly hard work and I don’t think the restaurant will pay me, but I’ll learn such a lot it’ll be worth it.’

  ‘They won’t pay you?’ Louise was outraged.

  ‘No. I’ll be learning so that’s my payment. In the old days young chefs had to pay old chefs for the privilege, so things are a bit better now.’

  Louise pursed her lips in disapproval. ‘Well, I do hope you won’t find working down here as boring as what you were doing in London. They’re not rich bankers, but most of our clientele like what they call “simple food”. In fact, everyone gets what the chef decides to give them.’

  ‘Please don’t worry, Mum. I’ll do anything you need me to do. My French slave driver doesn’t want me for a while, anyway. You can have me all summer, or however long you need me.’

  Louise put Meg’s case in the back of the car and walked round to the front. ‘Get in, darling. It’s not locked.’

  As the car pulled away, Meg said, ‘Now tell me everything! I’ve been dying of curiosity ever since you rang. I know it’s been awful for you, but I feel quite ex
cited about it. You know I love a challenge.’

  Louise swallowed. ‘We have a big function coming up, a lunch. The hotel does it every year and it’s quite a moneymaker for us. It’s been going on for years. It used to be for the birthday of the squire and all the tenants came and celebrated. There aren’t many tenants left now, so other people are invited too. Since the war, people have had to pay for the lunch themselves, but they still love to come. Some of them travel from quite long distances. Andrew made sure I knew all about it before he went away.’

  ‘Where has Andrew gone? It seems a strange thing to do just before this big event.’

  ‘Well, his father moved to France some time ago and he has just died. Andrew has had to go and sort out the estate. He rang me last night to say it’s all in a frightful muddle. We’re just hoping that as Andrew’s been running the hotel for a couple of years and really loves it, he’ll inherit it, but we don’t know.’ Louise paused. ‘He’s left me in charge, although I was only taken on as a receptionist and office manager.’

  ‘And it’s not easy?’

  Louise shook her head. ‘I’m still new to the job and the moment Andrew was out of the way, the chef, Geoff, who I’d never liked but didn’t have much to do with, turned into a tyrant.’

  ‘Well, I’m here now, so you can sack him.’

  ‘If only I could! But I have to run major decisions past Andrew’s son, who I’ve never met and has shown absolutely no interest in the hotel since I’ve been here.’

  Meg laughed. ‘Don’t worry, Mum. Foul-mouthed, bullying chefs are the norm. I’ve worked with dozens of them. It’ll be fine. Now tell me about the hotel.’

  ‘Oh! Nightingale Woods is the most gorgeous old Georgian house with perfect architecture,’ said Louise, obviously glad to move on from the chef. ‘When I read the advert in The Lady, I looked it up in an old AA Guide that was in the staff room at school and fell in love!’

  ‘In love?’ Meg was startled. She’d never known her mother to be quite so enthusiastic about a house, however perfect the architecture.

  ‘Yes! In love with the house.’ Her mother smiled mischievously. ‘I hadn’t met Andrew then, of course.’

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘I’m joking, of course. I’m just so happy that you’re here, I’ve gone a little bit giddy.’

  Her mother was indeed a bit giddy, Meg thought. It could have been the joy of driving a smart little car through country roads lined with wild flowers on a hot spring afternoon, or it could have been happiness because she was reunited with her daughter whom she hadn’t seen for a while, but somehow Meg thought there was more to it.

  ‘Why did you apply for a new job? I thought you were happy as an assistant matron. You liked looking after the boys and the teachers were friendly, weren’t they?’ said Meg.

  ‘It was a combination of things. I’d got bored with the school routine, counting sheets and dealing with lost property and it got a bit awkward eventually. Too many single men getting competitive.’

  At just over forty, Meg’s mother could be considered middle-aged but her lively, caring personality and her bright good looks meant that men were often attracted to her. She was medium height with a good figure, blonde hair, blue eyes and wonderful skin. This was one of the reasons that Meg was determined to earn enough money to buy a flat, so her mother didn’t always have to take live-in jobs which sometimes made her vulnerable to unwelcome advances. Meg already had almost enough for a deposit if only they didn’t need a man to support their application for a mortgage.

  Her mother, on the other hand, felt that Meg should keep her savings for herself. It was a tricky subject which they avoided discussing.

