The Blackhouse Bride

by Fiona Monroe

  Soon, Bridie hardly heard a word of English spoken when they passed cottages, or stopped for rest and refreshment in the scattered villages along the way. She understood the Gaelic well enough, since her mother had spoken it to her and she often had occasion to use it with passing customers, though few who lived around Bridge of Auchtie or Kirkton spoke it these days. Her father affected not to understand it at all, so she dealt, rather haltingly, with innkeepers and others they met on their way.

  It felt now as if they were on the roof of the world, or the ends of the earth. Nowhere, she thought, could be so desolate or so completely silent and empty. The all-pervading rain shrouded the scenery in grey, making the loch below them, the mountains beyond and the smudge of castle in the distance indistinct and unreal.

  Now they were clopping and splashing towards the first real signs of human life they had seen since leaving Inverlannan hours before, a village of smart, neat little cottages, which looked recently built in a uniform style around a church that also looked new. As they came into the village, children ran from the cottages onto the road, and women with shawls over their heads stood in open doorways to scrutinise the newcomers.

  Bridie's father pulled back on the reigns, and their old mule plodded to a halt.

  "The minister should be here to greet us, father," Bridie said. "His name is Mr Farquhar. Perhaps we should ask...?"

  She was aware that her father seemed disorientated, indeed bewildered, as he often had since they had left the borders of the Dunwoodie estate. To her knowledge, her father had never in his life been further abroad than Aberdeen, and she knew he had not travelled to the city for many years. As master of his house and forge, he was confident and in complete control of everything and everyone under its roof. Out in the world, he seemed a little lost.

  Bridie unfolded herself, stiff and aching, and climbed down from the cart. Her boots were full of water, and the ground felt uneasy beneath her feet as it always did after some hours of riding in the cart. She called to the quickest-looking of the children who had emerged into the rain to investigate the new arrivals, a barefoot girl of about ten in an ill-fitting frock, and asked her in Gaelic where the minister's house was.

  The girl giggled, perhaps at her accent, and pointed towards the far end of the street.

  Bridie squinted in that direction, and said to her father, "We should go on a little further, the girl says the manse is that way."

  She was desperate, above all, to get under some kind of cover. The rain had worsened suddenly, turning from drizzle into a driving downpour.

  Before she could climb back into the cart, however, she saw a tall figure striding down the middle of the street towards them. It was certainly a man, a tall, broad man, and he walked as if the lashing sheets of water scarcely touched his wide shoulders. As he came close enough for them to see each other distinctly, he stopped.

  He was scrutinising her, Bridie thought. She herself was frozen into place, also for now disregarding the rain plastering her hair to her face and streaming into her eyes. She knew, at first sight, that this was by no means Mr Farquhar, minister of Scourie Kirk. This was the man to whom she had provisionally pledged to give her hand and soul, to join with in holy matrimony within a day or so, and then never to part from while she lived, or he did. To pledge before God to love, honour and obey. The man who would take her maidenhead, and that perhaps tomorrow night.

  He was a peasant. There was no other word she could find in her numbed brain. This man whom Dr Menzies had, in measured tones, described as practically a gentleman, a scholar at the University, stood before her with bare, rugged feet, swathed in a dark green plaid garment that wrapped around his shoulders and fell somehow to below his knees, given shape only by a wide leather belt with an ornately-wrought silver buckle. That incongruous touch of finery, and the bone-handled dagger that hung from a loop on the same belt, was the only intimation that he was any kind of gentleman. A wild tangle of unruly black hair was topped with the blue knitted bonnet she had seen many Highland men wearing, pulled low over his brow.

  And below that, penetrating eyes. Even at a little distance, and through the rain, she could see that they were a brilliant, shocking blue.

  He was regarding her seriously with those eyes. She had no idea how she appeared to him, although standing there soaked to the skin, with hair bedraggled and face streaked with rain, she supposed she must present a sad sight.

  After a long hesitation, the figure stepped forward and held out his hand. "Angus MacAllister at your service, madam," he said, in English that was heavily marked with the peculiar lilt of Gaelic.

  She was shaking, and not just because she was cold and soaked. She felt for a long moment that she would never be able to make her arm move, to reach out and touch the big, solid hand that he patiently proffered. She imagined it as rough and calloused, though when she did allow him to take it, his grip felt firm and smooth.

  Just as Lord John had, he raised it to his lips, and she felt a brief warmth against her fingers.

  "I am Bridie MacFarlane, sir," she said stupidly, stumbling over the words, trying to curtsy in her wet skirts. She could not look up to meet his eyes, now that they had broken off that first long startled gaze.

  "Aye," he said. "It seems you are."

  #

  Dr Menzies had arranged it that the minister at Scourie, Mr Farquhar, should accommodate them when they arrived in the village and perform the wedding the very next day, unless - of course - either party changed their minds, upon actually meeting each other. It was Bridie's father's intention to stay in Scourie, and trespass upon the minister's hospitality, only a single night. He would stay to give his daughter to this tacksman in the kirk, to see her lawfully wed, and then would set out straight away on his long journey home.

  And Bridie supposed that it was the plan that her new husband would take her to his home, which she fully understood for the first time was not in or near the village of Scourie, but far beyond it up the glen. He had been waiting and watching for her arrival in the village, lodging with Mr Farquhar, for the past two days.

