Free The Tartan Touch by Isobel Chace Page A

won’t put his shirt on you and Birrahlee at the Cue Races?”
    I was troubled by the thought. “You mean money will change hands over me?” I exclaimed. “When I’ve only ridden this once! That would be daft!”
    “Daft or not, that’s what will happen,” Mary said cheerfully, “so you may as well grow used to the idea. Or are you going to stop Andy betting on you?” she added slyly.
    “I wouldn’t have the impertinence,” I admitted unhappily.
    Mary looked very pleased with herself. “Just as I thought ! ” she smiled. “Andy has you on a string, hasn’t he?” Her shoulders sagged a little. “I know just what it feels like t” she sighed.
    “Andrew is a fine man,” I agreed.
    “Quite right!” she approved. “You ought to think so. I wonder why men don’t spend more time worrying about our feelings! I’d love to be run after for a change!”
    That made me laugh. “I don’t think you have to worry!” I said dryly.
    Mary looked grateful. “Do you really think so? I suppose Andy told you all about it. It’s a terrible t hing to be young ! Nobody takes one seriously, even when I know what I want!”
    “And you want him?” I asked, knowing that it was the death-knell of my own hopes .
    “Yes, I want him, ” she said, with more than a touch of desperation. “That’s why he went to England. Apparently the idea was that I should forget all about him! And my mother’s contribution was to try and take me away from the Murchison altogether !”
    “Perhaps she was afraid of your being hurt,” I suggested, wondering why I suddenly wanted to cry.
    Mary gave me an ironic look. “She wanted to spite Andy. She doesn’t know about—about me ! I wouldn’t be likely to tell her and I asked Andy not to, and he always keeps his word. I’m surprised he told you,” she went on, “but then I suppose he had to.”
    “I suppose he did,” I said.
    “Anyway, I don’t mind your knowing,” she sighed. “You wouldn’t laugh at me for falling in love with a man of his age, would you?”
    I shook my head. “No, I wouldn’t laugh,” I said. How could I? There was nothing to laugh about I had comforted myself with her picture gallery of film stars and had thought her heartwhole, but now I knew my mistake.
    “It’s such a waste of time having to wait until I’m twenty-one!”
    “But you see him all the time,” I pointed out .
    She started. “Well, I do, but he’s afraid of making up my mind for me. If he only knew!”
    I found myself saying, as I had said to Andrew before: “F our years isn’t very long. I nursed my father for two years and it seems like a day now.”
    “Was that why Andy married you? Because he felt sorry for you?” she asked carelessly .
    “No,” I answered. At least I could be sure of that. “He never even said he was sorry that my father had died,” I remembered.
    “But he must have done!” she protested.
    “Not he!” I said darkly. “Too bad, he said, and asked if I intended to dig the grave myself!”
    “He didn’t?” Mary asked in an awed voice.
    I remembered my own indignation at the time. “He was busy with his own worries,” I excused him. “He had no time to pity me.”
    “He found the time to marry you,” Mary pointed out practically.
    “Because it suited his own convenience!” I answered sharply. “He had to have a female presence in the house if you were to be allowed to stay here.”
    Mary’s face looked very white . Her freckles stood out in sharp contrast to the pale fragility of her skin.
    “Is that what he told you?” she said at last. “Oh, Andy,” she added, “you didn’t have to go as far as that!”
    I took a last look at the river of sheep as it spread out, filling the valley beneath us, and turned Birrahlee’s head for home.
    “The blame, if blame there is, is mine,” I said fiercely. “I didn’t have to come . I could have stayed at home in Scotland ! ”
    Mary’s face softened as she looked at me. “Oh, Kirsty, I’m