The Last of the Kintyres by Catherine Airlie Page A

deep breath. “I heard you driving off just before dawn.”
    His mouth tightened.
    “I had quite a bit to do. Everything would appear to be settled now, however,” he added somewhat grimly. “All we have to do is to get Tony safely back to Ardlamond whenever Doctor MacTaggart says he is fit to travel.”
    Which meant that they might have to stay at Ravenscraig, wasting precious time for Hew.
    “Doctor Mac will be here before ten,” Shona said, glancing at the clock on the chimneypiece. “Elizabeth,” she added, “you haven’t met the boys, have you? This is John, and the one beside Hew, helping himself to a third plateful of cornflakes, no doubt, is Donald!” Her ready laughter was full of pride. “You’ll be meeting Miss Stanton quite a lot in future,” she told her sons. “She’s come to stay at Ardlamond.”
    There was a strange, almost aggressive firmness about the last few words which surprised Elizabeth, but she shook hands with John and Donald without thinking too deeply about it or pondering Shona’s meaning for very long.
    “We’re off on to the hill,” Donald announced, excusing hims elf and his brother a few minutes later. “The Colonel said we could go with him if we were up early enough.”
    “We l l, just you watch those guns,” his mother warned on the swift note of anxiety common to mothers the world over. “No larking, remember!”
    “Nobody could ‘lark’ with the Colonel around.” John assured her with a grin as his brother made off. “He takes his military manner on to the hill with him, but he’s really all right!” He made Hew a brief salute. “Shall we be seeing you at the Sheepdog Trials, sir?” he asked eagerly. “Our Gyp has to beat your Wraith one of these days, you know!”
    “I’m not sure if I’m going to have time for the Trials this year, John,” Hew answered regretfully.
    “But the Cup?” Shona protested. “The Laird has always presented the Cup, Hew.”
    It was the first reference to his new status, and Elizabeth supposed that he had not really had time to remember all his co mmit ments.
    “I had forgotten about the Cup,” he admitted. “It was something my father always did—and enjoyed doing.”
    “So we will be seeing you?” John said, delighted. “Well, until then, cheerio, sir!”
    Shona turned to the sideboard with a quiet smile in her eyes.
    “Will you take porridge, Elizabeth?” she asked, “or would you rather have cornflakes?”
    “Porridge, if I may?” Elizabeth sat down facing Hew, who was drinking a second cup of coffee. There was no other place set at the table and she wondered what had become of Caroline. “Has—Mrs. Hayler gone home?” she asked at last.
    “We had to report the accident,” Hew answered. “I took her back to the Castle. There was no point in her staying here when she was perfectly all right,” he added.
    So Caroline had been with him in the Daimler when he had driven it away in the first glimmer of dawn! It seemed rather callous of her to have gone without waiting for the doctor’s final verdict on Tony, but perhaps Hew had insisted. Two unexpected guests were quite sufficient for Shona to cope with, and Caroline was probably a difficult person to please.
    There was relief for Elizabeth in the thought that they would not have to drive back to Ardlamond with Caroline in the same car, although there was torture, too, in the memory of the Daimler speeding southwards in the first magic of the dawning with Hew at the wheel and Caroline by his side.
    She knew that she had no real right to feel jealousy or envy. Hew had belonged to Caroline long ago, and for all she knew the spell had never really been broken.
    Doctor MacTaggart came at ten o’clock and, greatly to her surprise, declared that Tony was quite fit to travel back with them immediately.
    “Let him stay here for a day or two, all the same,” Shona suggested unexpectedly. “The boys will love having him and he can go out with the guns or fish,