Free The French Gardener by Santa Montefiore Page A

so she can eat the grass,” the child continued.
    “That’s right, give them a good wash,” Miranda encouraged, more concerned about germs than the nature of the cow’s tongue. When she had finished, Miranda put Storm down and began to make the coffee. She noticed Jean-Paul looking at her with a bemused expression on his face. His mouth was sensual, uneven and twisted into a small smile. His eyes were warm, toffee-brown and deep-set, surrounded by long dark lashes. What struck her most was not the color, though it was rich and velvety, but their expression. They were filled with compassion as if he had a deep understanding of the world.
    “We’ve just moved here,” she said, pouring ground coffee into the machine. “We’re still adjusting.”
    “Change takes time. But this is a beautiful place. You will be very happy here.” The way he spoke sounded almost prophetic.
    “What brings a Frenchman to Hartington?”
    “That is a good question. I don’t really know myself.”
    “You don’t look like a tourist.”
    “I am not.”
    Storm pulled a stool over to where Jean-Paul was perched and climbed up. “Jean-Paul is going to build me a little house in a tree,” she said, smiling up at him.
    “She was sad she didn’t have a secret house, like her brother,” said Jean-Paul.
    “Gus won’t play with her, that’s the trouble. He’s nearly eight. Storm’s too little for him. Do you have children?”
    “No, I never married,” he said.
    What a waste of an attractive man , she thought.
    “Gus will be going to boarding school next year,” she continued.
    “Boarding school? He is very little.”
    “Believe me, if anyone needs boarding school, it’s Gus.” She chuckled, opened the fridge and took out a carton of milk. “Besides, I work. The sooner they’re both packed off to boarding school the better.”
    “What do you do?”
    “I’m a journalist. A frustrated novelist, actually. I like to think that when the children go to boarding school I’ll have the time to write a book.”
    He looked down at Storm. “Little Storm will go, too?”
    “When she’s eight and a half. I’ve got you for a while longer, haven’t I, darling?” said Miranda, smiling at her daughter. But Storm only had eyes for the handsome Frenchman.
    “What do you do, Jean-Paul?” She poured coffee into his cup and handed it to him.
    He hesitated while he took a sip. Then he looked at her steadily and replied, “I garden.”
    Miranda was astonished at the coincidence. “You’re a gardener?”
    He gave a wry smile. “Yes, why not?” He shrugged in the way Frenchmen do, lifting his shoulders and raising the palms of his hands to the sky. “I garden.”
    “I’m sorry, it’s just that I’ve been frantically looking for someone to do our garden. Everyone keeps telling me that the previous owners were brilliant gardeners and that this was the most beautiful garden in the country. I’m now feeling guilty that I’m letting it go. As if it’s a great crime or something.”
    He stared into his coffee cup. “Did you know the people who lived here before you?”
    Miranda shook her head. “No. Old people, I think. Lightly or something. They moved away.”
    “I see.”
    “You’re not…I mean…you wouldn’t consider…”
    “I will bring this garden back to life,” he said.
    Miranda looked pleased. “My husband will think I’m mad. I don’t even know you.”
    She couldn’t have known why he suddenly offered himself. That it wasn’t a wondrous coincidence but a promise made over two decades before.
    “Trust me, I am more than qualified. This is no ordinary garden.”
    “We have a cottage just over the river. It’s in need of repair. It wouldn’t take long. We’d be happy for you to live there rent free.”
    He turned to Storm. “Gus’s secret house, no?”
    “It’s very dirty,” Storm piped up. “It’s all dusty. I’ve looked inside.”
    “We’d clean it out, of course. It’s a charming place. I bet