“In a week’s time. It’s so short.” Iona looked into space, seeing beyond that week to the empty months ahead. “If only I had the courage to take my happiness.”
“Why don’t you tell your mother about him quite frankly?” Christine suggested. “If Bob wants to marry you—”
“He’s never asked me. I’ve only wished it with all my heart. It’s a hopeless situation, isn’t it?”
Christine, who never admitted that any situation was entirely hopeless, said abruptly, “Why not leave everything to Bob? He’s old enough to know his own mind ... and yours, too. Nothing is ever as hopeless as it seems at first, Iona. It’s hard to believe, but it’s true.”
“I wish I were as positive about these things as you are,” Iona said wistfully. “You’re always so certain about the right thing to do.”
“Perhaps we can’t be really certain about these things when we’re in love,” Christine returned thoughtfully. “I do want you to be happy, Iona,” she added impulsively, “more than anything else in the world.”
Iona pressed her hand silently, getting to her feet and turning back toward the house as her mother came across the lawn in search of them.
“Don’t worry too much!” Christine had time to whisper. “Everything is sure to turn out all right.”
She thought of those last reassuring words of her own many times during the following week, wondering what had made her give such an assurance when she had no real conviction to offer. Was it because one must assure people one liked, to try to keep them happy? Was it because she believed that love—true love—must conquer all things? If only Iona had the strength of will to carry her to final victory and happiness, she thought, and then those words of her cousin’s that had stirred her so profoundly came back to her again. “You’d go out and meet your love and stand by him in the face of everything.”
That would be what she would have to do-—what she would do if ever love came her way and the road was not smooth. She had always been quite sure about that. Why, then, should she feel, suddenly, that opportunity had passed her by?
It could have nothing to do with her advice to Iona, it could have nothing to do with Nigel or his love for her. What then? Was it really tangled up with Kinaird and her love and longing for Lochaber’s mystic shore? She thrust the name of Huntley Treverson away from her, but it came back, relentlessly, again and again.
It was in her mind so often that she almost rejected it impatiently when she finally heard it one afternoon in her cousin’s surgery. Douglas was seeing his last patient to the door and she was turning off the sterilizer when the telephone rang in the adjoining office. She went to answer the call, opening the appointment book automatically with her other hand and feeling for her pen.
“Dr. Lamington’s surgery,” she announced.
“Good afternoon,” said a vaguely familiar voice. “Could I make an appointment for one day next week?”
She consulted the neatly ruled columns in the book before her with a ridiculous sense of remoteness.
“Thursday,” she suggested. “No ... Wednesday at half-past three. Would that suit you? I’m afraid it is the only vacancy—the earliest vacancy,” she amended hurriedly.
“Wednesday? Yes, that should be all right. It will be a filling, I think.”
“And the name?”
But already she knew the name, and her heart was thumping foolishly against her side because it was the one name in Glasgow that brought Lochaber close, that brought back memories and sudden, foolish tears.
“Treverson,” she heard him say. “Huntley Treverson. Thank you very much. Good afternoon.”
He had not recognized her voice, he did not even know that they had been speaking to one another! Well, she reflected, scribbling in the appointment, why should he? And why had she chosen Wednesday, which was her afternoon at the surgery, when she could quite easily have put him safely in on Thursday instead?
Did it matter? Did any of these things matter? It was only because she was upset, remembering about Kinaird, that she thought of them at all, she tried to assure herself.
She told Douglas about the appointment when he came in. “Getting me patients already?” he laughed. “I’ll bet that’s why he’s coming!”
“Why? You don’t mean ... because of me?”
“Well, there are scores of other dental surgeons in Glasgow.”
“He may live nearby,” she suggested almost stiffly, trying in vain to subdue the color that rose to her cheeks. “I don’t think for a moment that he made his appointment with you because you were my cousin.”
“Don’t you? Well, frankly, I do, and I don’t blame him!” Douglas grinned. “I rather admire a guy who knows what he wants and goes after it!”
“Now you are being ridiculous,” she accused with some severity. “He merely wants a tooth filled.”
“I can oblige in that respect,” he said.
Driving home together, they picked up his mother as she stepped off the bus at Eastwood Toll. Christine thought her aunt looked tired and irritated.
“Thank goodness you’ve come, Doug!” she exclaimed. “I’m positively worn out. I had no idea you would be finished so early or I would have called in at the surgery and waited for a lift home.”
“What was it this afternoon?” Doug asked carelessly. “Bridge?”
“No, indeed!” Flora pursed her lips. “Something not quite so pleasant, I’m afraid.” She gave Christine a brief, sideways glance which suggested that her niece might be connected with her anger in one way or another. “It’s amazing that one can’t trust one’s family all of a sudden,” she added with accentuated bitterness. “I always thought I had brought both Iona and you up to be truthful and honest.”
“What exactly has happened?” Douglas asked humorously. “It’s nothing I’ve done, I hope?”
