Kingdom of Shadows

by Barbara Erskine

  One other piece of news they told her. The governor of the castle came to her and stood staring down at her as she knelt in the cage staring out at the English hills.

  ‘Good morning, my lady.’ As she looked up, startled by his sudden presence she felt a wild surge of hope. He saw it, and for a moment she saw compassion in his face. ‘I have some news, my lady, though not that for which you hope, I fear.’ He was uncomfortable now. He wanted to be gone. ‘Your husband, my lady, is dead.’ He stood awkwardly, feeling he should be able to say more, give some details perhaps of where or how, but he had none to give. Just the stark news that the Earl of Buchan was dead in England.

  Her face was white with shock. There was no sorrow, no regret, only stark shock and the strange illogical feeling that now she was free.

  Free!

  Her hands clutched the bars near him, her knuckles white as she pulled herself closer to him, and suddenly, hysterically, she began to laugh.

  ‘I’m sorry Kath, but you can’t stay here.’ Neil had slept on the sofa again. ‘You’ve had plenty of time to find somewhere else – surely there is something suitable.’ He sounded irritated and bored.

  Kathleen looked away. ‘I’m sorry, Neil, I am trying. It’s not easy just before Christmas –’ She took a deep breath. Keep calm. Don’t show you care. Don’t show him the ugly side. Don’t show him how much you hate her … She smiled and tossed back her mane of hair. ‘I’ve been distracted by the rehearsals. You know what it’s like. I’ll take a couple of days off and find somewhere straight away.’

  Neil nodded. ‘Thanks, Kath. I’m sorry it didn’t work out.’

  ‘So am I.’ She smiled. ‘And I’m sorry about Duncairn. It was a beautiful place. Who would have thought that Clare would sell after all her protestations.’

  ‘She hasn’t sold. It’s her husband.’

  ‘But her agreement was needed, wasn’t it?’ She smiled sweetly. ‘Poor Neil. You never understood, did you? Her fantasies weren’t so special. Everyone has fantasies, for God’s sake! She was using you. Using you against her husband.’ She stood up and reached for her coat. ‘I’ll go out now and get the papers. I’m sure I’ll find somewhere to camp over Christmas.’

  ‘Aren’t you going home?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ve shows lined up right over the holiday. It’s all right, Neil. I don’t mind being alone. I’ll get used to it.’

  He nodded. ‘Good. And, Kath –’ he smiled apologetically. ‘Please, can I have my key back this time, when you leave?’

  Emma had phoned Rex at his flat. It had taken her a long time to make the decision to call him. He was sitting on an easy chair near the window staring out across the square. There had been a snowshower and the trees in the gardens were outlined in white; clean and beautiful.

  ‘Please, will you come with us to Duncairn, Rex? Julia and I would both like it.’

  He hadn’t spoken once while she told him what had happened between her and Peter, his mind in a turmoil. Did this mean she liked him after all? That she had made a decision?

  The word Duncairn distracted him. Duncairn. The bastards had bought it after all. Sigma had double-crossed him. They had only gone ahead and signed because of him; their decision had vindicated everything he had said and done. He was hurt and very, very angry.

  He frowned. ‘I doubt if your sister-in-law would want me there, honey.’ Why had she sold it to them, and not to him? He cared for it; he would have restored it; he would have protected the environment when the drilling started. Was it because he was a Comyn? Was the old hatred still there?

  ‘She knows the sale has nothing to do with you, Rex. It’s not your fault. She knows you backed off because I asked you too. She’d like to thank you.’ Emma’s voice was pleading.

  Rex’s eyes dropped to the newspaper on the coffee table. It was several days old, but still he kept looking at it. He had been to the Sigma offices and confronted Warner. ‘It wasn’t my decision,’ Doug had said. ‘I’m sorry, Rex. It was the boys in Houston. One moment they said no, then they turned right around and said yes, go ahead, buy the place! You know the state of the oil industry over the last few months. It’s been up and down, but after the latest developments they had to go for it. They couldn’t afford not to when Royland suddenly offered it to me again.’

  ‘So, he finally talked his wife round, eh?’

