Unknown (19 page)

"We'll both do the same landscape," she suggested, "then we can criticise each other. It's the best way, but you'll have to be absolutely candid. No hurt feelings either way."

"I'm not easily hurt, Jenny."

It wasn't true, Elizabeth thought. She had been so easily hurt by Charles, although he hadn't given her the slightest reason to suppose he could ever love her. What was in a kiss, lightly given? It had been the product of the night, part of the magic of Hawaii, which was to be quickly forgotten because she had no place in his scheme of things. Natalie had been quite blunt about it. "There isn't any room for you at Kilchoan," she had declared. "We're a tightly-knit unit here—a family, I could say— and Charles hasn't time for any extra hangers-on."

Was that what she was becoming by staying on as the unnecessary companion to an old lady who had taken an odd fancy to her? There were sudden, bitter tears in her eyes as she tried to focus on the hills above the bum which Jenny had already transferred to her canvas.

"Don't hesitate too long," Jenny advised, looking over her shoulder. "Go straight at it—what you see. First impressions are so often best."

They worked until twelve o'clock, when they realised how stiff they had become sitting for so long in the same position. Jenny looked down at Elizabeth's effort.

"Not too bad," she decided. "You've got the flow of it. Perhaps your hills are a wee bit conical, but you can easily correct that as you go along."

"While you just put on colour and there they are!"

"I've had a lot of practice these past two years."

They looked around for Mrs. Abercrombie.

"There she is, up at the top pool," said Jenny. "I bet she hasn't caught anything."

"She'll be disappointed if she hasn't."

The old lady came clambering along the bank, defying her age.

"Not so much as a nibble!" she announced disgustedly. "And it's a perfect day."

The light was not too strong, so there was no reason why she should not have been successful. Jenny brought the picnic basket, spreading its contents on the smooth surface of the rocks.

"I'll try farther up," Adele decided. "There's quite a lot of water over the falls and it may be disturbing the fish." She bit hungrily into a sandwich. "Food tastes much better in the open air," she mused. "I wonder how many picnics I've had in my lifetime. In France we used to go out along the Dordogne and picnic near the hills. Sometimes we used to go as far as Limoges. In those days there weren't so many cars about and we had the side roads almost to ourselves. Now," she reflected, "one has to be like a mountain goat to leap on to a bank while the traffic whizzes past!"

"Not up here," said Elizabeth. "It's a wonderful place for walking."

They finished their lunch, drinking a final cup of coffee before they returned to their respective activities.

"I'm hoping to finish this," Jenny said, looking critically at her painting. "Do you think Charles will like it, Grand'mere? It's for him."

Adele took a full minute to answer her while she considered the effort Jenny had made, mostly with her left hand.

"Did he ask for it?" she asked, at last.

"He wanted a picture for his office," Jenny explained. "He said it would be nice to get a glimpse of blue skies instead of a horizon full of cranes and half-built ships."

"Which is pure humbug!" Adele declared. "Nowhere in the world can you see shipyards with such a background as on the Clyde. From the office window Charles can see nothing but hills."

"Perhaps he was just trying to be kind," Jenny said flatly. "To encourage me."

"You've had all the encouragement you need," Adele told her. "Your brush work is excellent, and provided you don't go Cubist or something equally bizarre you should do very well." She stooped to pull her waders up over her thighs. "Now, I must be off," she announced. "I'll try the rock pool above the falls."

"I'd come with you, but I'd like to finish this," Jenny said.

"I don't need a watchdog," Adele answered briskly. "Are you going to finish your sketch, Elizabeth?"

"I thought I'd take a walk first"

"Sensible!" Adele agreed. "Don't go too far."

She splashed away, her rod over her shoulder, gaff and basket at her hip.

"She
is
a remarkable person," Elizabeth said.

"If you walk up the glen," Jenny advised, "keep to the main path. Some of the others don't lead anywhere. They're just sheep tracks."

"I'll remember!"

