Wild Heritage

by Wild Heritage (retail) (epub)

  ‘Lots of people drink alcohol. They don’t all die of consumption,’ snapped Kitty.

  He turned, eyes blazing. ‘I do not approve of drinking. I discharge any man or woman in my mill who drinks. It’s a sign of moral weakness.’

  Greatly daring, Kitty said, ‘I remember once finding you the worse for drink yourself.’

  He was infuriated. ‘That was my one lapse, the only time I ever yielded. What exactly have you come about Miss Scott? I’m a busy man.’

  She stood up. ‘I came to tell you about your sister but you don’t seem to want to hear. I’m sorry I’m taking up your time.’

  ‘My sister is dead. In fact she’s been dead as far as I’m concerned for a very long time. She was the one who broke off the connection between us. I have no wish to be reminded of her.’

  ‘That’s all I need to know,’ said Kitty and she left.

  It’s perfectly possible to bring up a baby on my own, her heart was telling her. No matter where I go, Kate will go with me. We’ll have a wonderful time. The thing she had to do now was bring Kate out and act as if she were hers.

  She turned up that evening at the farm with the baby on her hip. Big Lily greeted the appearance of a baby with a loud sniff but held her tongue because Kitty fixed her with a fierce eye, daring her to say anything.

  Wee Lily and Jake were delighted with the child, cooing over her, waggling their fingers above her face, expressing their admiration for the pretty clothes that Kitty had dressed her in.

  Soon the neighbours dropped in, apparently casually, to catch a sight of Kitty’s child, for though she had not said Kate was hers, she hadn’t said otherwise. It was assumed that she’d followed the way of her mother and grandmother and given birth to another bastard. Not that she cared.

  The gossip reached the village shop where Bella, very fat and matronly-looking, served behind the counter. When Kitty failed to appear in the shop herself, Bella’s curiosity was too strong for her to resist walking up to the farm dairy with a milk-can in the hope of catching sight of the returned prodigal.

  Kitty, with Kate on her hip, was directing the workmen who had started repairs on the bothy, when Bella appeared.

  ‘It’s good to see you again, Kitty, after such a long time… and in such happy circumstances,’ she gushed.

  Kitty glowered. She’d never liked Bella and was not going to start pretending now.

  In an effect to be friendly, however, Bella looked at Kate and exclaimed, ‘What a pretty baby. Such black hair.’

  Kitty, hoisting the child higher up on her hip, said, ‘She looks like her father. He was a Hungarian.’

  Bella gasped, ‘A Hungarian!’

  Let’s give her enough gossip material for the next year, thought Kitty, so she smiled and said, ‘He was living in Paris… He was a sculptor.’

  Bella’s jaw dropped. A Hungarian sculptor in Paris!

  ‘You’ve travelled a bit since you left Camptounfoot then,’ she said.

  Kitty furrowed her brow. ‘Yes, I went off with the boxing booth first and then I lived with Freddy Farrell, the jockey. Have you heard of him? He won the Derby the year before last. Then I went to Paris…’

  It was all true. She’d only missed out bits like the baby being Marie’s and not hers.

  Bella was thunderstruck… Freddy Farrell, boxing booths, Paris… she was thinking as she hurried as fast as her bulk would allow her back to the shop to spread the news.

  When she told her mother what Kitty said, the old woman shook her head. ‘If she’s been running about wi’ Hungarians in Paris, she’ll no’ stay long in Camptounfoot, mark my words.’

  In fact, that was exactly what Kitty was thinking herself. Having seen the world, she was still too young and eager for adventure to settle back into Camptounfoot, where gossip and speculation were the main recreation. It was inevitable that she would provide most of it. She must travel again soon.

  At last the lawyer fixed up a house for Helen and arrived to collect her. She and the sheepdog were to be installed in a cottage in Rosewell where her respectable neighbours would be outraged to see her ragged, unwashed state. In spite of hints from the lawyer, Helen had done nothing to spruce herself up and intended to lead the same hermitical existence in Rosewell as she had at Camptounfoot.

