Return to Oban

by Ruth Hay

  When she was back on solid ground again, Ashley saw a huge dark brown dog waiting with its tongue lolling out. Donald did not seem to be worried by the sudden appearance and she remembered talk about a giant guard dog at the castle.

  “Is this the famous Hector?” she asked.

  “Ah, no, Hector himself is gone these many years. This would be Hamish, who is a descendant. He is not exclusively his master’s dog as Hector was, but he is a good guard for Fiona and the children. I’m thinking they must be nearby.”

  Donald turned to survey the cobbled yard adjacent to the castle and waved toward a cluster of children near the estate office.

  “I see the young master and his school pals. I’ll be off now. It’s been a pleasure to meet you, doctor, and to see you again Miss Ashley. I hear there’s to be a house tour soon. Mistress Fiona is looking forward to that.”

  “I may not be here for that event, Donald, but I am sure it will go well. How is the new baby doing?”

  The older man’s weathered face split into a massive grin as he replied. “The wee bairn is a strong laddie for certain sure. You might hear his cries in Oban when he gets going. A fine pair of lungs he has.”

  They took their leave and Edmund watched as Hamish followed Donald across the yard.

  “That’s the biggest dog I have ever seen. I am glad he’s well trained. I was shaking in my shoes when he sniffed at me. He could have bowled me over in a minute if he had stood on his hind legs.”

  “Not a dog lover, then?” observed Ashley. She felt a trifle pleased that he had a weakness. It made him seem more human somehow.

  “Well, let’s say I prefer dogs below my knees in size. Now, where can we have a cup of tea and a chat about you, Miss Ashley? I suspect you know much more about me than I know about you. I think it’s time to address the imbalance.”

  They had their tea and scones in an Oban restaurant. Ashley noticed curious glances toward their table and several local people made a point of greeting the doctor. They nodded at her but were not about to ask who she was. She surmised she would be labelled as ‘an in-comer’, which was close enough to the truth. Perhaps, when she was seen out and about with her aunt, she would be accepted as part of Anna’s group.

  Edmund did not notice the curious, sidelong looks, he was too busy trying to extract information from his companion. She was not making this easy for him. In fact, he thought she was acting like someone who had a secret to keep. She was quite open about her family in Canada and about her love for Scotland, but when it came to the topic of her work, she would swiftly change the subject.

  A mystery woman! I am trained in solving medical mysteries. I can use my skills to decipher what she is trying to conceal. That’s if she is willing to spend time with me again.

  On the ride back to the McCaig Estate farmhouse there was a pleasant feeling of ease between them. Edmund cast around in his mind for an excuse to see Ashley again. He was limited by his busy schedule and by his lack of knowledge of the surrounding area, but he felt he had to come up with some kind of invitation before he deposited her at the red door. If he left it too long he could not capitalize on the comfort level they had obtained so far.

  “Ashley, do you know of a place not too far away where I could walk in the hills? I need to get a bit of exercise after driving around to see patients or crouching over a desk for hours. I am no mountain climber, of course, but the countryside is very appealing on the west coast.”

  She wondered if he was being naïve or if he had not truly looked around when he came to the farmhouse. Helen’s Hill was the obvious nearby climb and she was the obvious one to show it to him.

  She let a moment pass while she considered if she wanted to see him again then, jumped in with both feet, surprising herself as much as she surprised the doctor.

  “Well, the islands you can see out in the bay are the places I would recommend. Mull and Iona are the nearest but they may take more of your free time than you can afford. For a quick climb you could come up to the top of the steep hill behind Anna’s house here. There’s a well-worn path which makes it easy and once on the top you can explore for quite a distance. I haven’t been up there for a while but the views are magnificent all the way out to the sea.”

  It was exactly the opening he had wanted. He came around the car and opened the passenger door for her.

  “Thank you for today. I really enjoyed your company. If you will agree to join me on the path you mentioned, I would be delighted to explore this area. May I call you when I have some time off?”

  She could hardly refuse now she had been so effusive about the benefits of the climb.

  “That would be good, Edmund. It’s been an interesting afternoon. Keep an eye on the weather. Being caught on the top of a hill in the rain is not something I would recommend.”

  “I’ll do that. Thanks again. We’ll talk soon.”

  Off he went after turning the car expertly on the track and barreling down toward the main road. She stood at the gate watching, and wondering if she had oversold her prowess in climbing. There were no hills to speak of on Prince Edward Island and Edmund Jansen, a Scot, was undoubtedly more accustomed to hill walking than she would ever be. There was always the chance the weather would descend and prohibit the ambitious scheme. As she turned toward the front door she could not decide if she would be relieved at that scenario or if she would be disappointed.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jeanette McLennan was as good as her word. She deftly co-ordinated her cleaning crew’s availability, Fiona Campbell’s baby-feeding schedule, and Anna’s recovery rate, and called the farmhouse to announce the date of the visit to Fiona’s new house.

