Mine Is the Night

by Liz Curtis Higgs

  The faint sound of the kirk bell ringing in the distance sent Peter scrambling to the ground. “Time to go, Mrs. Kerr!” He grabbed her hand and abruptly took off down the hill.

  She nearly tripped trying to keep up with him. “So soon? Surely it isn’t time for your evening meal.” Elisabeth thought Michael and Peter supped later, not at six o’ the clock.

  “Come on!” Peter cried, already breathless from dragging her along. “Faither said I was to start doon the hill whan the kirk bell rang.”

  On the fourteenth of May, when the gloaming stretched past nine o’ the clock, there was no need to hurry. Yet Peter seemed most determined. Elisabeth let him escort her to town posthaste, vowing to climb Bell Hill again as soon as ever she could.

  When they finally reached School Close, she started to turn left, but Peter shook his head. “Nae, I’m to take ye hame.”

  She smiled, realizing Michael must be teaching his son proper etiquette. “May I take your arm, then, as a lady should?” Tall as she was, this was no easy feat. Elisabeth bent forward, her hand circling the upper part of his arm, and tried to walk naturally. “Well done, Master Dalgliesh,” she said when they entered Halliwell’s Close.

  The last thing Elisabeth expected when she pushed open the door was to find their stair lined with people. “What has happened?” she cried, fearing the worst.

  Then she saw Marjory beaming at her from the top landing.

  And their neighbors welcoming her.

  And Mr. Tait lifting his cup of cheer. “ ’Tis the leddy with the birthday!”

  Twenty-One

  My birthday!—what a different sound

  That word had in my youthful ears.

  THOMAS MOORE

  verwhelmed, Elisabeth picked her way up the steps, aiming for Marjory. “You … remembered.”

  Marjory reached for her hands, then pulled her into a tight embrace. “After all you’ve done for us, dear Bess, how could we forget?” She released her with a tender squeeze, then guided her into the house while Peter darted round them, no doubt looking for his father.

  The house was even more crowded than the stair. A cup of punch was pressed into her hands, then Elisabeth was led to the dining table, laden with savory pigeon pies, oat puddings, apple tarts, and plum cakes. “Marjory, how did you manage this?”

  Her mother-in-law swept her hand above the serving plates with a flourish. “Annie helped, of course. Whenever you quit the house for an hour or two, we baked something at Mrs. Tait’s hearth and stored it in her larder.”

  “So I see.” Elisabeth shook her head, both delighted and dismayed. “But the cost—”

  “Wheesht!” Anne scolded her, touching her index finger to her lips. “You have Gibson to thank for that.”

  Only then did Elisabeth see their old friend standing by the hearth. When she signaled him, Gibson bowed his way past the throng and joined her beside the table. “How may I serve ye, Leddy Kerr?” he asked, a gleam in his eye.

  “It seems you’ve already served me.” Elisabeth kissed his cheek, making him blush. “Thank you, Gibson.”

  His shrug was gallant. “A leddy celebrates her first quarter century but once.”

  By the snippets of conversation she heard, her age was barely a topic of discussion. Instead, fresh rumors concerning the admiral were on the tips of their tongues. What day would he reach Selkirk? By carriage or astride? With an entourage or alone? Wearing an admiral’s uniform or a riding habit?

  Elisabeth found their wild speculations amusing. “Our neighbors have come not to toast my birthday but to deal in gossip,” she said, shaking her head before drawing her loved ones closer. “As for you three, I know better. You have done this to bless me, and indeed you have.”

  Gibson raised his eyebrows. “ ’Tis not ower yet.”

  “Aye,” Anne agreed, her pale face glowing, “there are presents to be opened.”

  “We shall save those for later,” Marjory insisted, “when our neighbors have gone home to their suppers. Come, Bess, and welcome your guests.”

  Elisabeth wove through the crowd of well-wishers, greeting each one. Though she could not recite all their names by heart, she knew their faces and was beginning to put husband with wife, mother with child, sweetheart with sweetheart.

  At last she spied Michael Dalgliesh standing by the window, holding court. Several young women were circled round him, laughing as he told one of his colorful tales. “Glad tidings to ye, Mrs. Kerr,” he said when he caught sight of her, then lifted his cup. His expression was positively smug.

