Front matter (continued 2)

She shook her head.

"I can't, Neil, I can't! Don't say another word about it."

"I'm not asking anything," he said with the humbleness born of a really unselfish love--"only the right to take care of you and shield you and, if need be, fight for you. Malcolm is your brother, Isla, but I'd like to get into grips with him just once to punish him for all these lines that have come on your dear face through him. And if he comes back to the glen I'll tell him what I think of him, even if it should be the last word I speak in this world!"

"It is easier to have one's men folk killed in wars, Neil," she said in a low voice. "Last week Lady Eden was bewailing Archie's death, even though she had his little V.C. on the table beside her. I could have cried out to her to go down on her knees and thank God because he is safe from all hurt and evil. She does not begin to know the meaning of sorrow, as we know it here. I have only one consolation--that my father will never now be able to grasp the real meaning of what has happened. You'll have to help me to keep it from him--to talk and to act as if nothing out of the common had occurred; and you must promise to come and to bring Kitty to see us at Creagh."

"At Creagh!" cried Drummond aghast. "You don't mean to say that you are going to bury yourselves in that God-forsaken hole? Oh, my dear, Garrion may be bad, but at least it is get-at-able. Shut up in Creagh, with the General and with Malcolm when he comes home!--it will be the death of you, Isla."

"No, no, I take a lot of killing. Do be a bit more cheerful, Neil. I'm sure you must have thought the Americans quite nice people. He is charming, I think. He builds bridges in America, and Cattanach says that he is a man of genius."

"He may build what he likes, but if he comes to Achree, whatever the price he pays, he commits the unpardonable sin," he said sourly. "Don't let us talk about him. I'm waiting for an answer to my question. It isn't much I ask, Isla. I promise not to molest you or to beg for your love, though I'll do my best to win it. Why is it that you won't believe in me?"

"Oh, I do, Neil. It is because I like you so much that I won't marry you," she answered frankly, but a little wearily. "You deserve something so much better than a half-hearted wife."

"I'd rather have the half or the quarter of you than the whole of any other woman," he made answer in the reckless way of the lover. "At least, promise me that if you should change your mind, that if things should get desperate, you'll come to me? A word will be enough, Isla--even a look. I'll fly to your bidding on the wings of the wind."

"Oh, Neil, I wish that all this eloquence and this devotion could be given to a better woman----"

"She doesn't exist," put in the lover stoutly. "Now, tell me about Malcolm. What is the meaning of this horrible thing that has happened, and who told you?"

"He told me himself in last week's letter. Oh, yes--he minds, of course, but he thinks he has been unjustly treated. Somebody is always treating Malcolm unjustly, you know; and, whatever happens, it is always another person's fault."

"But it must be very serious, my dear. Has there been any other communication--anything from his Colonel, or the War Office for the General?"

"No--nothing; and when anything comes I shall intercept it," she replied without the smallest hesitation. "What is concerning me most is that, in about three weeks' time, Malcolm will be at home, loafing about idle in the glen, and I shall never know a moment's ease of mind. That's the redeeming feature of Creagh--it's at least five miles from everywhere. But, of course, he can't be permitted to loaf about. He must find some occupation. I wonder----"

She stopped there, however, and Neil was left to conjecture what it was that she wondered. He would not have been so well pleased had he known that her thoughts had flown with a curious sense of restfulness and hope to the man who had just left them. The hated man had said that the business of his life was to demolish difficulties and to build bridges where none had been before. Could he--or would he--undertake the problem of Malcolm's life?

Kitty returned while that question was still lingering in Isla's mind, and, after a little more desultory talk, the brother and sister took their departure.

"Tell Kitty on the way home, Neil," whispered Isla as she bade him good-bye, her fingers aching under his strong, almost painful, pressure which was intended to convey all the thoughts of which his heart was full.

"Give Aunt Betty my love, and tell her that I will pay her a visit before I go to Creagh," she added. "Yes, of course, tell her about Malcolm too, but don't say too much about it, and, of course, outside Garrion----"

She laid a significant finger on her lip.

Neil nodded, and, with gloom sitting on his brow, ascended to his high perch on the dogcart and tucked the rug about his sister's knees.

The next three weeks passed in a whirl of business for Isla Mackinnon.

The very next morning after the visit of the Americans to Achree she had Jimmy Forbes up from Lochearn to drive her to Creagh. The sun was shining so brightly and the air was so soft and balmy that all of a sudden she decided that the drive might do her father good.

He had only just come down from his bedroom and was standing in the doorway, enjoying the air, when the trap drove up, and Isla came down the stairs.

"Where are you for this morning, my dear?"

"I'm going to Creagh. Will you go with me, dear? I have some particular business to do at Creagh this morning, and it's so deliciously sunny and warm and I think the drive would do you good."

"Yes, I'd like to go," said the old man with the wistful pleasure of the child, at the same time taking a critical look at the stout roan cob that had come up from the hotel stable, well and fit for the rough road over Creagh moor.

It did not take Isla and Diarmid long to wrap the General up, and off they went through the pleasant spring sunshine, mounting slowly all the time until they reached the broad plateau of the moor of Creagh, which was the one valuable asset of Achree and constituted its only claim to the dignity of being a sporting estate.

The Lodge stood at the far angle of the moor, about a mile across from the road--a small, bare, ugly house which made no pretence to being anything more than a shelter for sportsmen. It was well protected by a clump of sturdy fir trees, and it had even a fertile bit of garden ground behind, with a small glass-house, and excellent stables. It was furnished throughout, and it was in the care of Margaret Maclaren, an old pensioner of Achree and widow of a former keeper.

She was a faithful servant who attended well to her duties whether her employers were there to see her or not, and she was not at all put out by the unexpected arrival of the trap from Achree.

Bathed in the glorious noon sunshine, the place looked its best, and even the interior did not seem at all amiss. All the windows were open to the sun, and Isla's sharp eyes noted the complete absence of damp, which was her chief enemy at Achree.

"Father, isn't it pretty here?" she asked the General as they stood for a moment in the porch before entering the house. "I should like to come up and live the whole summer here."

"It would not be amiss in the summer, child. Many a happy day have I spent in Creagh and many a jolly night."

She led him into the dining-room--a goodly-sized square room, not unhandsomely furnished in oak, the carpet rolled up in the middle of the floor, and faded chintz covers over the leather chairs.

The open casement windows commanded a splendid and uninterrupted view of the whole moor which, even in its bareness and in the wildness of the winter, had a certain rugged beauty of its own. A low hill rose immediately behind the house, from which a glorious prospect of the whole valley of the Earn could be seen, with Ben Voirlich rising like a buttress behind all the lesser hills in the valley below.

The air was like wine, and Isla's spirits rose as she grasped the possibilities of the simpler life there, in that remote lodge in a wilderness.

She quickly interviewed Margaret Maclaren, and in her company she made a rapid survey of the dismantled house, the result of which showed her that a very few days would suffice to put it in order for their reception.

"We have let Achree for the season, Margaret," she said in the most matter-of-fact voice she could command, "and the new tenants want to come in at Easter. You will thoroughly air and fire all the house, but more especially my father's room above the dining-room. These two rooms will be most exclusively his. We shall eat in the little room at the back, while he has this for his library and sitting-room."

"Yes, Miss Isla, and hoo mony will come up from Achree--of the servants, I mean?"

"Only Diarmid, Margaret. You and he must just manage. I will help all I can. If we find it too much, your niece, Annie Chisholm, could be got. Perhaps this will be necessary when we have Mr. Malcolm at home. Yes--he is coming soon, and he will be here with us for a few weeks at least."

Whatever secret wonder may have been in the soul of Margaret Maclaren, she suffered none of it to be expressed on her face.

Isla was much pleased with her visit and with the possibilities of the house, part of which she had forgotten. She saw that her father, too, was pleased. He enjoyed his walk about the place and constantly spoke of the beautiful view from the front of the house across the moor and down to Glenogle.

"I'll take the reins down, Jamie," said Isla to the hotel groom.

When they were fairly out on the road she turned rather anxiously to her father, talking to him in a low voice which there was no possible chance of Jamie overhearing as he was rather deaf at the best of times, and was almost entirely devoid of curiosity--a trait in his character worth mentioning.

"Father, I want to tell you something. Will you mind very much if we come up to Creagh soon for the whole summer?"

"No, I think I should like it," he answered, unexpectedly. "But you would find it very dull, wouldn't you?"

"I'm never dull anywhere. You saw the folk who came yesterday--the Americans, didn't you? I saw Mr. Rosmead talking to you at the shrubbery."

"I saw them--yes. Who were they and what brought them to Achree? I don't remember having seen him before."

"You haven't seen him before. He's a stranger--a rich American, and I have let Achree to him for six months."

Her hand trembled a little on the reins, and she half-expected either a petulant outburst or some other demonstration of feeling that would vex and alarm her soul and would harm the old man. But when, made anxious by his silence, she turned to look at him, his face only wore the perplexed expression of a child's.

