“No.” Gemma felt suddenly, enormously, weary. “You had better be sure of what you want, really sure. There’s no point in going back divided—you’ve too much at stake to live it halfway.”
Hazel looked back at her, then nodded. She scrubbed a tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. “You’re disappointed in me, aren’t you, Gemma?”
Gemma thought about it. “No…at least…not you, exactly. It’s just that, after my marriage to Rob turned out to be such a disaster, I based my idea of what made a family work on you and Tim—that’s what gave me the courage to move in with Duncan—and now I find it was all a sham. It makes me feel—odd.” She rose and slipped back into her jacket. “You go on to bed. I’m going out for a bit of air.” Giving Hazel a shaky smile, she let herself out into the darkened drive.
She stood, gazing up at the stars, now mist-obscured, and listening to the faint creaking of the night. What she wanted, she realized with a shiver, was not air, but to ring Duncan and assure herself that her world was still intact.
4
O what lies younder north of Tweed?
Monsters and hillmen, hairy kneed
And music that wad wauk the deid!
To venture there were risky O!
The fearsome haggis haunts the snaw
The kelpy waits—your banes to gnaw
There’s nocht to eat but oatmeal—raw
BUT I’M STILL TOLD THERE’S WHISKY O!
—ANONYMOUS SCOTTISH POET
Carnmore, November 1898
BY MORNING, THE wind had died, and the world outside the farmhouse lay encased in a rippling blanket of white. This Will knew only from peering out the front windows, as the back of the house was completely blocked by drifts.
He had spent the remainder of the night dozing in the parlor armchair, waking periodically to stoke the fire, watching his mother minister to his increasingly restless and delirious father. By daybreak, Charles had begun muttering and clutching at his throat, as if it pained him, and seemed soothed only by spoons of hot water with whisky and honey.
As the cold morning light crept into the room, Will saw that his mother’s face was gray with exhaustion. Her thick, dark hair had escaped from its knot in wayward tendrils, and he noticed, for the first time, a single thread of silver.
“He’s burning with fever,” she said softly, resting the backs of her fingers fleetingly against his father’s forehead.
“Mam,” Will whispered, “let me look after him. You get some rest now.”
She shook her head. “No, Will. I’ll bide here. There’s porridge in the kitchen for you, and then you’d best see if you can get to the beasts.”
With a last glance at his father’s flushed face, Will left the parlor. The kitchen was bitterly cold, in spite of the stove, and he shivered as he ate his breakfast. Then he wrapped up as well as he could and, taking the shovel they kept handy in the porch, ventured out the front door.
His boots sank into the powdery snow—a bad sign. Once an ice crust formed over the top it would be easier walking, but for now he’d have to wade or shovel his way through the drifts to the barn and distillery buildings. Beyond the near field Carn More, the hill from which the distillery took its name, rose steeply, its rugged granite face softened by the white icing of snow.
As he watched, the sun rose, gilding the march of the Ladder Hills with a glistening rose as delicate as his mother’s best satin gown. The air was so still it felt charged with silence, as if the world were waiting for something to happen.
Will held his breath for a moment, listening, then picked up the spade and dug in.
It took him almost an hour to reach the barn. Wiping a hand across his sweating brow, he stretched his shoulders and contemplated the drifts that reached all the way to the eaves. He could hear the animals moving restively about inside, and he felt a moment’s stab of despair at the enormity of the task before him.
Not that it was the first time Carnmore had been snowed in, but always before, he and his father had managed together. He pushed away the unbidden thought of his wee sister, Charlotte, taken from them by a fever at less than a year old. But his father was older and stronger—surely he would be all right.
Will began digging with renewed energy, trying to blot out his fear with the thunk of the spade. Once he’d cleared the snow from the barn door, he was glad to slip into the relative warmth of the stone building. He moved among the shuffling beasts—his father’s prize dairy cows, his father’s horse, and the pack ponies that carried Carnmore whisky down to the coast—filling troughs and lining the stalls with fresh hay.
