Lure of the Falcon

Lure of the Falcon by Sue Peters Wyn Warwick was as well qualified as her boss to assess and evaluate the valuable antiques at Tylar Grange, so when he was unable to do the job himself and sent her instead, she didn't think twice about it. So she was more than a little indignant when Russell Tylar insisted that she wasn't up to the task. Happily, though, their initial antagonism soon faded and they came to a better understanding, and Wyn's personal future looked bright. But she had reckoned without the spoilt, ruthless Diane de Courcy, who had always got everything she wanted in life—and was not going to accept the fact that another girl might get Russell! Books you will enjoy by SUE PETERS PORTRAIT OF PARADISE Mallets, her grandfather's lovely old manor house, had been left, as it should be, to Katie's brother—but he had asked her to go there and get things sorted out for him before he took possession. But Ross Heseltine, it appeared, had already been put in charge of Mallets—and Ross was going to give her more problems to cope with than the house did! LAIRD OF DOORN Far from disliking Duncan Blair the moment she met him, Sue felt an immediate feeling of friendship and warmth developing between them—and who knew how far it might have gone, had the jealous Fiona Redman not set about making all the mischief in her power ... ONE SPECIAL ROSE Pip loved her boss, Giles Shieldon, but she knew he would never name his beautiful new rose after her. Why should he, when Stella Garvey was so obviously important to him? But how much longer could Pip bear to watch them together? Wasn't she only building up hurt for herself? CLOUDED WATERS The feud between the Montagues and the Capulets was like a childish squabble compared to the longstanding quarrel between the Dane and the Baird families, and it had already ruined the romance between Marion Dane and Adam Baird. But now fate had brought Marion and Adam together again. Was fate in fact offering them a second chance? All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the Author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the Author, and all the incidents are pure invention. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher. First published 1977 This edition 1978 © Sue Peters 1977 For copyright reasons, this book may not be issued on loan or otherwise except in its original soft cover. ISBN o 263 72542

CHAPTER ONE

`STAND in for me, Wyn.' Bill Stapleton's voice lacked its usual brisk confidence, and seemed as out of place as he did in the narrow hospital bed. `Appendicitis won't lay you low for all that long,' Wyn told him robustly. 'When you come out of here,' she wrinkled her small, uptilted nose at the clinical aroma that pervaded the ward, 'a week or two cataloguing antiques at—wherever this place is,' she skipped details airily, 'will, be just the sort of convalescence you need.' 'Not a chance! ' Bill's wife butted in from the other side of the bed determinedly. 'I don't want to be an antiquarian's widow,' she stilled her husband's protest, 'I want my husband to become an antique himself, if possible. So when he's discharged from here, he's coming away for a long convalescence, like any normal human being.' Bill's wife had never entirely accepted the fact that antique dealing took her husband away from her side, sometimes for weeks at a time, to all parts of the globe, and for this reason, as well as for her own acknowledged expertise, Wyn found herself taking on more and more assignments abroad. She had just returned from one, and found a crisis on her hands that apparently only she could solve. 'It can't wait, Wyn, it's an insurance job.' Bill's voice held a hint of desperation as she still hesitated, and Wyn capitulated. 'Don't get worked up, I'll go,' she told him hastily. 'You'll have to give me the details, though—remember I only landed this morning, and I haven't had time to catch up on what's been happening while I've been away.' She had been away for three weeks, and was looking forward to a long, lazy weekend with her family, but that would have to wait now, she decided. 'I went straight from the airport to the shop,' she demoted the small but world-renowned business owned by Bill and his father, who if they had their way wanted to make Wyn their junior partner. There she had learned of Bill's malaise from a distraught manager, whereupon she immediately re-engaged her willing taxi and set out to learn the details. 'Dad would have gone,' Bill's face cleared miraculously when he saw he had got her compliance, 'but he's had to go to the Continent to sort out a coin collection. That Leaves you,' he managed a grin. `To do what?' Resignedly Wyn hitched her chair closer to the bed, pushed back a brown wave that persisted in trying to get into her eyes, and bent her amber gaze on her unfortunate colleague with all the serious attention that she usually accorded to her work. . `To catalogue everything over one hundred years old at Tylar Grange, and give its estimated present-day value ...' `Does that include the owner ?' Wyn put in drily. 'Not the present owner,' Bill chuckled. 'Russell Tylar's just inherited the place from his uncle. It seems the old boy was a bit of a recluse. A love affair gone wrong, or something,' he explained cryptically. 'Anyhow, the upshot of it was that Tempest Tylar—that's Russell's uncle, and the late owner of the Grangeburied himself in his home and spent his not inconsiderable fortune collecting antiques. Or should I say, adding to the collection,' he corrected himself. `Tylar Grange itself is very old, Tudor, I think Russell told me once,' he mused, 'so it must have contained a lot of period stuff when it came to the old man in the first place.' 'Do you know the heir?' Bill spoke as if he was familiar with him.

'I knew him when we were at Oxford together,' Bill told her. 'In a way I'd have liked to be able to do this job for him myself,' he said wistfully, 'it would have been pleasant to renew acquaintance. We got on rather well, he was very much a man's man,' he remembered, 'fond of sport and so on.' Bill Was a rugger blue, and anyone who was 'fond of sport' was acceptable in his eyes. 'Then why don't you ...!' began Wyn, inspired by sudden doubt. From Bill's description it sounded as if the heir to Tylar Grange might welcome her companion through its august portals more warmly than he would welcome herself. 'Surely a week or two wouldn't hurt—even taking in your convalescence,' she added with a hurried sidewards look at the frown that had crossed the face of Bill's other visitor. `It's too urgent,' Bill dashed her hopes. 'Russell's inherited' a veritable storehouse of treasure, and when he came to check on the insurance and so on he found that most of the stuff isn't insured at all, and what is, the cover is thirty years old. You can imagine what the figures look like at the present rate of inflation,' he brooded uneasily. 'What if there was a fire?' Wyn's professional self was equally horrified. 'That's. what Russell said when he sent me an S.O.S. last week,' Bill retorted. 'His insurance company have arranged a block cover for him temporarily, on the understanding that the contents of the house are properly valued right away. Apparently they'd tried for years to make his uncle see sense about covering his possessions, but putting it mildly their approaches weren't welcomed.' Any more than hers was, thought Wyn ruefully, facing Russell Tylar's bleak grey stare the following afternoon, and wishing for the umpteenth time that Bill Stapleton had retained his normal rude health for just a few weeks longer, long enough to come to Tylar Grange and do his friend's valuation for himself. 'Bill Stapleton promised to come himself.' Russell's handshake was hard but perfunctory, and Wyn's fingers tingled with the force of his brief grip. She thrust her hand into the pocket of her stroller coat, flexing her fingers to bring the feeling back into them, and saw his glance drop to the movement under the cloth. Immediately she balled her fist, stilling her hand, feeling for an uncanny moment as if his grey eyes could see straight through the woollen material. 'Bill's in hospital.' She explained his predicament. 'There was no time to let you know, and he said the job was very urgent, so he asked me to come instead.' Her voice was as curt as his own, and she tossed in the fact that Bill had asked her to come as an afterthought. Knowing that, he can hardly throw me out, she thought uneasily, and the fact that she had Bill Stapleton's blessing should be enough to convince him of her capability to cope with the job. She remembered her colleague's comment, and even though she didn't know Russell Tylar, found herself agreeing with it wholeheartedly. He's very much a man's man ... It was a gross understatement, Wyn decided. And Russell Tylar hadn't changed his outlook since student days, judging by his attitude now. It was almost feudal to refuse an expert's services merely because that expert was a woman. Yesterday her modern outlook would have rejected the idea as impossible; today, she was sorely tempted to remind her host of the sex-discrimination laws, but one glance at his lean, set face made her think better of it. His black brows, as dark and wiry as his hair, met across the top of his aquiline nose in an almost straight line, and discouraged academic argument on the subject. `There must be other antiquarians. This Stapleton man can't be the only one in the country,' a supercilious voice turned Wyn's attention to the occupant of a high-backed

wing chair, cosily placed in the inglenook of the high-ceilinged drawing room. The sitter raised herself to an upright position with a languid movement that swung her flaxen hair back across her shoulders, revealing a pair of eyes that were deeply gentian, and cold as blue eyes had no right to be, Wyn thought with a shiver, feeling them fixed on herself with the same hostility that lay in the man's. They both want me gone because I'm a woman! she realised incredulously. If her professional pride had not been so sorely rubbed, Wyn could have laughed. Russell Tylar wanted to be rid of her because of sheer old-fashioned prejudice, and the girl— his wife?—because of fear, she guessed shrewdly. Any other woman of similar age and presentable appearance would be regarded as a threat by this girl, she thought, and her heart sank. If it was only Russell Tylar who was against her she might have won him round with Bill Staple-ton's backing. She had faced similar situations before, her dainty appearance usually drawing a response of sheer disbelief in the fact that she was an antiquarian of some renown, an opinion she always managed to quickly reverse by her own expertise. But if the girl Russell called Diane was against her as well, for whatever reason, she might as well leave her bags packed and return home by the next train. Which wasn't until next morning, she realised with a prick of dismay, and Tylar Grange was literally miles from anywhere. It had been half an hour's taxi' ride from the station at Tylar Barrow, which was the nearest village of any size in the area. 'I'm sorry, Mr Russell, I came in to lay the tea.' The subdued chatter of a tea trolley preceded the abruptly opening door, and they all three turned to face a plump, motherly-looking woman who stopped disconcerted when she found the room unexpectedly occupied. 'Don't worry, Nanny, we'd finished anyhow.' The man's tone gentled, as did his face, when he spoke to the newcomer. He's going to send me packing—now—right away. Without even a cup of tea! Wyn gazed at the lovely silver tea set resplendent on the trolley, and wished enviously that she might have been allowed to sample a cup. At Bill's urging she had not even stopped for lunch, and she was both hungry and thirsty. And this was all the thanks she had got for it, she thought sourly. 'I'd be grateful if you'd show Miss Warwick to her room.' Russell Tylar indicated Wyn. 'The one in the long gallery that was prepared for Mr Stapleton,' he added smoothly. 'Unfortunately he's ill, so Miss Warwick's come in his place.' He was going to keep her after all ! Wyn stared at him for a second, taken aback by this unexpected change of front, until another thought struck her. He probably knew there wouldn't be another train out of Tylar Barrow until the morning, so he had little option but to offer her hospitality for the night. As she herself had little doubt that it would be for the night only, she thought ruefully; Russell Tylar did not look the type of person who would alter his opinions easily, and the gleam in the fair-haired girl's eyes as she caught Wyn's own confirmed that she would do everything in her power to make sure Wyn caught the first train in the morning back to where she started from. 'Come with me, Miss Warwick.' The woman Russell Tylar had called Nanny gave her a friendly smile, and added to the man, 'Tea will be a few minutes late anyway, sir. Mrs Tylar and Mr Val have been out with the children, so Mrs Tylar asked for it to be put back ten minutes.' 'I hope you'll join us in ten minutes, then.' Latent hospitality forced Russell Tylar into a show of amiability he must be far from feeling, thought Wyn bitingly. Perhaps he had

caught her wistful glance towards the .teapot, but it was more likely that he did not want to appear rude in front of one of the house staff, even one so privileged as a nanny. She wondered who were the other people the woman had mentioned. It looked as if there were two families living at the Grange, Russell Tylar and his wife, and this other family. She shrugged. It was no business of hers, and she would be gone in the morning anyway, so what was the use of conjecturing about the Tylar family set-up? `I'll have your cases brought up for you, miss.' Her escort mounted the wide, gracefully curved staircase rising from the main hall, and in deference to her stout lack of breath Wyn slowed her own steps, which gave her time to study the portraits that mounted the wall beside them. Tylar ancestors, without a doubt, their family origin going back many hundreds of years, to judge by the changing costumes of the subjects, which marked each era and confirmed Wyn's guess at their age. Names of famous portrait painters of past centuries sprang to her mind as she gazed. Had she stayed, she would have been able to confirm her guess at the identity of the artists who wielded their brushes so long ago, but she would not be allowed the opportunity now. Bill would have to cope as best he could when he was fit again, she thought, angered in spite of her determination not to be upset by her frigid reception, and the fact that anyone would risk such possessions because of stubborn prejudice. There was a fortune hanging on this wall alone, she judged, and it followed them along the inner wall of what Russell Tylar had termed the long gallery, the typically long corridor of period houses with windows opening out on to what at one time must have been beautiful gardens and well cared for parkland, but now bore sad evidence of years of neglect.. Theinner wall of the gallery was punctuated by doors. leading off to bedrooms, Wyn guessed, and paused as her guide stopped short at one door and reached out for the knob. 'You'll be comfy in here, miss,' Nanny told her, with a slight note in her voice that could have been doubt. 'We'd prepared for a gentleman visitor, of course ...' 'This will do beautifully.' It didn't matter for one night, and the room was a pleasant one, beautifully furnished, though its overall appearance was slightly austere. As she imagined Russell Tylar's room might be. A man's room. A man's man, with no time for frivolities ... 'Tea will be in the drawing room in ten minutes, miss.' Nanny drew her attention back to her surroundings, and she smiled her, thanks. Ten minutes would be ample time for a quick wash and brush up. A plentiful supply of soft towels lined the rail of the modern wash basin, and there was no need for her to change her light wool suit. No need for her to unpack at all, in fact. The cup of tea would be welcome, though. The thought of it drove her downstairs as urgently as the desire not to incur her host's criticism by unpunctuality. The door of the drawing room stood slightly ajar as she reached the bottom stair, and checked her own miniature timepiece by the moon face of the longcase clock standing in the hall. A buzz of voices came from inside the drawing room, and one voice rose above the rest. 'Send her packing!' Diane's tone was as cold as her eyes, Wyn reflected, 'There must be other antiquarians who'll do the job for you.' 'Not as good as the Stapletons. Not on this side of the Channel, anyway. And to get help from abroad would take time.' There was strain as well as impatience in Russell Tylar's voice. 'She's not a Stapleton,' Diane was quick to point out the difference. 'She's only one of their employees.' Wyn

bit her lip. She would have loved to tell them she had been offered a partnership with Bill and his father, purely on her merits. But that did not help her case now. She backed apprehensively up the stairway for a step or two, and wished she had not been so prompt in obeying Russell Tylar's ten minutes' time limit. `You can't send her away just because she's a woman,' another male voice objected. `If she liked to take it further, she could sue you under the Sex Discrimination Act.' The unknown man, probably the one called Mr Val, made her point for her, and Wyn silently applauded his bluntness that she herself had not had the courage to use. 'I can't have a chit of a girl doing this job for me,' Russell Tylar replied harshly. 'It's too important.' suggest we all drop the subject for now.' The voice of another woman, soft and well modulated, but with a hint of firmness in it that effectively stilled the argument among her companions, brought Wyn hesitantly back downstairs again towards the drawing room door. She was dying for a cup of tea, and apprehension had dried her throat still further, and made her need even more urgent. 'Miss Warwick will be joining us for tea in a moment, and I won't have her embarrassed by your doubts.' The firmness was very evident now. 'Stay and have tea with us, Diane? You're very welcome.' She couldn't be Russell Tylar's wife, then, thought Wyn, if she had to be invited to a meal. She had noticed a platinum ring on the girl's engagement finger, and assumed it was a wedding ring. Probably it was an engagement ring, it looked old, so it could be a family heirloom. 'No, I must be off.' There was no 'thank you', Wyn noticed, putting her hand out to pull the drawing room door wider so that she could join the Tylar family, which she did not want to do, and acquire her cup of tea, which she did. 'You first,' she waited while the woman who had shown her to her room appeared with a large dish in her hands, which she carried carefully, shielding her fingers with, a cloth, as if it contained something hot. Wyn sniffed. 'Toast?' `Crumpets. The children love them ... oh, do be careful!' Her warning went unheeded and Wyn stepped back from the door sharply, nursing her elbow. 'Were you listening at the door?' Diane thrust it open and strode through, ignoring the fact that her careless exit had given Wyn a sharp bang. 'Certainly not!' Wyn flushed scarlet, anger robbing her of the faculty for further speech. 'She was holding the door open for me, Miss Diane.' Nanny gave her the kind of look that must have quelled many a nursery insurrection, thought Wyn with sudden amusement, and her tone suggested that it was a courtesy the flaxen-haired girl would probably not have thought to offer. 'I'll hold it for both of you.' Russell Tylar stepped out of the room behind Diane. He smiled at the elderly woman, and accorded Wyn a curt nod which left her undecided whether she should speak to him or not. She compromised by an unsmiling 'thank you', but he had already turned his attention to his companion. 'I'll see you to your car. Where did you park it?' 'In the stable yard.' They passed along the hall together, their voices fading, and Wyn followed her guide into the drawing room. 'This is Mrs Tylar, Miss Warwick. And Mr Val.' Nanny deposited the plate of crumpets on the trolley and beckoned to two ravenhaired children, a boy and a girl, who had been sitting beside a wire-haired fox terrier on the hearthrug.

'Come and have your tea, now.' They rose instantly, Wyn noticed with approval, and gave her shy smiles as they obeyed the summons, the crumpets keeping them and their helper occupied and leaving Wyn to make the acquaintance of the tall, whitehaired woman of aristocratic appearance who occupied the chair opposite to the one Diane had sat in earlier. 'Come and sit here beside me,' the owner of the soft voice patted the seat next to her, and offered her other hand in a friendly manner at the same time. 'You must be longing for a cup of tea.' She nodded towards Nanny, who obligingly started to pour out, and indicated the auburn-haired man who had risen from the chair opposite to her own. 'Val is my younger son. You've already met Russell, of course.' She neatly sorted out her family for Wyn, who turned to meet another pair of grey eyes very like Russell's, but containing a smile in them that was interested as well as friendly, and obviously approved what they saw. It was strange how a dark-haired family so often threw up an auburn-haired member, she thought reflectively, liking Val Tylar on sight. I'm prejudiced because he stood up for me, she told herself scornfully, but just the same it was good to feel she had one ally in this household. Mrs Tylar was friendly enough, but it would be difficult to tell what she was really thinking. Her high-boned face bore latent evidence of once great beauty, faded now with age but still graciously lingering like the elusive perfume of pot-pourri that brings back memories of summer rose petals to tantalise a winter's day. 'And- this is Jonathan and Jane,' she smiled at the children who had quietly resumed their seat on the rug and sat regarding Wyn with frank curiosity that even took precedence over the crumpets. Wyn glanced quickly towards the fox terrier that looked as if it waited the opportunity to sneak the piece in the boy's fingers, and consume it on the spot. 'In your basket, Scamp.' The man checked the dog just in time, and Wyn's eyes twinkled. 'His turn will come after tea,' Val smiled easily, and Wyn wished that his older brother could be more like him, it would have made her welcome warmer, and her task much easier; that was, if she was to remain. She wondered uneasily what would be the outcome of the argument. For the moment the tea was delicious. She was offered a choice, and opted for China tea with nothing added, a favourite whenever she had the opportunity, though her work tended to mean more snatched meals on journeys than leisurely ones in such delightful surroundings. It would be nice if she could stay. She missed her home, the big family farmhouse that sheltered her parents and two married brothers, each with a family of their own, so that the place, although it was divided strictly into three, and was large enough to make each abode a roomy home, tended to become a general dwelling whose occupants were fond enough of one another's company to want to be together as much as possible, and was in consequence a happy place of chatter and laughter. Her work took her solely among adults, as a rule, often into unoccupied, museum-like houses that were cold through lack of habitation, and she missed the children. Here, she could have had the best of both worlds, she thought wistfully, if it hadn't been for the prejudice of the owner and his fiancée. 'Sorry I took so long.' Russell reappeared and joined them at the tea table. 'Don't bother, I'll cope,' he waved aside his mother's move to help him and wielded the silver tea pot and milk jug with an expert hand, but disdained the sugar, which Wyn thought was a pity; his manner could do with sweetening. 'Diane had a bit of bother with her

car coming out here,' he explained, 'and she was afraid it might give trouble on the way , back.' 'Was it much?' Val's interest perked up at the mention of mechanical mysteries. 'Only a tappet chattering.' Russell helped himself to a crumpet. 'I borrowed your feelers and put it right. I've put them back in your toolbox,' he reassured his brother.. 'It's unlike Diane to bother about tappet noise.' Val's eyebrows rose. 'Where's the girl who used to go stock car racing, and live with a spanner in her hand?' he jeered, and Wyn looked up at him, surprised. She could not imagine Diane being interested in mechanical things. 'Does your fiancée race?' she asked Russell. There was no telling with people, of course, they had the most unlikely occupations. Her own career was a case in point. 'Diane doesn't race now,' Russell retorted shortly. 'It was a teenage enthusiasm,' he stated flatly. 'Are you engaged, Uncle Russell?' the small girl asked interestedly. `No, poppet—mind, the butter's dripping! ' he reached hastily for his handkerchief and mopped her fingers. 'Yet!' The murmur came from Val. It reached Wyn's ears, and she thought his mother's from the quick frown she sent in his direction, but mercifully Russell did not seem to hear it; he was absorbed with the two children. 'Surely being an antiquarian is an unusual career for a girl, even in these enlightened times?' The elderly woman cut across the awkward moment adroitly. 'Was it choice, or circumstance?' She smiled in a manner that told Wyn her interest was genuine. 'Both really. It started with an interest in antiques, and my family are friends with the Stapletons. It grew from there,' Wyn explained. 'They must value your services, to feel they can send you out on missions like this?' 'They've asked me to become their partner.' Wyn spoke quietly, talking to her elderly listener, but at the same time informing Russell. He should know he was not dealing with a 'chit of a girl'. Her anger simmered again as she remembered his description. 'Indeed? You must be very knowledgeable. And very interested in your work.' Mrs Tylar looked suitably impressed. 'Tell me about it,' she commanded. 'All right, Nanny, you can clear away,' she broke off to give permission for the tea trolley to be removed. 'And the children can go out to play until bedtime,' she smiled down at them. 'Mind you see that Scamp doesn't get into mischief,' she warned them. 'Now,' she turned back to Wyn as they left the room, 'we can talk comfortably. Your work ...' she reminded her. 'Our ,work's our life, really,' Wyn answered her frankly. She did not say 'our living', it was so much more than that to the Stapletons and to herself. That was what made it such a pity about Bill's wife ... 'Do you often get an assignment like this?' Val sounded as interested as his mother. 'Quite often. Sometimes it's at the request of an insurance company, the same as this. Sometimes a family home has to be sold and the contents come under the hammer, so they must be separately valued first.' Tylar Grange was a beautiful home, a place of dreams in fact, Wyn had already fallen in love with the little she had seen of it, but it was not unique, and it would not hurt its arrogant owner to realise this, she thought. 'And of course there's always the odd police enquiry,' she drew a red herring across the conversation, which she felt sure Val would follow. The lack of response from his brother was monumental, and his curt tone when he answered her question about Diane left her feeling snubbed. She had asked on impulse, but his demeanour accused her of prying, as pointedly as Diane had accused her of doing much the same thing

- —listening at the door. 'Police enquiry?' Val exclaimed. 'I didn't know antiquarians went in for that sort of cloak and dagger stuff,' he rose to her bait obediently. 'But then I didn't know an antiquarian could look like you,' he grinned, and Wyn's colour rose. She wished she had not laid the trap for him, it had sprung back on to her own fingers. Russell's brows drew together", but his brother ignored him. He could afford to, thought Wyn ruefully, but she could not. 'Tell us more,' Val begged. 'Yes, do. I'm intrigued,' his mother joined in, and Wyn was left with no option but to oblige them, which she did willingly enough. If Russell wasn't interested he need not listen, she told herself. She had the evening to get through yet among this family, and even surface rapport with two of them would help it along. 'Mostly the cloak and dagger work, as you call it,' she smiled at Val, 'involves paintings. Forgeries.' It sounded dramatic, but it was only the truth, and if Russell thought she was merely seeking attention she could not help it. 'We're usually able to sort it out, though the result isn't always satisfactory to the owner.' 'It's sad to think of old homes like these being sold, and their contents auctioned off,' Mrs Tylar reverted to Wyn's former comment. 'I always feel that.' Wyn turned to her impulsively. 'I often wonder how the furniture feels when it's stood by another piece for perhaps a couple of hundred years, and then the whole lot has to be sold in separate pieces, and they're scattered to the four winds. It sounds silly, I suppose,' she didn't think it would to two of her listeners, and she didn't care, she told herself firmly, whether it did or not to the third, 'but we always try to find good homes for the pieces that come through our hands. We try to make sure they go to people who value them for themselves, not for what they cost.' It was the nearest explanation she could give for her feelings, but she felt her listeners understood. 'I know what you mean,' the white head opposite to her nodded comprehension. 'People who love their past ...' 'We always try to trace the history of any piece that comes into our possession.' She pursued her train of thought lost in her enthusiasm, and encouraged by the fact that another enthusiast listened, so that for the moment she could ignore the black-browed presence of the man close beside her. 'That must make the pieces more interesting to your clients,' Val interposed, plainly impressed. Too plainly, thought Wyn vexedly, biting her lip. She wished Val's eyes would leave her face for a moment; his obvious admiration for wavy brown hair and amber eyes set in a delicate bone structure was both juvenile and becoming an embarrassment. 'Does it take long—this searching for history?' His brother spoke up suddenly, and she jumped. He had not uttered a word for some time, and briefly—blissfully—she had forgotten he was there. 'Months, sometimes.' She turned to face him, and found to her astonishment that an expression of interest lit his face, too. I wonder he bothers to listen to a chit of a girl, she thought waspishly, but nevertheless she went on quietly, sure of herself on her own ground, and of her name that, if these people hadn't heard of it before, was becoming flatteringly well known in the world of antiques. 'Sometimes the antiques themselves reveal their own history. We've found—oh, all sorts of things—in concealed drawers in cupboards and bureaux, and once we discovered some documents in the back of a picture.'

'Did you indeed?' Wyn looked at him, puzzled by the sudden sense of alertness that had taken hold of all three of her companions. A significant glance passed between them, and embarrassingly their eyes returned to her face, and in each of them there was a look of—she watched them, her puzzlement deepening—almost a look of hope, she thought wonderingly. 'We're not always so lucky, of course.' Some instinct warned her to go on, told her to warn her listeners, she did not know herself of what, but she carried on talking anyway, striving to brealc the silence that held a strange tension, that was intensified by Russell's stare, which she was sure had nothing to do with her own appearance, but seemed to look at and through her, as if he was seeing something inside her that she could not. 'It just might work.' He spoke half to himself, and removing his eyes from her face met those of his mother and brother with a question written large in his own. 'It will only work if you tell Miss Warwick what it is she has to look for.' Again that hint of firmness-in his mother's tone, and once again it worked, Wyn noticed. Not, she- was sure, because Russell was subservient to his mother's will; he had much too strong -a character for that, his jawline alone, square and firm in his tanned face, was evidence enough of his ability to make up his own mind, but because he respected her judgment. `For heaven's sake can't we call you Wyn?' Val protested. 'This Miss Warwick sort of formality destroys me,' he said impatiently. 'I'd be glad if you would,' Wyn confessed her own dislike of formalities. 'But Bill Stapleton didn't say anything about a search here. Should he have done?' she asked, doubtfully. 'No, this- didn't crop up until after I spoke to him.' Russell turned his gaze back to her, still with the same incredulous look of hope in it. 'We need to—we must—find a will,' he explained, speaking almost reluctantly as if he found it difficult to unburden himself to a stranger—and an unwelcome one at that, Wyn thought, but she remained quiet, waiting for him to go on. 'Tempest Tylar—my late uncle—left a will naming his heir.' 'I thought estates such as this were always entailed.' Wyn was mystified and showed it. 'I thought they descended directly through the next male in line of succession?' 'Tylar Grange is entailed, just as you say,' Russell told her, 'and to our prior knowledge my uncle had no children. But the solicitor has a letter in his handwriting which he left to be opened one month after he died. It mentions a will left somewhere in 'the house, which names his rightful heir. By the time the letter was opened, the solicitor had advised me to move in here, if only for security's sake. You can appreciate it would not do to leave such a place unoccupied.' Wyn could appreciate it very well; the thought that it was occupied but under-insured for so long still horrified her. 'We thought no more of it at the time. My uncle was—slightly eccentric.' A bit of a ,recluse, Bill had called him. A love affair gone wrong ... 'Anyhow, we didn't take it at all seriously.' His manner was serious enough now, his voice faintly weary, and a quick stir of sympathy caught Wyn by surprise. What a blow to inherit such a lovely home, and then have a doubt cast on its ownership. ,It should be possible to find out fairly quickly if anyone else has a claim to the estate,' she said practically. 'Can't your solicitors advertise, or something?' She was a bit vague about the details, but she felt something like that could be done.

'There's no need to advertise,' Russell told her, and there was no doubt that he sounded weary now, and disheartened. 'Someone—a man of about Val's age—has come forward claiming that he is Tempest Tylar's son, and the rightful heir to Tylar Grange,' he said bitterly.

