The Treasure of Stonewycke

by Michael Phillips

  “But how could I forget!” said Logan, coming to himself. “Hilary may have solved the entire mystery in one fell swoop, my dear,” said Logan to his wife. “She was just telling us that she has a locket . . . the locket, according to your mother, that used to be yours.”

  Before the impact of Logan’s words fully reached Allison’s mind, the door opened and Jo walked quickly in.

  “Dr. Connally is on his way,” she said. “I’m sorry I was so long. How are you feeling, Mother?”

  “Oh, I’m fine,” replied Allison. “Now, go on with what you were saying about the locket.”

  “She has it here,” said Logan. “Please,” he went on, turning toward Hilary, “go get it . . . right now.”

  Hilary obeyed, and left the room.

  When she returned ten minutes later, her step was slow and her face told what words hardly needed to say.

  “I . . . I can’t imagine what happened. But the locket’s not there.”

  25

  Mustering a Force of One

  The loud ringing of a phone split the midnight air.

  Muttering a curse, the occupant of the room struggled into wakefulness and fumbled for the receiver. The moment he heard the voice on the other end of the line, his body snapped almost as if to attention and sat up on the edge of the bed. All drowsiness instantly vanished.

  “It’s you!” he said. “I didn’t expect . . . no problem . . . no, I was just, er, lying down . . . time difference? It’s, let me see, two-thirty in the morning. . . .”

  He was silent for some time as the voice on the other end spoke, nodding his assent occasionally, a grave expression on his face.

  “Hmm,” he said at length. “Yes, that should work . . . a clever way to introduce myself . . . they would have no way of knowing . . . right, couldn’t check . . . yes, I’ll use that. . . .”

  Silence again. Another several nods.

  “ . . . I understand . . . I’ll get up there as soon as I can . . . getting into the house, that might be difficult, but . . . no, no, rest easy. We’ll handle it . . . what could go wrong? . . .”

  In response, the voice of the caller shouted a series of threats which the man softened somewhat by removing the receiver from his ear and holding it back about three inches. Then, without his speaking another word, the line went dead, and he hung up the phone.

  Well, he thought, this is an interesting twist to the schedule. “Get up there immediately,” his boss had said. “An unexpected setback . . . a complication . . . an unknown person entering the scenario.”

  He’d have to cancel his plans to go hunting with the earl. But then, this assignment would not be without its potential compensating rewards. And his caller was not a man to be refused.

  Now, if only he could get back to sleep. There were preparations to be made, and tomorrow would be a full day.

  26

  Small Talk in the Parlor

  The remainder of Hilary’s first day had gone by uneventfully. She’d spent every free minute searching her room for the locket, but it was nowhere to be found. Logan drove her down to the Bluster ’N Blow, but neither did a thorough turning over of the room she had occupied reveal a trace of it.

  Jo was away a good deal of the day, so Hilary felt somewhat a greater freedom to walk about the house and grounds, visiting with the staff. She and Allison had enjoyed a talk together—admittedly light, but without the strain of their first meeting the previous afternoon. Dinner had been a rather stiff, yet endurable affair—the conversation stilted, no doubt, on account of Hilary’s faux pas over the locket.

  The next morning she had arisen early and walked to town and on to the MacKenzies’, where she enjoyed a visit and a simple lunch. Now here it was the afternoon of her second day at Stonewycke, and time was beginning to hang heavy on Hilary’s hands. About three o’clock she wandered in to the family parlor. A fire burned cheerily in the hearth and the room was warm. Logan sat to one side reading a newspaper, with a pen and notebook on his lap with which he was jotting down notes from time to time. Kitty-cornered from him across the room Jo sat, a piece of needlework idle in her hands, staring vacantly into the fire. As Hilary entered, Logan glanced up with an inquiring expression, as if to say, Well . . . have you found the locket yet? Jo did not move.

  The furnishings in the parlor were modern and comfortable, the color scheme bright and upbeat, and there were no ancient vases to be troublesome to the occasional absentminded guest. A television sat in one corner and a low coffee table held stacks of magazines and newspapers. A great variety was represented, including every single London daily. It was clear Logan made a point of keeping abreast of current events and editorials and the shifting tides of public opinion. The Berkshire Review was among the offerings on the table, and Hilary could not help feeling a twinge of pride that an important man like Logan Macintyre would choose to read her magazine. She restrained an urge to pick it up and thumb through it, notwithstanding that it was last month’s issue and she already knew every article backward and forward from supervising them all through the different stages of production. Seeing the magazine did serve as a reminder that she ought to check in with the office. She had reported in when she left the inn. They were managing well, which was a good thing since they just might have to get the next issue out without her services at all. But she should call every couple of days regardless.

  She picked up yesterday’s Daily Telegraph, sat down on the sofa opposite Logan, and began to leaf through it.

  “Did you have a nice visit with Frances and Karl?” Logan asked.

  “Yes, very pleasant.”

  “They’re good folks, the sort that make this little valley so special.”

  “I can tell. So hospitable. They keep trying to get me to come back down and stay with them, in their little but-end room, as they call it.”

  Logan laughed. “That is like them!”