  By the time Elisabeth reached him, she had Michael all to herself, the others having momentarily deserted him for the punch bowl.

  “I suppose your task was to keep me away from the house,” she began, trying unsuccessfully to sound miffed. “What of that gentleman’s coat you needed to finish?”

  He laughed. “ ’Tis done. Tell me, did ye have a bonny afternoon with my lad?”

  “I certainly did.” Elisabeth looked across the room at Peter, who’d apparently visited the plates of sweets more than once and was now covered in sugary crumbs.

  “Faither!” Peter cried, dragging Anne in their direction. “Here’s a sweetie for ye.”

  Michael looked up just as a blushing Anne thrust a small tart into his hands. “Verra kind o’ ye, Miss Kerr,” he said, then popped the apple tart into his mouth without ceremony.

  Anne seemed intent on studying her shoes. “It was Peter’s idea,” she murmured.

  “I’ve nae doubt.” Michael tugged on his son’s ear. “Can ye find me anither, lad?”

  The moment Peter took off, Michael apologized to Anne in a low voice. “Dinna fash yerself, lass. We’ve been freens a’ oor lives, have we not? If ye bring me a sweetie, none will think ill o’ ye.”

  When Anne slowly raised her head, Elisabeth saw something travel between them as quick as a flash of lightning in the summer sky. We attended school together. It seemed a great deal more had been left unsaid.

  Elisabeth stepped back, feeling like an intruder.

  When Peter dashed past her, tart in hand, she sought an empty chair, needing a moment to recover. The heat of the room, she told herself. The press of bodies. The noisy chatter.

  Gibson appeared a moment later, bearing a steaming cup of tea. “Drink up, Leddy Kerr, for ye have a dwiny leuk about ye.”

  Elisabeth murmured her thanks, then quickly lifted the wooden cup to her lips, consoling herself with the knowledge that she’d not lost her heart. To Peter, perhaps, but not to Michael.

  She managed to compose her features by the time Gibson brought Marjory and Anne to her side. “Oor birthday leddy has had enough merriment,” Gibson told them. “ ’Tis time for folk to find their way hame.”

  All three women sat round the table and watched Gibson herd their neighbors out the door with efficiency and decorum. “Here’s a wee pie to take with ye,” he said to one man, nudging him forward, and, “Mind the stair as ye go,” he cautioned another.

  An hour later candles were lit to dispel the evening gloom, and the house was quiet again, with only the Kerr women and Gibson remaining. Michael had been the last to leave, tarrying at the door, sending folk off with a jovial word or a hearty slap on the shoulder, while Peter drooped about his father’s knees, ready for his supper and a warm bed. Finally Michael carried him off, bidding the Kerrs a good night.

  Elisabeth did not follow them with her gaze nor let her thoughts dwell on wee Peter. The lad needed a mother, aye, yet it seemed the Lord had another woman in mind. If ’twas Anne, was that not the best of outcomes?

  “Time for yer praisents,” Gibson said, grinning as he rubbed his hands together.

  Determined to enjoy the balance of her birthday celebration, Elisabeth sat in the upholstered chair where she slept each night, accustomed to its contours and the feel of the fabric against her cheek. Whenever Marjory or Anne suggested they find some other solution—a mattress made of blankets or a cot borrowed from a neighbor—Elisab
eth had assured them she slept soundly.

  She looked at her small circle of loved ones and confessed, “I’ll not be happy if you’ve spent any of your precious pennies on me.”

  “Have no fear on that account.” Anne held out two ladylike fists. “Choose wisely, for only one holds a present.”

  Elisabeth eyed one, then the other, looking for a clue. “What happens if I choose poorly?”

  “Then I get to keep my gift,” Anne said, sounding as if she meant it.

  “Your hospitality is gift enough,” Elisabeth protested, then was astounded when Anne opened her hand. “Cousin! You cannot give me such a treasure.”

  “ ’Tis done.” Anne held out the silver comb, gleaming in the candlelight, then tucked it into Elisabeth’s crown of hair with a satisfied nod. “Just as I’d pictured it.”

