Land of Heart's Desire (14 page)

“One tries to be on hand at the right moment,” he assured her instead. “But you are not to worry any more,” he repeated. “Leave me to see to everything.”

“You’ll tell Rory?” she asked.

“I’ll look after Rory, too,” he promised, leading her back across the hall to the stairs. “It’s early yet. There’s nothing we can really do till the Port begins to stir.”

“Rejoicing and sorrowing all within one week!” she said sadly. “Erradale loved my grandmother. She will be greatly missed.”

“And now you are Erradale,” he reminded her, looking directly into her tear-filled eyes as she turned back on the first stair. “You can work out your own destiny, Chris, wherever you like.”

“I shall find it here—in Erradale,” she told him with a strange conviction in her heart.

Once more he did not contradict her. He considered the moment too emotional for making any lasting decisions. The time for that would come later, and suddenly Christine looked beyond him to see Callum McKinnis standing in the open doorway.

With the tentative, hesitating movements of the near blind, the old man advanced a step or two into the hall and then stood still. Without a word Christine passed Hamish and ran to his side. Callum’s face had a curiously calm look, like the loch water in the first pale light of a summer’s dawn, and he nodded his head in understanding as she spoke.

“She’s gone, Callum. There was no way of telling—of sending for anyone.” Her voice was almost apologetic as she looked into the still handsome, bearded face of her grandmother’s oldest retainer. “She died in her sleep.”

Slowly Callum made the sign of the Cross.

“I thought that would be the way of her going,” he said. “She was indeed a wonderful woman.” He stood for a moment in silence, reviewing a lifetime of service and love. “An era has passed with her,” he said at last. “Croma could not have changed while she remained, nor could she ever have parted with Erradale. This, indeed, was the only way.” He looked towards the staircase and Christine said:

“You would like to go up, Callum?”

Once again she passed Hamish without seeming to notice him.

All Croma and Heimra and the people from the neighbouring isles came to Dame Sarah’s funeral. They came, too, from the mainland, from Inverness and Oban and as far afield as Glasgow and Edinburgh. The house was full of distant connections of her grandmother whom Christine had never met before, and the next three days passed in a strange unreality. She found herself depending upon Hamish more and more, because he was always there by her side, accepting his judgments because there did not seem to be anyone else to ask. Rory apparently preferred to be out of doors, going about the routine business of the estate, although she was aware of his loyalty, too, albeit from a distance.

Only after Dame Sarah had been laid to rest in the old family vault on the peculiar mound above the harbour which had been the island’s burial ground for centuries, did she realize that Finlay Sutherland had come from Ardtornish to pay his last respects to the woman who had liked him in spite of a host of prejudices.

He came back to the house with the other mourners, but he said good-bye almost immediately.

“If there is ever anything I can do for you, Miss MacNeill,” he offered, holding Christine’s hand in a firm grasp as they parted, “I guess you know you have only to ask.”

“I’m sure of that,” she said, and noticed that he smiled, although she had been quite genuine in her acceptance of his offer.

“You won’t wait and have something to eat?” she asked impulsively as Hamish came towards them.

He shook his head.

“I think you have enough on your hands,” he told her. “And I have several people to get back to Scoraig.”

“You came by sea?”

“Yes. The tide was full across the ford.”

“I see.”

“I’m not taking Jane back,” he mentioned as he turned to leave. “I’ve promised to come for her when she’s seen you through the next few days.”

Jane had been a tower of strength to her, Christine acknowledged inwardly. For two whole days she had planned and worked, answering innumerable questions and sending out messages, contacting people whom Christine might have missed and offended, and generally making herself useful without the slightest fuss. Finlay Sutherland had brought her back to Erradale as soon as he had heard the news of Dame Sarah’s death, and now he was promising to leave her for as long as she was needed.

“It’s very kind of you,” Christine said, walking with him to the door. “I don’t know what I would have done without Jane.”

“That’s the sort of person Jane is,” he said warmly. “The sort of person you need.”

She drew in a deep breath.

“Jane and I have been friends since we were children,” she reminded him.

“If you would like her to stay longer than a day or two,” he suggested, “don’t mind me. The library can wait. I’ve no intention of letting anyone else dabble with it now that Jane has started the job. Besides,” he added briefly, “I guess Jane feels quite happy at Ardtornish now.”

“She told me she had settled in.” Christine wondered suddenly if there was more to Jane’s happiness at Ardtornish than just a job well done. “It—keeps her on the island.”

He looked as if he would have added some comment to that, and then he appeared to change his mind. Perhaps he had reminded himself that this was no time for conflict. He went down the steps into the sunshine, saluting her briefly before he strode away.

“I think perhaps we might have a business talk,” he said, “when you find yourself as settled as Jane.”

