Highland Dew

by Barrett Magill

  “Yes! Out in the yard. You wanted to know where he put the envelope.” Fiona seemed revived and excited.

  “That’s what I was asking himself. Where he put the envelope with the recipe.” Murray shook his head. “I’m awful sorry I don’t know how to help. I never worked on that part of the job. It’s too complicated, you know.”

  Fiona patted his shoulder. “It’s all right, Murray. You tried. But, if you think of anything, I want you to come get me immediately.”

  He simply nodded and headed back to his cottage.

  “There’s nothing more we can do today. Let’s try another tack tomorrow,” Bryce said.

  Gavin moved toward the driveway. “I think I’ll sit on the front porch awhile. Might remember something.” He trudged dejectedly across the yard.

  Fiona grabbed her arms. “What are we going to do? I just feel sick. Why did we not think about all the steps first? This is a disaster, and what was Murray going to do with the recipe if he found it anyway?”

  Bryce put an arm around her shoulder. “Let’s take a walk. I think I might have an idea to work out.”

  Chapter Forty-eight

  “Tom and Liam, I am so grateful you’d take your day off to come and help.” Bryce shook hands with both men.

  Tom smiled. “You did sound a little tense and worried. Let me see if I understand the problem. You’re ready to run the first batch of the Highland Dew, but there’s a problem with Gavin’s specifics?”

  “That’s about it. Gavin doesn’t remember the specifics. I haven’t told him you were coming yet. I wanted to be sure this might work, and I think Liam is the only one who can answer that.”

  “Answer what?” Fiona came up from the office. “Hi, Tom. Liam.”

  Bryce looked around. “Okay. Since Liam is the Master Distiller and has tasted each of the whiskies in the cellar, I thought he might be able to walk Gavin back through the steps and have him describe them verbally. I know his memory isn’t great, but physical memory might be better.”

  Tom nodded. Liam spoke up. “I think it’s worth a try. I know for myself that I do a lot of my tasks by rote. If you asked me how I did it, I might not remember.”

  Fiona looked skeptical. “It makes sense, but I don’t know if Dad will feel pressured.”

  “How about if he just goes with Liam? Slow and easy. No pressure. And anything he can describe will be helpful.”

  Fiona agreed. “Let me explain it and bring him out. Bryce, why don’t you and Tom meet me on the front porch?”

  Bryce got Tom a beer and they settled in expectantly.

  “This doesn’t have to be a problem.” Tom took a swallow and leaned back in the wooden rocker. “If we know his barley purveyor, his cooper, and can figure out any malting quirks, we should be able to replicate the product. The water’s the same and the storage the same.” He smiled at Bryce. “Good call to bring Liam in. There’s nobody better to identify subtleties of taste. Believe me. He studied those samples you sent and was really impressed with the nuances.”

  “That’s what I’m hoping. Sure would be nice to have Gavin’s notes, though.” Bryce sipped her beer into the resulting silence.

  ****

  Fiona paced in the kitchen. She didn’t want to talk. She wanted her dad to have a moment of clarity and remember how he did his life’s work for so many years, or at the very least, where he put his notes.

  The hands on the clock didn’t move. She wiped every surface for the third time when she heard voices at the back door. “Bryce,” she called through the living room.

  Her dad walked in, followed by Liam. “I really enjoyed working with you, but I think we’re done for today.” He laughed. “At least I am. Will you excuse me?”

  He shuffled off toward his room, and passed Tom and Bryce in the living room.

  “Please sit down,” Fiona said. “Can I get you a beer or something else, Liam?”

  “I’d really like a beer. Thanks.”

  The tension was thick, and no one wanted to ask. Finally, Fiona couldn’t stand it any longer. “Was he able to remember anything?”

  Liam took several swallows of the beer and sighed. “Yeah, he did pretty good. I guess he’s been doing the same with the new lads. Explained some of the history that changed. They originally used apple wood to heat the malt. Probably added a nice flavor. And he still can discern the taste he wants.”

