The Cottage

by Michael Phillips

  What was on his mind, twenty-three-year-old Brogan Tulloch could not have said. He was unaccustomed to soul-searching. He disdained the very idea that he was the sort of person requiring analysis. All this brooding . . . it signaled a change in the spiritual and moral atmosphere. He wanted no part of it. He liked who he was. He wanted no clouds of change blowing in off the horizon.

  Funny how the silence felt different on this night. It was so quiet. He had never noticed it before. Usually at this hour he was either down at the hotel or staggering home after the revels had broken up. Once Emily had gone up to her room, however, he had had no interest in staying. He saw Craig at the bar watching him leave with an expression asking the unspoken question whether Brogan was ill to be going home so early.

  When was the last time he had been so sane and sober at such an hour? He hadn’t had a drop of alcohol all day. His senses felt keen, awake, invigorated.

  Whatever was going on was obviously due to the presence on the island of the American girl Emily Hanson.

  But why? The question had gnawed at him for two days now.

  He and she were completely different. He had no interest in her, he tried to tell himself. Then why had she so thoroughly gotten under his skin from the first moment he laid eyes on her? She wasn’t even that beautiful. She was religious, a Quaker of all things.

  He was behaving like a ridiculous schoolboy!

  Yet he couldn’t stop thinking about her. When they were together he turned pensive. The kinds of things he had said to her tonight he had never admitted to another soul, not even himself.

  Sleep eventually overtook him sometime between one and two in the morning.

  Brogan awoke hours later with sunlight streaming through the window.

  Gradual images of the previous night returned . . . dinner at the hotel . . . the walk with Emily in the gardens.

  He rose from bed and again sought the window. What had come over him last night with all those pensive reflections? So this was what mornings without hangovers were like. Actually . . . he felt great! He drew in a deep breath and began to dress.

  From somewhere in the house the Westminster chimes tolled the half hour. Probably half past seven or eight, thought Brogan. He picked up his pocket watch from the nightstand.

  A minute after ten-thirty! How could he possibly have slept so late?

  The words played themselves back in his brain: “Remember, we’re leaving Whales Reef in the morning.”

  Seconds later he was galloping down the stairs. He hardly heard Sally asking where he was off to. Two minutes after that the Studebaker roared out of the garage, sending dirt and gravel spraying and chickens squawking.

  Brogan slowed his father’s car as he made his way through town, busy at this hour with women about their shopping and also with carts and horses and dogs, then accelerated again out of the village. Northward he sped toward the ferry landing.

  Even as he half skidded to a stop in front of the deserted pier, he knew he was too late. Across the mile-and-a-half sound he saw the ferry chugging toward the opposite shore of mainland Shetland. Though the distance was too great to make out individuals, he could see the small boat’s rails lined with members of the Northern Adventure Tour.

  With a sinking feeling of more dismay than he would have thought possible, he got out of the car and walked onto the wooden deck. He stared after the retreating ferry until it disappeared in the morning mist.

  The image of Emily Hanson rose in his mind’s eye. She had been wearing the same dress on both evenings he had seen her at the hotel, a navy-blue wool that, while not perhaps the latest from Paris, had been attractive enough. Out on the moor, however, she had worn baggy trousers, a working man’s plaid shirt, and hiking boots. Nothing in her appearance, or anything else about her, created the impression that she belonged to some fringe religious sect.

  But it was not her clothes that drew him. It was the picture of her mouth, her laughter, her wit, her intelligence, and her eyes that filled his thoughts.

  Brogan drew in a deep breath of the sea air and slowly walked back to the car.

  The whole island felt deserted.

  50

  Above the Atlantic . . . Again

  For the second time in seven months Loni Ford was seated in a 747 and looking down from six miles above the Atlantic Ocean on her way home from Scotland. On her lap was her great-grandmother’s journal she had hastily grabbed from the coffee table in the Great Room in her madcap rush to pack before leaving the island. As much as she wanted to forget, she still found a comforting, sad, lonely solace in her great-grandmother’s words.