Elizabeth climbed up the bank to be met by the sharp wind from the moor. The sky was overcast, but there was still a width of vista which delighted her as she looked down to the smooth water of the lochan and Kilchoan's tall chimneys rising above the pines. Beyond the house she could see the mist-shrouded peaks which Jenny had named for her—Gualann and the mountains crowding around Ben Venue, while away to the west Ben Lomond seemed to touch the sky. Her mother's mountain!

I love it, she thought; I'll never be able to forget all this and the fact that it was Charles who brought me here. Her heart contracted at the thought as she climbed rapidly upwards, keeping faithfully to the narrow road, as Jenny had advised. Soon she was at the summit of yet another hill and she decided to turn back. She had come quite a long way in the past hour and it was time to rejoin the others.

Going downhill she could see the tops of the trees along the burn, the rowans with their white flowers displayed against the darker green of the hazel, and the ash and oak coming into bud. Pine and larch and spruce crowded each other on the far bank, marching through the glen in all the splendour of their varying greens, and between them the lochan lay, a long shimmer of greying light, with Kilchoan standing peacefully at its head. Even on a sunless day such as this there was a beauty in everything she saw, the magic her mother had spoken of long ago.

Before she reached the trees she stopped to listen to the sound of the waterfall. It came down between two gigantic rocks, spilling back into the river bed with a majestic roar, like a liberated giant, but farther down she was suddenly aware of another sound. It came up to her from the dark water between the first and second fall, a faint cry which she took for the distress signal of a bird. Then, suddenly, she knew that the cry was a human one. Someone was calling for help.

Jenny! She began to run, leaving the road and plunging into the rough grass and heather which went down to the burn, her thoughts racing ahead of her to the scene of calamity. Supposing Jenny was hurt? Supposing she had left her easel to climb down to the water's edge and had slipped and fallen, unable to support herself with hear injured arm?

She saw her almost immediately, crouched over the water where giant rocks made a deep, swirling pool which was finally sucked into the racing torrent of the lower falls. Jenny seemed to be completely immobile and she had ceased to call for help. She was like someone frozen in horror, gazing helplessly down at what she saw beneath her.

Elizabeth plunged down the bank, slipping and slithering in the mud. her hands lacerated by the vicious trails of brambles which lay across her path.

"Jenny, hold on!" she cried, realising what had happened in a split-second of horror. "Can you keep her head up? Try—try as hard as you can!"

Beneath them, in the water, Mrs. Abercrombie lay unconscious, her rod and line completely gone.

Jenny let her breath out as Elizabeth reached her side.

"I thought you would never come," she gasped. "I thought I would have to let her go."

"But you didn't!" Elizabeth went down into the water, taking the full weight of her employer into her arms. "Stay on the bank and help me to lift her."

Even in that first moment of desperation she was aware of Jenny using both her hands in the amazing effort she had made. She had clung to Adele for goodness knows how long and her injured hand had answered their need.

"I was coming along the bank and she was playing this enormous fish," Jenny gasped. "Suddenly she turned—perhaps I made a noise—I don't know. She turned to look at me and then it happened."

"Don't talk," Elizabeth commanded. "Just do as I say, Jenny. You'll have to take most of the weight for a moment while I ease her on to the bank."

"Is she dead?" Jenny whispered beneath her breath. "I couldn't bear it is she is!"

"No," said Elizabeth, swinging Mrs. Abercrombie's wader-clad legs on to the bank. "Don't bother to speak, Jenny; just pull her clear of the water, if you can."

She could feel the swirl of the burn round her own waist, pulling her away, but it was no time to consider personal danger. With one final, frantic effort they eased Adele clear, laying her on the bank in her sodden garments, her face upturned to the leaden sky.

"She's alive all right!" The words were a gasp of relief as Elizabeth felt the faint pulse-beat on her employer's wrist. "We must carry her farther up the bank and then get help. What happened ?

"The fish took' the line away, but she held on. She held on like grim death, not wanting to let it go. It was the biggest salmon I've ever seen and she'd probably been playing it for a long time, but she hadn't the strength to land it. Then the line caught on something and broke. Grand'mere wasn't ready for it and she went over backwards into the water. She must have caught her head on a rock."

