As she walked through the large timber door, she found herself in a lounge area. Artwork hung on the walls and soft lamp lighting gave the place a warm, homely glow. Elle stopped and soaked in her surroundings. She could almost feel the house breathing—there was an energy about it. Old houses had a special quality that she hadn’t felt in their younger cousins back home. Maybe they absorbed all that history, and that was the reason they just felt alive. A young man dressed in a suit appeared from another room, and smiled as he greeted her.

‘Welcome to Durn House.’

‘Hello, I’ve got a booking for a couple of nights. It’s under Kinnaird,’ Elle said, returning his smile.

‘I’m Kurt. Here, let me take your luggage,’ he said, effortlessly lifting her suitcase. ‘Come with me and I’ll get you checked in.’

She waited while Kurt took a key from a wall behind the bar and then she followed him to a beautiful wide staircase that swept upwards. When they reached the top floor, he opened a door that led through a narrow hallway to the end room, and unlocked the door. The Dunbar Room, the plaque on the door read as she walked into the suite.

‘Oh, it’s beautiful,’ she gasped.

Kurt put her suitcase down and smiled benevolently. ‘This is my favourite room too.’

After he left, Elle put her handbag on the bedside table and then crossed the room to open a set of French doors, gasping in surprise at the huge bathroom revealed behind them. In one corner was a massive high-sided claw-foot antique bathtub, and in the other, in stark contrast, was a modern shower stall. The mix of old and new gave the room a subtle kind of luxury that had Elle shaking her head in disbelief. It was all so … fancy. She had never stayed anywhere like this before—an authentic manor house in the Scottish Highlands.

Closing the door, she turned and gazed at the huge queen-size bed in the centre of the room with its imposing timber bedhead. High up in the slanted attic-style roof was a tall window that allowed the last rays of afternoon sunshine to filter into the room. She kicked her shoes off and sighed in relief as her feet touched the soft carpet.

Now, this is the kind of place fit for a Lady, Gran said.

‘Where have you been?’ Elle asked as she lay down on the bed and closed her eyes.

I always loved this old place. Of course, when I was a girl, it didn’t look like this. It was a private home back then and quite rundown.

Elle let silence settle between them for a few moments before she asked, ‘Gran, what happened between you and Moira?’

The past is the past. No point getting into all that now.