CHAPTER TWO

`AND what's worse, he wants to turn the place into a sports drome,' Val snarled into the silence that followed Russell's announcement. 'A—what?' Wyn felt her ears were deceiving her. `Hardly a sports drome, Val. A leisure centre, I think the solicitor called it,' his mother corrected him. 'A sort of safari park without the animals,' she suggested vaguely. `Safari park, sports drome, leisure centre—what's the difference?' Russell pushed aside his chair with an impatient gesture, and paced the carpet restlessly, reminding Wyn of a caged tiger in the safari parks he despised. 'I wouldn't mind so much,' he jerked out, 'if the Grange was going to be used properly, but this ...' His feelings choked him into silence. `The idea's monstrous.' For a moment she had almost felt sorry for the unknown contender for the Grange, Russell would be a formidable opponent, but her feelings hardened against anyone who could contemplate using good parkland for such a purpose. 'The land's been neglected,' her home background had trained her eyes to notice such things, 'but with time and a lot of hard work it could be reclaimed. There's some fine grazing going to waste out there,' she gestured towards the long picture windows that looked out across an ornamental bridge over a brook that had been dammed further down so that it widened into a large pond, from where an avenue of mixed deciduous trees made a cool walk across parkland that had all the appearance of .a Capability Brown landscape. 'There speaks a country lass,' Val hazarded shrewdly, and Wyn smiled. 'Farming family,' she confessed. 'Do you ride?' Val's voice was eager, the subject they were all discussing temporarily forgotten for the moment in the light of this new attraction. 'We could find you a mount,' he offered as she nodded assent, 'there's some fine riding country hereabouts.' He evidently saw himself squiring her, thought Wyn with some dismay, and she butted in hastily. 'I came to work,' she pointed out, conscious, if his brother was not, of the fact that Russell's brows were again drawn together in a frown. 'You won't be working all the time, surely? Our revered uncle did that,' Val complained, boyishly disappointed. 'He also left us with an insurance problem to sort out, and a will to find,' his brother reminded him sharply, and Val's face fell into crestfallen lines. 'May I see the letter the solicitor had from your uncle?' Wyn closed the subject firmly, showing both the brothers, she hoped, that while she was here she had only one object in mind—two if she was to search for the will, but cataloguing the contents of the house and will hunting were correlated. Then she wanted nothing more than to get back to their own business as quickly as possible to relieve the pressure there until Bill was fit again.

'I've only got a photostat copy, the original is with the solicitors.' Russell dug into his breast pocket and sorted out a sheet of notepaper that showed dog-eared evidence of being much read. He resumed his chair next -to her, and pulled up a small table on which he smoothed out the paper, so that she could easily read what was on it. Wyn looked at it incredulously. She had had some strange assignments before, but now she felt she must be dreaming. It was more like enacting the fantasy of some mid-Victorian work of fiction than anything she had encountered yet in real life. Spidery handwriting scrawled' across the page without any regard for lines, bp it was nevertheless clearly legible. It said : 'My property shall go to my rightful heir, whom I have named in my will.' Then underneath, underlined, and slightly darker in tone, as if the writer had pressed on his pen to emphasize his words, 'My hounds shall be its guardian.' 'There's only one thing to do.' She looked up from the paper and found the eyes of her companion looking at her once again with that odd mixture of question_ and hope. 'When the furniture and so on is being catalogued we must thoroughly examine every piece. Secret drawers aren't all that mysterious if you know how to go about looking for them,' she told them frankly, 'and if the backing of a picture has been tampered with it should be noticeable to a close scrutiny.' She did not like the responsibility that had been suddenly thrust upon her, any more than she liked the man who had forced her practically into the position of saving his home for him, but her spirit rose to the challenge that it presented. 'We'll find the will,' she spoke confidently into the tense waiting that was setting her own nerves as much on edge as those of her companions. I'd like to be the one to find the will myself, she thought suddenly; it would justify her position to Russell Tylar if she did. His doubts about her competence rankled as much as his description of her as a 'chit of a girl'. 'The man who claims to be your uncle's heir would have to get planning permission before he could use the house and land for such a purpose as he has in mind,' her lips curled at the thought, 'and I should say he would find that impossible.' No one in their senses would put the seal of approval to such a scheme, she was convinced. `Don't be too sure,' Russell silenced her coldly. 'Think yourself round the countryside hereabouts. Sorry,' he instantly retracted, 'I forgot you're not familiar with the district. But think of the number of ancestral homes that have been opened to the public in the last few years. Little more than grandiose public houses, now, for the most part.' His hurt at such a fate for the Grange rode him like a storm cloud. 'The man would have precedence on his side—and something else,' he added harshly. 'This is a rural area in the old-fashioned sense of the word. There's virtually no employment locally, except for farm work and the village pubs. There are one or two shops in the larger villages, but they're all small family businesses. It would be a brave Authority that would refuse the opportunity of extra employment within an area such as this.' His logic was devastatingly far-sighted and impersonal, and he did not shrink from his own conclusions, which must have been as painful to him as they were to the others. 'Then the sooner we get started the better,' she replied practically. 'May I keep this? I'd like to browse over it.' She folded the piece of paper together and looked up to Russell for permission.

'If you want to,' his tone was indifferent. 'We know the contents well enough by now ...' 'We've got to go to bed, now.' He broke off as a resigned voice came from the doorway, and the two children appeared looking cherubic, freshly bathed and pyjamaed, and Wyn glanced at her wrist watch with a sense of shock. Surely it wasn't an hour since they had gone out to play? It was nearly six, and it dawned on her that their own preoccupation had done the small pair a favour, and long postponed bedtime. 'Night-night, Gran.' They descended on their grandmother, then Val, and without any noticeable hesitation on Wyn as well. She felt herself kissed soundly, and laughingly returned their caresses. `You like children, miss?' Their nurse's smile held a glow of approval. 'Yes, we've got several of both sorts running about at home. I miss them,' she confessed. 'You promised to come up with us.' Jane held out chubby arms to Russell, and he bent and lifted her high into his own. 'You said you'd finish telling us about your horse,' her brother put in another reminder. 'You got as far as the race last night, and Pendelico was winning.' Evidently whatever story Russell had regaled the children with had impressed his young listeners, Wyn thought with a smile. `So I did,' he agreed gravely. 'They were neck and neck—oh, excuse me,' he broke off and spoke to Wyn, and now his look was warm and friendly, unguarded so that for a moment a different man shone through, one the children were familiar with, and no doubt his immediate family, but who else? wondered Wyn. Except for Diane, of course. The rest of the world probably saw him as she herself did, like a house with shuttered windows, drawing back aloof from human contact in a way that reminded her curiously of a marble statue, untouched and untouchable, yet desperately vulnerable to breakage. 'As you see, I've got a prior engagement,' he excused himself politely to his guest— employee? That was what she really was, Wyn admitted, and it would not do for her to forget it. Russell Tylar did not strike her as a man to excuse liberties, and the welcome she had received at Tylar Grange had come from his family, not from Russell himself. 'I've got a prior engagement ...' She wouldn't forget that, either, she thought wryly. She suspected Diane was his prior engagement, whether it was official or not, and it was probably the other girl's influence as much as his own old-fashioned ideas that had ranged him against her in the first place. 'And did Pendelico win?' She did not see Russell again until dinner, and Wyn was glad she had had the foresight to pack a couple of evening outfits when she came away. Her chocolate brown evening skirt and sleeveless top of cream, hand worked lace was an ideal in-between, she thought with relief, plain enough to pander to the fact that she was here on a job, but of a quality that brought a murmur of admiration from her hostess. 'The lace is exquisite.' 'It's handworked,' Wyn replied. 'It was a present when I was in Belgium some time ago.' It had in fact been a very special—and she suspected very expensive —gift from a grateful client, who was nevertheless wealthy enough to stifle any qualms of conscience she might have had on this score, and whom she had ,been instrumental in saving from the consequences of an ill-informed attempt to purchase a totally worthless painting, but she did not say so to her

companions, it would look as if she expected a similar gift when her work here was done. 'Pendelico won,' Russell replied gravely. 'He had to, of course. They'd never forgive me if I let their favourite horse lose.' 'All fictional characters must be unbeatable,' Wyn retorted. It would be nice to be like one occasionally, she thought, conscious that her own efforts in this house would be critically watched. `He's no fictional character,' Val responded, 'he's Russell's stallion.' 'It's an odd name for a horse.' 'You won't think so when you see him,' Russell told her, 'he's pure white—he's named after the marble,' he explained, and Wyn nodded. 'I recognised the name.' It looked as if she might even be favoured with a glimpse of the animal while she was here. But not tonight. A combination of an excellent dinner, and equally excellent wine, old like much of the contents of the house, and therefore potent, had made her sleepy. She stopped Russell's hand with a gesture as he went to refill her glass, and he instantly desisted, which chalked up a reluctant point in his favour, Wyn thought; she liked people who could take `no' for an answer. Using her drowsiness as an excuse, she sought the privacy of her bedroom. As much as sleep, she wanted to think. Her fingers urged to take out Tempest Tylar's letter again, to study it as his family must have done until the contents were imprinted on her own mind. She spread it out before her on her dressing table, her hairbrush lying unused on the mohair skirt of her dressing gown, and her mind once again eagerly alert. The words were irrational enough, but the handwriting was firm, denoting that the writer, even if he was eccentric, was far from being of unsound mind. 'I thought you might like a hot drink, miss.' A tap at her door heralded Nanny bearing a tray containing, to Wyn's delight, an antique, silver chocolate pot, complete with stirring rod, and a delicate china cup and saucer, with a sugar basin to match that Wyn's quick glance placed as early Doulton. At least where antiques were concerned, she thought, the Tylars were people after her own heart; they believed in using their treasures, instead of putting them away in cupboards, as so many people did, where they could be of neither use nor joy to anyone. `Mrs Tyler thinks it's better to use them and risk them getting broken, rather than lock them away,' the elderly woman replied to her exclamation of pleasure. 'And I've put you a few of those shortcake biscuits. I noticed you enjoyed them for your tea. They're my own make,' she added, and Wyn smiled her thanks, grateful for the kindly thought. She had made a friend in the children's nurse, for which the children's acceptance of her was mainly responsible, she guessed. She wondered if Diane liked children. It would not matter much, of course; Russell's younger brother would no doubt get married in time, and produce an heir if Russell did not, which would keep the family name going. `That letter,' Nanny gestured towards it in disgust, 'it's a pity it wasn't burned,' she grumbled. 'The trouble it's caused, already, and I don't doubt it'll cause a lot more before this lot's settled,' she said aggrievedly. 'You've seen it too, then?' She could not have too many eyes helping her in her search, thought Wyn, and if the pair watching her were elderly, they were still keen, and made keener by her affection for the family with whom she worked.

'Oh, I've seen it. We've all talked about it, little else since the solicitor came over with it to see Mr Russell,' Nanny sighed, and Wyn waved her to a chair. Elderly legs grow tired at the end of a busy day, and it was long past nine o'clock now. Her companion nodded her appreciation of Wyn's consideration, and perched on the edge of the seat, and Wyn had a moment of misgiving. It looked as if she was settled for a talk, and since she had made the excuse of tiredness to leave the others after dinner it would not look good if they realised she was indulging in gossip with one of the house staff. Still, there wasn't much she could do about it now ... 'You'd think that solicitor man would have had the sense to destroy it,' her companion's voice was vibrant with contempt for the lack of common sense shown by the legal profession, and Wyn bit back a smile. 'They can't do that,' she pointed out gently, 'that's why we must find the will for Mr Tylar. Though even then it might not name him as the heir to the Grange. She did not want to bolster false hopes in the loyal soul talking to her. `An' him giving up his commission with his regiment, to come and look after the Grange,' she worried. 'An' Corporal Benny came out of the regiment along with him! He's mad on horses and jumped at the chance. Mr Russell's more worried about his man's career than he is about his own.' She shook her head perplexedly. 'What'll he do if it says this Cedric Plumb creature is the heir?' 'Cedric—who?' For a second Wyn wanted to laugh, but the urge passed as quickly as it had come. It was no laughing matter for the family. She did not like Russell, but just the same his predicament gained her sympathy, just as it had gained her willingness to help. The more so now after what Nanny had just told her. A man such as Russell Tylar would gain honour and high rank in a military career, and to throw it up to come and take over his ancestral home, then find he might not be the owner after all, would be a double blow. No wonder the strain showed. `Cedric Plumb. That was his father's name, though he says Tenipest Tylar was his father,' snorted Nanny belligerently. `You see, miss,' she leaned forward in her seat confidentially, `Mr Tempest's wife was an actress. He married beneath him, she was no fit mistress for the Grange.' The snobbery of the old family servant was very evident now, but once again Wyn did not feel like smiling. The loyalty that lay behind it was both rare and precious. `In a way, I suppose, it wasn't all her fault,' Nanny struggled to be fair. 'She was used to the stage. Bright lights, and people,' she spread her hands expressively. 'Down here it's quiet, you see.' Wyn could well believe it; the place was as isolated as her parents' farm, and to anyone not accustomed to such a life the effect of such isolation would be dreadful. 'Well, in the end she left him and went back on the stage, and got married to this Plumb fellow. He was an actor, and they fitted one another. What made Mr Tempest so bitter was, she had a son.' The elderly eyes were fixed on the letter, brooding, treading paths that were best forgotten, but which had to be walked again now for the sake of the future of the Grange.'If the boy had been his own, surely he could have claimed custody of him?' `Ah, but he wasn't, you see. This Plumb man was his father, we all know that. But it made Mr Tempest bitter. He locked himself away here, he wouldn't even see Mr Russell and Mr Val, I suppose the sight of them as boys reminded him that he had none of his own, though he used to be fond enough of both of them before that,' she said regretfully. 'He spent his time here with just one manservant, and a woman from the village to do the rough work. He seemed to hate the whole world for what his wife

had done to him,' she sighed again and shook her head sadly, mourning a man's wasted years. 'Then we must find the will, and get it settled once and for all, then Russell will know what he has to do,' Wyn said briskly. 'It's not only Mr Russell, miss, it's the others,' her companion pointed out, and Wyn wondered what was coming now. The actions of one embittered recluse seemed to be like a stone thrown in a pool, she thought, their consequences reaching out in all directions. 'It's Mrs Louise—Mr Russell's mother, the lady you met,' she explained. 'She's sold up her home so that she could occupy the Lodge at the end of the Grange drive.' Wyn had seen it on her way in, it was a large, roomy-looking dwelling, probably from its size built as a dower house for just such a purpose, she guessed. 'You see, she has the children to look after for a year or two,' Nanny explained. 'Their mother's her daughter, she's several years older than either of the boys.' Wyn sup: posed Russell and Val would always be boys to their former nurse. 'She and her husband are out East on a plantation, arid it's no life for children when they get near school age, what with the heat and the lack of education and so on, they tend to grow up a bit wild.' That explained the children. Wyn had wondered about them. 'I stayed on with Mrs Louise after the boys had grown up,' Nanny went on complacently, `so the two little ones are no bother to her. And if Mr Val would make up his mind, he'll be joining their parents on the plantation soon,' she added, with a note of sternness in her voice that told Wyn she thought Val should have made up his mind before now. 'Does he have a career in mind?' Wyn stifled a sudden yawn and took a sip of her chocolate to cover it up. 'Oh, he's mad an aeroplanes,' Nanny said indulgently. 'But that's not a job, is it?' she airily swept aside the vast concourse of military and civil air pilots. 'He belongs to a flying club quite near here, and goes up most weekends. It's all right for a hobby, I suppose. There, I've kept you talking, and you're tired,' her glance detected a second yawn which Wyn was unable to smother in time, and she rose. 'Breakfast won't be until eight o'clock.' 'Goodnight, Nanny.' Russell's voice spoke to her from the gallery as she went out through the door, and Wyn's heart sank. She had dreaded this very thing happening, and now it had. He would think she was being standoffish by not remaining after dinner, and probably suspect her of gossiping as well. Her cheeks warmed at the thought. 'I've just brought Miss Wyn up a pot of chocolate.' Wyn let out a small sigh of relief that she instantly despised herself for as her visitor explained her presence in the room, and clinched the effect by turning as she closed the door. 'Don't go to sleep and forget your drink, now,' she warned Wyn, rather as if she was one of her charges, she thought with a smile, but nevertheless she used her hairbrush as a paperweight to keep the letter on her dressing table top ready for the morning, and picking up' her tray of chocolate she thankfully left Russell and his problems until the next day, and curled up in the most modern article of furniture in the room, the supremely comfortable bed. She bumped into him literally as soon as she was dressed the next morning. The sunshine poured through the windows with the promise of a lovely day. One she would have to spend mostly indoors, working. A glance at her watch confirmed that she had followed her usual practice and woken early, there was an hour to go before breakfast,

and a stroll outside tempted her. She pushed Tempest Tylar's letter into her slacks pocket and opened her door, intending to cross the long gallery to the windows that beckoned on the other side for a preliminary look before she went downstairs. 'Goodness! I'm sorry.' She hadn't heard Russell coming, striding along the corridor with the easy step of an athlete in his soft-soled suede shoes. She grabbed at him to stop herself from falling, and he instantly put his arm about her, lifting her as if she was feather-light, the muscles of his arm felt hard as whipcord through the thin wool of her ribbed sweater. 'It's my fault, I left my audible warning system behind. It sounds as if they're catching up with me, though,' he smiled ruefully, gesturing behind him to where the, voices of the two children could be heard in the distance., 'I thought I'd get a breath of fresh air before breakfast.' Wyn felt confused, conscious that her colour was high, and conscious too that he still held her, making sure that she was completely steady on her feet before he let her go. Thank goodness Diane didn't live in the house; it would be the last straw if she saw them like this, she would misinterpret it to Wyn's disadvantage, she felt sure. Her cheeks grew even pinker at the thought. 'It looks a pleasant walk under the trees.' She said the first thing that came into her head, gesturing towards the avenue of trees striding across the park with military precision, feeling his eyes on her with a strange expression in them that she couldn't fathom, and didn't want to; she had enough puzzles on her mind with his uncle's letter already, she told herself. 'That's where we're going—the children and I.' He strolled with her to the windows, dropping his arm as she moved away, and thrusting his hands deep into the pockets of his black slacks. He had rolled up the sleeves of his woolly of the same Stygian shade so that his arms showed deeply tanned, and bare to the elbow. 'As far as the Folly,' he indicated a ruined building that showed at the end of the trees, and which Wyn hadn't noticed in the twilight of the evening before. 'One of the many my family has committed.' He said it softly, almost to himself, but with a bitterness that reminded Wyn of the description of his 'uncle given to her by his old nurse the night before. 'It made him bitter ...' It was a gall that, running through the clear stream of a human life, could cloud it so that it tainted all it touched, and in his uncle's case at least had reached out beyond eternity to trouble those who were left to carry on. 'Are you coming with us?' The two children pattered along the corridor and caught them up. 'Wyn may not be feeling so energetic as you two,' Russell began, and Wyn spoke up quickly, without thinking. 'I'd love to. That is,' she hesitated, 'if you don't mind?' She wished she hadn't spoken. It would have been nice to go with the children, but their uncle's company was too much of a good thing before breakfast, she thought ruefully. And he hadn't seconded Jon's invitation, so their feelings might be mutual. 'Come by all means, you'll find your way about more easily if you know the lie of the land.' He hadn't changed his mind about her staying on and doing the job, then, she thought with relief. 'We're going to collect Scamp from the stables first,' Jon informed her. 'Gran says he mustn't sleep indoors, he's too b b ' He looked up at his uncle for help. 'Too boisterous, and she's right,' Russell smiled. How human he seemed when he was with the children, Wyn thought, watching the relaxed expression on his

face that had not been there the night before when they had been studying the letter. 'Don't let his lead trail,' he called as they followed the pair out into the sunshine, and paused to wait for them while they unbolted the stable door and loosed the shrilly vocal young dog out of his night-time confinement. 'Either hold the end of it, or unclip it from his collar.' Russell bent and captured the cavorting animal, but Wyn noticed he held out the end of the lead to Jon, and left the decision to him, paying him the compliment of being able to make up his own mind. The two children seemed well disciplined, but Wyn added another point in Russell's favour in that he did not seek to unnecessarily impose his own strong will on theirs. The boy had a confident, fearless manner that sat well on his six years, that Wyn judged him to be. 'I'll loose him, I think,' Jon decided after a moment's reflection. 'He's pretty good at coming when he's called, and if he looks like being naughty, you're here to shout to him.' Russell's lips twitched, and his eyes sparkled with quick amusement as they met Wyn's, but he made no comment. 'If he's free we can throw his ball for him.' Jane tossed it in her hands, teasing the pup, and all three 'of them scampered away in front of the grown-ups. 'Did you remember to bring the sugar?' Jon paused as they reached the rise of the bridge over the stream. 'It's in my pocket,' Russell told him, and the boy ran off satisfied. 'Is it for Pendelico?' This must be a regular morning stroll to see the horses, Wyn guessed. 'Some of it, the rest is for one of the mares.' Russell accepted her interest easily, not as if she was prying, as Wyn half feared he might since his prickly reaction to her of the evening before. She had told him her background, and that she herself rode, so he probably took interest in horses for granted. I'll have to stop being so edgy about his reactions to every word I utter, she scolded herself silently. I'll soon be afraid to think when he's anywhere near me, in case he can read my mind. 'Is she a special favourite?' She stopped her thoughts anyway just in case, and spoke out loud. 'She's in foal to Pendelico. She's the first.' There was pride in his voice, and suddenly she felt she wanted him to go on talking, so that she could watch his reserve blown away by enthusiasm, and catch a glimpse of the man who hid behind the stern exterior that so reminded her of a marble statue. 'Properly managed, this would make fine grazing ground. You could raise horses here without any trouble. The Tylar stud ...' She tried out the name on her tongue, and Russell stiffened. 'How did you know?' His voice was sharp. 'Did Val tell you—or Nanny?' So he had remembered her visitor of the night before. 'Tell me what?' Exasperation edged Wyn's voice. I've done it again, she thought resignedly. Really, being with Russell Tylar was like picking your way over a minefield, you never knew what would trigger off the next explosion. 'It sounded a good name, that's all,' she commented mildly. 'I know what I'd do if I had land like this.' Her eyes roamed appreciatively over the gently rolling grassland, rising to a conical hill, the symmetry of which attracted her attention, and Russell visibly relaxed again under her seemingly indifferent manner.

'That's Tylar Barrow. The one the village is named after,' he answered her question, which she used as a red herring to defuse what was rapidly becoming an uncomfortable atmosphere between them again. 'It doesn't seem the thing to do,' he added reflectively, `to walk across ancient burial grounds, but there's a grand view from the top of, the Barrow. It's a favourite spot locally for a walk, there's a footpath skirting that wood,' he indicated a distant stand of beeches. 'One day, we'll ...' 'Come on, Uncle Russell ! ' Jane trotted back to hurry them on. 'The mare's come for her sugar.' 'In that case we mustn't keep her waiting,' Russell smiled, and obediently quickened his step as she ran back through the trees, tugging at his hand until they got to a split rail fence, which she promptly mounted to give her enough height to fondle the mare's head that nuzzled her small hands, seeking its morning treat. `One each for you to give her.' Russell gave the children the sugar lumps, which rapidly disappeared in a contented crunching, and then he walked on along the fence to another paddock enclosure nearby. 'Pendelico,' he said quietly, waving his hand towards the paddock, and Wyn stared. 'He's—beautiful!' she breathed. A huge stallion, its colour as flawless as the marble that gave it its name, trotted towards the fence at the sound of their voices. 'He must be nearly seventeen hands,' she judged, even accounting for his pure whiteness, which probably made him look bigger than he was. 'Just seventeen hands.' Russell dug into his pocket and produced two more sugar cubes, but this time he did not offer them to the two children. 'They've been taught to keep their distance,' he explained. 'The mares are gentle enough, but a stallion can be unpredictable.' As unpredictable as its owner. The thought flashed through Wyn's mind, but she did not voice it, acknowledging that he spoke the truth. He knew she rode, and might be warning her as well as the children. He was not to know that she had been practically brought up on horseback, she was riding before she could walk properly, and that in the equestrian world her knowledge and prowess in all probability matched his. But her honest assessment of her own limitations, particularly those of physical strength, would have prevented her from attempting to ride such an animal anyway. 'A stallion is a man's horse,' she acknowledged quietly, and he looked down at her consideringly for a long moment, then nodded as if he was satisfied. 'It's all I can do to hold him myself when he's frisky.' His slender wrists looked as if they held steel strength, though the hands that caressed the stallion's ears were infinitely gentle, and she leaned her arms along the top rail of the fence, watching him. In the dip at their feet lay the Grange. The herringbone pattern of its brickwork picked out the ancient wooden frame of the house, that had stood the test of centuries and would stand for many more if it was left in the hands of men like Russell, who loved it for itself. Its corkscrew twisted chimneys gave out a faint blue haze of smoke, betraying Louise Tylar's one concession to her age, her love of a bright fire even on a May morning when the horse-chestnut trees along the ride raised tiers of blossom spikes like unlit candles in the early light. The beech wood beside which the footpath to the top of Tylar Barrow meandered looked unadorned by contrast, its turn would come with the flaunting colours of autumn. 'One day we'll ...' Russell had said.

One day we'll—what? she wondered idly. Walk up Tylar Barrow and enjoy the view from the top? She would like to go and see it. And when he said 'we', had he meant he'd walk up Tylar Barrow with herself, or with Diane?

CHAPTER THREE

`You were away such an age I thought you'd gone riding.' Val's voice was sulky as they joined him at the breakfast table. The two children had been collected for a nursery breakfast as soon as they returned to the house. 'Mrs Louise doesn't come down until later,' their nurse informed Wyn, and her heart sank. Russell at breakfast ! she thought wryly. And in his present mood Val was not much help. He's got out of the wrong side of his bed for some reason, she thought, unaware that her own slender presence, in `mink-coloured slacks and matching sweater that teamed with her soft brown hair, was a contributory cause. He had heard herself and Russell laughing as they came into the house, and he was not to know that their amusement was caused by the antics of the pup, which had decided to try and break house rules and sneak indoors to join the children at breakfast. 'There's no time for riding this morning.' Russell helped himself to kidneys and bacon from the hotplate, accepting without comment Wyn's preference for cereal and toast. 'You must try some bacon, it's home cured,' Val insisted. `Wyn said "no",' Russell told him flatly. 'She'll eat what she chooses.' His voice hardened at Val's impetuous, 'But it's ...' and Wyn intervened hastily. I'll try it some other time,' she soothed the injured feelings of the redhead. 'I rarely eat breakfast anyway.' 'How will you set about your cataloguing?' Russell asked her. 'Have you any sort of routine on this kind of job?' 'I like to have a glance at each room first.' Wyn felt thankful the talk had turned to work, there were no pitfalls there—no mines to explode, she thought ruefully. Val could evidently be as bad as his brother in that respect if something did not please him. And she was sure of herself on her own ground, which gave her more confidence when she was with Russell. 'Once I can find my own way about, I needn't bother you.' It was a tactful way of telling Russell that she preferred to be left on her own to carry, out her work in peace. She enjoyed her work too much to be lonely, and she did not relish the thought of him as a critical observer. 'I'll show you round.' Val's face cleared as if by magic. 'I need something to do,' he offered eagerly. 'You'd find plenty of work if you'd only make up your mind to do it,' Russell retaliated swiftly. 'I'll show Wyn round myself.' He turned away from his brother as if that closed the subject. 'I need to know for myself what the contents of the Grange are. I've only given them a casual look over so far,' he told Wyn. 'Your investigations will be thorough?' 'From attic to cellar if necessary,' Wyn assured him. 'There's nothing in the cellars except racks of wine,' Russell replied with a slight smile.

