Highland Mist

by Rose Burghley

  Charles looked at him questioningly when he came back into the room.

  “We’ll get through all right today, I imagine? I mean, we’ll get to Inverada House?”

  MacLeod shrugged.

  “We’ll have to dig my car out first, and if the engine hasn’t seized up altogether we’ll probably gel. through. At least, I’ll get through, but you’d better stay here until I’ve ascertained whether there’s any point in you getting through.”

  “But we can’t possibly stay here—!” Charles was beginning to protest, when his host held up his hand.

  “I understand! ... You’ve had a ghastly night, and you’re thinking in terms of a comfortable bed and a good hot bath and shave, but you won’t get any of those things at Inverada unless I’m greatly mistaken. You might get the bed—a damp one!—and you might get a tepid bath—if there’s fuel for the boiler!—but you won’t get anyone to feed you or look after you unless, as I say, I’m happily very much mistaken. That’s why I say you’d better stay here until I’ve made a sort of reconnaissance. If things are impossible you’ll be better off returning to London.”

  “Please,” Toni said rather faintly, from the couch, “is there such a thing as a cup of tea? If you’ll show me where the kettle is, and you’ve got a spirit-stove, I’ll make one.”

  Euan went across to her. Without saying anything at all he bent over her and felt her forehead; then his long firm fingers grasped one of her wrists. He frowned.

  “I’m all right,” she said, with undisguisable hoarseness. “I’ve just got a bit of a cold.”

  His frown knit his thick brows together. She felt as if his hard blue eyes were searchlights, boring into her.

  “You’ve collected a nasty chill,” he said. “Stay there while I make the tea.” Just before he disappeared out of the door he turned and spoke brusquely to Charles. “And you’d better get a fire going. A good fire, unless you want her to be seriously ill!”

  Toni would never have believed that Charles would obey a curt request of that sort—an order, in fact!—and she also wondered whether her temperature was very high and none of the things around her were actually happening when she saw the man whom her mother occasionally criticised as being too dependent on the ministrations of a highly-paid manservant, kneeling in front of the cold cottage hearth and almost frantically attempting to coax the embers of the dead fire into a blaze. Euan brought him a pair of bellows—since, apparently, the fire was not as dead as it looked—and a pile of dry kindling, and in quite a short space of time there were flames leaping merrily up the chimney, and the atmosphere of the cottage was a little less like the atmosphere of some cold stone vaults, or an icy railway station—Inverada, for instance—in the dead of winter.

  Euan came in with the tea, and Toni accepted her cup thankfully. She looked upwards gratefully at the tea-maker as she gulped the hot liquid eagerly, and he stood looking at her thoughtfully before he drank his own. Charles built up his fire and then concentrated his own concerned regard on her, but Toni tried to reassure him that she was perfectly all right. If she had a couple of aspirin tablets there wouldn’t be a thing wrong with her.

  Euan said nothing, but produced a thermometer and stuck it under her tongue. She watched him anxiously when he took the reading, and Charles watched him more anxiously still.

  “Well?” Charles demanded impatiently, as his host still remained silent.

  “You won’t be able to shift Miss Drew today, if that’s what you’re hoping for,” MacLeod remarked laconically. “She’s got quite a high temperature, and she’ll have to stay where she is. Fortunately, I’ve plenty of wood, and we can keep a good fire going. Also I’ve something I can give her.”

  “You’re not suggesting doctoring Miss Drew yourself, are you?” Charles asked incredulously. “If she’s ill she’ll have to have a doctor brought to her.”

  “From where?” Euan asked, eyebrows ascending in his turn. “Inverachy’s a good seven or eight miles away, and we’re not on the telephone. I very much doubt whether my car will start, even when I’ve got her out of the ditch, and the only doctor who could have been fetched without much difficulty packed up his practice here a good six months ago. So you see, there isn’t any alternative to my doctoring.”

  Charles looked as if such a situation had never occurred to him in his wildest imaginings.