"I don't know for what reason you want to let the place, Isla, or why anybody should wish to take it. But have it your own way. I dare say we could be very comfortable in Creagh unless, indeed, we have a wet summer. Then we would get very sick of it. I suppose the new folk would be willing to go out if we found it not possible to live up here."

"They would be perfectly reasonable, I'm sure, father," said Isla.

Her relief was so great that her features visibly relaxed, and her eyes began to shine. She was getting on famously. If only the latter part of the sad and sorry business should prove as easy to arrange as the first had been--why, then, perhaps she had been torturing herself needlessly. She had scarcely had a good night's rest since the arrival of the Indian mail, and the strain was beginning to tell on her.

"Well, I think I'll get you settled in Creagh comfortably with Diarmid as soon as possible. Then, after you are feeling quite at home, I think I shall go to Plymouth to meet Malcolm's boat. I haven't had a holiday for four years, father, and in the letter I had from Aunt Jean the other day she said they were all going up from Barras this week to Belgrave Square. So I'll take a few days of London dissipation before I meet Malcolm."

The old man made no demur. So great were his faith and his trust in Isla that he seldom questioned any of her doings.

During that week the bargain was concluded with the Rosmeads by Mr. Cattanach, after which a small correspondence began between Isla and Rosmead concerning certain minor repairs in the Castle that he wished to execute at his own expense.

A few days before they removed to Creagh he came down himself, ostensibly for the purpose of explaining to her that what he wished to effect was only a few small improvements with a view to making the home more comfortable for his mother.

Isla at first had resented the idea. Her Highland pride even got the length of tempting her to write and tell the man that he could either take the house as it was or leave it. But she could not afford to do that, so she relieved her feelings by writing the letter and then consigning it to the fire.

It was, however, a rather subdued and coldly aggressive Isla who met him on the occasion of his coming to pay his second call. But when she saw him, she was ashamed that she had written that letter and was glad that she had had the sense to burn it.

"I thought that I had better come instead of writing in reply to your last letter, Miss Mackinnon," he said presently. "We were getting adrift from the main issue. I want to explain that I don't propose to make any structural alterations on the house. The stove that I wrote about is an American invention for the heating of unsatisfactory country houses where, for some reason or other, the ordinary heating is difficult to arrange. It will greatly add to my mother's comfort while she is here, and it can be taken away when we leave. It will not harm the house but, on the contrary, will benefit it by drying it up. I think you mentioned to my sister that it was a little damp."

"It is very damp in parts," said Isla stoutly. "I am not seeking to deny it. I am sorry I wrote like that about the stove. You see," she added with her wandering smile which to him was wholly pathetic, "I am new to the business of house-letting, and you must be patient with me."

Her brief anger and irritation vanished under his clear, kind gaze, and the immensity of comfort and strength that seemed to be created by his very presence.

"You may trust me to do nothing which would alter the house out of your recognition," he said gently. "My mother is an old lady, and her chest is weak. It is absolutely necessary that she be kept warm and that no damp should be allowed to come near her. We are charmed with the house and with the kindness which you showed to us that day we came. My sister has never ceased to talk about it, and my mother is looking forward very much to making your acquaintance."

"Thank you, but at the moor of Creagh we shall be very much out of the way," said Isla softly.

"A quick and strong car annihilates distance," he reminded her.

But she made a quick little gesture of dissent.

"I think the moor of silence would beat it," she answered. "Well, I am taking my father up to Creagh next Monday, and when I have settled him in it I am going to London for a few days. The house will be quite empty and ready for you from next Monday, and I hope that you will not find it disappointing. At least I haven't embroidered any of the facts."

"You are going to London?" he said, as if surprised.

"Yes, I have to meet my brother's boat at Plymouth. He is returning from India."

"A soldier?" he ventured to ask, remembering the General's rank and wondering at the dull flush that rose to her face.

"Yes. But I think he may leave the Army for good. My father's health is so very frail. Nothing can be settled, however, till my brother comes home," she answered, hating herself for the prevarication that her clear conscience told her was nothing short of a lie.

But the pride in her burned high, and she would not demean herself to this man who, with all his pleasant ways and curious suggestion of power and strength, was only a rich, new-made American, who could never be expected to understand any of the feelings that lay deep in the heart of a Mackinnon of Achree.

As for Rosmead, he only smiled inwardly, attracted by her moods, which were as changeful as the face of Loch Earn. He was a builder of bridges, and the conquering of obstacles was, as he had told her, his business.

He could bide his time.

CHAPTER VI

THE HOPE OF ACHREE

When the "Jumna," an old troopship which had been fitted out for second-rate traffic from India, slowly approached her mooring in Plymouth Dock, Malcolm Mackinnon, smoking at the rail, ran his eyes along the waiting queue of expectant people at the landing-stage without the remotest expectation of seeing anybody belonging to him there. He knew the limitations of life in Glenogle, and how very little journeying to and fro on the face of the earth fell to the inmates of Achree.

He did not resemble the Mackinnons in appearance. He was short and thick-set, with his head set squarely on his shoulders, and he had a ruddy, sun-burned face, a pair of light blue eyes, a shifty mouth, and hair with more than a touch of red in it. He was very like his mother who had wrought confusion in Achree.

Isla, of course, did not know the full tragedy of her father's sad married life. Only she did know that she had been often impressed with the feeling and conviction that Malcolm was alien to Achree.

He might have been a changeling, so much did he differ in everything from any Mackinnon among them. Yet he had looks of a kind and a certain way with him which won people and made them, even against their better judgment, forgive him. This is a dangerous possession for a man who is not endowed with a very high sense of responsibility. It may at once be said that on more than one occasion Malcolm Mackinnon had traded on this happy-go-lucky, winning way of his.

When he saw Isla waving to him he gave a great start of surprise, which was almost chagrin. He had made several appointments in London, where he had intended to spend a few pleasant days before his liberty should be curtailed at Achree. His sister's presence would make these days difficult, if not impossible. Then the wild thought flashed through him that perhaps it meant that something had happened to his father. A month is a long time in a frail old man's life, and no one knew what a day might bring forth.

But Isla was not in mourning, and her face was as serene as usual. It would be unjust to say that he wished for his father's death, but certainly had he arrived in Scotland to find himself Laird of Achree, instead of merely heir to it, it would have made a material difference to his immediate comfort as well as to his prospects. For his affairs were in a tangle from which he did not know how he was going to extricate himself.

But now he had to meet the first stage in the coming of the inevitable Nemesis in the shape of Isla, whose frank tongue he knew of yore. He was fond of her in a way, and admired her greatly. He even wondered what all the men were thinking of that she remained unmarried at twenty-five. When he got nearer to her he saw that she had aged but little, while he himself had grown fat and gross, as will a man of his build who is fond of drink and of good living.

"Isla, how awfully good of you to do this! I never expected to see you or any of our ilk here," he exclaimed in greeting. "How on earth did you manage it, and how is the old man?"

"Father is very well. I thought I had better come to meet you, because there are heaps of things to explain; and besides, I felt that I wanted just a few days' change. I'm at Belgrave Square."

His face immediately fell. He did not like his Barras cousins, nor did they like him. Nay, they highly disapproved of him and all his works, and it was, he felt, positively cruel of Isla to have laid him open to the cross-questioning of the whole clan at the very moment of his arrival in England.

"In the circumstances you might have spared me that lot, Isla," he said with the gloom on his face that she remembered so well. "I won't go to Belgrave Square--so there!" he added positively. "There is a small cheap hotel off the Strand will do me--that is, if I don't go up north to-night."

"I haven't told them anything," said Isla quietly. "They only know that you are coming home, and, fortunately for me, they don't seem a bit curious. Aunt Jean was the only one who remarked about your getting leave so soon again. You can please yourself about going to the little hotel to sleep, but I promised that you should dine at Belgrave Square to-night."

"Oh, well, if they don't know anything and won't ask awkward questions," he said with a breath of relief, "I don't mind going."

"I had some difficulty in preventing Marjorie and Sheila from coming down. If they hadn't had a fitting for a Court frock they would have insisted on it. Sheila is going to be presented at the next drawing-room--on 7 May."

"Oh!" said Malcolm, but his interest was of languid order. "Well, I'd better see about my stuff. I haven't much. I sold out all I could before I left. There are always hard-up beggars in the regiment willing to buy, and I knew I shouldn't want much in the glen."

Again he spoke with airy inconsequence, as if nothing was of any great importance. Isla was quite conscious of a vivid and growing resentment. As she watched his strong, well-knit figure busy among the few traps which he was instructing one of the porters to collect, she wondered how he dared to be so regardless as he was. A grown man with a man's strength and ability of a kind--yet nothing but a burden and a care to other folks, to frail folks like an old man and a young woman. The inequality and injustice of it imparted a most unusual hardness to her face. She was hardly disappointed, however, because Malcolm had always held his sins of omission and commission lightly and feared only their consequences.