Although some of the Speyside distilleries now had their own railway lines, ponies remained the only reliable way to get whisky out of the Braes, even in good weather. The paths the smugglers had used to move whisky down through the Ladder Hills now carried a legitimate product. As for supplies, they warehoused enough barley to last the season, water flowed freely year-round from the Carn More spring, and the peats came from their own moss.
When he’d finished in the barn, Will cleared a path to the distillery easily enough, as the buildings themselves had blocked the worst of the snow. But once inside the main production house, he stood for a moment, trying to decide what to do. Distilling was a continuous process, made up of many interrelated steps. Barley lay soaking in the steeps, waiting for the maltster to determine when it had absorbed just the right amount of moisture; then the barley was spread on the mesh floor of the malt barn to germinate, after which it would dry in the peat fires of the kiln.
Once dried, the malt was ground into grist in the mill, and from there it was funneled into the enormous wooden mash tuns, where hot water would release the sugar from the grains. From the mash tuns the sugary liquid, called wort, ran into the great fermenting vessels. This was the brewer’s domain: it was he who added the yeast, he who decided when the wash was ready for distilling. Then the stillman would take over, running the wash into the wash charger, and from it into the first of the great copper stills.
Carnmore used three stills rather than the traditional two, one wash still and two spirit stills. His father claimed that it was this further distillation that gave Carnmore whisky its smooth, light taste, and it was a superstitious practice among most distillers that nothing which gave a whisky its distinct character should be changed—not a cobweb swept away nor a dent repaired in the copper stills.
From the final still, the whisky ran through the glass cabinet of the still safe, where it was carefully monitored by both the stillman and the distillery’s excise officer. This was raw, colorless stuff, not yet deserving of the name Scotch whisky. It would take at least five years of aging in oak casks in the earthen-floored warehouse before it would be bottled under the distillery’s name, or sold to blenders, and some was kept to age longer. It gave Will pause to think that he would be near his father’s age before some of the whisky now being casked was ready to drink.
Each of these processes had its own time schedule, and each required several men as well as a skilled supervisor. How, Will wondered, was he to manage on his own?
He could make a start, at least, by lighting the office fire. Going in, he lit the oil lamp on his father’s desk, then quickly arranged peats and sticks in the fireplace. As the flames caught, he sat for a moment, warming himself and taking comfort from the familiar objects. The great leather-bound ledger lay open on the desk, his father’s reading spectacles resting atop it. Along one wall, oak shelves held ranks of bottles covered with a fine layer of dust. The carriage clock ticked loudly in the silence.
Since he had left the Chapeltown school at fourteen, Will had chafed at the limited life of the distillery, dreaming of going to Edinburgh to study medicine like his Grant grandfather. But his father had believed him too young to go so far from home; nor had Charles been willing to give up his own dream of Will continuing in the family business.
Now, as Will recalled the helplessness he’d felt that morning when faced with his fath
er’s illness, he wondered if he really was suited for the pursuit of medicine. Then he thought of his father’s whispered entreaty to take care of the distillery, and he stood, leaving the old office chair rocking. He could at least turn the germinating malt on his own, and ready the peat fires for the kiln and the stills.
Stepping out into the alleyway between the production house and the malt barn, he stopped, listening, and relief flooded through him. He heard voices, carrying clearly in the still air. Will waded to the rise above the track that led down to the village and shaded his eyes with his hand. A dozen dark specks moved against the whiteness; it was a good half of the distillery crew, shoveling their way up the track.
Will shouted and waved, a voice shouted something unintelligible back, and Will began digging his way to meet them.
The men made good progress and soon met Will, with much slapping of arms and thumping of shoulders. It was all the men from Chapeltown—those who lived outside the village would have a more difficult time of it.
“Aye, it’s only a half day’s work lost,” said Alasdair Smith, the stillman, as they swung down their spades again to widen Will’s path. Smith, a large, burly man with a red beard, was no relation to the Smiths of The Glenlivet but always made a point to tell new acquaintances that he had just as good a nose for whisky. “No self-respecting Hielander would let a bittie snow get the better o’him,” he added, his teeth showing white against his beard as he grinned.
