A Highland Engagement

by Anne Douglas

Genres: Sagas

Synopsis

After their parents die, Leslie Mackenzie and her two siblings are taken in by their Auntie Peg. Leslie knows that given the poverty and unemployment in and around Leith, she is lucky to have a roof over her head - albeit her aunt's tenement - and a job to go to. But while Leslie enjoys working as a waitress, she dreams of escaping Leith for pastures new. When Aunt Peg announces her intention of marrying her widower boss, Leslie realises that since their lives are destined to change, she may as well seize the opportunity and look elsewhere for a position. The Hotel Grand Forest couldn't be more different from the Edinburgh hotel Leslie is used to working in. The luxury spa hotel is in the highlands of Scotland, in the small village of Glenmar, and caters to the whims of its rich, high society guests. Leslie accepts a position at the Grand Forest, little dreaming what fate has in store for her there...For whilst in many ways it is her dream job, strict rules govern the behaviour of all Grand Forest's employees and staff are forbidden from mixing with guests. But then Leslie meets Christopher Meredith and falls in love...

Release date: March 7, 2013

Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

Print pages: 464

Sample

Lesley MacKenzie was putting on her hat, securing it to the knot of bright hair at her neck with a large strong pin. Listening to the March wind moaning round the Kirkgate, she thought she’d be lucky to keep her hat on when she went out, pin or no pin, but she wouldn’t be put off by that. She and her sister, Carrie, always went walking in Leith on Sunday afternoons, dragging their brother Ned with them, if he could be persuaded to leave his fiddle; it was their one chance in the week for fresh air. Besides, today, Auntie Peg had Mr MacNab coming for his tea and wanted them out of the way while she ‘got on’, as she put it.

‘Lesley, are you no’ coming?’ asked Carrie, from the door of the tiny room they shared. ‘Auntie Peg’s wanting to sweep the floor.’

‘Well, I’m no’ stopping her!’

Lesley, tall and slim in a tweed coat that almost covered her ankle-length skirt, laughed a little. She was nineteen years old, two years older than Carrie, three years younger than Ned, and where they were pale, with brown hair and great brown eyes like Auntie Peg’s, Lesley had their mother’s looks, all colour and vitality, blue eyes and strawberry-blonde hair. But their mother had been dead for many years, their father, too. Auntie Peg was all they had.

‘You ken what she’s like when there’s company coming,’ said Carrie, squeezing in to take a look at herself in the mirror on their chest of drawers. ‘Canna settle.’

‘When Mr MacNab’s coming, you mean.’

‘He is her boss.’

‘Aye, and she carries the place on for him.’

Sam MacNab owned a ship’s chandler’s business near the Shore, the waterfront of Leith, which was Edinburgh’s port, though quite independent of the city. Margaret Darroch, variously called Peg, or Peggie, and now forty-eight, had worked for him since she was a young woman, and very efficiently, too, but it was Aggie, his wife, who’d been her friend. It was only since Aggie’s death two years before that Mr MacNab had begun coming over occasionally for his Sunday tea. Now, on that blustery March afternoon in 1913, Peg was as usual driving herself hard to have everything just right for him.

‘Have you girls gone to sleep in there?’ came Ned’s voice. ‘How long’s it take to put a hat on?’

‘Coming!’ called Lesley.

Their aunt’s tenement flat was in the bustling Kirkgate, where tall buildings, little houses and every kind of shop crowded together in pleasant harmony. Peg’s parents had been tenants before her, bringing up their girls there, always considering themselves lucky because they’d had two bedrooms and their own lavatory. No bathroom, of course, but who had bathrooms? Now the furniture they’d saved to buy was in Peg’s flat still.

‘Aye, they were lucky, and I’m lucky,’ Peg would say, and the MacKenzies would agree, even if the sisters’ room was little more than a cupboard and Ned had to sleep on the pull-down bed in the living room. So were the tenants of Number Fifteen lucky, for they had jobs, sheets on their beds and boots on their feet.

‘If you could just see the way some folk have to live!’ Peg would sigh.

But the MacKenzies had seen and they knew, how some folk had to live. Out there, beyond their home, the cold wind of poverty always blew. A different wind and worse, from the wind that was rattling the window frames on that Sunday afternoon when Lesley and Carrie joined Ned.

