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“I hope you won’t,” he said. “I’d like to be able to help all my life, you know that.”

She moved towards the horse-box, not answering him.

“Good-bye, Hope’s Star!” she whispered, turning blindly away.

“One o’clock at the Cross Keys,” Fergus reminded her. “I’d better book a table. It looks as if there’s going to be a crowd.”

She walked off down Bridge Street, past the abbey and the groups of people standing in the sunshine. Most of them were strangers, but here and there she saw a ‘kent face’, people she had known all her life who waved or called a greeting to her across the busy street.

What shopping she had to do was easily disposed of and she found herself wandering across the bridge to look down into the still, clear water of the Tweed where the coarse-fishing enthusiasts were already installed along the banks with their rod-rests and their camp-stools to spend the day in happy abandonment to their favourite sport.

It was still early, but the town was crowded when she turned to the Square. There were horse-boxes everywhere, reminding her far too poignantly of her
loss.
Because it was a loss. Hope’s Star had always been special, and they had moved so completely as one.

Parking was becoming difficult and she watched idly as someone tried to manoeuvre a large car and trailer into an inadequate space. The horse-box was new, its varnish sparkling in the sun, but the girl who got out to guide the driver was a stranger. She was very tall and very blonde and her skin was tanned to a rich honey-colour which was greatly enhanced by the vivid blue of the tweeds she wore. Susan’s experienced eye told her that the suit was both good and in perfect taste. The colour, too, was exclusive and had obviously come from one of the big
couture
houses which she knew so well. It was the clear, strong blue of the river flowing beneath the bridge on such a day as this, with the reflection of the sky in it.

It was difficult for her to keep her eyes off the girl’s arresting figure as she waited her opportunity to cross the street. She stood out from the crowd, like a bright star in a blurred firmament, her ash-blonde hair shining like silver-gilt in the sun.

When her companion finally got out of the car Susan wished herself miles away. There could be no mistaking that tall, commanding figure whose eagle glance picked her out immediately, and for no very good reason she was recalling their first encounter when he had swooped down upon her from the Hunter’s Crags, like a hawk who sees his prey from a distance and loses no time in manoeuvre before the attack.

Deliberately she turned in the opposite direction, but not before she had seen the brief, sardonic smile which spread across his dark face as he anticipated her flight His companion turned to glance in Susan’s direction as she moved away.

It was true, then! Maxwell Elliott was firmly installed at Fetterburn, in full possession of the mill. And the tweeds his companion wore might well be a Fetterburn product.

If it was, they were being shown off to the greatest advantage and in the best possible way, personally and confidently in a town that knew about tweed. They were probably going to the sales or had already been there. She remembered Maxwell Elliott saying that he wanted another mount and couldn’t help wondering if the new, highly-varnished horse-box already had an occupant.

Hurrying across the Square again at one o’clock, she noticed that the car was still there and was hardly surprised to see Maxwell Elliott in the foyer of the hotel as she looked about for Fergus. He was alone now, but he made no effort to speak to her, and she was glad when Fergus came and they were escorted to their reserved table in the dining-room.

She could hardly bring herself to ask about Hope’s Star.

“She brought her price,” Fergus said after a lengthy pause.

He seemed to be holding back some further piece of information which he thought might upset her, but for a moment she didn’t seem to notice.

“I’m glad I didn’t go,” she said. “Who bought her, Fergus?”

“Someone you already know,” he said, taking up his menu-card. “Maxwell Elliott.”

Her eyes flew to his flushed face.

“You can’t mean that!” she protested. “Both our horses! Why should he buy Hope’s Star after Bucksfoot?”

“If you mean why
did
he buy Hope’s Star it was because he wanted another mount,” Fergus said evenly. “He approached me before the actual sale, as a matter ; of fact. He said the mare was just right for his purpose.”

“And the price wouldn’t matter,” Susan finished for him, trying to swallow the sudden lump in her throat. “Oh, why had this to happen? Why do I feel that I dislike him so much?”

Fergus considered the point,

“Possibly because you resent him,” he suggested. “Explain that one, please!”

