There was the hush that snow brings; the air seemed motionless, but the breath she drew was mild, the cold had lost its spiteful edge. As she crossed the road blinking, the murmur of the river asserted itself like the voice of a friend. The rippled, glassy surface bore a scatter of gulls bobbing quietly in the current, their faces and tails black as though dipped in ink. For a moment her mind was empty of everything except birds, water, and benign, soft air. All over her body the tension fell away, and she surprised herself with an involuntary smile.
Just to notice this was enough to rewind her muscles and her brain. She stared at the gulls, hoping to catch the moment, yearning to inhabit its elusive serenity. It was only this she wanted, she told herself. Not revenge on an old man, not to prove her worth to a censorious world, only an end to anger and anxiety.
But it was impossible. She could not turn back from Angus Urquhart. The shame she had carried all her life belonged to him; she could discharge it into his hands alone.
She was much too early. She would have to wait at the station or in Henry Jennings’ hotel. She began to wheel her suitcase slowly along the line of guesthouses.
From the town, couples were strolling towards her on the riverbank, some with arms linked, their eyes bright with sun and snow. As they passed, each nodded and smiled. ‘Good morning. Lovely day.’
Of course, it was Saturday, their time for el paseo. In her village at such times, the streets became thronged with people arm-in-arm. But her mother and aunt had remained silent behind their shutters, and Elena had never learned the art. In Brussels Mikhail had begun to teach her. ‘At weekends we will dawdle together, Elena. We will look in shop windows, drink coffee with our friends. You will cease from running everywhere, except, once or twice, unexpectedly, to kiss me. Okay?’
Okay. And she had begun to understand how it was done. How she had no need to race every minute to prove herself. How time could linger and caress, not challenge and threaten.
She passed the last guesthouse and a church. Ahead, the riverside road skirted a hill, topped by a castle she had not noticed before. Built of pink granite with castellated towers, it looked fine against the snow. Yet it lacked the romance of Castle Urquhart, the ruined fortress she had viewed many times on the internet screen in Brussels. A name and the touch of a button had summoned the image; always technology impressed her, she had come to it so late.
She had carried her mobile to the breakfast table this morning, willing it to ring, but she had not pressed redial. Technology worked. Her messages had arrived. Mikhail had been angry, and now he was beyond anger. In his warm bed, happy with his new companion, he had forgotten her.
She paused to gaze up at the pink castle, obscured by snow-hung trees and bushes, and by her tears also. She had pushed Mikhail too far. ‘You are wrong! I am right!’ In the indifferent murmur of the Ness, she was hearing his reply.
Among the bushes she saw a rabbit. Then another, two, three . . . and yes, here, two more. Brown against the snow, their noses and whiskers trembling, they seemed anxious, jumping uncertainly. One, landing too deeply, struggled in panic to recover itself. Another was digging, here then there, abandoning each hole until finally it found grass and began to feed. Its companions quickly joined it. The patch of green grew. Soon all five were eating busily. They had seen Elena, but they paid her no attention, accustomed to the safety of their walled bank.
‘Only when you love your home country will you be happy.’
Mikhail had been so sure of this, but he did not understand. In Spain she would find no patch of green.
She reached the road-bridge that led west. There was no traffic; would the way be clear to Loch Craggan? A bird – un cuervo – huge and carbon-black, crossed the empty street ahead of her, twisting from hip to hip like a man with wooden legs. She followed, mimicking as she would have done for Mikhail to make him laugh.
She must stop thinking of Mikhail. Perhaps she must never think of him again.
Urquhart. She must think of him, not of Mikhail. She must plan what she would say and do. But it was too difficult. Urquhart, Urquhart. Her exhausted mind was stuck, like a needle on her mother’s old gramophone, unable to get beyond the name.
El cuervo opened big wings and laboured into the sky, filling her at once with longing and despair. A cold breeze had begun to blow, making her cheeks and fingers ache. Turning up the hill from the bridge, tugging the suitcase with one hand, she thrust the other deep into the warm pocket of Henry’s coat.
Of course. She would think of Henry Jennings, whose childhood, like her own, was unhappy. Sent away to school while his mother’s affection went all to her new baby. Elena quickened her step up the high street.