'And the attics are swept bare. We looked.' The spark of anger in Val's face against his brother died away as a new thought presented itself. 'All that lovely space, and not a thing in it,' he sighed. 'Just one of those rooms would make a lovely billiards room.' Or a children's playroom, thought Wyn. Like the converted attics in her parents' farmhouse that had provided soundproofed space for uproarious games on wet days for generations of her family. These would be for Russell's and Diane's children. For some unexplained reason the thought disturbed her, and she thrust it away, concentrating on the work that confronted her. I'm getting edgy, she told herself. The sooner I get to work the better. 'If you've finished, shall we go?' Russell waited politely until she had finished, her cup of coffee and refused another before he spoke. Wyn noticed that although he had chosen his own breakfast from the hotplate, the actual amount of food he ate was quite small, a breakfast in truth, rather than a meal. `My room's in a bit of a state,' Val began doubtfully, and Wyn paused at the door and looked back. `There's no need for me to invade occupied rooms,' she assured him, and turned to Russell. 'I'll give you at least a day's warning before I'm ready to start on a room that's occupied,' she told him. 'It'll give whoever's occupying it the opportunity to remove any personal possessions. When I'm assessing furniture—bureaux and chests and so on— I have to go through all the drawers and shelves,' she gave tactful warning of her activities. Hers was always a delicate job in a home that was already occupied, but so far her own tact had always ensured ready co-operation. 'Thanks for the tip.' Val poured himself out the last of the coffee and grinned across at her. 'I'll make sure to remove my pin-ups,' he promised, and Wyn laughed, thankful that he had recovered his good humour, as she left him to finish his leisurely meal. 'Oh, Russell, there you are! ' Diane's voice halted them both as Wyn followed Russell out of the breakfast room into the hall beyond. 'I've been up to the paddock looking for you. You're not usually in the house this late,' she emphasised her familiarity with his activities, and Russell waited for her as she strolled across to them from the outer door. 'You're not usually here so early,' he countered with a smile. 'If you've come for a ride you can take your usual mare. I'll have Corporal Benny get her out for you.' 'How soon will you be ready?' She cast a triumphant look at Wyn. 'I can't ride this morning,' Russell told her regretfully, 'but that needn't prevent you.' 'I'll take Pendelico and exercise him for you,' Diane said promptly, and Wyn looked up at Russell doubtfully. It was an involuntary movement actuated by his warning about the stallion, and she saw his brows contract. 'No, Diane ...' 'Why ever not?' The girl frowned too, her face as sulky as Val's had been a few moments before. 'I can ride as well as you,' she protested impatiently. Wyn did not doubt her assertion, or that she would look well on horseback, but the high-mettled thoroughbred stallion would need arms stronger than Diane possessed to hold him, she thought, concerned for the girl if Russell's infatuation with her should tempt him to give way. 'You must not ride Pendelico. I've explained why.' Russell was adamant. 'It's not safe, and it's for your own

sake,' he reminded her, his voice softening. 'You can have your usual mare,' he repeated his earlier offer. 'You and your caution ! ' Diane's face changed into a smile, and she looked up into his eyes coquettishly. 'You know it's not necessary, but it's sweet of you just the same, darling,' she murmured, just loud enough for her words to reach Wyn's ears. Wyn wished Diane would choose a more private place for her flirting; she felt embarrassed, as well as surprised in a detached sort of manner that even now Diane's eyes remained cold, with a calculating gleam in them that should warn Russell that she would get her own way if she possibly could, whatever his objections. 'I didn't come for a ride anyway,' the girl gave way gracefully for the moment. 'I came to ask for your help.' 'Ask away,' Russell invited, plainly relieved that she did not want to pursue the subject of the stallion further. 'It's my car again,' Diane complained prettily. 'It's the thing that holds the battery on. There's a metal rod given way. It's rusted through, or something,' she said helplessly. 'It's probably been eaten through by acid,' Russell laughed. 'I expect you've topped up your battery too generously and haven't bothered to mop up the overspill. Acid and metal don't mix, you should know that,' he scolded her, mock stern. Her car again. Wyn's lips curled as she watched her. It was a useful ploy. There were about a thousand things that could go wrong with the mechanics of a car, enough to cover any emergency that might take Russell away from Diane's side, and bring him running right back, she thought contemptuously. She despised the other girl's tactics, but she had to admit they were effective. 'There's some metal rod in that workshop place next to the garage.' Val strolled to the door of the breakfast room and took an interest in the proceedings. 'There's some welding equipment in there, too. I used it on one of the chassis members of my own car the day before yesterday.' Typically, Val ran a low-slung sports car with snarly exhausts. Wyn had seen him come in with it just after she arrived. 'I'll put you a new strap on your battery carrier if you like,' he said generously. `I asked Russell.' Diane's voice was the reverse of grateful. `I thought you were going to guide Wyn round the old ancestral home this morning?' Val turned to his brother innocently, and Wyn sighed. She suspected Val's words might not be so innocent as they sounded —certainly their effect on Diane was electric. She sent a barbed glance at Wyn, which told her quite plainly that she had made an enemy, and her voice was frosty as she spoke. 'Oh well, if you're that busy ...' Her tone made it quite clear that she thought it a poor excuse, and blamed Wyn for it. 'I must tackle the job here some time,' Russell reasoned with her, 'the solicitors are pushing me to get the work done, I can't put it off any longer.' `You employ people to do that kind of work.' Diane's implication was as contemptuous as her tone. `But some of it I must attend to myself,' Russell insisted, and the girl pouted. `Bill Stapleton wouldn't have had to be supervised,' she complained, relegating Wyn to the position of an ignorant junior, and Wyn flushed angrily, and bit her lip. She would not be goaded into retaliating, she thought furiously, if the other girl wanted a back alley squabble she must go elsewhere. Resolutely she

kept silent, though it cost her an effort, and her faint, impatient stirring brought Russell's attention to the fact that she was still by his side. `Val will put a new strap on for you,' he told Diane quietly. 'He just told us he wanted something to do, and he makes a good welder, he'll do the job so you won't even detect a join,' he answered her. 'Why not get it done now and I shall probably be free later in the morning, we could go for a ride then. Stay for lunch,' he suggested hopefully, and the girl tossed her head. `I've got something else to do,' she snapped. Her tone said she had something better to do. 'Are you coming?' she spoke to Val in a manner that if Wyn had been mending her battery carrier for her would have been enough to make her down tools on the spot, but Val merely grinned with a conspiratorial wink in Wyn's direction, and followed her out of the door. Wyn turned after Russell towards the first room door leading off the hall. He had paused to. speak to the children's nurse as she passed by with her arms full of small, freshly, ironed garments. `I'd be grateful if you would,' she heard him say, and then he ushered her into a large panelled room she had not seen before. `Except for the bedrooms the family occupy, everything's been left more or less as we found it,' he told her. 'There hasn't been time to make any changes, and when the solicitor said there was a doubt about me inheriting the property I thought it best to leave it exactly as it was. Until that problem is settled I'm really only a caretaker here ...' His voice was devoid of emotion, his expression as controlled as that of the marble statue Wyn likened him to, only the look in his eyes betraying his deep love of his family home that would make him its devoted caretaker for life if it were only he whom Tempest Tylar had named in his will. 'Your uncle had an eye for beauty,' she commented. For all that the embittered recluse had spent half his life collecting antiques, he had not done so without thought. None of the rooms that Wyn had seen so far had been over-furnished. True, they were spacious, a fact which might have tempted many collectors to fill them over-full, but the room they stood in bore out the impression she had gained from the others, of tasteful choice, each fresh acquisition chosen to blend with those that were already there so that wood, silver and porcelain combined to complement each other, and made a room that was a delight to live in as well as to look at. Each piece was so placed as to show it to its best advantage, the true touch of a connoisseur, and the walls showed the same restraint. Only one picture was in evidence, which, if it was genuine, was priceless, Wyn knew. 'It's an original.' Russell interpreted her glance and answered her unspoken question. 'So are these,' he preceded her back into the hall and shut the room door behind them, and gestured to the family portraits that mounted the wall above the stairway. There was no pride in his voice as he spoke, it was a simple statement of fact that yet could not hide his appreciation as he gazed at the assembled canvases, portraying generations of his family whose painted faces gazed blandly back at this latest scion of their race as he stood with one hand resting lightly on the newel post and his head lifted, gazing upwards, an unconscious nobility in his bearing marking him as one of them.

'You've had some of the pictures moved.' Wyn's quick eyes detected signs of disturbance among one or two of the portraits—the ones that had dogs among their subject. 'Hounds!' Russell corrected her grimly. 'I hadn't forgotten,' Wyn said impatiently, pricked by his correction. She slid Tempest Tylar's letter from her pocket, wanting but not needing to read the words again that were as familiar to her now as they were to Russell. 'My hounds shall be its guardian.' There was plenty of choice, she thought with something akin to despair. 'The first half dozen portray hounds, and as for that one ...' She gestured towards a hunting scene in which a whole pack seemed to be included. 'You've taken on quite a job,' Russell agreed, and there was a note of challenge in his voice that lifted Wyn's chin, and a gleam lit Russell Tylar's eyes as he saw his shot had gone home. 'You've already started the job for me,' she pointed to the pictures that had been removed from the wall and later returned. 'Did you find anything of interest behind them?' There was a fine edge of sarcasm in her voice which she could not quite control. 'No, and we were afraid to tamper with them in case we did irreparable damage. We left them for the ex-

pert,' Russell retorted promptly, acknowledging her status with a bite in his tone that kept Wyn's chin high as she followed him from room to room until even he began to flag, and she had to admit that Bill Stapleton's assessment of the size of the task before her had been no understatement. 'Oh, there you are Mr Russell. I've taken your coffee into the morning room.' Nanny annexed them as they came downstairs again. 'It'll be welcome,' Wyn admitted with a smile. 'I feel parched!' She stopped as the sudden roar of an exhaust shattered the silence outside the windows, and the screech of ill-used tyres betrayed a driver who was either showing off, or in a foul temper. The latter, Wyn suspected, and slid a glance at Russell's face. His jaw tightened, and he tensed, listening. `Where are the children?' His voice held sudden strain. 'In the garden, sir. They're trying to get out of the maze without cheating,' the elderly woman smiled, and his face relaxed. He's afraid they might get in Diane's way ... Quick anger boiled inside Wyn at the thought of the possible consequences of the girl's reckless driving, and her eyes met Nanny's in wordless agreement on the senseless performance. `Black or white?' Russell broke the small moment of tension, and Wyn dropped thankfully into a chair. `White, please. My feet and my neck need the refreshment most,' she complained ruefully. 'Your neck?' Russell's enquiry was amused. 'It's a hazard in our profession,' Wyn laughed. 'Looking up at things,' she explained. 'Mostly at pictures.' 'You should have said—I'd have lifted them down for you.'

'There's no need this morning. Though I'll want a tall stepladder this afternoon when I start working properly,' she told him. 'I shall want to be able to see on the tops of cupboards and so on, as well as lift pictures down from the walls.' 'I'll lend you a stepladder for the cupboards,' Russell told her, 'though I insist you don't touch the pictures until someone else is here to take them down for you.' 'Some of the big ones are too heavy for me,' Wyn agreed. 'I'll have to ask for help with those, but the smaller ones I can manage.' 'They're all too high for you to reach up to,' Russell interrupted her. 'I can't risk you falling. I'm responsible for you while you're in my—in this house,' he corrected himself quickly. 'I'm insured,' Wyn told him lightly. He need not feel in the least responsible for her, she thought, nettled by his tone, as if he had been giving instructions to one of the children. If Bill. Stapleton had been able to come and do the job himself, she was sure Russell would have left him to do it in his own way, with an offer of help only when he asked for it. 'That's hardly the point.' Russell's brows drew together in the now familiar frown, and Wyn sighed. She'd set off another mine ... 'I don't want you descending at speed from the top of a ladder and breaking your pretty neck while you're here,' he snapped. So he admitted it was a pretty neck ... Wyn bit back a smile at the backhanded compliment. He obviously doesn't mind if I go and break it somewhere else, she dissected the rest of his sentence candidly. 'I've got quite enough problems on my hands as it is,' he added in a deflatory tone, and she held up her hand in a gesture of surrender. 'I promise I'll ask.' She picked up the coffee pot and took up his cup to refill it, using the small service as he had done, as a gesture to cover a momentary awkwardness. Her action revealed the full beauty of the silver salver that bore the coffee set, and she ran her finger lightly across the gadrooned border, turning the circular tray so that the exceptionally fine engraving in the centre faced towards her. 'Your family crest?' He nodded, and she studied it thoughtfully. A black-crowned peregrine falcon looked back at her with fierce gaze, its wings half uplifted, poised ready for flight from the mailed fist on which it rested. 'Does the title go with the property?' Long years ago falconry had been the sport of kings and nobles, and to fly a peregrine was to hold no less a rank than earl, she knew. Yeomen had to be content to fly the lesser hawks. 'The title fell into disuse many generations ago,' Russell took her train of thought without difficulty. 'The direct line was broken. The name survived, and the crest with it, but no one laid claim to the title afterwards.' He sounded indifferent. His pride lay in his own family name and the honour brought to it by each individual who bore it, Wyn guessed shrewdly; her companion would have scant regard for honours handed down by other men. 'If you've finished with these, sir, I'll clear them away before I call the children in for lunch.' 'I'd no idea it was so late.' Wyn finished her coffee hurriedly, feeling guilty at her leisurely enjoyment of their break. 'There's still over half an hour to go,' Russell glanced at the carriage clock on the mantelshelf.

'By the time I've scrubbed Jane and Jon,' their companion stated significantly, 'lunch will be ready to serve.' 'I'll be out,' Russell announced. 'I've got a small commission to attend to.' Lunch with Diane, Wyn finished his sentence for him silently. He had asked her to lunch at the Grange, and she had refused. Rudely, but it was still a refusal, and he probably wanted to make peace between them again. 'I'll just go upstairs and get my jacket.' 'I think I'll go up too, and tidy up,' Wyn decided. 'I can start work on the cataloguing as soon as we've eaten.' 'Only on the things at floor level,' Russell reminded her. 'I'll bring you a stepladder as soon as I get back,' he promised. So he intended to return some time during the afternoon. It looked as if he was sure of making it up with Diane. 'I'll be in the first room we started on this morning,' she told him. 'The panelled one.' 'Tempest used it as his study.' Russell paced beside her up the stairs. 'In that case I'll take extra care in that one,' Wyn replied thoughtfully. 'If he was hiding his will, it seems the most likely place.' 'I'll look in as soon as I get back, to see if you've had any luck.' With a casual nod Russell passed along the gallery to the door of his own room, and Wyn thankfully opened her own door, suddenly realising that her ribbed woollen sweater felt too warm. The sun had increased as the morning progressed, and she headed for her dressing table, intent on changing it for the short-sleeved silk top she remembered packing before she came away. She pulled the dressing table drawer open, her hand reaching down inside to grasp the garment before the emptiness of it struck her. `That's odd,' she spoke aloud to herself. 'I thought I'd used all the drawers.' She must have missed this one. She slid it to and opened the next one down. That, too, was empty. Slowly she straightened _up, her eyes taking in the bare top of the dressing table. With a puzzled frown she turned to the big wardrobe in the corner, and flung its doors wide. It was as empty as the drawers. Bewildered, she spun round, and her glance fell on the bed. It was stripped bare to the mattress, in the centre of which lay one of her suitcases, with the lid open and her lingerie neatly folded and packed inside, just as she had brought it. It was Russell who had done this! Russell, who had ordered her things to be packed ready for her immediate departure, while he himself had made a pretext of guiding her over the house as an excuse to make sure she did not return to her room to see what was going on. Of her other suitcase there was no sign. Doubtless it was waiting outside in the vestibule, ready for her to leave. Wyn surveyed the rest of the room. Every personal thing that bore witness to her presence there had vanished. So Russell was determined to get rid of her after all. And he had chosen this cowardly way of telling her. He had not got the courage to tell her to her face. He was even missing lunch so that he should not see her again. Trembling with anger, she hurried to the door and flung it open. She would go to Russell now, make him face her ... 'Miss Wyn ! Just a moment, miss.' She halted and turned, her hand still on the knob, as the children's nurse bustled along the corridor, her face pink with hurrying.

'There now, you've come up and found your things moved,' she clucked vexedly. 'It was those two young scamps kept me, with their naughtiness, and me wanting to be up here before you got back to tell you where ...' 'Tell me what?' Wyn's voice bit. 'That I'm moving out? I can see that,' she said hardly. 'Yes—well, you see, miss, we were expecting a man to come.' It was so old-fashioned as to be almost feudal, Wyn thought, disbelief rendering her momentarily speechless. Russell's thinking hadn't progressed any later than one of the portraits they'd been studying beside the staircase, depicting a seventeenth-century soldier and his dogs—hounds! she corrected herself sarcastically. 'Men don't notice rooms so much as ladies. So long as they've got a comfy bed to sleep on, they don't usually care. It's different with young ladies, they like a dainty room.' Nanny got her breath back and prattled on happily. 'The one we've moved you to is bigger than this. Leave your case with the undies in, you won't need them for now, will you?' she questioned. Wyn shook her head, hardly able to take in what her companion was saying. The force of her fury against ,Russell left her feeling weak, and she- followed the older woman in a bewildered fashion along the long gallery, trying to break out of the daze that held her and grasp what Nanny seemed to think she should have understood automatically. 'I'll have your case taken into your new room for you, and I'll put your things in the drawers myself.' Her companion was so obviously pleased to have another charge under her wing that it drew a simile from Wyn, who was beginning to comprehend what had happened. 'You're only moving me into another room?' Sheer relief brought her words out in a gasp. Relief that was almost as great as the anger that had shaken her a moment before. My pride must have been rubbed harder than I thought, she realised ruefully; it could be the only reason for the upsurge of thankfulness inside her that she was not, after all, to leave Tylar Grange so abruptly. 'Why, of course, miss.' Kindly eyes turned a look of surprise in her direction. 'There you are,' Nanny flung open a door towards the end of the gallery, and ushered Wyn into the room beyond. 'I've hung up your frocks for you,' she was told, 'and put the rest of your things where I thought you'd want them'. 'Thank you.' Wyn still felt bemused. 'Oh, this is lovely!' she exclaimed impulsively. She had been quite content with her other bedroom, which was supremely comfortable, if austere, but this was a boudoir par excellence. A dainty mahogany table with lyre-shaped supports held the photograph of her family, without which she rarely travelled. A small kneehole desk with a leather top, its borders picked out in gilt, acknowledged that she might remain at the Grange for long enough to require letter-writing facilities, and her second suitcase stood on top of a large carved chest with a beautifully inlaid lid. A marriage chest. Her glance placed its origins at least two hundred years ago, and she wondered which Tylar bride it had been made for, and whether she had been happy here. It would be difficult not to be happy in such a room. To complete the effect, a large antique wine cooler stood under the one window, its brass bands gleaming softly in the midday light, its lead lining making an ideal stand for two large earthenware jugs full of late spring flowers, among which were placed enough velvet-soft wallflowers to permeate the room with delicate fragrance.

'The mattress is modern, miss, the same as the other bed,' Nanny hastened to assure her, but Wyn did not care. She would have slept on boards for the joy of inhabiting such a room, if only for a few nights. 'I must thank Mrs Tylar,' she turned a delighted face to her companion. 'How kind of her! I'll go down right away ...' 'It wasn't Mrs Tylar as had your room changed to this one, miss.' Nanny turned a puzzled look at Wyn. 'It was Mr Russell as suggested you ought to be moved. You saw him talking to me when you joined him in the hall this morning?' She spoke as if she thought Russell had told her all about it, and Wyn felt a flash of irritation dim her pleasure in her new abode. Russell certainly was a peculiar man, to have her room moved without saying a word to her. 'Perhaps he wanted to surprise you, miss,' her companion beamed, and Wyn nodded, her vexation evaporating. If he had wanted to surprise her, he had certainly succeeded, she agreed silently, and relief coursed through her at the thought of what she might have said to him if Nanny hadn't come along in the nick of time and stopped her impulsive flight. `Mr Russell said only to move if you wanted to, miss,' the elderly woman told her, with a tinge of anxiety in her voice. But there,' the anxiety vanished at the brightness of Wyn's smile, 'I knew you'd want to move in here. It's a pretty room, like I said. It's known as the bride's room,' she confided, and there was a look of wistful remembrance in her face as she spoke. 'All the Tylar brides spend their wedding night in here,' she told Wyn softly.

CHAPTER FOUR

`COME and play in the maze with us this afternoon,' Jane begged Wyn at lunchtime. 'It's fun. You have to try and find your way out.' `Scamp managed it,' her brother butted in, and the small girl shook her head severely. 'He cheated,' she claimed. `He jumped over the hedge.' `Right over the top?' Wyn eyed the small wirehaired terrier dubiously, and Louise Tylar laughed. `Eat up your pudding before it gets cold,' she turned Jane's attention back to her neglected lunch. `The maze is in the old knot garden on the other side of the house,' she explained. 'The walls are made of box hedges, they're close, but not very high, and as soon as we got here Russell clipped them so that the children could enjoy the fun of the maze without being frightened by hedges they couldn't see over.' Where his niece and nephew were concerned he was thoughtful, Wyn admitted. When he had first moved to the Grange, believing it to belong to him, there must have been a multitude of jobs presenting themselves for his attention, and yet he took time off to attend to the needs of the two children. `After tea maybe I'll be able to come out and see the maze,' she compromised. 'I must do some work this afternoon.' She did not relish the thought of Russell returning to find her playing outside in the garden, however tempting the sunshine made their offer. And when he came back she would have to thank him for moving her room. She had not expected such consideration from

him after her frigid reception. Maybe his conscience pricked him, she thought hopefully. `There's so much Russell wanted to do here,' the children's grandmother spoke regretfully. 'He intended to restore the knot garden, and he'd already instructed a local builder to start renovating the Lodge.' `Nanny told me you'd given up your home when you came here.' Wyn's voice was sympathetic. Elderly people did not take kindly to moving house, and the sheer uncertainty of their future accommodation must be most unsettling to Louise. `Yes, I let my house furnished to an American couple,' Louise answered. 'They're in this country for three or four years—the husband's at the Embassy,' she explained. 'It seemed an ideal arrangement at the time. They were glad to move into a working household, they settled in right away, and we were equally glad to move into our family home. The children will be here with us until they've finished school, and Russell was keen for them to be brought up in the Lodge. I can't possibly ask the Americans to vacate my house now they've settled in, can I?' she asked worriedly. 'We were so sure, you see, that Russell was the only heir. And I always did love the Lodge, it's the dower house to the Grange, so it's plenty big enough for Nanny and me, and the children when they're not at school. And now, of course, everything's so uncertain, since this business cropped up about the will. If only we'd known right away we needn't have burned our boats so completely ...' The anxiety in her voice haunted Wyn as she made her way back to the panelled room from which she and Russell had started their tour of the house that morning. Tempest Tylar's will hung like the. Sword of Damocles over the whole family, she thought. Russell and Corporal Benny had both sacrificed their Army careers, and Louise her home. The fact that Tempest Tylar's wife had had a son was common knowledge, and his paternity claim would be hard to refute. She settled down to work, the search she had to make lending a keen edge to her concentration. The solitary picture on the panelled wall gave her no clue, it was a landscape with neither people nor hounds in evidence, and for a moment she felt a sense of disappointment; the study had seemed an ideal place for a man to secrete a document. `It seems the logical place,' she shared her thoughts with Louise as she propped open the study door to allow a cool breeze through the room just as the older woman was passing along the hall. `I'm afraid logic won't help you in your search.' Louise paused as Wyn straightened up, releasing the wrought iron top of the heavy leather-covered doorstop, one of a pair that 'stood beside the double study doors for when the occupier might want them propped wide, as Wyn had done now. 'Unhappiness turned my brother-in-law into a hermit,' she pointed out quietly, 'so logical reasoning may not have dictated his subsequent actions,' she warned delicately. A shadow touched her fine eyes as she spoke, that looked beyond Wyn into the past. Remembering. Regretting. Watching her, Wyn wondered what Tempest Tylar had been like. Russell's dark head appeared in her mental vision; but it was possible that he was nothing like his uncle to look at. Still it persisted, with its straight black brows and grey, brooding eyes, and behind it appeared Diane's cold blue ones, her fair hair tossed in haughty arrogance as Wyn had seen her that morning. She wondered if Russell had succeeded in making friends

again. She shrugged her shoulders, dismissing them both. A lovers' tiff was none of her business. She was here to do a job, and nothing more. I'll look in all the unlikely places as well as the likely ones,' she promised, and turned back to the table where she had been examining a pair of silver jugs and an ornate candelabrum. 'I think I prefer the plainer pieces, myself.' Louise pointed to the candelabrum, and Wyn nodded. `So do,' she agreed, 'but this started its life plain enough. The rococo work was added at a much later date—early Victorian, I'd say, and it's done in a baser metal than the original, piece. If you look closely, you can see the difference.' She pointed it out, at her ease with Russell's mother, completely sure of herself on her own subject, and knowing she had an interested observer. The Victorians had some horrible habits,' her companion said disapprovingly, regarding the highly decorative work with disfavour. `They only followed the fashions of their day, the same as we do, I suppose.' Wyn countered ,tolerantly. `When their plain pieces of silver began to look old-fashioned, they had them modernised, and rococo was popular then,' Wyn added the candelabrum to her growing list in small, neat handwriting, and put a figure beside it that made Louise's eyes widen. 'Goodness! Is it worth as much as that?' she cried. 'I had no idea ...' 'Don't let my estimates prevent you from using the pieces you like,' Wyn begged. 'They're better for being, used, that's what they were made for in the first place.' 'Of course I shall use them,' her companion retorted promptly. 'I love beautiful things— as you do,' she acknowledged a kindred spirit. 'It's simply that I've never thought of them in terms of real money before.' 'You're the kind of owner we like to find for anything special that comes into our hands,' Wyn told her with a smile. 'But there may not be too much of this stuff,' she gestured towards the candelabrum. 'These jugs, for instance, they're all one period. The strap work and the cut card work on them were put on when they were made—it served a useful purpose in strengthening the vessels, as well as being ornamental.' 'I prefer these,' Louise handled one reverently. 'It's just that our present-day tastes more nearly match those of the earlier period,' Wyn smiled. 'Maybe in another hundred years or so, people will prefer the more ornate ornamentation.' 'Well, I don't,' retorted Louise fervently. 'Thank goodness the Victorians confined their alterations to the silver, and left the house alone ...' 'Gran, do come!' Frantic footsteps clattered along the hall, and Jane's voice implored from the doorway. 'Whatever's the matter?' Louise rose hurriedly, the silver forgotten. 'Scamp's chased a cat up a tree, an' Jon's shouting at him to stop barking, an' Nanny'll be cross 'cos she told us to keep quiet.' Echoes of canine hysteria, punctuated by ineffectual commands of 'Quiet, Scamp!' took Louise in haste to the door. 'I'd better go and restore order,' she sighed. 'Did you look ...?' she paused for a moment, turning back. 'I've looked in both jugs, and even tried the base of the candelabrum, to see if it comes away from the stem,' Wyn answered her. It did not, and she put it away from her and regarded the rest of the room. I'll start on the desk, she decided. She had better not touch the picture on the wall until Russell returned, there was no point in arousing his

wrath unnecessarily. Despite the change in her bedroom, she still felt very much on probation so far as he was concerned. She pulled the desk top down, revealing tiers of small drawers inside. She reached out and slowly pulled one towards her, revelling in the craftsmanship that made the fit of it so perfect that when she slid it shut again, the air it displaced puffed out the drawer below for nearly an inch. 'They really made things, then.' She stroked her hand across the perfect marquetry of the drawer face, the jigsaw pieces of differently grained wood so smoothly fitted together that the pattern might have been painted on the surface. The drawers were empty. She went through them all, paying meticulous attention to each one. Each joint was perfectly formed, and as firm as the day on which the desk was made, telling of careful use by appreciative owners. Things stand the test of time better than people. The senior Stapleton's philosophy returned to Wyn with forceful truth. I'm getting morbid, she scolded herself, determinedly feeling at the back of each drawer. Russell should have no cause to criticise her thoroughness while she searched, and once or twice she had discovered a concealed drawer in a similar piece of furniture, so why not in this oner Deftly she slipped under the kneehole of the desk, anxious not to miss even an inch of the wood facing, and grateful not for the first time that slacks were an accepted item of feminine apparel. Slowly she ran her fingers under the rims of the carved edges, feeling for something—anything—that might be even slightly loose, and so betray the presence of a hidden drawer. 'Have you had any luck?' Something clattered with a metallic sound on the floor of the study; a pair of black-clad legs appeared in Wyn's range of vision, and Russell's voice greeted her with unconcealed eagerness. 'Not yet.' Her own voice was muffled because she was curled up in a tight ball under the desk. She stretched out her legs cautiously, careful not to kick against Russell's feet. It simply wasn't done to kick a client, though more than once since coming to the Grange she had felt the temptation with this particular one, she remembered grimly. 'I haven't got far yet, I started on the pieces of silver on the table, and then tackled the desk. It takes a lot of time—ouch!' She forgot the carved edge of the kneehole, and as she shuffled out her head came in brutal contact with a leaf cut-out, with a force that momentarily rocked her back on her heels. She recovered her balance, and emerged into Russell's view, shaking her head to clear her hair from her eyes. Agilely she swung to her feet, and immediately the room began to rotate round her like a circus merry-go-round. 'Oh, my goodness!' She put her hand to her head dizzily. 'You're hurt.' Russell's voice floated out of a foggy void, coming from somewhere close above her head, and two arms went round ther as she swayed. She felt a hand on her shoulder, pressing her downwards. She resisted, trying to remain on her feet, but her knees refused to hold her and she obeyed the pressure of the hand and let her legs give way. The arms guided her gently but accurately on to something that felt soft but firm beneath her. They pulled her head back to rest on something else that smelled faintly of expensive after-shave lotion, and she lay back thankfully and closed her eyes, and wondered why anyone should put after-shave lotion on a cushion. 'You're not going to pass out, are you?' Anxiety tinged the voice above her head, and she opened one eye experimentally. It focussed on the over-ornamented candelabrum, which obligingly stood still, so she opened the other eye with more confidence.