But in his heart of hearts he did feel his latest disgrace. A certain dogged dourness, however, would not permit him to show it.

After his meagre baggage had been collected there was still no sign of the boat-train leaving, so they paced the platform from end to end, talking together in low, eager tones, indicative of the deep interest of the subject under discussion.

"How long do you intend to stop in London?" he asked.

"I only came down to meet you. I thought we might go home on Friday."

"Oh well, if you like," he said, but she saw his face fall.

"I don't like to leave father any longer. He was very good about my coming, and Kitty Drummond was to go over to Creagh every day while I am away."

"To Creagh, you say! Who's there now, then?"

"We are. I have let Achree to some rich Americans, and they went into residence yesterday, I believe, or at least partly. They are doing a lot to the house, but their tenancy dates from Easter."

Malcolm stood still on the wooden pavement and stared at her in genuine dismay.

"You've let Achree, you say! In Heaven's name what for, and who gave you leave?"

"Nobody gave me leave. I took it; and you are the last person who ought to ask why," she made answer rather passionately.

"But--but--" he stuttered, "whatever did the governor say?"

"He said very little one way or other. I'm not even sure if he grasped the fact. But at least he was quite pleased to go to Creagh."

"To Creagh--to that little one-horse place! Do you mean to say that you propose to live there, then?"

"We are living there," she answered steadily.

"And you did this on your own, Isla? Well, I think you had a jolly good cheek. The decent thing would have been to wait till I came home at least. You won't deny, surely, that I have a say in it."

"I don't know about the say. What I did know was that if you came home the bargain would probably never have been concluded."

"But what was it for, anyway?"

She turned her small proud head to him, and her clear eyes flashed.

"Malcolm, I do really wonder what you are made of."

"Flesh and blood like other folks, and I can't get away from this. How much are they paying?"

"Five hundred a year with the shooting, and we propose to live on three and to lay bye the other two to help to pay off those terrible obligations you spoke of in your letter, which has kept me awake more or less since ever it came."

He laughed airily.

"Now that's just like a woman--to imagine that the practice of small and most beastly uncomfortable economies could do any good! Have you reckoned out that it will take ten years at the rate you speak of to get me clear? Most of us will be dead by that time."

"The train is going, thank God," said Isla in a high, clear, outraged voice. "Let us get in. I don't want to talk any more to you, Malcolm--either now or at any other time. You--you are outside the pale."

"Now take it easy, old girl. I made a clean breast of it all just to show you that I was really penitent; and of course I wasn't to blame for getting chucked. Any fool in the Thirty-fifth will tell you that. But this little attempt to pull the financial wires does strike a chap as rather comical. What did old Cattanach say? I suppose he's still at the helm--worse luck for me."

"Yes, he is. I gave him your letter, Malcolm."

"The deuce you did! Then you shouldn't have done it. He's a fossil--knows nothing about life. But there--don't let us quarrel about such things. I am jolly glad to see you, old girl. And now I'll relieve you of all these beastly sordid cares. But Creagh, good Lord!--and not a bit of horse-flesh on the premises, I could bet my bottom dollar! I think I must try and rake up a motor-bike before I leave town; otherwise it will be like being buried alive."

The guard was calling London passengers to take their seats, and they made haste into the nearest compartment, which quickly filled up so that no further talk of a private nature was possible. Isla was glad of it. She had had enough.

As she sat opposite to her brother who, immediately the train started, composed himself in his corner for a sleep, she had ample time to study his face. That study filled her with a great and growing sadness. He was just over thirty, and in all these years there were few well-spent days. As a boy he had been a care and trouble to his people and to his schoolmasters, and, in these respects, the boy had been father to the man.

She thought again with a little, faint, passing sight of envy of the gallant boy whom the Edens had given to their country, who had died a hero's death upon the field. She told herself that had such a fate been Malcolm's she could have thanked God for it. Then she drew herself up with a little shudder, remembering sharply certain Bible words which had no uncertain sound--"Whoso hateth his brother is a murderer."

She did not hate him--only her heart was very tired and full of fear for the future.

That night, at the hospitable table of his uncle in Belgrave Square, Malcolm shone with the best of them. He was on his mettle, and he exerted himself to please, showing a nice deference to his stately aunt as well as to his jolly uncle, and he made himself perfectly adorable to his cousins.

Isla felt herself quite put in the background, but she did not mind. It was even a relief not to think, but just to sit still and let Malcolm's false light shine. Soon enough they would have to know what had happened, and then she knew that her Aunt Jean would never forgive him.

She came into Isla's room that night when the girl was brushing her hair, and, touched by the expression on her face, put a kindly question.

"What is it, dear child? Don't you feel very well? You haven't looked like yourself all day."

"I'm all right, Aunt Jean," Isla answered, but she did not meet her aunt's eyes.

"Malcolm is simply splendid! How improved he is! What charming manners! After all, the Army is the place for boys like Malcolm. Do you remember what an anxiety he used to be to your father in the old days? How proud of him he must be now!"

Isla did not answer--she simply could not. She felt as if she must scream out loud.

"Your uncle is delighted. They've been having a long talk in the smoking-room. Must you really hurry away on Friday, dear? We should simply love to have you and Malcolm for another week. I could get up a little dance for Malcolm. That sort of impromptu affair is often most enjoyable and it really seems a shame to go and bury him in Achree, or rather in Creagh, for so long."

"I can't stop, Aunt Jean. You know how father is. He is really quite frail, and I should not have an easy mind after Friday, but Malcolm can stop if he likes."

"I must ask him. How long has he, do you know?"

"You can ask him that, too, Aunt Jean," answered Ida very low.

"He isn't at all pleased about the letting of Achree. From his point of view, it does seem a little hard. Why did you do it, Isla, when you knew he was coming home this year? Surely it could have waited at least till the autumn."

"It couldn't wait. We had no money to go on with, Aunt Jean," answered Isla.

"Oh but, my dear, your uncle or I would have come to the rescue. What are folk for if they can't be made use of in that direction?" asked Lady Mackinnon almost playfully.

"It didn't matter about the letting, auntie. Everybody does it, and as for Malcolm, he is the very last person who ought to complain."

The voice was so hard that it slightly wounded the woman who heard it. She stepped forward and lifted the girl's chin in her hand and looked down into her face.

"Don't get hard, Isla. It is so unbecoming to a woman. I know that you have had a lot to think of, but now that Malcolm has come home roll it off on to his broad shoulders. It is what broad shoulders are given to our menfolk for. And, above all, don't get thinking that nobody can do things except yourself. Don't you think you're just a wee bit inclined that way, Isla?"

"Yes, I am all that way," answered Isla stolidly. "I fully admit it. But don't imagine I like it, Aunt Jean. The thing that I most want in this world is peace, and I can't get it. Good night, auntie. I'm sorry that I'm so disappointing."

Lady Mackinnon kissed her fondly, yet with a little regret.

"Isla's getting hard, Tom," she said to her husband when he came up a little later. "It's very bad for a girl to lose her mother, though in Isla's case, of course, it would have been worse if her mother had been spared. Don't you notice how hard and dull she has got to be of late? What a pity she couldn't marry! She used to be quite pretty."

"Used to be, Jean! What are you talking about?" asked Sir Tom rather irritably. "She's pretty yet, with the sort of beauty that a man doesn't tire of, and she's clever too. Depend on it, if Isla's hard she has had something to make her so. Malcolm's charming, of course, and much improved, but just once or twice to-night I felt that he didn't ring true."

"Nonsense, Tom. We have been out of the world too long and haven't marched with the times. I should like them to stop for a week or two, but Isla won't hear of it. She says she must go on Friday."

"Let Isla alone. She knows her own business best. As for Malcolm, please yourself, but I haven't got at the bottom of the meaning of this leave of his yet. It's unusual. I shouldn't wonder to hear that there is something behind it."

Lady Mackinnon did not take her husband's words at all seriously. She had no son, and her heart warmed to Malcolm, and she fell asleep, thinking how blessed she would have been among women had he been hers. Another of the mistakes this into which poor humanity, seeing through a glass darkly, is so liable to fall!

Next morning Isla left the house about eleven o'clock to go to an obscure street on the other side of Bayswater for the purpose of calling on an old servant at Achree, who had married a butler, and who now conducted a small boarding-house off the Edgeware Road.

It was a lovely spring morning, and she said she would prefer to walk across the Park. She greatly enjoyed that walk. The wide spaces of the Park, the enchanting glimpses through the trees which, though still bare, were beautiful with the sun upon their delicate tracery of branch and bough, seemed to fill her soul.

She did not greatly care for London life, and she often wondered a little at her cousins' enthusiasm over balls and routs, and all the treadmill of fashionable society. They were so excited over their Court frocks that their dreams were haunted by chiffons and festoons of lace and Court trains hung from slender shoulders.