Then widowed, poor man, a blood vessel bursting in his wife’s head. One minute here, the next gone. The wheels of her case rattled over the stones behind her. She swung left towards the station.
‘Truly, you must think me mad,’ he had said.
‘Why?’
‘You know why.’ His gaze dropping. ‘What you saw in the library.’
‘Your mistake about the writer?’
‘Yes. Marjorie Macpherson. Michael McCoy.’ Lifting his eyes to hers again. ‘I’ve been obsessed with a ghost, Elena. In love with a woman who doesn’t exist. Writing her letters, for God’s sake. If that’s not mad, tell me what is?’
She had seen the misery tugging him down. She had reached to touch his hand. ‘You are not mad, Henry. You are too much alone.’
His pain had eased. His face was not handsome, but it was open. ‘Thank you, Elena. It helps that you understand.’
She could not accept his gratitude. ‘It is not that I understand, Henry. More it is that I know.’
She had reached the station square. On the inside corner, as he had described, was the Royal Highland Hotel. And there in the doorway, looking extremely nervous, he stood.
Henry
‘Better weather for you today, sir.’
A new, bland-faced receptionist stowed Elena’s case behind the desk. It fitted snugly alongside Henry’s Gladstone, from between whose hinges a corner of the tartan blanket showed.
‘Yes. Indeed. Thank you.’ Henry prolonged the exchange, trying to steady his pulse and control his rampaging hopes before turning back to Elena. In the subdued light of the hotel lobby, her face seemed sallow with fatigue, the dark eyes lack-lustre.
‘You managed to get some sleep, I hope?’
She shook her head. ‘No, almost none. And you?’
‘Oh, you know. Enough.’
It was true. A kind of unwinding had come from saying no to Michael McCoy’s ghost, and that, plus the brandy, had done the trick for a few hours, before yesterday’s events had come swirling through his head in luminous dreams.
He had woken in an icy sweat, and for a moment, as the memories slammed into him, his need for his mother had been overwhelming. Her ghost had hovered nearby, eager to resume as though nothing had altered. With huge effort he’d managed to refuse her, turning his head away and closing his ears to her sympathy while he took breakfast in his room, then braving the lobby to escape her.
There, while the other guests came and went beneath the tulip chandeliers, he’d battled to overcome his dread of meeting Michael McCoy. He was damned if he would hide. An exchange of nods would suffice, of ‘good morning’s perhaps. He would decline any further conversation with dignity.
But McCoy had not appeared, thank heaven, and as reward for his courage Elena had turned up early. She looked warm but awkward in his Barbour and her shoes were no use at all. He gestured at them. ‘Look, I don’t know what you think, but we have an hour. The shops are just opening. May I help you find a coat. And something warmer for your feet?’
Her face was hard to read. ‘You mustn’t worry if you’re strapped for cash. It would be my pleasure, if you’d allow me.’ Oh dear. She was looking surprised. ‘What am I saying? I’m so sorry.’ How crass to ply a woman he barely knew with offers of expensive gifts.
‘No, Henry, please. I have money. But if I had not, you are generous, thank you. Let us go shopping.’
She slipped her fingers into his elbow, which he bent instinctively to support them. She was beside him, allowing him to guide her across the ice of the station square, towards the kilted stone soldier on his plinth.
A real woman on his arm. How long had it been? His mother, he supposed. After his father’s death, he’d taken her to restaurants. Encouraged her to try the more expensive dishes, taken care of the bill, then escorted her to the car or for a post-prandial stroll. How good it felt to be allowed to take care of a woman again.
‘In Spain, they call this el paseo,’ Elena said.
‘I thought that was in the evening, before dinner.’
‘Yes, or before the lunch on Sunday. They walk, we walk, to be with our friends. But why not in the morning also?’
Henry looked about him. There was a shopping centre along to the left – M&S, that sort of thing – but that didn’t seem right for Elena. Across the road he saw an entrance in monumental style. Corinthian arches, animal carvings. “Victorian Market”, it announced itself.
‘Let’s have a look in here.’