She rubbed her head ruefully, feeling the swelling that was already beginning to 'rise above her right temple. 'I saw stars for a -few seconds, that's all.' She sat upright gingerly, holding on to the edge of whatever it was she leaned on. 'Don't get up too soon, give it time to pass.' Russell tightened his hold on her, preventing her from rising to her feet, and she realised she was still clinging to the thing she had rested against. Her thumb and forefinger discovered well cut tweed, that her startled glance told her rode its wearer's shoulder like a glove. 'I'm sitting on your lap,' she realised weakly. 'Tell me a better way to hold on to a fainting female,' a wrinkle of amusement creased lines about his grey eyes, and strong white teeth glinted in a smile. -but ...' Hot colour suffused her cheeks, creeping down her throat with rosy fingers, and confusion gripped her as he looked down into her face, the smile in his eyes deepening as he watched the tide of pink flow and recede in her cheeks. 'No buts,' he said firmly. let me see the bump.' She felt his supporting hand leave her back, confident that she could now sit upright on her own. Gently—so gently—his long, slender fingers gripped her chin, turning her face towards him, when she would fain have buried it in the loosely woven lapel of his jacket and hide the blush that had brought the smile to his eyes. 'I promise I won't hurt you, but I must see ...' Equally gently, his other hand stroked the soft brown waves of her hair back from her forehead, seeking the injury with a touch so light that it was no more than a breath against her hot cheeks. He had the fingers of a musician. The thought came to her from nowhere. The sensitive fingers of an instrumentalist, stirring notes of sweet Pan music that drew chords of response from her wildly beating heart which until now had lain unawakened, but from now on, because lie had touched her, was destined to carry with it a throbbing awareness of the man in whose arms she rested, feeling the strength of them about her, holding her safe, and his touch on her hair that was as soft as a caress, yet drew from her trembling lips a gasp of exquisite pain. `Did I hurt you? I'm sorry.' Instantly he lifted his hand, not knowing that its withdrawal hurt more than its touch, and she shook her head slowly, with the dazed feel of a sleeper arousing to a make believe world that so far had only existed by other people's telling, but now, engulfed herself, she recognised as real. 'I don't want ...' shook her head. She didn't want to fall in love, but she could not love with him. She had never visualised that love would be like this, she had always thought it would be the other way round, she thought numbly. First friendship, deepening into love, and always on the man's side first, her own heart left to uncurl its petals like a flower responding to the warm rays of the sun, sure of its eager reception. She had never thought it could descend on her in this black whirlwind of emotion, storming her defences with a ruthless strength that left her helpless and bewildered, her eyes as they sought his as dark as a mountain peat stream when a storm has devastated the heights, then passed on, leaving the bleak rocks as indifferent as before it came—as Russell was indifferent to her. 'Don't look so scared,' he misinterpreted her expres- sion, and his head bent lower over her upturned face, closer so that the smell of his after-shave lotion was like a faint spice between them. Suddenly she struggled, pressing herself away from him, afraid that he might kiss her—afraid that he might not—and if he did what her own response

would be. The touch of his fingers on her hair had been sufficient to rouse feelings she did not know she possessed; if his lips touched hers only lightly—only once—she would be unable to hide those feelings from him. Mortification coloured her cheeks tell him so. Particularly, she did not want to fall in 'What?' he asked her softly, watching her, and she again, and she dared not look up at him, knowing he would still be smiling. TO him a kiss would be a moment passed, much as he might have kissed Jane after a tumble, partly for reassurance, partly for comfort while he held her in his arms, nothing more than that, and as quickly forgotten. To her the touch of his lips would mean the surrender of her whole heart, and with her last vestige of control she fought to remain its master. 'I don't want anything on the bump,' she remembered her words and made them sensible. 'The skin's not broken, and I'm feeling all right again. It was that leaf cut-out— oh, look!' The sight of the carved piece of wood, swinging out now at right angles to the desk, froze her feelings and shocked her back to awareness of what she had been doing before Russell held her in his arms. 'It's broken. Heavens! You did give your head a crack!' He was concerned for her, not for the antique desk. Through her shock that fact had time to register with a small, warm glow. 'It isn't broken, it's swung out on a hinge,' she said wonderingly. 'A hinge? I didn't know there was a drawer ...' He stopped and stared at her, realisation of what they were both looking at dawning on him. 'I was looking for a concealed drawer—it looks as if my head found it.' Unresisted this time she slid off his knees and on to her feet, her one hand still unconsciously holding on to his for support, for the success of her efforts had left her still slightly shaky. 'I can see something inside, some paper ...' His voice was hoarse with excitement. 'You look—it's your right.' Nicety of feeling made Wyn hang back, but he gripped her hand and took her with him across the intervening stretch of carpet to the front of the desk, where with one accord they both dropped to their knees, Wyn because hers trembled so much that they would hardly hold her, from excitement, not from the bump, and Russell to reduce his considerable height, so that his head was on a level with her own. He turned to look at her, and his eyes were alight with a mixture of excitement and hope. `Go on, reach inside and get it out.' Her throat was dry, anticipation flared inside her, making her voice taut. Let it be Russell's name in the will, she beseeched silently. Let it be Russell ... 'It isn't a drawer, it's just a concealed hole, you'll have to feel inside,' she urged him. 'You feel, my hand's too big.' He withdrew his hand and gripped hers, his fingers overstrong in his eagerness, and Wyn wriggled her abused members in protest. 'Loose me, then, so I've got two hands to use.' 'Poor little hand! ' He rubbed it remorsefully. 'That's twice I've hurt you.' It was three times, but he was not to know about the other hurt. With suddenly set lips she turned her face away from him towards the aperture in the front of the desk, that ran back narrow and flat, and to which the leaf cut-out served as a door. 'There's a sheaf of papers.' She felt inside experimentally. 'Let me see.' Russell put his face down against her own, peering into the aperture with her, his cheek, with

the faint dark blue jowl line that no amount of close shaving would erase, disturbingly touching her own. Her heart did odd things inside her breast, but he seemed unconscious of its beating, although it sounded in Wyn's ears as if it might be heard as far away as the village. 'Handle the papers gently, in case they're old. They might crumble,' she checked his eagerness, instinct and training combining to guide her own handling of the documents. Cautiously she drew them out, and without looking to see what they 'were she instantly placed them in his outstretched fingers. For a brief moment he ignored them, and their eyes met, his acknowledging her restraint, thanking her for it, and then he looked down at the bundle of yellowed papers which had been carefully clipped together at the top. 'They're newspaper cuttings.' He sounded bewildered. 'They look like advertisements for the most part.' Slowly he leafed through them. 'Let me look.' Wyn took them from him and spread them out on the carpet between them, carefully stroking them flat. She glanced at the headings on the tops of the pages. They were all sheets from London newspapers, and all of them were many years old. 'There's a theatre bill here ... Your uncle's wife—do you know what her stage name was?' she asked him, sharp disappointment flattening her voice. There was no will among the papers. 'Tempest's wife?' Bewilderment still rode his tone. 'I think she just called herself Marylyn. Why?' 'We've stumbled on your uncle's souvenirs,' Wyn told him gently. 'Playbills,' she ruffled through them again, 'and critics' columns from the London papers of the day.' She smoothed them flat again with gentle fingers. `There's something else in the desk.' Russell peered inside. 'In that corner? I can see it.' Wyn reached inside again to the back of the hole, and fished out the only other thing it contained. Silently she held it out to him, a small, tissue-wrapped bundle, but he shook his head. `I'd rather you opened it. I feel I'm—trespassing.' 'Shall I put it back?' She made no move to touch it. `No, open it, we'll put it all back afterwards,' he told her quietly. She looked at the tissue paper, yellow with age, and knew how Russell felt when he said he was trespassing. Hesitantly she glanced up at him, but he nodded, obliging her to do as he asked, and reluctantly she unfolded the wrapping, parting the wafer-thin sheets. 'It's a rose—a dark one.' Wonderfully preserved, the once red bud lay open to their gaze. The long, slender stem held one thorn, still sharp, Wyn discovered. Her abrupt movement away from its point disturbed something from among the dried petals, something round and shiny that rolled to the floor. She bent swiftly to retrieve it before it rolled under the desk, and Russell bent at the same time. Their hands reached it together, clasped one another and missed the errant object, and Russell smiled. 'It's all yours.' He drew his hand away, leaving her to pick it up. 'It's a ring of some sort.' He had only caught a brief glimpse of it as it fell. 'It's a wedding ring ' Sudden tears pricked Wyn's eyes, blurring the smooth gold circle that rested on her palm, and she lowered her lids so that he should not see.

'He still loved her ...' Her voice was no more than a whisper, a thin thread of sound through the constriction in her throat, made worse by the sudden feeling of kinship with the deceased owner of Tylar Grange. Unrequited love. It was a quaint old-fashioned phrase, belonging to the stilted theatre of yesteryear, and yet here in this room which contained so much that belonged to that era, it did not seem out of place to Wyn. The pain she felt at Russell's accidental touch was very real to her, and the desert of loneliness to which her heart had condemned her became a grey bleakness in her own future days, as well as a past reality in those of Tempest Tylar. 'You've bought some new steps.' Jon peered round the door and discovered the new acquisition with interest. 'Can I climb up them?' `No ' Russell rose swiftly to his feet and with one lithe movement reached out and grabbed the boy as he reached the third rung of the stepladder that leaned rather precariously against the wall by the door. 'I'll spank you if I catch you on those,' he threatened severely. 'Corporal Benny lets me climb his,' Jon protested vigorously at being brought down. 'Benny's steps are not so high as these, and his can be used as a stool as well,' Russell countered swiftly, and Wyn bit back a smile. She was used to having to keep one step ahead of her own nieces and nephews, and it amused her to watch Russell coping with the same mental gymnastics, at which he seemed an able performer, she observed approvingly. 'These are nicer. They're all shiny.' Jon stroked the high aluminium steps enviously, and puffed at a label tied temptingly at about the height of his head, so that it fluttered at the force of his breath. 'You bought these new?' The label was a price ticket, she could see. 'You bought them for me?' They were tall steps, the sort decorators use, and their light alloy construction would enable her to handle them with ease. They would also be very expensive, she realised guiltily. 'They're safe for you to use.' It was Russell's turn to look embarrassed. 'Safe for grown-ups, not for small boys,' he added sternly, meeting Jon's interested stare. 'And they'll always come in handy for—er—things, later on,' he excused his generosity. He did not specify for what things and there might not be a 'later on' for him, not at Tylar Grange. 'I'm grateful,' she told him. 'You must have gone all the way to the village for them.' 'The label says they're from Mostyns,' Jon read it out loud, proving, Wyn suspected, that he could read properly. 'That's in town—coming, Gran!' he broke off and ,pattered away as Louise's voice sounded faintly from the garden, calling his name. The nearest town was thirty miles away. Russell couldn't have gone to see Diane after all. The thought made Wyn forget the headache started by the bump she had received. Unless he had called on Diane and found her out, and gone on to town instead. Afterthought brought the headache back. 'Shall we put these back again?' She turned to the desk and picked up the faded newspaper cuttings, then folded the rose and the barrelshaped wedding ring back into its tissue paper.

'Yes, now we know where to find them we can show them to the others later on. Let's make sure we know which piece of carving is the one that opens.' He counted the leaf cutouts from each side of the top of the kneehole. 'It's the centre one.' 'I found it before, well enough,' Wyn commented ruefully, and he laughed. 'Don't make a habit of opening it like that,' he advised her drily. 'You may not be so lucky the next time.' She did not feel particularly lucky now. The bump to her head would heal, but her heart had sustained more enduring damage. It twisted inside her now as she replaced the pitiful remnants of another's broken love affair, aching with newly awakened fellow feeling. 'It needs a fairly sharp pull, but it opens easily enough.' She snapped the small door shut and pulled it open again to make sure. 'Let's leave it now: Russell took her arm, urging her away. 'I'd already gone over the rest of the desk, I don't think there's likely to be anything else to find,' she told him. 'I'll start on the picture now you've brought the steps.' 'Not now—leave it for today and have a break.' He took the steps away from their leaning post and opened them out fully in the space of the room. 'You can start again tomorrow morning. I'll reach the picture down for you then. If you try to carry on working now,' he interrupted her half-hearted protest, 'you'll only end up with a worse headache, and have to give up tomorrow.' `The children asked me to go and play with them in the maze.' The sense of his reasoning overcame her conscientiousness. `Trying to get out of the maze won't help your head, but the sunshine might,' he smiled. 'Come this way,' he offered to guide her. 'There's a short cut through the conservatory into the knot garden.' Even in its neglected state it was pretty. The entire garden consisted of a formal arrangement of miniature box hedges. The outside hedges made four large squares, separated by wide grass paths, which in many places had given way to the rampant growth of weeds. The same slow-growing evergreen had been used to break up the individual squares into an assortment of different shapes, inter-connecting with one another, and the centre of each shape filled with brightly coloured flowering plants that responded to the warm May sunshine with a brilliance and perfume that brought a delighted sparkle to Wyn's eyes. `You love gardens?' He had been watching her, and read his answer in her expression. She had no need to hide her feelings from him on this. 'Oh, yes! My fingers itch to clear the weeds, though.' Her love of growing things deplored the wild growth, however showy its colour, knowing it to be a fight for survival that made for spindly height instead of sturdy plants, with room to breathe and bloom their best. 'Me, too.' He shared her feeling companionably. `This was going to be one of my first jobs when we came here, to clip back the hedges and replant the beds. Now, I don't feel I've got the right to interfere.' His voice trailed away, and Wyn looked up at him sympathetically. 'We found your uncle's souvenirs,' she reminded him, 'we'll find the will in the same way. It will probably take time ...' But find it she must, if it took her months, she determined. No one must be allowed to destroy beauty such as this.. Sheltered on three sides by the house walls, and merging into the velvet softness of old turf on the fourth, the formal elegance of the knot garden

breathed back past romance. The soft rustle of silks and taffetas would be heard here, as their wearers avoided the eyes of their ever watchful chaperones and kept assignations with the gallants of their day. Whispered vows would be made, and now and then broken. Perhaps Tempest Tylar and his wife—but no, Wyn could not visualise the woman whose stage name was Marylyn walking here. There would be tears, perhaps, and soft laughter. There was children's laughter now, as Jane and Jon ran to and fro in the only boxhedged square that carried no other colour, but where the neatly clipped hedges marched in pairs, presenting paths that from the antics of the pair running along them nearly all came to a dead end. Wyn and Russell strolled towards them. 'I haven't thanked you yet for moving my room. It reminds me of—this,' she gestured vaguely to the garden. In its full glory it would match the room she now occupied, in dainty elegance. She could not put her thoughts into words, but somehow she felt he would understand. `We expected our guest to be a man,' he reminded her, courteously promoting her own status in the household, and briefly, humanly, Wyn wished Diane could hear him. She thrust the feeling away, and capitulated to the urging of the two children. `Come and join us. Help us to find a way out.' Everyone in the household was trying to find a way out, she thought; and sudden depression gripped her. The children wanted her help to find a way out of the maze, and as soon as they knew the right route it would spoil the game for them for the future. Russell wanted her help to find the will, and she herself ... Russell was the only one who could help her, and he did not know of her need. To him she was just a hired help, here by virtue of the fact that the person he had wanted to come—Bill Stapleton- was ill. She was second best so far as he was concerned, and she did not need Diane to remind her of the fact. With leaden feet she followed the happy pair along the paths, coming up against a blank end each time, and having to turn back. Although she could easily see the path that lead out of the, maze she could not unravel the complications of turns and twists that would set .her feet upon it, and in the end she followed the example of the wirehaired terrier and jumped over the hedge, frog-hopping Jane and Jon across them too when they tired of their play, and letting them run ahead of her to where Russell awaited them at the end of the path, with his arms wide open to receive their hurtling advance, and closing about them again as they reached him, hugging them close against him, and effectively shutting her out.

CHAPTER FIVE

'YOU'RE not going to start work again this afternoon, surely? It's Saturday.' Val regarded Wyn in amazement. 'I only came out for a breath of fresh air,' she reminded him, turning away from the paddock fence towards the house. The whole family seemed to regard the walk under the aisle of trees as far as the paddocks as a regular perambulation, taking a titbit for the horses providing them with a point as well as a turning point to their stroll.

'You worked all morning,' Val pointed out, which was true. Russell had worked with her for part of the time, reaching down the solitary painting from the study wall, so that she could examine it more easily, ,observing her movements closely. Too closely for her peace of mind, since her fingers trembled so that she had difficulty in holding the priceless oil, and found they shook as much from fear in case her distress should show, and that Russell might enquire the cause, as from his nearness as they worked. 'You didn't find anything of interest in the study,' Val said impatiently. 'Russell showed us what you found in that hole in the desk. A lot of mouldy old newspaper clippings,' he said disgustedly. 'They were your uncle's souvenirs,' Wyn pointed out gently. 'Souvenirs!' Val was not disposed to sentiment. 'I can't think why you bothered to put them back, you might as well have thrown them out and have done with it. I say, Russ ! ' He broke off and quickened his step, and Wyn saw to her dismay that Russell and Diane were heading in their direction along the avenue. 'I'll go indoors.' She could cut across the bridge over the stream, and she need only smile and pass on when she met the couple approaching her. Diane would not want to stop and speak, of that she could be sure, and in Diane's company, neither would Russell. `No, you won't.' Val caught at her arm masterfully. Unless she struggled she could not release his grip, and it was too late now, anyway. At Val's hail Russell quickened his step towards them, and Diane was obliged to do the same or be left behind. 'You don't expect Wyn to work on a Saturday afternoon, surely?' Val lost no time in coming to the point, and Wyn wished heartily that he had not joined her on what had started out as a pleasantly solitary walk until he spotted her from the house windows and hurried out to join her. From his tone it sounded as if he was accusing his brother of slavedriving, and that she had been complaining. 'Of course not.' Russell's brows rose enquiringly. 'Not unless she wants to, that is?' As in the case of the children, he left the choice to her. 'Are you and Diane going riding?' It must have been obvious to Val that they were, since they were both dressed in riding kit, and Diane swung a hard black hat by its chinstrap from her fingers. 'Let's make it a foursome, shall we? If you'll wait a few minutes for us, we'll soon be ready,' Val said eagerly. 'I don't have any riding kit with me,' Wyn protested, annoyed at not even being consulted before he tried to make the arrangements. Surely even Val's youthful impetuosity could see when he was not wanted? The scowl on Diane's face was as black as an August thundercloud. Although Val had gone to the trouble of mending her battery carrier for her she did not hide from him the fact that his room would be more welcome than his company. Wyn held her breath. The girl's look was so venomous she half expected Val to turn into a cinder on the spot. 'The right clothes don't matter. I'll stay in reach-me-downs as well, to keep you company,' Val urged. 'Your slacks look comfortable enough to me,' he gave them a cursory glance, 'they're not the wide sort that might flap.' 'If you're coming with us, go and cut out two of the mares,' Russell suggested, seeing that his brother was determined. 'Those in the top paddock could do with some exercise.' 'They're not a very lively ride.' Val seemed inclined to argue.

`Wyn won't want a skittish mount,' Russell retorted flatly, 'she'll be riding without a hat,' he pointed out, and his younger brother subsided. 'I'll go and collect two for us.' 'I'll come with you,' Russell decided suddenly, patently not trusting Val to choose wisely. 'We won't be a moment,' he promised the two girls, and Wyn's heart sank. She did not want to be left in Diane's company, but if she turned back towards the paddock rail she would leave herself open to an accusation of unsociable behaviour, which she did not doubt Diane would make full use of. 'Hold on to Scamp's lead, Jon,' Russell called unexpectedly, and Wyn's spirits rose. The children were heading towards them along with the dog. They would save her from being with Diane. 'Don't let the leather trail,' their uncle cautioned as they got nearer, 'or someone is likely to trip over it. Either hold it, or take it off. On second thoughts, hold it,' he decided. 'The mares might be a bit lively, and we don't want to start either of them off feeling scary.' 'We've come to give the mare some sugar.' Jon headed towards the paddock fence, and to Wyn's relief Jane caught at her hand so that she was dragged willy-nilly with them. She did not turn round to see if Diane followed, hoping she would not, but when they reached the fence the girl was just behind them, and leaned her arms along it a little way from them. 'It looks as if Uncle Russell's caught Dusky for you,' Jon observed the efforts of the men in the next enclosure but one. 'She's gentle, Jane and me've been on her,' he offered unnecessary reassurance, and Wyn smiled. 'That'll be nice,' she assured him, 'it's a little while since I did any riding.' It was only a matter of months, but she did not stress that. 'Why not get up on this one and try her round the paddock?' Wyn looked round in surprise as Diane sidled along the fence nearer to them, and spoke to her directly, assuming a pleasant manner that Wyn guessed she must be far from feeling. 'A quick trot round would give you the feel of it again, and she's got a head rope on.' `This one?' Wyn could hardly believe her ears. Surely Diane must know the mare they were fussing carried a foal? It was obvious, she thought, astounded at the other girl's sudden change of face. `You can't ride this one, Uncle Russell said so.' Jon looked up into her face with dismay written all over his own. 'She's in foal,' he pleaded. `Yes, I know. I wouldn't dream of riding her,' Wyn calmed his fears and faced Diane, her own expression set with anger. The girl knew the mare was in foal, and she had deliberately tempted Wyn to ride her, risking the mare and the unborn foal, her body cradled in a deliberate effort to make Russell angry with her. And she must have known, too, how much the first foal by Russell's beloved stallion would mean to him. The start of the Tylar stud. Whether or not he eventually became the owner of the Grange land, he could always start up somewhere else. To risk his dreams from sheer petty spite was something beyond Wyn's comprehension. `You should know better than to suggest such a thing.' Her voice was quiet, but vibrant with feeling, and the contempt in her eyes was undisguisable. Diane's face flamed. 'It wouldn't have hurt, just one canter,' she muttered. 'Oh well, if you don't want to be friendly, that's up to you.' She turned her back on Wyn and the two children and walked swiftly away, towards the paddock where the two men were leading the captive mares towards the gate.

'We caught them easily enough,' Val grinned triumphantly as they rejoined the others, with the mares in tow. 'We'll get them saddled up. Why not go and wait over by that notice on the lower fence,' he suggested, 'we'll bring them out to you. Benny is saddling the other two for us.' 'What notice?' Wyn shaded her eyes against the bright sunshine. 'Oh yes, I see it— though I can't read what it says,' she smiled. 'It says "no trespassing",' Diane snapped with a malice that made Val stare, and left Wyn in no doubt of her meaning. Russell did not appear to hear her, he was busy answering the questions fired at him by Jon and Jane and had his back turned towards them. 'I'll walk back with you,' Diane decided as the two men made ready to take the horses along the avenue of trees to the stables, and Wyn breathed out a small sigh of relief. She did not mind waiting on her own, certainly she preferred it to being left in Diane's company. 'We can manage the horses.' Val looked at her in surprise. 'It won't take us long to saddle up, and it'll save you the walk back.' 'I've left my riding crop in the car,' Diane answered him flatly, and he shrugged. 'You shouldn't need a crop.' Russell caught her. words. 'The mare will respond without that,' he told her quietly. 'I don't feel balanced without one.' She turned and walked beside him, in between the two men, deliberately excluding Wyn, so that if she wanted to go along with them she would have to either walk behind them, or on the other side of the led horses. 'Are you going to wait by the notice?' Val checked and looked over his shoulder towards her. 'Yes, I'll wait for you there,' Wyn agreed readily. Diane's-reluctance for her own company was mutual, she thought waspishly. `We'll come with you.' The children were not averse to staying with her anyway, she thought, and her heart warmed to their cheery chatter, though she noticed that Jon seemed more subdued than usual, and once or twice she intercepted an anxious glance in her direction. `Tell me?' she invited quietly, when Jane begged Scamp's lead off her brother and ran on ahead of them, her inexhaustible energy soon making her impatient of their sedate pace. `The mare—the one that's in foal,' he spoke hesitantly. 'I wouldn't ride her, Jon. I know better than that, the same as you do,' Wyn hastened to set his young mind at rest. 'I know you wouldn't, you said so.' His trust in her was implicit, and touching. 'It's Aunty Diane ...' He stopped awkwardly. 'She knows not to as well, now.' So it was 'Aunty Diane'. The glory faded from the bright May sunshine. Even the children accepted her as being already a member of their family. And Diane herself had lost no time in warning Wyn not to trespass. Unconsciously her eyes sought the notice, and her lips tightened as she read what was inscribed on it in large, black-painted print. 'Paddock One.' Russell had even started to number the paddocks. She looked at the fencing with renewed interest. It was all new, the perimeter fence was made up of posts and rails, pale in colour which indicated that they had not

been up for many weeks, and the dividers )were temporary electric fencing. She approved his method; the parkland made ideal grazing, but it consisted of many unbroken acres, and if he intended to breed horses it would make it easier to control his stock if he broke it up into numbered paddocks. No wonder Val looked startled when Diane said it read `no trespassing', she thought, especially as he could not share Wyn's knowledge of the double meaning to her words. 'She knew not to ride the mare before.' Wyn brought her mind back with an effort to what Jon was saying. 'I was there when Uncle Russell told her,' he said, and once again she felt anger flare inside her at the other girl's unprincipled action. 'She forgot, I expect.' She tried to speak mildly, but her voice came through tight lips. 'She'll remember, now she's been reminded.' Somehow she made herself sound confident, and the boy's face cleared. 'I hope the foal's like Pendelico. Isn't he lovely?' he breathed, and Wyn turned to follow his entranced gaze. The three riders cantered towards them. Val was leading the spare horse, a blue roan that looked well bred. In spite of her misgivings, Wyn's spirits lifted, and she found herself looking forward to the ride. Russell and Diane rode side by side. They made a handsome couple, she had to admit reluctantly. The girl sat astride a jet black mare whose colour was unrelieved except for a star-shaped white blaze on its forehead. It made a perfect foil for the girl's fair colouring, a fact she was well aware of, thought Wyn uncharitably, though she had to concede that Diane rode as if she was a part of her mount, an ease that betokened an accomplished horsewoman. Russell towered above her on Pendelico, a tall, slender, upright figure outlined against the sky, atop a mount that danced with the nervous energy of a thoroughbred. No wonder he would not let Diane ride the stallion. Wyn noticed that he rode it on a hackamore, typically confident of his ability to control the spirited animal, and his body swayed to the restless movements it made, perfectly balanced as he soothed it to stillness while he waited for Wyn to mount. 'Corporal Benny feeds him corn, that's what makes him lively,' Jon remarked with a sage wisdom that twitched Wyn's lips upwards in a smile, which she immediately turned on Val to cover its reason. He jumped down, and with boyish gallantry offered her his knee and two cupped hands in approved style. Rather than snub him she availed herself of his lift into the saddle, although she was more than capable of mounting without his aid, even on her tall steed, and she gathered the reins in competent hands, revelling in the feeling of a horse under her again. This was something else she missed when she was away from home. 'Comfortable?' Russell asked her, and she nodded happily. 'We'll go out to the right of Tylar Barrow,' he gave his intended direction to his brother, 'we can cut across the edge of the wood and follow the river fields along as far as the level crossing. If we come back along the high ground towards the main road, I can see how Benny's getting on,' he told them. 'He wanted to try his hand at repairing the gap in the drystone wall near the Lodge.' 'He's a versatile character,' Val acknowledged, 'interesting to talk to. He's been around quite a bit, and seems to have tried most things.'

'He's only a groom.' Diane's tone indicated her feelings, and Wyn stared at her in surprise. She had met Corporal Benny twice since she had been at the Grange, and liked him. He was a quiet, reserved man, but on the subject of horses it was easy enough to draw him out, and when he had discovered her own interest in them she had found him only too willing to talk, in the slow soft dialect that marked him as coming from the wold country. 'We'll be more or less beating the bounds of the Grange land, going this way,' Val chatted amiably as Russell turned his horse to lead the way. Diane put her heels to her mount and caught him up, leaving Wyn and Val to fall in behind them. 'How far does it extend?' She was not really interested in the extent of the land belonging to the Grange, but any sort of conversation was better than listening to the torment of her own thoughts as she rode behind Russell and Diane, watching them together, absorbed in each other's company, as alone, she thought miserably, as if they had come out on their own as they had originally intended. 'About a couple of thousand acres,' Val answered laconically. 'An ideal size for Cedric Plumb to turn into a sports centre, or whatever,' he added cynically, and Wyn turned in her saddle and faced him. 'It won't come to that,' she said fiercely. 'It mustn't. I'll find the will if it takes months ...' 'I say, you do feel strongly about it, don't you?' Val eyed her appreciatively, for once serious. 'I’m glad you're battling for Russ as well,' he said quietly. We've done everything we can think of. Looked in all the holes and corners, and so on, but you're one step ahead of us there,' he admitted, 'you've got specialist knowledge.' 'I'd hate to see a lovely old place like this spoiled,' she answered him lamely, biting her lip with vexation. She had not meant to let her feelings show so plainly. Val would probably think it was just professional enthusiasm, but she knew if Diane had heard her she would have put a different interpretation on her fervour. The correct interpretation. Women were more intuitive than men, especially if they were in love themselves, and she dared not let Diane suspect her feelings towards Russell, it would leave her more vulnerable than ever to the girl's spite. She used a tussock of thistles as an excuse to veer slightly away from Val's side, and in front of him, so that she would have time to compose her expression. His acknowledgment of her expertise soothed her pride, even Russell had to concede that, but her emotions were indeed 'battling for Russell', though not in the way Val meant, even if her pride would not allow her to take any action to satisfy their longing. 'Mind the branches ! ' Russell called back. Diane did not echo his call, as under the circumstances Wyn thought she might have done. Evidently she believed in letting other people take pot luck, particularly when they foisted their company on her, and made an unwelcome foursome. The riders swung into single file as they skirted the bottom of the ancient burial ground, and cut across a glade of trees on the very edge of the wood. Wyn could see the faint line of the footpath winding up the slope to the\top of the Barrow. 'One day we'll ...' Russell had said, and bleakly as she traced it with her eyes Wyn wondered if she would ever walk up the slope of the hill with him, and stand by his side to gaze at the view from the top. More likely if she did climb the Barrow it would be in the company of Val or the two children, and she did not find the prospect appealing. 'Duck!' Val exhorted her from behind, but she had already leaned low across her horse's neck, following Russell's example and that of Diane as they each avoided a

low-slung branch. Briefly, Diane looked back over her shoulder, in time to see Wyn duck safely under the branch, but Wyn doubted if the girl was concerned for her safety; more likely she hoped the following rider Might not see the hazard in time, and get entangled; she thought candidly, realising from her earlier experience by the paddock rails that Diane would give no quarter if she imagined her standing with Russell was threatened. Ahead of them a train whistled, a cheerful 'toot-toot' as if its driver found life good, and a long black snake, toylike in the distance, wound its way across the fields beside the river. A small aircraft buzzed overhead, its drone no more intrusive than the hum of bees, and Val cocked an interested eye upwards. 'It's one of the Club planes,' he identified its markings. 'We often come over this way when we're flying,' he told Wyn. 'The river makes a useful guide if the pilot happens to be shaky on navigation,' he grinned. 'It'll be pleasant by the water, let's drop down a bit and follow it ourselves as far as the level crossing. Russell urged the stallion into a trot. 'If you want to let Pendelico out, go on ahead,' Val called. 'We'll catch up later.' He sympathised with the horse's need, and with a raised hand Russell accepted his consideration. Wyn heard him speak to the horse once, quietly. The animal's one ear flicked back, and it stretched out into an easy lope, its powerful limbs doubling the distance between them in seconds. Russell was a superb rider, a part of the flowing motion of his horse that moved with effortless speed, glorying in its own controlled power and the space and freedom to use it. `They make a lovely picture, don't they?' Val sat back in his saddle and watched the performance critically. 'Pendelico must make a wonderful ride.' 'Have you never been on him?' Wyn was surprised, she would have thought Val at least would have ridden the stallion. `No, never.' His look was thoughtful. 'No one's ridden him but Russell. He did offer me a ride once, but—well, I'm not such a good horseman as he is, and Pendelico is special. He's a one-man horse. After all,' his seriousness faded, 'I wouldn't like Russ to tinker with my car, so why should I tinker with his horse?' It was a thoughtfulness that Wyn would not have suspected in Val, and her ' irritation at his occasional gauche tactlessness faded. Everyone had to grow up some time. Val seemed to be taking his time about it, she admitted drily, but once he had decided to take up a career, and shouldered some responsibility, he bid fair to turn into a very likeable person. She already liked him. He would make a very nice brother-in-law, she thought forlornly, and wished she had remained at the Grange and worked, instead of coming out riding. `Then it's time someone else did get a chance to ride the animal,' Diane snapped, plainly unable to understand her companion's reasoning. 'It's selfish to keep the stallion to himself when other people are just as cap. able of riding it as he is.' 'It's safer that way,' Val protested, 'and other people aren't as capable as Russell. Benny's the only other one I'd trust with a horse of that calibre, and he thinks the same as I do. Pendelico's a one-man horse, and he should stay that way.' His tone was unexpectedly firm, and Diane tossed her head. 'He'll have to learn to share it some time,' she pouted, with a pointed look in Wyn's direction, and with a quick flick of her riding crop she set her horse into a gallop and set off after Russell. `Go on after them if you want to,' Wyn offered, but her companion shook his head.

