Free Master of Glenkeith by Jean S. Macleod

shooting, though, won’t you?”
    “There’s a good deal to do at Glenkeith,” Andrew said. “But I’ll see if I can manage the shoot.”
    Nigel vaulted lightly into the saddle, gathering the reins into one hand as he saluted Tessa.
    “When the mist clears, ask Meg to bring you to Ardnashee,” he said. “You will find quite a lot there to remind you of Italy! ”
    He pulled the mare’s head round, riding off into the mist, and Tessa got in beside the silent Andrew, who drove off without another word.
    “Would it help if I said that I didn’t go to meet Nigel Haddow?” she asked desperately when they had travelled at a snail’s pace for a quarter of an hour. “I didn’t do this deliberately.”
    He took a full minute to reply, and, glancing at him covertly, she saw a small pulse hammering swiftly at the side of his cheek.
    “It wouldn’t make the slightest difference,” he said. “You are not, and never could be, answerable to me for your actions.”
    The words struck at her like a knife thrust, finding that deeply-sensitive core of reserve which had always lain in her heart, making it vulnerable, leaving her open to hurt as easily as she was prone to laughter, and this time she knew that the blow had been dealt deliberately. There was something between her and Andrew—something that concerned Glenkeith—that could never be revoked.
    I won’t care, she thought. I won’t! But she knew that she did care. She cared desperately because she had come to Glenkeith wanting to be loved and twice in the few short days she had been there she had found herself rebuffed.
    CHAPTER V
    FOR the next few days Tessa spent all her time with Daniel Meldrum, and it was not long before he was carried from his bed to sit in a long chair beside the window. Although he had lost the power of his legs, he seemed to have won a strange new contentment out of life since Tessa’s arrival at Glenkeith, and they were wonderfully happy together.
    It was always like that, Tessa thought, when you knew that someone liked you. It was easy to be happy and natural and helpful. It was only when you felt yourself distrusted and unwelcome that foolishness went hand-in-hand with your actions, laying a trap for your unwary feet.
    She did so many stupid things when she knew that Hester was watching in that critical, almost spiteful way she had. Not actually wayward things, although more than once there had been a suggestion of rebellion in her heart at the thought of an injustice, but foolish, impulsive things that could so easily be misconstrued by someone who just would not try to understand. Like the time she had lain in the hayloft watching a brace of partridges eating the hearts out of a row of Hester’s prized winter broccoli without scaring them off because the cock bird’s plumage had been all the colours of the rainbow as he had strutted about in the sun!
    Daniel Meldrum had heard the noise as Hester had let the dogs loose, but Tessa had known a fierce sort of joy as she had listened to the lifting beat of wings as the terrified birds had risen into the air and disappeared over the juniper hedge to safety.
    Daniel’s eyes had twinkled when she had told him the story afterwards, although he had explained how destructive all game could be in search of food. It was not often that they came as far as the garden, he explained, unless they were feeding their young or the weather had been hard. They were very much aware of the dogs, but this might have been an adventurous pair.
    “I was as quiet as a mouse!” Tessa said soberly. “I
    wanted to go on looking at them for as long as I could.”
    “You could have seen one hanging up at the back of the kitchen door!” he told her.
    She shivered, and her expression changed.
    “I don’t like to see them dead,” she said.
    “Then you won’t want to go shooting at Ardnashee,” he suggested.
    “I haven’t had a ‘bidding’ yet!” she smiled. “Isn’t that the right word?”
    “Not too