He couldn’t have chosen better. The morning light streamed through high windows into a charming interior of stained glass and wrought iron. An arcade of small shops stretched ahead. The shopkeepers were setting out their pavement displays, and two wholesome-looking children were busking on a fiddle and a flute, playing a Highland reel that had him quickening his step, and Elena quickening hers in time beside him, so that in his head they were almost dancing, and he dropped a pound into the fiddle-case before spying exactly the shop, piled high with oilskins, fleeces, socks and boots.
‘This looks the thing. I hope there’s something here you like. We’ll soon have you cosy and warm.’
Peter
Kippers afoot – stench luring him down to busy kitchen. Chin and beard dab hands with fish-slice at the Aga, swathed in daft scarves and headgear for some away game in Arbroath. Fair Fi blithely stirring cauldron of porridge. Bow-wow tucking into Meaty Crunch.
‘Hi, Peter. Sleep well?’
‘Yes, ta.’
‘Hannah’ll come with us to Loch Craggan today. She likes the car.’
Jumbo rush of glee. ‘We’re going then? The road is clear?’
‘Yes. My brother William says the blizzard wasn’t too bad up there. The postie got through all right.’
Nothing but time and miles between him and Calum. Severe attack of heebie-jeebies. ‘Did you tell your father I was coming?’
‘No. These last two months he’s been mostly in his croft. It’s up the hill a way. I’ll have to fetch him down or take you to him. And . . . Peter . . .’
‘Yes?’
Wooden spoon aloft and beckoning, solemn as a miniature Statue of Liberty. Slide past chin and beard, snouts in plates, minds on kippers, chewing and grunting. Heat-seek wicked thrill of FU’s whisper. ‘Listen. Only the family know he’s Calum. You mustn’t let on I’ve told you. Okay?’
Wonderful! Was he in or what? Gifted protégé in the know!
FU loud again, her glutinous oats aswirl. ‘I explained to William about Elena,’ fuck it, he’d altogether forgotten the Spanish Connection, ‘and I said a friend of mine was coming too.’
‘Meaning me?’
‘Uh huh.’
Better and better. Close friend of great man’s edible daughter. ‘So may I hold your hand and call you “darling”?’ Flash eyes and make her giggle. Good giggle Fi’s, throaty soft, not one to make you wince and run.
‘No, you may not. Behave yourself.’
‘Oi oi?’ Chin tuning in, mind a quagmire of conjecture.
‘Grow up, you berk.’ Beard plating last kipper as he spoke.
‘Hang on, Greg.’ Damsel to rescue. ‘Did you want that kipper, Peter?’
Fight own battles, thanks. ‘No thanks.’
Greg grinning between ginger, hairy cheeks, shovelling in forkloads of juicy, orange flesh. Grin back with malice. Fuck you, fat thighs. Ginger, hairy cheeks both ends. Graciously accept Daddy-Bear-sized bowl of porridge.
‘So what’ll it be, Peter? Bacon? Sausage? Mushrooms? Egg? Tomato?’
Bloody marvellous. Catch jealous quiver of Fat Thighs’ chubby chops. He fucking loved this woman. ‘Now you’re talking, Fi. The works!’
Chapter Seventeen
Henry
It was hard to think straight. A boisterous yellow Labrador was thumping its rear end against his knees while rummaging nosily under Elena’s new coat. She was struggling with the dog and failing to make introductions. Peter was scowling, no surprises there, but – oh dear – the librarian was looking distinctly miffed as well. And her car, red and yellow, was one of those French tin-can affairs, embarrassingly small. Thank heavens there was a harness arrangement on top for luggage.
But worst of all, the library was here. It had given him a shock when he turned the corner of Margaret Street, to see it lying in wait. Without Elena’s hand on his arm, he didn’t think he would have been able to approach it. It towered over him, its grand Doric portico unforgiving against the turquoise sky. And the librarian was staring at him, open-mouthed. Oh God, was she about to spill the beans?
‘Hannah. Stop it. Be good.’ She seemed flustered. She’d been so level-headed yesterday.
‘Henry! What the fuck are you doing here?’
‘Do you two know each other?’
