The Inheritance

by Michael Phillips

  “The man’s base born, that’s a’ there is tae say.”

  At the words base born, the conversations around the inn stilled.

  Ardmore dropped his voice. “You don’t dispute that he is Ernest Tulloch’s great-great-grandson, just as you are?”

  “Aye. But there’s gran’sons an’ there’s gran’sons. ’Tis weel kent that the titled men o’ times past didna always hae the morals tae ken the difference.”

  “However, you both could be said to possess equal claims. His lineage, however, comes through a son, yours through a daughter—before women were rightfully included in the inheritance laws.”

  “Aye. Except that my grit-grit-gran’mother was married tae the Auld Tulloch.”

  “What are you implying, Mr. Tulloch?”

  “Only that David’s wasna.”

  By now the only sounds came from the kitchen.

  “Wasn’t married . . . to Ernest?”

  Hardy nodded, then took a great swallow from his glass as if to punctuate the veracity of his claim. He set the glass down on the table with deliberation and stared across the table.

  “Folk has always believed,” he said, speaking as if with the authority of a judge rendering a verdict, “that David an’ his father an’ gran’father came o’ Ernest Tulloch’s second wife after my ain grit-grit-gran’mother Elizabeth died. But she was ne’er his wife, the woman called Sally Lipscomb. David’s name may be Tulloch on account o’ the Auld Tulloch himself. But he’s nae mair nor the bastard offspring o’ a line o’ illegitimate bastards comin’ fae the auld man’s mistress, nae his wife. The hussy Sally was ne’er Lady Tulloch.”

  The silence in the room was suddenly rent by a single voice. “Ye’re a liar, Hardy Tulloch!” Audney cried from behind the bar. “Ye hae nae proof o’ sich lies.” She did not care that the eyes and ears of the whole village were on her.

  “I’m afraid the young lady has a valid point, Mr. Tulloch,” said Ardmore. “Even if what you say about the past may be true, it bears no reflection on subsequent generations. You would be advised not to use such inappropriate terms with reference to anyone in the present family.”

  Not relishing being put in his place by a stranger, Hardy ignored Ardmore’s subtle rebuke. He glanced around the room, then back at Audney. “Has David said a word tae deny it?” he said with cunning smile

  Audney did not reply. She knew, even if he could, that David would never deny an accusation.

  “Ye ken as weel as I that he winna because he canna,” Hardy went on triumphantly. “When the truth is kenned for a’ tae see, I’ll be chief an’ laird. Where will David be then? An’ ye’ll be the lady o’ the island yersel’, Audney, an’ the chief’s wife besides,” he added, glancing about the room with a smile and a few winks to the other men.

  Audney was quick to recover her poise. “Ye think I will marry ye if ye become laird!” she retorted

  “Laird an’ chief,” said Hardy. “Ye’ll come tae yer senses soon enough, Audney Kerr. An’ when ye do, ye’ll be the wife o’ Hardy Tulloch.”

  “In yer dreams, Hardy!” Audney shot back with a peel of laughter. “I wouldna marry ye if ye was the last man on Whales Reef!”

  The laughter that now erupted through the pub, directed at Hardy rather than originating from him, was not so pleasant for him to swallow. He was accustomed to dishing it out, not being the butt of anyone else’s joke.

  But it quickly died down. The men of the island were wary of Hardy for many reasons, not the least of which was the very real fear that he might indeed be their future laird. He had never been one it was well to offend.

  “Ye winna be laughin’ once the inheritance is mine!” he said angrily. “None o’ ye’ll laugh at Hardy Tulloch then.”

  He shoved himself back from the table, rose and strode toward the door, casting dark looks at the tables where the laughter had been loudest.

  Within thirty minutes everyone in the village knew every word that had been spoken between Hardy Tulloch and the island’s high-profile visitor, as well as Audney Kerr’s outspoken response.

  41

  A More Guarded Interview

  By the time of David’s scheduled interview with Clement Ardmore that afternoon, the pub was again empty.

  Ardmore had had a light tea about two o’clock, then went for a walk around the village between rain squalls. He had been in Whales Reef just a little more than twenty-four hours and was already beginning to feel that no more desolate place on the face of the earth could be imagined. He was in his room upstairs resting when the second claimant walked in.

