The Last of the Kintyres (15 page)

Calmly enough she said:

“I have no intention of embarrassing anyone, Caroline. Hew needs me here at present. He has said so.”

“Because of Tony?” Caroline was adept at putting her finger on the truth. “That might make you feel better, but I’m quite sure Hew can handle even this sort of trying situation by himself. He doesn’t need help. He is the most self-sufficient person I know and— he values his privacy.”

“I don’t think we have been invading his privacy too much,” Elizabeth countered angrily. “I’ve hardly seen him for the past three weeks—”

Caroline’s eyebrows shot up again.

“That ought to prove something,” she reflected. “Could it be that he is deliberately staying away from Ardlamond, where he really ought to be?”

“It could be.” Elizabeth felt the words choking in her throat, but she would not let Caroline see that she was beaten. “But I don’t think so. You see, he isn’t at Whitefarland
all
the time.”

Caroline turned towards her car, which she had parked a little way down the drive.

“When Whitefarland is sold he will want to be here every day,” she said deliberately. “And he “will want his home to himself. He intends to marry, you know.”

“I—expect that,” Elizabeth said huskily.

“Do you?” Caroline turned with a slightly insolent smile. “Then surely you don’t expect to stay here when it happens?” she demanded.

“No.” Elizabeth’s voice was no more than a whisper. “No, I won’t expect to stay—”

When she was left alone she wondered if Hew and Caroline had resolved their differences. Was everything forgiven and forgotten between them and Caroline’s wealth accepted as something they could overlook?

She could not quite reconcile that with the fact that Whitefarland was still up for sale. The very first thing Hew would have done would have been to withdraw the farm’s name from the factor’s notice-board in
Oban, and she felt, too, that he would have told her of such a reprieve.

He came home that evening with Tony, earlier than she had expected either of them, and almost instantly she detected a strange sort of finality about the look in his eyes.

“Well,” he said, “that’s that. We’ve brought down the last of the ewes. They’re in the long pasture behind the shrubbery at the moment. I hope they won’t disturb you during the night,” he added, since her bedroom was on that side of the house.

Elizabeth wanted to rush to him, to tell him how sorry she was that this had to be, but the need for comfort seemed to have no part in his make-up. He looked ste
rn
and cold, as if he could not share his feelings with anyone, even with Tony, who had worked long, hard hours on the hill with him without a murmur, surprising himself as much as he had surprised Elizabeth.

When Hew had left them to shut himself into the business room with the estate books, Tony said:

“I’m almost sorry that’s over, Liz.” He crossed to the window which looked out to the hill, his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his trousers, his brows drawn in a half-perplexed frown. “Sheep aren’t the dumb, stupid things people imagine them to be, y’know,” he added confidentially. “They understand quite a lot. You should have seen them trying to avoid going into the dipping pens!” He whirled round to face her, a reminiscent smile lighting his eyes and spreading over his entire face. “Hew’s tremendously strong! He can catch a ewe and turn her into the trough without any effort at all.” He grinned broadly. “You should have seen the mess I made of it! The wretched animal kicked up her heels and before I could even think I was up to the eyebrows in sheep-dip! Hew laughed his head off!”

“I’d like to have seen that,” Elizabeth smiled.

“What? Hew laughing or me completely demaggoted?”

“Both, I think!” She put an affectionate arm about his thin shoulders.

“Are you going to like it here, Tony?” she asked hopefully.

“I’m a terribly new broom at present,” he said, “but I expect I mi
ght
be some use in time. I think I could work quite well with the dogs after a while. They’re absolutely terrific on the hill, Liz! It’s like the Trials, but on a much larger scale, and they know every move. You can very rarely fault a good collie.”

A tremendous sense of thankfulness swept over Elizabeth, a vast, encircling warmth which embraced herself, and Tony, and Hew and everything at Ardlamond. Chiefly the credit went to Hew for the interest he had taken in her brother, but Tony, too, had played his part. He had tried, and in making the effort he had gained a new interest and a confidence which would serve him well in the future.

