Free The Last of the Kintyres by Catherine Airlie Page A

THREE
    WHILE she sat by her brother’s bedside in the yellow circle of lamplight waiting for the first flicker of returning consciousness, Elizabeth could think only of Hew Kintyre and the added burden they had placed upon him.
    She blamed Caroline, of course, but what was the use of that? Tony was equally to blame. He was not a child and he knew the rules of the road. He had done this thing in a spirit of reckless bravado, no doubt, and it had ended in an accident.
    Her first thankfulness that nothing worse had come of it was short-lived. It gave way to irritation, followed by something very near to despair. Would she ever be able to curb Tony’s impetuosity—alone?
    Now, of course, she was not really alone. Hew Kintyre’s strong hand was also on the rein, but Tony was the sort who would champ at the bit and bolt whenever he saw an opportunity.
    How well she knew that! The blood ran swiftly into her cheeks as she remembered the look in Hew’s eyes when Caroline had first mentioned the police.
    In all his life he had probably never come up against the law, and now, within a day almost, Tony had succeeded in dragging his name before the courts.
    That, no doubt, was what it would finally amount to.
    She bit her li p, feeling immeasurably ashamed, and could hardly bear the kindness of Shona Lorimer when Shona came to relieve her of her long vigil.
    “Off you go and lie down in the spare room,” Shona whispered.
    Elizabeth looked down at the bed. The long black lashes on her brother’s cheek flickered for an instant and a gleam of recognition flashed in Tony’s eyes as he caught sight of her sitting there.
    “Hello, Liz!” he said faintly.
    The heavy lids drooped and he sighed and went to sleep.
    “Without the slightest bit of concern!”
    Unconsciously Elizabeth had spoken the thought aloud, and Shona looked into her distressed face and smiled.
    “Don’t judge him too harshly,” she advised, patting her hand. “He wouldn’t really remember what happened. He was just so dreadfully tired. He’ll be as sorry as can be in the morning!”
    “But Hew!” Elizabeth protested. “All this is so unfair to Hew.”
    A shadow passed in Shona Lorimer’s eyes.
    “He, too, will feel better about it all in the morning,” she predicted after the briefest hesitation. “It is a pity it happened at such a time, of course, when he was upset about his father.” She drew Elizabeth gently on to her feet. “Hew Kintyre is not a petty man,” she added firmly. “He will not hold this against your brother once he has had it out with him.”
    Elizabeth looked deeply into the blue eyes, her own full of an imm ense gratitude, and in that unguarded moment, while they were both thinking about Hew, Elizabeth glimpsed the secret longing in the older woman’s heart. For years, perhaps, Shona Lorimer had been in love with Hew. They had known each other for many years, and this was the result for one of them.
    How could Hew have preferred Caroline, Elizabeth wondered, when there was someone like Shona in the background?
    She went slowly along the corridor to the open door of the room Shona had prepared for her. All the other doors were tightly closed, the occupants asleep for the night, healthily tired after their long day in the open with rod or gun, and somehow she knew that it would always be like this for Shona. She would spend her life here, at Ravenscraig, welcoming her “visitors” each summer and filling in the long, lonely winter evenings reading and knitting while her little family studied at a distant university, and she would never marry again.
    Was that how it always was, Elizabeth wondered, when one had fallen in love, finally and irrevocably? There could never be compensations; never any “second-best.”
    She could not fall asleep immediately, although she was more tired than she had ever been. She turned her face into the pillow and closed her eyes, aware of Hew Kintyre in every fibre of her being, feeling the