“It’s a bad omen,” said John MacGregor, the excise man, “I’m telling ye, such a blow this early in the year.” MacGregor was a sharp-nosed, precise man, and kept his distance from the others, as was usually the case with the government officers. But Will had always found him kind, in his fussy way, and MacGregor had never minded taking the time to answer a boy’s questions. Now, he said more quietly to Will, “It’s a good thing your faither’s safe in Edinburgh, laddie. He’d ha been in a right bother this morning—”
“But he’s not in Edinburgh,” interrupted Will, and the other men fell silent as he told them of his father’s arrival in the night. “And now he’s burning with a fever,” Will added, “and his throat paining him somethin’ fierce.”
Seeing the look Smith shot at MacGregor, he said, “What is it?” When the men hesitated, he barked, “Tell me!” The note of command in his voice surprised him—for a moment, he had sounded like his father.
“Och, laddie, it’s nothing to worry ye,” said Smith, but his eyes didn’t meet Will’s. “It’s just somethin’ I heard up at the Pole—seems there’s a fever going round in Edinburgh…” The Pole Inn was the nearest public house, at the head of the Braes.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Will pushed him, knowing the answer even as he spoke.
Smith turned to his assistant, Kenneth Baxter. “You, Kenny, go back to the village, quick now, and fetch the nurse here. And you, Will,” he continued, this time meeting Will’s gaze, “you get back to the house. Your mam’ll be needin’ ye.”
Gemma climbed slowly from the depths of sleep, shedding the disquiet of her dreams like layers of skin. Then, full consciousness arriving with the disorientation that often accompanies the first night spent in a strange place, she sat up.
Innesfree. The barn conversion. Hazel. The pieces clicked together, and she looked towards the other bed. There was no tousled dark head on the pillow, no sound from the bathroom. Hazel must have already dressed and gone out.
When Gemma had come in from her walk the previous evening, Hazel had been in bed, her light out. Although doubting that her friend was asleep, Gemma had been relieved not to talk further until she’d had a chance to sort out her reactions to Hazel’s revelations. She’d rung Kincaid, hoping to talk with him, but much to her surprise, the line had been engaged.
Now she pushed her hair from her face and swung her legs out of bed, curling her toes against the chill of the tiled floor. What had she been thinking last night, to encourage Hazel to pursue her relationship with Donald Brodie? It was not just mad, but dangerous. Not that Tim Cavendish would ever hurt Hazel, Gemma told herself in an effort to still the sudden thumping of her heart, but she’d seen marriages disintegrate too often to take the possibility of violence lightly.
Glancing at the clock, she saw that there was still an hour to breakfast. She had plenty of time to talk some sense into her friend.
Showered and dressed, Gemma stepped out and looked around her. Yesterday, she had only seen the property in the fading light of early evening. Now, it lay before her, golden and gleaming in the morning sun. It was still cool, wreaths of mist drifted up from the river, and birdsong trilled up and down the scale. The air had a fresh, evergreen scent to it, and when Gemma breathed, it felt like wine slipping down into her lungs.
There was no one visible in the garden, and on an impulse, Gemma turned away from the house and took the path leading towards the river. The track ran along the outer edge of the pasture that lay between the river and the road, winding through a stand of birch and rowans. It was still and silent beneath the trees, and after the first few yards, the thicket enclosed Gemma in a green and dappled world. Looking down, she saw the tightly curled fronds of fiddlehead ferns, and a stand of bluebells. Enchanted, she knelt to examine the flowers more closely. The rich scent of damp earth tickled her nose, and a closer inspection of the ground revealed a shiny beetle making its determined way over a fallen log. Kit would love this, Gemma thought as she rose, and was struck by a wave of longing for her family.
