Unknown Read Online Free Page A

chair.
    "Tea becomes a ritual as one grows older," she declared. "It is a splendid excuse for pausing for a moment to reflect The world is so busy nowadays I often wonder if we are not all rushing to some terrible end. My older grandson, Charles, never has any time for tea. He is always involved with one thing or another, never able to relax, I fear. Even when he is at Glen Dearg he can always find something to be done which he must see to immediately. We are all very proud of our Scottish home. It is in one of the most beautiful parts of Scotland, although it is quite near the Clyde where all the money is made. That is a great feature of Glasgow, by the way," she ran on. "In so short a time— a mere twenty minutes' motoring—one can be in the lovely heart of the mountains. Loch Lomond is at our back door and the Campsie Fells shelter us from the north wind. The house is very old, of course, but each generation has done something to it in their individual way, contributing to the beauty of the whole. One day you must see it and judge for yourself."
    One day, perhaps, Elizabeth thought, if Charles Abercrombie did not turn her down.
    The thought of the future head of the Abercrombie family was never very far from her mind, as if some sixth sense warned her that he would be critical of her no matter what kind of impression she tried to make.
    When the kettle came to the boil Mrs. Abercrombie made the tea, allowing it to infuse as Elizabeth set out the cups and saucers on the table between them. The sun streaming through the window behind her burnished her red-gold hair to a glowing halo around her head and when she looked up from her task the old lady was smiling.
    "You have such beautiful hair, my child," she said spontaneously. "It was my great ambition to have hair like that, and I was as black as a crow! Now I am speckled grey, like an old hen. Que voulez-vous? We must all grow did!"
    The luminous eyes under their dark brows belied her statement. She was far from accepting the limitations of age, even at seventy-three.
    Elizabeth helped herself to a buttered scone, eyeing the French pastries covetously.
    "You're not on a diet?" the old lady asked. "Surely you don't have to be?"
    "I haven't seen a real French pastry in years," Elizabeth told her.
    "I make them myself," Mrs. Abercrombie confessed with pride. "Just to remind me that I'm a Frenchwoman at heart. I also bake Scotch shortbread, which is very patriotic of me, don't you think? My husband loved it, and he said that nobody baked it quite like me, but that must have been flattery, I think. Was your mother a great baker?"
    "She taught me all I know," Elizabeth answered. "We had a book of old recipes, handed down from my grandmother, but I haven't been able to bake much recently. It's so easy to buy things here in Sydney and there isn't much room in our kitchenette."
    "You should see the kitchens at Kilchoan," the old lady said, supping her tea. "They are very old, but one could waltz around the table! We have electricity, of course, but we also have a grand old coal oven which bakes the most delicious bread. French bread," she added pointedly.
    "Glen Dearg must be a wonderful place," Elizabeth smiled. "You must love it."
    "After fifty years of living there it has become part of me, more a part of me than my native France, if I am to tell the truth. But then Scotland and France were always closely united. The Auld Alliance was a very vital thing, you know." Mrs. Abercrombie set down her teacup. "Have you travelled much?" she asked.
    Elizabeth shook her head.
    "I've never been out of Australia. That's why this job means so much to me," she confessed truthfully.
    "Everyone should travel as much as they can. It is the greatest education," her hostess returned. "But if you are to go back to the city as you promised, my dear, we must continue our conversation some other time."
    Elizabeth got to her feet, glancing guiltily at the little ormolu clock which adorned the