  She was taking some of the best pieces of furniture from the farmhouse with her but Kitty did not care because she reckoned she was lucky to be rid of her with so little trouble.

  As soon as the wagon carrying Helen’s furniture rolled away, Kitty, carrying Kate, and accompanied by her mother and Jake, took possession of the old farmhouse. It was even dirtier and more broken-down than she’d imagined but Wee Lily gaped all around as if she were in a palace.

  ‘My mother says Craigie has treasure hidden in this house. You’ll have to find it,’ she said.

  They started looking for it at once. Kitty expected that it would be buried beneath the floor but in fact it was far more accessible than that because it had been Craigie’s greatest pleasure to take it out and turn it over, estimating its value night after night. So he kept it in a big wooden trunk in the cellar. Since he’d gone to prison, however, the chest had rarely been opened and finally Helen lost the key.

  Kitty called in Tibbie’s brother William, the village blacksmith, to break its hasp and the sight that met their eyes when the heavy lid was heaved up made even the phlegmatic blacksmith gasp. Silver ewers with handles covered with clusters of grapes, huge silver platters, a gladiator’s golden face-mask and embossed breastplate, golden horse armour, glittering weapons (for Craigie had burnished everything he found), small statues of Roman gods in bronze or gold, bracelets, toga pins, bead necklaces, a big bag of coins from the reigns of the Emperor Sevcrus and Governor Agricola… it was a treasure trove indeed.

  Also standing around the walls of the cellar were huge earthenware amphorae and smaller black pottery jugs with hunting scenes embossed round their necks. Craigie had used them for storage of home-made beer and grains or pulses, so Kitty kept them there, happy with the idea that they could still be put to the use intended by the long-dead potters who made them.

  The great value of Craigie’s treasure was an embarrassment to Kitty who consulted the lawyer about it and he decided she should bequeath the most valuable items to an Edinburgh museum under the name of the Craigie Scott Bequest. It turned out to be the most valuable gift the museum had received in its whole history.

  When the treasure was crated up for its journey to Edinburgh, Kitty made a return visit to the prison to tell Craigie what had happened to his possessions. She found him very ill and feeble, worse than before, and apparently not capable of taking in all she said.

  ‘Just sit by the bed and talk to him, miss. He doesn’t look as if he’s listening but he is,’ said the guard who was caring for him. Kitty did as she was told and reeled off the recent events…

  ‘Helen’s in Rosewell with the dog. She seems quite happy, or as happy as she’s ever been, let’s say.

  ‘The hay’s in and it was a good crop. We’ve stacked it and I’ve bought ten more calves to fatten up. We’re going to plough the river meadow and the back field and put one of them into turnips for the sheep and the big one into corn again. The house is being repaired and so is the bothy. I’m living in the house… my grandmother and my mother are still in the bothy.’

  Craigie’s closed eyes fluttered at that and she knew he was hearing her.

  ‘I found all your treasure,’ she whispered leaning forward. ‘It’s safe. I sent it in your name to a museum. It’s made you famous. There have been articles in the newspapers about it.’

  He smiled for the first time since she sat down beside him.

  Before she left she said, ‘The farm’s in good heart and I’ll take care of it. Thank you for giving it to me.’

  He made no sign that he’d heard her and it would have seemed false to try to kiss him, so she only patted his hand and went away.

  Ten days later, she was info
rmed by the prison authorities that Prisoner number 7942, Craigie Scott, aged eighty, had died and been interred in the prison burying-ground. At his own request the burial had been conducted without any of his family being informed in advance.

  Craigie’s death made Kitty unsettled. His going had freed her and she did not want freedom yet because that meant that she would have to start contemplating what lay ahead.

  She was living in the farmhouse and when she rose in the morning, she drew back the curtains of the room in which she and Kate slept and gazed out towards the Three Sisters brooding on the horizon.

  The orchard swirled around her like surf. Only a few trees were still productive and she knew she ought to cut down the lichen-covered ones but could not bring herself to call in the fellers. Some of the trees were hundreds of years old and she loved their spectral appearance.

