Highland Interlude

by Lucilla Andrews

  ‘Indeed? You’ll miss his company for your walks.’

  ‘Yes. He’s amusing.’ I asked if my Sunday date would be all right. ‘He’s hoping to meet you.’

  ‘I shall look forward to meeting your American friend.’

  ‘Perhaps your grandfather knew the Gairlie grandfather of whom he’s so proud?’

  ‘Possibly. Certainly,’ he added drily, ‘Calum MacDonald proved a man his grandson must be proud to acknowledge. You’ll forgive me if I return to my study? Johnnie’ll be down directly.’

  Johnnie took some time, and I spent it trying to fathom why Dougal found it right and proper to hallow the tragic past, but not a crofter grandfather who had had the guts to up and out. Archie had never mentioned his grandfather’s job in the States, but from the various remarks he had let fall about his family background Calum MacDonald seemed to have been one more example of successful Scottish enterprise in exile. Then why didn’t Dougal approve? Or had I merely imagined his disapproval because I was feeling thoroughly bloody-minded over the immediate prospect of life without Archie?

  That set me wondering how much I really liked Archie, whether ‘like’ was the right word, if I would see him after Sunday, or whether ours would go the usual way of holiday affairs. I started hoping it would not, then realized what I was doing and, from old habit, instinctively clamped down on the hope. If one didn’t hope hard one couldn’t be hurt hard. That had been my angle for years. Of course, I knew why now, but I had only acquired that bit of self-insight in the last year, and I was not yet ready to do more than acknowledge my weakness to myself. In Martha’s I had always avoided ‘steadies’ like the plague. That way no one got hurt. Joe Fenton played by the same rules, which was another reason why he and I got along so well. I suspected Archie did the same. I hoped he did, and as that was a safe hope, I didn’t clamp down on it.

  The rain continued all Friday. I felt like Judas Iscariot over my personal delight in the downpour every time the twins groaned at the prospect of a cancelled picnic. Johnnie’s bellow of joy woke me on Saturday morning. It was the most perfect morning since our arrival in Gairlie.

  Mrs Pringle had been offered the day off and chosen to spend the day baking. Her husband was away on his trawler, none of her married children lived locally, and though her husband was related to half Gairlie, she told me after breakfast she aye found it easier to maintain a strong affection for her man’s kin when she kept herself to herself.

  ‘Then you’re not from Gairlie, Mrs P?’

  ‘Och, no. Oban.’ She studied my skirt hem, but not as previously. ‘I’m not saying you’ve not a bonnie pair of legs, lassie, but with that expanse you’ll take it awful cold up the hills.’ She scuttled off and returned with a pair of hand-knitted stockings. ‘Do you fancy these?’

  ‘Do I not! Dead kinky!’

  We were travelling in two cars, Judy and I with Dougal, the boys with Maury. Dougal suggested this, ‘on the grounds of medical prudence’. From his expression when he put it to me it pleased him as little as it was going to please Mrs Valentine.

  She was late, and Robin went into the front garden to watch for her. He rushed in squeaking, ‘Here’s her car!’

  Judy drew me aside. ‘His voice always comes out a squeak when he’s gone on a bird. Makes him right spare! He’s been practising all morning to get it low as Uncle’s.’

  ‘Poor old Robin! He often go for birds?’

  ‘Oh, blimey,’ said Judy, ‘he’s sex mad. Boys get so grotty. Johnnie’s starting. He’s gone on you, though he’s not such a drag about you as Robin about Mrs Valentine. Of course, Johnnie’s younger.’

  ‘Makes a difference.’

  Dougal had gone out to meet Maury. Judy watched him through the open front door. ‘Do you suppose he is going to marry her, Elizabeth?’

  ‘Your uncle?’ I shrugged. ‘Don’t ask me.’ I was watching Maury making like Stanley should have greeted Livingstone. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Don’t sort of know her yet, but Johnnie says she’s dead grotty. Johnnie’s quite bright ‒ for a boy,’ she added, not unkindly, as an afterthought.

  Maury wore a tan trouser suit and a blue suede car coat. The outfit suited her. She advanced on me with outstretched hands. ‘I’m so glad Dougal was able to persuade you to join our little party, Elizabeth. Haven’t you been lucky! No sign of scarlet fever. It does rather look, doesn’t it, as if you must have had it ages ago?’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Dougal answered for me. ‘Elizabeth may have a natural immunity, but let us not tempt providence until after tomorrow.’