"Help me to lift her."

Jenny was shaking all over now, looking down at her injured arm for the first time.

"I used it, Elizabeth!" she cried in disbelief. "I used it to keep Grand'mere out of the water!"

"You saved her from drowning," Elizabeth said quietly. "If you hadn't been here,
Jenny, she would have gone down over the falls."

"I can't think about it." Jenny was chafing Adele's hands, endeavouring to warm them between her own. "What can we do now? What can we possibly do? It's miles and miles to Kilchoan."

Elizabeth, glanced at her watch.

"It's almost four o'clock," she said. "Jenny, if you run as fast as you can to the road end you can intercept Murdoch with the car. It's our only chance," she insisted as the younger girl drew closer to the inert figure on the grass. "We couldn't possibly carry her all the way to Kilchoan."

"I could go across the moor," Jenny offered. "There's a path we use with the ponies."

"Whichever is quicker," Elizabeth agreed. "Could you bring me one of the flasks before you go? There's one with some coffee still left in it." She took Mrs. Abercrombie's head on to her knees. "I might be able to bring her round even before you get back with Murdoch."

Jenny returned with the flask, which was half full of coffee.

"Are you all right, Elizabeth?" she asked anxiously. "You're soaked through."

"Don't worry about me. I've been drenched before," Elizabeth said, "I'm glad you brought the rug."

They eased the tartan travelling-rug under Adele's head and Jenny rushed away, but it was many minutes before there was any spontaneous movement from the prone figure on the grass. Adele stirred and groaned, making an effort to sip the coffee which Elizabeth held to her lips.

"Not too fast," Elizabeth cautioned. "You'll feel it warming you through in a moment."

Adele's eyes opened, regarding her hazily until a look of absolute horror broke in them.

"It got away!" she whispered. "That magnificent monster got clean away from me!"

"And left you with a cracked skull, maybe!"

Adele put a shaky hand to her head.

"I don't crack easily," she said, "but it does ache a bit"

Almost immediately she sank back into unconsciousness, and for the next half-hour Elizabeth did her best to keep her warm, wrapping the travelling-rug more securely round her and trying to shield her from the wind. They were still well down the bank and, mercifully, it didn't rain.

When she finally heard the sound of the car on the road above them she could have cried for joy. Jenny had managed to intercept Murdoch and had brought him back in time.

It was Charles who slid down the bank towards them. The unexpectedness of his coming unnerved her for a moment and she could only look at him with mute entreaty as he bent over his grandmother.

"Are you all right?" he asked sharply. "You look as if you've been in the water."

"I'm all right," she assured him. "Look after Grand'mere," the word slipped out without her noticing. "She's been conscious. If only we can get her home, Charles."

He lifted the old lady into his arms.

"Stay where you are," he ordered. "I'll come back."

When he had gone Elizabeth struggled to her feet, realising for the first time how cold she was. Her wet skirt clung to her knees and her feet squelched in her boots as she attempted to climb the bank in spite of Charles's order. She could hear Murdoch's voice on the road above her, and Jenny answering a question, and then Charles was beside her again, lifting her as easily as he had lifted his grandmother. She felt his arms about her and the touch of rough tweed against her cheek, and it was as if they were back in Waikiki on the beach in gentle moonlight and the time between was no more than an unpleasant dream.

He put her into the back of the car beside Jenny and Adele, driving the remaining distance to Kilchoan as swiftly as the winding road would permit. The old lady opened her eyes again as they reached the door.

"I let that fish get away," she said hazily. "He was the biggest one I've ever seen."

"The ones that get away generally are!" Charles was searching her face for possible injury. "You'll never learn, will you? Some fish just can't be played the way you want them, however experienced you are."

"You could be right." She closed her eyes. "But measuring one's strength with a worthy adversary is worth the effort, don't you think? Where is Elizabeth?" she added sharply. "She helped Jenny to get me out of the water."

"She's there, on the doorstep," said Charles. "I'm going to send her straight to bed."

Adele smiled.

"Come with me, Jenny," she said.

Elizabeth was still standing on the doorstep when Charles reached her.