  David and Audney chatted easily. David had been busy all morning with some repairs and modifications to his barns intended to increase the comfort of his livestock over the cold winter months. He had heard nothing of the morning’s fireworks. Audney related the gist of what had taken place.

  “News’ o’ it’s likely all o’er the village by noo, David,” said Audney. “What are ye goin’ tae do aboot it?”

  “There’s nothing I can do, Audney. I’ve told you before that I’m not bothered by Hardy’s talk. Not that I don’t want to see the thing settled. But my fretting about it won’t change the outcome any more than Hardy’s bluster.”

  “Ye dinna care what folk may think o’ ye?”

  David was silent several seconds “That is a good question, Audney,” he finally said. “I don’t know how to answer you.”

  “Jist tell me what ye think, then, David?”

  “Who doesn’t want people to think well of them?” David replied after a moment. “But I want them to think well of me as a man, not for something that happened in my ancestry several generations ago. What if Hardy is right? Maybe Ernest Tulloch didn’t marry Sally Lipscomb, and so my great-grandfather Leith was an illegitimate son. We don’t know. If it turns out to be true, does that make me illegitimate? Does that make me less the man I am, less worthy to be known as David Tulloch? Am I not still the same man I have always been?” He turned to face her directly. “Would you think differently of me, Audney?”

  “Ye ken the answer weel enough, David. Ye ken the regard I hae for ye.”

  David looked deep into Audney’s eyes and smiled tenderly. “I do know, Audney. You have too much regard for me.”

  “We’ve been a’ o’er that a long time ago, David. Some day ye’ll ken I was right tae say no when ye said ye’d marry me. ’Tis for the best. Ye’ll see. Ye’ll ken one day why I answered ye as I did.”

  “But I don’t like Hardy still making his advances, Audney.”

  “I dinna mind so much. Weel, I do mind, but I can handle him.”

  “If it gets to be too much, you come to me.”

  “I dinna want ye getting’ involved wi’ him, David. Especially noo, wi’ the future hangin’ in the wind like. In his eyes, ye’re his enemy. There’s nae tellin’ what he would do. Promise me ye winna speak tae him aboot me.”

  “I am still chief,” said David. “I have to take care of my people. That includes you.”

  “He winna hurt me. My daddy’ll see tae that. Promise me ye winna make a fuss wi’ Hardy on my account?”

  “I can’t make that promise, Audney. If Hardy becomes laird, then we shall make the best of it, and I will serve him to the extent my conscience will allow. But if he threatens any woman’s honor on this island—now or then—whether it’s one of the old women or my aunt Rinda or Rakel Gordon . . . or you, he will have to answer to me for it.”

  Audney was spared further entreaties by the appearance of Clement Ardmore descending the stairs from the rooms above.

  “Mr. Ardmore,” said Audney, walking toward him, “here’s the man ye came tae meet. David, this is Mr. Ardmore fae Edinburgh. Mr. Ardmore, I’m pleased tae hae ye make the acquaintance o’ Chief David Tulloch.”

  “I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Ardmore,” said David.

  “And I you, Mr. Tulloch,” replied the heir hunter, extending his hand.

  “Your presence has caused quite a stir on
our little island,” said David. “You met my cousin earlier, I understand.”

  “A most enlightening interview, I must say. He is a confident young man.”

  David laughed. “That’s Hardy.”

  Even as the two men retired to Ardmore’s table to begin their conversation, a few villagers began to wander into the pub, hoping perhaps for a command performance, especially if Hardy happened to return.

  Audney appeared a few minutes later with a tray, cups, and a pot of hot tea. For the next hour she did her best to busy herself cleaning tables and attending to the afternoon’s influx of curious customers. But eavesdropping was not so easy as when Hardy had been one of the participants.

  Two hours later neither Audney nor anyone else straining to listen knew anything of what had quietly passed between the two men.

  42

  Chief and Aunt

  David left the inn and made his way through the village, stopping in at most of the shops before paying a visit to the home of his mother’s sister.