A french polisher by trade, Ned really thought of himself as a violinist. The only thing he minded about not having a room of his own, was that he had to keep his precious fiddle in his aunt’s room along with his clothes. He had to practise there as well, because the girls said otherwise they’d have gone mad.

‘It’s no’ the tunes we mind,’ Carrie told him kindly. ‘They’re lovely. It’s thae exercises and scales, you ken, seem to set our ears ringing.’

‘And it’s no’ so bad, you see, with Auntie Peg’s door shut,’ put in Lesley.

The Jamesons, who shared their landing, never complained about Ned’s playing, but whenever he got to what they called the scrapy bits, the Crawfords above would bang on the floor with shoes, and then he’d want to go out and shout up the stair and Auntie Peg would have to intervene.

‘Och, what a life, eh!’ he’d cry. ‘Being a musician here!’

But he was good-natured enough on the whole and grinned now at his sisters, while Auntie Peg stooped over her baking, counting lardy cakes.

‘Now, if Mr MacNab has two and Ned has two, I have one and the girls have one, that’ll only leave one over …’ She raised her long sweet face and shook her head. ‘Should’ve made more, eh? Trouble is, four got caught on, wi’ that dratted oven. You can never tell what it’s going to do.’

‘I don’t mind having the burnt ones,’ Ned said cheerfully.

‘They’re no’ burnt, just caught on.’

‘Well, who says Mr MacNab’ll want more than two?’ asked Lesley. ‘There’s plenty, Auntie Peg, stop worrying.’

It always surprised her that her efficient aunt should appear so nervous when her boss visited. Today, she seemed to be particularly on edge, even though everything looked ready for the ‘knife and fork’ tea that they only had on Sundays when Sam came. If they’d had a good Sunday dinner, they usually just had sandwiches for their tea, but see, there was the ham shank laid out in the scullery today, hard-boiled eggs in a pan, the beetroot in a glass dish.

‘And there’s cake,’ Carrie was saying comfortingly. ‘Ginger cake – ma favourite!’

‘You don’t think it’s sunk a wee bit?’ asked Peg.

‘It looks grand,’ Ned told her. ‘Come on, girls, let’s away and leave Auntie Peg to get on.’

‘Aye, I’ve the floor to sweep yet. Will you look at all that flour? There’s more on the mat than on the board!’ Peg sighed and covered her baking with a tea towel. ‘Then I’ve to get maself ready.’

‘Should’ve let us do the floor,’ said Lesley. ‘And we could’ve done the baking as well. You did the Sunday dinner.’

‘Och, no, you work hard all the week.’

‘So do you.’

‘Aye, well, I want you to go for a bit blow and get some fresh air now. You’re always indoors.’

Well, that was true. Lesley worked as a waitress in an Edinburgh hotel restaurant where she complained she scarcely saw the light of day, while Carrie served in a Leith draper’s where it was so dark they had to light the gas in the morning. Ned did get out and about with his french polishing, but every evening he spent playing his fiddle in the pubs, making the odd bob he called it, and drinking far too much, his aunt and sisters told him.

Well, what was he to do, he protested? The pints came up for him, he couldn’t turn them down! And he was never drunk. Now how often did they ever see him drunk? Ah, well, they’d let it go. But if they didn’t see him drunk, they saw plenty who were in the streets of Leith. Fact of life, said Ned.

*

Out on the landing, they decided to give Adam up the stair a shout. If he hadn’t a meeting on, he’d probably like to come with them.

‘He’ll be sure to have a meeting,’ said Lesley. ‘But ask him, Ned.’

Adam Kay, who lived in the top flat with his widower-father, a docker, had been at school with Ned and was now an official for the dockers’ trade union. His life was almost completely absorbed by his work, yet he seemed willing to spare time for the MacKenzies when he could.

‘I think he might be sweet on Lesley,’ Carrie had once remarked.

‘He was always sweet on Janie Scott at school,’ Ned told her. ‘Just up his street, is Janie.’

‘I don’t want anybody to be sweet on me,’ declared Lesley. ‘I don’t want to get wed. At least, no’ for years.’

