The Sapphire Child (The Raj Hotel #2) - Janet MacLeod Trotter Page 0,45

brave face for long. Willie the gardener found her struggling with her case up the drive.

‘Let me take that, Miss Dubois,’ he said, quickly shouldering the case.

‘Thank you,’ Stella said, on the verge of tears.

Then she caught sight of Tibby striding down the overgrown track and waving.

Stella ran towards her. ‘I’m so sorry, Miss Lomax . . .’ She broke down crying.

Tibby pulled her into a hug. ‘Don’t be sorry. It’s wonderful to have you to stay. I’m surprised you’ve stuck it out so long with Lydia – she can be quite impossible.’

Stella buried her face in Tibby’s shoulder – she smelt of cigarette smoke and cooking – and was comforted by her words.

‘Last night was terrible,’ Stella sobbed. ‘I’ve let Andy down and now he’s gone away.’

Tibby steered her towards the castle. ‘Come on. We’ll have some of Dawan’s chai tea and you can tell me everything.’

Chapter 17

The Anchorage, mid-August 1933

The final two and a half weeks in Scotland dragged by. Stella did her best to keep busy at the castle, helping in the kitchen with meals using food grown in the garden, and ordering supplies from the village shops. Tibby, whose housekeeping was erratic, was lavish in her praise of Stella’s attention to detail.

‘You are amazing, dear girl. No wonder my brother is so admiring of you and your family – no doubt you keep his hotels shipshape.’

There were only three artists in residence over the summer: Dawan, a young bearded man called Mac, and Walter, a student from Glasgow who hammered away making furniture in one of the outhouses. Stella enjoyed their company at mealtimes but each was absorbed in their work during the day. Time hung heavily and Stella worried about Andrew. She had heard nothing from him and neither had Tibby.

‘I’m sure it means he’s having a lovely time in Durham,’ Tibby assured her. ‘I wouldn’t expect a thirteen-year-old boy to waste a moment of his holiday writing letters to his aged aunt.’

Stella had sent the airmail letter to Esmie that she had written in the small hours of what had turned out to be her last night at Templeton Hall. Now she wondered whether that had been wise. What could Esmie do at such a distance? It would probably have been better just to wait till their return – or write from the boat to give warning – rather than let Esmie and Tom stew over the revelations.

After a week at The Anchorage, Stella decided to write to Hugh. She had tried to push him to the back of her mind while she dealt with her new surroundings and situation, but he had lingered at the edge of her thoughts. It would give her something pleasurable to do and she began to indulge in daydreams about how they might meet up in India after his furlough.

One evening, she took out her writing case and settled down at the table in her bedroom window. She couldn’t find his letter. Panic seized her. She took everything out of the small attaché case, but the letter wasn’t there.

Overcome by a sickening feeling, Stella realised she must have left it in the attic bedroom at Templeton Hall. She had slept with it under her pillow but had been so tired the morning she had left and had had to pack up so quickly that she’d forgotten to retrieve it. How could she have been so careless?

Stella determined to go round to Templeton Hall and get Lily to let her into the house to search her room. Hopefully, Lydia and her mother would still be away on holiday.

Borrowing a bicycle from Tibby, Stella cycled over the next morning, buffeted in a strong wind coming off the sea. The sky looked laden with rain clouds. To her relief, there was no car under the portico and the blinds in the conservatory were pulled down. She wheeled the bike round to the back entrance.

The kitchen door was locked. Perhaps the servants had been given leave while Lydia and her mother were gone. Stella knocked but no one came. In frustration, she turned to go, and then remembered that Miss MacAlpine kept a spare key tucked under a stone behind a rain barrel. Stella retrieved the rusty key and triumphantly let herself into the house.

The range was still lit so someone was keeping an eye on the house. Stella crept up the back stairs and into her room. To her dismay, her bed had been stripped and the blankets bundled into the