“That fellow’s completely insufferable!” Hamish said at her elbow. He appeared to have followed them to the door, although Christine had not noticed him until now. “Imagine attempting to talk business on the day of a funeral!”

“He said ‘when I was ready’.” Christine’s voice was suddenly uncertain. “Jane thinks he is doing his best for Croma, Hamish. Perhaps we have been mistaken about him—too hasty in our judgment.”

“Good heavens!” he exclaimed. “Don’t you realize that Jane has only one reason for liking the fellow? Can’t you see that she’s mad about him, that she would do anything to find that he thought the same about her?”

“Perhaps he does,” she said with a strange constriction in her throat. “He said he wouldn’t have anyone in her place at Ardtornish—”

“So he did!” Hamish smiled. “That might be a pointer to things to come, and it would certainly solve a few problems in the future. As things are,” he went on carefully, “I’m more or less responsible for Jane. Head of the family, and all that, you know! She’s mighty independent, of course, but the responsibility does exist, I suppose, until she marries.”

He stood watching her, waiting, it would seem, for some sort of reaction on her part, but she did not speak.

“Chris,” he asked after a moment, “what about us? Now that you are more or less a free agent—free to do as you please—we could be married whenever you like.” He drew her towards him, his arm tightening possessively about her waist as he bent to kiss her. “You know I’m crazy about you,” he told her. “Always have been. I was only waiting for the opportunity to tell you.”

Her head went back to avoid his kiss and her heartbeats were suddenly hammer blows somewhere in the region of her throat as she looked into his eyes.

“Don’t look so surprised!” he laughed, drawing her back into the circle of his arms. “This is a proposal, Chris. I want to marry you, and you have only to say ‘yes’!”

Somehow, inexplicably, it was the most difficult thing to say. A week ago—yesterday, even—she would have rushed to meet Hamish halfway, but now she could not.

“I can’t,” she said. “I couldn’t—do a thing like that so soon after Granny’s death. I couldn’t arrange my own particular happiness as quickly as that.”

He frowned as if he would override her decision, and then he accepted it with as much grace as he could muster.

“All right,” he agreed, “I stand corrected, but that doesn’t mean that I shall wait for ever, Chris. I want you—I need you, and there’s no real reason why you should refuse—apart from your respect for the old lady, of course.”

Christine drew her hands away.

“Please can we leave it like that?” she whispered, her lips gone suddenly dry. “That you’ll ask me again in a month or two?”

He smiled broadly.

“A month or two can be a long time, Chris,” he said, “but—we’ll see!”

CHAPTER VII

By
the following morning most of the visiting cruisers and small craft had left the shelter of Port-na-Keal and the remainder of Christine’s guests were getting ready to join the afternoon steamer for the mainland.

After they had gone, she thought, the house would seem doubly empty, and it would be then that she would really know the meaning of loss and loneliness.

She had come to the turret room, almost by way of retreat, feeling that she was nearer Dame Sarah up here than anywhere else, and in the long months of trial ahead, which were blissfully unrevealed to her now, she was to seek the sanctuary of her grandmother’s room, again and again, drawing courage from it in the moments of her greatest despair.

Standing beside the window, she was looking through Dame Sarah’s mirror at the long green glen stretching out before her when someone knocked gently on the door.

“Come in!”

Agnes Crammond put her head into the room and nodded.

“I thought I would be finding you up here,” she said. “Would you have a minute to spare for the lawyer man from Edinburgh, Mr. Tulloch? He says if you could manage to see him it would save him a journey back again later on.”

“Of course.” Christine walked automatically towards the door. “It must be some legal formality he has to clear up.” She paused, gazing at the old woman who had served her grandmother for as many years as she could remember. “You’ll stay on at Erradale, Crammy, won’t you?” she asked. “I suppose I’m in charge now and I shall need your help.”

“You needn’t have asked, Miss Christine,” Agnes Crammond assured her. “I’ll stay, for your own sake, as well as hers.” She nodded back into the room which still remained peculiarly Dame Sarah’s. “She was everything to me—mistress, counsellor and friend. In all the years I knew her she never did a mean action nor failed to show courage in adversity.” Unashamedly she wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. “I see you growing like her in many ways,” she added as she stepped aside to let her new mistress pass.

“Thanks, Crammy!” Christine said. “I only wish I really deserved such a compliment.”

The lawyer was waiting for her in the hall. He was a tall, rather gaunt-looking man in his early sixties, with thinning hair and a cadaverous jaw. He rarely smiled, but Christine knew that he had served the family well and that her grandmother had liked and trusted him.

“This is most kind of you,” he said, following her as she led the way to the library. “There are one or two points we may have to discuss, and I feel your grandmother would have wished you to know the true state of affairs in connection with your inheritance.”

