Love Comes Home

by Molly Clavering

  “We’re behind the waterfall?” she said in a frightened undertone.

  Danny nodded. “Surely ye’ve heard tell o’ the Tod’s Hole, Miss Magdalen? It was a great place o’ refuge in Covenanting times, an’ that’s the Spout o’ Allander there before ye.”

  “The Spout that we see from Craigrois? And I’ve never been close to it in my life!” said Love, and would have pursued the fascinating topic, but Peregrine interrupted.

  “As it seems we can talk safely here, Buchanan,” he said. “Suppose you explain a bit further?”

  Danny, no longer the sulky disciple of Labour, but the alert soldier, the best scout in his battalion, began willingly. “It’s yon Sir Theophilus Watt, sirr, who’s rented the Hopes. He’s sworn that he’ll no’ have his game frightened by folk going up to the Queen’s View, though nae other proprietor nor keeper has ever stoppit them, and he set on these gentry to watch the moor. If it had been the keepers we could hae bided and argied wi’ them, but yon’s a different proposeetion, an’ they might hae been rude to the miss here, an’ if we’d shown fight we’d have been handled rough. Knuckle-dusters, ye ken. Forbye, it wad do neither you nor me any guid tae be mixed up in an naffray o’ that kind. And forbye that,” he added with a grin, “ye wouldna be wantin’ tae gang awa’ doon the wrang side o’ the Greenriggs an’ end up in Hopeshiels polis-station. It wad be right oot o’ yer road hame.”

  “It’s been a grand chase,” said Peregrine, looking contritely at Love. “Good girl!” he murmured aside to her. “Are you sure we couldn’t have faced it out? Told them who we are, and so on? They must know Miss Cranstoun by name, at least?”

  “They’re strangers to the place, chuckers-oot frae Glasgow pubs,” said Danny. “And it’s rough work they’re after. I’ve seen one o’ the lads they got. He never showed a sign o’ fight, but they bashed him aboot. He hasna a front tooth left in his heid.”

  “Danny’s perfectly right,” said Love suddenly. “Old Watt is a horror, and he and father have had a set-to already, about the march, I believe. Sir Theophilus accused dear old Cleghorn of poaching, too, so altogether things aren’t too cordial, and it would be absolute jam to the old brute to catch me on his land.”

  “When can we move on, do you think?” asked Peregrine with another look at Love. “Miss Cranstoun’s soaked, and though the Covenanters may have been glad enough of this place, it’s confoundedly chilly.”

  Danny peered cautiously out, announced that he would reconnoitre, and disappeared. He was back fairly soon, grinning, to tell them that he had just seen the watchers’ backs going disconsolately over the top of the hill. “Seven-and-six each they’ve lost over us. They’ll be sorry men this afternoon,” he said gleefully. “We’ll can go noo, sirr.”

  He led them by secluded sheep-tracks to the woods which shrouded Allander and left them there, shrinking back into his shell as soon as they began to thank him.

  “It was naethin! It was as much for masel’ as you,” he insisted, and then, as he turned away, a smile broke over his dirty face. “By! Yon was a rare ploy!” he said.

  When Love walked into the sitting-room at Allander in front of Peregrine, she was greeted with a cry of horror from Jane, grins of derision from George and John, condolences from the Scotts, and much sympathy from Kitty.

  “You poor child!” she said sweetly. “You’ve come out in such an odd rash! Really, you ought to take a little care of your complexion, my dear, young though you are. A skin like yours never tans successfully, Would you like me to lend you a veil?”

  “No, thank you,” said Love, even more sweetly, “You see,”—with an arrow-swift glance at Mrs. Mariner’s carefully made-up face, “I can put my complexion, poor as it is, under a tap, and the rash will come off, but nothing else!”

  “But how did you get into such a deplorable state, my dear?” asked Miss Scott hastily, seeing that trouble was brewing. “Did you fall into a bog-hole?”

  “Something like that,” said Peregrine with a conspiratorial smile at Love. “But we’ve had quite an amusing afternoon, haven’t we, one way or another?” And Love, turning her back pointedly on Kitty, who did not speak to her again that week-end, laughed. “By!” she said, smacking her lips and achieving a very creditable imitation of Danny. “‘By! Yon was a rare ploy!’”

