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Richard stared at the big chased silver coffee pot. ‘You know, this whole place is a white elephant,’ he said sadly. ‘Until I started going through things with my father I simply hadn’t realised.... There’s all this land, the house, furniture, paintings, all worth a fortune. But no money. Periodically, my father has to sell something—a painting, a piece of land, something like that, to keep things going. I don’t know which painting has gone to pay for this cruise, he wouldn’t say, but I know he’s had to sell one.’ He accepted a cup of coffee from Rachel and his fingers brushed hers, sending the familiar tingle through her veins and making it difficult for her to concentrate on his words.

‘You can’t keep on selling off family heirlooms in order to live,’ he went on, ‘it’s all wrong; you end up with nothing at all. A place this size should be made to work for itself. I know what could be done ...’ he shook his head, ‘but of course Alistair would never agree.’

‘I suppose,’ Rachel sipped her coffee thoughtfully, ‘this could be the reason he was so against Melanie going to boarding school. The fees would have been yet another drain.’

Richard nodded. ‘And as it was a special private school the fees were very high. Yes, I’m sure you’re right about that, but of course, he’d never admit it.’ He made an impatient gesture. ‘Why on earth didn’t he
say
what was happening? After all, I am his son! ’

‘Perhaps he thought you weren’t interested,’ said Rachel, tracing the design on the handle of the coffee pot with her finger. ‘I remember you telling me once that you found it impossible to work with him.’

His shoulders sagged. ‘Yes, I suppose I am partly to blame. But he would never listen to my ideas.’ He finished his coffee and got up and began to wander round the room. ‘Things have got to such a state now, though, that something’s got to be done. The whole Estate’s running down. I’d no idea until I went over it with him and Ben. There’s far too much for Ben to cope with alone, too.’ He came and leaned on the back of a chair. ‘But there are several things that we could do, just for starters.’ He ticked them off on the fingers of his good hand. ‘We could easily support twice as many sheep as we’ve got. We’ve endless grazing and it’s virtually going to waste. Some of the small cottages dotted around could be done up and let out as holiday cottages, or even sold as such.’ He gazed round the room. ‘We could even turn this place into an hotel— goodness knows it’s big enough, and we don’t actually live in a quarter of the space .....’

Rachel smiled. ‘I don’t think Alistair would ever agree to that.’

‘No, perhaps you’re right. I got a bit carried away. But we could sell the fishing rights in the river. There’s salmon and brown trout .... Oh, heavens, a place this size
must
be made to pay!’ He went to the door. ‘If only the old man would give me a free hand,
I’d
make it pay,’ he added as he reached it.

Rachel’s heart went out to him, but she knew there was no way she could help him. Unless .... Melanie was much better now, one might say, back to normal. What she needed more than anything was the company of other children. School was the obvious answer. Not the special school Richard had had in mind when Rachel arrived at Glencarrick but an ordinary school, such as the other children in the Glen attended. This was at Ardenbeg. There were even facilities for children to board for the week, coming home at week-ends. It would be ideal for Melanie and it would mean she would no longer need a governess. She, Rachel, could return home. Home. She realised suddenly that she had come to regard Kilfinan House as home, and that would never do. It would seem that the sooner she made plans to return to Suffolk the better.

After lunch, with Mrs Munroe and Jeannie gone home and Richard off to a far corner of the Estate with Ben, Rachel suggested a ride and a walk to Melanie.

‘And I know just where we’ll go,’ she added mysteriously, much to Melanie’s delight.

But when she drove the car through Ardenbeg and along the high road by the loch, pulling in at the vantage point above Eilean Dorcha, Melanie began to whimper. ‘Not here. Please not here!’ She clutched Rachel’s hand.

Rachel put her arm round the little girl’s shoulders. ‘Now, why not, Melanie? What are you afraid of? I’ve brought you to this place several times purposely to show you that there’s nothing for you to fear. So why are you still worried about it?’

‘Long way down.’ Melanie shuddered.

‘Yes, but there’s a footpath. Come with me, I’ll show you.’

‘No. Get lost! Leave me!’

‘Of course you won’t get lost. And of course I shan’t leave you.’ Rachel studied the child. Her eyes were big with fear and her speech had reverted almost to monosyllables. There was obviously something about this particular spot that terrified Melanie still. Or rather the memory of something here. Rachel sat quietly in the car with her arm encircling the little body.