  “But you don’t have to worry,” MacLeod said dryly. “I am a doctor. A fully-fledged one, with all the usual qualifications, and a couple of years’ experience in private practice.”

  “Then what are you doing here?” Charles wanted to know, with greater incredulity than before.

  Euan shrugged, and tightened his lips.

  “Shall we say I’m having a holiday?” he said. “At this time of year, and in a spot like this?” Another shrug. “Perhaps I’m one of those people who can’t take their holidays at the proper season.”

  Then he approached the couch, and bent once more over Toni, who was shivering despite the warmth from the fire, and feeling absolutely wretched He tucked in an end of the plaid rug, and placed another cushion under her head.

  “That better?” he asked, almost gently. “I’ll give you a tablet that will help bring down your temperature, and you’ll have another one in about four hours. I’ve some coats in a locker that I’ll pile on top of you to keep you warm, and I’ll fetch your case that I dumped in the front porch last night. There may be some things inside it that you’d like to have.”

  “There’s a hot water bottle,” Toni said, between her chattering teeth, remembering that Celia had popped one in at the last minute—a pretty pale pink one, encased in a quilted satin cover. “And there’s a bedjacket and some warm pyjamas.”

  “Then I’ll get them for you.”

  Charles stood in the background, looking and feeling as if the situation appalled him. Dr. MacLeod smiled sideways at him with detached mockery, his kingfisher-blue eyes bright and gleaming, his teeth hard and white between well-cut lips.

  “And while Miss Drew changes into her own things you might start digging my car out,” he suggested. “I’ll come along and help you when I’ve made sure the case is where I left it last night.”

  For the next forty-eight hours Toni had no real idea of what went on around her. She only knew that she was chained to the couch with its wooden framework, and pillows that were so hard she thought lightheadedly of the Japanese, who are reputed to prefer wooden pillows to any other kind, and she wondered whether Dr. MacLeod had ever visited Japan. And once she stopped shivering she was so hot she wanted to throw off all her covers, but was firmly restrained by the blue-eyed doctor, and she ached so much, and her throat was so dry, her head throbbed and her eyes watered to such an extent that she didn’t greatly care what was going on around her, and the fact that Charles was not allowed to do anything at all for her never even penetrated to her understanding.

  He spent most of that first morning that they were confined to the cottage out of doors digging out Euan’s car, and when summoned in for a meal was in such a state of repressed fury, resentment and indignation—behind which was his concern for Toni, who was in his charge—that his Scottish host thought it best not to attempt any conversation while they ate. He had prepared—in his little lean-to kitchenette-cum-storehouse-cum-workshop—quite a savoury broth, followed by an equally savoury omelette, and a batch of oatcakes, but the Englishman didn’t even think of praising the meal, and was secretly absorbed with plans for getting away from the cottage, and getting Toni away, too.

  But in the meantime, MacLeod looked after Toni with a skill and tenderness that were all part of his training, and she ceased to feel in the least shy every time he appeared at her bedside to do something for her. He lifted her, bathed her face—and, that night, when her temperature was rocketing, sponged her slight body and changed her pyjamas while Charles sat helplessly in the lean-to and wondered why he had never taken up medicine—fed her spoonfuls of broth, and mixed her long, cooling drinks,
all while Charles sat hopelessly by and gnawed at his lower lip because he had never felt so futile in his life.

  Or disliked anyone as he disliked the capable MacLeod.

  In the early hours of that horribly long night Toni began to feel a little better, and when dawn came creeping through the window she was sleeping peacefully, the perspiration shining on her face, the hectic flush died down.

  MacLeod, who had sat beside her all night, his face grim, his fingers on her pulse every quarter of an hour or so, allowed himself to relax a little, and in the harsh light Charles saw how haggard he looked when he was unshaved—unshaved and feeling the reaction after a long and anxious vigil. Charles himself looked almost as haggard, but he had shaved twice during the night for something to do—and also because he couldn’t bear an unshaved condition—and he had only guessed at the weight of responsibility that rested on the other man’s shoulders, and known he could do nothing about it.