‘You’d change your mind if you met Mr Right,’ said Carrie.

‘Mr Right!’ Lesley gave her sister an indulgent smile. ‘I hope I don’t meet him then. No’ yet!’

Adam Kay, bounding down the stair at Ned’s call, should have been Mr Right for somebody, thought Carrie. He was so handsome, so full of vitality – like Lesley, in a way. He had fair hair, too, but his eyes, as far-sighted as a sailor’s, were grey, and he had the most determined chin surely anyone had ever seen. Needed it too, for his job. Imagine what it must be like, arguing all the time between the employers and the men!

‘We’re away to the Links,’ Lesley told him. ‘Want to come, if you haven’t got a meeting?’

‘I’ve time to come before the meeting, it’s no’ till six. But there’s a bit of a wind today, mind. Brace yourselves.’

A bit of a wind? They were glad he’d told them to brace themselves. As soon as they opened the street door, they were caught in the blast and had to leave it to Adam’s strong hands to get the door closed again behind them.

‘Och, we’ll lose our hats!’ cried Carrie. ‘Hold on, Lesley!’

‘There’s a fellow already lost his,’ said Ned, watching a Leither in his Sunday suit chasing his bowler down the Kirkgate. ‘And will you look at thae bottles rolling everywhere? Saturday night drinking, eh? You can always tell it’s Sunday by what’s in the gutters.’

‘Shocking,’ said his sisters, giving him meaningful looks, at which he waved his arms in protest.

‘Don’t look at me. I drink in the pub.’

‘As we say!’

‘Come on,’ said Adam with diplomatic calm. ‘Give us your hands, girls.’

And away they went, blown before the wind down the Kirkgate, dodging the bottles and flying papers, holding on to their hats and laughing, not a care in the world, it seemed, amongst them.

It was no distance at all from the Kirkgate to the Links. Over the foot of Leith Walk, past the Central Station on the right of Duke Street, and there they were, at one of the largest open spaces in town. Long ago, it had been just a place of dunes and rough grass, with Leith Sands and the Forth in the distance. By 1913, the view of the Sands and the water had been obscured by buildings and docks, and the Links had acquired trees and paths, cricket pitches and seats, a bandstand for concerts on Saturdays and a long colourful history for folk to remember.

You could still see the old artillery mounds left on the Links by the English army back in 1560, for the early history of Leith had been stormy. It had been under siege; it had been burned on the orders of Henry VIII, and destroyed a second time by his son’s Protector; there had always been the military around and usually on the Links. But more peaceful days succeeded the turmoil. The Links became a place for leisure.

For years folk played golf, said actually to have been invented on the Links, but then some said it caused trouble and the course wasn’t good anyway, so it was moved away to Craigentinny. But that still left football to play, and cricket, bowls, or quoits, or anything else you fancied, as well as dancing and listening to the music from the bandstand. And what the Leithers really liked was to escape to the Links from the busy streets for a while, pretend they were in the country, walk the open spaces, get a ‘bit blow’. Even if sometimes the blow was rather too much.

‘Och, it’s so cold!’ cried Carrie, when the MacKenzies arrived with Adam on that wild Sunday afternoon. ‘I’m away home.’

‘Wait. Wait!’ Ned was putting an imaginary telescope to his eye. ‘What do I spy with my little eye? Something beginning with – J!’

‘J?’ Carrie was instantly alert. She dropped the hands she had put to her chilled face and screwed up her own eyes at two figures in the distance. ‘It’s Joe! It’s our postie.’

‘Aye,’ said Ned. ‘But J can stand for Janie as well as Joe.’

‘That’s Janie Scott with Joe?’ asked Carrie. She shrugged. ‘Oh, well, they’re friends, you ken. Stay on the same stair.’

Janie’s folks and Joe’s lived round the corner from the Kirkgate in a tenement off Great Junction Street. Joe had only one brother, who was away in the merchant navy, but Janie was the eldest of four whose father was dead. It was she who kept the family together on her wages as a council office clerk.

Bright girl, Janie, thought Lesley. As bright as Adam. Yes, she was just up his street. But Carrie’s eyes were still on Joe. Why go home yet? She didn’t really mind the cold.