  I had spent most of that morning giving myself a ‘Let’s start loving Maury’ pep talk. I told myself I had imagined her earlier instant antipathy. I hadn’t. Dougal might fox me, but I knew my own sex. I made a few trite remarks and waited in unkind anticipation for her reaction to our travelling order.

  ‘Dougal darling, must we? I thought we’d all go together.’ She widened her eyes. They were lovely eyes, even if slightly lacking in expression. ‘With you driving of course!’

  ‘I think we should play it safe for one more day.’

  ‘Then we shall.’ She nearly purred to prove she was a docile kitten. ‘Naturally, you know best! You’ll lead?’

  ‘If you’ve no objection?’

  ‘Dougal, you know me. I’m the old-fashioned type.’ She smiled at me through her very good eyelashes. ‘I expect Elizabeth finds that amusing. English girls are so strong-minded and, well ‒ modern ‒ these days.’

  Elizabeth was finding her hysterical. She was very good-looking but if she was really what Dougal wanted as a wife, then he deserved her.

  Dougal thought we should be on our way. The master had spoken, and we scattered to the cars like so many obedient chattels.

  We left Gairlie by a road new to me and began to climb at once. Within a few minutes Achnagairl House became a grey matchbox and the village a shrinking set of blue-and-white toy houses. Then we were high enough to see over the hills round the loch to the mountain range on the northern horizon, and oddly the twin blue mountains in the east seemed much closer. Oddly, as we were travelling west. We could just glimpse the sea, and a very long way out a handful of minute wispy clouds moving down the coast.

  Judy was sitting in front. Dougal’s head turned seawards a couple of times. ‘I hope the wind doesn’t change and bring those clouds inland.’

  ‘Will that matter, Uncle? They’re so small.’

  ‘They only look that way because they’re so far out. If the wind brings them inland and then drops those clouds could cover these hills like a blanket. So, if the wind changes, I’m afraid we go straight down.’

  ‘How dead grotty! Ouch! Uncle, my ears are popping!’

  ‘Already? We’re not high yet. Swallow, lassie. That’ll fix your ears. All right in the back, Elizabeth?’

  ‘Yes, thanks.’

  Occasionally we passed small crofts built of granite slabs; some had thatched roofs with the thatching repaired with string or held down with heavy stones; others were roofed with corrugated iron. They were all well away from the road and looked picturesque in the sunshine. I wondered how they looked in a blizzard in winter, then accidentally glanced over the ravine edge as we took another hairpin bend and shut my eyes, fast.

  ‘Sleepy, Elizabeth?’ asked Dougal.

  I had forgotten the driving mirror. ‘Just drowsy. Unaccustomed altitude, I expect.’

  ‘It can have that effect.’ He produced chocolate from the dashboard shelf. ‘Help yourself, and Judy. It’ll step-up your blood sugar.’

  Judy said, That’s why Elizabeth gave us all sweets when Johnnie cut himself. Mrs Pringle said they made her feel much better. Elizabeth said they would. Elizabeth’s dead clever, isn’t she, Uncle?’

  ‘She is, indeed,’ he agreed, very drily.

  Only Judy thought he was paying me a compliment.

  Chapter Five

  A PICNIC ON A HIGH PLATEAU

  Dougal tightened the stra
ps of Robin’s haversack. ‘We’ll go up by the main burn, Maury, then use the sheep track for the last lap.’ He hitched the picnic basket on to his back. ‘Twins, stay by me. Robin, look after Elizabeth.’

  Robin grimaced. ‘What about Mrs Valentine?’

  ‘Darling Robin, so gallant!’ exclaimed Maury. ‘But you don’t have to worry about me. Your uncle knows I’m quite at home here, and poor Elizabeth must feel a bit awkward ‒ not being used to our hills, I mean.’

  Dougal glanced at Robin, but so effectively that the boy even lent me an occasional hand. We followed a few yards behind the others, and though the gradient was very steep, the turf was springy and the going pleasant as we took it very slowly.

  Maury swung herself round to lean against the slope and looked down. ‘Ever see such a view, Elizabeth!’

  I looked over my shoulder and upwards. ‘Never!’

  ‘Bloody hell,’ muttered Robin, ‘if you’re going to keep stopping we’ll never get up to the top.’

  We moved on up. Dougal’s outstretched hands hauled me up the final few feet of sheer rock. ‘How do the sheep manage this bit?’ I demanded breathlessly.