Isla indeed was far too grave for her years. She had been cheated of her youth. Even she herself did not know what possibilities for frivolity and fun her nature held, nor how gay she could have been had not care, like a gaunt spectre, walked so long by her side.

Her discomfort about Malcolm was keen this morning. Even the gracious influence of the sun could not altogether banish it. But it helped, and her face looked very sweet under the brim of her simple hat, and more than one pair of eyes filled with admiration as she passed.

She left the park at the Marble Arch, crossed the road, and made her way along the Edgeware Road to Cromar Street, where Mrs. Fraser lived. It was not her first visit, and Agnes having been apprised of her coming, was on the doorstep to welcome her.

"There ye are, Miss Isla--a sight for sair een! I have been so put about wi' joy all this morning that I have not been able to do my work. How are you, and how is all at dear Achree?"

"So, so, Agnes," answered Isla with a smile as she grasped the faithful servant's hand and passed across her hospitable threshold. "You look wonderfully well. I hope that Fraser is too, and the children, and that everything is going right with you?"

Isla possessed to the full the faculty of binding those who served her to her with hooks of steel, she was so sweetly kind and interested in everything concerning them. Yet she held their respect, and no servant, even the least satisfactory, had ever been known to presume in the smallest degree upon any kindness shown.

She sat down in Agnes Fraser's ugly, heavy dining-room, which reeked of stale tobacco smoke, but which represented the greater part of her living, being let, with bedroom accommodation, to two permanencies who paid her well. And there Isla listened to the whole recital of the good woman's affairs. It occurred to Agnes only after Isla had gone, at the end of an hour's time, that she had really heard very little about Achree.

As Isla had risen to depart, she had said with a smile: "If you are coming to the glen this summer, Agnes, you will have a longer walk to get to us. We have gone to live at Creagh for the season, and Achree is let to some Americans."

Agnes looked the dismay she felt, but abstained from comment and only remarked that she hoped they had made Creagh comfortable, and that they would not find it too dull.

But after the door was shut upon her visitor she wept tears of sorrow because the glory was departed from Achree.

Her last duty done, Isla's thoughts as she left the house began to revert with persistent longing to the glen. She had neither part nor lot in cities, and she could not understand the craze that people had for this great, overgrown London, where folk were always in a hurry and falling over one another in their haste.

Mrs. Fraser's house was well up the street, and Isla, walking quite fast and wrapped up in her own thoughts, had no eyes for any of those who passed her. But presently she came to the corner house of a little street near the Marble Arch end of the road. The door opened as she passed, and two persons came out, so close upon her that she could not but notice them.

Then her heart gave a sickly bound, and she sped on without once looking back.

It was Malcolm who came out of that house, and there was with him a woman, an impossible woman--that was the impression Isla carried away--a large, tall person, with an abundance of yellow hair and an enormous black hat perched upon it. Handsome in a way she might be, and her smile as she had made some jesting remark to her companion had been dazzling.

But it did not dazzle Isla. She grew cold all over, and, without waiting on her better judgment, which might have urged some quite simple explanation, she jumped to the conclusion that Malcolm had some entanglement which was at the bottom of his downfall.

CHAPTER VII

THE HOME-COMING

Having been made free of his aunt's house, Malcolm arrived at Belgrave Square that afternoon in time for tea. The room seemed quite full of people, for the young Mackinnons were a gay crowd, never happier than when surrounded by their friends. Somebody had said that the London season was to be Scottish that year, and there were heaps of their own immediate friends already settled in town.

Isla was greatly in request, and it was about twenty minutes before Malcolm got a chance of having a word with her. He came up to her jauntily with an air of the utmost unconcern, and, as he might have expressed it, took the bull by the horns.

"Why were you in such a hurry this morning, Isla, and what were you doing in the purlieus of the Edgeware Road? Don't you know that's the wrong side of the Park altogether?" he said teasingly.

"I might say the same to you," she answered a trifle tartly, and her eyes, which seemed to have acquired a distaste for his face, did not meet his gaze.

"I was doing my duty--and a beastly fagging bit of duty it was too, a little commission for a pal in India--and, as I'd made up my mind to go north with you to-morrow if you really are bent on going, this was my only opportunity."

It sounded a perfectly plausible explanation, and Isla suffered her somewhat unwilling eyes to dwell for a moment on his smiling face. Never did man look more innocent and ingenuous. There was not the flicker of a lid or a tinge of colour to condemn him. Knowing perfectly well that her scrutiny was judicial, he met it without flinching.

"I did not like the look of the woman, Malcolm," was all she said. "But please, I don't want to hear any more about it."

It can hardly be said that she was convinced, but only that she realized the utter futility of trying to get to the bottom of Malcolm's mind or of ever reaching his real self. What that self would be like when she reached it she did not ask.

But a little later, watching his matchless manner with his aunt's guests and the way in which he held his little court of admiring womenkind about him, she marvelled at his powers. So long as he possessed such faculties of pleasing and could attract those with whom he came into contact, nobody need wonder at his gay aplomb. Nothing could greatly matter, for whoever might suffer or go under, it would not be Malcolm. He would sail--a little unsteadily perhaps, but still successfully--on the crest of the wave, and only those who knew him intimately and who had suffered through him would ever probe the depths of his colossal selfishness.

This was the estimate of her brother at which Isla had now arrived. The trials and hardships of the last three years had wrought a great change in her outlook upon men and things and had made her judgment a little merciless. In fact this was a very critical moment in the history of Isla Mackinnon, and but for the timely introduction of some fresh forces into her life she might have become a really hard woman.

Malcolm airily declined his aunt's rather pressing invitation to stay a week.

"I'll return, dearest aunt, a little later, when the Glen begins to pall," he whispered with that little air of personal devotion and interest which even old women found so charming. "Behold the gloom on Isla's face! She represents my duty. I shall take her home to-morrow, Pay my humble respects to the old man, and syne, if you will have me, I'll be only too glad to come back."

Lady Mackinnon nodded, well pleased.

"Come up in time for the Court. Marjorie and Sheila will never be satisfied till you see them in all their bravery. And we'll give a ball for you if you do come!"

"All right, my lady," said Malcolm with extreme satisfaction. "Fix the date and I'll come."

"I'm so sorry about Isla. I keep telling her not to take life so seriously," said Lady Mackinnon, her kind eyes wandering in the direction of her niece. "As I told her last night, it is you who ought to bear the burden of Achree. It's robbing her of her youth. She has changed greatly in the last year, don't you think?"

"Yes, and gone off decidedly, but there----"

He gave his shoulders a little shrug which expressed much that he did not say.

He dined at Belgrave Square that night and showed another side of him--the grave, quiet, attentive side, which pleased his relatives equally, if not even more.

"Why am I distrait?" he asked, when Marjorie twitted him with his quietude. "Well, the windbag was pricked last night. I couldn't sleep in my hard hotel bed for thinking of all the gas I had let out. It was pure exuberance of joy at again finding myself in such an atmosphere after hard service and a month on that beastly boat. Here's to our next merry meeting! Uncle Tom, Aunt Jean--the best of luck and nothing short of coronets for these fair heads."

Then they all laughed, and the last memory of the evening was as pleasant as possible. Next morning the whole family were at Euston to see the brother and sister off, and they duly departed in the full odour of family farewells.

"Well, that's over, thank goodness," said Malcolm as he dropped into his corner. A judicious word and a tip from Uncle Tom had secured them a compartment to themselves, in which they could talk of their private affairs. "Now, it'll be the tug-of-war--eh, Isla? Don't look so glum, old girl. Believe me, there isn't anything in life worth it."

"I don't want to be glum, but I have felt rather mean these two days, Malcolm. Perhaps we ought to have told Uncle Tom and Aunt Jean. Didn't you feel that we were there under false pretences? They would have felt differently, I mean, if they had known that you had sent in your papers."

He shrugged his shoulders, tossed his cap to the rack, and took out his cigarette case.

"Do you mind if I take a whiff? I suppose it would have made a difference, but why intrude unpleasant topics until one can't avoid them? That's a pretty good and safe philosophy of life, Isla--to lie low and keep dark about what can't be helped."

"They will know before you go back to London again, that is, if you were serious about going to them in May."

"Anything may happen between now and the month of May. The thing is to grease the ropes. Now, what earthly good would it have done to have told them the real state of affairs? It would only have depressed them and made us all most beastly uncomfortable. By the by, as we are on the subject, may I inquire how many people in the Glen you have told?"

"Only Neil Drummond."

"That young, unlicked cub! And why, in Heaven's name, should you have told him? Are you engaged to him--or what? There must be some reason why he should be taken into the family's most private counsels."

"I had to tell somebody, and it was in a manner forced on me," she said rather coldly. "But you need not be afraid of Neil telling anyone. He feels it too much."

"Very kind of him, I'm sure. Well now, tell me something about this American chap. Is he a bounder, like the rest of them?"

"No, he's a gentleman, Malcolm."

"It's an elastic term. Do you mean that he wears good clothes and that sort of thing?"