“You resent what he may be able to do for Elliott’s.” Fergus beckoned to the waiter. “Sue, it’s no good! He’s come over here to take charge of the Fetterburn mill and, sooner or later, we’ll have to accept him as one of the community.”

“Later, as far as I’m concerned! I don’t
have
to like him,” Susan answered.

They ate their lunch without referring to Hope’s Star or Maxwell Elliott again, but when they passed through the foyer on their way out he was coming in with the tall, fair girl in the blue tweeds. She was clinging to his arm now, chattering to him excitedly, and Susan thought how much younger she looked at closer quarters. Her eyes, which were vividly blue, were shining with obvious delight and it wasn’t difficult to imagine the subject of their conversation. Hope’s Star had a new and enthusiastic owner.

Fergus hesitated, not quite sure whether they should exchange greetings on the strength of their recent transaction at Springwood or not, but Susan pulled him away. The foyer was crowded; it was easy enough to avoid Maxwell Elliott,

On the way back to Yairborough Fergus said:

“I think I ought to come to Edinburgh with you tomorrow.”

Susan hesitated.

“I’d like to say ‘come’, but I know you’re far too busy to take another day off,” she answered, at last. “Thanks for the offer, though. I’m really looking forward to Evelyn coming home,” she added. “I had no idea how much I had missed her these past few months.”

“She must have been very busy in London.”

“I think she wanted time to straighten things out,” Susan suggested thoughtfully. “It must have been a terrible blow to her when Father died, yet she kept on working for Denham’s. That was important to her, I think, and it probably helped. You know, ‘working your despair away’.”

“Talking about work,” he said, “are you going back to the mill?”

“Of course! I only allowed myself half a day.” She was relieved at the prospect of several hours’ engrossing employment to keep her thoughts at bay. “I’ll probably work late, to get as many orders as possible off before the end of the month. I’ll want to have time for Evelyn, too,” she added. “We’ll have so much to talk about.”

“You don’t think she’s coming home to stay, then?”

“I don’t know.” Susan pushed her hair back from her forehead in a characteristic gesture as she considered the point. “I wish she would, though it might be difficult to replace her in the London office. She has everything at her fingertips down there and, after all, she’s had years of experience of the export trade. Quite honestly, Evelyn has carried her fair share of Denham’s. My father always acknowledged that, and so do I.”

“I suppose he left her comfortably off,” Fergus reflected. “Apart from the house, I mean.”

“We share Denham’s,” Susan agreed, “but naturally Evelyn has the controlling share.”

He looked up sharply at that, but didn’t make any comment, and soon they were through Fetterburn and driving in between the ivy-covered gateposts of Denham House.

Fergus unhitched the horse-box while she went into the hall to collect her personal mail. She couldn’t really expect another communication from Evelyn, but the thought was in the back of her mind, all the same, as she sifted through the small pile of advertising pamphlets and samples which invariably came her way.

“There’s nothing,” she said automatically as the housekeeper came through from the kitchen regions to greet her. “Nothing I hadn’t expected.”

“I thought there might have been another letter from Mistress Denham,” Nellie Burgess observed, “but you’ll know her plane time and that will be enough. I expect. Everything’s ready for her,” she went on with an eagerness surprising in anyone so phlegmatic as Nellie. “I’ve given her the sun room, as you said, in case she might feel too upset coming back to so much emptiness in the house. It’s lost I feel myself, sometimes, without your father about the place, and she’s bound to feel it, poor soul! Only here once since he died, she was, and that was right at the beginning, when she came to pack her clothes. It makes a body think, I’m sure. Ay, it makes you think!”

Whatever Nellie had to think about, Susan was sure that Evelyn would be well looked after on her return to Denham House. Nellie had worshipped Evelyn ever since her marriage to Adam Denham, although it was Nellie who had helped to bring Susan up in the years when Adam had struggled on alone. It couldn’t have been easy for him, Susan thought, with a small, wilful daughter to care for and only a housekeeper to share his responsibility in that direction, at least.