And Caroline couldn’t be allowed to interfere. Elizabeth was adamant about that point, at least, although she was not quite sure what she could really do. And if Hew meant to marry Caroline
...

“Caroline was here this afternoon,” she told him when he joined them in the library for supper.

“What did she want?”

Aware of Tony listening intently, Elizabeth could only say:

“She didn’t leave a message. I think she expected to find you here.”

“She would know that we were at Whitefarland,” Hew said almost stiffly.

She could not tell from his expression what he was thinking, and while Tony was in the room with them she knew that he would not speak his mind. She could, she supposed, give him the opportunity later, when Tony had gone to bed.

“Are we going to take the sheep off Lingay?” Tony asked when he had finished the mug of hot chocolate which he had carried with him to the window-seat overlooking the loch.

“I think we can safely leave them for a day or two yet,” Hew decided. “They’re due to be sold,” he added, drawing heavily on his pipe, as if he were still wrestling with a weighty problem. “The grass over there is the best we have at this time of the year, but it will soon be time to evacuate Lingay.” Suddenly he smiled, the dark look vanishing from his brow. “Don’t worry!” he promised. “I won’t do the job without you, Tony. You could very well do it on your own, in fact,” he added, “with Dan’s help.”

“D’you think I could?” Tony was eager. “It means taking the launch, doesn’t it?”

Hew nodded.

“We’ll tackle it before the end of the month,” he decided. Suddenly he turned and looked straight at Elizabeth. “Did Stephen phone you about the weekend?” he asked abruptly.

Elizabeth shook her head.

“Did he promise to? He may have called when I was out. I walked over to Dromore this morning,” she explained.

“Mrs. Malcolm would have taken a message. She rarely forgets that sort of thing.” He paused before he added deliberately: “I’m rather surprised.”

“Why?”

“I thought he would have invited you to the Club’s closing regatta. He made a point of mentioning it some time ago.”

“Perhaps he thought I wouldn’t be here all this time.” It had come out into the open at last, almost naturally. “Perhaps he thought I would have returned to London long ago.”

He knocked out the contents of his pipe on the blackened stone of the fireplace.

“Is that what you wanted?” he asked.

“No!” Her denial had been swift and almost pleading in its intensity. “It’s—only that I don’t want to stay here if I’m going to be in the way.”

Tony moved uneasily, but Hew did not
seem
to notice
him.

“
I’m sorry if I have suggested anything of the kind, he said. “My manner is sometimes not all it should be, but you must excuse that,” he told her. “I have a great many other things to think about.”

“Yes, I know. I only wanted to make—quite sure.
”

He stood looking down at her for several seconds before he said:

“And now that you are assured, do you want me to phone Stephen about Saturday?”

“Not unless you want to go.”

He looked surprised.

“I suppose I ought to turn up at the close of the season,” he agreed, “and Tony has worked hard enough these past three weeks to justify a break.”

“Then—we can all go?”

The light in Elizabeth’s eyes'" surely betrayed how much this meant to her.

“I don’t see why not,” he said. “Most of the people you know will be there.”

When Stephen telephoned the following morning he said it was to remind them about the regatta, not to invite them to it.

“I knew you would still be here,” he said. “As a matter of fact, Elizabeth, I want a word with you. Can I come over and pick you up for lunch tomorrow?” The following day was Friday, and Hew was generally at Whitefarland, but now that the sheep were down off the hill he would probably be somewhere on the estate. It was no reason for refusing Stephen’s invitation, of course, but she said:

“Why not come and have lunch here? Hew may be at home.”

“I didn’t particularly want to see Hew,” came the reply from the far end of the line. “I said I wanted to have a word with you. Nevertheless, being the martyr type, I’ll give in! What time did you say?”

“I didn’t!” she smiled. “But twelve-thirty will do. It would give us time for your highly mysterious talk before one o’clock. Will you bring Imogen?”

“It’s quite a thought! Will Tony be there?”

“You sound like a meddling old matchmaker!”

“Perhaps I am.” His voice was suddenly serious. “How is Tony shaking down?”

“It’s quite wonderful.” Elizabeth lowered her voice. “Oh, Stephen, if only he can keep it up!”

