Read Online The House of the Laird by Susan Barrie - Free Book Online

far away, that he was someone who had taken upon himself the right to care for her and look after her. Craigie would be her home, and the seasons would come and go there, and everything would be very peaceful, because Craigie was peaceful. But, above all, if she had said “ Yes ” she would have the right to call herself the wife of Iain Mackenzie !...
    She felt that excitable little pulse beating wildly again in her throat, and for a solitary instant she wondered just as wildly as the pulse was beating why she had not said “ Yes. ” And then as he looked up and met her eyes she felt the vivid pink dye her cheeks, and she looked away abashed—terrified lest he should be able to read, in her face the thoughts she had been thinking.
    But all he said was:
    “ Are you a little bit tired tonight? Would you rather go to bed and learn this game another night? We mustn ’ t forget you ’ ve had rather a lot of fresh air today—for you—and you ’ re probably sleepy. ”
    She agreed at once that she was, and as he stood up to open the door for her she felt anxious to dart past him wildly and escape. But instead she forced herself to walk sedately towards the foot of the stairs, and although she knew he was still watching her she mounted them slowly.
    B ut she thought in almost a frantic fashion: “ He must have guessed!... I ’ m sure he guessed!.. .

 
    CHAPTER SEVEN
    Two days later A unt Horatia Montagu- J ackson and Mrs. Barrington arrived just in time for lunch, without any warning whatsoever. They drove up in an old-fashioned chauffeur-driven Daimler. Aunt Horry was wearing tweeds and a hat rather like a Tyrolean hat, with a feather stuck in it. She was small but agile, with grey hair a nd a pair of bright blue eyes that beamed from under the Tyrolean hat, and an incongruous note was added to her appearance by a great many diamonds, in the shape of brooches, brac e lets and ear-rings, that adorned her diminutive person.
    She advanced upon her nephew when he arrived to greet her in the hall and embraced him with obvious fervor, kissing him heartily on both cheeks.
    “ You look, ” she told him, “ extraordinarily well, and I ’ m delighted to see you. ”
    “ And you, ” he told her, “ don ’ t look even half a day older! ”
    “ My dear, I ’ m being treated by a wonderful Italian doctor who ’ s performed miracles—simply miracles!—for my rheumatism, and in fact I just haven ’ t go t it any more! ” She looked around her as if searching for someone, and then exclaimed quickly: “ But where ’ s the young woman? My new niece-to-be! I must see her—I must see her at once, because I ’ ve been simply dying to know what she looks like! ”
    As Karen emerged from the shadows of the hall she felt rather than saw the keen blue eyes fasten upon her, and then Aunt Horatio darted forward and caught her by her slender shoulders and looked at he r so hard that the girl ’ s blush rose uncontrol l ably.
    “ H ’ m! ” the elderly lady exclaimed, at the end of her inspection, and then “ h ’ m! ” again. She sent an oddly quizzical sideways glance at her nephew, light l y patted Karen’s cheek, and then released her. And then they all turned as footsteps sounded at the end of the hall near the open front door, and Fiona Barrington appeared, moving gracefully towards them, with her arms full of flowers and parcels she had stopped to collect from inside the car. It was a habit of Mrs. Montagu-Jackson’s—her husband had been Montagu Jackson, who made a fortune out of baby powder and other nursery toilet requisites many years before he died, and after his death she had decided to give herself a double-barrelled name by including his Christian name—to bring with her, on her visits to her nephew, large quantities of useful provender, such as eggs from her own farm, and vegetables cultivated by her gardener, being firmly of the opinion that they were always most acceptable to a bachelor. So behind