‘Yes, worse luck. He’s my brother.’
‘Your brother?’
‘Yes, Fi. My turn to have brothers.’
‘Brothers?’
‘Just the one. Just this banana here.’
‘I am full of apology.’ Elena, bless her, was struggling to recover the situation. The story they’d agreed on was gushing from her as from a fractured pipe. ‘It is my fault completely, I meet Henry last night and he lend me his coat, I tell him about the book I am writing, he is kind, he is interested, he ask will he come with me.’
How implausible this sounded. Henry grimaced in what he hoped was a jolly way, squeezing Elena’s hand tightly in the crook of his elbow.
‘And you are Peter’s brother?’
‘Yes.’
The librarian, bewildered, looked from him to Peter and back again. She was about to say ‘Get lost’, and who could blame her?
Elena streamed on. ‘But I not realise, Fiona, about the dog, perhaps we are too many?’
Fiona seemed to collect herself. ‘No. Forgive me. I’m sure we can squeeze in, if no one minds. You in front, Elena. Or perhaps . . . Henry, is it?’
‘Yes. So sorry. Henry Jennings.’
‘How do you do. I’m Fiona Urquhart.’ Glory be! She wasn’t going to tell. ‘Perhaps you, Mr Jennings, in the front, seeing as you’re . . .’ She stopped in confusion.
‘The largest,’ completed Peter sourly.
Elena
She was crushed in tight with Henry’s brother and the dog, breathing the new coat’s dark-brown sheep-smell, and following the dog’s avid eyes through the car window.
They were climbing through a forest of conifers, heavy with snow as in a land for vampires. Beside the road, water cascaded over a staircase of giant rocks. She could hear its thunder above the roar of the engine, which carried them relentlessly up towards Angus Urquhart.
Her stomach contracted. What would she say? How would she greet this man? She should be preparing herself, but she could not. She could only anticipate and fear.
The hill eased and with it the noise. In a gap of pasture, three cows with wide horns and dense, red coats lifted their heads from a hay-bin. The dog’s bark made Elena jump.
‘Hannah. No. Shush,’ said Fiona Urquhart.
Then they were climbing again. A van emblazoned ‘Daily parcel service – Glasgow, Inverness, Skye’ was parked where the road widened for the first zigzag. Fiona sounded the horn and dropped a gear to pass it. The car laboured and complained. From her window, Elena
saw un altro cuervo, calmly meeting her eyes. Its stare unsettled her.
‘Fiona. Please. That bird. You know it? Big, black, solitary – ’
‘A raven.’ Henry’s brother stopped biting his fingers to answer her. ‘As hymned by Edgar Allen Poe.’ He met her eyes without a smile. ‘Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted.’
‘Stories of murder and horror,’ Fiona shouted above the noise of the engine. ‘My father likes Poe.’
Elena frowned. Of course he did. The car toiled around another curve above a torrent of water. Peter’s elbow pressed sharp against her arm. She tried to move away but the elbow followed her. His face loomed close, his blue eyes malevolent. He began to declaim as if to her alone.
‘Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! Quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!’
He meant he did not want her here. His stare was icy. She managed not to blink.
Henry was twisting his head, trying to see. ‘Are you all right, Elena?’
‘Yes, Henry. Thank you.’
‘Yes, Henry. Thank you,’ Peter echoed. Then, ‘And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming – ’
‘By the way, Peter,’ kind Henry interrupting, ‘to answer your question, I’m in Inverness on business. So how come you’re here?’
To Elena’s relief, Peter’s eyes left hers and seemed instead to seek Fiona’s in the driving mirror. The pressure of his elbow eased also. He extended a hand to touch Fiona’s shoulder. ‘Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore – ’
‘Oh, please yourself,’ said Henry.
Anger filled the air. The hatred of brothers. Elena’s knees pressed hard against the back of Henry’s seat, and the dog weighed so heavy she could barely move. It turned and panted in her face. Recoiling from the stink, her head bumped against the canvas ceiling, fat with luggage. She fought a wave of nausea, then wrestled her arms from the sleeves of the coat.
Love, Revenge & Buttered Scones Page 10