“What makes you think he won’t?”

“I—oh, lots of things!”

“Enlighten your Uncle Steve!”

But Elizabeth did not want to bring Caroline’s name into their conversation. She had, in fact, determined to try to forget what had almost amounted to a warning on Caroline’s part.

“See you tomorrow!” she said instead, and rang off. “I’ve invited Stephen to lunch,” she told Hew the following morning. “He phoned yesterday—about the regatta.”

Hew glanced at his watch.

“I’ll try to be back by one o’clock,” he said. “I have to go to Oban this morning, on business.”

She wondered if he would have taken her, offering her a lift to do some shopping, perhaps, while he was busy. She would have loved that, but she had forestalled him with the information about Stephen.

Oh, well, she could not go back on her arrangements now and—and perhaps he hadn’t meant to ask her, after all. He might even have arranged a meeting with Caroline, although he had said “on business.”

“I’ll be up at Whitefarland,” Tony informed them, spooning up porridge as if he had been
born
to it. “Pity about the farm,” he added when his mouth was empty. “Hew’s heart is up there, and no mistake!”

Elizabeth got hastily to her feet. Hew had gone out, closing the door behind him, and she could hear him starting up the Land-Rover out on the drive.

“I know,” she said shakily. “He meant to get married and live there, Tony.”

“I don’t think that’s all,” Tony observed with amazing perspicacity. “It meant more to him than just a home. He knew that he would be faced with all these heavy death duties on Ardlamond and he thought of Whitefarland as the answer. A flourishing, well-established sheep-farm would not only have paid its own way but shown a considerable profit in time. And it was all going to be ploughed back into Ardlamond.”

“Who told you all this?”

“Oh—I came by it bit by bit. Some of it I worked out for myself—much to your surprise, I dare say—and Stephen dropped a few hints, I suppose. I think he had some idea of instilling a sense of obligation into my head, making me see that one can’t go on being selfish all the time, that people—and things—demand something in return now and then. The point is that Hew hasn’t had the time he needed, and you can’t fight time, I suppose.”

“No.” There was a little silence. “Oh, I wish we could
do
something,” Elizabeth said.

“Even if we could buy Whitefarland—if we could get hold of some of my money, somehow,” Tony suggested gloomily. “I don’t suppose it would help all that much. It’s time Hew needs.”

“All the same,” Elizabeth said, the tears very near her eyes, “the thought was very sweet of you, Tony.”

“It would have benefited myself,” he pointed out. Was that the way? Elizabeth held the thought to her for a moment before she was forced to relinquish it with a little practical shake of her head.

“You’d have to know an awful lot more about sheep
-
farming, Tony,” she said aloud. “Hew would never allow you to risk your capital at this stage.”

But later? Was this, perhaps, what Hew saw for Tony in the future, provided he would stay the course? It would be a wonderful opportunity for any boy, a glorious, free, open life among the hills. Whitefarland, she thought. Whitefarland would have been ideal!

When Stephen’s brake drew up on the gravel outside the main door exactly at twelve-thirty, the first person to get out was Imogen. She looked shyly about her until Tony appeared.

“Hullo!” he greeted her with apparent indifference. “Come and have a look at the launch. We’re trying her out this afternoon, so I might be able to take you across to Lingay.”

There was a proprietorial swagger about him, an air of belonging where Ardlamond was concerned because, for three weeks now, he had earned the right at Whitefarland. Elizabeth smiled a little as she watched
him
walking off with Imogen.

“What about Hew?” Stephen asked, easing himself out from behind the steering-wheel.

“He’s gone to Oban, but he’ll be back by one,” Elizabeth answered. “He had to go on business.”

Stephen turned towards her rather sharply.

“Was he at the factor’s?”

“I’m not sure, but I expect so. Why?”

He frowned.

“Stephen,” she asked quickly, “is there anything wrong?” He shook his head, taking her arm to lead her round the gable end of the house where they could walk in the sun.

“Nothing apart from what we already know,” he answered slowly. “Whitefarland has been snapped up right away. In fact,” he added, “I strongly suspect that it was bought even before it came officially on to the market.”