  Chapter Ten

  AN ENGAGEMENT IS ANNOUNCED

  As she walked back from a women’s Unionist Committee meeting in the village Jan hoped rather anxiously that she would be able to remember some of the arrangements made for the annual general meeting (with tea), because her mother, whose place on the committee she had most unwillingly taken, would be certain to ask all about it. Pulling a small penny notebook from a pocket of her green tweed suit, Jane turned the pages, studying it intently as she went along.

  “Scarlet sateen,” she read. “Small pot gold paint, glue, paper flowers from Woolworths. That can’t be it!” A slight effort of memory then told her that these odd requirements were for the Guides, who were giving a performance of Snow-White shortly before Christmas. Hastily she flipped over several pages, and came upon the following more hopeful jotting:

  Ask abt. Urns.

  Cakes?

  Sandwiches. . . . Pianist.

  What the connection was between the sandwiches and the pianist, she had no idea at the moment. Perhaps the pianist was to be refreshed for his—or her—labours with sandwiches? Jane racked her brain for some more sensible explanation, heedless for once of her surroundings, though it was early September at its finest, clear skies, pansy-coloured hills, pale stubble fields set with orderly rows of stocks, ripening haws and fiery rose-hips, and a thin golden light lying gently over all.

  “Sandwiches! Of course. I know!” cried Jane suddenly, aloud, but as there was no one within hearing to shake a sorrowful head and think that Miss Cranstoun was surely getting a wee thing saft, it did not matter. Now it all came back to her, with a picture of the close little room behind the hall, where, round the table, sat the group of women, pleased and important, or bored and trying to hide it, according to their stations. Jane herself had secured a seat near the window, a fatal move, since it meant that she spent most of the time gazing out at the valley, lovely under the mellow sunshine, instead of taking any real part in the proceedings within. But she must have paid more attention than she realized, for she could see now Miss Scott’s alert face, her blue eyes looking out keenly yet kindly from under the brim of her plain grey felt hat, the doctor’s wife, alarmingly elegant in black and scarlet, Butcher Thomson’s sister with large red roses nodding on her toque every time she nodded her head, which she did frequently and vigorously, their own gardener’s wife, Mrs. MacKenzie, a homely figure among the more fashionably dressed younger village women, like a hen-partridge among parrots, Jane thought. She could hear again the very words of the discussion about the tea to be provided after the general meeting, for it had been the burning question of the afternoon. The date and hour, which of the political speakers available should be asked to come and give the address, were impatiently and perfunctorily agreed to with hasty unanimity, and then, at last, with an almost audible quickening of interest, as of heavy breathing, for THE TEA.

  Barely had Miss Scott, the honorary secretary, introduced the subject, when a babel of tongues rose, like hounds in full cry on a red-hot scent.

  “Not a purrvy this time,” said the decided tones of Miss Thomson the butcher’s sister, her mincing board-school refinement of accent totally forgotten, and a chorus supported her at once. “Yon tea the Bowlers gave wis a fair disgrace, purr-vyed from Glesca! . . . A wee dry sangwidge an’ a biscuit, if ye’ll believe me” . . . The tea that weak it wouldna hae drooned a fly . . . No’ a decent cake on any plate. . . .”

  “Then I take it,” Miss Scott’s cool, clear voice rose above the tumult, “that we are to do the tea ourselves. Are the Committee prepared to undertake this?”

  “What for no’?” This was Mrs. MacKenzie, speaking for the first time. “G
uid hame-baked scones and pancakes—”

  “Plenty nice sangwidges,” came an approving interruption.

  “An’ we can get the cakes frae the Milton baker. A big orrder like yon he’ll pit his best fit foremost to cairry oot—”

  “Plenty nice sangwidges—”

  “Scones and sangwidges—”

  “Jammy cookies, an’ the tea good an’ strong an’ hot,” finished someone else triumphantly. “And whit mair could they ask?”