“No Doug, I believe you have more sense than to worry me in this way,” his mother said fretfully. “But Iona apparently thinks that most things are well lost for what she considers love. I feel that Iona must have had a good deal of encouragement from outside before deciding to go against my wishes so pointedly.”
This was too much for Christine, and she said bluntly, “If you feel that I encouraged Iona, Aunt Flora, you’re wrong, but I have met Bob Niven and I think he’s a fine man,” she added deliberately.
“He’s years and years older than Iona, and he hasn’t a penny!” Flora pointed out wrathfully. “If you think that’s any match for my daughter after all the advantages I’ve given her, you’re mistaken. And the ingratitude of Iona—”
Words failed her for the moment and Douglas, who had been looking decidedly uncomfortable as he steered the car through the homeward-bound traffic, said briskly, “Look here, mother, couldn’t we postpone all this until we get home and give Iona a chance to speak for herself? I’m quite sure Chris had nothing to do with it because Iona knew this fellow long before Chris came to Glasgow.” His mother looked at him askance. It was a bad moment for Flora Lamington.
“Are you telling me that you knew about this, too?” she cried, rounding on her son. “But this is too much! Is there no loyalty in this family at all?”
“I ... well, the fact is, I knew it would upset you,” Douglas confessed sheepishly, “so I thought the best thing to do was to keep quiet about the whole affair. Possibly I thought it would blow over and no real harm done, but now it does seem that things are serious and ... well, suppose this fellow does want to marry Iona? I guess it’s their pigeon, isn’t it? All the same, I’d help if they really needed money just at first—”
“Stop talking nonsense!” his mother broke in. “There’s no question of Iona marrying this man ... none at all! In any case, he told me today that he was leaving Glasgow to take work elsewhere.”
Christine gazed at her aunt in astonishment. Flora must have gone to the library and challenged Bob Niven!
“I went to see him this afternoon,” she confessed. “I was quite straightforward about the whole
thing and I think he appreciated my point of view. He hadn’t a great deal to say for himself, but he admitted that he thought it best to go away. He has probably come to see how preposterous the whole thing really is,” she concluded with a superior smile.
She talked on in the same strain long after they had entered the house, and gradually Douglas drifted away to the garage until tea was served. Christine began to watch the clock, nervous about Iona’s homecoming and even thinking of suggesting that she might go halfway to meet her cousin so that she could explain quietly to Iona just what had happened and give her time to think. By six-thirty Flora decided she could not wait any longer.
“We’ll have our tea,” she decided. “I’ve always taught my family to be punctual for meals.”
They had almost finished their tea when they heard Iona’s key in the lock, but she did not come immediately into the dining room.
“I’ll get some fresh tea,” Christine offered, rising, but her aunt motioned her back into her seat.
“Sit where you are, Christine, if you please,” she commanded, but Christine would not sit to hear her gentle cousin reprimanded like a schoolgirl.
When Iona came into the room, she rose and began to collect their used plates, carrying them out to the kitchen.
The storm of her aunt’s abuse floated through to her even over the sound of running water in the sink, and the daily maid was quite openly postponing the moment of her departure to hear the outcome of it.
“I think you can go now, Minnie,” Christine told her firmly. “I’ll finish off in here.”
“Are you quite sure, miss? I could stay. Mrs. Lamington likes everything tidied up before I go.”
“There are only a few cups and I can manage these. Off you go!” Christine was adamant.
Minnie made her reluctant departure and with the banging of the back door Christine became aware of an ominous silence in the dining room beyond. Presently she heard footsteps on the stairs, someone going heavily up to the floor above. Iona? She waited for a few minutes and then her aunt came to the kitchen door.
“If you are going upstairs, Christine,” she said severely, “you can tell Iona that I won’t have sulking. The Hendersons are coming over for tennis this evening. Perhaps she has forgotten. You will tell her to change her frock and come down at once.” Her voice was peremptory, her mouth unsmiling as she looked across the expanse of checkered flooring to where her niece stood at the table. “I don’t quite know what part you have played in all this,” she said, “but if you knew about Iona’s affair with this man I find it very reprehensible of you to have lied to me the way you did the other afternoon.”
“I don’t think I lied to you, Aunt Flora,” Christine returned quietly. “You couldn’t expect me to carry tales, but after this, I feel that I have no right to go on accepting your hospitality. It has been good of you to have me here and I appreciate it, but I’ve thought for some time that I should be earning my own living now, so if you don’t mind, I’ll look for an apartment and find myself a job.”
Flora looked completely nonplussed for a second, but after she had drawn a swift breath, she said, “I think that might be the best thing all around. You’ve always been encouraged in your independence at home, but I feel it my duty to write to your father and acquaint him with your views.”
“I shall be writing to him myself,” Christine said firmly. “I don’t think dad expected me to remain idle for long.”
“Just as you like.” Flora seemed almost relieved that the initiative had not come from her. “We must all live our own lives, of course.”
The hypocrisy of that final remark would have struck Christine as being humorous if she had not suddenly thought of Iona sitting somewhere upstairs with a world of despair in her heart, and the thought brought with it sudden doubt of her own action.