  ‘He sure did. I have all the documents right here.’ Warner had grinned, jerking his thumb in the direction of the safe.

  Rex’s knuckles tightened on the telephone at the memory. ‘Emma –’

  ‘Please, Rex. You don’t want to be alone for Christmas. If you can’t go back to the States for some reason –’ She hadn’t probed why he had suddenly changed his mind about going home. ‘Then come with me.’

  He could hear the tears hovering in her voice. Uncomfortably he stood up, the receiver to his ear. He stared out of the window. There was an icicle hanging from the guttering just above the french door. A droplet of water appeared at the end of it. As he watched it filled suddenly and fell into a snow-covered flower pot.

  ‘OK.’ He sighed and turned his back on the scene. It was Mary’s fault he wasn’t going back. He had wanted to go home to the States, finish with Duncairn, and with the unhappiness which was Emma, but Mary had told him that she had arranged Christmas without him, and he had not argued. He had hung up on her, and waited for her to call him back. She hadn’t.

  ‘I should be through here and all packed up by Tuesday,’ he said, suddenly brisk. ‘We’ll fly up then. But check with Clare, my dear. If she doesn’t want me there, I’ll understand.’

  ‘I’ll ask her now.’ He could hear the relief in Emma’s voice. ‘Take care, my love.’

  He frowned as he put down the phone and sternly squashed the sudden flutter of hope. My love. They were such easy words to say.

  The phone at the Duncairn Hotel was engaged. Emma tried time and again that evening to reach Clare and at last she gave up. She would have to try again in the morning.

  Paul was sitting by the fire in Jack Grant’s small office, the phone on his knee. Outside, the snowflakes clung white to the window, slid a little and compacted on the glass. He had stripped off his jacket and shirt and examined the bite on his arm. It was a bad one. He wondered briefly if his anti-tetanus jabs were up to date, then he gritted his teeth and poured some TCP on to the wound, binding it with the bandage Mollie Fraser had grudgingly given him.

  ‘Antonia?’ At last she had answered. ‘Good news. I’ve found Clare and she is well.’ He had thought it all out so carefully. He smiled. ‘My dear, I want you and Archie to celebrate with us. Tomorrow. Will you meet us in Edinburgh? Guess what! Clare is going to have a baby!’ He leaned back slightly in the chair and put first one foot then the other on Jack’s desk, crossing them meticulously at the ankle. He was barely listening to Antonia’s delighted clamour.

  ‘I know, I know. We all thought she couldn’t.’ He paused. ‘The doctors must have been wrong. And it’s changed everything. She is so much better, completely calm. Antonia, we’ll meet tomorrow – in Edinburgh, for lunch. Then I am going to take her back to London.’ His gaze focussed on the corner of the office. Jack had propped the rifle there, behind the filing cabinet. ‘I’m worried about all this snow, so I’d like to get her home. Nothing but the best for my child!’

  He picked the phone off his knee and standing up threw it down on the desk. The receiver dislodged, half off its track. He did not bother to replace it. Switching off the light in the office, he turned and made his way towards the stairs and the room he had been given on the second floor.

  Clare was asleep when he went to her early next morning. Still huddled in her blood-stained raincoat she was lying across the bed, hugging the pillow, her hair tangled from the wind and rain. In the light of the single bedside lamp her face was pale and strained. He could see the stains of tears beneath her eyes.

  ‘Clare!’ He shook her arm. ‘Clare? Get up!’ It was st
ill dark outside.

  She half protested in her sleep, her arms tightening around the pillow.

  ‘Clare, get up!’ Again he shook her, harder this time. ‘Come on. We’re going back to Airdlie.’

  She sat up slowly, pushing the hair back from her face, staring up at him blankly.

  ‘Come on, Clare. Wake up.’ He was losing patience. ‘I’ve phoned your mother and told her what happened last night. She is expecting us.’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere with you, Paul.’ Wearily Clare swung her feet to the floor, and paused a moment swaying with fatigue and nausea. The events of the previous night flooded back, blotting out the bars, the loneliness, the despair. This new despair was quite different. This was reality. She looked up at him. ‘Why did you take that gun out to the castle last night? Was it me you meant to kill?’