"No. I don't mean that."

"Then, he's a thorough good chap that a fellow might know?"

Isla, with a vision of Rosmead's calm, strong, fine face in front of her, sat back suddenly and began to laugh.

"What's the joke?" asked Malcolm, mildly surprised.

But she did not give him any satisfaction. She felt tempted to say that very probably had Rosmead known the facts of the case he might have declined the honour of Malcolm's acquaintance. She told herself, however, that she must try not to break the bruised reed. Yet there was not much of the appearance of the bruised reed about the airy Malcolm, who looked as if he had not a care in the world.

He was very kind and amusing on the journey, telling her lots of stories of his Indian experiences. More than once she felt herself almost completely succumbing to his spell and inclined to accept without reservation his own estimate of himself.

It was dark when they reached the station at Lochearnhead, where the wagonette from the hotel was waiting for them.

Malcolm elected to sit on the driver's seat and to take the reins from Jamie Forbes, and so Isla was left to her own contemplations in the roomy space behind. She was not sorry that it was so. Once more back in the Glen, she experienced a return of all her cares, accentuated, because the biggest one, embodied in the flesh, was in front, carrying on an animated conversation with Jamie, from whom, in a few minutes' time, he wrested the whole gossip of the Glen.

He learned that the hotel business was flourishing exceedingly, now that the making of the new railway line was coming near the head of the Loch. It had been started only a year when Malcolm last went away, and now they were at work on the viaduct, which had just escaped being built on Achree land.

"If only we'd been a mile lower down the Glen, Isla!" he looked round to say. "We might have had a haul off the Railway Companies, but that's just our luck all through. We miss it every time by the skin of our teeth. Do you mind if I just stop at the hotel and pass the time of day with Miss Macdougall?"

"Don't stop long, then, Malcolm. I want to get home to father as quickly as possible."

She sat with what patience she might for ten minutes while he was inside the hotel getting a drink, and soon after he had resumed his seat they began the gradual ascent of Glenogle. She was conscious of a quickened heart-beat as they came near to Achree; and presently the blaze of its lights could be seen through the trees.

"By Jove, Isla--no stint there!" he called over his shoulder. "Achree has never been illuminated like that within the memory of man. What are they saying about the new folk in the Glen, Jamie?"

"They like them not that pad, sir. They are fery civil-spoken and kind, forpy peing likely to spend a heap of money. They are fery anxious that whoefer hass things to sell in the Glen shall pring them to Achree. There are not many like that come now to the Glen, Maister Malcolm. The most of them do nothing put send for big boxes to come from the store. They will pe well likit, I'm thinking."

"Oh, yes, it sounds idyllic," said Malcolm drily, the meaning of which adjective Jamie did not grasp.

"It seems a shame to pass by the old place. I'm down to-morrow if I'm a living man, Americans or no Americans," said Malcolm to Isla. "Has he any women-folk?"

"I'll tell you about them later," she answered, and her voice shook a little, for she too felt a qualm as they passed by the gate and the little lodge.

It was a long cold climb to the Moor of Creagh, and she was heartily sick of it before they drew up at the unpretentious white gate from which a straight, short drive led up to the house.

Diarmid was in the porch to meet and welcome them, and, though there was an odd shrinking in the old man's eyes as they travelled with a look of anxious reproach to the young Laird's face, Malcolm himself seemed quite unaware of it. He grasped the old man's hand cordially, asked for his welfare, and then passed in to where the old General, holding himself rather erect and proudly, though leaning hard on his stick, was peering through the dim light for sight of his son.

There can be no man who is wholly bad, and the sight of big father--that pathetic and yet noble figure, a brave soldier who had spent himself for his country, shook Malcolm Mackinnon as his sister's appealing eyes had altogether failed to do. He now realized that if his father was ever able to grasp the fact of his dismissal from the Army it would kill him. He should never know, Malcolm swore to himself, as he bent low and ashamed over the outstretched hand and saw the quiver of the thin, pale face.

"How are you, sir?" faltered Malcolm.

And Isla, seeing his expression and noting the tremor in his voice, placed that bit of genuine feeling to his credit and wiped something off the slate.

"Glad to see you home, my boy, though this is a queer little house you are come to. Ask Isla about that. She's the culprit, but it's a very comfortable place, and I like it well. We'll have some happy days here, my son. Welcome home."

"Glad to see you well, father," answered Malcolm, though in truth he did not think the old man looked long for this world.

Then there was a greeting of sheer affection for Isla, and a look passed between father and daughter which told of a most perfect understanding.

Malcolm had a sniff of scorn for the cramped little house and, when presently, with the grime of his journey washed off and his dinner-jacket on, he came to the queer little room for the evening meal, he looked round rather grimly until his significant gaze rested on his sister's face.

"You'll never be able to stick it, Isla," he said in his most aggressive tones. "There isn't room in it to swing a cat."

The old man was in good form. The coming of his son seemed to awaken him for a little space to a fresh interest in life.

"Was there anything brought up from Achree cellar, Diarmid?" he asked as the old servant passed the plates.

"Yes, sir," answered Diarmid, not daring to say how very low the cellar at Achree had fallen and how its precious store had been diminished without the smallest hope of replenishment.

They were very abstemious folks at Achree, and the General, being forbidden all stimulants except a little whisky when he needed it, had hitherto asked no questions.

"A bottle of Pommery, then, to drink Mr. Malcolm's health," he said, with the air of old times, when there had been big parties round the table at Achree and when the wine had flowed at his bidding.

Diarmid looked desperately--imploringly at his young mistress, who rose, smiling slightly.

The Pommery had long since disappeared; but, in anticipation of this reunion, she had laid in one bottle of champagne in order that her father might not be disappointed. So it was brought and duly drawn by Diarmid, who filled the glasses and then helped his master to his feet.

"Welcome home, my son. Long life, good health, and honourable prosperity to you and to Achree. God bless you and make you a blessing. Isla, my dear, your best health."

Isla's eyes suddenly swam in tears, and Malcolm had the good feeling to bend his head in honest shame. The General did little more than taste from his glass and then set it down with a little sigh of disappointment.

"It is bad for good wine to be shifted," he said. "Never mind, Malcolm. When we go back to Achree you shall have your pick of the cellar."

The wine was good. The change was in his palate, which had lost its verve. He was very tired after dinner, and his rambling thoughts could not be kept in check. He babbled a good deal of old days, for which indeed Isla was thankful, since it kept him from asking questions about the present ones.

She had dreaded what might happen on the night of the home-coming, but she now clearly saw that her father was less and less likely to disturb himself about any untoward happenings. He accepted everything--a circumstance which certainly considerably relieved the strain.

"He looks jolly bad, poor old chap," said Malcolm, when Isla came down about ten o'clock from seeing him safely in bed. "He can't last long. It was a pity that you didn't let him see it out at Achree."

"He has not got any worse in the last six months that I can see. Of course the excitement to-night wore him out. He will be brighter in the morning."

"I still think it was a beastly shame to bring him up here. There isn't even decent comfort. This is the only room worth mentioning."

"Well, he has it. He is quite comfortable," said Isla, stoutly. "We must take what is left."

"In wet weather, of which Glenogle has its full share, we shall fight like Kilkenny cats," said Malcolm with a grimace.

Isla passed over the vulgarity of the remark in silence, and, after a moment, said quite straightly. "But surely you won't stop long in the Glen, Malcolm. You'll try to get an appointment of some kind."

"I'd be glad if you'd mention the sort of appointment I'd be likely to get," he answered carelessly. "I must say it's very cold cheer you have for a chap, Isla, after three years' absence. If I weren't the most unsuspicious of men I might suspect you of having underhand motives."

Isla, staring hard into the crackling embers of the peat-fire, answered nothing.

"It strikes me from all I can gather that the place wants a good deal of looking into. I'll make that my first business. I thought them all slack when I was home before, and Heaven only knows what they'll be like now. Then, I must be on the spot on account of the way the old man is. I shouldn't like to be out of the way if anything should happen."

Isla rose to her feet and bade him good night. She had had just about as much as her tired body and strained mind could stand.

"Dead men's shoes" were the words that beat upon her brain through the hours of a restless night.

CHAPTER VIII

MALCOLM'S PROSPECTS

It is the mission of the morning to clear the air, and next morning things looked brighter. The sun shone out gloriously, and the air was soft and balmy as a child's kiss.

Isla slept late and rather heavily after a restless night, and she was horrified when she awakened with a start to find that it was nine o'clock. She sprang up, threw her window open to the sun, and leaned over it for a moment to inhale the delicious breath of the morning. She had taken one of the attic rooms for her own, Margaret Maclaren occupying the other one, while Diarmid had made shift with a bed in his pantry.

The attics had storm-windows on the roof, from which you could see across the angle of the Moor and get a glimpse of Glenogle. Also from that high coign of vantage there was a fascinating view of Ben Voirlich, on whose peak still rested the cap of morning mist. But all the little hills huddled around and below were clear, and the day gave promise of being fine.

