A Dark and Distant Shore

A Dark and Distant Shore by Reay Tannahill Read Free Book Online

Book: A Dark and Distant Shore by Reay Tannahill Read Free Book Online
Authors: Reay Tannahill
you to feel perfectly at home here. So, if you have no objections, my dear, I propose to call you Vilia, and I hope you will call me Lucy.’ She smiled with the sweetness that was peculiarly her own.
    The girl coloured very slightly, but produced no answering smile. ‘You are most kind, Mrs Telfer. But I cannot think it would be proper for me to address you so familiarly.’
    Lucy Telfer, seldom defeated, accepted this gracefully. ‘Very well, my dear. You must do as you wish, of course. But when you feel more comfortable and at ease with us, I hope you will change your mind. Now, I have something for you, a little welcoming gift. While I go and fetch it, you and Luke can become acquainted.’
    With a whisper of rose-coloured skirts she departed towards the front of the house.
    There was a moment’s nonplussed silence. The girl suddenly looked much younger.
    Luke said stiltedly, ‘My governess, Mrs Weekes, and I are accustomed to take a stroll every day in the gardens of the square here. I do not know whether you might care to accompany us?’ He had been rehearsing it, sullenly, all morning.
    ‘Thank you, but I believe I must leave that to my own governess to decide.’
    He had no idea which of The Downtrodden Duo was the governess. Neither of them had even looked capable of deciding to come in out of the rain.
    He waited, but she said nothing more. She seemed prepared to go on sitting there, saying nothing, until his mother came back.
    He tried again. ‘I believe you used to live at Kinveil? My grandfather lives there now.’ It didn’t occur to him that it might sound like a gibe.
    ‘Yes.’ Her eyes dropped to the hands clasped in her lap. They were very thin, long-fingered hands with shapely, well-kept nails. On the middle finger of the right was a ring far too large and heavy for it, an amethyst seal engraved with some kind of circular design and mounted on a plain gold band.
    Perseveringly, he said, ‘What a handsome ring! Does the design have some meaning?’
    ‘It was my father’s. The signet of the Camerons of Kinveil. The design represents the Loch an Vele whirlpool.’
    ‘I didn’t see any whirlpool.’
    ‘It only occurs under certain conditions of wind and tide. You wouldn’t see it. I imagine you have only been there in the summer.’
    It sounded disparaging. What was more, it didn’t seem right to Luke that this girl should be flaunting a ring belonging to Kinveil. He felt quite strongly that it should have been handed over to his grandfather with the other furnishings.
    Motivated by a desire to put her in her place, he said loftily, ‘Oh, I know Kinveil very well. My father takes me there and we have a delightful time. I caught my first salmon when I was only six.’ True. Six years, eleven months, and twenty-nine days still counted as six.
    ‘Where?’
    ‘Where? Oh, I see. In Loch an Ee-ahs... In “the osprey’s loch” above Carn Mor.’
    ‘Oh, yes. That’s always full of fish.’
    He was indignant. ‘No, it isn’t!’
    The green eyes looked up in detached surprise. ‘Of course it is.’
    ‘It isn’t !’He came very near to stamping his foot. ‘I had to make several casts, and it was almost an hour before I got a bite!’
    She shrugged. ‘You must have been unlucky. Ospreys always choose their lochs well. They don’t need rods and lines and flies, they just pounce. That’s why we call the osprey “Allan-the-fisherman” in the Highlands.’
    We in the Highlands, indeed! When she hadn’t been near Kinveil for eight years. Very rudely indeed, Luke said, ‘Pooh! What do you know about it, you horrid girl!’
    There was a moment’s appalling silence. He wouldn’t have thought it possible for her face to turn paler than it already was. Her eyes expanded into great dark pools, and her lips began to quiver. Her voice, too, was shaking when she spoke, and by the time she had finished he could scarcely make out the words.
    ‘You – you – stupid little boy! What do I know

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