  The place awed her; it seemed to cast some strange spell on her, a sort of enchantment that was frightening because she knew if she yielded to it, she would be in thrall for ever and would never get away. One morning she would gaze out and find that she had become an old woman. Time would have passed in a kind of dream.

  She still carried Big Lily’s knife in her skirt pocket and was afraid to let her grandmother know that she had it, not because she feared violence any longer, but because she would be branded as a liar. Big Lily’s bad opinion of her granddaughter would be justified.

  She kept Tim Maquire’s half-sovereign as well. This she stitched into the corner of the coverlet that was spread over Kate at night as she sprawled in her wooden cot. Kitty hoped that its protective magic would be passed on to her adopted daughter.

  Though she loved the farm, Kitty felt very alone, as isolated as she had been when she was ostracised because of her bastardy and the circumstances of her conception, for now she stood outside local society because of the elevation in her status. The Scotts of the farm had always possessed power in the little, close-knit village. The bondager’s bastard who now owned Townhead assumed the mantle of local ruler and people drew back from her, fearful that she might think them to be currying favour. Only Bella gushed over her and Kitty was too wary of Bella ever to consider her a friend.

  One afternoon she walked over to Falconwood farm in search of familiar faces. MacPhee, she was told, was dead; Laidlaw, the steward, had bought the land and lived in lordly state with his young wife, a farmer’s daughter twenty years his junior. Liddle, too, had died but Walter Thompson was still skulking around the cattlesheds. He pretended not to know her and she returned the compliment.

  When she asked about Effie, one of the married women bondagers who had not been on the farm when she worked there, said that the once happy, flirtatious girl was living on a farm in Berwickshire with her ploughman husband who beat her and had given her six children already. Kitty decided against going to see Effie, for she knew that the gulf between them would have grown too great.

  She walked home from Falconwood farm over her own land and wondered why she could not be content with the miraculous turn in her fortunes, but she still longed for travel and adventure and, most of all, she longed for love.

  She was lonely but she knew that her imposing appearance and self-possession intimidated local men, including the ones who might have been tempted to pay court to her because of her inheritance, and those she would not want.

  Even the sorrowing widow, Emma Jane Maquire, had more male companionship than Kitty, for the besotted Dr Robertson was her constant visitor and people were already beginning to whisper that when her period of mourning was up, she would marry him. The company she and Tim had started and run so well was still in existence with Lord Sydney Godolphin at its head. He had taken over the management of it after Tim’s untimely death.

  What am I going to do? Kitty wondered. The farm would soon be settling down into its winter hibernation and did not need her. She built a pair of workers’ cottages and hired two good hands. Everything would go perfectly well even if she was far away. But still she did not go. She was waiting for something though she did not know what it was.

  * * *

  Robbie Rutherford got off the train at Rosewell deadly tired and his injured leg ached as it always did when he was overworked or overwrought. He whistled for a cab and climbed in stiffly. On this trip he had not sent up his own carriage because it seemed to him that his attempts to impress the people at home had been infantile. He’d grown out of needing to be admired so much.

  The cabbie knew him of course. ‘Weel, Robbie, you’re lookin’ awfy braw. That’s a grand coat you’ve got on,’ was his first remark. The night was chilly, for the first frost of autumn was silvering the hedges, and Robbie was wearing a long coat with a thick fur collar which he had purchased in New York. He liked it because he thought it gave him a dashing appearance.

  He bit back a remark about buying the coat in America. A year ago he would have said it and boasted about his success there but tonight he only laughed and murmured, ‘It keeps me warm.’

  The cabbie kept talking as he drove along. ‘You’ll have heard about what happened wi’ Craigie Scott’s farm. Thon Kitty Scott, the navvy’s lassie, got it. Craigie gave it to her because her mother was his daughter by Big Lily… and Big Lily was his half-sister of course. Some family the Scotts, eh?’ he said sarcastically.

  Robbie leaned forward with interest. ‘Yes, I heard. My mother wrote to me about it. It certainly seems to have given folk up here something to talk about.’