'Russ was right,' he admitted 'rather shamefacedly, 'you haven't got a hard hat. We can trot after them, give them time for a breather before we catch up.' And a few minutes to themselves, Wyn thought, but she could hardly blame Diane for that. 'I can let my mare go on the way back home,' he eased her conscience, aware that she felt she was holding him back. 'Diane rides well.' She watched the girl critically, and could find no fault in her performance, except for her unnecessary use of the crop. 'But not well enough to ride Pendelico,' Val retorted. 'She's not strong enough. Few girls would be strong enough to hold him, and he's never been ridden in anything but a hackamore,' he answered. 'The trouble with Diane is, she always wants her own way. The de Courceys lost their son in an accident, and afterwards they indulged Diane to a silly extent. She was always a spoiled brat even when she was little,' he added disgustedly, implying ungallantly that he had not changed his opinion of her since. Wyn did not answer him. She urged her mare into a brisk trot, which saved her from any further conversation, deciding to take refuge in silence rather than take sides. There was only one side she could take if she followed her instinct, and it was not Diane's. 'He's turning to go in to land,' Val indicated the aeroplane above them, which was now much lower, and heading in the direction of Russell and Diane, who were walking their horses towards a signal box where the site of the level crossing must be that Russell had mentioned earlier. Wyn reined to a walk and watched as the pilot did a neat aboutturn, lined up with the signal box and dipped the nose of his machine gently, losing height in the long run in to the flying field. 'It's a couple of miles away, and the box is in dead line,' Val said with a satisfaction that drew a laugh from Wyn. 'I thought you flew by instruments,' she teased him. 'What happens when it gets dark?' 'We stop and ask the way ! ' he threw her banter back, cheerfully good-humoured. 'But I'm logging up quite a few flying hours, it's all experience,' he told her proudly. 'What about your brother-in-law's plantation?' Wyn questioned him carefully, wary of treading on delicate ground. 'I thought you were going to join him eventually, and learn to help manage the place?' 'The trouble is, I like flying ...' `Stop dawdling, can't you?' Diane called irritably, 'we shan't be over the level crossing before the train comes, otherwise.' 'That won't matter ...' Russell began Mildly. 'We shall have to wait,' she retorted impatiently. 'Yes, but only for a few minutes.' He did not sound unduly perturbed at the prospect. 'And I'm trying to get Pendelico used to the noise of the trains.' 'It's too late anyway, the barriers are coming down,' Diane shrugged ill-humouredly. 'Morning, Arthur.' Russell ignored her and raised his voice in greeting to the pink face, surmounted by an equally pink bald head, that appeared out of the signal box window. `Mornin', Mr Tylar. Mornin', all.' The shirt-sleeved occupant of the box beamed down on them. 'I daren't let you risk it,' he indicated the barriers, red and white striped horizontal poles, one on each side of the lane that ran away from the river fields on to an extension of the Grange land on the other side. 'These goods wagons travel quicker

than you bargain for,' he nodded at the approaching black speck along the line. 'The track hereabouts is straight for a mile and a half and it makes the speed deceptive,' he explained, meeting Wyn's interested look. 'I think I'll back off a bit.' The horse under her was a strange one, and Wyn's keen ear had detected a mounting clatter that sounded as if the rapidly approaching wagons contained an unmusical assortment of scrap iron. She was not far wrong. The assorted produce of some far-away foundry was in them, to judge by the name painted on their sides, and the noise soon made speech impossible. Her mare moved restlessly, responding to her request to back away with an alacrity that made her glad she had decided to move. She caught a flash of white out of the corner of her eye, and hastily reined away as the stallion suddenly jittered past her with wide flaring nostrils and dilated eyes. Russell's body swayed in lithe response to the sidestepping animal's movement and Wyn watched him, fascinated. He did not look up, he was totally absorbed in quietening his horse. It was like watching a strange sort of ballet as the two swung past, the horse finally rearing as the last of the wagons passed them with a noisier than ever clang at the end of the swaying train. Wyn saw the man's lips move, saw the stallion's one ear flick backwards, and then it gradually quietened as the train rumbled away in the distance, and the snorting animal calmed until only an occasional shiver along its white flanks betrayed the excess of fright that the easier nature of the mares had taken more in their stride. 'He isn't used to it yet, Mr Tylar.' The signalman released a lever and reached out to turn the great spoked wheel in his box that raised the barriers to let them through. 'He doesn't seem to mind the moving poles.' Wyn watched the stallion eye them indifferently as they rose and stuck skywards, clearing the way across the lane. `They go up in the air, so he reckons they're nothing to do with him,' Russell smiled. He did not even seem out of breath himself. 'I'll get him accustomed to the trains in time,' he raised his face to the friendly pink one at the signal box window. 'It'll take a bit of patience, that's all. Keep to the centre,' he continued to Wyn, 'the sleepers are laid between the rails and it's easy for the horses to step.' He waited for her to go on, and rode behind her, catching her up on the other side, so that once again the small party rode in pairs, only this time it was Val and Diane who led, and Wyn and Russell who followed behind. 'Let's have another gallop.' Diane twisted round in-her saddle impatiently and spoke to Russell. The lane was too narrow for her to drop back and ride side by side with him, and the look she directed at Wyn spoke plainly of her feelings at the present arrangement. 'I think I'll walk Pendelico for a bit. He's had a good gallop—and a bad fright at the end of it.' Russell's hand sympathised, running lightly down the side of the long white neck, which arched in response, showing the rapport between the two. 'I'd like him to have a chance to calm down before I put him back in the paddock, or he's likely to go 'off his feed, then Benny will wonder why.' 'What's it to do with a groom?' Diane asked scornfully. 'Everything,' Russell interrupted her quietly. 'Benny looks after him for me, and he is as interested in him as I am. I want him to stay that way,' he pointed out, and Diane righted herself in her saddle again, pouting. 'Head towards the Lodge, will you, Val?' Russell changed the subject abruptly, as if he found it distasteful. 'We'll see how Benny's getting on with his drystone walling. He might want a hand.'

'You surely aren't going to help him yourself?' Diane looked genuinely shocked. 'Why not?' Russell sounded equally puzzled. 'Dry-stone walling's an art on its own, it would be interesting to learn how it's done.' 'It looks as if Benny's found someone to teach him.' Val pointed ahead of them to where the familiar figure of the ex-soldier turned groom bent over a pile of stone. He selected one and held it up to his companion, as if he was asking if it was suitable, then joined the other man at the wall. 'Do you mind if I watch?' Russell jumped down and approached them, and Benny turned to him eagerly. 'This is Enoch Marshall, Major.' He gave Russell his Army title. 'He used to be a drystone wailer.' It was obvious that he did not do it for a living any longer, his body was bent with years and rheumatism. 'I met him in the Horse and Hounds last night, and he said he'd show me how. I fetched him in the Land Rover,' he told his employer, with the confidence of a trusted employee who knows he has a free hand. 'It was good of you to come,' Russell thanked the old man with the automatic courtesy he always extended to those who worked for him. 'If you don't object to having two pupils, instead of one?' He eyed the plumb rule in the old man's hand with interest. 'It's all right by me, Squire,' the man answered him with dignified respect, and -Wyn saw him flinch. The craftsman would not know that he might not, after all, be the Squire of the Grange. 'It's good that the master should know the jobs his men have to do.' The old man set his rule and motioned Benny to fix the stone, which after some moving about he did to his tutor's satisfaction. Wyn watched the process interestedly. She came from a countryside where hedges outlined-the boundaries of the fields, and this was a craft she had never seen practised before, although she had admired the result often enough. 'What are the two posts for?' She could contain her curiosity no longer. Two wooden posts, some six inches thick, and curving away from one another, so that they were about nine inches apart at the bottom where they entered the ground, and eighteen at the top, seemed to serve no useful purpose except to confuse the man doing the walling by having an awkward gap to fill in. 'That's a stile, missie,' the old man smiled at her, in no way averse to his position as a teacher. He seemed to be enjoying himself, Wyn thought with a smile, and sensed that via Benny, Russell would see that he was well rewarded. 'They calls it "Fat Man's Misery" hereabouts,' he chuckled and Wyn laughed outright. The shape of the opening so aptly fitted its title. 'It keeps animals from getting out, he explained, 'but lets folks through. All this used to be sheep country,' he waved his hands at the green tide that flowed as far as the eye could see. 'It's an ideal answer.' Nothing could get through that, certainly not a sheep, and no lamb small enough to get through would venture so far from its Mother's side. 'Why don't you just block the hole up and have done with it?' Diane did not intend to be left out of the conversation. 'Can't do that, Miss de Courcey,' the man was a local, and knew her, 'you know you can't put barriers across footpaths. It's against the law.' He stuck his short, thickstemmed pipe in his mouth with an air of finality, and turned back to' see what Benny was doing in a manner

that told Wyn her companion was not popular among the local people. Her haughty attitude would make her disliked, Wyn thought shrewdly, added to the fact that she was badly spoiled, making her manner towards other people nothing to be desired. 'If you want to go on, why don't you have your gallop now, on the way home?' Russell asked Diane, seeming to become conscious that she might be bored watching them. `That's a good idea. I'll race you,' Val challenged. He did not wait to see if she would respond, assuming she would be behind him, and speeded away from them with boyish enthusiasm. 'I'm not racing anybody.' Diane scowled at his retreating back, and realised that Russell was not paying attention to her either, he was helping Benny lift a particularly large piece of stone in place on the wall. 'Maybe Wyn would like to, instead,' she snapped. Before Wyn realised what, she was about to do, or could make any move to prevent her, Diane brought her riding crop down with a vicious swish on the flank of Wyn's mount. It gave an indignant whinny and bucked, and with a grip that told its rider it had got the bit firmly in its teeth, and was therefore out of her control, it took off at a speed that put it swiftly out of earshot of the startled shouts coming from behind it, and bolted behind Val back home towards its stable.

CHAPTER SIX

Wyn sat tight. There was little else she could do. After the first wild buck the mare stretched out in a blind gallop. The ground fled beneath her at an alarming speed, and a tentative tug at the reins told Wyn the worst. The animal had indeed got the bit between its teeth, and with panic driving it she had no control whatsoever. The mare had a strength far in excess of anything she could exert, it was a useless waste of energy tugging at the reins, so she settled herself to the task of remaining on its back until the fright had passed and it slowed down of its own accord. She leaned low over its neck, riding easily, talking to it in the hope that Russell did the same; she had seen him talk to Pendelico, and the accustomed sound of a soothing human voice might be enough to calm her mount until she could gain some sort of control again, instead of just being a helpless passenger. She looked-up and ahead of her, but the countryside stretched out green and undulating, with only an occasional stone wall to present a hazard. She had seen no barbed wire on the Grange land, for which she was thankful now; it was one danger less, and there were several fields to go yet before they reached the stables in the distant buildings of the Grange. Russell had said the animals needed exercise, and she hoped fervently that the one under her would run out of breath before it ran out of space. A drystone wall loomed up in front of them, high, and ragged at the top. The wind whistled in Wyn's ears, and the flying hooves beat a tattoo that hammered in her brain with a monotonous accompaniment to the thoughts that despite, her predicament she could not stop running through her head. What would Russell say? Had he seen Diane strike the mare? Grimly, she faced the truth that if Diane thought she would be seen, she would not have done such a thing. And just as grimly, she knew that Russell would not believe her if she attempted to

explain to him what had happened. The drystone wall raced towards them with terrifying speed. It was useless to try to turn the mare, any attempt to do so might crash her. `Don't let there be loose stones on the other side.' Momentarily, she shut her eyes and prayed. She had no protection for her head if she fell, and years of neglect by its late owner had left the walls on the estate in a dilapidated condition. All too frequently on their ride they had come across patches of wall that had crumbled, similar to the piece that Benny was learning to repair now, and Wyn had noticed the loose stones scattered in the grass on each side of the gaps, a deadly trap to racing hooves. Her throat felt dry. She cast a desperate look ahead, but the wall directly in front of them seemed in fairly good condition. She exerted all her strength, and her mount rose to her command. Rose and cleared the wall like a bird in a long, headlong jump that took it clear of the tangle of stones and bramble on the other side that might have thrown it over, and then they were racing clear again, on even turf, speeding across the next field, but with a slightly slackened pace. Cautiously Wyn tried the reins again, but the mare still had the bit, and she did not press the point, preferring while there was space to let her run herself out rather than bring her to a halt by brute force. She had automatically responded to the aids and cleared the wall, which gave her rider a flash of hope that they might clear the next wall in the same fashion. The field they were in now was narrow, and it seemed as if the mare had not taken many strides before the next wall confronted them. Buoyed by hope, Wyn tried the same tactics again, and they worked. The mare rose to the wall, and briefly Wyn shut her eyes. There was a pile of loose stones on the other side that they could not possibly miss. She had reckoned without her mount, however. The mare saw the stones too, and seemed to veer in mid-air. She landed awkwardly, but straightened out and continued to run. Wyn looked ahead for signs of Val, but he would hardly realise that there was anything wrong. He would, expect to hear another horse racing behind him, would probably think it was Diane trying to overtake, and would ride even harder to ensure that she did not. Vaguely she heard a thunder of hooves from behind her. She risked a quick glance over her shoulder. Russell was following her on Pendelico. He was gaining ground, the big stallion outpacing her smaller mare, and in seconds of her first seeing him he was riding beside her, his huge horse dwarfing her own. He checked Pendelico to the speed of the mare, and leaned sideways in the saddle. He's slipping! A thrill of horror ran through Wyn, and left her feeling weak. Her hands sought the front of the saddle for an insecure instant, and then shaky laughter shook her as she realised her mistake. With superb timing, and consummate skill, Russell adjusted his balance so that his body leaned at right angles to his mount, never for a moment losing his limpet-like grip. He's a polo player ... Realisation flashed through her mind along with the relief, and a kind of detached surprise that she could think of such a thing now. She had often admired the skill of the polo teams she had watched play during her travels abroad, wondering at their ability to remain atop mounts that spun and changed direction with the agility of cats, and the sudden recognition of the possible source of his skill—she learned later that he had played for his regiment —calmed her fears for his safety as he -stretched out a lean brown hand and grasped the mare's head leathers.

His action drew the two galloping animals close together, so that they ran neck and neck, Wyn could feel the leather of Russell's riding boot hard against her own leg, and felt a moment of fear in case they should crash. He must not risk Pendelico, for her sake. She had sat bolting horses before, and coped, he must not risk his dreams to save her. 'Don't risk it !' If he heard her shout he gave no sign. She saw his knuckles white with the force of his grip as he fought the strength of the mare. Gradually, ever so gradually, their pace slackened, the whipcord muscles of his arm standing out with the strain of the pull he exerted. The headlong gallop lessened, and after what seemed a lifetime to Wyn, though it could only have lasted a few minutes, Russell straightened in the saddle, relaxing his hold on the head leathers and grasping the reins instead, sure now that he had the mare under control. She dropped to a canter, then a trot, and eventually came to a standstill, her sides heaving and dark rivulets of sweat coursing down her flanks. Now that the ordeal was over, Wyn found she was trembling herself. She swung her leg over the saddle and slipped to the ground. For a second or two she leaned against the mare's side, feeling the heat and the wetness of it through her sweater, and then two hands gripped her shoulders, their fingers digging into her .flesh mercilessly as Russell turned her to face him. Made her look into his eyes that were blazing with anger, which roughened his voice when he spoke. 'Are you all right?' She nodded, shocked into silence by the black wrath that rode his face, and he rushed on, his eyes dark with the force of his feelings. 'What possessed you to race a horse like that? You're riding an animal, not a machine,' he stormed. 'Look at the state she's in ...' Fury choked his words, and he gave her a shake to emphasize what he could no longer pronounce. Caught by surprise, she staggered, and he released her abruptly, as if afraid that he might shake her even harder if he left his hands where they were. Wyn put up her arm to keep her balance, and he caught her to him, realising she was in danger of falling, but 'she drew back abruptly, stung by his attitude. His rage at the condition of the mare was understandable, it would have been unforgivable to ride a horse into such a condition, but at least he could have given her a chance to explain first. Hot indignation coursed through her at the injustice of his charge, adding strength to her knees so that she stood upright, facing him with her chin uplifted defiantly. 'I didn't ...' she began angrily, but he cut her short with an impatient gesture. 'I, don't doubt you didn't mean to run her half to death,' he misinterpreted what she had been about to say, and put his own scornful construction on her words. Wyn stared at him in silence for a moment, matching his glare fearlessly. It was a relief, almost, to be able to dislike him again, she thought in a detached sort of way. At least it made a change from the ache she had felt for him since yesterday ... 'I'll walk her back.' She spoke quietly, holding up her hand for the reins, and fighting down a desire to shout at him that it wasn't her fault, it was Diane's. But he wouldn't believe her, so what was the use? Somehow she managed to control her anger, that rode as high as his. 'Give me the reins, please.' 'No!' Without handing them to her he turned and leapt on to the stallion's back, and quickly reaching down he caught her under the arms and lifted her up in front of him.

'There's over a mile to go to the house, and you're in no fit state to walk.' He must have noticed the whiteness of her face, and diagnosed accurately that her knees still trembled under her, but she had no desire to return in this ignominious fashion, and she drew herself upright to tell him so. 'Sit still,' he commanded her curtly. 'It's a long way to the ground,' he reminded her grimly, and one glance told her just how far it was. She knew the horse they were on was tall, but from where she sat, held against Russell, and with nothing but his arm circling her to hold her in place, the distance looked twice as far. If she struggled free she could bring them both down, and common sense warned her that injury could result; it was better to injure her pride than break their bones. Reluctantly she subsided, wishing that the steel band that was his arm would not hold her quite so closely against him. She could feel the strong beat of his heart through the soft wool of his sweater, melting her anger and bringing the ache back to her own. He rode in silence. Not a warm, companionable silence that would have made her closeness to him an intimate, precious thing, but the tight, hard silence of anger that put a wall of antagonism between them, and made his hold on her that of a captor, from which she desperately desired to be free. 'I say, what on earth's the matter?' Val met them at the gate leading into the stable yard, his face puckered with concern. 'Have you come a cropper?' he asked inelegantly, and Wyn managed a smile. 'No, I'm all right,' she assured him. 'The mare bolted.' 'Loose her, Russ, I'll catch her.' Val held out his arms, and Russell eased his grip about Wyn's waist, though he did not completely let go. Instead he loosed her slowly through the loop of his arm, letting her slide down against him so that she did not leave the protection of his hold until Val could grasp her and lift her safely the rest of the way to the ground. 'What rotten luck ! And on your first ride here, too,' he sympathised. 'Sit down on this for a bit if you feel wobbly.' He toed a bale of straw nearer, but Wyn shook her head. `I'm all right now,' she refused his offer. 'I'll stay and rub the mare down, she's in a lather.' 'I'll attend to the mare,' Russell said curtly. `Go indoors, there's nothing you can do here,' he cut short her protest, and she turned away from him, sudden tears of reaction stinging her eyes. It was unfair of him not to listen. 'I'll give you a hand,' she heard Val offer, and heard Russell reply. `I'll do it myself,' he said grimly, 'I want to see if there's any damage been done. And the next time you decide to have a race,' his tone hardened as he addressed his brother, 'do so in your Club aeroplane, not on one of my horses.' She'd got Val into trouble as well, Wyn thought miserably. He had galloped his own mare, but no more than Russell himself had let Pendelico out, indeed Val's horse was dry, and breathing easily. She saw it nuzzle his pockets, searching for sugar, as she turned towards the house, and stepped hastily out of the way of the Land Rover turning through the yard gate, with Benny behind the wheel. 'Are you all right, missie?' He had the drystone waller in the passenger seat with him, and the old man leaned out and called to her, concern all over his wrinkled face. 'Yes, I'm fine, thanks,' she smiled her appreciation. 'You've got a grand seat, miss,' Benny commented approvingly. 'There's not many ladies would have stuck on the same as you did.' Under any other circumstances Wyn

would have chuckled at his choice of words, but not now. His kindly praise had the opposite effect; and bid fair to upset her already precarious self'it control. A couple of tears brimmed over, as she turned away hastily, brushing them off her cheeks. She did not want to encounter Diane, and give the other girl the satisfaction of seeing her cry. She looked round cautiously. but Diane was still some distance away, clip-clopping in a leisurely fashion towards the stables as if she had not a care in the world. Wyn fled for the house, hoping she need not encounter any of the family until she had recovered her composure. The voices of Louise Tylar and the two children came faintly from the garden as she entered the hall, from which she had set out after lunch on a peaceful, solitary walk, it seemed a century ago now, so much had happened in the meantime. She heard Nanny tell Jane to stand still for a minute while she did up her shoe lace, and then she gained the stairs, and blissfully the door of her own room, where she could shower and change, and bathe her face, and wonder bitterly what unkind fate had struck her colleague down with illness and forced her to come to the Grange in his stead, bringing with her a carefree mind and a whole heart, and having the peace of both shattered on the unyielding rock that was the new owner of Tylar Grange. Except that he was not the legal owner yet. The cool shower calmed as well as refreshed her, and she sorted through her drawer and drew out her favourite blue underslip with the white lace edging, that she had purchased in a moment of extravagance when she was last in Paris, then bought a blue dress on the rather feeble excuse that the colours exactly matched. She would put them on tonight; she would need all her confidence to go down to dinner and face Russell again, and she knew the delicate colour suited her. She pulled it over her head, enjoying the smooth freshness of the material that clung to her, revealing the soft contours of her slender form in the cleverly draped bodice and the flowing skirt, fashionably longer than her other dresses, and somehow more suitable to her graceful surroundings. She fingered through the small amount of jewellery she had brought with her, finally choosing a heart-shaped locket that Bill Stapleton and his wife had given to her on her last birthday, almost a year ago now. It was an antique that had come into the shop, and which at the time she had admired without thinking, and wondered why it had disappeared from the showcase so quickly. She hail never had a photograph in it yet, an omission she intended to remedy, but had never got round to. I'll do something about it as soon as I get home, she promised herself, feeling guilty that she had left it for so long. A year almost, except for about a week. She counted the days, and realised that she would still be at the Grange for her birthday. The thought did not disturb her, it was not the first anniversary she had spent away from home, and her family were well used to sending her birthday cards to all corners of the world, in the hope that they would eventually reach her near enough to the date to be appropriate. They usually kept her presents until she returned home, when she could enjoy them among the family gathering that always collected in. the big- farmhouse at every opportunity, and she hoped they would do the same this year. Parcels here, at the Grange, among unsympathetic company, would be more of an embarrassment than a pleasure, she thought unhappily. `Come in ! ' She looked at her wrist, and realised she had taken her watch off to have a shower, and not replaced it. It must be later than she thought, for Nanny to come up

and remind her that it was nearing dinner time. She frowned, fumbling with the fine chain of her locket that had unaccountably got itself into a knot. `It's not Nanny, it's me.' Russell stood inside the door, looking down at her as she fumbled. Nervelessly, her fingers loosed the locket, and he stooped swiftly to prevent it from falling to the floor. 'Let me do it.' His strong brown fingers unknotted the delicate chain with a lightness of touch very much at variance with the strength they had recently shown when they were holding back the mare. 'Shall I fasten it on for you? 'He did not wait for her permission, although she nodded dumbly, unable to speak as he stepped behind her, dropping the locket over her head and drawing the chain together. What had he come to her room for? She caught sight of his watch face, where the white cuff of his shirt slipped back from his wrist, and saw that there was still fifteen minutes to go before the dinner gong. Why had he come to see her? To tell her to pack her 'bags and go? His fingers touched the back of her neck lightly as he manipulated the fastening, and she shivered. `Cold?' He closed the clasp, and reached over to where her blue and silver stole lay draped across the bridal chest. He ran its soft length across his fingers musingly, before he placed it carefully across her shoulders and let his hands rest on them, gently this time, with a lightness of touch very different from the hard, bruising grip that he had held her with that afternoon. `Enoch Marshall told me what happened this afternoon.' He spoke quietly, deliberately, his voice coming from just above her right ear, as if he leaned over her, to see her reaction. She tensed under his grasp. 'Told you?,' she repeated stupidly. It couldn't be true. All the fright and misery of the disastrous after- noon welled up inside her, making her eyes suspiciously bright, and refusing to let her mind grasp what he told her. She had forgotten the old man. Russell and Corporal Benny had been 'intent on their task of mending the wall, and had their backs turned towards Diane when she so cruelly used her riding crop, and Diane herself had been turned away from Enoch Marshall. She had evidently forgotten him, too. Bless Enoch Marshall! Wyn's eyes grew brighter still, but this time it was not with tears. 'I shouted at you.' His voice was full of remorse. 'I shook you ...' He remembered his action in a horrified tone. 'It doesn't matter.' She turned to him swiftly, looking up into his face. Nothing mattered now. 'I'd have shaken anyone for running a horse into that state.' She would not let him blame himself. 'I do believe you would.' He still left his hands on her shoulders, and momentarily they tightened, drawing her closer towards him. 'For someone so small, you're fiery!' He was laughing at her, his eyes, that had glared at her, hard and stormy with anger, lit now with an amused smile. She wasn't all that small, she thought indignantly, but beside Russell she probably appeared so. She opened her mouth to tell him so, and shut it again, disconcerted because he was still watching her. He must not upset her hardly won poise again; there was dinner and the evening to get through, and besides, there was something she wanted to know. 'Is the mare all right?' If Russell had not found out the truth of what happened that afternoon she would have had to go to his groom to find out, but now she could ask him directly. The animal had been badly used, and sheer compassion drew the question from her. She did not ask what he had said to Diane. She did not want to

know. Wyn had been badly used herself, and she still felt raw. She thrust the thought from her. It was over now. Until Diane gets another chance. The thought came back to trouble her above his calm 'The mare's fine, no harm done,' that eased her mind on one score at least. She would not let Diane have another chance, she determined. Her chin came up in a characteristic gesture. This afternoon's experience would be enough to arm her against further spite, preferably to avoid it, since Diane fought from an advantageous position, having already got Russell's affections, which made her position at the Grange assured, and very different from Wyn's own. 'Miss Wyn?' A discreet knock on the half open door turned Wyn towards it. 'It's nearly dinner time, miss. I thought I'd come up and warn you, in case you'd dropped off. I see there's no need.' The children's nurse beamed at them both, and Russell's hands dropped from Wyn's shoulders to his side. 'Mr Val said the mare bolted,' the elderly woman looked at her anxiously. 'You didn't take a tumble, did you?' 'No, she stuck on like a leech,' Russell said admiringly. So he had noticed that, even through his anger. The thought sent a quick warm glow through Wyn, that stayed with her right through dinner, keeping at bay the tiredness of her inevitable reaction to the events of the afternoon, and finally sending her to bed early at Russell's insistence. It was a novel experience to be fussed over when she was away from home, she thought contentedly, even though his concern for her safety stemmed only from his sense of responsibility towards her while she was employed in his house, and she meekly did his bidding, grateful for his concern from whatever cause, and surprisingly drowsy when she had not expected to be able to sleep with so much to occupy her over-burdened mind. 'We're going to church in the pony and trap,' the children told her excitedly the next morning. 'It's their Sunday treat, if it happens to be fine,' Louise Tylar smiled. 'Val's driving Nanny and me in. No, not in that horrible contraption you call a car,' she dashed his hopeful look. 'I don't intend having my hair blown all over the place, we'll go in the saloon,' she decided firmly. 'There'll be a spare seat in the car, and in the trap for that matter, if you'd like to come to the service with us?' She issued her invitation delicately. 'I'd like to very much.' She would love to go in the trap with Russell. A ride in the sunshine and fresh air at the easy pace of a shaft pony appealed far more than the offer of modern transport, particularly in .a closed car. But once again the invitation had come from a member of Russell's family, not from Russell himself. She turned towards him, seeking her answer in his face, but she could not see his expression; he was bending down disentangling the terrier from an unequal tussle with a sheepskin rug. 'Come with us,' Jane begged. 'It's lovely in the trap. Though you mustn't wriggle,' she told Wyn seriously, passing on what were obviously repeated grown-up warnings. 'I won't wriggle,'Wyn promised gravely, and tried to restrain her lips from twitching. 'Uncle Russell says the trap rides better with some ballast,' Jon offered, airing his knowledge, and Russell laughed outright. 'There's a backhanded invitation for you!' He straightened up and chuckled amusedly. 'I assure you we wouldn't regard you as ballast,' he told Wyn, his eyes dancing. 'Unless you've had enough of horse transport for a while,' his face sobered, remembering the previous afternoon.