  “She’s always talking about the people ‘up on the hill.’ She seemed especially fond of Lady Joanna.”

  “Oh yes! Mother always had a special place in her heart for Frances MacKenzie. As do I. She shares my mother’s name, so I’ve been rather fond of her.”

  “She said it was her aunt the Queen Mother visited with Lady Joanna.”

  “That’s right,” chuckled Logan. “Frances is fond of that story—tells it every chance she gets! She was old MacDuff’s granddaughter. MacDuff—he was the chap—”

  “Yes, I know,” said Hilary. “I read all about it, remember?”

  “That’s right, of course. In any case, I think Joanna’s love for Frances stemmed more from the soft spot she always had in her memory for her grandfather, who first brought her into Port Strathy.”

  The door opened and Flora’s face appeared. “Ye’ve a telephone call frae Lonnon, sir,” she said.

  “Thank you, Flora,” said Logan, rising. “You ladies will excuse me. I’ll be back in a few minutes. In the meantime, it’ll be a chance for you to get better acquainted.”

  He left the room and silence fell, broken only imperceptibly by the thin crackling of the fire. Hilary feigned interest in her newspaper, trying to think of some appropriate question to ask. It was the first time she and Jo had been alone together.

  It was Jo who spoke first, however, rising and sauntering slowly toward the fire. “It’s so cold outside! Cook said the back-door thermometer read 23 degrees this morning. She said it will snow soon.”

  “That will be a nice change,” offered Hilary.

  “It will be like home for me,” Jo sighed dreamily. “I’m from Baltimore, you know. In Maryland. I’ve been dearly hoping for a white Christmas.”

  “You should have no worries here in Scotland—even Bing Crosby would be pleased.”

  Jo laughed softly, and Hilary noted how much the sound resembled tiny bells that seemed in perfect harmony with thoughts of Christmas.

  “Do you miss your home?” asked Hilary after a short pause.

  “Sometimes, I suppose. Britain is so dif
ferent in many respects. But I have no real home back in the States any longer.”

  “Your adoptive family no longer lives there?”

  “My parents—my adoptive parents, that is—were killed in an auto crash three years ago.”

  “I’m so sorry . . . I didn’t realize.”

  “There was no way you could have known,” replied Jo.

  She sat down in an upholstered chair adjacent to the sofa and folded her hands in the lap of her navy cashmere dress. Her lips twitched into a tentative smile as if she were debating some problem in her mind involving the present conversation. Then, apparently deciding to go ahead, she spoke again.

  “Hilary,” she said with feeling, “it was such a special thing for me that the Macintyres came back into my life when they did. I had been so devastated by my parents’ deaths and was so very much alone. It’s bad enough to be orphaned once, but twice! I really didn’t think I would be able to survive it.”

  Hilary could think of no appropriate response, so said nothing. A brief silence fell.

  “Do you mind my asking you something?” Jo asked after a moment’s pause.

  Hilary shook her head.

  “I’m only curious, so please don’t read any other meaning in this, but I heard you say that you spent some time debating whether you would even approach the Macintyres. I wondered what changed your mind?”

  “I made a promise to Lady Joanna.”

  “You knew her quite well then?”

  “We only met once.”

  “Hmm . . . I see.”

  “Even though she died before I fulfilled it, I knew in the end that I must be true to what I pledged to her.”

  Hilary paused before continuing. There was another reason she had come. Suddenly she felt a strange hesitation about mentioning it. But just as quickly as it had come over her, she shook it off and went on. “I think it was mostly the journal that convinced me that this whole thing went beyond my personal likes and dislikes and hangups.”

  “The journal?”

  “You don’t know about Lady Joanna’s journal?”

  Jo seemed to consider her response a moment, then slowly shook her head.

  “For years she has kept a record of all the events in the life of the family. It begins with Margaret Duncan’s life, and is brought up to the time just prior to Lady Joanna’s death.”

  “A history of the family?” asked Jo. “Births, marriages, deaths—that sort of thing?”

  “That, but much more too.”

  “More, you say. Like what?”

  “I don’t even know how to describe it. A chronicle of . . . of life—emotional, spiritual, as well as historical. It’s so much deeper than a mere factual recounting of events. Lady Joanna’s impressions come through on every page. It conveys such wisdom, such truth about . . . oh, I don’t know, so many things . . . Lord and Lady Duncan, others who touched their lives, how the family was sustained through the years.”

  “Then she must have written about us—my arrival, her visit with you?”

  “That’s the peculiar thing. There’s no mention made of any of that. Knowing how Lady Joanna wrote down what she thought about everything, I can hardly believe she would omit something so crucial. It’s like the last three months were removed from it altogether.”

  “Removed?”

  “The journal ends abruptly, in mid-sentence, actually. It’s very odd. But she was getting up in years. Perhaps they were just misplaced.”

  “Do you still have it?”

  “Oh yes. And after misplacing the locket, I’ve made double sure I don’t lose the journal. I’ve got it safe and sound.”

  “Would it be an imposition if I asked if I might have a look at it?” Jo’s tone was hesitant, demurring, yet a trace of tension could be read in it also.