  It was he who had brought Toni away from the amenities of civilised life at the wrong time of the year, and he ought to have had more sense ... but he hadn’t had more sense, and if MacLeod felt responsible because he was a doctor and she had suddenly become a patient, Charles felt responsible because without the other man’s medical experience they might have been in a very serious mess indeed. Snowed up—or almost virtually snowed up—in the Highlands, and with no one near.

  What would Celia say if anything happened to Toni?

  How would Charles feel, if anything happened to this tall, slight willow-wand of a girl, with the pearly skin and the huge eyes, who had been so looking forward to an adventure?

  He felt himself grow so haggard at the thought that he wondered whether his expression was very revealing as he moved silently to the side of the improvised bed and joined with MacLeod in gazing down on the sleeping girl.

  He whispered hoarsely:

  “She’s better, isn’t she?”

  Euan nodded.

  “Very much better?”

  The doctor frowned.

  “She’s sleeping, and that’s a good thing. But it won’t be a good thing if you wake her, so please don’t talk unless you feel you must.”

  Charles looked at him, his expression hardening. The old resentment rose up in him, taking the place of his relief. What right had this man to talk to him as if he was a kind of half-wit? As if Toni wasn’t any real concern of his, and he hadn’t any right to feel gnawing anxiety! The most intense anxiety for her well-being!

  When Toni opened her eyes several hours later both men were looking distinctly grey, and Charles made her think of a rather sulky schoolboy as he sat glowering in his corner. She held out her hand to him, and his handsome face brightened instantly ... became transformed. He rose and walked softly across the room to her.

  “Feeling better, infant?”

  She smiled.

  “Much better.”

  “You’re looking better. And it’s morning. Some time today I’ll get through to Inverada and give you a report on the house.”

  Euan MacLeod rose and looked at them both without any expression at all on his face.

  “I’ll get you a cup of tea,” he said. “I expect you can do with one.”

  Instantly she dragged her eyes away from Charles and smiled gratefully at the man who had sat beside her all night, and because she had sensed his nearness and she knew very well that she owed quite a lot to him, she held out a hand to him, too.

  “Dr. MacLeod! ... it is Doctor, isn’t it? We ought never to have called you Mister MacLeod?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” he answered, as if it really didn’t matter. “It’s quite unimportant.”

  “But the stationmaster called you Mister.”

  “Yes,” he said indifferently.

  She smiled at him with a most attractive light in her unnaturally large brown eyes.

  “I’m so sorry I’ve been such a nuisance to you. You’ve been so good.” A vague memory crept back to her of him sponging her body as tenderly as if he had been a woman, and a flush returned to her cheeks. “It was too bad of me to make myself such a nuisance.”

  “Not at all,” he replied, with the same sort of indifference, and the flush brightened a little before it faded.

  Charles bent over her.

  “Of course you weren’t a nuisance, infant,” he said softly. “But I don’t mind admitting to you that you’ve become an awful responsibility.” He smiled ruefully. “Last night I wondered what your mother would say if I had to send for her to come all the way up here to see you.”

  She glanced round the bare little cottage room—a room, she decided, in that grey dawn light, that could look attractive, if one worked hard over it—and found herself quite unable to picture Celia sitting on one of the hard wooden chairs.

  “Celia would never have come,” she said simply.

  He frowned.

  “She would if I’d thought it necessary...”

  A voice spoke to him reprovingly from the doorway of the lean-to.

  “Don’t talk too much to my patient at this early hour, Henderson. And, if you must talk, don’t discuss the patient’s health with the patient.”

  Charles muttered resentfully.

  “That fellow! I’ve got to get you out of here, Toni, but I realise that you can’t be moved until you’re better. However, as soon as you are better ...” He glanced balefully at the door of the lean-to.

  “What is the weather like?” Toni asked, without much curiosity, glancing at the window.

