SHORTLY AFTER THAT my father was ill again. This time Zillah had a mild form of the illness. She recovered first and gave herself up to the task of looking after my father with my help.

“It must have been something we ate,” said Zillah.

Mrs. Kirkwell was indignant.

“Does she mean something which came out of my kitchen?” she demanded.

I reminded her that they had both dined at the home of one of my father’s business colleagues on the night when they had been taken ill. “It couldn’t have been here,” I added, “because I dined at home on that night and I was all right.”

That mollified her. She said: “I think Mr. Glentyre ought to see a doctor. This is not the first time he’s been taken ill in a little while.”

“I’ll suggest it,” I told her.

When I did, Zillah said: “It might not be a bad idea, although I’m sure it was something we’d eaten, and that sort of thing soon passes. Moreover, I was ill, too. Admittedly I was not very ill, but I eat a good deal less than your father. I think it was the veal we had at the Kenningtons. Veal, I’ve heard, can be a little tricky. I’ll see what he says about seeing a doctor.”

He was firm in his refusal at first, but she managed to persuade him.

When Dr. Dorrington called my father was back to normal. The doctor came at about eleven-thirty and was asked to stay to luncheon. He had been a friend of the family for years. He must have been quite sixty and we had been wondering for the last year when he would retire. There was a young nephew in the offing who was just passing through the last stages of his training and was at the time working in one of the hospitals in Glasgow. It was an understanding that in due course he would take over his uncle’s practise.

I heard my father greeting the doctor in the hall.

“Oh, come on in, Edwin. This is all very unnecessary. But I’ve at last given in to my wife … for the sake of peace.”

“Well, it can’t do any harm to have a little check.”

They went upstairs to the bedroom.

When I went down to lunch, the doctor greeted me warmly. He had, as he was fond of saying and did so almost every time we met, brought me into the world. This seemed to give him a kind of proprietary interest in me. He had attended my mother through her illness and had been very upset when she died.

I could see that he was a little fascinated by Zillah.

“Is everything all right?” I asked.

The doctor replied: “Oh yes … yes.” But he did not sound altogether convincing.

However, it was a very pleasant luncheon. Zillah was in good spirits and made much of the doctor. She flirted with him mildly, which he seemed to like, and my father looked on with amusement.

Afterwards I talked to her.

“Is anything wrong with him?” I asked.

“Well, he’s not a young man, is he? But there’s nothing to worry about.”

“You don’t seem very certain.”

“Well, I made old Dorrington tell me the truth … the absolute truth. I made sure he knew that this was the second attack your father had had. It must have been the food the second time … because I had it, too. He said your father should take care. There could be a weakness … an internal weakness. His heart’s all right, but the doctor kept stressing his age.”

“He’s not so very old.”

“He’s not so very young either. People have to be careful as they advance in years.” She laid a hand on my shoulder. “Never mind. I’ll look after him. I’m discovering a hidden talent. Do you think I’m rather a good nurse?”

“My father seems to think so.”

“Oh, he’d think anything I did was good.”

“That’s nice for you.”

“Indeed it is, and I intend to keep it so.”

MATTERS CAME TO A HEAD soon after that when Alastair McCrae came to the house to see my father.

He was taken to the study and was there some time. He left without staying to lunch or seeing anyone else.

My father sent for me and when I arrived in his study he smiled at me benignly.

“Shut the door, Davina. I want to talk to you.”

I did so.

“Sit down.”

When I was seated he went to the fireplace and stood, his hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels as though he were about to address a meeting.

He said: “I have some very good news for you. Alastair has been to see me. He has asked my permission to marry you.”

I stood up. “It’s impossible.”

“Impossible! What do you mean?”

“I’m engaged to someone else.”

“Engaged!” He was staring at me in horror, words on his lips which he was too shocked to utter. “Engaged,” he said at length, “to … to …”

“Yes,” I said. “James North.”

“That … that … student!”

“Yes,” I said. “You met him.”

“But … you are a fool …”

“Maybe.” I was feeling bold. I was not going to be intimidated. I loved Jamie. I was going to marry him. I was not going to allow my father to rule my life. How dared he, who had brought Zillah into the house … who had kept her here in the pretence that she was a governess to me? I thought of her creeping into his bedroom. It gave me courage.

“You will forget this nonsense,” he said.

“It is not nonsense. It is the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

He raised his eyes to the ceiling as though speaking to someone up there. “My daughter is an idiot,” he said.

“No, Father. I am not. This is my life and I will live it as I want to. You have done what you want and I shall do the same.”

“Of all the ingratitude …”

“Gratitude for what?”

“All these years … I have looked after you … made your welfare my chief concern …”

“Your chief concern?” I said.

I thought he was going to strike me. He came towards me and then stopped abruptly.

“You’ve been meeting this young man?”

“Yes.”

“And what else?”

“We have discussed our future.”

“And what else?” he repeated.

I was suddenly angry. I said: “I don’t know what you are suggesting. James has always behaved to me with the utmost courtesy and in a gentlemanly fashion.”

He laughed derisively.

“You must not judge everyone by yourself, Father,” I said.

“What?”