  The cabbie laughed again. ‘Talk? You’ve never heard the like. They’ll still be talking about it this time next year.’

  ‘How’s she getting on?’ was Robbie’s next question.

  ‘Grand, grand. She’s got her heid screwed on that yin. She’s a real Scott. She’s hired men to work for her and the farm’s looking better than it’s done for twenty year. Folk are scared o’ her though. She’s a tough one.’

  ‘My mother said that Craigie left her the farm because she reminded him of his mother and she was a capable woman apparently,’ agreed Robbie.

  ‘I heard that too. There’s still old folk around that mind Craigie’s mother. She was a besom, they say, wi’ a tongue that could cut through leather and she had hair that colour, reed as fire,’ the cabbie told him.

  Robbie leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes. He had only recently returned from America after months of negotiating, arranging, estimating and winning contracts. His company, which he now owned entirely, was about to expand into America, for he had secured so much work for it there.

  He was tired and he wanted to spend more time at the Villa Favorita where his garden called him. He longed to be able to relax.

  The cab took him to the arched gate in his parents’ garden wall and when the driver saw how badly Robbie was limping, he got down and offered to carry in his bag for him.

  ‘Look after yourself, Robbie,’ he said, clapping him on the shoulder. ‘Nane o’ us are gettin’ any younger.’

  Robbie responded with a laugh but he was not really amused. The advice worried him. Life was moving on too fast. Though he looked younger, he would soon be forty years old. The years were flying by and he felt that, in spite of his huge worldly success, he had missed something.

  As usual he was greeted like a conquering hero. People stopped him on the street when he strolled out next morning and they all had the same thing to say, ‘Isn’t it amazing about Craigie giving his farm to Wee Lily’s bairn?’

  He went up to Townhead in search of her and found her in the yard with a baby on her hip. This was a surprise. He had not expected her to have a child. No one had mentioned it.

  She saw him staring at her from the farm gateway and a brilliant smile lit up her face, making her eyes dance. ‘Robbie, it’s wonderful to see you,’ she exclaimed.

  The word ‘wonderful’ made him feel strong again. His leg didn’t hurt so much any more. He straightened up and walked smartly towards her.

  ‘Well, well, this is some turn up, isn’t it? I didn
’t expect you to be mistress of Townhead when we next met.’

  A laugh gurgled from her. ‘I didn’t either.’ Then she sobered. ‘Did you get my letter about Marie? I sent it and what was left of your money to your London office.’

  ‘Yes, I got it. Thank you. It must have been a comfort for her to have you there when she died. I hope it wasn’t too painful.’

  She shivered at the memory. ‘It was very sad.’

  Instinctively when she remembered Marie, she always thought of little Kate and patted the curly dark head peeping out of the bend of her arm. The child’s brown eyes were fixed on Robbie as if she were wondering who he was.

  Seeing the solemnity on his face, Kitty said, ‘I’m sorry that I had to give you such awful news about her. You must have been very upset.’

  ‘It was tragic, but somehow she was always marked for tragedy, I think,’ said Robbie.

  Kitty was surprised that he did not seem more affected and decided that he must be hiding his feelings.

  ‘That’s a handsome child,’ he said, admiring the picture they made standing in the yard.

  She smiled proudly. ‘Yes, isn’t she? And she’s very good, an angel. I always used to think that I didn’t like children but I adore her. Come over to the farmhouse Robbie and see what I’ve done to it. I’ve got crocks of whisky in the cellar that must have been there for years and years. I’ll give you a tot so that you can toast the future.’

  He grinned. ‘That would be very appropriate. I don’t usually drink whisky in the morning but this time I’ll make an exception.’

  He’d only ever been in the gloomy front hall of Townhead farm but even that surprised him because she’d knocked a new window through the wall and painted the wood panelling a pale colour that reflected light from outside. There was a huge vase of autumn flowers, Michaelmas daisies and mop-headed chrysanthemums, on the polished pedestal table that dominated the middle of the floor.

  Robbie laid a hand on its gleaming surface. ‘That’s a fine bit of old furniture,’ he said.