  Anna was thrilled. She felt as if she was given parole from prison. A very comfortable prison, of course, but one nonetheless. She could hardly wait to see Fiona again. It had been too long since her last visit to Scotland and she was eager to see the children and especially the new little one. Lacking a child of her own, Anna always considered Fiona as her daughter of the heart and so her children were like grandchildren to her.

  “I am so grateful you shopped for presents for the children, Ashley. I don’t want to arrive empty-handed, as they say here. The older ones will be happy to play with their new gifts and we can have peace to visit with Fiona and the baby.”

  “Ah, about that, Aunt Anna, I think I will stay here, if you don’t mind. I won’t get in the way of the cleaners. I’ll be in the office working on our latest recording. You and Fiona have lots of catching up to do and Jeanette will bring you back here afterward. I really need the time to work.”

  “Of course you must do that, Ashley. There will be other occasions to meet Fiona. Can I leave you to load the dishwasher? I want to look out clothes for the excursion. I am so excited about finally getting out in the world again.”

  Ashley collected dishes from the kitchen table and smiled at the sight of her aunt skipping up the stairs like a young thing. It was a tribute to her determination to recover her strength and to the walks around the garden and the rest of her property she had been doing daily for the last week. Ashley estimated she could relinquish her role as nurse at last and return to her professional mode. It would be good to get a long spell of time alone, to pull together the preliminary document, especially after last night’s session. She itched to hear the recording again and complete her notes.

  After admiring her aunt’s outfit for the day, and ensuring she had a warm coat and hat to wear, she bade farewell to Jeanette, assured the cleaners she would be no trouble, and shut the office door with a satisfactory click. She was alone at last. She started the latest recording and picked up her notebook with the excitement that comes from anticipation. If the story her aunt had told last night was as dramatic as she remembered, it would make her book a ‘must read’.

  “We had debated for a long time if we should marry. I knew Lawren was sensitive to my feelings about the difference in our ages and he was reluctant to do anything that might be constr
ued as benefitting from this divorced woman’s property. I was equally conflicted. In many ways it seemed easier to keep things as they were. We were happy in each other’s company and we grew closer every day.

  It wasn’t until we had actually slept together that I felt it necessary to legitimize our relationship in the eyes of our friends and associates. Not that they had any idea we were at that stage. I was not about to shout it from the rooftops despite how I felt about having a man in my life after so many years alone.”

  “If it isn’t too intrusive, Aunt Anna, how did you feel?”

  “I never expected to feel again the emotions Lawren Drake awoke in me. It was as if I was reborn in some ways. I felt lighter, younger, happier, more positive, jubilant, and a whole lot more that I can’t even express. Who would have thought a woman of my advanced years could act and feel like a teenager in love? I knew the euphoria could not last forever but, unlike a teenager, I also knew I could survive and relish the stages of more settled emotions that would result from our initial passion.

  Alina was watching both of us like a hawk. She would have pounced on Lawren if she even suspected he was taking advantage of me but she saw how happy he made me and she had, at last, to admit defeat.”

  “Were there others who were initially fearful of your closeness to Lawren Drake?”

  “It’s hard for me to say. I met his father eventually and he was pleased his son had something and someone in his life other than his obsession with his art, but I was not a part of his professional associations. I doubt any of his fellow artists knew about me until the paintings and drawings were seen in art galleries. We were, in our different ways, quite private people. Our love was known to only a few.”

  “But didn’t you two have big parties to celebrate your union? I remember my grandfather talking about the one in your London home and wasn’t there another here in Scotland?”

  “You are quite right, Ashley. We decided to gather our friends together separately, on each side of the Atlantic, but our actual wedding ceremony was a very private affair at which none of them were present.”

  “What? I didn’t know this. I just presumed your Samba friends were there.”

  “No. We couldn’t decide whether to do the deed in Scotland or in Canada. Whichever we chose, there would be people who were disappointed. So we went to a place that had great meaning for us and with the help of George McLennan, we obtained a license and married in secret.”

  “You mean, no one knew?”

  “That’s right. No one knows to this day. We refused to talk about it and some thought we just had a party and the actual marriage never took place. We let them think what they wanted. We had done what suited us best.”

  “Well, I am surprised all right, and yet, it speaks to the unique style of you two as a couple.

  Dare I ask more about the secret ceremony?”

  There was a pause on the recording and Ashley remembered how she had held her breath while her aunt considered her response.

  “I suppose it doesn’t matter now. It was our own special secret but I can share it now, since he has gone. It was a magical day in a magical place and I will never forget one moment of it. If others learn what we did together it can’t possible tarnish that day.

  We took the journey to the holy isle of Iona which we had taken when we were at the first tentative stages of our romance. It was there by the crystal sea of The Bay At the Back of the Ocean where we picnicked and Lawren drew my face while I dozed with eyes shut.”

  “Oh, that must be the sketch in the beautiful frame upstairs. I have often admired it. You looked so relaxed and youthful, like a young girl.”

  “It was how he always saw me. How can I explain what it is to be loved by a man who saw inside me my best, most optimistic self, long before it was tainted by pain and disappointment? It was like being reborn to be with him.”

  “That’s a very powerful image.”