“She made it quite clear that there would not be a lot of money,” Christine acknowledged, closing the door behind them. “She didn’t pretend about that, Mr. Tulloch, or about anything. I know that she contemplated selling the estate less than a month ago, when she thought I wasn’t interested in returning.”

James Tulloch coughed and averted his eyes.

“The number of death duties the estate has had to pay in the past twenty years was, of course, the reason for your grandmother’s concern,” he pointed out. “And now there will be more.”

He paused, waiting for her to speak, and Christine said: “You are trying to tell me, Mr. Tulloch, that I am far from being a rich woman, but I already know that. I have not been expecting a fortune, you know. I don’t suppose I would know what to do with one if I had it. I would probably fritter it away on
objets d’art,
so it’s just as well!” She smiled and he smiled thinly in return.

“There will be nothing to fritter,” he remarked somewhat dryly. “On the contrary, I’m afraid that you are going to find the estate rather heavily in debt.”

Christine blinked uncertainly.

“It—can’t be all that bad,” she said. “My grandmother was carrying on—keeping our heads above water.”

“But only just.” He began to take some legal-looking documents out of the brief-case he had brought with him. “I have all the details here, if you would care to go into them. Your grandmother had asked me to make a full assessment a few weeks before she died. I’m afraid,” he added apologetically, “that it is rather worse than she expected.”

Christine bit her lip.

“You’re not trying to tell me that Erradale will have to go?” she asked, but before he could confirm her fear or supplant it by a more encouraging hope, she added: “Because I don’t mean to let it go! Whatever it costs, whatever else there may be to give up, I’ve got to stay here. It’s what I know I’ve got to do. It’s what she wanted.”

“Yes,” he agreed, “that is true. The one rather important circumstance is the existing debts. In a good many ways your grandmother was rather lenient with her tenants, Miss MacNeill. Rents were never collected, for instance, where there was sickness, and the arrears were forgotten about afterwards. She erred always on the generous side. In other matters she was quite a good business woman, but the times and conditions in the Islands were against her. She recognized, I think, especially towards the end, that the island was dying.”

Christine, who had not been looking at him, looked up now.

“You’re wrong there, Mr. Tulloch,” she said, her golden-flecked eyes fully on his. “She would never have admitted a thing like that. What was wrong was me. I wanted to try my wings, I suppose, to wander off to new places, to—pursue a rather selfish desire of my own, and she wouldn’t stop me.” She sat with her hands clasped tightly in her lap, small and straight in the high-backed chair, with a look of Dame Sarah about her that even the lawyer, hardened in experience, was forced to recognize. “I don’t intend to sell Erradale, if that was what you were about to suggest—for the best, I’m sure. I intend to stay here to fight, if need be, and if—anybody has made an offer for my home you can turn it down on my behalf. I have some money of my own, I believe?”

He glanced down at a sealed envelope and smiled.

“A little,” he agreed almost pityingly, “but I would not advise you to squander your personal bequest in such a way.”

“I don’t feel that I shall be wasting my money by putting it into the estate, Mr. Tulloch.” She smiled across at him decisively. “Will you make the necessary adjustments for me and let me know, after that, just how I stand?” They had come to an end of the argument and the lawyer rose to his feet.

“Your grandmother mentioned that this money should be kept quite apart from the estate,” he reminded her.

“She also said that I must use it as I wished,” Christine told him, her thoughts deep in the past. “She said it never had been MacNeill money, but I am a MacNeill, Mr. Tulloch. What other purpose could I possibly use it for?”

She did not expect an answer and he gave her none. He had argued too often with her predecessor not to know that Erradale could demand any sacrifice from the MacNeills.

“May I wish you luck?” he said instead, rising and holding out his hand. “There are one or two documents here that I would like you to sign, and then I must go for the steamer.”

They remained closeted together for another half-hour, at the end of which James Tulloch was left in little doubt about the quality of MacNeill determination.

“I remember your father,” he said, “so well. He was a fine gentleman, worthy of a great heritage. It was a tragedy—a very great tragedy—when he died.”

When he had gone Christine sat for a long time staring at the rows of books which lined the wall facing her, and suddenly she realized that she was thinking about the new laird of Ardtornish. Had he, she wondered, made a final direct offer for Erradale?

Perhaps not. Perhaps he was too busy helping Jane in that other library on the far side of the ford. Helping her and falling in love with her, perhaps.

That was what Jane wanted, no doubt, and Hamish had said that Jane would be a valuable asset to him. An asset where the islanders were concerned, because they would accept him more readily as Jane Nicholson’s future husband than as the stranger in their midst.

When her last guests had waved their final good-byes from the steamer’s rail she went in search of Hamish.