  She had cried twice since takeoff. Her wet handkerchief was still in her hand. She had used up two handkerchiefs during the short flight from Lerwick to Aberdeen yesterday, and half a box of tissues during the night at the hotel. She’d had almost nothing to eat since leaving the Cottage.

  This trip home was unlike that of the previous November after the financial conference at Gleneagles. During that flight she had promised herself that she would never set foot in Scotland again.

  She obviously hadn’t kept that vow. How could she have known she was about to inherit an island?

  She couldn’t say such a thing to herself this time, though she would if she could. One part of her never wanted to set foot on Whales Reef again. She had asked Jason MacNaughton if it was too late to change her mind. Was there some way she could relinquish the inheritance? Not without enormous complications, he replied. The tax liability was already set in motion. She could not stop it.

  She was a property owner, a millionaire if Jason MacNaughton was right. A reluctant millionaire.

  What a disastrous trip. She had been a perfect idiot more than once—lashing out at David and Audney, falling head over heels over a flock of sheep, and then falling for the shepherd himself—a man who was already engaged.

  What was she thinking, getting all decked out in her nicest dress? And why had she sprinkled on a dab of perfume at the last minute?

  What an unbelievably stupid thing to do. He was engaged to Audney!

  Right now she just wanted to get home, go to work as if nothing had happened, and eventually talk over the finances of the thing with Maddy.

  The fairy tale was over. It was time to get back to her real life.

  51

  Mother of All Reentries

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  Animated cries ranging from joyous greetings to exclamations of surprise brought Madison Swift out of her office.

  “Loni!” she exclaimed, stunned along with the rest of her staff. She ran forward, and the two embraced like teenage girlfriends.

  “Hi, Maddy . . . I’m home,” said Loni.

  “I see that!” rejoined Maddy, stepping back and gazing up and down at her tall assistant. “What a surprise. The last time I heard from you it was all about monkey wrenches in the works and having to stay indefinitely and asking me about that obnoxious Texan—which, by the way, I got the lowdown on. Now, suddenly you’re here! Come and fill me in.”

  Loni followed her boss into the familiar office.

  “Why the change in plans?” asked Maddy.

  “Let’s just say,” replied Loni as she eased into her usual chair opposite Maddy’s desk, “that an unforeseen new monkey wrench made a hasty departure imperative.”

  “Sounds mysterious.”

  “By the way, how do you know that Jimmy Joe McLeod is obnoxious?” asked Loni.

  “He was here. He walked straight into my office without knocking and started throwing his weight around looking for you.”

  “And he eventually found me,” rejoined Loni. “He showed up at my door on Whales Reef. All six-and-a-half feet of him, boots and hat and twang to match.”

  “Well, I have the goods on him. It’s all there in that tube in the corner waiting for you. You won’t believe what I dug up.”

  “I don’t want to think about him right now. Just put me to work. What’s on the agenda? What new deals are cooki
ng?”

  “Hey, not so fast. When did you get in? What about jet lag?”

  “An hour ago.”

  “An hour? Did you even go home?”

  “Just to drop off my bags and change.”

  “Then you need some downtime.”

  “All I want is to get back to my routine.”

  “It’s Friday. I’m not about to plunge you into something new on the last day of the week. Plenty of time for that on Monday.”

  Maddy paused, staring across her desk with a puzzled expression. Her eyes narrowed.

  “What?” laughed Loni. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “I’m not sure. Something’s different about you.”

  “I’m just tired.”

  “No, it’s a good different. Something . . . I don’t know, a light in your eyes I’ve never seen before. You’re happy, more exuberant, even tired.”

  “It must be finding out I own an island,” said Loni. “Believe it or not, the solicitor over there told me—”

  Loni glanced back at the open office door, rose to close it, and returned to the chair.