  He walked through the side door into the kitchen with neither knock nor invitation. This house was a second home to him, and his aunt a second mother, and his only mother since the death of his own.

  Rinda greeted him with her customary, “Noo then, yoong David, what hae ye tae say for yersel’?”

  Most of the villagers who had watched him grow up were completely unaware of David’s expanding reputation as an expert and spokesman—even advocate—for Shetland tourism, along with his ongoing scientific research. They knew he was gone frequently and traveled widely. They were also aware that he led tours and that visitors came to the island seeking him out. Word was that he was writing a book, but he had kept from the islanders that he had already published two. Least impressed of all at his rising stature was David’s sharp-tongued aunt Rinda Gunn.

  It was not her words that had earned Rinda Gunn a reputation for crabbiness, gossip, and irritability, but the tone in which she seemed to invest every syllable. Hers was a mode of expression colored by dissatisfaction, annoyance, and unspoken reproach. She might greet a friend on the street with “Fine day” yet convey the unmistakable impression that it would have been an even finer one had she not suffered the misfortune to run into the woman at all.

  As she greeted David on this afternoon, her voice was anything but welcoming. Her tone, as well as her brow, indicated gathering thunderclouds.

  David, however, made a habit of seeing the good in others, imbuing their words with the kindliest motive possible. More than anyone on the island, his aunt sorely tested this resolve. But his love for her was no less that he found her caustic tongue and grating manner trying in the extreme.

  During the early years of his life, with his own parents still alive and busy with her own brood of seven sons and daughters, his aunt Rinda had exerted no special claim on the son of her elder sister. She would not have dared. Arna would not have stood for it. With Arna now gone, however, David had become the recipient of Rinda’s middle-age irritability and sharped-tongued advice. Her own sons and daughters had endured all they cared to in their early years, and all but one had now put a safe distance between themselves and their mother.

  That her nephew was still unmarried at thirty-four was inexcusable, especially that he had let Audney Kerr slip through his fingers. The good Mrs. Gunn berated him for being more interested in birds and wildlife than in people. This alone gave ample fuel to her charge that he was failing in his responsibilities as chief, not living up to the proud tradition that now had come to rest, for good or ill, upon his shoulders. No chief, in her opinion, buried his nose in books, much less wrote them.

  How Rinda’s gentle-tempered husband, Fergus, put up with her incessant haranguing was a mystery. He not only put up with it, he loved his wife with a devoted affection marvelous to behold. Flowers and chocolates appeared on every birthday, anniversary, Christmas, and Valentine’s Day. He had never been heard to utter a word of criticism toward his wife. If a negative word about her was spoken in his hearing, he invariably defended her, occasionally adding, as if in subtle recognition that he was aware of her occasional excesses, “She means weel an’ that must count for somethin’ in the end.”

  Perhaps she did mean well, though she had a rough way of showing it. Whatever it would count for in the end was hard to say. It was likely that her husband’s good-natured spirit would count for more.

  “Naethin’ much, Auntie,” replied David cheerfully to his aunt’s greeting, hoping to deflect whatever darts she was getting ready to launch in his direction. “I’ve jist come fae the hotel speakin’ wi’ the fellow they call the heir hunter.”

  “Oh, aye, an’ what was he askin’ o’ ye?”

  “Jist aboot the family, aboot mama an’ daddy an’ daddy’s kin. Hardy’s set a rumor goin’ that there was mischief afoot back in the auld times atween the Auld Tulloch an’ his second wife.”

  “Oh, aye, a’body kens what’s bein’ said weel enough. So what are ye goin’ tae do, yoong David?”

  It was the second time David had heard that question today. “About what, Auntie?” he said.

  “Everything, David. ’Tis a’ o’er the village—ye’re nae likely tae be the new laird. Are ye goin’ tae meet the lie like a man? Are ye goin’ tae fight back an’ make yer mama and daddy prood?” As she spoke, she stood staring at him with hands on hips.

  “I dinna ken yet if it is a lie, Auntie. I canna weel fight against it if it’s the truth, can I noo? Ye wouldna hae me set my hand against the truth.”