“I was on my way to look for you,” he said. “I have a proposition to put forward!”

“I wish you would,” she smiled. “I’m rather short of propositions at present.”

His look was oddly calculating.

“I think you need someone behind you, Chris,” he said. “Some man.”

“There’s Rory,” she answered immediately.

“Rory’s all right about the estate,” he allowed, “but that’s not exactly what I meant. If you won’t marry me right away,” he added slowly, “at least give me the right to protect you.”

She smiled at that.

“I don’t think I’m the type who needs to be protected,” she said, “but if you would like to help I’m quite sure that we could work together.” She broke off, her new seriousness melting in humorous self-criticism. “Hamish!” she laughed, “don’t ever let me grow pompous! One would almost have thought just now that I was
employing
you!” “Why not?” he suggested warily. “I might even be able to serve you as faithfully as Rory.”

The veiled sneer in the words was lost to her as she embraced this new idea with characteristic enthusiasm.

“It would mean,” she pointed out eagerly, “that we would all be back on the island—you and Jane and Rory and me—just as it used to be, and that’s what Croma needs. Young blood—youth, energy, hope! Young people who can look ahead and not backwards, was how Callum put it. We can’t possibly fail, can we?”

“No,” he said slowly. “This could be a new beginning.”

“I wish we had a bigger margin for success,” she mused thoughtfully as they walked back towards the house. “As it is, there’s not much more than Erradale and our bare hands.”

“What do you mean?” He had stopped in his tracks to look at her.

“Money,” she told him. “I haven’t got a lot of money, Hamish. My mother left me some, but I’ve sunk all that in the estate. After my grandmother’s debts are paid there will be very little left. She was a most generous landlord.”

He walked on in silence, brooding over what she had told him.

“I think you have been very foolish,” he said, at last. “You could have cut your losses and sold out.”

“Sold Erradale?” She stared at him incredulously. “You don’t mean that, Hamish!” She forced a smile. “You would have done exactly the same if you had the same chance at Ardtornish.”

He did not contradict her.

“What plans are you making?” he asked. “What do you mean to do?”

“I haven’t had much time to think,” she confessed. “All I can feel sure about just now is that Erradale will be safe—for the present.”

“Well,” he said almost reluctantly, “it rather seems as though we are in this together.”

It was the beginning of what turned out to be an uneasy partnership. Vested with her authority, Hamish strolled about the estate making enemies wherever he went. Among the first of these was Rory, who came to Christine less than a fortnight later to tell her bluntly that she must choose between them.

“I can’t go on working with Hamish undoing everything I’ve done,” he complained angrily. “It must be either him or me.”

Not quite prepared for such an ultimatum, Christine attempted to reason with him.

“But, Rory, I shall need you both!” she protested. “Hamish isn’t really interfering with your running of the estate, but he has to ask questions if he is to keep the accounts in order.”

“If it stopped at asking questions,” Rory said darkly, “I wouldn’t object, but it’s—more than that.” His face grew red with embarrassment. “This isn’t just a personal thing,” he got out. “I’m thinking about you.”

Christine put a friendly hand on his arm.

“I know you are, Rory,” she said. “But don’t worry.” She hesitated for a moment and then confided in him. “Would it help if you knew that Hamish had asked me to marry him?” she asked.

He swung round, his brown eyes confused and disbelieving at first, and then something seemed to die in them, like a light suddenly extinguished.

“So that’s it?” he said. “Well, I wish you luck. You may change him.”

“Rory,” she said after a minute, “it isn’t official. Not yet.” She held out her hand. “Please change your mind about going,” she begged.

He shook his head.

“I’ll be happier away from the island now. There isn’t room for Hamish and me here.”

“Not even if I asked you to stay—for Croma’s sake?” He did not look at her.

“It’s better that I should go.” His hands clenched and unclenched at his side. “There might come a time when words wouldn’t be enough and I might cause you sorrow by some foolish action.”

“No, Rory,” she said gently, “I don’t think you could. Think over your refusal and try to see eye to eye with Hamish and I will have a word with him.”

She knew that he did not think it would be any good, and when, a week later, Hamish came to the business-room at Erradale House and told her that Rory had gone she could not pretend surprise.

“What happened?” she asked.

“He took a particularly gloomy view of an order I gave,” he informed her with an indifferent shrug. “I suppose we nearly came to blows over it. Rory always did have a fiendish temper. It goes with red hair, doesn’t it?”

“I wish you hadn’t provoked him,” she said without thinking. “He’s sensitive, but he’s very, very loyal. I depend upon him a great deal. The sheep were his job.”

Hamish lit a cigarette with studied calm, blowing a circle of smoke into the air above his head and gazing at it abstractedly before he answered.