For my own sake, she thought, I must go, but what must I do for Iona’s sake? And then her own words came rushing back, and she could not gainsay them. “I’ll stand by you, Iona, if ever there’s any trouble.”
Well, that was it! She would stand by. She turned to go upstairs. What a day it had been, and it wasn’t over yet! The Hendersons were on the doorstep.
Christine found herself whisked back to the kitchen to prepare sandwiches and coffee, and when the door bell rang at seven o’clock she went to answer its summons with a sigh of weariness. What now?
Huntley Treverson was standing on the doorstep.
“May I come in?” he asked. “There’s something I have to say to you, Christine.”
She held onto the handle, realizing that she was steadying herself against the shock of complete surprise.
“What’s the matter?” he asked whimsically. “Don’t tell me I’ve done the wrong thing again!”
“No ... no ... of course not! It’s only that my aunt has company.” She felt as if she was speaking against time, trying to gather her scattered thoughts, wondering what she should do about this most unexpected and, to her aunt, at least, unwelcome caller. “I ... there must be somewhere we can talk without being interrupted,” she added lamely.
“Wouldn’t the garden do?” he asked in a tone which seemed to recall their previous meeting in the garden at Kinaird.
“The family is in the garden, playing tennis.” She stood back, opening the door wider. “I think we had better go into the lounge.” There was a slight smile playing about his firm lips as he followed her across the hall into the large, over-furnished room.
“I think I’ll have to ask you to hurry,” she confessed. “I’m not overly popular this evening. My aunt and I have had a slight difference of opinion, and I suppose I am more or less under notice.”
“To quit?” His eyes searched her face. “Then ... you’re going home?”
“No. I can’t go home yet.”
“That is why I’ve come,” he said briefly. “To ask you to go home now because I know you will want to go very soon. I know the need to go will be too great in the end even for your determination.”
She looked back at him, her puzzled eyes demanding an explanation.
“Why do you say I should go now?” Her voice quickened. “You haven’t heard anything ... any bad news.”
“No, nothing like that,” he told her swiftly. “On the contrary, everybody appears to be in the best of health and spirits. My uncle has even invited me to choose the job I would like in Kinaird.”
“You’re going to work there?” There was deep longing and envy in her voice and she had to struggle with a sudden mist of tears. “How lucky you are! It was ... what you wanted, I suppose?” Somehow, without waiting for his answer, she knew that it was, knew it beyond any shadow of a doubt, and she envied him with all her heart.
“Well,” he asked, “what about you?”
“Me? It doesn’t concern me, except that I envy you very, very much.”
“Christine,” he said almost roughly, taking a step nearer as if to emphasize what he had to say, “don’t you see what I’m trying to put to you? I want you to go back before I do, before the same old tongues begin to wag.”
“Saying I followed you back?” She flushed painfully, but she could see nothing but concern for herself in his suggestion and thanked him for it though she could not do as he wished.
“I won’t be going back for a long time,” she said.
“You’ll eat your heart out in longing in some dusty office when you might be riding bareheaded through the glens?” His voice was suddenly rough and edged with an impatience he did not even try to disguise. “Christine, are you a complete lunatic?”
“Don’t—!” she protested, feeling on the verge of tears.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized immediately, “but the whole thing makes me furious. I can’t see any sense in it at all.”
“Tell me what you are going to do,” she demanded, steering the conversation away from herself with a deliberation equal to his own. “Are you going into the quarrying with your uncle?”
“I’m going to
try to get him out of it, or, failing that, to try new methods at another site.”
“You’ll have difficulties,” she warned.
He smiled grimly. “No one knows that better than I do. I’ve been having difficulty with Uncle Ben for as long as I can remember!”
“It’s strange,” Christine mused, “that I can’t remember anything about you when you lived at Glenavon as a child. I think I only have one reasonably clear impression, and that is of a very small boy standing up to a raging giant of a man for some reason or other and the small boy not seeming the least bit frightened or even looking very impressed!”
“That’s possibly because I knew that his bark was generally worse than his bite!” he laughed. “Anyway, I’m hoping I’ve kept the trait.” He swung around as if to leave. “But I’m disappointed that I have failed to make you change your mind. You’re quite sure you won’t reconsider?”
“No, I can’t. It’s not because I don’t want to. There’s another reason.”
“Kilbridge?”
“Some of it has to do with Nigel,” she confessed truthfully, “but not in the way you mean. We haven’t quarreled.”
He swung around to the window, looking out at the garden under the trees. “You said you were leaving here,” he remarked. “Where will you go?”
“Into an apartment, or even to a hostel.”
“I can’t imagine you in an apartment.”
“Why not? I mean to become a most efficient working woman!” He smiled at that. “I don’t doubt your efficiency, but wasn’t it apparent enough at Kinaird?”
She wondered if he meant to hurt her by these sudden reminders of home. “I suppose it was,” she admitted quietly, “but that’s all over now.”
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