Philip shrugged and offered her his arm. 'Good. So, are we ready for din-dins with mother?' 'Indeed we are,' she replied with a small laugh. They headed down St Giles. 'So, tell me. You missing New York?' Philip asked. 'Not yet.'
'You never talk much about your old life.'
'Not much to say, I guess. And dad, "old life" sounds weird. I've only been here, what? Six months?'
'Feels like a lifetime.'
'Gee, thanks!' Jo turned to Philip with her mouth open.
'I'd close that if I were you.' Jo shook her head and huffed. 'No, it's good here. It felt a little, I dunno, a little claustrophobic in Greenwich Village. Cool place, but you know, apart-ment-too-small-for-suddenly-famous-author-mother-and-teenage-daughter syndrome.'
'Yes, quite a common social disease in one form or another. Glad I don't have to deal with it — one of the perks of being a committed bachelor, I suppose.'
Jo gave him a sceptical look. 'You reckon? Can't outweigh the disadvantages, though, can it? I've told you before, one of my missions before leaving these hallowed halls is to hitch you to a good woman. Someone who'll look after you.'
'Oh, please. You think I need fattening up?' Philip patted his slight paunch.
They crossed the road and walked past the old Quaker Meeting House. The pavement was narrow: rows of metal railings to the left, road to the right. Old bicycles lined the pavement, padlocked to the railings. Along the way, a ragged busker who had made this patch his own juggled oranges ineptly. 'Spare any change?' he slurred hopefully as they passed.
Ahead of them, twenty yards off, they could see Laura waiting for them outside Brown's Restaurant.
Their plates had been cleared and the waitress had topped up their wineglasses. Laura considered the dessert menu sceptically and took a sip of her wine.
They were seated close to the kitchen doors and as staff charged in and out they caught glimpses of the controlled chaos that lay beyond. The smell of cigarette smoke wafted over from the smoking area, and the conversation of. a hundred or so diners created a haze of human voices that interwove with barely audible acid jazz spilling from the sound system.
'We're going to miss you, Laura,' Philip said over the rim of his wineglass, and looked first at her then to their daughter.
Laura's time in Oxford had flashed past and she was due to fly back to New York the next morning. Although she was looking forward to seeing her neat and spacious apartment in Greenwich Village again, another part of her was drawing her in, grounding her here. She would miss Oxford too, and the two people who meant most to her in the world: Philip and Jo.
'Oh, I'm sure I'll be back again soon,' Laura replied, tucking some blonde strands of hair behind her right ear. 'I'll have to keep a check on this one for a start.' She glanced at Jo.
'Yeah, sure — like I need looking after.' Jo gave her mother a rueful look.
'Well, here's to a safe journey,' Philip said and raised his glass. Jo echoed the sentiment, but was easing out of her chair and looking at her watch.
'Hey, mom, I'm real sorry, but I have to split. I was supposed to meet Tom ten minutes ago.'
'That's cool,' Laura replied. 'You run along. Say "hi" to lover boy for me.'
Jo kissed Philip on the cheek. 'I'll see you in the morning, just to check you have your ticket and passport,' she said, turning back to Laura with a wry grin. Then she negotiated a twisting path between the closely packed tables.
At the exit Jo waved goodbye. Gazing across the restaurant, Laura recalled the many times she had sat here in Brown's. It had been a regular haunt during her student days, the venue for her first date with Philip and the place where she had broken the news that she was pregnant with Jo. She loved the never-changing decor — the cream walls and the old mirrors, polished oak floors and enormous palms. Looking across the room she could almost see her younger self at an adjacent table, and a fresh-faced Philip gazing back at her.
'So, has your trip been worth it?' Philip asked. 'Did you find what you were looking for?'
Laura took another sip of wine, placed the glass down and began to play with the stem. 'Yes and no,' she sighed. 'Well, actually, no, to be honest. I feel I've got stuck up a blind alley'
'Oh?'
'Well, you know, it happens.'
'Does this mean you've wasted your time?'
'No,' she said emphatically. 'Just that I'll have to work harder.' Laura paused before going on. 'Well, in fact it's not been good. I think I'll ditch the idea.'
Philip looked startled. 'But it sounded so promising.'
'Yeah, but that's what writing is like. You think something's going to work and sometimes it does. Other times it definitely doesn't.'
After years as a struggling journalist in New York and writing half a dozen novels in her spare time, watching each of them flounder and sink, Laura had suddenly pushed all the right buttons a year earlier. Restitution was a historical crime thriller set in seventeenth-century New Amsterdam. The New York Times had called it 'scintillating'. It had garnered the White Rose Fiction Award and had sold enough to allow Laura to finally quit the day job. The media had taken to her immediately, promoting her on her looks and her career as a journalist who had specialised in covering the grisliest crimes in New York City. Seizing her chance, Laura had launched herself into the next project, a novel set in fourteenth-century Oxford in which the real-life theologian and mathematician Thomas Bradwardine was the central character in a complex plot to murder the king of the day, Edward II.
'So what about the mysterious monk, Bradwardine?'
'Oh, I'm still interested in him. He was never a monk, by the way, Philip.' Laura smiled. 'It's just that I've come to realise that he could never have been involved in a plot to kill the king. He just wasn't the type. He was a deeply religious man who was the greatest mathematician of his time and went on to become Archbishop of Canterbury, but he was no Rambo. Anyway, it's OK, I hadn't gone that far with the idea. Besides, there are plenty of other stories; they're all out there in the ether ready to be grabbed. And I even think that Bradwardine may come back on the radar one day — I'm just storing it all away'
'Sounds like something I would say,' Philip retorted.
'Yeah, well, perhaps I've been too harsh on your odd little personality traits all these years.' Laura leaned back in her chair and took a sip of her wine. As Philip looked away to attract the attention of a waiter, she caught a glimpse of his profile and was struck by the fact that more than twenty years had passed since they'd first met. In that time Philip had hardly changed. Of course, there were now quite a few grey hairs among the unruly mop of dark curls, and his face was podgier, his eyes more tired. But he still had the same confident, world-weary smile that she had found so attractive when he was twenty-two, the same devastating brown eyes.
She had thought so much about him when she was the other side of the world. She had been away so long it almost seemed impossible that they could be sitting here together in this crowded restaurant with the rain splashing against the windows and the massicot glow of the street lights outside.
Seeing Philip now, Laura knew why she had fallen for him in the first place, why she had given herself to him in a way she had never done before or since. For a second, she could not believe that she had walked away from it all.
'Coffee?'
She looked at him blankly. 'Hello! Coffee?'
The waiter was beside the table and Philip was waving a hand in front of her.
'Oh, yeah, ahem. . sorry. I'll have a decaf latte. . thanks.'
'You were miles away. In the land of Bradwardine and the Plantagenets?' 'I guess,' she lied.
'So, what're you going to do?' Philip asked as the waiter walked away.