A Dark and Distant Shore Read Online Free PDF Page A

she had felt an odd sense of identity with him, as if they were two of a kind. She had been too young, then, to separate the man himself from the threat he represented, but now, the threat long since fulfilled, she tried to recall him.
    On the sea wall, when she had attempted to put an end to the whole thing in the only way she could think of, he had not been angry but nauseatingly understanding. He hadn’t even mentioned the episode to her father. Afterwards, she had prowled aimlessly around until, frustrated beyond bearing, she had slipped up the curving staircase to the corridor outside the Long Gallery. There, with her five-year-old henchman Sorley McClure standing guard, she had climbed on a chair to eavesdrop at the Laird’s Lug. This was a concealed listening tube sunk in an angle of the wall above the door, and tradition had it that former lairds of Kinveil had used it for listening in on the conversation of guests they did not trust. Vilia didn’t trust either her father or the man Telfer an inch.
    But she had only heard snatches of the two men’s talk, because Sorley had done nothing but fidget.
    ‘...my daughter, Mrs George Blair, lives not too far away...’
    Vilia remembered Charlotte Blair, without pleasure, as a disapproving young woman who had ridden over from Glenbraddan to pay a call, with the only too obvious intention of patronizing the little girl.
    ‘...convenient to be near her. My son Magnus has had two years at Oxford, but he’s not one of Nature’s scholars. He’ll be living in London for a while, seeing as he’s...’
    Distracted, Vilia had turned and hissed at Sorley, who was sitting on the floor at the top of the stairs, blowing vigorously at a fat black spider to make it tuck in its legs and play dead. ‘ Be quiet, Sorley!’
    When she turned back to the listening tube, the two men were talking about roads.
    ‘New roads?’ Her father’s voice had been politely dismissive. ‘Certainly it would revolutionize life in the Highlands and Islands to be properly linked to the centres of population and industry in the south, but I am told that something like a million pounds would be needed and I cannot believe the Treasury will ever be persuaded to disburse such a sum.’
    ‘Aye, well,’ the man Telfer had said. ‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that. The government’s worried about all the folk sailing away to America, instead of staying here and starving. Every Highlander who emigrates is one less potential recruit for the Highland regiments – and if things go on at this rate it’ll fairly put a crimp in His Majesty’s army! They think building roads and canals would provide employment and persuade the folk to stay. I’m not so sure about that, but I doubt if it matters. What does matter is that the roads and canals would make it possible for you to market your livestock and fish and timber.’
    Vilia’s father said nothing, although the man Telfer sounded as if he knew what he was talking about. After a moment, he went on, ‘And, you know, I’ve met the fellow who’s in charge of the project, and I believe he’s got the rumgumption to push the whole thing through. In fact, I’d wager you a sovereign to a semmit-button that, ten years from now, there’ll be a network of Parliamentary roads and canals that’ll bring the two hundred miles from here to Glasgow down to a mere three days. Well – four, maybe.’
    Vilia’s mind was racing. If what the man Telfer said was true, it would be madness to sell Kinveil. Now that her father knew salvation was so near, he must change his mind. Vilia thought it excessively silly of Mr Telfer to sound so positive about the roads. He was as good as inviting her father to reconsider the whole thing.
    But all her father said was, ‘You are more optimistic than I. I remember all too clearly that when I last made the journey it took me twelve days, and I broke my coach axle three times between Fort Augustus and Glasgow. In any case, I fear