  Ashley immediately planned to get permission to use the sketch in her book and the thought recurred when she got to this part of the recording. She made a note in her notebook but returned to listen closely. The next part of their conversation was the most amazing of the entire session, perhaps of the entire book.

  “We had a suitcase with us containing a change of clothes. We had booked a small Bed and Breakfast hotel in the town, facing the ferry terminal.

  In the early morning of the following day while the mists were still wreathed around the buildings, we crept out and made our way to the Abbey. Lawren wore a dark suit he had borrowed from someone and I had on a long dress of a material he chose for me. Over the dress I had a warm wool shawl and I had flowers in my hair that we picked from the roadside on our way.

  A monk awaited us, but the Abbey was silent and empty as we stood by the altar. The ceremony could not have been more sacred or more simple. It was a blessing and a promise in an ancient place so holy that I felt the weight of the years and the prayers that emanated from the very walls.

  We made our vows to each other and it was done.

  A couple who worked in the Abbey gift shop were summoned to provide witnesses. Lawren took the signed document, folded it and placed it in an inside pocket of his suit jacket. The evidence meant nothing to us. The experience was everything.

  When we emerged, arm in arm, the sun had risen and the mist had dissolved. Around us were the symbols of Saint Columba’s faith; Celtic stone crosses, the graves of kings and above all the seabirds calling and crying his praises to heaven.

  It was a moment of wonder, dedication and love and I have never felt anything to compare with those feelings, before or since.”

  Another silence occupied several minutes of the recording. Ashley picked up her pen to note her own feelings during this period but again her eyes were moist and she could scarcely see the page before her. It was such an intimate moment. So much so that she knew she would not change one word of her aunt’s account. It spoke for itself.

  As a journalist she wondered if there was a wedding breakfast back at the B&B and where the dress went that Anna had worn and if they said anything to anyone at all when they returned to Oban or if George McLennan maintained his professional discretion forever.

  She imagined their two faces told the tale that day to anyone who saw them, but she would not press her aunt to reveal more details.

  Her account was perfect, as it stood.

  So, what next? She decided to prepare a kind of map of the book in a chronological order so she would know if there were significant gaps she needed to fill. The finished work would not likely be strictly chronological, but it would be an interim aid to clarity.

  She found a program on the laptop that allowed the kind of outline she wanted and spent several minutes mapping out a lifeline. She also started a list of notes for reference. It included significant moments in Lawren and Anna’s relationship that would be important for the book. On this list she added Lawren’s death scene and as she typed the words she knew it was something she was reluctant to even ask about. As far as she knew, Anna Drake had never discussed the time and place of her husband’s death. Ashley knew only that it was sudden and traumatic and that Anna was present.

  If she had enough of her aunt’s confidence, it was possible this private information might be shared.

  At the very thought of this coup, she drummed her fingers on the edge of the keyboard in excitement.

  First the marriage revelation, and now the hoped-for detail of Lawren’s death; it would make the proposed book a best seller.

  Once again, Ashley had to calm her expectations. She must not push her aunt beyond what she was comfortable sharing. It could bring the entire project to a crashing halt and that was unthinkable.

  Anna Mason Drake’s account might not be her only source. There were others who might be persuaded to contribute but in the end it would be Anna’s choice what, of her own life story, was allowed to be in print for the world to read.

  It was not her usual custom to be
so talkative. Anna sat beside Jeanette in her Design company van and chattered away like a monkey. She felt released from her long confinement and noticed every single thing she saw on the way to Glenmorie Castle.

  “Is that a new shop on the promenade? I see a For Sale sign on that lovely Victorian Hotel right by the shore. Are the couple who owned it retiring? Just look at the seagulls clustering around that fishing boat! Isn’t it a lovely fresh day for our outing? I am so grateful to you, Jeanette, for arranging this.

  I know how busy you are.”

  “Nonsense! I am delighted to spend time with you, Anna, and to see you looking so well again. You are not the only one who is anxious to see Fiona and the new wee one. Remember, also, that I have been moving house lately and that has kept me from seeing the new Campbell residence. We’ll enjoy it for the first time together, and I can’t wait. George says it’s something special although, as usual, he is closed-mouthed about any detail. I guess one of his clients is in the building business and mentioned how forward-thinking the young Campbells have been.

  Not far now. Is that a maple tree flaming red over in the forest? It reminds me of Canada, seeing that sight here in early November. There’s nothing to compare with the colour of our homeland’s trees in the fall.”

  “Do you miss Canada, Jeanette?”

  “Truthfully, Anna, I rarely think about it. My life is here with George and the children and as soon as my mother arrives from Vancouver to live with us, I think my last real link with Canada will be severed.

  There will always be memories, of course, and they are good ones. What more can I ask?”

  Anna tucked away her friend’s comments for later discussion with Alina.

  They were now bumping along the side road that led to the castle drive and Jeanette was busy steering the van over potholes filled with the recent rain.

  “Oh, I see the castle ramparts ahead! We’ll be there soon.”

  The gates were open and as soon as they came to a halt on the circular driveway in front of the castle, Donald emerged and climbed into the van’s back seat.