  “Jist listen tae ye, laddie! What are ye sayin’?”

  “Only that we’ve got tae ken the truth before we take up oor swords in the fight.”

  “If they’re speakin’ ill o’ ye, then ye got tae fight against it, whate’er the truth.”

  “That is not a code I can live by, Auntie,” said David, again assuming the higher tongue to enforce his words. He knew his speaking English angered his aunt. One thing his manhood had taught him, however, was that occasionally he must stand up to her. “Besides, I’ve heard no word against me. If the thing is true, the stain is on the character of the Auld Tulloch, not on me. On that score, we know nothing yet. I won’t judge the man as it seems too many’s willing to do. I’ve heard nothing in our family tradition but that he was the most godly man any on the island ever met. You know what they say about the room in the Cottage.”

  “Aye,” she shot back, “that the bones o’ auld Macgregor’s wife’s hidden in it where he killed her, an’ then he locked the door an’ none’s been inside the room syne, nor kens where he hid the key, an’ that he’s taken his secrets an the key tae the grave wi’ him!”

  “That’s all nonsense, Auntie!” David laughed with good humor. “It was the Auld Tulloch’s prayer closet, not a burial crypt.”

  “Then why has the room been sealed up a’ the years syne the woman disappeared?”

  “As I hear it, the room was sealed up long before his time by the Auld Tulloch’s widow.”

  “Macgregor could hae opened it tae hide his evil deed.”

  “If he had the key, which he may not have—no one knows what became of it. Listen to yourself, Auntie—talking of murder and evil deeds. I won’t dignify your insinuations with a reply. The Auld Tulloch was a God-fearing man, and I will believe nothing else until I am shown otherwise. Both his memory and that of my uncle Macgregor are deserving of my honor. And yours.”

  “I dinna ken aboot a’ that. All I ken is that braggart Hardy Tulloch’s likely tae become laird if ye dinna step in an’ do somethin’ aboot it.”

  “What would you have me do, Auntie, seize the title by force?”

  “If ye hae tae du it, David, take up the sword o’ yer clan! ’Tis what the auld Highlanders, yer ancestors, did, lad.”

  David could not help breaking out in laughter again. “This isn’t the Middle Ages, Auntie. Disputes over property are not settled with swords. It’s the twenty-first century and there are laws. Whatever happens will be de
cided by the law of the land.”

  “Aye, but ye’re no speakin’ like a chief, David. Ye soun’ like a coward.”

  The word hit David with unexpected force. His aunt was as surprised as he. She had not expected to go quite that far.

  Her tongue silenced by the power of its own blunt force, she did not add to her momentary victory with another verbal thrust. She saw that she had hurt him.

  But no apology followed. The words I am sorry did not exist in Rinda Gunn’s vocabulary.

  An uncomfortable silence filled the cottage.

  At length David spoke. “Do you think I’m a coward, Auntie?” he asked softly.

  “I dinna ken, David. I’m sayin’ nae mair than that sometimes ye soun’ a mite too acceptin’ o’ yer fate. I’d like it better if ye’d fight for what ye believe in.”

  “I hope I do, Auntie. I pray that I am willing and have the courage to fight for what I believe in. But a man has to choose when and where he fights. I believe in truth, and until I know the truth on a matter, I’ll not take up the sword.”

  “All I’m askin’, David, is what’s tae become o’ folk?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The Mill’s troubles—ye ken the rumors.”

  “What rumors?”

  “Financial problems . . . that they’ll be layin’ folk off afore much longer.”

  “I know about the finances,” David assured her. “It’s nothing like you say. I hope you’re not spreading such nonsense and worrying people.”

  “Maybe ’tis worse than ye ken yersel’,” rejoined Rinda. “Ye’re still the chief. An’ there’s nae reason ye winna be chief e’en after Hardy’s named laird, if indeed things is as he says. Ye must do something for the island. Folks is lookin’ tae ye, David.”

  “What would you have me do? I told you, I can’t rush the probate process.”

  “A few o’ the folk is desperate, David. Puir Noak Muir’s in such straits he’s had tae butcher one o’ his family’s cows.”

  “I didn’t know that. Why?”