  Cold disdain showed for a moment on his face. ‘Don’t be so melodramatic, Clare. Come on. Take off that raincoat, it’s filthy. Where is your mink? You’d better wear that. It’s bitterly cold out there.’

  She smiled enigmatically. ‘It’s stained with blood, too.’ Neil had told her about the mink cages, so small that they couldn’t turn round; told her how they killed them. She would never wear a fur again. She looked down at the Burberry and touched the brown stain with gentle fingers and her eyes filled with tears again.

  Paul frowned. ‘It was an accident, Clare –’

  ‘Of course.’ She stood up unsteadily. ‘Now please, leave me alone.’

  ‘No. Not this time. Your place is with me.’ Paul folded his arms. ‘Antonia and Archie are waiting at home for you. I’ve told them about the baby. Our baby.’

  ‘Our baby?’ Clare echoed. She blinked away her tears. ‘Oh no, Paul. Not ours. Mine. This child has nothing to do with you.’

  ‘I am your husband, my dear. And there is going to be no divorce. The child is mine. He is mine.’ When he awoke that morning he had been so sure. There could be no question about it. Clare might have been unfaithful to him in the last few weeks, but the baby had been conceived before she left him. Long before she left him. It must have been. He put his arm around her shoulders. ‘The unpleasantness last night has upset you, but you’ll see it all more clearly when you’ve got over it.’ He was guiding her towards the door. Clare protested, but she was too dispirited and ill to fight him. Her head was swimming now she was standing up and she found herself leaning against him for support.

  At the foot of the stairs Jack Grant, still wearing his dressing gown, was lighting the fire in the front hall. He looked up in surprise as he saw them. ‘It’s very early still, to be going out,’ he said disapprovingly, glancing from one to the other. ‘The weather is closing in.’

  ‘That’s why we have to leave now.’ Paul’s fingers tightened on Clare’s shoulder. ‘We don’t want to get snowed in. It’s better for all of us, I think you’ll agree, if I take her home for a while, away from the scene of the accident.’ Already he was half guiding, half carrying her across the hall towards the door.

  The car was still standing outside the front door where Paul had left it. The air was cold and sharp and very clear. Their breath hung in wisps in the darkness. Beneath their feet the snow was white and soft, a filmy blanket over the garden. Clare was only half conscious as he opened the car door. Too dazed to protest she let him push her up on to the front seat of the Range Rover, and she sat back, her eyes closed, feeling waves of nausea sweep over her. All she could think about was the dark hole in the garden and the warm golden fur sprinkled with snow crystals as Jack lowered the dog into the grave.

  Paul started the engine. He glanced across at her. ‘Do up your seat belt. The roads will be slippery.’

  Automatically she obeyed, although her mind had not registered that he had spoken to her. She was far away. She hadn’t looked at him once.

  The windscreen wipers were pushing the snow in white arcs across the glass, crunching slightly as their powerful strokes swept back and forth. Beyond them, the headlights swept across the drive and across the road as Paul swung the car on to it. The verges were white now, and the country beyond, but the tarmac was still wet and black as he put the accelerator down and headed south. On their left, beyond the trees, there was a slight lightening in the sky.

  Archie came out of his study. ‘The line at the hotel is still engaged. It must be out of order. Do you really want to go to Edinburgh? The forecast is appalling.’

  His wife, wearing a brown sheepskin coat, was collecting her gloves and scarf. ‘Of course I want to go. I wouldn’t miss this for the world. A grandchild, Archie! My very own grandchild! And he’s right to take her home. She’ll forget all this stupid Duncairn business at home – and she’ll forget Isobel.’ She shuddered. ‘Paul sounded so thrilled, Archie. I do hope it means they have made it up.’

  Archie grunted as he shrugged on his own heavy coat. ‘I never did think there was much wrong with Clare. In my opinion having a baby was all she needed to put her right. That is what that young woman has needed all along to bring her back to earth.’ He whistled the dogs as he opened the front door.