  ‘They’ve four feet, not two.’ He was suddenly looking at me clinically. ‘You’re very breathless. You’re not cyanosed, but have you ever had any cardiac trouble?’

  ‘Never. Altitude, I guess. How high are we?’

  ‘Just under one thousand feet. Turn round and take a look, and you’ll see why we’re here.’

  We were away from the edge, so I could look out. I inhaled sharply. ‘It’s like standing on the edge of the sky.’

  The plateau topped the highest hill in the district. On every side the hills rolled like petrified giant brown waves that lapped that greater giant, Ben Gairlie, and then rolled on to the snow-crested mountain range in the north. Here and there the brown was broken with vivid blue slits of lochs and black velvet patches of glens. The beauty was genuinely breath-taking.

  Dougal said, ‘A view worth seeing.’

  Maury slid a hand through his arm. ‘Not so fine, though, as the view must be from the top of the Ben?’

  ‘Possibly not, if one could see clearly from the top. Every time I’ve been up the Ben’s crest there’ve been clouds in the way.’

  ‘Every time?’ I turned to him. ‘Dougal, do you make a habit of nipping up to the top of Ben Gairlie?’

  He smiled. ‘We all have our odd habits.’

  Maury was not amused. ‘Really, Elizabeth, before you drop any more bricks I think I ought to warn you you are talking to one of the best rock-climbers in Scotland! No, Dougal, you can’t deny that,’ she insisted, as he was about to interrupt. ‘Charlie Urquhart always says so. He should know. And, surely, even you must’ve heard of Charlie Urquhart, Elizabeth?’

  ‘Only since Dougal mentioned his name to me the other evening.’

  She raised her eyes in horror. ‘Only then?’

  Dougal said there was no occasion for her to be so surprised, since London was a long way from Gairlie.

  She brightened. ‘One forgets it’s another world.’

  I hadn’t forgotten. Three days, I thought, and the thought so cheered me that I beamed on them both and went off to talk to the twins.

  The plateau covered about two-thirds of an acre. It was criss-crossed with burns, and some of the ground between was boggy, but there were enough dry patches to make the final selection of our picnic spot a lengthy business. Eventually we settled on rugs on the southern side of a heap of granite boulders that provided us with back-rests and shelter from the stiffish wind.

  Maury gave us an excellent lunch, and throughout the meal talked exclusively to Dougal and Robin. Dougal did his best to keep me in the conversation, but he had a tough job, as whenever he produced a subject that could include me she produced another that shut me out. That didn’t bother me, seriously, nor did it make me feel a welcome guest. After a while I kept as silent as the twins. Unfortunately, being an adult, I couldn’t disappear as they did, directly we finished eating.

  Robin wanted to sketch. ‘Can I go down to that shelf over the edge there? It’s only about thirty feet down.’

  ‘Providing you stay put on that shelf. It’s good and wide, but the drop beneath is steep enough for real experience or ropes.’ Dougal got to his feet. ‘I’ll see you down.’

  Maury decided her legs needed stretching. ‘Wait for me!’

  ‘With pleasure.’ Dougal turned, smiling. The breeze lifted his hair and gave him a faint colour. Outlined against the sky at that moment, he looked younger and more alive than I had ever seen him. I could well understand, if not share, Maury’s point of view. ‘Will you join us, Elizabeth?’

  I used laziness as an excuse. He did not press the point. Directly they disappeared over the edge ahead the twins rejoined me. Judy sat on my rug, and Johnnie pottered round examining the picnic basket and haversack. ‘I say! Aren’t we here for tea?’

  ‘Uncle told Mrs Pringle we wouldn’t be back till nearly six.’ Judy twisted round. ‘Why?’

  ‘There’s nothing left to nosh here.’

  I said, ‘Probably the tea-basket’s still in Mrs Valentine’s car.’

  Johnnie looked worried. ‘I only saw one basket.’ The moment Dougal and Maury returned Johnnie tackled his uncle. ‘Is it in the boot? Can I go down and fetch it?’

  ‘Tea! Oh, my goodness!’ Maury was shocked beyond belief by her absent-mindedness. So was Johnnie. The tea-basket was still in the front hall of her house. ‘I’ll drive back at once. Silly me!’

  ‘No.’ Dougal looked at the twins, then at the sky. ‘I don’t like leaving you girls up here, but this weather does look set, if only for the next hour or so. I’ll go for the basket. Well, twins? Coming for the ride?’

  ‘Gosh, yes! A picnic without tea ‒’ Johnnie was too shaken to put the full horror into words.