‘Fancy meeting you folk!’ cried Janie, as she and Joe reached the group of four. ‘We thought sure we’d be the only ones out here today.’

‘Why, what’s a bit o’ wind?’ asked Adam, looking down at her, and she grinned.

‘Doesn’t bother me, I like it.’

‘So do I,’ said Lesley, but she knew she had very little else in common with Janie, so small and fierce, her hazel eyes always snapping, her dark hair always slipping from its pins and being pushed back with impatient hands. Janie didn’t worry over her hair, or her looks, she cared about other things. How to improve the world, mainly, and you had to admire her for that. But, heavens, thought Lesley, there were easier folk, eh? Folk like Joe, for instance.

Joe Halliday was rather short and rather broad. He had curly brown hair and bright eyes with long lashes, a cleft in his chin and a ready smile. He was the most popular postie in the area, and though folk in the tenements didn’t get many letters, they always looked out for Joe, just to see his cheerful face and have a bit crack. Carrie looked out for him, too. She was always first down in the morning, waiting for the post. Waiting for Joe.

The six of them began to walk, still blown by the wind, as more Leithers began to appear on the Links, some with small children, running and shrieking, some with dogs, fetching and carrying sticks, barking with joy. Sunday afternoon. A lovely break from the grind of the week. Soon be over, that was the trouble. All too soon for the MacKenzies in fact, for after they’d walked as far as the edge of the Links, Ned was saying they should be going home. Carrie, walking now only with Joe, was unwilling.

‘Needn’t go back yet!’ she cried, as Ned pointed to the time on his grandfather’s watch Auntie Peg had given him on his twenty-first birthday.

‘Thought you were cold, thought you wanted to go home?’

‘We’re talking about the old Sands,’ she answered loftily. ‘We’re saying we wished we could’ve gone to the races.’

‘But no’ the executions?’ asked Adam with a grin. ‘Used to hang folk on the Sands, you ken. Pirates and such.’

Carrie shuddered. ‘No executions,’ she said firmly.

‘Aren’t any now, thank the Lord. And it must be a hundred years since there were races on the Sands. Come to that, since we got the docks, there’s no’ much of the Sands left, anyway.’

‘I’d like to have gone to the races too,’ Ned remarked, carefully returning his watch to an inside pocket. ‘There’s nothing much to do in Leith these days, eh?’

‘Don’t say you’re like Lesley, wanting away?’ asked Carrie.

‘Never said that.’

‘Do you say that, Lesley?’ asked Adam, looking at her. ‘Do you want away?’

‘Och, I talk sometimes,’ she answered, smiling. ‘But I don’t know where I’d go.’

‘Anywhere away from Leith?’ asked Ned.

‘Why, I canna understand you, Lesley!’ cried Janie, suddenly halting. ‘How can you talk of leaving Leith? There’s so much to do! You’re needed, we’re all needed! And it’s your home.’

‘I never said I’d go for ever,’ Lesley retorted, rather stung. ‘All I’d want would be a change.’

‘And why not?’ asked Ned, as Janie impatiently tossed her head. He took Lesley’s arm. ‘Come on, old MacNab’ll be waiting and Auntie Peg’ll be sending out search parties.’

‘Sam MacNab’s coming to your place?’ asked Joe.

‘Aye, Auntie Peg invites him sometimes for his tea,’ Carrie told him. ‘Only now and again, mind.’

‘Bet she’s his right hand at the shop, eh? I like your Auntie Peg.’

‘Everybody likes Auntie Peg.’

‘Why’d she never marry, nice-looking woman like her?’

‘Trust a man to ask that,’ cried Janie. ‘As though every woman has to marry.’

‘Well, most do,’ Joe answered easily. ‘I was just wondering.’

‘She did have a sweetheart, but he was in the army,’ Lesley told him. ‘Got killed abroad somewhere.’

‘And she never met anyone else?’

‘Took us on,’ said Ned. ‘We were lucky. It’d have been the orphanage for us, without Auntie Peg.’

Joe, of course, knew that. All the folk in the area knew about Peg Darroch’s taking on her sister’s bairns, and the orphans themselves had learned to accept the interest that had come their way.