  Outside the sky was heavy and dun-coloured with unfallen snow. Sarah was already sitting in the Volvo as excited and thrilled with the news as Antonia. As the dogs jumped into the back of the car he pulled the front door of the house closed and double-locked it. Then with a worried glance up at the clouds he climbed into the driving seat beside his wife.

  It was full daylight by the time Paul and Clare had driven through Aberdeen. The snow was falling steadily now, and a scattered whiteness was forming on the road. Clare’s eyes were closed. Paul was driving fast, his gloved hands clutching at the steering wheel. The road was empty.

  ‘Why, Paul?’

  He glanced at her, startled to hear her voice suddenly after the long silence and saw she was staring out of the windscreen.

  ‘Why, what?’ He changed gear, throwing the Range Rover round a steep double bend.

  ‘The hatred. The anger. The trouble in the City. We didn’t need more money.’

  His lips tightened. ‘One always needs money.’

  ‘Will you go to prison?’ She still hadn’t looked at him. The snow was beginning to close across the road now that they had turned inland.

  ‘I doubt it. I’ve got good lawyers.’

  ‘It’s just as well that Duncairn is still in my name. They might have taken it otherwise.’ She hunched her shoulders defensively.

  ‘Duncairn is already sold.’ He smiled grimly. ‘Don’t you read the papers?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ For the first time she turned and looked at him. He was startled by the whiteness of her face.

  ‘I mean what I say. It is sold.’

  ‘But I signed nothing.’

  ‘No.’ He gave a perfunctory laugh. ‘I did. Your signature was remarkably easy to copy. No one questioned it.’

  Clare stared at him. ‘I don’t believe you!’

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘But I’ll deny it –’ She broke off suddenly her eyes widening. ‘That was why you wanted to kill me –’

  ‘Clare, I did not want to kill you. The gun was to persuade you to come with me, if you needed persuading.’

  He glanced at his watch. It was nearly eleven. Archie and Antonia would be halfway to Edinburgh by now.

  The snow had settled heavily around Dunkeld and he was forced to slow up as he followed the gritted strip down the centre of the slushy road and turned at last into the drive. For a moment he was afraid she might try and jump out but she hadn’t moved.

  ‘I will tell my step-father. He won’t let you get away with it, Paul.’

  Paul swung the car around the front of the house. It looked very empty, the curtains half drawn, and he smiled to himself with relief as he drove into the deserted stable yard and switched off the engine. He had been afraid for a moment that the snow would have stopped them from leaving.

  He had made his plan so carefully. He had spied out the land, out of curiosit
y, weeks ago, before he knew what he was going to do and now suddenly everything had fallen into place. It was all so obvious. All he had needed was the padlock.

  ‘It looks as though they are out, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘You may have to delay telling him for a while.’

  For a moment neither of them moved, then Clare reached for the fastening on her seat belt. She unlatched the door and pushed it open, wishing she felt better, wishing her mind was clearer. Her legs were weak and she still felt very sick. All she wanted was to get indoors and to a fire.

  Watching her taking deep breaths of the cold air as she tried to will herself the strength to stand, Paul tensed. He could feel his heart banging suddenly beneath his ribs. As he climbed out of the Range Rover he felt very alert. Every sense was screaming. He walked quickly around to Clare and took her arm. ‘In fact I know they are out. They are in Edinburgh for the day.’ He smiled. ‘This way, my dear.’

  ‘What? Where are we going? Paul –’ Her words were cut off in a shriek as Paul stooped and lifted her off her feet. He turned away from the house towards the coach house and stables which formed the northern and eastern sides of the courtyard. ‘There is something here I should like you to see, my darling,’ he said as she tried to struggle free. He could carry her easily, but in front of the coach house he put her down, and holding her arm tightly he pushed open the old heavy doors. They both swung inwards, creaking. Inside it was almost dark, lit only by high dirty windows, almost lost beneath festoons of cobwebs. It was almost empty. An old rusting car, parked in one corner and not disturbed for twenty years, two bicycles, a pile of torn apple boxes, haphazardly stacked on the high cobbles on one side of the drain, that was all. The whole place smelt musty and damp.