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heard . . . once.'
    ‘You must find that very trying.'
    ‘I’m striving to bear up.'
    ‘We must try to keep you contented. Perhaps he would like to pay you a visit.'
    ‘Would that be possible?' she asked uncertainly; her fiction about Tony might be difficult to maintain.
    ‘Quite, there’s plenty of room in the house.’
    ‘It’s very kind of you to suggest it,’ she said brightly. ‘But he has a job, so I’m afraid he couldn’t get away until he has his holidays late in the summer.' When Gray would have gone to America.
    ‘But surely he could manage a weekend,’ Gray persisted.
    His keen grey eyes had a mischievous sparkle and she feared he saw through her fabrications. She should have told the truth, that Tony had let her down so she was immune from masculine advances, but it was too late now, and she decided to launch a counter-offensive.
    'It’s a long way for a weekend. Are you wanting him here to ... er . .. distract me from Ian? I'm not at all interested in Ian.’
    ‘Poor Ian, but his presence might effect a cure.’
    ‘I don’t think lovesickness is ever cured that way,’ she said, thinking of Lesley and her hopeless passion for the man beside her. ‘But I'm sure you’re exaggerating.’
    ‘You’re much too good-looking,’ Gray said slowly. ‘If I were your fiancé, I’d never let you out of my sight.’
    ‘Please don’t flatter me,’ she requested quickly, aware of a sudden quickening of her pulse. ‘I’m afraid you have a jealous disposition, Gray.’
    ‘I resent others’ claims to my possessions,’ he said shortly, ‘and I know how to take care of them. But have you no family?’
    Glad to change the subject, Frances told him of her orphaned state, her need to earn her living in any post she could obtain.
    ‘I only have one living relative,’ she concluded, ‘a grandfather who refuses to acknowledge me. He disapproved of my mother’s marriage and dropped her. But none of this can be very interesting to you.’
    ‘I like to know my employees' background,’ he returned coolly. ‘You know the Fergusons, I suppose?'
    ‘Aren't they relations?'
    'They're not, but Crawfords are responsible for them. Margaret's husband was killed testing one of our boats, so the firm felt we had a moral obligation to take care of the widow and her children, though James had only himself to blame. The accident occurred as a direct contravention of orders.'
    That started a new train of thought. ‘Is speedboat racing very dangerous?' she asked.
    He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Men have been killed, but so they have at other sports, to use a cliché, no more risky than crossing the road—but we’ll never get there if we continue to dawdle like this.'
    He turned his attention to his driving and the boat gathered speed.
    Mallaig is not a pretty place, but it has character; conspicuous is a long row of whitewashed fishermen's cottages facing the harbour with a bleak hill behind them. Fish is its main occupation, and now the tourist trade. Sheep wander in its streets and it has an enormous population of seagulls, which follow the ferries all the way to Skye. That island and the nearer Eigg and Rhum are features of the landscape.
    When they had landed, Gray handed Frances Ian's grocery list and told her to leave it at the shop he named to be made up and they would take it down to the boat, and then do her own shopping.
    ‘I’ve booked lunch at the West Highland Hotel,' he told her. 'I'll meet you there at twelve-thirty. Okay? ?
    ‘Oh, but I didn’t expect ...' Frances began, considerably taken aback.
    ‘A treat for your day out,’ he explained, ‘to compensate for depriving you of Ian’s company. You'd better get on with your shopping or you’ll be late.’
    He strode away and Frances proceeded to sample what shops there were and execute Mrs Ferguson’s commissions. She was perturbed by Gray’s insistence that there was something between Ian and herself. She liked the lad, but that was all he