  He took another drink. “Unfortunately, he’s pretty vague on some of the details. I think I might be able to reconstruct some information by taking a careful look at the next barrel that comes to us for bottling. Maybe one of the 1998 ones. If I can check the barrel and take apart the layers in the whisky, I might have a better handle on what’s missing. No guarantee, though.”

  Bryce smiled. “That’s a really good start. I hoped you could figure some of this out. Man, you’re good.”

  “Will it be enough to make the Highland Dew?” Fiona asked.

  “I think we’ll just have to try a batch and then make adjustments if necessary. Then try again,” Tom said.

  Bryce stood as both Tom and Liam did. “We’ll keep looking. Thank you both for coming. I’m sure Leo would say the same.”

  As their car left, Fiona started to cry.

  “What’s wrong? We got some good information.” Bryce came over and sat beside her.

  “I don’t know. I’m relieved but still scared this will all blow up.”

  “I know how you feel, and I’m worried, too. But you know, we might be able to blend the new whisky in three years with some of the older stuff. We’d have to call it something different, but that could work.” Bryce stood up and stretched. “If it’s okay with you, I think I’ll go out to the office and go through some of the old invoices to see who their original purveyors were. Who knows, they might remember somebody who worked here back then who remembers some details.”

  “That’s a good idea. I never would’ve thought of it.” Fiona started making a list on a piece of paper. “Since you’ll be around, I’m going to run over to the store and get a few things. Tomorrow is Dad’s birthday, so I want to make him something special. Maybe you could bring those files into the kitchen so you could listen for him?”

  “Sure, I can do that. You take your time.” Bryce kissed her forehead and left for the office.

  Fiona finished her list and grabbed her shopping bags and purse. She stopped. “If I don’t check that recipe, I’ll be kicking myself.” She dropped her stuff and snatched her mum’s cookbook off the shelf and dropped it on the floor. It bounced and dozens of small and large pieces of paper flew everywhere.

  “Dammit to hell! What else can go wrong?” She swiped tears from her eyes and swept all the papers into a pile and slapped them on the table. “This can wait.” A quick look at the recipe and she was out the door.

  Bryce waved as she sped down the driveway.

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Bryce spent an hour going through the accounting records. Once she had a few names, she went through the file folder marked “1990s.” It was a thick folder. What she wanted was a name or an address for the companies that provided the barrels, barley, or other services.

  After an hour, she had found a few leads. She got up to get a drink and noticed the mess of paper at the other end of the table. Fiona must have been in a hurry to leave such a mess.

  She dug in the fridge for a beer, and sipped it while she stared at the mess on the table. “Aw, be a sport and clean that up.”

  First, she separated them in to piles by similarity—age, handwriting, size. Some of the older ones intrigued her. Small delicate handwriting with a fine-pointed fountain pen. Mysterious ingredients with odd measurements. A few must have been in Gaelic. She set three plain envelopes aside.

  Bryce just started to look through the cookbook for strays when she heard the car door slam, and Fiona clattered up the steps with some noisy packages.

  “Here, let me help.” Bryce held the door and took the bag heavy with beer.

&nbs
p; “Thanks. That took longer than I planned.” She set bags all over the counter and table. “I ran into Bert Coe in the parking lot. He worked for Dad—at least, oh, twenty years ago. I was still in secondary school.” She handed Bryce items for the fridge. “Apparently, he moved to Edinburgh eight years ago and apprenticed in one of the large bottling companies. Just retired and moved back.”

  “How closely did he work with your dad?” Bryce folded up bags and stowed them under the sink.

  Fiona smiled. “Exactly what I wondered. I asked him to come by next week to surprise Dad and catch up on old times.”

  “He might be able to help.” Bryce picked up her notes. “I found a couple of names and numbers: one for a fella at the Speyside cooperage and the other at Crisp Maltings. That was listed as barley.” She shrugged. “Maybe this guy Bert could shed some light.”

  “Shed light on what? We got another mystery?” Gavin stood in the doorway with his cane.