She looked bewildered.

“You mean that someone knew Hew was going to sell and forestalled everyone else?”

“Someone who wanted Whitefarland very much,” Stephen added dryly. “Caroline.”

“Caroline?” Elizabeth echoed in disbelief. “But what—”

“What could Caroline want with a farm?” he supplied for her. “Nothing, if it happened to be any fa
rm
, but Whitefarland was different. She paid a fantastic price for it, and she’ll use it to hold over Hew’s head like a tantalus. It’s what he wanted to keep more than anything else in the world, and he can have it again when he marries her! Oh yes, Caroline is very clever!”

“Perhaps she had another reason for wanting it,”
Eliza
beth said in a strained undertone. “Hew saw it as their future home—”

Stephen’s laugh was sharply cynical.

“You can tell that to someone else!” he said. “No, Elizabeth, you can’t think up anything sentimental about Caroline’s motives. She knows what she wants and she’ll go out to get it, one way or another. And this is the way she intends to try for a start.”

“But surely Hew must have known—”

“I don’t
think
he did. But I think he will see through her little ruse and be furious.”

“Or—grateful.”

“Maybe,” he agreed laconically. “Do you know if he has definitely agreed to the sale?”

“I think he would leave it entirely in the hands of the factor, but I should imagine that that’s why he has gone to Oban this morning.” Her voice was not quite steady. “Stephen,” she added after a moment, “who told you about Caroline?”

“Intuition! Fact is,” he confessed briefly, “I went in yesterday to buy Whitefarland myself. I rather fancied a farm,” he added hastily and, Elizabeth was convinced, untruthfully, “but I was told that I had been beaten to it by ‘a lady with other interests in the district.’ Who, then, could I suspect but Caroline?”

“But you’re not really sure?”

“As sure as doesn’t matter.”

They walked in silence until they heard the sound of a car’s engine coming from the direction of the shore road.

“If Hew doesn’t know who has bought Whitefarland are you going to tell him what you suspect?” Elizabeth asked uneasily.

“He’ll know,” Stephen said, “If he’s been to Oban.”

Hew came round the gable end of the house. His face was a mask, and Elizabeth knew that even Stephen had no idea what he was
thinking
.

“Had a successful trip?” he asked.

“Most successful.” Hew’s tone was grim, his jaw as hard as granite. “Have I kept you waiting for your lunch? I’m several minutes late.”

Throughout the meal he spoke of everything but Whitefarland, guiding the conversation skilfully to the events of the following day, and when their coffee was served he excused himself, saying that he had several phone calls to put through.

“Will we see you tomorrow?” Stephen asked doubtfully.

“I hope so.” Hew paused at the door. “I can spare the day,” he added briefly. “Whitefarland has been sold.”

Giving them no opportunity to question him about the farm’s new owner, he strode from the room, but that retreating back view seemed eloquent of disappointment and frustration to Stephen and Elizabeth, at least.

Tony, who had not been asked to work after lunch, spent
the
remainder of the time with Imogen and Elizabeth walked with Stephen along the beach to Dromore.

Clambering over the rocks, they could have spoken about Hew again, but neither of them appeared to want to discuss this thing. The victory was to Caroline.

She put in an appearance the following afternoon at the Yacht Club, as the guest of the Commodore.

It was a glorious early autumn day, with the sun sparkling on the surface of the water as if a
milli
on
diamonds had been scattered across the bay from the quayside to the green shores of Kerrera. No wind blew, to the bitter disappointment of the racing fraternity, and Stephen told Elizabeth with disgust:

“It’s going to be no more than a drifting match. We’ll be in the bay for hours.” He screwed up his eyes to look out to the Commodore’s yacht, lying like a painted ship above her clear reflection. “The old man’s going to call it off, I
think
. There isn’t a hope of getting anywhere under sail.”

“Will anyone dare go out on his engine?” Elizabeth laughed. Already she was beginning to understand, and appreciate, the foibles of the keen yachting enthusiast. “Or will it be more than his life is worth after the ‘no racing’ signal has gone up?”