Margaret, who had been up twice to the door, now appeared with her hot water.

"So glad you had a good rest, Miss Isla. I thought you looked terrible tired last night. The General is still sleeping. Diarmid says he has hardly moved all night."

"Oh, I am glad of that--and Mr. Malcolm?"

"Been out since the back of six and had his porridge with Diarmid and me," answered Margaret proudly. "Now he is asking for his breakfast and inquiring when you are coming down."

"Serve the breakfast. I'll be as quick as I can," said Isla.

She plunged into her dressing with a will. When she got down to the dining-room she found Malcolm in a tweed knicker-bocker suit, discussing the Loch trout that had been sent up from the hotel with Miss Macdougall's compliments.

"I'm surprised at you, Isla. I thought you would have been down at six anyway, giving us all points," he said gaily. "I've been up for two hours and a half and had a tramp across the Moor. It was glorious. Seen father?"

"Yes, he's just waking up after a good night"

"He doesn't come down to breakfast?"

"No. Diarmid is taking it to him now."

She passed round to her place at the tray, and Malcolm admired her trim figure with its slender, well-belted waist, the poise of her head, the glint of her hair, and the clear red-and-white of her complexion.

"You look better here than you did in London, Isla. London doesn't suit you, and that old black frock you had on at Aunt Jean's in the evening was an unbecoming rag, if you'll excuse me for saying it. You could wear vivid colours. I'd like to see you in emerald green--shimmery soft stuff, don't you know?--with trailing draperies round you?"

Isla laughed outright.

"I'm afraid the chances of that are small. The old black rag has been my only evening frock since you went away, and I believe I've had it on only about half a dozen times."

"Poor old girl, what a shame that it can't get pretty clothes! Now, if I were you I'd have them. By Jove, I would, and let pay who will."

"Yes, I know," she answered quietly. "But I've got into the habit of paying for my clothes before I wear them. Well, what are you going to do to-day?"

"Well, the first thing undoubtedly is to rig up a horse and trap of some kind. I'll go down to Lochearn presently--on my feet, that haven't done much walking of late, you bet, and see whether Miss Macdougall can fix me up. It's quite obvious that Creagh isn't livable in unless one is provided with some means of escape from it. What about the post? Do the old primitive arrangements still hold good?--half the day gone before the bag comes in?"

"It's half-past twelve before the postman gets here. I generally walk as far as Little Shuan to meet him."

"I'll get farther than that this morning--probably all the way," he said. "What are you to be about? I suppose you have things to see to in the house after having been away?"

"Yes," said Isla. "I want you to be careful about the letters while you are here, Malcolm. There are only some my father cares to see, and even these do not always interest him. But he has gleams of comprehension and of most disconcerting clearness of vision. Dr. Blair says it is most imperative that he should not have a shock of any kind, however small, and in the last year I have been keeping almost everything back from him. He grasps one bit of a thing, you see, and confuses the rest, and so might very easily work himself up into a state about nothing."

"I understand," said Malcolm. "So, between us, we have to keep him in the dark. That's what it amounts to, I suppose."

Isla nodded. "I hate to see it, but it does amount to that."

"I'll make a note of it. But, now that I'm home, the chief cause of anxiety may perhaps be removed," he said airily. "Well, I'll go, and don't keep my luncheon for me. If I want anything I'll drop in at the hotel. It's possible that I may call at Achree as I come up. Of course it is necessary that I meet this American chap and have a talk with him."

"I suppose so, but you can't do anything, Malcolm, even if you see things you don't like at Achree. He has paid the half of his money."

"And where is it."

"In the Bank at Callander, in my name."

Malcolm whistled.

"Rather high-handed, isn't it, Isla?"

"There wasn't anything else to be done. Father can sign cheques, of course, but I banked Mr. Rosmead's money in my name on Mr. Cattanach's advice."

"But surely now you'll let me take over the business part of the show, Isla?"

He pushed back his chair and took out his cigarette case as he put the question.

Isla looked uncomfortable, and her face even paled a little. She hated the position in which she was placed, but past experience had shown her the folly of trusting Malcolm in money matters. He had certainly not the money-sense nor yet the sense of honour where money was concerned.

"I don't think I can do that, Malcolm. Remember, it is all the money that we have to live on until the rents become due again at Martinmas."

"Don't any of them pay now?"

"One or two--Roderick Duncan and the farmer at Little Shuan. But these are crofts, their rent amounting to only a few pounds."

Having lit his cigarette, Malcolm proceeded to turn out his pockets.

"A few coppers, some Indian coins, and two half-sovereigns!" he said ruefully. "I'm stonybroke, Isla. Have I to come to you for the few pence that I shall need in the Glen? By Gad I can't do that! I must speak to the governor about it."

Isla's face reddened where it had been pale before.

"It's a horrible situation," she said almost passionately. "But don't you see I can't help it? It isn't my doing. Since you left we have lived on next to nothing at Achree. We haven't bought any butcher's meat hardly, but have had rabbits and fowls and game of our own killing and the everlasting trout. I never get any new clothes, as you have already observed and remarked upon."

"But now that the American has paid you should be a little rougher."

"I'm going to save that money to pay off the mortgage and the--the other money you owe," she said quite quietly, and he had no idea what fires blazed beneath that calm exterior. "You'll have to find something to do, Malcolm, and that soon. You must see that for yourself."

"I see that I'm to have a jolly rotten time here," he said gloomily. "I must write to Cattanach and tell him to look out an agent's place of some kind for me."

"But you don't know anything about land or estate management, Malcolm."

"I know as much as some of the fellows of my acquaintance who fill fat billets. Meanwhile, I simply must have a fiver, Isla. I shan't spend it, but a fellow can't go about with empty pockets."

She rose and, unlocking the old bureau, counted out five sovereigns from the little cash-box in the secret drawer. He took them without shame and even with a twinkle in his eye.

"Pay Saturday! Well, good-bye, old girl. I'll go out on the hunt and see whether I have any luck. I don't mind telling you I'm rather building on this American chap. If he's a millionaire I must try and coax him to disburse a little in this direction. I'll ask him quite frankly whether he doesn't want a handyman about the place. I could take on that job and fill it to a T."

Isla did not demur, but her pride rose again in revolt at the thought of what Malcolm might do. She thought she did not wish to see anything more of the Americans. She would keep strictly to the letter of their bargain and leave them at Achree in peace. But if her observation was to any purpose she told herself that Malcolm would not make very much of Peter Rosmead, who was far too hard-headed a man to be taken in by his specious ways.

She had a good many uncomfortable moments during the day, however, while contemplating possible interviews between Malcolm and Rosmead, all of which fell short of the actual happening.

Malcolm went up to spend half an hour by his father's bedside, making himself so charming that the old man was full of it when Isla came to see how he was getting on.

Then he left the house and set off with a long swinging step to cover the distance between Creagh and Lochearn. He did not keep to the road. There was not a hill-path or a sheep-track in the district with which he had not been familiar since his boyhood. He came out just below Achree, deciding that he would go on to meet the post first and take it as he returned. About a quarter of a mile from the Lodge he met Donald Maclure driving some black-faced ewes in front of him, and he stopped to pass the time of day.

Donald was a large, slow man, with a stolid face and a shock of red hair sticking out from under his broad bonnet, and he presented a sharp contrast to his trig and sonsy wife. Indeed, many had wondered how Elspeth had ever come to marry him and, above all, who had done the courting, Donald being the most silent man in the whole of the glens.

"Hallo, Donald, how is the world using you?" cried Malcolm cheerily.

"No sae pad, Maister Malcolm," Donald was forced to answer. "I heard ye gae by last nicht--at least Elspeth did. She wass oot wavin' her hand."

"I must go in and give her a kiss for that--eh, Donald? Where are you taking that nice-looking herd to?"

"The other side of the little hill," answered Donald briefly.

"Coining money off the sheep--eh, Donald? It's you farmers who haul in the shekels in these days. What with taxes and reduced rents and what not, there's little left for the poor landlord. You needn't shake your head, my man. We'll thrash it out another day, however. But you can't get away from the fact that we can't afford to live in our own house."

Donald pulled his forelock and passed on with a mysterious Gaelic direction to the sheep-dog, which was attended with magical results. He was neither convinced nor deceived by Malcolm's small hints. He knew him of yore; also Elspeth, having the most perfect faith in her big, silent husband, had not failed to confide to him the true story of the Americans' coming to Achree.

A few steps further on Malcolm saw in the distance two ladies, walking together, with shepherds' crooks in their bare hands and with no hats upon their heads.

Their bearing and carriage at once riveted his keen interest. Wherever there was a petticoat Malcolm Mackinnon was interested, and these ladies were evidently strangers to the Glen.

One was very tall and slender, the other short in stature but neatly built, and both wore most workman-like country attire with a grace that he had never seen excelled.