  “Come, sit. We were doing some detective work to find out about your suppliers hoping that might help.” Bryce pulled out his chair.

  “What’s all this?” He picked up a stack of recipes.

  “I dropped Mum’s cookbook and Bryce was kind enough to pick up the mess. I wanted to make you something special for your birthday.”

  Bryce brought a bottle from the living room. “Would anyone care for a dram before dinner? All this talk about making whisky made me thirsty.”

  They all took a seat and sipped some Highland Dew while Fiona and Bryce took turns telling Gavin what they had found out about suppliers and Bert coming to visit. All the while, Gavin was picking through the scraps of paper and reading the notes. His eyes misted up as he read notes from Mary and from his mother.

  “You okay, Dad?”

  “There’s a lot of our history just in these old notes and recipes, Fi. I’m glad we kept them.” He opened one of the envelopes and found a handful of snapshots from Fiona’s childhood. He handed them to her. Another envelope held a small amount of cash.

  “What do you suppose Mary was saving this for?”

  Fiona was explaining the photos to Bryce when her dad slapped the table.

  “These are my notes!”

  Chapter Fifty

  By Monday afternoon, it was all-hands-on-deck. Bryce had set up a schedule and an outline of what they needed in order to start a new batch of Highland Dew. Assembled around the table were Gavin, Brian, Gary, Fiona, and Bert Coe. While Gavin and Bert were trying to put together a list of what they needed, Brian and Gary were reviewing the invoices from Crisp Maltings, and the Speyside cooperage.

  Bryce went outside to take a phone call from Liam. “Okay, I have some paper. Go ahead.”

  “From what I could figure out, they’ve always used oak Bourbon barrels. The six special-edition barrels were sherry casks. Here’s the oddity—in the oldest samples, I can just barely detect apples.”

  “You know, that was the first thing I noticed when I did the blind test. I really think that was what made it unique.” Bryce shook her head and smiled. She had underlined the word “apples.” “We have found the source for the barley and the barrels. It looks like sometime in the early nineties they started using the maltings from Crisp. For a while, they did a few small batches here using a combination of coal and apple wood.”

  “That’s interesting. I also think that was detectable in the Distiller’s Edition.”

  “I need to get back. As soon as we can, we’re going to start the first batch. Keep your fingers crossed that we’ve got all the ingredients we need.”

  “Let me know.”

  Bryce reported Liam’s comments, and when she mentioned the apple flavor, Gavin smiled and nodded. He began messing with his pipe, which meant a story was coming. Fiona winked at Bryce. Now conditioned, Brian and Gary sat back for the story.

  “When all this started back in the early part of the eighteen hundreds, makin’ whisky was illegal. Hell, the monks were distilling spirits since the sixteen hundreds. Anyway, your great-great-granddad got caught and fined so many times that he quit. He started making cider from the apples in this valley. Got away with that, so he tried aging it a bit more and made some good hard cider. They had to build a bigger cellar to keep it.

  “When things cooled down, your great-great-grandmother helped set up the still and started making whisky. Stored the barrels right behind the cider.” He laughed. “Granddad was in the clear. She kept all the records hidden. When their boy married, his wife learned the secrets from Great-grandmother. Eventually, they paid the excise men for a license.”

  “So that’s how the recipe ended up in the cookbook,” Fiona said.

  “No one would think of lookin’ in a woman’s cookin’ stuff.”

  Bryce nudged her. “Good thing you tossed it on the floor.” Laughter broke out.

  “That was an accident!” Fiona argued.

  “A heavenly accident, I’d say.” Gavin winked at her.

  ****

  The next few weeks flew by in acute anticipation. There was still work to be done, and Speyburn sped the number of barrels they bottled to the maximum capacity they could muster alongside their own product.

  Fiona fought between elation and panic. They had designed and ordered a new sign, and Bryce had just gone down to direct the installation of two large sign posts.