  “He said I was a millionaire,” she added.

  “Whoa! That would put a sparkle into anyone’s eyes. Congratulations, Loni!”

  “Thanks . . . I guess. I’m still in a daze. That’s what you see in my eyes—the deer-in-the-headlights look.”

  “I don’t think so. Are you sure there isn’t something you’re not telling me?”

  A serious expression came over Loni’s face. “I do feel different,” she admitted. “Knowing who I am, where I came from, the connection to roots, you can’t know what a difference it makes. I can tell that changes are taking place inside me. And—”

  Loni hesitated, her lips quivered, and she looked away. It was enough. Maddy pounced.

  “I knew it! There’s something more.”

  Whatever Loni’s boss had expected, it was not for Loni to burst into tears.

  “Oh, Maddy,” she said, “I got myself into a terrible pickle.”

  Maddy jumped out of her chair and hurried around the desk. She laid a gentle hand on Loni’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “No, actually it feels good to cry,” said Loni, “though I’ve been crying on and off for two days.”

  “Care to tell a friend what’s going on?”

  “I’m not sure I’m ready.”

  “It has to do with a man, doesn’t it?”

  Tears filled Loni’s eyes again. “I can’t think about it. What am I saying? I can’t think of anything else.”

  “One thing’s sure, you are definitely in no shape for work.” Maddy glanced at her watch. “Okay, here’s the plan,” she said. “I’m taking the rest of the day off. It’s about lunchtime. I am going to treat you to something I discovered while you were gone—a genuine high tea right here in D.C. My treat. We will take all afternoon.”

  Loni could not help but laugh at Maddy’s enthusiasm.

  “After lunch,” Maddy continued, “we’ll go to a park, then have a salad or something for supper, and then catch a movie. I think Da Vinci Code is still playing. Do you like Tom Hanks?”

  “He’s okay,” replied Loni, still smiling.

  “Or,” Maddy went on, “in keeping with my management philosophy of giving clients choices so they make the final decisions themselves, if you are too jet-lagged for a night out—Option Two: after our high tea I will buy you some chocolate, then you go home, take a hot bath, make yourself a big bowl of popcorn, put on your pajamas, and watch While You Were Sleeping. If you aren’t sound asleep by then, I don’t know jet lag when I see it.”

  “Chocolate and popcorn!” laughed Loni. “You sound like my grandparents.”

  “They are the two essential ingredients in the Madison Swift blues-relief regimen!”

  52

  High Tea Stateside

  “You were actually thinking of not accepting the inheritance?” said Maddy as her conversation with Loni an hour later continued into the tea shop.

  “I was uncertain what to do,” replied Loni while glancing about for a table. “It was so complicated. At first I thought it ought to go to someone there.”

  “Just as you said when the letter came a month ago.”

  “Then I met my two cousins, who were both vying for the honor before I came along,” Loni went on after they were seated. “That complicated everything all the more.”

  “How so?”

  “Long story. Let’s just say one of them turned on the charm and conned me.”

  “What did he do?”

  “He tried to coerce me into turning my affairs over to him. When I realized what was going on, I knew I couldn’t let the inheritance go to him.”

  “And the other?”

  “That would be David, the shepherd-chief of Whales Reef.”

  “That sounds very bucolic. Are you saying there are actual sheep?”

  Loni smiled. “Apparently I own a flock myself. But it’s mostly the gamekeeper who—”

  “Gamekeeper!”

  “Yes. Believe it or not, I employ a gamekeeper . . . and a housekeeper and butler.”

  “Get out of town!”

  “Really.”

  “This sounds more like a movie script every minute!”

  “And even after the fiasco with Hardy, I was set to walk away again when I found out that the inheritance taxes could be as high as four million dollars.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding!” exclaimed Maddy. “And now they’re on your head?”

  “It may sound worse than it is. I nearly fainted when the estate’s accountant told me. But I went over everything with her and our solicitor. They assured me the estate’s assets and investments could absorb the taxes with relative ease, though I might have to sell off a few oil leases.”