After Fergus had gone she drove down to the mill, and the first batch of orders she lifted were from Elliott’s of Fetterburn.

She gazed at the familiar heading on the business writing-paper for several minutes before she dealt with them, thinking about the friendly link between the two firms which any hostility on her part might so easily break. Fetterburn tweed and Denham knitwear had gone hand-in-hand for several years now to produce matching dyes for their yarns in order that their finished products would complement each other, but she searched through her colour charts for the particular blue she had seen that afternoon without result. She had been almost prepared for failure, because colour was her speciality and she had an excellent eye for it. The muted blues and blue-greys and near turquoise of last season had a washed-out look in comparison with that clear, bright, singing blue Maxwell Elliott’s companion had carried so naturally, and she remembered it as clearly as she remembered the girl who had worn it.

When the factory closed at five o’clock she stayed behind for a couple of hours to catch up with her work, but it was difficult to concentrate on samples and new designs in her present restless state of mind. It was almost impossible to divorce her thoughts from her coming meeting with her stepmother, and even on her way to Edinburgh the following morning she found herself thinking about Evelyn to the exclusion of everything else.

Whatever Evelyn decided to do would surely settle their future. She had mentioned selling out ‘at the right moment', and that moment, for Evelyn, might be now.

Whatever her ‘great surprise’ turned out to be, the fate of Denham’s could scarcely be connected with it, unless she intended to marry again. In which case, Evelyn might want to sell immediately, severing her connection with her old life up here on the Border for a new beginning in the south.

The idea was curiously repugnant to Susan at first until she told herself that her stepmother had every right to a second chance of happiness if she could find it, and if she had found it sooner rather than later nobody could really condemn her.

Princes Street seemed busier than usual as she negotiated its magnificent length on her way to the airport. She could have taken the circular route round the city, but the heart of Edinburgh held a great fascination for her and she had given herself plenty of time. It was colder here, at the edge of the North Sea, than it had been when she left Yairborough, and she had no intention of spending longer than was necessary at Turnhouse.

When she got there the London plane was coming in and she hurried through the reception lounge to greet her stepmother.

Characteristically, Evelyn was not alone when she walked in. A tall, good-looking elderly man walked by her side carrying the numerous bits and pieces without which she found herself unable to travel more than a hundred yards, and they were laughing and talking together as if they were old friends.

Her stepmother saw her immediately, but Susan felt as if she had been frozen to the spot. Evelyn’s ‘great surprise’ was obvious, even though the tweed coat she wore swung, tent-like, from her slim shoulders. She was pregnant. Six months pregnant, by anybody’s guess!

Susan continued to gaze at her without believing until the elderly man had unburdened himself of all her belongings, raised his elegant bowler hat, and strode away.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” Evelyn said. “My ‘great surprise’?”

Susan bent to kiss her on the cheek.

“Evelyn!” she exclaimed. “You’re a dreadful old fraud, keeping this to yourself for so long!”

“Not so old!” her stepmother countered, returning her kiss. “Just thirty next birthday, and that won’t seem so ancient to you either, in a year or two’s time! As for keeping my secret,” she added more seriously as Susan unburdened her of all the paraphernalia of her travels, “I wanted to tell you about it myself. I didn’t want to write. Pen-to-paper’s such a cold way of passing on important family news, I always think.”

“You ought to have come home,” Susan said, “or at least sent for me. Imagine working all this time!”

“Susan!” Evelyn laughed, “I’m not an invalid, and I flatly refuse to be treated as one. We’ll have to get that put straight before we go any further. I’ve loved working during these past few months—for Denham’s. It was something I felt I had to do, and—it helped.” Her clear grey-green eyes fringed with the long black lashes were suddenly raised to Susan’s. “You understand, don’t you? It helped the time to pass, the awful first months when it didn’t seem possible I had lost him for ever.” Susan took her arm.

“I know,” she said. “It was so cruelly sudden. But, Evelyn—this!” Her voice rose excitedly as they reached the car. “I couldn’t have imagined it in my wildest dreams. It’s wonderful, wonderful news!”