  With fall around the corner, Fiona busied herself with young Robbie planting new flowerbeds and adding decorative stone. And since the men had power washed the house, she wanted to get the trim painted. All the while, in the back of her head, she weighed several options that might give her and Bryce a way to live together. It frustrated her to say goodbye every evening and watch Bryce drive the few miles to her cottage. Her fantasy was to add onto the house, or build a separate house for her dad—or for them. As the sales increased, the financials ceased to be a worry.

  Bryce came running from the office. “It’s time.”

  “For what?”

  “Your Dad’s gonna check the second distillation.” She stopped and hugged Fiona. “Come on.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “I don’t know the particulars, but a sample in the spirit safe is being tested to be sure that the amount of alcohol being produced is between sixty and seventy percent.”

  Fiona laughed. “Well, that helps.”

  When they got into the still room, Gavin was standing at the spirit safe with Brian, whispering and fiddling. They were both smiling. Brian stepped back. “It looks like we’re on schedule. Time to start filling some casks.”

  Gavin leaned down to them, grinning. “Too early to tell for sure, but it looks good. I’ll stay to switch it, then I think we should celebrate. How about we go somewhere for dinner?”

  Fiona and Bryce looked at each other. “Why not?”

  “Let’s ask Brian and Gary,” Bryce said. “I know they have family to get home to, but maybe for a drink.”

  It was settled, and Bryce offered to make a reservation at the Highlander Inn so they could tell Billy.

  Fiona and Bryce walked back to the house. Fiona finally admitted to feeling relaxed. “Do you think we could talk about inviting a few people to celebrate this?”

  “You realize it’ll be at least three years before we really know how this will taste.”

  “Yes. But we solved the mystery, and we have whatever information Dad can give us. I think we should thank the people who’ve helped us.”

  Bryce smiled. “You’re right. We can start making lists. Say, do you think I should contact Helen?”

  Fiona shoved her forward. “Arse.”

  Chapter Fifty-one

  The fall weather in the Speyside region turned everything rich and golden. The distillery buildings were restored and painted. Even the house looked warm and welcoming. The flowerbeds were neat, the bushes trimmed, and the porch furniture repaired and stained. Fiona had marked out a special area in the apple orchard for chairs and tables. She hoped to provide tastings and simple sna
cks.

  Meanwhile, Bryce had been busy on the phone with local and American distributors. She wanted to be sure the official rollout of their product would be well received. Tom Hobart assured her he’d have samples ready.

  Brian and Gary had been working on a secret project in the warehouse. The whole building was off-limits for weeks.

  Gavin checked on the production every day to be sure those barrels were treated like new babies. While still a little unsteady, Gavin MacDougall was once again feeling the pride of his heritage. John MacDougall, and especially his wife Helen, had started small and struggled mightily; in the end their legacy had survived. He was especially proud of Fiona. She had assumed the mantle of responsibility, and had grown into a very efficient manager.

  ****

  Bryce was up early checking her notes. Tom had promised he’d get the new bottles there by noon.

  “Sign. Right.” She dialed the local rep. “Hi, this is Bryce Andrews. I’m checking on the sign installation for the MacDougall Distillery? That’ll be perfect.” She had driven to Elgin to be absolutely sure that the sign looked exactly as she’d ordered.

  Next call was the Taste of Speyside in Dufftown. She’d enjoyed eating there and the owner was thrilled to put together some options for lunch. When she hung up, she looked at her watch. Billy had promised to order some Champagne and she needed to check on that, too.

  “Hello, may I speak to Billy? This is Bryce Andrews.”

  “Oh yes, he said if you called to tell you the wine is in the coolers and he’ll be there by noon.”

  “Thanks.”

  She changed clothes and got ready to drive over to the celebration.

  ****

  Fiona finished sweeping the porch and smiled at the spot-on appearance of the whole place. When she heard a car, she stuck the broom in the house and went out to greet Bryce. When she rounded the corner, there was a bright red convertible parked and two unfamiliar figures getting out. It only took a moment to recognize Reggie Ballard.