'I'd love to come.' She spoke to Jane, but her eyes watched Russell. 'It's a glorious morning.' The sunshine was already warm and bright, but it had nothing to do with the way her heart sang as she joined Russell and the children outside the front door, and stood under the harsh stone carving of the falcon on the mailed fist, waiting for Corporal Benny to lead the cob round to them ready for the journey. 'She's quiet as a lamb, this one, Major,' the groom opined as Russell quickly glanced at the horse between the shafts. Wyn saw with relief that it was not Dusky, the roan she rode yesterday. 'She'll plod along nicely, but she's no hurrier,' he smiled at Wyn reassuringly. 'You sit up front, opposite to me. We'll balance one another.'.Russell opened the door at the back of the high-sided governess cart, and held out his hand to help her in. 'That's what Jon meant when he mentioned ballast,' he grinned engagingly, and Wyn chuckled. 'We'll six these two in between us—just in case they don't remember not to wriggle.' He bent and lifted Jane in, they gave Jon a helping heave via the seat of his shorts. 'Keep your blazer with you,' he advised as the boy divested himself of his jacket, and would have tossed it on to. the mounting block to wait until he returned. 'It'll be cool inside the church.' 'It's hot now.' Jane looked up at Wyn appealingly, and she leaned over and helped with her struggle to undo the buttons of her own jacket. Put it on the seat with Jon's. You can slip it on again when we go inside.' She pushed apart her own edge-toedge lightweight wool coat, which teamed with the leaf green dress underneath, and pulled Jane closer to her on the seat as Russell joined them, making the trap rock to his heavier step. He bent and carefully fastened the miniature door behind him, then took the reins into his hands from the rowlock type holder in front of him. `Giddup ' Benny gave the cob's flank a friendly slap and stepped away from her head, responding cheerfully to their waving hands until they turned out of sight around the bend in the drive. 'We'll go by the lanes. It takes longer, but we've got plenty of time,' Russell consulted his watch, 'and it's quieter than the main road,' he answered Wyn's enquiring look as they turned away from the Lodge gates in a direction she had not been before. 'Jon will close them for us.' He would not let her get down, although her plain tan court shoes were low-heeled, and she would have encountered no difficulty in alighting from the trap on her own. 'All set?' He waited for Jon to settle himself safely back on his seat before he clicked his tongue and the horse moved on again, gently clip-clopping at a pace that might drive the moguls of commerce mad, but suited her admirably, Wyn decided, finding the rhythmic sound of the hooves, and the lack of hurry, infinitely soothing. She noticed with interest that the whip hole in the side of the trap was unoccupied. Someone—Benny probably—had stuck a fresh sprig of flowering shrub in which added to the carefree mood of their journey. 'Listen! There's a cuckoo ! ' Jon cocked his head on one side as the unmistakable, directionless call echoed across the woods that marched sentinel like beside the lane. 'Do they really sing night and day, in May?' he asked, referring to the old rhyme. 'They change their tune in June,' Wyn hedged, unwilling to commit herself on this point. 'By the middle of next month that one will begin to stutter,' as the call came

again. She glanced up and met Russell's amused look, accusing her of cowardice in evading an answer, and grimaced back at him amicably. 'He'll fly away in July. The poem says so,' Jane piped up, determined to let the others know that she had learned it as well as her brother. 'He doesn't stay long, does he?' Jon realised, and his voice sounded suddenly wistful. 'He's only a bird of passage,' his uncle replied philosophically. 'He doesn't stay the course with us until the winter comes. He prefers a sunnier climate.' The cuckoo was like herself, Wyn thought with a pang. A bird of passage. She would willingly stay the course- until the winter of their lives, if she could travel the road by Russell's side, but like the cuckoo she was only a spring visitor to the Grange. By July her work, too, would be done. She hoped for Russell's sake that by then she would have found Tempest Tylar's will, and that it would be in his favour. So many hopes— she raised her head as the birds cry came hauntingly from the nearby thickets. Instinct would soon drive it away from the green, shaded woods on the Tylar land, to seek brighter sunshine in another clime. A mission accomplished would be her reason to depart, when all her instinct bade her remain. And when she left, she knew sadly that she would leave the sunshine behind her. `Take Wyn in, you know where to go.' Russell reined to a halt by the church lych gate, and once again held out his hand to help her down. He kept the reins in his other as a precaution, but the cob stood patiently enough. 'I'll loose her in the paddock at the back of the church, and join you in a minute,' he promised. 'Oh, don't go off with the coats.' She stopped him hastily, and he bent and rescued the two small garments and handed them over the side of the trap. 'I should make sure they put them on,' he advised. 'The sun's not been with us for long enough yet this year to warm the walls.' He indicated the tiny, ancient church, whose stone walls Wyn judged would probably be a foot thick, and take a good deal of sun to thaw them from the winter cold. 'I'll make sure they do.' We're behaving like a married couple, she thought, chokingly conscious of Jon's alert gaze on her face as she handed him his blazer, and slipped Jane's jacket over her arms before taking her hand and following the boy into the dimness of the church. The children led her 'to a large square family pew at the head of the church, and soon they were joined by Val and his passengers. Louise seated herself next to Wyn, and Val promptly claimed her other side. She swallowed her disappointment and shared his hymn book, an unnecessary economy since there was a stack of them which he could have easily reached in a corner of the pew. She saw Russell glance at the pile as he joined them, but Val shook his head, and looking slightly surprised at their desire to share he took his own seat on the other side by the children. 'The solicitor rang just before we came out,' Louise told Russell as they walked back to the car together after the service was over. 'He said he'd be at home until lunch time if you'd care to call him when you get back.' 'He said he was hoping to have sight of some more of Tempest's papers. Some documents he'd left in a bank somewhere,' Russell said thoughtfully. 'Perhaps he's found a copy of the will,' Val butted in excitedly. `He wouldn't say.' Louise sounded doubtful. 'These legal johnnies never do.' Val was not to be put off. 'Why don't you drive the car home, Russ? I'll bring the trap back for you,' he offered generously.

'Well—if you're sure you don't mind?' Russell hesi tated, looking at Wyn. 'Of course I don't mind! You must find out what he wants.' Wyn felt as excited as Val. And why should Russell ask her if she minded? She did mind—very much. She resented anyone denying her the ride back in the trap with Russell. Why couldn't the solicitor have contacted his client during normal working hours in the week, like anybody else, and left them their Sunday in peace? It was selfish of her, she knew, and she crushed the feeling down, hoping the solicitor's news would be good. If it was, and Russell was indeed heir to the Grange, it would probably hasten his marriage to Diane, once he knew that his position was assured. The thought added to her depression as she helped Val shaft the cob and took her seat beside him, where Russell had sat on their outward journey. 'Let's have a sing-song.' Val's irrepressible spirits bubbled over as soon as they left the village behind them. 'Jingle bells, jingle bells ...' He burst into song, and the children followed suit, their gay young voices twinkling along behind Val's, less sure of the words, but happily willing to join in the noise. Irrationally, the sound irritated Wyn. The peaceful silence of the journey out, followed by the quiet ritual of the service, had left her in no mood for the noisy demonstration. 'You can't hear the cuckoo,' she protested, and Val looked at her in surprise. 'What cuckoo? Oh, look!' He elevated his face skywards. 'There goes one of the Club planes.' 'Are you going flying today?' Wyn hastily threw him a red herring. She couldn't explain about the cuckoo. He probably would not understand if she tried. 'Yes, I'm going this afternoon. Come with me for a flip,' he invited immediately. 'I'd be terrified!' she laughed. 'And besides, I must write some letters.' She set the seal on her refusal, and blocked his protest. 'You go ahead and enjoy yourself up there.' Her upward glance cast doubts about the possibility of anyone enjoying being so far from the ground in such a small plane. 'It s marvellous up there,' Val enthused. 'If only I could do it for a living ...' 'Why can't you compromise?' Wyn asked him. 'There must be transport needed on your brother-in-law's plantation. What he grows must have to be ferried out somehow.' 'The transport system's a bit primitive from all accounts, out there,' he replied ruefully. 'Then improve it!' She supplied him with a ready-made challenge. 'You're going out there to train as manager. Well, manage the transport side. Build your own runway— you wouldn't want one all that long,' she reminded him, 'you'd hardly be flying jet liners from it,' she said impatiently. 'Eureka! You've got it! Why didn't I think of that before?' Val cried delightedly. 'Wyn, you're wonderful!' He pulled the trap to a standstill outside the front door of the Grange and leapt to the ground enthusiastically. Eagerly he reached back and lifted Wyn to the ground, and immediately kissed her soundly on both cheeks. 'This'll be great news for the family,' he told her joyfully. 'Russell should have some news too,' she brought him down to earth, laughing at his delight. Val had A lot of growing up to do yet. 'I wonder what the solicitor had to tell him?' 'That's what I came out to tell you.' Russell stood just outside the front door, watching them, and Wyn's heart sank as she saw the familiar meeting of his dark brows across eyes that were regarding herself and Val angrily. 'But I see you're both occupied,' he continued bitingly, `so my news can wait until later,' and he turned and stalked back indoors.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE solicitor had not found a will among Tempest Tylar's papers. That much Wyn gathered from the gloomy silence that pervaded the Sunday lunch table, the depressed atmosphere even quietening the two children, who for once bent their attention on their food, and made no attempt to liven the—to them—dull pastime of eating with their chatter. Russell sat in black-browed silence, scarcely responding to Val's enthusing over Wyn's suggestion to combine his hobby and his future career, to the benefit of both, and his own satisfaction. It's a great idea. I can't think why I hadn't thought of it before,' he said wonderingly. 'I'm glad it's helped you to make up your mind about going out to the plantation.' His mother cast a grateful glance in Wyn's direction. 'It's nice to know your career's settled, at least.' The relief in her voice betrayed the anxiety she still felt about her elder son's prospects. `Why not cable East and tell them you're coming?' Russell came out of his brown study to offer practical advice. 'The last time they wrote home, they said they were desperate for help,' he pointed out, and Val rose from his chair impetuously. 'I'll do it now—if you'll excuse me,' he added hastily, unable to bear a wasted minute now he had found a prospect that appealed to him, and Wyn nodded her permission tolerantly. He's got the bit between his teeth as badly as the mare, she thought amusedly. 'I'm glad I was able to help,' she smiled at Louise, conscious that she had helped his mother as much as Val, so far as peace of mind was concerned. `Let's hope you can help with equal success in the job you've come here to do.' Russell spoke drily from the other side of the table, addressing her directly for the first time since she had come downstairs. Anger still rode his voice, and Wyn flushed. In the job you're paid to do, he wanted to say, she thought bitterly. His mother's glance was quietly anxious as it rested on him, doubtless seeing his anger as resulting from disappointment over the solicitor's message. To receive such a call, and hurry home buoyed by hope, then to have his expectations dashed in such a cruel manner, would upset any man, but Wyn knew that the force of his annoyance was directed at herself. Russell had seen Val kiss her, and he was furious with them both. If he was angry because he was jealous I wouldn't mind, she thought miserably, giving up her pretence of eating food that she suddenly found she could not force down. It wouldn't be so bad, then. He's just angry because his brother's kissed an employee. Her thoughts ran on depressingly. In Russell's eyes, it was probably tantamount to finding Diane in the arms of Corporal Benny. She felt glad she had refused Val's invitation to go flying that afternoon. Russell, she felt sure, would not approve. It shouldn't matter to me whether he approves or not, I'm a free agent, she told herself, but her argument was unconvincing. It did matter, very much, and it was with a sigh of relief she at last left the lunch table and sought the privacy of her own room, to write the letters which she had in truth wanted to send off, it was not merely an excuse she had given Val.

'You should have come up with me,' he scolded her at supper time. 'It was grand up there, this afternoon.' 'I like my feet on the ground,' she shook her head firmly. Russell would know, now, that Val had asked her out, and that she had refused. It was a negative sort of satisfaction, but at least it was something. 'You'll have to get a plane of your own,' she teased the enthusiast, 'you'll wear out the Club planes if you go there every day.' 'I'd love a kite of my own.' Val's eyes were suddenly wistful, making him look curiously like Russell in one of his softer moods. 'The trouble is, they cost a bomb, and its all I can do to keep the car filled up.' 'You should get one with a smaller engine,' his brother retorted. 'By the way, that reminds me, the can of spare fuel in the garage is empty. He looked at Val accusingly. 'I know.' Val's retort was sheepish. 'I ran out of juice and cash at the same time,' he explained guiltily. 'I'll get some tomorrow, my allowance is due then,' he promised. 'It'll be better when I'm earning,' his cheery optimism reasserted itself. 'You've got to be working on the plantation to qualify for a salary from it,' Russell pointed out drily. 'And by that time you'll be out of reach for refilling my petrol can,' he added significantly. 'I only took enough to get me to the Club and back,' Val protested. 'Powered flying's expensive,' he told Wyn earnestly. 'You've no idea how the charges mount up for a few hours aloft.' Wyn could guess, but she had no desire to get involved in the argument between the two brothers. Russell's mood did not seem to have improved much since lunchtime. 'You should go to the Club less often,' Russell retorted unfeelingly, and Wyn wondered if it was he who made his brother an allowance. It would account for his authoritative attitude towards him, and in a great measure for Val's seeming acceptance, of his authority. It would be typical of Russell, Wyn thought; he seemed to regard the entire family as his responsibility, even to his small niece and nephew, whom he could justifiably regard as no concern of his. She had noticed this trait in him before, and liked him for it. Her own family was a closely knit one, and it was an attitude of mind she understood. 'I'm going to sort out my books and things, I might want to take some of them along with me.' Val departed energetically, and Louise laughed. 'Isn't it wonderful what enthusiasm can do?' she chuckled. 'You've wrought a real change in Val, my dear,' she smiled at Wyn. 'Hasn't she?' Russell murmured sarcastically, and Wyn rose to her feet abruptly, sudden anger giving her the strength to forget her feelings for him. 'It's good to know I've pleased somebody,' she snapped, and gathering up her wrap she followed Val out of the door. 'If you're still going to the post box, miss, I'd be glad if you'd drop a letter in for me.' She bumped into Nanny on the other side of the door. 'It'll go by the first post in the morning, then.' 'I'll take it.' Wyn held out her hand. 'I'm going to post my own.' She had said so earlier, had asked the children's nurse where she might find the nearest posting box, fearing it could be as far away as the village. `Don't forget to turn left at the Lodge gates,' her informant reminded her now. 'The post box is let into the wall a few yards along the lane, it's not all that easy to find unless you know where it is.' With which piece of wisdom she left Wyn and carried on into the room to clear away the supper things.

`I'll walk with you.' To Wyn's surprise Russell was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs when she came down. She had not bothered to slip her arms into the sleeves of her coat, content to let it swing loose from her shoulders, and she carried her bundle of letters in her hand. He must have heard Nanny speak to her, for the door had been open. She hesitated on the bottom step. `I'll take yours as well, if you like.' Perversely she did not want him to come with her. Her heart did uncomfortable things when she was with him, and his very closeness was a strain. `I've got none to post,' he answered. But like Nanny said, the post box isn't easy to find unless you know where it is.' His lips twitched. 'And besides, it's getting dusk.' `I'm not afraid in the dark.' She was used to isolated countryside, and rather enjoyed walking when the sun had gone down. `I can believe that.' He looked at her strangely, and she wondered what he meant. Why did he have to bite every time she spoke? she thought crossly. It would be a lot easier if he was pleasant to get on with, the same as Val. And a lot harder on her heart, she admitted ruefully. It was better as it was. With a shrug she walked out with him into the gentle summer twilight, which greyed the air and for some odd reason made the colours seem deeper than they were during the daytime, adding a richness that was paled by the bright sunshine. She pulled her coat more closely about her, seeking sudden protection. From what? She did not know, except probably from the hurt that loving him had brought. She stole a glance at his face, but it was turned away from her, his eyes seeking the black tracery of the trees that lined the drive, and presented a tunnel of semi-darkness for them to walk through. 'Mind the dead bits of wood.' Russell put his arm about her shoulder and drew her to him. Her hand was out of reach under her coat. 'There's rather a lot of it just about here, we had a bad wind storm the week before you came, and it brought a number of small branches down.' 'I noticed them when we came along in the trap this morning.' Her country-bred eyes had registered their presence, and the probable reason for the debris. 'It was a lovely run to church.' Her voice was unconsciously wistful, bringing the man's eyes down to rest on her face, which showed as a small white blur below his shoulder, indistinct in the half light, so that he had to judge her expression by the tone of her voice. 'You had two rides in the trap, one out and one back,' he reminded her, and there was a question in his words, but Wyn did not notice, her ears still echoed to the remembered cry of the cuckoo, the migrant wanderer whom she would soon have to emulate, and return, like the bird, whence she came. `Y-e-s ... yes, of course I did.' She became more positive, unwilling to show how much she disliked the noisy journey home. The children loved it, alighting laughing and eager when they returned to the Grange, and running to Louise eagerly to tell her the songs they had chanted along the way. Russell had been within earshot at the time; and must have known what the journey back had been like. 'We were quite—gay--on the way back.' She tried to instil enthusiasm into her explanation, as unaware of her signal lack of success as she was of the thoughtful look in her companion's eyes, that still sought her face even though darkness had stolen the world from the twilight, and made it impossible for him to discern it clearly. 'I should have walked straight past the pillar box if you hadn't come with me,' she confessed, as Russell took the letters from her and slipped them into the mouth of the

Post Office receptacle let into the drystone wall at the side of the lane. She did not add that she had forgotten to look for it. Forgotten, even, the letters in her hand, that were the sole purpose of her journey. `Then it's a good job I came.' He stepped back from the grass verge, high with a tangle of grasses and flowers. Wyn could smell honeysuckle from somewhere close by, and thought that its sweetness would always remind her of this bittersweet walk together through the soft summer darkness. Russell had not offered his reason for wanting to come with her. Perhaps he intended to talk to her about Val—there was no doubt he was furious when he saw them kiss. Perhaps it was his over-developed sense of responsibility towards her while she was in his home. It did not matter. All that mattered was that for a few stolen moments he was with her, and seemed inclined to let his troubles remain behind him at the Grange, and enjoy their walk together. Any companion would probably have done just as well, she realised, since Diane was not with him. She was simply glad that it was herself. 'Slip your arms in your sleeves,' he caught her coat from about her shoulders, 'it's getting chilly.' She wasn't cold, but she did as he told her, taking a long time to fasten the buttons as an excuse to occupy her hands, that longed to take his own, feeling again the sure, firm clasp of his fingers as he helped her into the trap that morning. She bent her head over her task, and looked up again quickly as a thin, high squeak sounded from just overhead. 'Bats! ' 'You're not superstitious about them getting in your hair, are you?' He was laughing at her, and she stiffened, trying to subdue the panic that had been instilled by callous young brothers so many years ago that it would never really leave her. 'Your curls are too short to get entangled,' he teased. 'And anyway, I thought you weren't afraid of the dark?' 'I'm not,' she protested, 'it's the beasties that fly about in it I don't like. Oh, not him,' as an owl whoo-hooed close by, 'he's got business of his own to attend to. It's the flittermice I don't like,' she used the old country name, and ducked hastily as a tiny black rag of a creature glided by alarmingly close. 'You really are bothered, aren't you?' as she shrank close against him, feeling foolish but unable to quite subdue her irrational fear. 'Don't worry, I'll make sure they don't carry you off.' He put his arms about her and drew her against him. For a second he held her, comfortingly, impersonally, and then without warning the feel of his arms changed. He drew in a hard breath and his hold became fiercely urgent, crushing her against him, taking her breath, and when she opened startled lips to speak, closing them with the pressure of his own. For a brief, unresisting moment Wyn responded, unable to help herself, and then from near the house the terrier barked, sharply demanding to know who was about. The sound acted like a douche of cold water in her face. She drew away from him, panting, breathless, pushing both her hands against his chest to thrust herself away from him. 'Don't—you mustn't—' It was inarticulate, but it was all she could manage. He belonged to Diane. He must not play with her own affections, she could not bear the pain. Pushing harder against him, she staggered free, putting her hands up to cover her cheeks that the darkness hid from him anyway.

'Mustn't kiss you? Why not?' His voice grated angrily. 'Don't you like being kissed? Or is that Val's prerogative?' His voice followed her harshly as she spun away from him, and turning, fled for the sanctuary of the house. Blue shadows marked her eyes with sooty fingers as she set about cataloguing a fresh room the next morning, listless after a night in which her troubled mind, and equally troubled heart, refused to let her rest. 'I've had a trestle set up, and all the rest of the silver put on it for you, miss. I thought it might make it easier, like,' Nanny told her, and Wyn thanked her gratefully. If she spent the day cataloguing silver, she would not need Russell's help to lift down pictures, she could work on her own. 'That's all the stuff from the butler's pantry,' her helpmate told her, and Wyn gasped. The trestle table looked like a Show judge's nightmare, it positively groaned with silver cups, porringers, tureens, and goblets of every description. 'The Tylar men have always been keen on horses,' Nanny offered the information proudly. 'A lot of these are racing trophies from days gone by,' she confirmed Wyn's suspicions. 'What a collection ! ' Apart from the bona fide articles of tableware from the butler's pantry, the sporting prizes alone represented a small fortune. There was even a pair of swords, their handles beautifully chased and inscribed with the name of the winner of the race. 'Grange Star, owner Thomas Tylar of Tylar Grange,' Wyn read the inscription out loud. The date was . 'All that fancy work's going to take a terrible lot of cleaning.' Nanny sounded less than enthusiastic as she viewed the ornamentation. 'Not really,' Wyn told her cheerfully. 'You don't have to use silver polish and a brush anymore,' she chased some of the gloom from her face. 'There's a modern method that's quick and simple,' she comforted her, 'and a good deal cleaner. No messy fingers afterwards. I'll show you,' she promised. I'll bring you some of my special shortbread with your mid-morning coffee,' the older woman rewarded her, and Wyn chuckled as she set to work, beginning to feel better after the friendly encounter. She need not meet Russell until lunch time, and even then with a bit of luck he might decide to lunch out. Her list and estimated values grew steadily longer, and she became absorbed as the morning wore on until the promised treat with her coffee took her by surprise, and she realised that for the last hour she had not even thought about the owner of Tylar Grange. If, indeed, he was the owner. She had not relaxed her vigil so far as the will was concerned, but the smaller items of silver tableware would make dubious hiding places for such a document, and after her tray had been removed she started on the larger stuff. A punchbowl was nearest to her hand and she picked it up. Ornately decorated, it was another racing trophy, but this time there was no date on the inscription, an omission that was unusual in such a piece. Russell had inherited his ancestors' love of horses, she mused, even if Val hadn't. But to carry on the line it only needed one in any generation, and if all went well the property would still go to the one most interested in it. She searched for the hallmark. Every piece she had touched in the house so far was 'signed' silver of the finest quality. She found the tiny assay stamp, which told her the date and where it had been made. It was on the base of the bowl, and automatically she breathed on it, as she had done on all the other pieces she examined. Almost in the same movement she reached out for the soft duster on the table beside her, to rub

the clouded spot bright again. A faint line at the side of the hallmark arrested her hand, and she frowned, looking at it more closely. As the mist of her breath on the silvei faded, so did the mark. To Wyn's keen eyesight it was still faintly discernible, but to anyone who did not know exactly what they were looking for, it would probably be unnoticeable. She breathed on it again, harder this time, a prolonged puff that deeply clouded the surface, which she tipped towards her, leaning it so that the full light from the windows fell on it, the better to see. To her trained eyes the line was definite enough, and it matched the line that creased her forehead. `If you scowl at it like that you'll melt it She was so absorbed she did not even start when Russell spoke from just behind her. Her whole attention was concentrated on her work. She spared him a quick glance, but it was the impersonal look of a professional, armoured by her task against personal feelings. `Come and look.' She beckoned him closer, undisturbed for once by his nearness as he bent over her, his head close to hers. `Is something wrong?' His frown matched hers, but this time it was born of curiosity and not anger. `The hallmark's been faked.' She made no attempt to cushion the information, the evidence was there before his eyes for him to judge for himself. `D'you mean someone's forged an assay stamp, and ...?' `No, the stamp's genuine enough,' she told him, 'but it doesn't belong to this punchbowl. I'd say the assay mark that was on this piece originally was cleverly removed, and this mark,' she pointed to the small stamp, 'has been taken from something smaller and more insignificant than a punch bowl, and grafted on to the larger piece. Faking isn't unknown to the trade,' she smiled faintly. 'That's why people employ an expert, to make sure it's all genuine,' she reminded him drily. 'I don't see how you can tell.' Diane bent her head beside Russell, she must have followed him into the room unnoticed, and Wyn looked up at her indifferently. 'If you breathe hard on the metal,' she suited action to her words, 'you can see where the new hallmark has been grafted on. The line of the joint shows up faintly —there ...' 'I can't see ...' Diane frowned. 'I can, -which is all that counts,' Wyn retorted brusquely. 'I can see it. It's very faint.' Russell traced the line with his fingernail. 'You can just see where it's been soldered in—oh, it's disappeared,' as the haze cleared from the surface. 'It's clever,' he commented interestedly. 'Whoever did that knew how to use his tools.' 'He'll do the job so you won't even detect a join.' Russell's earlier description of Val's welding prowess returned to trouble Wyn. The join on the punchbowl did not look all that old. It was difficult to tell. According to what Louise had told her, the family had been in residence at the Grange for over three months now. 'Powered flying's expensive. You've no idea how the charges mount up ...' It couldn't be Val. She refused to let her mind even dwell on the possibility. Borrowing his brother's petrol was one thing, he had intended to replace it the moment he got his next allowance. But faking hallmarks on the family silver—no, that just wasn't Val. Or was it? She liked the boy, but she didn't know him all that well, really.

'I don't see that one hallmark's much different from another,' Diane shrugged indifferently. 'Why all the fuss?' 'I should say the bowl is at least a hundred years younger than the assay mark suggests,' Wyn addressed Russell, ignoring the other girl. 'That makes it a good deal less valuable, and having a faked hallmark will detract from its worth still more.' She pencilled it in on her list, and after a brief moment's hesitation put a figure beside it. 'I'll check this with Bill Stapleton, but I don't think it's worth anymore.' 'It must be worth a lot more than that,' Diane butted in angrily. 'A piece this size—why, it'd be worth twice that much, even melted down.' 'I didn't know you were an expert on silver,' Wyn said evenly. `I'm not.' Her bluster faded as Wyn faced her squarely. 'But any idiot can see ...' 'If you think I'm an idiot,' Wyn turned to Russell, putting faint, cold emphasis on the 'you', 'you're free to seek other advice,' she reminded him, refusing to acknowledge Diane's assumption of the right to even criticise her, let alone interfere. She was not prepared to tolerate any interference where her work was concerned. 'If you don't want to keep the piece, there's always a ready market for this kind of thing,' she added, deliberately keeping her tone brisk and businesslike. `Hotels and restaurants are always willing to take anything that looks the part, particularly those that are converted country houses, and they're not particular whether the sideboard silver is genuine or not. Generally, they prefer it not to be,' she told him, 'the stuff is less costly to buy, and to insure afterwards, and it doesn't attract the attention of thieves. Bill Stapleton would take it off your hands for you, if you wished,' she added indifferently, and turned back to the table to get on with her task. 'That's a clever manoeuvre,' Diane sneered. 'You tell Russell the thing's a fake, then offer to take it off his hands. He believes you, and you get a huge piece of silver for next to nothing. No wonder antique dealers get rich, on that sort of profit,' she snapped accusingly. `How dare you!' Wyn jumped to her feet furiously, Russell and stooped with equal haste to prevent the silver punchbowl from rolling to the edge of the table, and on to the floor. She did not want to lose face by letting it fall and dent itself, now. She pushed it back on to the table with the rest of the silverware, resisting an almost overpowering impulse to hurl it at the girl's sneering face. 'Diane's only joking,' Russell intervened hastily, and Wyn turned on him, her eyes snapping. 'I don't regard it as a joke,' she cried angrily. 'Accusations like that are actionable,' she flared, and Diane paled. 'I didn't mean ...' she faltered, taken aback by the unexpected attack. 'Well, I do mean. And I'm not joking,' Wyn refusal to relent. 'You've been insufferably rude,' she turned on her tormentor, goaded beyond endurance, and heedless of what she said, equally heedless that Russell heard her, 'and now you've openly accused me of malpractice, in front of a witness.' It was Russell's turn to look dismayed now, and he put out a restraining hand and touched her arm. 'I say, Wyn, cool off,' he begged. 'I'm sure Diane didn't mean ...' 'She meant exactly what she said.' All the frustration and misery that had welled up inside her during the last few days spilled over in a spate of words. 'She didn't expect me to answer back, that's all.'

'You wouldn't ...?' Diane began, and checked, biting her lip. 'Sue you for defamation of character?' If the other girl was squeamish about putting it into words, Wyn had no scruples now. She put it plainly to her so that there was no possible doubt of what could be the outcome of her outrageous behaviour. 'I most certainly would,' she assured her icily. 'By casting doubt on my personal integrity, you cast doubt on my firm,' she pointed out. 'I don't care what you think of me,' she gave her a look as haughty as any that she herself had received from Diane, 'but I do care about the firm's good name. And so do Bill Stapleton and his father,' she added meaningly. 'I'm sorry ...' Diane looked thoroughly frightened now, seeing. that Wyn was in deadly earnest. 'Won't you reconsider, Wyn?' Russell looked deeply disturbed, and for a moment Wyn's heart smote her. As if he hadn't got trouble enough, without this storm blowing up and making things worse, she thought wretchedly. 'I'll do nothing for the moment.' She spoke more quietly, keeping a tight control of her anger. It was a costly effort, her own face was as white as Russell's stallion, and the blue shadows under her eyes even more deeply marked than they had been when she first got up, but her chin was high, and the glint of battle shone in her eyes. 'But since I've been here I've stood the brunt of Diane's rudeness, as well as her mischievous behaviour that could have cost me my life,' she reminded him' bluntly, and had the satisfaction of hearing Diane's sharp intake of breath behind her. 'I came here to do a job, and I expect to be allowed to do it without hindrance,' she pointed out. 'It's up to you to see that I have the facilities to work in peace, and without interference.' She gave no quarter to Russell either. It was now or never. If he let Diane get away with this, Wyn felt she would have no alternative but to pack her bags and leave. And wearily she acknowledged that she did not want to do that. More than anything else in the world, she wanted to remain at the Grange and find the will, to ensure Russell's future if it was in her power, even if that future was to be spent with Diane. `I'll see that you're not disturbed again.' Russell's face was as grim as his voice. In future, Diane,' he turned on the girl, and his voice was steely, 'when you come to the Grange, kindly remain in the drawing room, unless I'm with you.' `But I've had the run of the house,' she protested, flushing to the roots of her hair. `From now on, consider yourself tethered,' he advised her drily. `Do you understand? Well?' As she remained mutinously silent, his voice rose a fraction, and she nodded hastily. `Oh well, I suppose I'll have to—while she's here,' she tossed her head in Wyn's direction. `See that you do,' he advised her tightly. 'I don't want to forbid you the house ... yes, what is it, Benny?' as the Corporal clattered along the hall and burst in on them in evident distress. 'Sorry to come into the house after you, Major,' he apologised, with the nicety of manners that Wyn had liked him for from the start. It was a pity that Diane didn't cease despising him and copy his natural good breeding, she thought caustically. 'I couldn't see Nanny to come and find you, and I daren't wait. The mare's foaling,' he said breathlessly, 'and she's in trouble.' 'Have you phoned the vet?'

