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afraid,” he confessed. “A woman has a better command of words on these occasions.” He turned towards the fire, with his back to her. “My father will have a Highland funeral, of course,” he added. “It was his wish. He will probably be the last of the Kintyres to be buried on Lingay.”
    She looked at him inquiringly.
    “That’s the island at the mouth of the loch,” he explained. “It’s Kintyre land, and the ancient burying ground of the family is over there. Apart from the ruins of an old church, there’s no thing else on the island. Some of the local inhabitants will tell you that Lingay is haunted, but I graze sheep over there, in spite of the fact,” he added dryly.
    “It sounds like Mary Rose’s island,” Elizabeth mused. “We saw it when we came round the head of the loch in the car. It looked lovely in the setting sun.” For a moment she felt that they had struck some sort of chord of mutual attraction, but it was difficult to be sure.
    “I used to think Lingay had the same quality as Barrie’s island,” he said. “But that was when I was very young. There must be some food waiting for you,” he added, dismissing the moment of intimacy as if it had never been. “If your brother is ready I’ll show you the way to the dining-room.”
    Tony put in his appearance on the gallery above them but almost before they were seated at the long rather formal dining-table in the panelled room on the far side of the hall Hew was called to the telephone.
    “Will you carry on without me?” he excused himself, pushing back his chair. “This sort of thing will probably go on happening all evening now. I know you must be hungry after your journey, so don’t bother to wait.”
    He was still talking on the telephone in the alcove leading from the hall when they had finished their meal. Mrs. Malcolm had carried the coffee table from the drawing-room and set it in front of the blazing log fire in the hall but he did not look round as they came in.
    “What happens now?” Tony asked restlessly, pacing to the window as they waited for their coffee. “Don’t tell me we’re expected to go to bed. It’s only nine o’clock!”
    Elizabeth glanced guiltily at the alcove, but Hew was still listening intently to the person on the far end of the line.
    “I don’t think there will be any hard and fast rules about that sort of thing, Tony,” she decided. “But we must remember that both Mrs. Malcolm and—Hew have been up from very early this morning. They may even have been up all night, so they won’t want to be out of bed till midnight.”
    “O.K.!” he shrugged. “But if it’s going to be like this all the time we’re here I shall probably have to jump in the sea out of sheer boredom!”
    Elizabeth did not answer that, saying instead: “Would you like to walk to the end of the drive or out along the cliff? We needn’t go very far, and if Ardlamond is like most other Highland houses the door won’t be locked, anyway.”
    “I’m ready,” he agreed. “Do you want a coat?”
    “I expect I’d better take one,” Elizabeth decided. “And I’ll tell Mrs. Malcolm we’re going out.”
    The old house seemed curiously empty when she went in search of Jessie, but presently the housekeeper came hurrying through from the back premises to say that she would wait up for them. Hew had evidently finished his conversation on the telephone while she had been upstairs collecting her coat and he had not touched the coffee they had left for him.
    “The young master has gone out,” Jessie informed her. “He’s probably gone up to Whitefarland for an hour. He lived alone up there and there’s a lot to do. He’s been dipping sheep for the past three days, with only a hired boy to help him. He must have the heart of a lion,” she added with a sigh.
    Elizabeth joined Tony at the open door.
    “I suppose the old man dying will have made a difference where we’re concerned,” he remarked as they set out together