  What indeed? thought Jane as she turned in at the gate and walked up the avenue to Craigrois. The tea, finally arranged to the last egg ‘sangwidge,’ sounded sumptuous as Miss Scott called a sort of roll before the Committee, thoroughly satisfied with their afternoon’s entertainment, broke up. “Miss Thomson, egg sandwiches. Mrs. Low, salmon sandwiches and pancakes. Mrs. Simpson, scones and ham sandwiches. Mrs. MacKenzie, girdle-scones and pancakes. Miss Cranstoun, sardine sandwiches, cutting cake, and the two urns that are always lent by Lady Cranstoun. Mrs. Johnston, cookies and rock-cakes. . . .”

  It had really been rather pleasant, the friendly rivalry between famous bakers of scones or pancakes, the eagerness to provide of their best, even if it was probably actuated by a spirit of emulation only, yet Jane knew that all she would find to tell her mother would be that there had been a fairly good turn-out, and she was to provide sardine sandwiches and two of Mrs. Sword’s largest plum cakes towards the tea which had caused such lively discussion. It seemed a pity that she could not present in words the picture so clear to her mind’s eye, but it didn’t really matter, after all, for Lady Cranstoun had attended so many village meetings that she could visualize this one for herself.

  What was important was that she, Jane, was finding amusement and solace in these functions, which used to be a weariness. They could not be said to take the place of John; nothing, she was afraid, would ever do that—or at least, not for a long time—but they filled in the days and occupied her thoughts. Reluctantly she was beginning to admit to herself that her mother might be right in urging good works upon her daughters. So far she had only succeeded in urging them on Jane, for Love, pleading that this was her first year of freedom, had gone off with Violet Graham, in charge of Milly, on a round of Highland gatherings and balls in the north.

  “She’ll be home this afternoon,” Jane remembered, quickening her steps. She had missed Love during the past six or seven weeks, and would be glad to have her at home again, with her singing, her dressmaking, her solemn, clear-cut, absurd young theories. She had gone away not long after the disastrous week-end which the Mariners had spent at Craigrois, since when Jane had heard only once from Kitty, and not at all from John.

  A small, battered two-seater, which looked as if it had been driven far and carelessly, stood in front of the door; a hum of voices drifted out across the hall from the drawing-room. Jane, pulling off her hat, walked in, announcing that she needed pints of tea, find Lady Cranstoun plying her younger daughter and Violet with hot scones and strawberry jam, while listening to the recital of their adventures on the road, they broke off to greet Jane with yells of welcome, and at once returned to their saga, until Sir Magnus, coming in with Maggie, who was at home for a few days to recuperate from the effects of a poisoned hand, asked his wife to find him some papers.

  “You put them in your desk, my dear,” he said, and the two moved away to the far side of the big room.

  Maggie, pouring himself a cup of tea, said genially: “Upon my word, Violet, I believe you’re fatter than ever. You should have stuck to walking. A car is not for the likes of you, it just encourages laziness.”

  “Pay no attention to him, Violet,” advised Jane. “You’ll get quite thin again after your next walking-tour.”

  “I don’t mean to go for another,” began Violet, to be interrupted instantly by Maggie.

  “There? Isn’t that just what I said? Now that you’re bitten with the motoring bug, your legs will just turn into two appendages for dealing with the clutch and accelerator.”

  Violet did not deign to reprove him. Turning a pure and selfless look upon her friends, she said: “I am going to devote my life to Higher Things. I mean to be a nurse.”

  “A nun? Never, m’dear,” said Maggie positively. “They don’t feed you well enough in convents. Mortification of the flesh, you know, and all that.”

  Violet swallowed the mouthful of cake, which, impeding her utterance, had caused Maggie to mistake her meaning, and exclaimed angrily: “I said a nurse, not a nun!”

  “Oh! A nurse?” he repeated unmoved. “You shouldn’t speak with your mouth so full, duckie. And anyhow, I don’t believe you’d find being a nurse much better than the other. They don’t nourish ’em with porter and gin nowadays, you know. Sairy Gamp’s out of fashion.”

  “Well, I don’t know who your friend Gamp is and I don’t care. She’s got a very ugly name,” retorted the ruffled Violet, her nobility of purpose forgotten. “If I want to be a nurse, I will be a nurse!”