'I didn't stop, sir. I thought I'd come and tell you first, then if you'd phone I could go back to the mare.' He stood poised impatiently at the doorway, and Russell waved him away, his hand already reaching out for the receiver. 'On your way, I'll ring through and then come and join you.' His fingers drummed impatiently on the telephone table as he waited, then he straightened. 'Is Mr Barlow in? Tylar here, the Grange,' he said hurriedly. 'D'you think you can contact him? Good, as soon as possible if you will.' He explained briefly what the trouble was, and rang off. 'We'll have to do the best we can,' he spoke worriedly. 'The vet's gone over to Harry Williams' place to attend one of his cows.' He came over to where the two girls still stood. 'Diane, come with me,' he commanded. 'What, to the stables?' She looked at him incredulously. 'You're mistaken if you think I'm going to help you with the mare,' she told him bluntly. 'Leave that to the groom, he's paid for it.' 'Where are you going, then?' Russell did not intend she should break his promise, evidently. 'Home, where do you think?' she snapped. 'If you insist on getting mixed up in that messy business in the stables, I'm not going to be confined to the drawing room like a criminal until you've finished. You could be hours.' She stalked out of the door ahead of Russell, and Wyn stood for a moment in the empty room, letting the quietness seep in. Now that the unpleasant scene was over, she realised she was trembling. She was not used to rows, and discovered she did not like them. Poor Russell! She hoped the mare and foal would be all right. 'She's in trouble,' Benny had said, but he didn't specify what. It would be a tragedy if Russell were to lose his first foal by Pendelico. The thought galvanised her into action. 'Nanny?' She invaded the kitchen quarters. 'Sorry to barge in, but they'll want a lot of hot water down in the stable. And some soft soap, if you've got it. Quickly ! ' She explained the reason why, and soon the elderly woman had produced a tin of soft soap from the depths of a cupboard while Wyn got a couple of kettles and three saucepans all boiling on the big cooker at once. 'There's a galvanised bucket here, miss.' The nurse produced one, bustling with eagerness to help. Russell could not complain about the co-operation he received from his household, thought Wyn gratefully. They worked like a smoothly running team. If only she could join them ... She thrust the thought aside, pouring boiling water into the bucket and adding enough cold to make it bearable. 'I'll take this on down to the stable, and then come back for more.' 'I'll get some more on the boil while you're gone. Oh, miss,' Nanny touched Wyn's arm, 'I do hope he gets this foal all right. It means such a lot to him.' 'We'll do what we can to make sure he does,' Wyn assured her, with a cheerfulness that she did not feel. Corporal Benny was not a man to panic, and by the time the vet arrived his services might be too late. 'I've brought you some hot water,' she dropped the bucket on the stable floor beside the Corporal, 'and some soft soap. There's plenty more if you want it.' She thrust the tin into his hands and he gave her a grateful look. 'Good for you, miss. You know what's wanted, I can see that.' Wyn did, she had encountered more than one similar emergency while she was at home. hurriedly, the groom soaped his one arm to the elbow, working up a slippery lather. 'That's fine,' his face was tight with concentration. 'The foal's laid all of a tangle. I'll see if I can

straighten him out a bit.' Wyn marvelled at the patient way the mare accepted hisministrations, seeming to know by instinct that the man was doing his best to help her. 'There, I reckon he might do now, but the mare's exhausted. We'll have to help her.' 'I've got some pieces of rope here.' Russell quickly unwound two short coils. 'You tie that side, and I'll tie this.' They bound the cord securely round two tiny protruding hooves. 'Now pull.' 'Give me your side, and have a rest.' Wyn took the other rope from Corporal Benny. 'Thanks, miss. I could do with a breather.' He used the rest of the hot water and some more soap, and lathered his arm clean with scrupulous care. 'Now give it back to me,' he took the rope again. 'This needs more strength than a lady's arms have got,' he smiled at her. 'I'll go and get some more water.' She picked up the bucket and vanished housewards, trying not to see the warm, grateful expression on Russell's face as she worked beside him, lent energy she would not have otherwise possessed by his urgent whisper in her ear while his groom was busy sluicing himself at the other side of the stable. 'Bless you, Wyn,' he murmured fervently. 'You're a grand little partner in an emergency.' If only she could be just that, she thought wistfully, pouring kettles of hot water into the swilled-out bucket. But not just in an emergency. 'For life,' her heart added, as she began the return journey back to the stable.

CHAPTER EIGHT

'It’s a boy ! ' The lines of strain on Russell's face faded into a contented smile as he took the fresh bucket of water from Wyn, and stepped aside so that she could see. 'He's white—just like Pendelico,' she breathed, her eyes shining. 'There isn't a flaw on him.' Russell put his arm about her shoulders and hugged her to him in an excess of delight, laughing down into her face, forgetful of everything but the wonder of the new life lying in the straw at their feet. 'The mare?' Wyn asked. 'She'll be fine. Look,' instinctively he lowered his voice, 'she's nuzzling- the baby already.' Slowly the mare's tongue came out, licking life into the tiny body lying bewildered and helpless at her feet. 'Oh, look, he's trying to stand up.' Long spindly legs suddenly realised what they had come into the world to do, and struggled ineffectually to raise the funny little body with its too big head, only to collapse again instantly, leaving a surprised look on the long face that drew a chuckle from Corporal Benny, busy with his sponge and fresh supply of hot water. 'His knees haven't got the message yet, but they will,' he predicted comfortably. 'Can we see?' A would-be whisper cut piercingly through the stable, and they turned to where two pairs

of round eyes peered owlishly over the top of the stall. There was a scraping sound and one pair disappeared. Jane had slid from her precarious foothold on the hinge of the door; she was not tall enough to see over it if she stood on the floor. 'Come in quietly, then.' Russell did not remove his arm from about Wyn, but kept her close, a position she was content to rest in for as long as it suited him. A quiet sense of happiness pervaded her whole being, a strange contentment that was without foundation, and would not last, but for the moment it acted as a balm to her sore heart, and she let it heal the bruises, refusing to think ahead. 'Isn't he sweet?' Small Jane gazed entranced. 'He's just like Pendelico—oh look, he's made it,' Jon offered ungrammatical congratulations as the foal staggered to its feet and stood triumphantly splay-legged, with a precarious balance that lasted a full half minute before its legs folded under it again and deposited it back on the floor. 'It's a boy, Gran ' Jon spread the good news as Louise joined them. 'What'll you call him, Uncle Russell?' 'We'll all have to think about a name,' Russell replied gravely. 'It's important, it's got to last him the rest of his life,' he gave them both an interest in the proceedings, and the opportunity to share. 'He's lucky he's got any life,' he added, eyeing the object of their hard work as if he still could not quite believe that all was well. 'He wouldn't have had if Wyn had rode the mare like Aunty Diane wanted her to,' Jon put in sagely. 'She .. 'Hush, Jon ! ' Wyn put her fingers to her lips severely, but she was too late to prevent Russell from hearing. 'What's this?' His rapt look faded, and he frowned. 'Oh, it's all right, Wyn told her no.' Jon watched fascinated as the small creature regained its feet and stood more steadily. 'She said Aunty Diane should know better,' he remembered with evident satisfaction. 'I think it's time we left the mare in peace, don't you?' Louise broke in tactfully. 'Come along, both of you. You can come again to see the foal before you go to bed.' She coaxed them out of the stable, and Russell looked at Corporal Benny. `Do you need any more help?' he enquired. 'No, sir, I'm finished myself now,' his man replied cheerfully. 'I'll let the vet have a look at the mare when he comes, just to be on the safe side, but she should be as right as a trivet as soon as she's had some rest,' he said thankfully. 'I was real glad of your help, miss,' he told Wyn. 'And so am I,' Russell added his thanks as they walked across the cobbled yard together. 'And it seems I'm in your debt on another score, as well,' he referred' soberly to Jon's comment in the stable. 'Is there no end to the things I've got to thank you for?' he asked her. 'There's no need to thank me for not riding a mare in foal,' she retorted quietly, 'it's only common sense. And as for the rest,' she meant the work inside the house, 'it's my job. What you're paying me to do.' 'Don't do any more of it today,' he said impulsively. 'Let's have the afternoon off, to celebrate?' His face looked boyishly young and carefree; as she had not seen it since she came to the Grange. 'I promised I'd take you up Tylar Barrow to see the view,' he reminded her. So he had meant herself, and not Diane after all. `Are the children coming, too?' 'No—do you want them?' He looked oddly disappointed.

'No! ' Her emphatic reply made him laugh, and he grasped her hand and pulled her towards the house. 'We'll go in the Land Rover to the foot of the Barrow,' he suggested. 'We can spend more time up there then. Let's go as soon as we've finished lunch.' She didn't care what they, went in, so long as they went together—and alone. Wyn raced upstairs to tidy herself for the meal, her heart singing so that it rivalled the blackbird carolling through the windows to his mate in the knot garden. 'You've got some post by your plate,' Louise told her as she sat down, and Wyn excused herself and slit the envelopes open quickly. They were all birthday cards. She had forgotten it was her birthday. 'No wonder you look so happy,' Val laughed. 'Many happy returns! ' She accepted their congratulations, laughing with the others at the children's out-of-tune rendering of 'Happy Birthday to You'. It hadn't seemed much like a happy birthday when she got up that morning, she remembered ruefully. It was strange, and wonderful, how a few hours could change everything. `Go and jump in the Land Rover,' Russell bade her afterwards. 'I'll join you in a few minutes. I just want to make a quick phone call.' He was less than five before he reappeared, and dropped his jacket carefully on to the back seat. It landed weightily, as if he had something in the pocket. 'Hold on to me if you find the going too steep, I'll pull you up,' he advised Wyn as she gazed upwards at the high rise of the ancient Barrow looming overhead when, they stopped. 'You'll do no such thing,' she retorted, her pride stung. 'I've climbed stiffer slopes than this many a time.' Just the same she took his hand, for the sake of the feel of his firm, warm grip that seemed to melt her muscles so that she was glad after all to rely on him to pull her up the last few feet on to the small plateau at the top. The light wind ruffled her hair into soft open curls, and he drew her to him, his hand forestalling hers as she went to brush them away from her forehead. He let the curls wind about his fingers, entrapping them with their soft, silky folds, and gently he tipped her head so that she looked into his eyes, her own wide, and fawn-startled. `Wyn—darling.' His voice was hoarse with emotion. He bent his head and his lips sought hers, not angrily, as he had kissed her before, but hesitantly, with a seeking, tender pressure that asked as well as took. 'I love you,' he whispered huskily. For a brief, unbelieving minute Wyn wondered if the breeze had bewitched her ears, but it was Russell's voice that murmured; Russell's lips that left her own and touched the throbbing hollow of her throat, her eyes, and chin, and then her lips again, until she raised her arms and twined them about his neck, returning his ardour in a long, sweet surrender that sent her heart to sing along with the skylark, trilling high above them in the clear, cloudless blue. 'Say you'll marry me.' He still had to be sure, standing above her, his grey eyes raking her face for the answer he wanted. I’ll marry you.' It was only a whisper, but it was enough. 'I've no right to ask you, but I couldn't wait any longer,' he confessed. 'I had to know ...' 'Then why ...?' If he had spoken before it would have saved her heart a lot of suffering. 'I've got nothing to offer you,' he pointed out, but now he had her answer his voice was uncaring. 'I've thrown away my career, and unless you find the will, and it names me as the heir to the Grange, I've got no prospects either.'

'I don't care about prospects, so long as we're together.' But he did, and she sensed that it hurt his pride, that he could not lay his bounty at her feet. 'You've got Pendelico and the mares. And the foal, now, as well,' she reminded him, snuggling contentedly under his arm that wrapped protectingly round her. 'We'll start from scratch and build the Tylar stud together.' It would be a long, uphill battle, but by his side Wyn felt strong enough to achieve miracles. 'If you don't inherit the Grange, we'll get land somewhere else. The treasures in the house are wonderful,' she knew it would hurt him to have to part with his lovely home, 'but possessions aren't necessary. Not to us,' she declared softly, and felt his lips press lightly, lingeringly, on her hair. 'You're my dearest possession. My greatest treasure. All the rest are bric-a-brac.' And happily returning his embrace, Wyn knew that what he said was true. If he inherited the Grange he would be a man of con-

siderable wealth, and not a little standing, but in his eyes she would always come before both. 'It's been a wonderful birthday.' Her words were a long sigh against his shoulder. 'Your birthday—I completely forgot ! Loosing his one arm from round her, he felt in his jacket pocket, that he had draped on the ground for her sit on. 'Happy birthday, darling.' His kiss was the only present she wanted, but she took the tissue-wrapped package from his hand. 'But you only knew it was my birthday an hour or two ago!' 'I've been saving it for you for days,' he confessed. 'I thought it would be a nice goingaway present for you. And then I couldn't bear to think of you going away ...' 'They're lovely ! ' Wyn lifted out the pair of Bristol blue scent bottles, gilded with delicate decoration, and traced her finger across the tiny screw-on silver-gilt caps. They were twisted, 'just like the chimneys of the Grange,' she smiled, and came encased in a small wooden travelling box covered in green shagreen. 'I got them the day I went into town to get your ladder,' Russell told her. 'There's an antique shop there. They told me the date was about 1790 .' His raised eyebrows questioned their authenticity, and she nodded. 'That would be about right for these. Oh, Russell, thank you!' She returned his kiss. 'I'll treasure them, always,' she whispered. 'I wonder who they belonged to, all those years ago?' It would be nice to think they had been given as another birthday present, and brought joy to the heart of a girl long ago who treasured them too. 'The shop didn't have their history, I'm afraid,' Russell said gravely. 'They haven't all got the interest in lovely things that you have.' 'I'll have to add them on to your insurance bill,' she smiled up at him mischievously. 'If all goes well, you will.' His face darkened momentarily. 'I'd have liked to give you the little silver dressing table set in the bride's room,' she had admired the dainty ware when she first moved in, 'but until the matter of the will is settled it's not mine to give.' He was scrupulous about his stewardship, and Wyn loved him all the more because of it. 'Don't think about that.' She smoothed the crease from his forehead with soft fingertips. 'It's too peaceful up here to bring worries with us. In a way,' she mused, can understand how Val feels about flying. The world seems a long way away, up here ...'

'You mean he's above mundane cares when he's in his plane? Val usually is, even with both his feet on terra firma,' Russell chuckled, but there was no malice in his words, only affectionate tolerance for his younger, rather harum-scarum brother. 'There's one of the Club Moths in the distance now.' Wyn pointed to a dark speck in the sky that was the author of the continuous droning noise that assailed their ears. 'He said he was going flying this afternoon. He must have the same glorious view that we've got.' She gazed contentedly at the patchwork pattern of field and wood and water lying below them. ',I can see someone riding.' A flash of movement below them drew her eyes. 'Whoever it is has got a horse like Pendelico.' 'There isn't another white one in the district, to my knowledge. It must be a newcomer.' Russell stopped playing with her hair, rolling and unrolling, the soft brown curls for the joy of seeing the wind fluff them up again, and raised himself lazily from his semirecumbent position, leaning on his elbow. 'Whereabouts?' .he asked interestedly. 'Going towards the level crossing.' Wyn pointed. 'It's like Pendelico.' Russell narrowed his eyes, accustomed to gazing across long distances. 'It is Pendelico ' He sat up swiftly, tension in his face. 'And it's Diane riding him.' His voice was suddenly, coldly furious. 'That girl needs a sharp lesson,' he said grimly. 'It's time she realised she can't go on behaving like the spoilt little brat she's always been.' `She's a good rider, 'Wyn gave what comfort she could. 'She may not come to any harm.' 'She's not good enough to ride Pendelico. She's not strong enough.' Anxiety took the place of fury in his voice as he continued to watch the racing figure of horse and rider below them. 'There's something wrong. Pendelico's fighting her ...' Even from this distance it was possible to see that something was amiss, and a cold feeling touched Wyn as she caught sight of a puff of smoke from further along the railway line. 'There's a train coming, too.' 'Come on, let's get down to the Land Rover.' He stooped swiftly and picked up his jacket. 'Let me have your scent bottles, I'll put them back in my pocket for safe keeping.' Even in his urgency he made sure her birthday present was safe. 'It's too late to turn her.' Wyn held her breath as the goods train rattled closer, watched a minute rag doll of a figure appear at the window of the signal box waving frantic arms, and saw, incredibly, the horse and its rider rise over the first of the barrier poles across the level crossing, just in front of the train, then start to rise again, awkwardly, to the second one before the wildly hooting engine passed the spot and blocked their view. `The plane's spotted them, too. It's coming down! ' Wyn suddenly became aware of the urgent roar of the Moth's engine above them, and heard it rattle into a throttle back as it went into a long glide towards the flat grassland below them. `Can you run?' `I'll manage.' She was already running beside him, helped along by his arm, firm about her to speed their passage down to the Land Rover. 'Up you get!' Russell boosted her up into the passenger seat, jumped into his own and keyed the engine into urgent life, then he was spinning the wheel, backtracking round

the base of the Barrow, and cutting diagonally across the long stretch of grassland that sloped gradually down to the level crossing. 'There's another rider,' Wyn pointed slightly ahead, 'it looks like Corporal Benny.' She screwed her eyes up against the sun to follow the path of a big chestnut which was racing after the first rider. `We'll stop and pick him up.' Russell demanded speed from their transport that made Wyn thankful it was purpose-built to stand up to off-the-road travel. `I'll signal him, maybe he'll slow down.' Russell gave two sharp blasts on the horn, and the man riding the chestnut glanced back over his shoulder. Immediately he slackened speed, raising himself from his crouching position in the saddle. Within seconds he pulled his horse to a standstill and slipped to the ground, and stood waiting while they drew up beside him. 'Jump in!' Russell jerked his head backwards, and the groom turned the 'horse round, knotted the reins up over its mane, and gave it a light spank. 'It'll go back to the stable,' he said as it trotted off, back the way it had come. 'It'll wait for me there and I can see to it when I get back,' he added confidently. 'What happened?' Desperate anxiety made Russell economical with words. 'Miss Diane came into the stable yard and demhnded a ride.' The man's tone was as grim as his master's, and he made no pretence at misunderstanding what the latter meant. 'I was making a warm mash for the mare that had just foaled, and I asked her if she'd mind waiting a couple of minutes while I finished it. I wouldn't have kept her long,' his tone was hard, 'but she seemed in a bit of a mood. Beg pardon, sir, but you did ask ...' 'I want to know.' Russell cut short his apology and waved to him to continue. 'Well, Miss Diane went off to the tack room, and I thought she'd gone to sort out her favourite saddle, so I took no notice when I saw her sling it in the back of her car and drive off to the paddock. I thought she was just impatient, and I'd follow her along and check her gear before she set off.' 'Go on.' Russell's voice was sternly controlled. 'Well, when I gets to the paddock, sir, Miss Diane had already got Pendelico kitted up.' The man's voice was incredulous. She was on the stallion's back, and he was rearing and backing up. 'Twas that as made me notice what she'd done.' He sounded more unhappy by the second as his tale unfolded, and Russell spoke without turning his head. 'I'm not blaming you, Benny. Diane is responsible for her own impulsive actions.' He hesitated slightly. 'Whatever the outcome, it's not your fault,' he stressed. Even in his anxiety he could still be fair, and his man's face cleared miraculously. 'Well, sir, she'd used an ordinary bridle and bit, instead of a hackamore. The Major never rides the stallion with anything but a bitless bridle,' he explained to Wyn. 'Pendelico had never had a bit in his mouth in his life. That's what made him try and back away from it,' he added. 'I wonder he didn't buck her off.' Wyn marvelled at the girl's stupidity. 'i would have been better for Miss Diane if he had, I reckons,' the groom said despondently. 'The horse tried his best, but in the end she used her crop on him. That's what made him take off at such a speed—why, there's Mr Val, he's taxiing up to the level crossing, look.' He caught sight of, the grounded plane for the first time. 'He was above the signal box when Diane jumped the poles. She only just made it in front of the train, and Val must have seen what happened from the air.' Wyn filled in

the background for him, hoping privately that Diane had indeed made it safely to the other side of the permanent way. The train had been almost on top of the horse and rider when they jumped, and must have been level with them when they rose to the pole on the far side. If, indeed, they had time to rise ... A shiver shook her, despite the warmth of the day. 'Mr Tylar ! Mr Tylar ! ' The signalman gesticulated wildly to them from the window of his box, and whether he called to Russell or to Val seemed unimportant, as they both jumped down from their different modes of transport and raced the last few yards to the crossing. `Go round the train, sir. Round it!' The goods train had screeched to a jangling halt across the level crossing. 'No, t'other way, behind the guard's van,' the man shouted directions at them, better able to see from his elevated position where their quickest route lay. 'I've phoned for an ambulance, it's on its way,' he called down to Corporal Benny as they neared the box behind the others. The Corporal raised his one hand in response, and used the other to steady Wyn as she raced beside him, following Russell and Val round the back of the now silent wagons that Wyn saw with dismay were filled with a similar assortment of metalwork as the train they had encountered on their previous ride. It would have made the same hideous clanging noises that had contorted the stallion into circus antics even with Russell on his back. With Diane riding him ... Wyn shivered again. 'Don't come any further, Miss Wyn. Go back to the Land Rover, do!' Corporal Benny begged her, his hand on her arm as they rounded the end of the guard's van and both instinctively stopped in their tracks, shocked into momentary immobility at the scene which confronted them. 'I'll come with you.' Wyn spoke quietly, exhibiting a calm she was far from feeling, but which turned the groom's look of entreaty into one of respect as she forced herself forward. 'I'm qualified in first aid, I might be able to help.' 'See to Pendelico, will you, please, Benny?' Russell raised a haggard face as he heard them coming. He and Val were kneeling on the ground a foot or two away from the second pole, one on each side of a silent jodhpur-clad figure that lay ominously still. 'I don't think there's much you can do, but ...' He broke off, looking away from them, and Wyn felt sick as she looked at his stallion. Its body, from where she stood, appeared to be unmarked. 'It looks as if the train missed him. I suppose we've got that to be thankful for.' There was weary relief in the groom's voice, coupled with the flat finality of acceptance forced on him by the utter stillness of the stallion's prone form, with the long white neck, which must have felt the caress of its groom's hands almost as often as it felt its master's, lying at an awkward angle that told Win more clearly than words that it would never again bear aloft the proud head, to turn with flicking ear and a whinnied greeting whenever it heard the sound of Russell's step. Numbly, she stepped around Pendelico, tactfully turning her back on the groom, whose murmured 'Penny, Penny old lad,' as he knelt unbelieving on the ground beside his charge, bade fair to crack her own hard-won self-control. She dared not lose that, for Russell's sake. 'Diane?' Her voice was hardly louder than the groom's, but it reached the two men. Val rose to his feet, and made way for her beside the girl. 'She's breathing.' The boy's face was very white, but Wyn saw thankfully that he was calm. Val had already

taken a long step towards growing up, and Wyn silently applauded the way in which he had risen to what must, have been his first real hurdle. No, not that ! Her mind cringed from her own description. Pendelico must have taken his first hurdle, over the level crossing pole, but the second one had brought about his downfall. `He was fighting her, every inch of the way, sir,' the crossing keeper told Russell, hovering in shirt-sleeved indecision -above them, and added, `I'd better get the goods train into a siding out of the way, so it won't hold up the express.' He pulled the necessary levers and let out a shout, which was acknowledged from the engine cab by a blue-denimed arm, and slowly the wagons clanked away from the level crossing, and after what seemed a long time the two red and white poles moved upwards, clearing the way. `It'll give the ambulance a straight run in.' His task accomplished, the signalman appeared at the box window -again. 'Why didn't she heed me, Mr Tylar?' he asked helplessly. 'I shouted to her not to risk it, with the train coming and all, and your horse being so scary of the noise as 'e was. I know she heard me, she looked up,' he remembered wretchedly. `The stallion probably bolted when he heard the noise of the trait.' Russell didn't sound too convinced even as he spoke, and the crossing keeper shook his head adamantly. `No, sir. The horse bucked and tried to back away from the line, he didn't want to get near. If anything, I'd say he wanted to bolt in the opposite direction, but the young lady, she cropped him something cruel and put him straight at the poles.' In spite of the circumstances his voice mirrored his disapproval of Diane's behaviour. 'It drove him over the first pole, but he jumped to one side, as if he was trying to keep as far away from the train as he could. By this time the engine driver had seen him, and he added to the din with his brakes and his whistle, trying to stop her from attempting to cross. Anyway, the horse landed between the lines instead of on the sleepers. He'd have had a smoother take-off from there. As it was he landed awkwardly, and took off the same, and I daren't raise the poles, there wasn't time. His only chance was to jump clear.' 'He got to the other side,' the groom choked. 'Aye, he did, but it was his own haste that was his undoing. He was frantic to get away from the train, and he didn't jump high enough. The pole caught him under the knees and tipped him head first over it ...' His voice trailed away, the grim evidence on the ground below his window eloquently finishing his sentence for him. 'Here's the ambulance,' Val broke in quietly. 'Will you go with Diane, Russ, or would you like me to?' 'You take your plane back to the Club, then cut straight on home and take over there, will you?' Some instinct made Russell lean on the younger man, whose shoulders straightened under the unaccustomed trust. 'I'll let Mother know what's happened.' Briefly an uncertain note crept into Val's voice, then it strengthened again. 'Will you go back to the house with Benny, Wyn?' 'When I've seen Diane into the ambulance.' The girl-had not stirred. Her face was as ashen as her hair, and Wyn sent up a silent prayer that her riding hat had saved her head from the worst. If not ... Sternly she pulled her thoughts to a halt. Time enough to wonder about the outcome when they knew just how badly she was injured.

The ambulance men wasted no time once they drew up beside the crossing. With swift expertise they transferred the unconscious girl on to their stretcher, and slid it into the long vehicle while Russell and Wyn looked on. 'Ring as soon as you know—anything,' Wyn gulped. 'Benny or Val will come in to town and fetch you back.' 'I feel responsible.' Russell met her eyes, his own haunted, boring into her face with a kind of desperation that puzzled as well as distressed her. 'It isn't your fault. How can you say that?' He had expressly forbidden Diane to ride Pendelico, she had been there when he told her not to. 'I shouldn't have scolded her quite so harshly,' he harked back to the unpleasant-scene in the study that morning. 'I might have known she'd do something silly ...' 'We're ready for off now, sir, if you're coming with us?' The brisk, professional voice of the orderly jerked Russell away from his thoughts. 'Yes, I'm ready.' He gave Wyn a long, curiously despairing look, and turned away, and the ambulance door thudded shut with grim finality. He looked at me almost as if he was afraid he might forget my face, she thought, made uneasy by his manner. 'Take Miss Wyn home, will you, Benny?' Val seemed to have gained new stature. 'I'll get in touch with the vet myself, and come out with him again here afterwards.' He raised the groom from beside the stallion, taking on his own shoulders a dreadful task in order to spare the man. 'You drive the Land Rover back—and mind how you go,' he paid keen heed to the groom's unashamedly wet face. 'Go back and look after the foal. Russell will need the little fellow more than ever, now.' He gave the man a lifeline that steadied his first stumbing steps away from his lifeless charge, and himself walked back with them to where the Land Rover was drawn up on the grass. 'Sure you're safe to drive?' Was it really Val's voice? Wyn looked at him curiously. The gay flippancy had vanished, and a new, strong timbre was resonant in his tone, that raised Benny's head and made his answer as forthright as the question. 'I'm meself again now, sir: It was just—for the moment, like ...' 'Then take it steady on the way back, and I'll be along soon after you.' They waited and watched while he taxied to a point where he could make a smooth take-off, and soon became a rapidly disappearing speck in the sky hastening towards the flying field. 'Best leave breaking the news to Mr Val,' Benny advised as they turned into the stable yard. 'It sounds as if Mrs Tylar's in the knot garden.' Voices raised in childish merriment reached their ears and Wyn smiled slightly; it sounded as if the children were engaged in their favourite game of trying to puzzle a way out of the maze. 'Go to them, will you, Wyn?' Val joined them a brief half hour later, that seemed like a lifetime to Wyn, who dreaded that Louise might bring the children to the stables to see the foal, and want an explanation of their sober faces. 'I'll tell Mother on her own.' 'Take Nanny along as well,' Wyn suggested. Louise had more than enough strength of character of het own to withstand shocks, but Wyn guessed the motherly little nursemaid would resort to her panacea for all ills, a timely cup of tea, and one would be very welcome at such a time, she knew. `I've taken Benny one.' Twenty minutes later Nanny appeared in search of her. 'And I've left yours poured out on the tray in the drawing room. Go along and get it, now,' she shooed Wyn away. 'I'll stay here with the children.' She lowered her ample form on to the garden seat. 'You go on in and join the rest of the family,' she included Wyn

among them, which gave her a quick warm glow which eased the tension a little that had remained with her since she returned to the Grange with Benny. `Come and join us, my dear. You must need this.' Louise's voice was strong and calm, her hand quite steady as she handed Wyn the welcome beverage. She sipped it gratefully, grimaced at the amount of sugar the children's nurse had stirred into it, deliberately she was sure. `Wyn was wonderful, while we were at the crossing. You've no idea ...' Relief at having accomplished his unpleasant task made Val incoherent. `I think I have,' his mother smiled, her kindly eyes searching Wyn's face. And reading—what? Wyn discovered she did not mind if she read her precious secret, although she remained silent; it was Russell's place to tell his family. Even so, she felt that the older woman had made a shrewd guess, and warmly, happily, that she approved. 'It's a sad end to your birthday,' Louise sympathised quietly. 'We'll have' to make your next—celebration,' she laid delicate emphasis on the word, 'a happier one.' She proffered her own birthday gift, and impulsively Wyn bent to kiss her, delighted with the tiny flask of perfume that, she was convinced, had been purchased specially to fuel the scent bottles Russell had given to her. 'It's a shame to spoil your birthday, just the same.' With a flourish, Val produced one of the biggest boxes of chocolates Wyn had ever seen, and dropped it on to her lap. The box with its floral painted lid was a work of art in itself. 'Oh, Val ! And after what you said ...' It was a magnificent gift by any standards, and from someone who had admitted being so hard up ... Wyn looked at him helplessly. 'I had my allowance this morning,' he grinned happily. 'I've filled up Russell's petrol can again, as well,' he added naïvely, and Wyn chuckled, a small, gusty relief from strain that could not lift until they heard how Diane was faring, but helped just the same to keep up a pretence in front of the children and one another —that all must soon be well. And try to ignore, if only for the moment, the knowledge that they dared not remember, and could not forget, of the wanton destruction of a man's dream to satisfy a spoiled girl's pique. Was it only the one dream Diane had destroyed? Wyn wondered dully. Russell's face, drawn and strained even beyond what might have been expected by the shock of the accident, and the loss of his horse; returned to trouble her. Automatically she dabbed some of her new perfume on the pulse spots at her temples and throat; spots that had felt the ardent pressure of his lips, tingled with the remembered feel of them still. She sighed, and slipped her locket over her head. She would get a picture of Russell to put in it, she promised herself, seeking comfort from the small commitment as she finished her toilet in readiness for dinner. And afterwards, she would transfer her birthday perfume to the lovely little blue glass bottles he had given to her. She fingered them lovingly, twisting and untwisting their delicate corkscrew tops until another thought stilled her nervous hands. 'I feel responsible,' Russell had said. A small, cold finger touched her heart at the memory. If he felt responsible for what Diane had done, how far would this feeling take him with Diane herself? What if her injuries were severe—perhaps sufficient to cause permanent disablement? The way he had looked at Wyn, as if he was trying to imprint every detail of her face on his memory, suddenly did not seem so strange to her. If Diane should be disabled, would Russell feel obliged to support her because of his

sense of responsibility—even to marry her? And spend the rest of his life looking after a woman whom Wyn knew, now, he did not love?