  ‘Grotty,’ said Judy, looking at Maury. ‘Dead grotty.’

  Dougal had gone to call some instructions down to Robin. He returned and reminded Maury how swiftly hill weather could change. ‘Get down to the road at the first sign of any change. Don’t hang around. Start walking. Keep on the road and going down, and you’ll not get lost.’

  Maury crossed the plateau to see them down the sheep track, then came back and wrapped herself in a rug. ‘I feel so guilty about giving poor Dougal this extra chore, but I must admit it’s much more peaceful without the prattle of the very young. Aren’t you exhausted after a week in their company? My poor Dougal looks positively jaded! Or do you feel’ ‒ she studied her hands ‒ ‘that what with one thing and another it’s all been well worth while?’

  I looked at her before answering. ‘I’m not quite sure what you mean. That it’s been worth while to get to know the twins? If so, yes. They’re sweet kids. I like them a lot.’

  ‘How touching! And clever. Dougal told me you’re clever.’ She looked up. There was a queer little smile in her eyes. ‘Though one can’t help feeling rather sorry for Joe Fenton.’

  ‘Joe?’ I was beginning to wonder if I was hearing right. ‘Sorry, Maury, but I’m lost.’

  ‘Darling,’ she drawled, ‘spare me the injured innocent, please. I’m another woman, remember? That sweet-angel-of-mercy line may fool some men, but it doesn’t wash with me. Nor, I think you ought to know, has it with Dougal. He’s seen through you.’

  I was hearing all right. ‘He has?’ I asked softly.

  ‘Do you seriously imagine a man of his intelligence wouldn’t? Though, of course, he’s far too polite to tell you himself. But since I happen to dislike seeing scheming young women taking advantage of my friends, I feel it’s up to me to do the job for him.’

  ‘That I believe.’

  She flushed. ‘Don’t you take that tone to me, my girl! I won’t stand for it!’

  ‘Then I suggest we change the subject, smartly.’

  ‘Oh, no! No! I’m not letting you wriggle out of it like that! Someone ought to tell you just what all Dougal’s friends think
of you before you leave Gairlie. I suppose you think no one’s noticed the way you’ve been using him to suit your own ends?’

  This unexpected and unimaginable onslaught now had me nearly as breathless as the climb up. ‘I ‒ have?’

  ‘Don’t pretend you haven’t imposed on his hospitality to suit yourself. It’s too obvious! You knew no one could prove you’ve had scarlet fever. You knew Dougal would have to ask you to stay. He told me himself ‒ his hands were tied. Very clever,’ she jeered, ‘and very understandable! What’s a young doctor like Joe Fenton up against a man who’s already inherited one of the largest motor corporations in the United States?’

  ‘Archie MacDonald?’ I queried incredulously.

  ‘You never drop the act, do you? But I’d better warn you not to set your hopes too high. As Dougal says, to run his business as well as he apparently does, Archie MacDonald must have inherited some good Scottish common sense in addition to a few million dollars from his Gairlie grandfather. He won’t be easily hooked ‒ and one’s not too surprised that he’s suddenly had to fly back to London on business. One won’t be surprised if he suddenly finds he can fly back ‒ after you’ve left on Monday. So I thought I’d tell you not to count your chickens ‒ just yet.’

  I was too angry to think straight. I voiced the first thought in my head. ‘You forgot that tea-basket intentionally.’

  That so increased her anger that it was obviously true. ‘Just because you’ve everything all worked out you assume everyone else indulges in crafty little schemes! No wonder Dougal’s so keen to get you on that train on Monday that he’s going to drive you to Glasgow himself! He told me, himself, he gave you the impression he’s got business there that day, but he hasn’t. He just wants to make good and sure you don’t miss that train.’ She jumped up, shedding her rug. ‘I’m going to talk to Robin. I don’t suppose you want to come?’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘I don’t.’

  I felt slightly and physically sick as she disappeared over the edge ahead. I had been weighed-into by ward sisters when I was a junior, but I had never experienced anything quite like this. I lay flat and dropped an arm over my eyes as I had to think things out and could always do that better with my eyes closed. If she returned I hoped she would think me asleep, and if that was cowardly I didn’t give a damn. I’d had as much as I could stand of Maury Valentine and fine old Highland hospitality, but I wanted to get things under control before the others returned with the tea-basket, as I did not want to upset the twins. As for Dougal, had he appeared alone at that moment, I’d have sat up and informed him my favourite day for celebration was the anniversary of Flodden Field.