  “Do, dear. But don’t forget you have been warned,” said Maggie kindly.

  Jane, who knew how he loved to bait Violet, hurriedly broke in. “Tell us about the balls,” she said. “Love, you’ve hardly mentioned them. Did you have a good time?”

  “A good time?” echoed Violet at the top of her voice before Love could speak. “Of course she had a good time! How could she help it, with her young man at nearly all of them?”

  “Her young man?” Maggie looked keenly at his younger sister. “What’s all this, Love?”

  Again Violet replied. “Why, John Marsh, of course. He took his summer holidays—”

  “I believe they are known as ‘leave’ in the Navy,” Maggie told her.

  “Well, whatever it’s called, he was having his holidays, and mother got him invited to the places where we were staying, and he went to the balls with us.”

  “She would. Trust Milly,” murmured Maggie.

  Jane was staring silently at the equally silent Love, whose downcast face, as she played with a teaspoon, hardly bore witness to Violet’s passionate assertions that she had had such a wonderfully good time. Had John, still hankering after Kitty, who was now safely on her way to China to join George at Hong Kong, been unkind to her?

  “And,” continued Violet, crescendo, “what do you think? Oh, yes, Love, you may sit there looking the way you used to at school when you’d done something frightful and hoped you wouldn’t be found out! I shall tell them, if you won’t—”

  “Please, Vi—” murmured Love, very low, and unheeded by her noisy friend.

  “Why, she’s come back engaged, if you please! Yes, to John Marsh. What do you think of that?” Violet, having reached the end of her announcement and the full pitch of her lungs simultaneously, paused to take much-needed breath, and to refresh herself with another handsome slice of chocolate cake. As she cut it she cast a wary but defiant look at Maggie, quite unnecessarily, for he and Jane had eyes for no one but Love.

  Not only they, but their parents, disturbed in their fruitless search of the inlaid writing-table by the piercing tones of Violet’s voice, were staring speechless at the youngest member of the Cranstoun family.

  Finally Sir Magnus, clearing his throat, said mildly: “Perhaps you won’t mind my asking, Magdalen, if the extraordinary announcement made by Violet is true or not?”

  The formal name, so seldom used, struck like a blow on everyone’s ears with the realization that this was a serious moment. It roused Love.

  “Yes, it’s true,” she said quietly. “What is there so extraordinary about it, father? People do get engaged, you know. You were once engaged yourself, weren’t you? More than once, for all I know.”

  Lady Cranstoun was murmuring like a charm the words which had comforted her all through the summer. “You’re only a child, Love.”

  “Of course, the whole thing is preposterous,” said Sir Magnus, irritably now, like so many fathers whose feelings have been unexpectedly and uncomfortably stirred up. “You are far
too young to think of anything of the sort, Love. And even if you had been of a reasonable age, surely the proper thing to do was for you and Marsh to have told us, so that we did not have to learn of it through Violet’s blurting it out in this—this brusque fashion.” He shot a look of distaste at Violet, who immediately choked on a crumb, and, coughing, wheezing, and crimson in the face, had to submit to having her back thumped by Maggie.

  “Ark! Rk! Rk!” she croaked.

  Love, raising her voice in order to make herself heard, said loudly: “John’s leave was up, father, or he would have come back with Violet and me, and told you the glad tidings. He’s coming over for the night on Saturday, and you can interview him then and play the stern parent to your heart’s content.”

  “Do you seriously expect me to agree to this ridiculous—” began Sir Magnus, but the croaking and thumping as of rugs being beaten drowned him. Angrily turning on Maggie, he cried: “Stop that confounded noise, sir, and leave the girl alone! She’ll choke if you persist in hitting her like that.”

  “She’ll choke if I don’t!” shouted Maggie cheerfully. “Now then, duckie, corf it up!”

  “Ark! Ark!” croaked Violet, now an alarming vision of purple cheeks, starting, streaming eyes, and wildly gesticulating hands. One of them, lashing out at Maggie, caught the heavy silver teapot and overturned it, and a flood of long-infused dark brown liquid poured on his feet and the carpet round them.

  “Oh, hell and damnation!” roared Maggie, ceasing to thump and hopping madly about the room.