the Sheiling. Heather would go with Alice and Charlie and John with the major and Jeremy.
Alice fished diligently until Heather announced they should break for lunch. Fishing fever had her in its grip and she had not thought of Jeremy once.
At lunch it transpired that Lady Jane and the major were missing. Jeremy said the local ghillie from Lochdubh had taken him aside and begun talking to him, and the major had packed up and left with him. Daphne said crossly that Lady Jane had thrashed her line about the water enough to scare away a whale and then had mercifully disappeared.
The absence of Lady Jane acted on the spirits of the party like champagne. Heather had augmented the hotel lunch with homemade sausage rolls, potato scones, and fruit bread covered in lashings of butter and strawberry jam. Alice was dreamily happy to see that Daphne’s skin was turning an ugly red in the sun while her own was turning to pale gold. A little breeze fanned their hot cheeks and Jeremy made Alice’s day perfect by opting to fish with her for the rest of the afternoon.
After some time, Jeremy suggested they should take a rest. Alice lay back on the springy heather by the water’s edge and stared dreamily up into the blue sky.
“What do you think of Lady Jane?” asked Jeremy abruptly. Alice propped herself up on one elbow. “I dunno,” she said cautiously. “I think she’s learned the knack of fishing of a different sort. I think she knows everyone’s got some sort of skeleton in the cupboard and she throws out remarks at random and watches until she sees she’s caught someone. Like with you and Daphne this morning. Whatever she meant by that servant and Spanish waiter remark, it upset you and Daphne no end.”
“Nonsense,” said Jeremy quickly. “I was upset for Daphne’s sake. I could see the remark had got home.” But you were upset
“You mean, she’s
“Don’t, for God’s sake,” said Jeremy harshly. “She’d bite back like a viper.”
“But you said she’s got no power.”
“Hasn’t any power,” corrected Jeremy automatically, and Alice hated him for that brief moment. “It’s just that I’m thinking of standing for Parliament and I’m very careful about avoiding enemies.”
“You’d be marvellous,” breathed Alice. Why, he could be Prime Minister! Maggie Thatcher couldn’t live forever.
“You’re a funny, intense little thing,” said Jeremy. He leaned forward and kissed her on the lips, a firm but schoolboyish embrace. “Now, let’s go fish.” He grinned.
Alice waded dizzily into the Sheiling, her legs trembling, a sick feeling of excitement churning in her stomach. The future Prime Minister of Britain had just kissed her! “No comment,” she said to the clamouring press as she swept into Number Ten. Where did Princess Di get her hats? She must find out.
Sunshine, physical exercise, and dreams of glory. Alice was often to look back on that afternoon as the last golden period of her existence.
The sun burned down behind the mountains, making them two-dimensional cardboard mountains from a stage set. The clear air was scented with thyme and sage and pine.
To Alice’s joy, Daphne had been suffering from mild sunstroke and had been taken back to the hotel by Heather. So she was allowed to ride home with Jeremy.
There is nothing more sensuous than a rich fast car driven by a rich slow man through a Highland evening.
Alice felt languorous and sexy. The setting sun flashed between the trees and bushes as they drove along with the pale gold brilliance of the far north.
The grass was so very green in this evening light, this gloaming. Green as the fairy stories, green and gold as Never-Never Land. Alice could well understand now why the Highlanders believed in fairies. Jeremy slowed the car outside the village as the tall blonde Alice had seen with Constable Macbeth came striding along the side of the road with two Irish wolfhounds on the leash.
“That’s the love of Constable Macbeth’s life,” said Alice, delighted to have a piece of gossip.
“No hope there,” said Jeremy, cheerfully and unconsciously quoting Lady Jane. “That’s Priscilla Halburton- Smythe, daughter of Colonel James Halburton-Smythe. Her photograph was in
“Oh,” said Alice, feeling a certain kinship with the village constable. “Perhaps she loves him too.”
“She wouldn’t be so silly,” said Jeremy. “I wouldn’t even have a chance there.”
“Do people’s backgrounds matter a great deal to you?” asked Alice in a low voice.
Jeremy reminded himself of his future as a politician. “No,” he said stoutly. “I think all that sort of thing is rot. A lady is a lady no matter what her background.”
Alice gave him a brilliant smile, and he smiled back, thinking she really was a very pretty little thing.
The sun disappeared as they plunged down to Lochdubh. Alice prayed that Jeremy would stop the car and kiss her again, but he seemed to have become immersed in his own thoughts.
When they arrived at the hotel, it was to find the rest of the fishing party surrounding Major Peter Frame. He was proudly holding up a large salmon while Heather took his photograph. Two more giants lay in plastic bags on the ground at his feet.
“How on earth did you do it?” said Jeremy, slapping the major on the back. “Hey, that fellow’s got a chunk out the side.”
“Fraid that’s where I wrenched the hook out, old man,” said the major. “Got too excited.”
“Gosh, I wish I had stayed with you,” said Jeremy. “But I thought you went off somewhere else. Did you?”
The major laid his finger alongside his nose. “Mum’s the word, and talking about mum, the filthy Iron Curtain champers is on me tonight.”
“Let’s take them to the scales and log your catch in the book,” said John, his face radiant. The photograph would go to the local papers and the fishing magazines. He loved it when one of his pupils made a good catch. And no one had ever had such luck as this before.
They all were now looking forward to the evening, reminding themselves that that was the time when Lady Jane could be guaranteed to be at her best. They were to meet in the bar at eight to toast the major’s catch.
Alice slaved over her appearance. She had bought one good dinner gown at an elegant Help the Aged shop in Mayfair. Although the clothes were secondhand, most of them had barely been worn and the dinner gown was as good as new. It was made of black silk velvet, very severe, cut low in the front and slit up to mid-thigh on either side of the narrow skirt.
She was ready at last, half an hour too early. This was one time Alice was determined to make an appearance. Her high-heeled black sandals with thin straps gave her extra height and extra confidence. In the shaded light of the hotel room, her reflection looked poised and sophisticated.
Alice was just turning away from the mirror when all the barbed remarks Lady Jane had made seemed to clamour in her brain. It was no use pretending otherwise; Lady Jane had set out to fold out something about each one of them.
Jeremy must never know. The future Prime Minister of Britain could not have a wife with a criminal record. But then, Lady Jane knew something about Jeremy. Had he seduced a servant? But that was an upper-class sin and therefore forgivable, thought Alice miserably. She sat down on the edge of the bed and looked about her with bleak eyes.
How perfectly splendid it would be to go back to Mr Patterson-James and hand in her notice, and say she was going to be married to Jeremy Blythe – “one of the Somerset Blythes, you know,” There was Mum and Dad in Liverpool to cope with. Alice thought of her small, poky, shabby, comfortable home. Jeremy must never be allowed to go there. Mum and Dad would just have to travel to London for the wedding.
But between Alice and all those dreams stood Lady Jane. A wave of hate for Jane Winters engulfed Alice; primitive, naked hate.
