BrokenTune

Pat sends what would be his love if he were a little older or just a little younger. Being nine, he says: ‘Tell Alan I was asking for him’, and has a fly of his own invention waiting to be presented to you when you come on sick-leave. He is a little in disgrace at the moment in school, having learned for the first time that the Scots sold Charles the First to the English and having decided that he can no longer belong to such a nation. He is therefore, I understand, conducting a one-man protest strike against all things Scottish, and will learn no history, sing no song, nor memorise any geography pertaining to so deplorable a country. He announced going to bed last night that he has decided to apply for Norwegian citizenship.

Haha. 

"Pat" is Grant's cousin's son, and he appears again in The Singing Sands, which follows The Daughter of Time.

This scene also shares the same rebellion by Tey against the rise in Scottish nationalism at her time. She was not a fan. Tho, I wonder if she would have changed her mind had she lived on.

I sometimes wonder what she would have made of other aspects of our time that she also specifically calls out in her books. 

Anyway, in her (excellent) biography of Tey, Jennifer Morag Henderson also mentions that "Pat" as a beloved recurring character is based on a very close friend of Tey's, who was a budding writer and whose early death had a profound impact on her. From what I've read about Tey and within her work, it seems a plausible theory. Unfortunately, she was such a private person that we know very little about her.