  Elisabeth touched the comb in awe. “Oh, Annie. To think you would part with such an heirloom.” When their gazes met, Elisabeth prayed her cousin might see what could not be said. Have no fear of me, dear Annie. You are the wife Michael wants and the mother Peter needs.

  Then she noticed Gibson carrying something across the room, hidden beneath their cousin’s woolen shawl.

  “This praisent is from me,” Gibson said proudly.

  “Is it a table?” Elisabeth wondered aloud. He’d not concealed the wooden legs or the crosspiece between them, but she still wasn’t certain what it might be. When he lifted the shawl, she gasped with joy. “A tambour! Gibson, wherever did you find it?”

  Enthralled, she ran her hands round the double hoop that held the fabric in place and admired the plain but serviceable legs that positioned the hoop at the perfect height. The tambour Donald had purchased for her soon after they married was fashioned of mahogany, richly polished, and ornately carved. This one was made of sturdy oak along simpler lines but a fine tambour nonetheless. She inched it closer, resting her feet on the crosspiece, already imagining what she might embroider first. “Did you find it at Friday’s market?”

  Gibson confessed, “I made it myself, mem. With scraps from the carpenter.”

  Trapped in her chair by the tambour frame, Elisabeth could not leap to her feet and embrace Gibson, but she could pull him down for a peck on the cheek. “Whatever did I do to merit such blessings?”

  “Birthdays are like the good Lord’s mercy,” Marjory told her. “Undeserved yet always celebrated.” She reached for her apron, her gaze narrowing as she regarded their house, now in shambles. “We’ve work to do before supper and bed. And Gibson has brought news from the manse.”

  He bowed. “The honor is yers, Leddy Kerr.”

  Marjory struck an aristocratic pose. “Admiral Lord Jack Buchanan is already in Selkirk.”

  “Ah!” Anne sat up straighter. “I knew it.”

  “He arrived this morn,” Marjory told them, “and has taken up residence at Bell Hill with a handful of servants who traveled with him from London.”

  “He’s at Bell Hill?” Elisabeth’s eyes widened. “Then … I saw him.”

  Twenty-Two

  If it were not for a goodly supply of rumors,

  half true and half false, what would the gossips do?

  THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON

  very eye in the sanctuary was trained on the open door, and every parishioner uttered yet another conjecture. Marjory tried not to turn round in the pew, tried not to listen to their whispering, but it was hard since the admiral had been in Selkirkshire for several days and had yet to make an appearance. Surely Lord Buchanan would ride down from Bell Hill and show himself on the Sabbath.

  Katherine Shaw and her four pretty daughters were seated behind the Kerrs, spinning yarns as though they were seated at a treadle wheel. “He’s niver taken a wife,” Mrs. Shaw was telling her girls, all of a marriageable age.

  “Nae wonder,” her oldest said softly. “He doesna set foot on land for years at a time. What sort o’ husband would a gentleman like that make?”

  “A rich one!” the youngest squealed.

  “I do hope he’ll tarry in Selkirk,” one of the middle daughters said with a sigh.

  “He’s forty years auld,” Mrs. Shaw reminded them. “Nae man would buy so fine a hoose and not live there. Mark my wirds, he means to settle doon and start a family.” At which the young women all giggled, drawing stares from those round them.

  Marjory held her tongue, but she could not still her thoughts. The admiral would hardly marry one of the Shaw girls, however charming their smiles or beguiling their figures. Not when he might choose a lady of high standing from anywhere in the world. Had Lord Buchanan not circled the globe aboard the Centurion? Such a man would want a woman with a title of her own and a dowry to match. If and when this wealthy admiral took a wife, he’d not look for her in the wynds and closes of Selkirk.

  “Why is Mr. Armstrong not attending to the gathering psalm?” Anne murmured. At the moment the precentor stood near the pulpit counting heads, a satisfied expression on his wizened face. A kirk filled to the rafters boded well for the collection plate.

  When Reverend Brown came down the center aisle, all whispering ceased as folk prepared for the start of the service. Gibson trailed a few steps behind his master, pausing at the Kerr pew long enough to exchange a brief nod with Marjory before claiming his seat in the front, where he might serve the reverend at a moment’s notice.

