Hospital in the Highlands by Anne Vinton Page A

the youngest member of the family.
    Still Robert Strathallan had not put himself about to justify his previous request. He idled the time away talking to various people while Colonel and Mrs. MacGregor made the necessary introductions on the newcomers’ behalf and Flo explained that Fay would probably be late, having been detained in town.
    “I think we’d better warm up with a Strathspey, my dear,” the Colonel said to his lady. “That’s the best way of shaking up the mixture.” He turned to Meg, smiling. “Do you dance, Miss Lamont?”
    “Only ballroom fashion, I’m afraid,” she laughed. “But we’d love to watch, wouldn’t we, Flo?”
    Flo tore her eyes away from the splendor of the menfolk who were present, their kilts—whether bright or braided and brightly buttoned, their lace cuffs and j a bots immaculate.
    “Yes, we would,” she agreed, and back went her eyes to the colorful throng. The Strathallan of Glen Lochallan stood half a head above the rest of them, and he had shoulders that must have been the despair of his tailor, like a Highland bull. His dress kilt, equal squares of red and green with white and yellow intersecting lines, was of a finer material than the one he wore normally, and the plaid—which was more an item of decoration than necessity—was fastened on his left shoulder with a large cairngorm .
    “Ye’re not here to sit and watch,” Colonel MacGregor said jovially. “Your feet will follow the rhythm soon enough. Come on!”
    He took both girls by the hand and led them forward like two debutantes.
    “Here I have two willing pupils,” he said ringingly. “Who’s for the honor?”
    There was no lack of volunteers. Meg was claimed by Michael Lammering, who was not a Scot by birth and so did not wear a kilt, and Flo found herself looking up at the chest of a slim, very young man who was a son of the house.
    “I hope you won’t find me a bad pupil, Mr. MacGregor,” she said rather nervously. “I should know what a Strathspey is, but I’m afraid I don’t.”
    “Don’t worry, Miss Lamont. It’s not unlike the English dance, Sir Roger de Coverley. It’s slow and—we like to think—graceful.”
    “Don’t you think it’s disgraceful, young Roderick, that Miss Essie is without a partner?” demanded a new voice.
    Flo looked up. Her heart did its usual gymnastic leap as she recognized the laird.
    “Sir?” inquired Roderick MacGregor.
    “I think you’d better dance with Essie MacPhie, and I’ll look after Miss Flo. She’ll excuse you.”
    Roderick bowed somewhat regretfully in Flo’s direction and went off.
    “Why couldn’t you have danced with this Essie, Mr. Strathallan?” she asked as coolly as she dared.
    “Because she wouldna thank me for my company, and my eyes would be wandering after you.” He took her arm very firmly in his own and really seemed to look at her for the first time that evening. “Now that you’ve been shown off by our host, Miss Flo, I consider I’ve resigned enough of you to make my welcome good. You’re wearing my tartan, and you’ll dance with me. Unless,” he added, “you have strong feelings against that arrangement?” Her heart soared with happiness as her eyes fell.
    “If that’s all right,” she agreed softly. “I don’t want to keep you from your other friends.”
    “A ceilidh is a mingling,” he explained, “but not quite as free and easy as your ballroom affairs. We usually stick to our partners, and numbers are asked accordingly.”
    “Is there somebody for Fay, when she comes?”
    “There’s an elder MacGregor son somewhere about. It takes a face as pretty as your sister’s to drag him from a bottle.” Somehow they were in a line the length of the room, and on either side of the french windows stood the pipers, magnificent in bearskins, plaids, chequered hose and buckskin-topped boots. The abandon of the drones seemed to put fire in the blood, suddenly, and as the lilt of the tune whined out light feet