CHAPTER NINE

`She's still unconscious.' Russell's voice sounded flat and drained of emotion when he rang at about ten o'clock. The evening seemed to stretch interminably to Wyn. They all picked at a dinner none of them really wanted, but each felt they had to eat for appearances' sake. Even Val's normal exuberance was not proof against the journey he had made with the vet back to the level crossing to arrange for the removal of the stallion's body, and he alternated between periods of gloomy silence and restless prowling round the room that eventually earned him a sharp reproof from Louise. 'For goodness' sake, Val, if you can't sit still why don't you take the car and go into town to collect Russell? I imagine he'll be ready to come home soon, there'll be no point in him remaining at the hospital all night. It'll save him another hour of waiting if you're already there.' 'A good idea!' Val jumped up, patently glad to do anything but wait in soul-destroying inactivity that was playing on his nerves as much as the others. 'Russell said he'd ring,' Wyn began doubtfully, and spun round as the telephone bell set up a shrill alarum, as if it had heard her speak. Val grabbed it eagerly, and Wyn saw his face fall. 'Oh—oh, in that case I won't come in. He'd like a word with you, Wyn.' He held out the receiver to her, and wandered disconsolately back to his chair. `How's Diane?' She forced the words out, afraid of his answer, and her heart sank when it came. `Her parents are here as well.' He sounded unutterably weary. 'I'll stay with them, Wyn. It's the least I can do. The doctors say it might be hours before she comes round, and they won't be able to tell us much until she does. If she does ...' She hardly caught the last words, they were so faint. It was as if he was voicing his fears to himself, rather than talking to her. `You mustn't blame yourself, Russell. You mustn't let them blame you ' She felt a moment of wild impatience with the telephone. Why was the instrument so useless at conveying her real feelings? Her voice probably sounded as flat and unconvincing to Russell as his did to her. If only she was there with him, she would manage to convince him; if only she could reach out and put her arms about him, press her lips on his as she had done when they were on the top of Tylar Barrow, together, she could tell him he was wrong to blame himself, and he might listen. She should have gone with him ... 'Mr and Mrs de Courcey don't blame me,' he cut across her anxious thoughts. 'They know I forbade Diane to ride Pendelico. I'd told her often enough, and in their hearing too, and they upheld me. But Diane wasn't used to being refused anything she set her" heart on.' `You couldn't have guessed she'd do anything so silly,' Wyn protested.

'I should have known she'd try something. From the time she was little she would always do something wild if she was thwarted in any way. To try and get her own back, I suppose.' Diane had 'had her own back' with a vengeance now, Wyn thought drearily, and destroyed the stallion in the process. Was there no limit to a spoiled girl's determination to get her own way? And it looked as if she still might get her wish and marry Russell—and probably destroy him, too. 'Don't wait for me, Wyn.' His words hit her like a blow, almost as if he had been reading her thoughts, and her heart turned to ice within her. 'I'll wait.' Her voice came in a desperate gasp. Surely it was better to wait until they knew if Diane was badly injured or not? There could be no need for Rusell to make up his mind about it, now. No need for him to sacrifice himself unless there was cause. 'What's the point? I'll be staying here most of the night, I expect, and you need your beauty sleep.' His voice became firm, once more in control of the situation. 'Go to bed, and I'll come and tell you how things are in the morning.' 'You mean don't wait up?' She could have laughed aloud with relief. 'Tell Val not to wait, either. I'll get a taxi back, it'll save him the double journey. I'll see you in the morning.' He paused, and for a second Wyn wondered if he had put the receiver down, then, 'We can talk then ...' 'Yes, we can talk.' She mounted the stairs on leaden feet, entered her . room, the bride's room which might never be hers now, to face the long, agonising wait through the night: Surely, even if Diane was badly injured, Russell could not contemplate destroying his own happiness and hers to marry a girl he did not love? There must be some other way. The thoughts ran round and round in her head, driving her off the comfortable bed to pace the room as anxiously as Val had done earlier, and finally, as the events of the day took their toll and exhaustion set in, she collapsed into the deeply padded window seat, drawing the curtain aside so that she could see out along the long, dark, tree-lined drive, and watch for headlights turning in through the Lodge gates, that would tell her Russell had come home. Through a haze of returning consciousness she heard his voice speak to her, felt his arms about her, and a sensation of being lifted up. Drowsily she tried to return to sleep, so that she might not lose the comfort of the dream. 'You'll rest better in bed.' She opened her eyes to the reality of Russell's face above her, holding her close to him as he picked her up from the window seat as effortlessly as if she was a child, and carried her gently across to the bed. 'I told you not to wait up for me,' he scolded her softly. 'You told me not to wait ...' 'There was no sense in us both losing sleep.'. He did not understand the implied difference, and she did not point it out to him. His face was drawn and exhausted after his long vigil, and she struggled to a sitting position as he lowered her down on to the bed. 'Have you had anything to eat or drink?' He looked as if he had had neither for hours, and Wyn's native common sense made her thrust aside her own feelings for the moment in the need to be practical. 'I've had both, at the hospital. I had to coax Diane's

parents to eat a meal, and the best way was to pretend to feel hungry myself,' he smiled faintly. 'All I really want now is sleep, but I thought I'd drop in and let you know the latest news if you were awake.' He looked down at her from his seat on the side of her bed, his arms still closely around her dressing-gown-clad figure. `You must be exhausted.' Concern for him drove all other thoughts out of her mind, even Diane. `She's regained consciousness, her hat saved her head from any great harm.' Russell gave her the information she wanted most in the world. 'She's got slight concussion, but the doctors aren't worried about that. It's her back ...' His voice was troubled. 'She bruised herself badly when she fell. Apparently she came off like a bullet from a gun when—Pendelico—fell,' he swallowed hard and went on, 'You saw how far away she landed, and she landed on her back.' 'Bruises will heal,' Wyn cried desperately, as much to convince herself as to convince him. 'If they're only bruises, yes. She's got to have some tests of some kind tomorrow. Xrays, I expect. They wouldn't disturb her while she was unconscious, but we should know more tomorrow.' 'Then get some rest. We can face whatever comes in the morning.' Wyn did not want to face the morning. She wanted to go to sleep now, and never wake up. If she could only remain as she was, for ever, in Russell's arms, her head resting on his shoulder, the world would be well lost, she felt, envying the miniature Doulton figurine of a shepherd lad and his dainty milkmaid sweetheart that rested on the table by their side, with their arms entwined in a timeless porcelain embrace, heedless of everything but the flower-garlanded bliss that was theirs. She felt him sigh, and stirred. 'Go to bed, and try to rest,' she urged him, her face a pale entreaty upturned towards his. 'It won't be long now before dawn, but I'll rest until then.' He lowered his head and his lips brushed hers, lightly, caressingly, then with, a fierce, bruising hunger that would not be denied. His arms tightened, drawing her to him, matching the pressure of his kiss. 'Oh, Wyn darling ...' For a brief, agonising moment he held her close, then with a muttered exclamation he thrust her from him. 'Whatever happens in the morning,' he told her hoarsely, 'remember—always remember—that I love you.' And then he was gone, and the door closed behind him, leaving her alone in the darkness of the bride's room, wondering unhappily if she would ever be his bride. He was gone when she got up the next morning. 'He had his breakfast early, and went straight off to the hospital,' Nanny told her, standing over Wyn until she was satisfied that she had eaten at least some breakfast, if not the substantial one she thought she should have. 'I'll go for a walk before I start work,' she decided aloud. 'A breath of fresh air might wake me up.' 'It might put a bit of colour into your cheeks.' The children's nurse looked at her disapprovingly, noting-the dark smudges under her eyes that were even more noticeable than they had been the previous morning. 'Can we come?' Jane begged, divining her intention as she headed for the bridge over the stream. 'You're not to bother Miss Wyn this morning,' their nurse began, but Wyn smiled at the child, and held out her hand. 'I'd be glad of their company,' she confessed, 'unless you want them for anything?'

'No, go along, while,' take Mrs Tylar her breakfast. And yes, they know,' Nanny answered Wyn's unspoken question. `Gran told us,' Jon said soberly, with a wary glance in the direction of his sister, whose small face still bore traces of .tears. 'What'll Uncle Russell do now? For his stud, I mean?' He manfully kept his own chin high, though Wyn saw with compassion that his lips quivered. 'He still has the foal, you know,' she reminded him quietly. 'He's a boy, like you said; it'll mean waiting a few years, that's all.' She tried to speak lightly. 'Let's go and see how the little chap's getting along,' she suggested, hurriedly offering a diversion. 'You can collect Scamp from the stable at the same time, and bring him with us,' she relented. 'But not until we've been to see the foal. Scamp's too lively first thing in the morning, and the mare might not like it.' She checked their headlong rush to the stable door, and hardened her heart CO the terrier's desperate howls for freedom. `He's doing well, miss,' Corporal Benny beckoned her inside. 'Yes, it's all right for the children to come, they know they must be quiet, and move gently so as not to frighten him.' He gave them a cautious warning, which was not really needed, Wyn saw with relief; their manner towards the mare and foal was impeccable, speaking of careful training. Jon held out his hand and offered the proud mother an apple, which she took with evident delight. 'We always took her a titbit in the morning, it seems a shame to stop now—she expects one from us,' he said gravely, and offered his fingers to the foal which immediately sucked at them, bringing a smile to his small, woebegone face that Wyn was thankful to see. Diane's outrageous behaviour had caused misery even to the children, and Wyn found it hard to forgive her for that. `His knees aren't wobbly any more. He's standings well.' Jon already had his uncle's discerning eye. 'Aye, he'll be a real little treasure.' Corporal Benny surveyed the leggy little creature with pride. 'That's what we'll call him.' Jane jumped up and down excitedly. 'It's a lovely name.' 'It's better than the one you thought of before,' her brother conceded loftily. 'She said to call him Beauty, and there isn't a black spot on him.' His scorn was withering. 'Tie a knot in your hanky so you'll remember what it is,' Wyn intervened hastily, 'and we'll ask your uncle what he thinks as soon as he gets back.' Russell, as well as the children, would need a diversion for his thoughts, and what better than naming the foal, that watched them with luminous baby eyes, innocently trusting. Remembering how its sire had fared at Diane's hands, Wyn hoped it would always find the human race as friendly as it did now. She had an instinct that Russell would never willingly part with the foal, which should ensure it a good home for the rest of its life. Treasure. Treasure of Tylar 'I think it's a lovely name.' She kept the train of thought going, as much to keep herself from brooding as the children. That's what Russell had called her. His treasure. And now he was prepared to squander it, on dross. Without conscious thought her feet guided her away from the paddocks, keeping to the avenue of trees that led to the half ruined folly at the end, standing picturesquely ivyclad, a monument to wasted effort. Her own life would be wasted without Russell. Her steps slowed, lagging behind the children who joyfully descended on the gloomy pile, Jon in the vocal hope that he might disturb a roosting owl, and Jane to pull a handful of dogrose buds to bear back in triumph to the nursery.

Wyn helped her to find a jamjar and arrange them along with a handful of flowering grasses when they returned to the house, and wondered, as she looked at them, why beauty had the power to hurt. `Now I must start work,' regretfully she refused the children's blandishments. 'I'll come out and play in the maze for a while afterwards,' and they departed, satisfied with her promise, and leaving her wishing wearily that she could see her way out of the maze of doubt and, uncertainty that seemed to have closed round herself and Russell and offered no way out. `Do you need a hand with any pictures?' Val stuck his head round the door and offered his services, conscious that Russell had helped her with the heavier items until now. `No, I've finished with those, there's only the furniture in this room, and then I'm through.' Wyn had finished the job she had come to do, and unless she found Tempest Tylar's will among the cupboards and drawers surrounding her, she had failed in the most important part of it. 'In that case, I'm going to the flying field for a few hours.' Val prowled restlessly, not quite knowing how to cope with the continued strain. 'You might as well,' Wyn agreed readily. Occupation would be the best thing for him. And for herself. 'Russell probably won't be home for some hours, and the time will pass more quickly with something to do.' It was a philosophy that didn't seem to apply to herself. She found it difficult to concentrate, every sound from the house was a distraction, and she ran to the window three times on hearing, a vehicle in the drive. The postman, the baker, and the milkman each saluted her with a cheery wave, and the next time she heard a car arrive she resolutely remained where she was, half way up the steps Russell had bought for her, determinedly investigating the top of a fine inlaid cabinet that disappointingly revealed no sign of a hidden crevice that might possibly contain a will. 'Who cares about a will?' Wyn gasped as Russell came up behind her and caught her about the waist, swinging her gaily off her perch. 'You're back! ' 'And here to stay,' he grinned as he set her on her feet. 'At least, with you, if not at the Grange.' His gaiety was infectious, and she allowed herself to be twirled in an impromptu dance across the parquet floor before she collected her wits and her breath sufficiently to demand an explanation of his behaviour. 'Everything's all right. They've given Diane all sorts of X-rays and tests and things,' he gestured vaguely, 'and they say there isn't a crack in her anywhere,' he cried jubilantly. 'Oh, Wyn, I'm so relieved!' He looked ten years younger than he had when he left her in the small hours of the morning, even lack of rest could not destroy his high spirits. 'Has Diane said anything?' How would she excuse her behaviour? Wyn wondered, knowing as she did how much his stallion had meant to Russell. 'She blamed Pefidelico. She said he bolted.' His face hardened. 'Russell,' she tightened her arms about him, 'I'm sorry—about Pendelico—' She faltered to a halt. What words were adequate to ease such a hurt? she wondered miserably. 'It's hard to bear, losing him,' he replied soberly, not attempting to bypass the subject. 'But when I thought I might lose you too—well, it brought things into perspective a bit,' he admitted quietly.

'Does Diane know she's going to be all right?' 'Yes, she knows. She refused to accept it at first. She played up a bit, wanted me to stay with her, and so on ...' Wyn could imagine the scene. The tears and entreaties; the clinging hands, and then the tantrums when Diane found that for once she was not going to get her own way. 'The doctor there was pretty firm. He told her to stop her nonsense,' he remembered incredulously. 'I don't think anyone had ever spoken to her like that before. And it worked! I think maybe the fact that he'd got curly auburn hair and an attractive smile might have had something to do with it,' he added drily, and Wyn chuckled, a rich, happy sound that lowered his head above hers. 'There's only one question left to answer now,' she murmured happily, several minutes later. 'Only one,' he agreed, smiling down into her eyes. 'How soon will you marry me?' he voiced it. 'Not that—I mean about the will,' she laughed at his deliberate misunderstanding. 'As if that matters, now ' he exclaimed, then, 'Yes, it does matter. It matters more than ever, now I've got you.' 'It doesn't, to me,' she murmured. But it would matter when they had an heir. She didn't voice her thoughts, that belonged to the future. The long, happy years when they would be together, and an heir would come in the natural fulfilment of time. For now they had one another. 'You've got the foal,' she reminded him gently, trying to erase the shadow that still remained in his eyes when he thought of Pendelico. 'The children think they've found a name for him. Treasure,' she tried it out again, and saw from the way Russell's face lit up that he liked it. 'Treasure of Tylar.' `Tylar's found its own treasure,' he kissed her gently, `but we'll let the foal share the name as well, if you like. He can be your wedding present, from me.' He gave her his most prized possession. 'We'll share him,' she countered softly. He would need something to fill the gap left by Pendelico. 'There's a gentleman to see you, Mr Russell.' Nanny knocked discreetly at the door, and beamed largely on them as they turned to face her, still contentedly in one another's arms. 'It's Mr Avery, the solicitor. I've put him in the study, and Mrs Louise has gone in with him, and Mr Val. He's just back from his flying,' she informed them. 'Maybe he's found the will?' Wyn looked up at Russell hopefully. `More probably he's come on another errand I asked him to do for me,' he answered. 'Let's go and see.' He kept hold of her hand, drawing her with him when she would have hung back. 'You're family too,' he reminded her. 'Whatever concerns me, concerns you as well.' `It's about that faked hallmark you asked me to investigate, Mr Tylar.' The elderly solicitor rose and bowed over Wyn's hand with olde-worlde courtesy before he announced his business, and Wyn drew in an apprehensive breath. Don't let there be more trouble, she begged silently. She could not bear further disharmony on this day that had been clouded as darkly as any she had ever known, and now shone with happiness that simply must not be tarnished. 'Did you find what I suspected?' Russell sat down on the settee, drawing Wyn on to his knee possessively, as if he could not bear to let her out of his reach. `Exactly as you suspected,' the solicitor nodded gravely. 'I travelled to Manchester myself to see your late uncle's manservant, and he confirmed what you had already

guessed. Your late brother-in-law, ma'am,' he turned to Louise, 'was not entirely—ah-responsible during the latter part of his life. He held a grudge against the world— justifiably, as you know—and he must have decided to even the score a little, and create confusion by altering the hallmarks on some of his collection of silver. Fortunately he only had time to tamper with the one piece,' he finished with relief. `So that's what all that welding equipment was for,' Val exclaimed. 'There was no end of the stuff in the coach house, I used it to mend Diane's battery carrier.'

Thank goodness it wasn't Val! Wyn heaved a small, private sigh of relief. She had never seriously suspected the boy, but just the same it was good to know the real culprit; it left no lingering doubt behind. 'I had to have my guess confirmed,' Russell spoke to her quietly. 'I couldn't let Diane get away with such a monstrous accusation—I'll explain later,' he promised as Louise made a small, distressed murmur. 'If I'd let the matter drop she might have repeated it at some time, if she was upset about anything.' He made no excuse for the girl's malicious spite, or for her potential for mischief if things did not go her way. 'If your uncle was of—how do they put it? Unsound mind?' Wyn looked at Russell hopefully, 'might his will be invalid? Perhaps there's another way of proving who is heir to the Grange?' 'Tempest Tylar was in full possession of his faculties,' the solicitor dampened her enthusiasm. 'Having a grudge against mankind in general does not constitute feeblemindedness,' he pointed out. 'And besides, litigation is ruinously expensive. To prove Mr Tylar's claim in that way could drain the estate of its resources until there was nothing left to inherit,' he told her. 'It would be better for everyone, including the estate, whoever inherits it, if a will could be found. Have you had no success in_ that direction so far?' he addressed Wyn directly. 'None.' She did not waste words bolstering false hope. 'I was examining the last piece of furniture when you Came in,' she explained to Russell. 'There wasn't a dent in it that would hide a postage stamp, let alone a document of the size we're looking for,' she said disconsolately. 'Come back, Scamp!' A shrill call cut across the small silence that fell on the group in the study like a faint, grey cloud, so still that they could almost hear one another's thoughts. Wyn tightened her fingers convulsively about Russell's slim brown hand, wretched at her own failure to help him, and not knowing what else to suggest. Perhaps if Bill Stapleton had come as he originally intended to, he might have had better luck. `Don't let that dog into the house, Master Jon. Your uncle's got a visitor. There, now he's in, and there'll be no stopping him!' Nanny's voice, raised in exasperation, floated through the open study door. 'He'll head straight for Mr Russell, you know he always does.' 'Prepare to repel boarders!' Russell's lips twitched at the sounds of domestic strife, and a triumphant puppy yap that proclaimed Scamp's success at eluding his captors. 'I'll put him out when he gets here,' he stilled Louise's movement to get up from her chair. 'What do you suggest our next move should be, Avery?' He turned back to the solicitor. `Well, Mr Tylar,' his visitor looked thoroughly worried, `this—er—person,' he did not even deign to mention his name, 'who is contesting your right to the Grange—his lawyers are getting restless at the delay.' He pursed his lips disapprovingly. 'I've done all I can, but they're threatening stronger action ...'

'Scamp, come back, I said a despairing wail cut across his words, and Val looked across at his brother. 'Shall I shut the door against him?' He reached out towards the wrought iron handle of the big, leather-covered door stop that propped it open. 'No, leave it, it's too warm to close up,' Russell shook his head. 'I'll grab the pup and get the children to take him into the knot garden out of the way. Jon, I've told you before not to let his lead trail,' he added sharply as the pup tumbled into the room and hurled itself at Russell's legs, closely followed by the boy. 'I put it on him so's he wouldn't come inside, but he heard you speak an' he was off like a shot.' Jon grabbed ineffectually at the lead, and the pup, sensing capture, dived under the spokes of Val's chair, nearly upsetting him in the process as he, too, reached out to grab the lead, and missed. 'Outside, Scamp!' Russell raised his voice threateningly, and pointed a stern finger at the door. There was no mistaking the voice of authority, and the terrier reacted instantly. His lead still trailing, he shot for the door, and promptly became entangled by the loop of the leather, which wrapped itself round the wrought iron handle of the doorstop, and snagged him to an abrupt halt. 'Jump ! ' Wyn grabbed Jon up as the pup's speed swung the heavy doorstop across the doorway, sliding it like a curling stone on the polished parquet floor. It arced across the doorway and hit the wall on the other side with a resounding crack that made Wyn wince. 'Thank goodness it missed you,' she let Jon go, 'or you'd have been the second one to be taken to hospital.' One casualty, she felt, was quite enough, she still felt unnerved by the happenings of the previous day. 'Ooh, Scamp, you've broke it!' Jane stood round-eyed outside the door, which Russell put his foot against to prevent it from swinging to. The child's eyes widened with awe as the doorstop split apart with the force of its contact with the wall, and clattered into two halves on the floor. Even the pup looked comically dismayed. Its small, furry face registered indecision at whether to make a dash away from the retribution that must surely fall at this latest and worst escapade of its short life so far, or to jump at the interesting-looking roll of something with fluttering tapes that spilled out from between the two halves of the doorstop, and slid across the floor. Russell reached ‘it first. His fingers closed about it a second before the pup's teeth snapped to, on empty air. 'It's a document of some sort.' He turned it over in his hand. 'It's sealed with wax.' His face had, gone pale under its tan, and he turned towards the solicitor, holding out the roll for him to see. 'I think you should take charge of this, Avery.' His voice shook slightly, reflecting the almost unbearable tension that crackled across the room. Val half rose from his chair, and stayed frozen, as if afraid that any movement of his might break the spell that had caught them all in its thrall. 'Let me see.' Even the elderly man of law, accustomed as he must be to crises of all sorts in his daily work, could not quite keep the rising note of excite, ment out of his voice. He took it from Russell's hands and turned it over in his own thin, claw-like fingers. "It's been closed with the Tylar seal—look.' He tilted it so that the others could see the outline of the falcon family crest deeply indented in the scarlet wax, his legal training making him notice details even at such a time. 'And it's unopened.' He looked up at Russell. 'Have I your permission?'

'You're the trustee until the identity of the heir is established,' Russell countered. 'You don't need my permission to open it,' he reminded him. 'In that case—' the solicitor slid his finger under the edge, splitting the seal with a deliberation that made Wyn want to scream at him to hurry. Russell reacheced down" and gripped her hand, and the force of his hold told her that he must want to do exactly the same. 'It's a will.' The solicitor resumed his seat and fumbled in his jacket for his spectacle case. He extracted a pair of steel-rimmed pince-nez and clipped them on to the end of his nose, then closed the case lid again with a little snap. The small sharpness of the sound released some of the tension that had become almost a tangible presence in the study. Val exhaled a long breath and sat down again, and Russell lowered himself on to the arm of the settee beside Wyn as if, she thought with quick compassion, his knees felt suddenly unsteady, although there was no hint of a tremor in the arm that he put across her shoulders, holding her to him as if to assure her that, whatever the contents of the will, they could not affect their happiness together. 'It's signed by your uncle, the late Tempest Tylar.' The legal man became briskly businesslike. 'There can be no mistake?' Russell responded in kind. 'None.' The solicitor cleared his throat, and began to ., read in the ensuing hush that gave flattering attention to his every word. 'Your uncle's handwriting is unmistakable, as is his signature. I'll have it checked, of course.' Wyn stifled a sudden urge to giggle at this cautious volte-face as he read on. 'I, Tempest Tylar, being of sound mind ...' His dry, legal voice droned on through the usual phrases. `Ah, here's what we're looking for!' a sudden enthusiasm warmed his utterance. let it be known that my rightful heir is my nephew, Russell Tylar, son of my brother of that name.' Wyn heard Russell's sharp intake of breath, but beyond that he made no sound and after a slight pause the solicitor read on, 'and that the male child, baptised Cedric, born to my wife, is not my son. He is the child of an actor, one Cedric Plumb, after whom the boy was named._ I charge my trustees to ensure that my estate be handed down in due time to my rightful heir, so that in some measure the wrong that has been done to me shall at last be righted. Ave et Vale!' 'Hail and farewell! ' Russell repeated softly, into the pregnant silence that followed the solicitor's reading. 'Farewell to uncertainty, anyway,' the little man spoke briskly, and retied the tapes securely about the parchment. 'The outcome of this will give everyone concerned— except the contestant—the utmost satisfaction, Mr Tylar,' he came as near to congratulating Russell as his legal caution would allow him. 'What puzzles me is what Tempest meant by hounds.' Val's forehead wrinkled in perplexity. 'Why go on like that about his hounds being his guardians? He led us all a merry dance, and all for nothing,' he said disgustedly. 'He left the beastly will in one of the doorstops after all.' 'Door dogs,' Wyn laughed out loud. 'Oh, Russell, why didn't we think of it before?' she cried. 'The old folks called them door dogs, not stops. And I ignored them because when I said dogs, you told me "hounds",' she chuckled as she remembered the sharp way he corrected her, and her resentment at the time.

'Does this mean we can go 'n live in the Lodge, Gran?' Jon piped up, unable to bear the suspense any longer. 'Yes, it does,' Louise smiled at him. 'Just as soon as it can be put ready for us, and that shouldn't be long.' 'I bags the bedroom at the back, by the pear tree,' Jon put in a prompt claim, with harvest time evidently in mind. 'I haven't been upstairs in the Lodge. It isn't fair .. His sister's lips drooped. 'We'll go down there now, and have a look, shall we?' Louise put in quickly. 'We'll take Scamp—and Uncle Val as well,' she added firmly. 'Me?' Val looked surprised. 'Why me? Oh!' He glanced from his mother to his brother, and back again. 'Yes, of course. Right away,' he said hastily, and picking up the pup he disappeared rapidly after the two children. `I must be getting along, too. I've things to do.' The solicitor beamed at Wyn, shook hands with Russell, and bowed himself out. 'I'm very glad things have turned out the way they have.' `So am I,' Russell agreed fervently, but the look which he directed at Wyn, and which brought the rising tide of colour to her cheeks, held a double meaning, which from the solicitor's smile he was not slow to interpret. 'We'll see you off,' he kept his arm about her, and they walked together to the door, waving as the solicitor drove away in a back-looking manner that nearly caused him to collide with Corporal Benny, who crunched across the gravel sweep in the pony and trap, with a passenger beside him whom Wyn recognised as the man who was teaching the groom to repair the drystone walls. 'We've come up to see the foal, sir. I knew you wouldn't mind.' The groom slowed their progress to speak. 'Of course not.' Russell nodded courteously to the old craftsman, and received a dignified salute in return as the two rolled off in the direction of the stables. `Evenin', miss. Evenin', Squire.' His still sturdy voice floated back to them, and then they were alone, standing together on the doorstep of their future home, under the stone carving of the peregrine falcon that no longer seemed fierce to Wyn, but rather poised as if its outstretched wings were raised in shelter over them. 'He can call you Squire and mean it, now,' she murmured, her voice closely muffled against his shoulder. 'I don't mind being Squire, with you as my lady,' he murmured back contentedly, so softly that not even the falcon overheard.