‘You’ve been here before, then?’

A violent nod.

‘Who did you come with?’

‘You.’

‘No, before you came with me. Did you come with Rose? Grandpa? Daddy? Ben?’ She hesitated between each one. ‘Mummy?’

‘Yes.’ It was barely more than a whisper.

‘Mummy. You came here for a walk with your mummy.’

Melanie nodded, her little body was tense.

‘That was nice.’ Rachel kept her voice soothing. Melanie had never before mentioned her mother. ‘Would you like to tell me about it? Perhaps you could show me where you went.’

‘No. Got lost.’ Melanie was shivering. ‘All alone.'

Rachel got out of the car and walked round to Melanie’s side. By the time she opened the door the little girl was curled up in a ball with her arm across her face. Rachel was completely baffled. But she knew without any doubt that here, at this place, lay the reason for Melanie's strange behaviour. If only she would talk about it!

‘Now come along, darling,’ she coaxed, ‘show me where you went. I promise you won’t be alone. We’ll hold hands all the way.’ As she spoke she was gently easing Melanie out of the car and leading her to the stile. ‘We’ll go this way, shall we?’ Talking to her and holding firmly on to her hand, Rachel led the reluctant little girl along the forest trail, down rough-hewn steps and along overgrown pathways. Once they came unexpectedly to a tiny lake with the remains of water-lilies in it and an ornate stone bridge by a little waterfall, and Rachel remembered that Ben had once told her that at one time there had been a castle at the edge of the loch near Eilean Dorcha, so this must be the remains of its landscape garden. She spoke of this to Melanie, but Melanie didn’t answer, she might not even have heard, and her hand in Rachel’s was cold and clammy.

Quite suddenly they came to a clearing. Heaps of stones and a low rectangle of wall was all that was left to show that here had stood the castle that Ben had spoken of.

Melanie began to cry.

Rachel sat down with her on a mound of tussocky grass and let her cry for a while. She could see just below her the dark shape of Eilean Dorcha against the blue of the loch and the boats moored in its shelter. From this distance the little lighthouse looked like a toy model. Gulls wheeled and shrieked in the sky, but that and Melanie’s sobs were all that disturbed the air.

‘Now,’ Rachel said, when at last the tears stopped, ‘tell me all about it. Tell me everything, then it won’t worry you any more, I promise you that.’

Melanie lifted a tear-stained face and Rachel detected a plea in the dark brown eyes.

‘I’ll help you. Tell me if I go wrong,’ Rachel encouraged. ‘Now, I think this is what happened. You came to the vantage point with Mummy, parked the car and walked—just like we’ve done today?’

An uncertain nod.

‘You and Mummy became separated and then you couldn’t find her at all?’

‘They hurried. I couldn’t keep up,’ Melanie said in a halting whisper.

‘They? There was someone else?’

Melanie nodded, biting her lip.

Rachel hesitated, undecided whether to press the child as to who the other person was, but decided against it for the moment and contented herself by prompting, ‘But they found you. They waited for you and –'

Melanie shook her head emphatically. ‘Here. Found them here. Kissing. Over there. Kissing and .... Mummy was cross.’ Her voice dropped even further. ‘Said I mustn’t ever say.’ She looked up at Rachel, her eyes beseeching. Rachel nodded and smiled at her, then suddenly, as if this was what she’d been waiting for, it all came out in a flood, the words tumbling over themselves as she opened her heart.

‘I always went with them. They said it was secret, that I mustn’t ever say, and that if I did something dreadful would happen. They often came here. Sometimes I’d have to stay in the car while they went somewhere. He was nice to me; he always gave me sweets. One day he gave me so many I was sick. I didn’t like being alone in the car up here, I was afraid it would roll over the edge, but they gave me books to read and said I’d be all right. Sometimes Mummy would say '
Oh, let her come', if I cried too much, but one day I got lost in the woods and I cried even more because I couldn't find them. And then I did, and they were here and they were kissing on the grass, and he was cross and he said never to speak of it or something really dreadful would happen.’ She took a deep shuddering breath. ‘I didn’t speak of it, truly I didn’t, not to
anybody
, not
ever,
Rachel, but something dreadful still happened.’ She hesitated. ‘Rachel, do you think the dreadful thing happened because I
thought
about it so much? Do you think it was my fault Mummy’s car crashed?'