For it was a sad story, right enough. First, their dad had gone down in Ben Wallace’s fishing trawler. Two years later, their mother had died of scarlet fever, caught from her own children. That was what sometimes happened with childish diseases – the young ones survived, the adults died, as Janie’s father had died from diphtheria at the time his family recovered.

‘Aye, you were lucky,’ Janie herself now commented. ‘Having Miss Darroch.’

‘Well, you had your ma,’ said Lesley, but Janie looked away across the Links. She said nothing of her mother and Lesley bit her lip, remembering that Mrs Scott had not been one to cope with widowhood and four fatherless bairns. There’d been talk of ‘the bottle’ and still was, and Janie, who’d had to bring up her brother and sisters, had added the temperance movement to her causes when she grew up.

‘Are you walking back with us, Joe?’ Carrie asked shyly, as the others turned for home.

‘Aye, might as well,’ he answered, his cheerful eyes on her face. ‘Could do with a cup of tea. Wish there was somewhere you could buy one, eh?’

‘What, on a Sunday?’ Carrie smiled at the idea. Nothing was open on a Sunday except churches. ‘But maybe you’d like to come back and have a cup with us, Joe? Auntie Peg’d be pleased to see you.’

‘No, no, thanks, you’ve got company. Anyway, I have to get back maself. Ma’ll be waiting.’ He gave a rueful smile. ‘Since Kenny’s left, she’s for ever on the look-out for me. Canna call ma soul ma own, but, och, she means well, eh?’

‘Aye, means well,’ said Janie with a grin. ‘Mothers always mean well.’

‘Come on, then, we’ll away,’ said Adam. ‘Be walking into the wind going back, remember.’

‘No need to remind us,’ said Lesley, catching her breath.

Janie and Joe left them at the corner of the Kirkgate, with Lesley heaving a small sigh of relief at Janie’s departure, while Carrie’s gaze was tender on Joe’s retreating back. At the door to Auntie Peg’s flat, Ned asked Adam if he wouldn’t care to come in for a bit, have a cup of tea with old MacNab?

‘Thanks, all the same, but I’ve things to do before the meeting,’ Adam answered. ‘Good walk, though, eh? I’m glad I went, I feel the better for it.’

‘Me, too,’ said Lesley, as his gaze moved between the sisters.

‘It’s a fact, you both look grand. Bonnie Lesley, bonnie Carrie!’

‘Och, there’s no Burns poem for me,’ said Carrie, blushing.

‘And I wish there wasn’t for me!’ cried Lesley. ‘If you knew how I’d been teased over that poem. “Bonnie Lesley” indeed! I wish Rabbie Burns had never written it.’

‘“O saw ye bonnie Lesley, as she gaed o’er the Border?”’ Adam quoted. ‘Are you going over the Border, Lesley?’

‘Who knows? I might.’

‘I might, too,’ said Ned.

‘You’re too idle,’ said Lesley. ‘You’d never get round to it.’

Ned laughed. ‘I’ll just stay at home and play ma fiddle, then.’

They were joining in his laughter as they parted, Adam to run up the stair, the MacKenzies to go into their aunt’s flat. How cold they were, but so flushed, so exhilarated!

‘Is that you back?’ cried Peg, hurrying forward. ‘Now here’s Mr MacNab waiting for you. Tea’s all ready.’

If Sam MacNab had had a beard, he might have looked like Father Christmas. So the MacKenzies used to think when they were younger, for his hair was quite white – prematurely, they’d been told, though he looked old enough to them – and his face round and rosy. He smiled a lot, too, and was always very affable, but his eyes were shrewd. He was said to be a very good businessman. Not really like Father Christmas.

That afternoon, he was already sitting at the table Aunt Peg had laid so carefully, and greeted the MacKenzies with a beaming smile. He wore his Sunday suit of dark tweed, with a watch chain across his waistcoat and a silver pin in his tie, and looked very pleasant and prosperous. No different from usual, which could not be said of Auntie Peg, who was definitely not herself. She had changed into her best dress of green wool, with a cape at the shoulders, and would have looked very nice, the girls thought, if it hadn’t been for her air of anxiety.

What was up with her? the sisters wondered and looked at Ned, but he was shaking hands with Mr MacNab and appeared to have noticed nothing.