  “Oil leases? Goodness, girl—you are a tycoon.”

  “Hardly,” laughed Loni. I’m still trying to get my head around it. But the estate is worth a lot of money. I need to lay it out to you and have you help me figure out a financial game plan.”

  “That’s what I do. How fun to do it for you.”

  “Who would have dreamed I would become one of your clients?”

  A young lady came to their table and gave them a friendly greeting.

  “We would like high tea for two,” said Maddy. “My friend here just returned from Scotland. I want to show her that Americans know how to do this too. And two coffees.”

  “Actually,” interjected Loni, “I would like a pot of tea, please. What do you have . . . PG Tips, Typhoo, Scottish Blend?”

  “We have PG Tips,” said the girl.

  “That will be perfect. And with milk.”

  When the girl was gone, Maddy arched an eyebrow. “How many more surprises do you have up your sleeve?” she said. “I thought you hated tea.”

  “A lot of things changed for me over there, Maddy,” said Loni as a faraway expression spread across her face. “I’m not the same person as when I left.”

  “That is obvious. But you’re making me nervous. You’re not yourself, girl. Where’s my old Loni?”

  Loni smiled wistfully. “I’m not sure, Maddy. Right now I think she’s Alonnah.”

  “So when will Loni be back?”

  Loni drew in a deep breath. “I’m not sure she will be.”

  “The old you was my best friend. I don’t know if I want a new you.”

  Loni smiled again. “That is sweet of you. I hope I’m the same person, or will be after I get all this figured out.”

  “So you’re a millionaire, you are drinking tea, you’re going by Alonnah now, and you’ve got a strange new light in your eyes—that’s a pretty topsy-turvy two weeks.”

  “Please, Maddy, I’m confused enough as it is.”

  “All I’m saying is that you’re definitely different. All these years I’ve only known Loni. I guess I’m going to have to get to know Alonnah. But whichever one you are, the instant you mentioned that shephe
rd fellow, a glow came over you.”

  “It did not.”

  “I know you, Loni. I’m telling you that something is going on here.”

  “It’s over, I tell you. I’ll be back to work on Monday . . . as Loni.”

  “Over? What’s over?”

  “Nothing. There never was anything . . . and it’s over anyway.”

  “Come on, girl—admit it, you’re an emotional wreck. It’s the man, isn’t it, the shepherd?”

  Again tears flooded Loni’s eyes.

  “What’s the big deal?” Maddy added. “So you got smitten by some guy? There’s nothing wrong with that.”

  “I’m not smitten.”

  “Even if you are, it happens all the time.”

  “Not to me.”

  “Point taken. Nor to me. But still . . . what haven’t you told me that makes it so complicated?”

  “Probably the fact that he’s engaged.”

  “Whoa! Okay, I see now—that changes things.”

  “And then there’s Hugh,” Loni added. “That’s another monkey wrench.”

  “I’m not interested in Hugh. Tell me about this Scottish guy.”

  “There’s no point, Maddy. I just want to forget.”

  Loni was temporarily rescued by the arrival of their tea and coffee and first plate of goodies.

  “Okay then,” said Maddy when they were alone again, “give me the Wikipedia on this mysterious shepherd you’re trying so hard not to tell me about.”

  Loni wiped at her eyes, drew in a breath, and poured milk into her tea. She proceeded to give Maddy as brief an account of David as she could, which went on longer than she intended.

  “I made a complete fool of myself more than once,” she said. “As I learned more about him, I soon realized he was no ordinary shepherd. He was well-spoken, articulate, educated, knowledgeable, a modernist in some ways yet traditional in others. He is unbelievably gentle, sensitive, chivalrous, yet progressive too. The passion that most deeply drives him is the duty he feels to his people. In that sense he is two centuries behind the times. The villagers all call him Chief.”