Friends and Lovers

FRIENDS AND LOVERS by HELEN MACINNES

Available in Fontana by the same author ‘

Pray for a Brave Heart ; Above

Suspicion ;

Assignment in Brittany

The Unconquerable Decision at Delphi ;

The Double Image ;

I and my True Love

North from Rome

The Salzburg Connection

The Venetian Affair

HELEN MACINNES

Friends and Lovers

First published by Geo. G. Harrap & Co. Ltd .1948 First issued in Fontana Books 1972 Second Impression June 1972 Copyright. All rights reserved Printed in Great Britain Collins Clear-Type Press London and Glasgow

TO MY MOTHER AND FATHER

WITH MY ADMIRATION AND LOVE

All incidents and characters in this novel are entirely fictitious, and no reference is intended to any actual person, whether living or dead

CONDITIONS OF SALE:

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Chapter One.

THE FOREIGNERS COME TO INCHNAMURREN.

The morning mist had cleared. Now a fresh wind was blowing, curling the edges of the waves, touching them lightly with flecks of white.

The sea had lost its cold grey look; the blue waters were a darker reflection of the smiling sky, intensifying its colour and emotion by their great depths. The mainland, wide stretches of heather and bracken sloping down from barren hills, ended abruptly in red granite cliffs. On this part of the coast there was no sea loch or ragged inlet to distract the swiftly moving tide in its course between the mainland and the scattered islands. There was no sign of house or croft. There was nothing but the uneven hills, silent, watchful, folding eastward, one behind the other. To the west and north and south was the Atlantic, with the lonely islands jutting out of its deep waters to break the force of its rolling waves and turn them into swirling currents.

The men in the boat—single-sailed and small, speeding swiftly with the wind and racing tide—had not spoken since they had left Loch Inrush, on the mainland. But then, David Bosworth thought, this was the kind of place where conversation was hardly necessary. He was content to watch the wide-winged gulls wheeling overhead.

George Fenton-Stevens, who was standing upright with an arm hooked round the mast, oblivious to wind or spray or gulls, suddenly looked down at David, sitting securely in the well of the boat.

“What do you think of all this, David?” There was a smile of enjoyment on his face, possessive pride in his voice.

David studied Fenton-Stevens for a moment before he replied. Perhaps if he waited long enough no reply would be necessary. George’s eyes and attention were once more fixed on the islands lying ahead of them. When in Rome, David was reflecting, old George could always be counted on doing more than the Romans did. In Oxford, for instance, George wore more twists of scarf round his neck, trousers both baggier and more stained, a gown torn into more tatters, than the usual undergraduate adopted. In London, at Christmas, he had appeared more Foreign Office than Anthony Eden; never had there been so black a hat, so neat an umbrella, such impeccable shoes and gloves. And now, in the Western Highlands of Scotland, he was the Celtic sea-reiver standing proudly before the mast as his ship bore down on an unsuspecting island.

“What do you think of it?” George asked again.

David buried his chin in the upturned collar of his jacket as he tried to avoid a sudden shower of cold sea water.

“Ninth century,” he answered.

“Definitely. Kishmul’s galley and all. If I could see properly’—and he wiped the spray ostentatiously from his brows” —I could perhaps give you the decade as well.”

George relaxed noticeably, and his very Anglo-Saxon chin was less pointed towards the prow.

“I hadn’t thought of that,” he said, ‘but it is ninth century. Nothing has changed. This sea —and these hills.” His flight of fantasy failed, and he was left with embarrassment. He sat down beside David Bosworth.

“That’s better,” David said.

“With you swaying up there above me I couldn’t concentrate on equilibrium.”

George was watching him with amusement. And the red-bearded Highlander sitting at the stern gave almost a smile. In all the jokes against oneself, David thought, there was always a particle of truth.

Ever since they had left the shelter of Loch Innish his mind had been persuading his stomach that this was all perfectly normal, and was even considered enjoyable by some. But it was difficult to forget the hideous groaning of the wooden planks, the laboured creaking of the mast, or the pool of water washing about in the bottom of the boat.

All quite normal, of course, if you were accustomed to this kind of thing.

There’s Inchnamurren,” George said suddenly, and pointed to the larger of two islands lying close together. For company, David thought; they would need that in winter. George was explaining that the smaller island was uninhabited, and that Inchnamurren’s houses couldn’t be seen yet. They were hidden by the sharp hill, on the north end of the island, which fell steeply into the sea.

“Devil’s Elbow, they call it,” George said. -“Nasty piece of work, isn’t it?”

“Sounds ominous,” David agreed. He spoke lightly, but his thoughts were serious enough as he looked at the crook of black rock thrusting itself so evilly out into the Sound. Full fathom five … The grim sea-raiders, the quiet fishermen who once sailed round these islands, and then sailed no more— The sea-wrack their shroud … Back to back they lie, lifeless lie … The lines from the sea dirges which George’s mother kept prominently displayed on the piano at the Lodge were haunting him today.

David looked at the red-bearded owner of this boat. Captain Ma clean retired from the Seven Seas to spend his remaining years sailing round his own islands. David wondered what the Highlander thought of them, the intruders.

His blue eyes, bright beneath the heavy brows, met David’s gaze. He nodded slightly as if in greeting. He raised one hand slowly to his pipe and removed it from his lips.

Tine day,” he said.

“Fine,” David answered, conscious of the strange fact that he felt just like a schoolboy trying to win the friendship of an austered headmaster. Then the pipe was replaced, the blue eyes looked beyond David once more, and the conversation was over.