“It is no use playing the virtuous citizen with me. I know you brought your mistress into this house. I know she visited your bedroom before you were married. As a matter of fact, I saw her going to your room.”

He stared at me, his face scarlet.

“You, you … brazen …”

I felt I was in command. I said: “Not I, Father. You are the brazen one. You are the one who poses as virtuous, self-righteous. You have your secrets, do you not? I think you should be the last one to criticise my behaviour and that of my fiance.”

He was aghast. I could see he was deeply embarrassed. I had unmasked him and he knew that I must have known this of him for some time.

His anger burst out suddenly. There was hatred in the look he gave me. I had cracked the veneer. I had exposed him as an ordinary sinful man; the aura he had always tried to create about himself had been destroyed by those few words of mine.

“You are an ungrateful girl,” he said. “You forget I am your father.”

“I find it impossible to do that. I am sorry I shall have to refuse Alastair’s offer, but I shall tell him that I am already engaged to Jamie.”

I opened the door and was about to go. He had lost control. He shouted: “Don’t let that student think he is going to live in luxury for the rest of his life. If you marry him, you’ll not get a penny of my money.”

I ran upstairs to my room and shut the door.

IT WAS ABOUT AN HOUR LATER when Zillah came to me. I was still in my room, shaken by the shock of the encounter and wondering what was going to happen next. I longed to see Jamie and tell him what had taken place between my father and me.

Zillah looked at me in horror.

“What have you done?” she asked. “Your father is raving against you. He says he’s going to cut you out of his will.”

“Alastair McCrae is coming to ask me to marry him. He has asked my father if he might and, of course, my father has said yes. He has already given him his blessing and was prepared to do the same to me. Then I told him I was engaged to Jamie.”

“Yes. I gathered that from him. Rather rash, wasn’t it?”

“What else could I have done?”

“Nothing, I suppose. But what are you going to do now?”

“I shall not marry Alastair McCrae just because my father says I must.”

“Of course you won’t. Oh, Davina, what a mess! You’ll have to talk this over with Jamie.”

“I shall send a note to his lodgings and ask him to see me tomorrow.”

“Give it to me and I’ll send one of the servants over with it.”

“Oh, thank you, Zillah.”

“Don’t fret. It will all come right.”

“I don’t think my father will ever forgive me.”

“He will. He’ll get used to it. These things happen in families.”

“Oh, thank you, Zillah.”

“You know I want to help, don’t you? Besides, I’m a little anxious about your father’s health. I know old Dorrington says there is nothing to worry about, but I don’t want him too upset.”

“Yes, yes, I know. I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Well, write that note and we’ll get you and Jamie together. See what he has to say. He might suggest a runaway match at Gretna Green.”

“Do you think he might?”

“It would be very romantic.”

“But where should we go? Where should we live?”

“They say love conquers all.”

“I feel I want to get away from my father, and I feel he’d want me to go.”

“What he wants is a nice rich marriage for you with a man of solid worth like Alastair McCrae. After all, that’s what all fathers would want for their daughters.”

“But if the daughter loved someone else …”

“Well, write that letter to Jamie. Tell him what’s happened, and if he suggests Gretna Green, I’ll do all I can to help you get there.”

“Thank you, Zillah. I am so glad you’re here.”

“So you said, dear, and so I am glad I’m here. You want someone to look after you.”

I wrote the letter and it was despatched for me.

THE NEXT DAY Jamie was waiting for me at the seat in the gardens.

When I told him what had happened he was aghast.

“So this man is coming to ask you to marry him and he has your father’s approval?”

“I shall explain to him at once that I am engaged to you.”

“And your father?”

“I don’t know what he’ll do. He might turn me out of the house. He says he will cut me out of his will if I marry you.”

“Good heavens! What a terrible thing to do!”

“He means it. He will never forgive me for what I said to him … even if I agreed to marry Alastair McCrae. Jamie, what are we going to do?”

“I can’t see what we can do.”

“Zillah said we might run away and get married at Gretna Green.”

“Where would we go? You couldn’t live in my lodgings. I’ve yet to go through those two years before I can take my exams. How could we live?”

“I don’t know. I suppose some people manage.”

“You’ve always lived in comfort. You don’t know what it would be like.”

“Perhaps your people would help.”

“They are desperately poor, Davina. They couldn’t help in that way.”

“Well, what are we going to do?”

“I can’t see what we can do.”

I was dismayed. I had thought he would be so delighted that I had admitted to my father that we were engaged and that I had stated so firmly that I would not marry anyone but him. It seemed that romance was crumbling before the mediocre problem of how we were going to live.

“There is only one thing to do,” he said gloomily at length. “We can’t afford to marry. We’ve got to wait until I’m through. I’m taking help from my family now. I can’t ask them to keep a wife as well.”

“I can see that I shall be a burden.”

“Of course you won’t. But you see it simply isn’t possible yet.”

I was deflated. I realised I had been rash.

“What can I do then? I’ve told him now.”

“You’ll have to hold him off for a while. Wait until we can work something out.”

“Zillah said she would help. I think she thought you would suggest our running away together.”

“It’s not practical, Davina. I wish it were. Oh, why did this have to happen now?”