‘Och, you’re cold!’ cried Sam. ‘Where’ve you been, then?’

‘The Links,’ Ned answered. ‘And you’re right, it was cold.’

‘Get a good blow there. But you might’ve gone to the Shore. Always interesting on the Shore.’

‘What, with all thae pubs and such?’ asked Peg. ‘It’s no’ what it was, anyway.’

‘Heart of everything, one time,’ Sam agreed. ‘Our first harbour, eh? Where the Water o’ Leith flowed in to the Forth. Should’ve seen the ships there in the old days! Now, of course, we’ve got the docks.’

‘Plenty of docks, all right,’ Peg commented. ‘Never could see why they wanted so many.’

‘The Edinburgh and the Imperial, the Victoria, the Albert, not to mention the old docks. All do their job, Peggie, all needed with increased trade.’ Sam nodded his white head. ‘Did I ever tell you I saw the Albert Dock opened back in 1869? I was a wee laddie at the time.’ He gave a reminiscent smile. ‘I can still remember the band playing “Rule Britannia”.’

‘Yes, well now the young folk are here, I think I’ll make the tea,’ said Peg. ‘Take your coats off, girls – Ned – and wash your hands.’

‘Thinks we’re six years old,’ murmured Lesley, but they obediently washed their hands at the cold tap in the scullery, and sat down at the table.

‘Very nice,’ said Sam genially. ‘Always made a lovely spread, Peggie.’

Peggie? The MacKenzies, exchanging glances, noted the use of the name. It was not their own name for their aunt and not one Mr MacNab had used before. What had happened to ‘Miss Darroch’, then? And would their aunt be calling her employer ‘Sam’? A strange feeling of unease hung over the table, so real they felt they could touch it.

Tea was over. There had been more than enough lardy cakes to follow the cold ham, and the ginger cake had not sunk in the least. The kettle had been boiled and reboiled and everyone had had several cups of tea and said at last they didn’t want any more. Plates had been removed, chairs pushed back, and Sam MacNab was taking out cigars and offering one to Ned.

‘Cigars, eh?’ Ned whistled.

‘Aye, I’m partial to a good cigar. And this is a special occasion.’ As the smoke rose and Ned’s eyes watered a little as he drew on the cigar, Sam looked round for Peg.

‘Peggie, what are you doing? Never mind thae pots, now. Come and sit down.’ He patted the chair next to his. ‘I think it’s time we told ’em, eh?’

Peg sat down, fixing her eyes on the crumbs on the cloth. She said nothing.

‘Tell us what?’ asked Ned, while Lesley and Carrie fixed their eyes on their aunt.

Sam sat back in his chair and put his hand over Peg’s that was by now fiddling with the same crumbs she had been studying. He said genially, ‘Your aunt and me – we’re getting wed.’

There was a silence. The MacKenzies couldn’t speak. Sam, his eyes now very serious, watched them. Auntie Peg didn’t raise her head.

‘You’re surprised?’ asked Sam at last. He puffed strong smoke from his cigar. ‘Now, I wonder why?’

‘We – never thought of it,’ said Ned.

‘Never,’ agreed Carrie.

Lesley, conscious of a great weight around her heart, still remained silent. What could you say, after all, when your world had changed with one small word? Wed. That was it. Wed. ‘Your aunt and me are getting wed.’ Had Sam MacNab really said that? The words echoed around them like a tolling bell, yet still seemed unreal.

‘I canna believe it,’ she said suddenly, in a voice she didn’t recognise as her own. Her eyes went to her aunt, who slowly raised her head.

‘I know it’s a shock, pet.’

‘Why’d you never say anything?’

‘We’ve only just decided.’

‘Today?’

‘Well, a few days ago.’ Peg’s fingers were now kneading the crumbs hard. ‘Mr MacNab – Sam – asked me if I’d consider him. I said I’d think it over.’

‘And you never said a word to us!’

‘It was your aunt’s decision,’ Sam said smoothly. ‘She’d to make up her own mind, eh?’

‘We’re her family!’ cried Lesley. ‘What Auntie Peg decides concerns us.’

‘Aye, that’s right,’ said Ned. ‘If you go to stay at Mr MacNab’s, Auntie Peg, what’s going to happen to us, then?’