As he came nearer the face of the taller of the two attracted him still more. It was exquisitely beautiful, being chiselled on pure classical lines, and the skin was soft and clear, the colour so pale and delicate, without giving the smallest suggestion of ill-health, that he had never seen anything like it. The abundant dark hair, slightly waved in front and worn simply parted over her ears, gave a look of Madonna-like simplicity to the face, which, to Malcolm's eyes, seemed most alluring.

The other was more ordinary, though her face had a certain piquant charm. He wondered who they were and whether he dared make any remark as they passed, but they solved the difficulty by bidding him a pleasant good morning.

Instantly his cap was in his hand, and he would have stopped, but they immediately passed on, evidently slightly surprised at his intention to detain them. He waited only until they were over the brow of the next little hill, and then he deliberately entered Donald Maclure's pasture and crept back after them in shadow of the few scanty trees and shrubs that lined the road--and all just to watch where they would go!

From the next hillock he could see the gate of Achree in the hollow, and, having waited sufficiently long, smoking another cigarette the while, he had the satisfaction of seeing them turn in at the Lodge. Then did an immense content steal over Malcolm Mackinnon. With two such charming inmates at Achree, life which had promised to be like a desert, suddenly began to blossom like the rose.

He hastened on without stopping at the farm-house to pass the time of day with Elspeth Maclure, and presently his attention was diverted by the sight of the new railway track which had gradually crept up the side of the Loch, and which was about to culminate in a big viaduct over the burn at the lower end of Glenogle. He had not a very keen sense of beauty, but, somehow, he did not like the ugly scars on the hill-sides and all the unsightly paraphernalia of the work, though he knew very well what a boon it would be to them when all was finished.

He was still contemplating it when the post-gig drove up, and then there was another stop and an exchange of greetings with David, while the letters were handed over. He glanced at them with a sort of careless keenness, and, deciding that there was nothing affecting him, he handed them back and told David to deliver them at Creagh.

Finally he landed in the Hotel, where he spent a good hour at the bar, hearing all the gossip of the Glen and, incidentally, a good deal that he wished to know about the new folk at Achree.

"I think I met them, Miss Macdougall. Have they passed by this morning?"

"Yes. They have been in here, sir--the two young ladies, but they do say that the big tall one is a married woman that has divorced her husband. I don't know the story rightly, but that's what they say. She is very quiet and seems sad-like. The other speaks most of the time and is very lively. The old lady I have never seen, but they do say that they are a most superior kind of folk and not like some of them we get in the Glen in the shooting season."

"Do you happen to know whether Mr. Rosmead himself is in the Glen to-day?"

"No, he iss not, sir, for the motor went by with him for the nine o'clock train and syne came back empty."

"Well, I'm not supposed to know, so I think I'll call at the place as I go up. I have a good enough excuse anyhow, as I have been away so long."

And thus it came about that this bit of information did not deter Malcolm from doing that which he had in his mind.

About half-past twelve he passed through the familiar gateway to Achree and made his way to the house. His pulses scarcely stirred as he did so. The place of his fathers made no appeal to him. It was merely stone and lime, and if it had been in his power he would have sold it for hard cash to any purchaser. In fact, the thought uppermost in his mind as he approached the door was that, having once caught the millionaire, he might find it worth while to keep him. He determined to make himself, somehow, master of the law of entail in order to discover whether there was any loophole of escape from the disability to sell it. Not in his father's lifetime, of course. But when Isla and he should be left, of what use would this great, rambling, uncomfortable old house and its attendant acres of hungry moor and hill be? Far better convert it into the money with which they could enjoy life, making choice in the whole wide world of a place of abode.

A woman-servant opened the door to him, and in answer to his inquiry, informed him that Mr. Rosmead was not at home. Malcolm's sharp eyes noted in the hall beyond the flutter of a petticoat, and as he turned to go he purposely raised his voice.

"I am sorry that I've not a card on me. Will you be so kind as to tell him that Mr. Malcolm Mackinnon from Creagh called to see him and that he will call another day?"

"Yes, sir," said the girl.

But at that moment the figure within came towards the door. It was Sadie, who, having heard the name, advanced with an insatiable curiosity. She extended a very frank hand.

"So you are Mr. Mackinnon that was expected home from India," she said, showing her dazzling teeth in her smile. "Won't you come in and have a bit of lunch with my sister and me? We shall be alone, as my mother does not yet come down."

"Thank you, Miss Rosmead. But that would be presuming on a very slight acquaintance--in fact, none at all, wouldn't it?"

"Oh, but we know your sister and that perfectly dear old father of yours, and, anyway, this is your house and you must want to have a look at the old place after having been away so long. I've no doubt you are hating us for being here. Come in. Oh, Vivien, do come here! It was Mr. Mackinnon whom we met on the road, and I am asking him to lunch."

Malcolm passed into the house, hat in hand, and was duly introduced to Mrs. Rodney Payne. Seen at closer quarters, she was even more beautiful than he had thought. The still repose of her manner contrasted strongly with her sister's vivacity and seemed from the first to cast a sort of spell over Mackinnon.

"We shall be happy if you will stay to luncheon, Mr. Mackinnon," she said, obeying the instructions from Sadie's eyes. "My brother will be very sorry to have missed you. He has gone to the Forth Bridge to-day to meet the contractors there and have a talk with them. It seems it is the annual inspection--or something. Anyway, Peter had an invitation to go. He won't get back till quite late, perhaps not even until to-morrow."

Malcolm Mackinnon did not care. He was in no hurry to meet Mr. Hylton P. Rosmead so long as there was such a charming substitute to take his place. He wouldn't have hesitated about making this glib compliment to another woman, but there was something about Vivien Rosmead which repelled any attempt at even the slightest familiarity. She held herself aloof, and her mouth, made for sweetness, seemed as if it were chiselled in marble. Malcolm wondered what the experience had been that had given her that petrified expression, and he longed to be the man to melt her heart.

Sadie, as usual, did the talking and proved herself an admirable hostess. But while he answered her gay badinage it was Vivien who had his whole admiration. He noticed how little she ate and that her eyes had in them a far-away look which seemed to detach her from the common things of life. Yet she was not dull. A word now and then indicated that she was not by any means dead to the possibilities of life or to the interests of everyday.

"We like your sister so much, Mr. Mackinnon," she said with a sudden warm flash of interest when Sadie left a moment's breathing space. "We hope that she is going to allow us to be friendly with her."

"Oh, yes, of course. Why not? She will be only too pleased, I'm sure," murmured Malcolm eagerly.

"She was so kind about letting us come here in a hurry that we can never forget it. And it is so lovely to see her with your father."

As she spoke of the old General, Vivien's eyes grew large and pitiful, more and more like those of the Madonna.

"It's even more lovely to find how adored she is in the Glen, in all the glens," said Sadie the irrepressible. "Everywhere you hear nothing but her praises. Don't you find it a little hard, Mr. Mackinnon," she added with just a little malicious flash, "to live up to such a sister?"

"Sadie, Sadie, do be careful!" said Vivien softly. "That is not quite kind."

"It's true, Vivien, and I see from Mr. Mackinnon's face that he admits it. You and I must be pals, Mr. Mackinnon, for I'm just like that with my sister. She's so frightfully good that she ought to have a halo, and she makes all common folks who approach her feel worship in the air."

"I am sure of that," said Malcolm with a queer little bow in the direction of Vivien who, though she laughed, was a little vexed.

"Mr. Mackinnon will think us very frivolous, Sadie. Suppose we change the subject and ask him to tell us something about India. Your British rule in India is so splendid! It stands, just like a great rock, immune from the assaults of criticism. I'm sure all this talk about sedition and unrest means nothing. Perhaps you can tell us about it."

Very little did Malcolm Mackinnon know about British rule in India--as little indeed as any Tommy in the ranks.

"Well, you see," he said with rather an awkward laugh. "I was only a bit of the system--don't you know?--a small--very small spoke in the big wheel. My part was to make forced marches in the night and keep an open eye after stray bullets, and to be all ready when occasion rose."

Sadie's eyes positively glowed with excited interest. She loved the Army, investing it with colour and romance, and in Malcolm Mackinnon she pictured to herself a heroic figure--a replica of the fine old father, of whose valour the Glen had many tales to tell.

But Vivien, the more discriminating of the two, had already decided in her own clear and quiet mind that the son of Achree occupied a lower moral plane than the daughter. Her instinct was very swift and fine, and the feeling of distrust born of that first meeting was never afterwards wholly dispelled.

Sadie, with her elbows on the table, wagged her unconventional tongue and asked so many questions about their guest's life in India that he gave her a very highly coloured version of the same, playing up to her for all he was worth and deepening her impression of the soldiery who had upheld Britain's prestige all over the world.

In the midst of this fascinating talk which proceeded almost entirely between Malcolm and Sadie, Vivien merely listening with an odd air of cool detachment which was almost critical, a servant entered the room with a message which she delivered to Sadie. Since Vivien's return to her mother's house she had taken a secondary place, and, though she resumed her own name, it was Sadie to whom were accorded the privileges of the elder daughter.

