‘Dolores Ibarruri, the Spanish woman revolutionary leader. Now don’t make a face, she was magnificent. She restored my belief in the Movement. Do you know what she said to the men who’d been fighting? She said, “You can go proudly, you are history, you are legend. We shall not forget you and when the olive tree of peace puts forth its leaves again, come back…” It was wonderful. Everyone was weeping. I was walking away at the end and I bumped right into Ninian because I couldn’t see for my tears.’
Her eyes told the rest. How they’d held each other, how they’d wept and promised never to part again, how they’d clung together and been so entranced with each other that even the dangers of their flight from Spain seemed insignificant.
‘Is he well?’ asked Lizzie.
‘He was wounded in the cheek, but just a flesh wound. He was wearing a bandage on his head but I knew him at once.’
Lexie was babbling like a child in her excitement.
‘Where is he now?’ Maggy spoke up from the doorway where she’d followed Lexie in.
The girl’s face sobered. ‘He’s in France. He’s waiting to go to America with some men he met in Spain. He won’t come back to Britain because he’s in trouble with the authorities – over the Communist thing. He’s too outspoken. Besides he says he doesn’t want to come back. He says everything’ll be the same, the same government, the same hopelessness, it would finish him. He wants a new world, a new start.’
As she talked about Ninian’s determination to go to America, Lexie’s ebullience gradually died down and the other women could see that she was confused.
‘What are you going to do?’ asked Lizzie.
‘I don’t know. He says he wants to marry me but I had to come back and see everyone here before I made up my mind. I need time to think about it away from him, he affects my mind when I’m with him… I can’t think properly.’
‘You should go,’ said Lizzie, laying her hand on Lexie’s. ‘I’m sure you think that as well.’
‘I’m going to see Rosie now and then I’ll decide,’ said Lexie.
* * *
When she came back the next afternoon she told Lizzie, ‘For once Rosie agrees with you. I’m going because I love him so much, but—’
‘But what?’
‘But I know it’s not going to be plain sailing. He’s not an easy man in any way but he’s the only one I’ve ever loved. The doctor in Spain was so good that I admired him tremendously but I didn’t love him like I love Ninian. He’s in my blood like a fever.’
‘Then go,’ said Lizzie with a smile, but as Lexie stood up, she suddenly asked, ‘Would you do something for me before you leave? Would you help me set up my trust fund? You know better than anybody what sort of women need help and how it would be best to give it to them.’
They worked over it for a week and when it was finished they showed the papers to Johnny.
Lizzie told him, ‘Lexie’s been helping me. We’ve selected the trustees. She’s very fussy. But you’re not going to be happy about it – she’s persuaded Rosie to stay in Dundee and be one of them.’
Johnny looked at Lexie and was impressed by her tawny, leopard-like beauty. Old David Mudie produced two magnificent daughters, he thought.
‘You’re a scheming pair,’ he said, ‘but I’m not really surprised. It’s obvious to me by now that Rosie’d never settle in San Francisco. She’s far too much a Dundonian for that. She’d want me to bring her back within a month.’
‘You’d be lucky if she lasted that long,’ laughed Lexie.
Lizzie was more serious. ‘You needn’t travel back alone, though. Why don’t you take Lexie with you? She’s been trying to get across to America to meet Ninian again but we haven’t been able to book her a passage, all the boats are full.’
Johnny nodded. ‘War’s coming. People are getting away. I don’t want to be trapped on this side of the Adantic either, because my business is needing me. I’m flying back and if you’re not afraid to fly, Lexie, I’ll take you with me. The Government’s lending me a plane.’
They stared at him in amazement. ‘The Government?’ asked Lizzie in disbelief.
He nodded modestly. ‘I do some things for them from time to time,’ he said.
She laughed and said, ‘Your mother was right and so was the fortune teller she met in Duthie Park.’
‘There must be something in fortune telling after all,’ grinned Johnny.
Lexie looked at her sister with a frown. ‘But will you be all right, Lizzie?’ she asked.
Johnny looked at her too and added, ‘I’d take you as well if you’d come.’
She shook her head. ‘No, Johnny, it’s too late for that. I’ll stay here with Maggy. I’m feeling much better since I sold the mill. The doctor says my health’s improved enormously. Come back and visit me when the war’s over.’
She turned to Lexie and said with conviction, ‘But you must go. Everything’s organized now. You and Johnny have helped me find something to do with myself. Pack a bag and go with him before he changes his mind.’
* * *
They left next day. All Lexie’s possessions were contained in one small suitcase but beneath her arm she carried two paper-covered parcels – her silver Alphonse Mucha plate and Ninian’s Rembrandt drawing.
Lizzie waved them off from the doorstep with more brightness and energy than she had shown for a long time, but when their car disappeared up the drive she seemed to wilt and Maggy had to help her back into the house.
‘You’ve done too much. You’ve been overdoing it. I’m going to call the doctor,’ she scolded as she plumped up the cushions behind Lizzie’s back in her favourite chair.
‘No, don’t, Maggy. I’m all right, stay here with me for a bit,’ whispered Lizzie between bouts of coughing. ‘I’m only tired.’
She was put to bed and lay without complaint while the maids fussed around fetching and carrying. Charlie came to visit and was reassured by her that she was perfectly well and only resting. When evening drew in she fell into a sound sleep.
Since Charlie married, Maggy had slept in the bedroom adjoining Lizzie’s. Early next morning she sat up with a start. She had heard something. She listened, her head cocked, but there was only silence all around her. The sky was streaked with dawn light so she knew it was still very early. When she settled down into her pillows she heard the sound again. It was coming from Lizzie’s room.
Jumping from bed, she ran in bare feet, very quietly opened Lizzie’s door and slipped into the room, carefully closing it behind her so that no draught would disturb the sleeper. The room was silent. She tiptoed across the carpet and saw to her surprise that Lizzie’s eyes were open.
‘Did you hear me coughing?’ she whispered.
‘I heard something. I didn’t know what it was.’
‘I feel very strange, Maggy dear. Something’s happening to me.’
Her voice was quavering and feeble. Frightened, Maggy whispered back, ‘I’ll fetch you a brandy and phone the doctor.’
Lizzie moved her head on the pillow. ‘Not yet, stay with me for a little while. Hold my hand. I don’t want brandy. I’d rather have your company.’
Maggy knelt by the bedside holding the hand with its many sparkling rings. She was gently brushing the hair back from Lizzie’s face when she heard the bedroom door slowly creaking open. In an exasperated way she turned her head to reprimand whoever was coming in but, though the door stood half open revealing the hall, there was no one there.
With a ‘tch’ of impatience Maggy let go of Lizzie’s hand and rose to close the door again.
When she was halfway across the carpet she heard Lizzie’s voice, surprisingly strong and very happy, crying out, ‘Oh, it’s you! I’m so glad it’s you!’
When Maggy turned she saw that the woman on the bed was smiling towards the open door.
She turned back. The doorway was still empty. She went over to the bed again and what she saw there made her sob out in anguish, ‘Oh, no, no!’
> Lizzie’s head had fallen sideways into the pillow and her arm was swinging loosely down towards the floor. In the growing brightness of dawn Maggy could see that her eyes were open and there was a half smile on her lips, but she was dead.
First published in Great Britain in 1990 by Random Century Group
This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by
Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
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United Kingdom
Copyright © Elisabeth McNeill, 1990
The moral right of Elisabeth McNeill to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788636346
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Mistress of Green Tree Mill Page 39