Another silence fell. Sam looked at Peg, whose great dark eyes went from Ned to Carrie to Lesley.

‘You’ll be all right,’ she said breathlessly. ‘I can get the tenancy put in Ned’s name, you can stay on here.’

‘Without you?’ asked Carrie.

‘Well, you’re no’ exactly children.’ Sam laid his cigar in the ashtray Peg had provided. ‘If you’d been bairns, of course, you’d have come with your aunt. But you’re all fully grown, you’ve got jobs, you’re independent. In no time, you’ll be getting wed yourselves. Till then, you’ve got this good flat, as well as your aunt’s furniture.’

‘You’ll be leaving Granddad’s furniture?’ asked Lesley, turning on Peg. ‘You’ll be having all Mrs MacNab’s things?’

‘I’m taking ma books and ma mother’s chair,’ Peg replied, bright spots of colour burning in her cheeks. ‘And maybe a few other pieces, but you’ll be needing the furniture yourselves, anyway. Och, it’s for the best, Lesley, you’ll see.’

‘Of course it is,’ Sam said softly. He pressed Peg’s hand and stood up. ‘Now, I’d better be going. You’ll have plenty to talk over, eh? Ned, how did you like that cigar?’

It seemed an age before Auntie Peg came back from seeing Sam MacNab off at the front door. Maybe they’d kissed on the doorstep, like a couple of young lovers? Lesley, crashing cups and saucers into an enamel bowl at the sink, wondered how Ned could keep so calm, finishing that damned cigar, while Carrie seemed quite apart, as though nothing that had happened had anything to do with her. Did they not feel, as she felt, that their world had collapsed?

‘I suppose all that matters to you, Ned, is that Carrie and me’ll be here to look after you,’ she said bitterly. ‘We’re losing Auntie Peg, but you’ll still get your meals made, eh?’

‘She’s only going to Sam MacNab’s,’ he said, a little uneasily. ‘We’ll still be seeing her.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t bank on that. Mr MacNab won’t want her coming round here, will he? Aren’t you upset she’s going to marry him?’

‘Yes, I am. I’m no’ keen on the change. But if it’s what she wants, what can we do?’

‘Nothing,’ said Carrie. ‘I mean, you have to think of her. She’s got no one of her own.’

‘She’s got us!’ cried Lesley.

‘It’s no’ the same.’

‘So, you mean she’s got no man and that’s all that matters?’ Lesley’s eyes were flashing. ‘And if she takes on Sam MacNab, you won’t mind us being without her and looking after Ned?’

Carrie shrugged. She had a dreamy look in her eye that Lesley couldn’t remember seeing before, and it made her feel irritated and apprehensive. In one short afternoon, everything she knew seemed to be changing and shifting, as though in an earthquake. And she was the only one standing up.

‘Oh, you’re doing the tea things?’ came Auntie Peg’s voice, and there she was, the one who had always been their rock and was now only part of the crumbling world. ‘I’ll just get ma pinny—’

‘Auntie Peg!’ cried Lesley, bursting into tears. ‘Just tell us – why?’

Ned had discreetly removed himself to Peg’s room, where the women in the living room could hear him playing popular tunes on his fiddle – thank heavens, not exercises – but of course they weren’t listening. Auntie Peg had opened up the range to give more heat and was sitting in her mother’s chair, her hands folded over the apron she had put on to cover her best dress, while Lesley, her eyes stormy, waited for her to speak. Not saying a word, intent on keeping out of things, Carrie perched between them on a stool, darning one of her black stockings for tomorrow.

‘Why?’ Auntie Peg repeated at last. ‘Why should I marry Sam? Well, I’m fond of him and he’s fond of me. Nobody’s saying we’re in love.’

‘But Auntie Peg, if you’re getting married, you should be in love!’ cried Lesley. ‘You were once.’

At that, Carrie raised her eyes and drew in her breath sharply, as though shocked at Lesley’s bringing up Auntie Peg’s old engagement. They all knew their aunt didn’t like talking about poor Gordon Forgan. She certainly wouldn’t want to talk about him now.

But Peg only shook her head. ‘Older folk get married for different reasons from young folk,?