  “It hasn’t snowed since yesterday,” Charles told her, in a more cheerful voice. “And the stars have been bright all night. I’ll get through to Inverada today,” he added.

  Toni’s eyes fastened on his face. She had adored it so long that it seemed strange to have it constantly so near her.

  “But Dr. MacLeod has been so kind,” she said doubtfully. “We mustn’t appear too anxious to be gone.”

  She thought Charles’s expression was distinctly grim as he replied:

  “I’m so anxious that I don’t have to appear anything at all!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  That afternoon Euan reported that the road to Inverada House was badly blocked, and there was no hope of getting through for at least a couple of days. There were no ploughs in that part of the world, and the only thing they could hope for was that the weather would hold, in which case—and with the aid of a little sun—they might get through in a couple of days, but if the drifts were deep it would take longer.

  Charles, thoroughly depressed by the prospect of having to spend two more days and nights in the cottage—and, aware of his own limitations, convinced that he couldn’t stand it—suggested to Toni that they make for Inverechy and put up at the hotel there. Euan’s face was at its most expressionless when he was approached on the subject of the road to Inverechy, and he admitted that it was not nearly as bad as the road to Inverada House. He had explored it for a short distance himself, and in addition he had received reports from Willie Bride, who had delivered a couple of sacks of chicken meal to him that had been left at Inverada station.

  “So you don’t think it’s impossible for us to get through to Inverechy?” Charles asked, looking straight at him.

  “Not if you wait until tomorrow, when Miss Drew will be a little more fit to travel,” Euan replied.

  “Ah, yes.” Charles looked anxiously at Toni, who was sitting huddled up in her own dressing-gown by the fire. “Do you think you’ll feel fit enough to drive seven or eight miles, infant? In any case, it would be much better for you to be in a hotel, where you can be properly looked after, and receive proper treatment, if necessary. I’m sure your mother would agree with me, and in fact I feel very guilty, because I haven’t been able to let her know what has happened.”

  “I’m surprised Miss Drew’s mother allowed her to travel up here from London at this season of the year,” Euan remarked bluntly.

  Charles—although he agreed with him—looked at him as if he thought the obse
rvation was presumptuous.

  “Will you be able to drive us to Inverechy?” he asked.

  Dr. MacLeod shrugged.

  “I’ve no alternative, if you insist on going.”

  Charles frowned.

  “It’s not a question of insisting. We came up here for a purpose, but everything seems to have gone wrong, and I feel that I ought to restore Miss Drew to her right type of background without delay. Of course, we’ll pay you for the use of your car,” he added, with supreme tactlessness, “and for any inconvenience caused,” rather loftily.

  Toni felt as if the breath caught in her throat as she saw Euan MacLeod—who so seldom betrayed any kind of emotion—turn red. Or rather, a dull red rose up underneath his tanned skin, and the line of his lips grew so taut that for some reason she thought of finely-tuned violin strings, and their tendency to snap suddenly. By contrast with the betraying fire in his cheeks his blue eyes grew cold as northern ice floes as he looked back just as steadily at Charles as Charles was looking at him.

  “That won’t be necessary, Mr. Henderson,” he said. “My cottage is humble, but I don’t charge for shelter, and I don’t charge for driving people about in bad weather.”

  Charles refused to see the warning light.

  “But you’ve done quite a lot for Miss Drew ... doctored her, in fact. Without your medical knowledge she might have been seriously ill, and I should certainly have called in a doctor to her if one had been near enough. I think you ought to accept a fee.”

  “Charles!” Toni exclaimed, and felt her own face grow hot.

  Euan walked to the window, and stood looking out at the tiny, neglected wilderness—buried under snow just then—that was his garden.

  “You can forget that I ever told you I’m a doctor,” he said curtly. “I only did so because Miss Drew needed attention, and I certainly don’t consider that for anything I did for her I’m deserving of a fee.”

  Charles studied him curiously, and then obviously decided he had abandoned his practice for eccentric reasons, and was in himself something of an eccentric.