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chosen to emigrate to Canada the position at the Mains had changed, too.
    Even on this glorious spring day when, normally, he would have looked about him at the rolling hills and towering crags which were his natural heritage with a countryman’s pride and satisfaction, Fergus Graeme felt depressed. If only Susan had agreed to marry him she could have been spared this sort of thing, he reasoned with a man’s straightforward logic.
    Long before they reached it they could see Kelso’s spires and the ruined tower of King David’s Abbey silhouetted against the vividly green backdrop of the distant Lammermuirs. They had come to Kelso so often for the spring and autumn pony sales and the ‘wee Highland’ in July; they had been frozen stiff watching Border ‘sevens’ at Poynder Park in winter before the grand new pavilion had been built; they had attended parties and balls together, and curled and skated at the ice rink, but now it seemed that something warm and intimate about the past was gradually breaking up.
    They parked in the Square, running in over the cobbles to find space in front of the hotel. It was all so familiar, Susan thought, with its newly-planted flower-troughs and the window-boxes which would be gay with geraniums and lobelia in full summer, and the friendly blue-faced clock looking down from the dome of the Town Hall. The big gilt weathercock shone in the sun and it wasn’t difficult to imagine the tramp of ancient feet and the clangour on the cobbles as Mary, Queen of Scots rode through on her way to Craigmillar, or Charles Edward Stuart led his rough Highlanders over the Border.
    Why was she dwelling so much on the past—the distant past? Susan got out, standing uncertainly to look about her. Kelso was at its smiling best on such a day, green and spacious and beautiful, but already it was crowded with strangers, people gathering from far and near for the horse and pony sales. Suddenly she felt incapable of going out to Springwood Park, and as if he could guess her every thought Fergus made his suggestion.
    “Why not let me take Hope’s Star out for you, Sue? You could do your shopping till I get back, and then we might have a spot of lunch at the Cross Keys. What do you say?” he urged when she appeared to hesitate. “You won’t like it, seeing Hope’s Star being led into the ring.”
    “I know.” She looked round at him, her eyes very bright. “What would I do without you, Fergus?”
    “I hope you won’t,” he said. “I’d like to be able to help all my life, you know that.”
    She moved towards the horse-box, not answering him.
    “Good-bye, Hope’s Star!” she whispered, turning blindly away.
    “One o’clock at the Cross Keys,” Fergus reminded her. “I’d better book a table. It looks as if there’s going to be a crowd.”
    She walked off down Bridge Street, past the abbey and the groups of people standing in the sunshine. Most of them were strangers, but here and there she saw a ‘kent face’, people she had known all her life who waved or called a greeting to her across the busy street.
    What shopping she had to do was easily disposed of and she found herself wandering across the bridge to look down into the still, clear water of the Tweed where the coarse-fishing enthusiasts were already installed along the banks with their rod-rests and their camp-stools to spend the day in happy abandonment to their favourite sport.
    It was still early, but the town was crowded when she turned to the Square. There were horse-boxes everywhere, reminding her far too poignantly of her loss. Because it was a loss. Hope’s Star had always been special, and they had moved so completely as one.
    Parking was becoming difficult and she watched idly as someone tried to manoeuvre a large car and trailer into an inadequate space. The horse-box was new, its varnish sparkling in the sun, but the girl who got out to guide the driver was a stranger. She was very tall and very blonde and her skin was