That thought brought back her concern for Hazel in full force, and as she walked on, Gemma mulled over what she might say to her friend. The woods gave way to heather and tussocks, then the path angled sharply to the right to follow a lightly wooded fence line towards the river. Here the Spey widened in a gentle curve, and the shallow water near the shore grew thick with reeds and marsh grasses.
As Gemma stepped gingerly up to the bank, a duck took flight from the cover of the reeds with a sound like a shot. Gemma started reflexively, jumping back and stepping in a boggy spot. She’d begun to laugh at her own case of nerves when she caught a glimpse of motion off to the right. Two people stood farther down the shore, half-hidden by a clump of trees. Hazel, and Donald Brodie.
They stood a foot apart, their heads bent towards each other, and as Gemma watched, Donald raised his hand to Hazel’s cheek. The murmur of their voices reached her, carried by a shift in the wind. Hazel shook her head and stepped back; Donald reached for her but didn’t pull her closer.
Gemma hesitated, torn between her desire to call out—to stop Hazel being such a fool—and reluctance to interrupt such obvious intimacy. Then Donald bent down, taking Hazel’s face in his hands and pressing his mouth to hers. After a moment, Hazel’s arms slipped round his neck.
Feeling the blood rise to her cheeks, Gemma turned away and started back to the house, all pleasure in the day forgotten.
When Gemma reached the B&B, she found Louise Innes in the vegetable and herb garden at the back, snipping sprigs of thyme into a basket.
“For the breakfast plates,” explained Louise, indicating her handiwork, “and mint for the fruit.” She straightened up and tucked her clippers into a pocket in the apron she wore beneath her cardigan. “Did you have a nice walk?”
“Yes, thanks,” answered Gemma, looking round at the neat garden. The smell of frying bacon drifted enticingly from the house, but she’d lost her appetite.
Louise studied her, then gestured towards the toolshed at the bottom of the garden. “You look a bit peaky. We’ve a few minutes before breakfast. Come and have a cuppa.”
“What? Out here?” asked Gemma, puzzled.
“It’s my retreat.” Louise led her into the shed. A small window set in each side provided filtered morning light, benches held tools and potting equipment, and on a camp stove, a kettle bubbled merrily. “That’s the downside to running a B&B, I’ve discovered—lack of privacy. Even though we don’t open our bedroom to the guests, we’re still always on call. Th
is gives me at least the illusion of getting away.”
“It’s like a doll’s house,” Gemma said delightedly. “And I’m honored to be invited.” She looked away from the intricate spiderweb decorating one corner, repressing a shudder.
Louise took two mugs from a shelf, wiped them out with a corner of her apron, and removed two tea bags from a canister. While the bags were steeping, she pulled a stool from beneath the bench and overturned a pail. “You take the elegant seat,” she said, motioning Gemma to the stool. “It’s a bit primitive, but then I don’t usually entertain out here.”
Gemma accepted a mug as she watched Louise tip the tea bags directly into a compost pail. “Did you garden before you came here?”
“Not in Edinburgh. We lived in a tenement building, where the most I could manage was a pot of geraniums in the kitchen window. But I helped my mum when I was a child.”
Gemma thought of her own parents’ flat above the bakery in Leyton. Her mother had never even managed a pot of geraniums. “You’re English?”
“Yes, from Kent, originally. But my parents divorced when I was thirteen, and I went to boarding school in Hampshire. That’s how I came to know Hazel.”
Gemma came to a decision. “Louise, I’m really worried about Hazel. I know you’re old friends—”
“You’re talking about Donald, aren’t you? I didn’t approve of this arrangement, if that’s what you mean. Home wrecker is generally not part of my job description.” Some of the previous evening’s edge had returned to Louise’s voice.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t criticizing you. I just thought you might have been able to discourage her, if you knew—”
“I’ve had nothing from Hazel in ten years but a scribbled note on a Christmas card. I don’t think my opinion would have counted for much. And besides, we can’t afford Donald Brodie’s ill will. He’s too—”
Now May You Weep Page 6