They passed the Devil’s Elbow, and entered the island’s sheltered bay. Here, in sunlit peace, colours sharpened. The water, shallow, flowing over white sand, became a broad band of jade edging the shore. At its edge was a row of whitewashed cottages. Farther back there were other houses, equally white and gleaming, scattered widely over the green fields and rugged ground. The heather was beginning to bloom; one rough hillside was already covered with reddish purple.

“Every time I see this island I wonder why Mother didn’t buy a house here rather than on the mainland,” George said.

David didn’t reply to that. There was only one obvious answer, which George was too good-natured to see: there wasn’t a house on the island big enough to suit Lady Penton Stevens The Lodge at Loch Innish, on the other hand, had Scots baronial turrets which photographed well for the August and September issues of the fashionable magazines.

“You really ought to see it when all the heather is out,” George was saying.

“Look, David, why don’t you stay for August? Mother and the girls will be here for the Twelfth.”

“Can’t be managed, George,” David said firmly. Lady Fenton-Stevens had no doubt invited some really eligible bachelors to amuse her daughters.

“I hope it isn’t because of Eleanor,” George began, and then halted awkwardly. He frowned as he thought of his very pretty sister, who had such an enchanting time, always —so it seemed—at the expense of his friends’ emotions.

“Good Lord, no.” David gave a short laugh which sounded almost genuine.

Eleanor wasn’t within his price range, even if he had still wanted her.

“I still think you ought to have a few weeks of proper holiday,” George said stubbornly.

“London in August is hideous. You’ll never be able to work there.”

I’ve got to, David was thinking: I’ve only myself to depend on.

George would never know what grim urgency that small fact gave to life. But he smiled and said, “God, isn’t it bright? I am seeing all colours in the spectrum now, black-dotted.” He watched the boat as it was carefully eased along the jetty, where two brown-legged, barefooted children halted in their game to see the foreigners arrive. A white-haired man was working on the seams of an upturned rowing-boat. Two women gathered seaweed on the shore. Three men leaned against the wall of a cottage.

“A hive of industry,” David remarked.

“George, are you sure there is a hotel?”

“Over there beside the church. They’ll give us a decent enough lunch, and then we can call on this Dr. MacLntyre of yours.”

“Not mine,” David said hastily.

“This is all Chaundler’s idea.”

Walter Chaundler was David’s tutor at Oxford. When he had heard in June about his pupil’s visit to this part of Scotland he had been delighted.

“You must go to see MacLntyre and take him messages from me,” Chaundler had said.

“I shall write to him at once and tell him that you are tutoring this summer at the Penton-Stevens’ place at Loch Innish. That is almost next door to Inchnamurren, as far as I remember. I spent a summer on the island three years ago, in 1929, when MacLntyre and I were collaborating on that book on Mysticism and its Influence on History. Quite a remarkable man, really. He was born in that island and went to school there. Then he went to Glasgow University, and after that came up to Oxford. He became a don here, and later he was a professor in London. And then, quite suddenly, after his wife died, he went back to his island again. Quite remarkable.”

And when David had remained silent, wondering if retiring to an unknown island in a forgotten part of the world was the depressing proof of failure after so much effort, Chaundler had sensed the young man’s doubts. He had urged in his kindly, gentle way, “Do go. I am sure MacLntyre would be delighted.” And that was how this visit had been decided.

David had not been altogether happy about it, though. He had postponed it until almost the last week of his stay at Loch Innish. And he would not write to Dr. MacLntyre, either. His excuse was that if Dr. MacLntyre lived on a small island he would always be easily found.

Better keep the whole thing as informal as possible, he had thought: then it would seem less of an invasion.

As they began walking towards the village David found that he was following George and Ma clean with rather a slower stride. Either George was being too enthusiastic about this whole place or he was taking charge of this visit too efficiently—anyway, it was all becoming a forced pilgrimage. It had never seemed to dawn on George that Dr. MacLntyre might find them rather a nuisance.

“George,” David said very quietly—and, as Fentonstevens halted while Ma clean went over to talk to the three men outside the general store, he went on, “Look, why don’t we call the whole thing off?”

George stared at him.

“Rather late to think of that. But just as you please.” He gave a worried glance towards Ma clean and his friends, now deep in conversation.

David touched George’s arm.

“All right,” he said, “I agree we did arrive rather obviously. Let’s see this medieval historian on his medieval island, and justify Chaundler’s letter of introduction about us. Let’s get that over and done with.” He watched George’s transparent relief at not being forced to do the wrong thing.

“Good’.” George said.

“Now we had better collect Captain Ma clean He has invited us to visit his sister, as we’ve arrived here earlier than we thought. I couldn’t very well refuse.” He looked anxiously at David, but David was smiling now quite openly.

“Well, come on, then,” George said, with a touch of sharpness.

They walked over to the group of islanders, who stopped speaking Gaelic and watched the foreigners gravely as Captain Ma clean introduced them with as much seriousness as a grand seigneur presenting two young proteges at Court.

There was a brief exchange of polite phrases, the Highlanders now speaking in English with their soft voices and careful pronunciation. It was very far removed from the coarse dialect of the stage Scotsman. David was noting, too, that there was not one inch of tartan displayed—that was probably kept for dress occasions—and he was thankful that George had not worn his Clan Stevenson kilt to-day. That was best left for the Lodge, where the natives had become more inured to tourists.

Ma clean measured the necessary length of the slow, simple conversation with considerable skill. As they were led away from the group, along the narrow earth road which ran in front of the row of cottages, David had the feeling that George and he had been weighed in the balance. And not found wanting, he hoped.