  Noting his squared shoulders and lifted chin, Marjory could not keep from smiling. Never mind the good admiral; here was a man who should have married. More than once Marjory had wondered if Gibson and Helen Edgar might have made each other happy. But though their exchanges were friendly while in her employ in Edinburgh, no true spark had struck between them.

  Mr. Armstrong stepped before the Psalter, eying the congregation over his spectacles. When the precentor began to sing the metrical psalm chosen for this morning, Marjory’s smile broadened. Admiral Lord Jack Buchanan was not only anticipated; he was expected.

  The earth belongs unto the Lord,

  and all that it contains;

  The world that is inhabited,

  and all that there remains.

  Who else, other than the Almighty himself, would the precentor have in mind, singing of all the world and all the earth? Marjory considered the psalm a fitting welcome for Selkirk’s newest resident. The parishioners must have thought so too, for they sang the next stanza with unaccustomed zeal.

  For the foundations thereof

  he on the seas did lay,

  And he hath it established

  upon the floods to stay.

  Marjory almost laughed aloud. The seas and the floods? Why, the admiral might wash through the door any moment! For the next few weeks, she imagined he would sit in the front pew near the pulpit until a proper loft could be built for him. Perhaps in the upper right corner, above the Kerr pew. She would not object to worshiping beneath his shadow.

  Eight stanzas later they still had no sign of the man, but Marjory would not give up hope so easily. She continued to sing, stealing glances up and down the pews to see if anyone had spotted an unfamiliar face. Though most parish churches closed their doors once services began, the dim sanctuary in Selkirk, with its narrow, crumbling window openings, needed every bit of light the sky had to offer. Indeed, the admiral could slip through the gaping entrance without a sound.

  Ye gates, lift up your heads, ye doors,

  Doors that do last for aye,

  Be lifted up, that so the King

  Of glory enter may.

  A final stanza and their singing ended, the last notes hanging in the air like dust motes.

  When Reverend Brown ascended the pulpit, his gaze scanned the crowded sanctuary—looking for Lord Buchanan, Marjory was certain of it—before the minister began his sermon drawn from Isaiah. “Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer,” he charged them, “I am the LORD that maketh all things.” She nodded in approval. If the admiral was a godly man, he would find much to his liking in the parish kirk this day.

  M
arjory settled against her seat, grateful the floor had been swept and the pew scrubbed. God bless you, Gibson. Other pews had been tidied as well, whether by Gibson’s own hand or because of his good example. But the sagging walls needed more than a good cleaning. Perhaps the admiral might contribute some of his vast fortune toward the sanctuary’s upkeep.

  Unless he hoards his gold, as you once did.

  Marjory bowed her head, knowing it was true. She’d been blessed with wealth in Edinburgh yet had spared little for their parish kirk beyond the rent for her pew. And here was Elisabeth, who earned only a few shillings a week, quietly slipping one of her silver coins in the collection plate each Sabbath, far more than Reverend Brown would ask of his flock.

  The sermon ended as the kirk bell tolled the noon hour. After the closing psalm and the benediction, Marjory stood, a bit stiff from sitting, then turned to survey the congregation.

  “I’ve never seen the kirk so full,” Anne confided to her.

  Marjory nodded, narrowing her eyes to improve her vision. “Who is that dark-haired man in the back? The one already bound for the door?”

  “ ’Tis the admiral,” Elisabeth said softly. “At least I think so. On my birthday I caught a glimpse of him on horseback.”

  Marjory did not doubt the man’s identity. Heads were turning, and latecomers seated near the entrance were hurrying out of doors. The Kerrs followed them, moving down the aisle with purpose rather than standing about as they had on Sundays past.

  Whispered questions quickly escalated into shouts.

  “Did ye see the man?”

  “Are ye sure ’twas him?”

  “Och! Whatsomever did he leuk like?”

  By the time Marjory and the others reached the kirkyard, there was no sign of the stranger who’d slipped from their midst. Folk tarried round the gravestones, waiting for more news now that idle rumors had become fact.

  “The admiral rode aff on a bonny gray horse,” James Mitchelhill was telling them, pointing east.