‘Oh, Melanie, no!’ Rachel gathered the little figure to her and held her close. ‘You were never in any way to blame and you must never think you might have been. Your mother’s car crashed because she took a bend too fast, it was purely an accident. It had nothing whatever to do with anything you may have thought or even said.’ She gave the child a gentle shake. ‘Do you understand, dear? It would have happened anyway. You couldn't possibly have influenced it, either consciously or unconsciously.’ She paused. Melanie wouldn't understand those words. ‘You couldn't have made it happen—even if you’d wanted to,' she finished.

‘I didn’t want to,’ Melanie said seriously, ‘but sometimes I almost wished she'd go away so I didn’t have to keep so many secrets.’ She was calmer now. She sat on Rachel’s lap, her head nestled against her shoulder and Rachel held her close and stroked her hair. Here was the answer to Melanie’s silence; quite simply, afraid of saying something she shouldn’t, she subconsciously found it easier to say nothing at all. And it had taken these past months of patient affection, which for varying reasons the child had never received before, to pierce and finally shatter the barrier she had unwit
tingly put up against the world. Poor little Melanie 1 Rachel gazed down at her. She had fallen into an exhausted sleep, her face streaked with tears, but strangely serene and untroubled. It was as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders—as indeed it had. Rachel turned her eyes to the distant shore of the loch, beyond Eilean Dorcha, to where the heather-capped hills rose uneven against the sky. So Rose had been right after all. Celia Duncan had been unfaithful to Richard and Ben had lied. No wonder he had never encouraged Melanie to speak! Yet one thing struck Rachel as rather odd. In Melanie’s story of her mother’s affair, not once had she mentioned Ben by name.

Melanie stirred. ‘Come along, darling. Time to go home,’ Rachel said with a smile.

The little girl slid to the ground. ‘I know the way. Follow me.’ She didn’t even bother to hold Rachel’s hand as they climbed back to the road, and she prattled happily all the way home in the car.

But Rachel was troubled. How much should she tell Richard of Melanie’s story? Something would have to be said, the change in the child was so dramatic, but how could she, of all people, be the one to shatter his faith in his beloved Celia? On the one hand he would never forgive her—if, indeed, he would even believe her—and on the other it would surely send him straight into Moira McLeod’s waiting arms. She decided to wait a few days until Richard commented on his daughter’s change of behaviour, which he surely would.

She was right. But it was almost a week later that he knocked on her sitting room door about nine o’clock in the evening. She had washed her hair and it was still damp after towelling and brushing, so rather than get out her hair-dryer she was sitting by the fire, reading.

‘Don’t get up.’ He had opened the door and let himself in. He came and sat in the armchair opposite to her, dressed casually tonight, in grey slacks and a black shirt, open at the neck. Rachel noticed that his eyes were very blue against his deeply tanned face. He looked at her without smiling, automatically flexing his injured hand, a habit he had acquired lately. ‘What’s come over Melanie?’ he asked. ‘She’s …' he cast round for the right word, ‘she’s normal.’ He sounded almost accusing.

‘Aren’t you pleased?’ she stalled for time.

‘Of course I’m pleased. But how did it happen? And, more to the point, will it last?’

Rachel leaned forward and pushed a curtain of hair away from her face. ‘I think it will last,’ she said slowly, ‘now that we’ve discovered the cause. It was simply that she was frightened, too frightened to speak.’

‘What was she afraid of, for goodness’ sake?’

Rachel stole a glance at him. He was scowling. In spite of hours of thought she still wasn’t sure how to explain Melanie’s transformation to him without a downright lie. Yet how could she speak the truth without shattering his love and faith in his dead wife? This was something she knew she could never do.

‘Well ’ she hesitated for such a long time that he prompted, ‘Well, go on,’

‘Well,’ she repeated, ‘you know how scared she’s always been of the vantage point on the road above the loch?’

She looked at him. His nod was barely perceptible, but his eyes never left her face.

‘It seems—someone took her there and on the walk down the forest trail she somehow got lost. She was so frightened that .....’ Her voice trailed off. It didn’t sound plausible, even to her own ears.