"Please, Miss Sadie, Mrs. Rosmead would like very much to see Mr. Mackinnon before he goes if he will come to her room."

Malcolm would have declined if he had had any excuse, but Sadie jumped up immediately, saying that she would show him the way.

Vivien did not accompany them, and when, after a brief interview with the beautiful, white-haired old lady who had Vivien's eyes, Sadie and he returned to the hall-place, she was nowhere to be seen.

"Must you go, Mr. Mackinnon? I don't know where Vivien is. She's like that, poor dear. Her troubles have quite taken the life out of her. You'll come again, won't you? In the name of the whole Rosmead folks I make you free of your own house."

She was so frankly kind and her eyes so beamed on him that Malcolm would not have been Malcolm had he not made quick response.

He bent low over her white, outstretched hand and murmured certain words which somewhat heightened Sadie's colour and brought an odd softness to her eyes.

"I like that man, Vivien. He's perfectly lovely, I think, and all the things they say about him in the Glen are lies. Don't you think so?"

But Vivien, whom sad experience had made wise, answered not at all.

CHAPTER IX

THE MESSENGER

As Malcolm strode up the Glenogle road a little later, well pleased with his day's achievement, he was overtaken by a smart drag and a pair of swift roan horses handled by Drummond of Garrion, whose sister Kitty was by his side.

Neil drew up of course, and there was an odd look on his face as the greeting passed. Malcolm's manner was perfectly cool, even a little defiant. It would certainly have been better had Isla held her tongue, but he was not going to eat humble pie before that big, sheep-faced boy who had nothing but his money to recommend him.

He took off his cap to Kitty, however, who smiled sweetly upon him.

"We're going to Creagh--no, not to call on you, Malcolm, so don't think it. We only wanted to know whether Isla had come back."

"We returned last night," he answered. "Well I'll see you later."

"Nonsense. You'll get up, Mackinnon," said Drummond so shortly that Kitty turned reproachful eyes on him.

There were heaps of stories about Malcolm in the glens, but after all, nothing had been proved against him. And, anyhow, it was not the province of friendship to turn a cold shoulder.

"I'd walk, Malcolm, if I were you. Wait a moment, and I'll get down to convoy you."

"No you don't, my lass," said Drummond firmly. "Get up, Mackinnon. The brutes won't stand--you see how fresh they are."

Malcolm did not hesitate longer. It was three good miles to Creagh yet, and a man doesn't walk so easily after a good meal as before it. He swung himself to the back seat and settled himself so that he could talk to both, but chiefly into the ear of Kitty, whose looks, he decided, had improved.

"Neil's manners, as I dare say you have observed, have not improved of late," said Kitty airily. "He has been such a bear to-day that I am forced to the conclusion that he must have something on his conscience."

Malcolm laughed.

"If it comes to that we've all got something on our consciences--more or less," he answered gaily. "Don't let it put you down on your luck too much, old chap. It's good policy to wait till the clouds roll by."

As to what Neil thought of him Malcolm did not care a fig, but he wished to stand well with Kitty, having proved that women were generally a man's best friends and would champion him, often against their better judgment. It was a favourite jest with him that he would prefer a court martial of women to anything in this world, and that he would never despair of getting off.

Drummond had told his sister only a judicious amount about Achree affairs, and it is to his credit that he had kept the fact of Malcolm's dismissal from the Army entirely to himself even when sometimes tempted to tell what he knew.

It was for Isla's sake that he had kept silence--Isla, whom he loved with a dog-like fidelity that was capable of any sacrifice and any suffering in order to make her happy.

Malcolm was unaware of Drummond's sentiments towards his sister, and if he had known them they would only have amused him. He despised Neil as a man of the world might despise and belittle a boy who had seen nothing of life. Neil, on his part, had the heartiest contempt for Malcolm Mackinnon, and cherished such an honest rage against him that it would have relieved him to have given him a good thrashing.

"You won't like Creagh, Malcolm," said Kitty sympathetically. "I can't help thinking that Isla was in too big a hurry to rush the Americans in. They were so frightfully keen on Achree that they would have waited your time."

"That's what I think, but I don't grumble," said Malcolm. "I've been to lunch with them to-day, and they're quite decent--upon my word they are."

"Been to lunch already, have you, Malcolm? You don't let the grass grow under your feet. And what do you think of them? I really think we must call, Neil. Why not this afternoon when we go down?"

"No," answered Neil shortly, "I'm not needing any truck with such folks. If they must swarm into Scotland, then, let them, but they'll get no encouragement from me."

"Touch me if ye daur," whispered Malcolm with his eyes full of laughter.

Kitty laughed out loud.

On the way down she took the opportunity of asking Neil what had made him so disagreeable to Malcolm all the afternoon.

"I'm sure he's very nice and has greatly improved. His manner to his father is beautiful, I think--such a nice mixture of deference and devotion."

"Fiddlesticks, Kitty!" said Drummond in his grumpiest tones. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Do you?" she asked saucily.

"It takes a man to know a man like Malcolm Mackinnon. I wonder how he can bear to loaf about idle--great big hulking fellow that he is!"

"Loaf about? But he's on leave, Neil, and he has had a hard year of skirmishing. You should hear him tell about it."

"Don't want to--shouldn't believe it if I did," said Neil, biting his lip and conscious that he had very nearly let the cat out of the bag.

He had not had an opportunity of private speech with Isla at Creagh, because he and his sister had found the Edens in the little drawing-room and had left them still there when they went away. The whole afternoon had been a disappointment, and when, as they neared the gate of Achree, Kitty had again ventured to suggest that they should pay a call he refused point-blank.

It seemed as likely as not that Malcolm was to become a bone of contention in the Glen and that very soon there would be two factions--one that believed in him and another that discredited him in everything.

Malcolm himself was the least concerned of them all.

The weather continuing beautiful and spring-like, he went out early and stayed out late, and they saw very little indeed of him at Creagh.

Isla now heard less of the news of the Glen, for it was a long walk down to Lochearn and her father seemed more than ever reluctant to let her out of his sight. These were rather trying days for Isla, because her father talked almost incessantly about Malcolm, praising him to the skies and predicting a glorious future for him.

As the days went by and no letter or communication of any kind came from India or from the War Office, and as no intimation regarding Malcolm's withdrawal from the Army had been seen in any of the newspapers, Isla began to cherish the hope that they had heard the last of it. Of course Malcolm might have intercepted any that had been sent, but if he had done so he did not tell her. They saw little of each other and there was not much brotherly or sisterly confidence between them. They were indeed working at cross-purposes and, without knowing it, each was jealous of the other.

Nobody would have been more surprised and indignant than Isla had anyone told her that she was jealous of Malcolm's frequent visits to Achree: yet that was the truth. Also, she was keenly disappointed that Rosmead, after all his considerate kindness at the beginning, had never made the smallest effort to see her again. She would not go to Achree unless she was specially invited. So she remained at Creagh, living out the dull and narrow days, her heart full of vague discontent and unrest and forebodings which she could not have put into words.

Four weeks passed away--certainly the longest four weeks of Isla's life. She did not like Creagh though nothing on earth would have induced her to admit it. She missed all the cheery, pleasant gossip of the Glen and the little village, the daily intercourse with her own folk, the give and take of a social life which, if limited, was at least very sincere. Achree and Creagh were evidently two different places in the estimation of her circle, for nobody but the Edens and the Drummonds took the trouble to look her up, and even they did not come often. All the fun and all the social life apparently fell to Malcolm's share.

She was thinking of all this one morning as she sauntered down to the gate to meet the post-gig. She was a little late, she found by the watch-bracelet on her arm, and wondered as she glanced down the long white line of the road, on which there was not a single moving object visible, whether she had missed David Bain.

She had been over at the keeper's house about half a mile distant, inquiring after a woman who had had a new baby and, meeting the doctor from Comrie there, had stopped a little to talk with him. She had assured him that he need not call at Creagh, unless indeed he particularly wanted to see her father--as he had not been so well for years as he had been since they came up to live on the Moor.

Presently she saw something in the distance--a man on horseback, rather a rare spectacle on the moorland road at that season of the year. She thought at first that it must be Neil Drummond, who was the only horseman that ever came to Creagh. But a nearer glance assured her that the figure was a heavier one than Neil's, and, besides, she did not recognize the horse, though she could see that it was a good one.

She waited a few minutes longer, and as the horseman drew rapidly nearer she recognized the figure as that of Rosmead. This surprised her very much. Somehow, she had never imagined that an American man, though even a distinguished builder of bridges, would ride a horse and look so well on it.

Having no doubt that he was coming to Creagh, she opened the gate and stood by the white post until he came up. She admired the ease with which he sat, proving thereby that he was no novice on a horse's back. He looked uncommonly well-pleased to see her, and before he reached the gate he saluted her and threw himself to the ground.