  ‘Before Andrew – your boss – went away and you had to deal with the chef, did you like the job?’ asked Meg.

  ‘Loved it! It’s such a beautiful house – quite large – in an idyllic spot. Wait until you see it! And I liked doing something a bit different. I still have to count sheets and towels of course, but I deal with the guests, the staff, do the wages, look after the books. Anything that needs doing, in fact. And if I’ve got a spare afternoon, I do some decorating.’

  ‘You’ve always enjoyed that.’

  ‘It’s because I so rarely get the chance to, always living in staff accommodation. But there are a couple of bedrooms that I can do up in my own time. Andrew let me choose the wallpaper and the paint. They’re going to look lovely.’

  ‘It sounds as if there’s lots going on. Not the sleepy backwater I was imagining,’ said Meg.

  ‘Usually, it is a sleepy backwater, make no mistake. But at the moment, it’s the scene of high drama!’

  Meg laughed. ‘This special lunch?’

  Louise nodded. ‘It’s for fifty people, which is a lot for us.’

  ‘Why are you so worried? If the hotel has done this lunch lots of times before?’

  ‘But the chef hasn’t. And he’s sacked a lot of people, including a whole family, three generations, who’d worked for the hotel for years. He said he’s organised agency staff, that it’s more cost-effective to just get people in when you need them.’

  ‘Well, obviously that’s really sad but the agency staff may do a good job.’

  ‘It’s possible, but the guests have been coming to the lunch for years and they like being served by the daughters of the men who they’ve known forever. It’s hard to explain, but Nightingale Woods is like a family, one that has been broken apart, and our guests will see that.’

  ‘Oh, Mum!’

  Louise sighed. ‘I promised Andrew that I’d look after the hotel for him, and I feel I’ve failed already.’

  ‘But how on earth are you managing without the staff?’

  ‘It’s only been a couple of days, so we’ve coped. I’ve been serving dinner.’

  ‘And you can’t take anyone new on?’

  ‘Not officially, no. But while I may not be allowed to hire anybody, Geoff can’t stop me inviting my daughter to stay! I asked Andrew before he left, in front of Geoff, and Andrew was positively encouraging.’

  ‘Mum, I know I’m good – no point in being modest – but I’m not sure I could replace a whole team of people who’ve worked in the hotel for years!’

  Meg had always been able to make her mother laugh even with the most feeble joke, and her mother obliged. Then she suddenly slowed down the car. ‘Look, there’s our permanent resident, Ambrosine. I’ll see if she’d like a lift to the hotel.’ She pulled up alongside an elderly lady in a hat that she had probably made herself and clothes that were either also home-made or came from a previous century. She was striding along with a basket on her arm. ‘Ambrosine? Do you want a lift?’

  ‘Oh, Louise, it’s you! How kind. I’ve been to visit my friend the colonel. You could take my basket with pleasure, but I prefer to carry on walking.’

  Louise opened her door and put the wicker basket on the back seat. ‘This is my daughter, Meg. She’s going to be staying with me for a little while.’

  ‘How nice!’ said Ambrosine, peering into the Mini. ‘I look forward to meeting you properly later. But now I must get on and I expect you must too.’

  ‘She is a true eccentric,’ said Louise once they were driving again. ‘She’s over seventy but fit as a flea. Walks for miles every day. She’ll outlive us all. That’s what Andrew says.’

  ‘So, she actually lives in the hotel all year round?’ asked Meg.

  ‘Yes. She has a couple of rooms in the old nurseries. She doesn’t pay to live here. It’s an arrangement made by Andrew’s father, I think. The colonel is her gentleman friend who lives nearby and who is possibly even more elderly. Talking of elderly people, have you got any news of Clover? I miss that little dog.’

  ‘Sad to say, I don’t think she misses you. She loves living with Lizzie in the country, being doted on, and being taken for lots of walks in the woods.’

  ‘I’d love another dog, I must confess. I’ll ask Andrew about it when he gets back.’

  ‘He may not like dogs,’ Meg suggested.

  ‘Of course he likes dogs! Would I like him if he didn’t? His old dog died and he hasn’t got round to getting another one.’

  Meg was sorry she probably wouldn’t meet Andrew. If her mother was keen on a man, and all the signs were there that she was, she needed to give him a thorough inspection.