  “I don’t know,” Hilary began to answer haltingly. “It seems perhaps we ought to ask Mr. Macintyre if he thinks we ought—”

  Before she had a chance to complete the sentence, Logan returned and walked briskly back into the room.

  Appearing relieved, Hilary said no more, glancing down at the paper that still sat in her lap.

  “Well, what have you ladies been talking about?” asked Logan lightly, masking his obvious interest in that very thing. He did not like to have left them so long alone.

  “Nothing much,” answered Jo. “Just girlish parlor talk, you know.”

  Logan was at that moment looking toward Hilary, and did not see the momentary flash of defeat that flitted through Jo’s eyes, belying the calm nonchalance of her words.

  She sauntered toward the chair she had previously occupied, disinterestedly picked up her needlepoint, and then a moment or two later left the room.

  Logan resumed his seat, scanned the notes he had written earlier, quickly jotted down the gist of his phone call for future reference, then laid his papers aside and attempted to engage Hilary in easy conversation.

  She did not appear interested, however, and remained quiet. Though her apparent reaction to her talk with Jo concerned him, Logan did not press her. In a few moments he rose again, excused himself, and left the room, this time with a determined look of mingled uneasiness and decision etched on his face.

  27

  A Visit to the Stable

  The rustic old loft over the stables had not changed much in fifty years. In fact, it had probably hardly changed in the more than one hundred years since its most revered occupant lived there.

  The steps were relatively new, at least by comparison, and remained in good repair. Logan had built them himself in 1931. They were good, solid steps and barely creaked as he now ascended them.

  When Logan reached the door, he had to brush away cobwebs from above the entry, a reminder that it had been too long since he had come to his dear uncle Digory’s humble home. The door creaked when he pushed it open, straining upon its rusty iron hinges. But that scarcely lessened the awe the place held for Logan, for it was a reminder that a hundred years before, Digory too had shoved open this same door every day—though not to the sound of creaks, for he was known to keep his equipment well oiled. Inside, everything was just as he had found it that first time, though a bit cleaner perhaps. A small shaft of the late afternoon light pierced the corner of the single small window high up on the western wall. It wasn’t much, but enough to illuminate the small room and even smaller alcove.

  Logan ambled idly about for a few minutes, brushing down a cobweb or two, running his hand along the sparse furnishings, absorbing the ambiance of quiet peace this room would always hold for him. He did not come here nearly often enough, he told himself. Though since it was usually times of uncertainty or crisis that drove him here, perhaps he ought not to rebuke himself too harshly.

  The last time had been more than a year ago when he had been seeking direction for his career. Wilson’s long and successful Labour government had been surprisingly voted out, and for a time Logan seriously thought he ought to take that fact as a personal mandate indicating that it was time for his own retirement from public office. He had tried to tell himself he was getting too old to jump back into the fray of running for Parliament again, with all the strain it entailed.

  But after time in prayer in the stable loft, he had realized his reaction was due to bitterness, not age. In six years the Labour Party had brought economic health—at least the strong beginnings of such—to Great Britain, yet the election of 1970 had turned into a rejection of the party. It was difficult not to take the rejection personally, for he had played a key role in the formulation of many of the party’s policies. But once he recognized the bitterness for what it was, he had been able to ask God sincerely for a change to occur in his heart. With the answer to that prayer came renewed enthusiasm for his job, and renewed faith in and love for his constituents. When he had told Allison of his decision to re-seek his seat in Commons, she had sighed with relief.

  “I hadn’t wanted to push you before,” she said. “It had to be your decision. But I wondered when y
ou would see through that excuse of being too old. Why, sometimes I think it’s the political battles that keep you young, Logan! You love the ‘fray’ as much as any part of the job.”

  How well she knew him!

  Logan was not the sort whose job consumed every aspect of his life. Yet he had to admit that his job was an important part of what kept him going. He loved what he did, and felt he was making a contribution as a Christian to society and to his fellow man.

  His position had come as a gift from God, a true answer to the prayers of a returning veteran, coming home from a war that contained many dark hours for those in the thick of it. He had desperately needed direction to his life back then, for even if his faith and his marriage had been substantially healed, he could not keep from fearing stumbling into the pitfalls that had been the catalyst of his personal deterioration before the war.

  The first few years had been tenuous, at best. Though he and Allison were at last able to trust one another fully, Logan found himself still lacking in marketable skills. Arnie Kramer had secured him a position in public relations in his father’s shipping company. Logan enjoyed the work well enough, yet not to the extent that he was able to envision it as his life’s vocation. But the hard-learned lessons of his war years served him well and he stuck with the job for four years. As a result of his tenacity, in the course of his assignments he became associated with members of the Trade Commission and thus first tasted the outer spheres of political life. He knew immediately this was something he liked!

  Arnie had been the first one to jokingly mention his running for public office. Logan had scoffed at the notion. But Arnie wouldn’t let it go, and began to bring it up with increasing frequency, and with deeper and deeper sincerity—with at least as much seriousness as the old windbag could muster.

  “Logan,” he exclaimed one day, “everyone knows that politicians are nothing but legalized con men! You’d be a natural at it, old boy.”