  The rain lashed against the windows of the dining room, where Bridie sat for the first time in her life a guest at a gentleman's table, in company with Mr Farquhar, the minister's very pretty, very young wife, her father and the man she was to marry in the morning.

  They formed an odd group. Mr Farquhar was not old, not at all, but he had a stiff, elderly air about him, and a very formal way of talking. Bridie had liked him immediately, but also felt intimidated by him. Mrs Farquhar was about Bridie's own age, golden-haired, slight and vacant-looking, an unlikely wife for such a serious man. Her father looked most uncomfortable, forced to sit at table with a minister and his wife, as if he were their equal; Bridie knew that he must dread making some mistake.

  She herself was not concerned about that. She had acquired enough genteel manners, first from Dr Menzies and lately from Lady Crieff, to feel quite at her ease eating soup in a minister's modest dining room. She also recognised that this dinner represented the fact that her place in the world, and her father's by extension while he was with her, was about to change. However difficult it was to believe, with this barefoot barbarian before her, she was marrying above her station.

  He had in fact donned garters and some kind of suede slippers in the spirit, she supposed, of dressing for dinner, and he had swapped the sodden plaid drapes for another, smarter set. He had also pinned a silver brooch with a large amethyst at its centre to one shoulder, and Bridie found her eyes drawn to the sparkling gem, and reflecting that the jewel might be worth what her father made in half a year.

  It did not appear that he had dragged a comb through his forest of hair though, now fully revealed in the absence of a bonnet, and though it was only June his face and hands were burnt coarse and brown. He was a head taller than the minister, who was not himself a small man, and seemed to fill half of his side of the modestly-sized dining table.

  Throughout the meal, s
he was drenched in an embarrassment that she supposed must be modesty. She was acutely aware that everyone around the table - the austere minister, his silly-looking wife, and of course her silent, frowning father - must be looking between them, and wondering how they felt about their imminent, near sight-unseen union. She was conscious too that he must be scrutinising her, judging her beauty, deciding whether he could like her or not. She had towelled her hair dry and attempted to arrange it, and put on her one fine gown - a present from Lady Crieff - but she was not sure, after a day spent rattling along narrow roads in the rain, whether she could possibly look presentable.

  For her part, she was too overwhelmed with confusion to dare look at him directly, but stole quick glances between bites.

  "This is the mouth of Gleann A'Chaisteall," he explained, as they were served soup by a maid in a neat uniform.

  They did not have soup at home, they did not eat multiple courses, and her father toyed uneasily with his cutlery.

  "All the land from here on belongs to the laird, Sir Duncan Buccleuch," he continued. "Baille nam Breac is not above two hours' travel. It's not so far."

  "Village of salmon?" she asked, timidly. Everything she said seemed to be coming out sounding timid, and very stupid, in a broken voice. She was horribly conscious that she had been sent here in the character of a learned young woman, and her every utterance so far had been trivial, commonplace and dull. She had been shocked by his rough and wild appearance, was shocked still even though his voice was gentle and - she supposed - cultured, but she did not want to be thought a poor bargain herself.

  "A'bheil Ghaidhlig agaibh?" he asked, sounding only mildly surprised.

  "Tha... beagan." Yes, a little.

  "I had not expected that," he said, returning to English. "I had thought that around Aberdeen, the Gaelic had died away."

  "My mother was from Nairn, sir, she spoke it with me when I was a child."

  "Well, it will soon need to be more than a little, because in the township we speak nothing else."

  "If you thought I would not have the Gaelic, how did you expect I would talk to anyone?"

  The question sprang from her before she could stop herself. It was his evident, casual assumption that she would have been mute and helpless in her new community, as if that did not matter much, that suddenly ruffled her.

  Her father shot her a look of surprise and censure. He had been silent throughout the meal so far, his discomfort with his surroundings evident, but he was quick to reprove her with his eyes when he thought her too outspoken, and possibly disrespectful to her future husband.

  Angus MacAllister, too, looked momentarily taken aback. His spoon paused halfway to his mouth, and he lowered it back into the bowl. "I expected you to learn. Dr Menzies lauded your wits highly enough."

  In that moment, she had forgotten her embarrassment, and looked directly into his eyes.

  "My Bridie is a good girl, sir," said her father, gruffly, breaking his silence. "She will do whatever you require of her, in duty. I have brought her up as best I can to be dutiful and obedient."

  "And so Dr Menzies told me, Mr MacFarlane. I've no doubt of it."

  "She is sometimes wont to speak her mind too freely, that's all. She needs correcting for that, sometimes, but that is all, sir."

  Bridie's face burned, and she broke their interlocked gaze. She did not want to see her intended groom's disappointment or disapproval.

  "It seems that Miss MacFarlane might like to pray upon Corinthians in preparation for tomorrow," said Mr Farquhar mildly. "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence."

  "Timothy," Bridie said, entirely without thinking. She pretended to cough then, to cover herself, but the minister turned his head and leaned towards her.

  "Excuse me, Miss MacFarlane?" said Mr Farquhar courteously and solemnly.

  Bridie could feel her father's gaze boring into her, but she had to answer the question. "Timothy, sir. That verse is from Timothy - 2, I think - er, not Corinthians."

  Her intended husband threw back his head and gave a great bellow of laughter which startled Bridie. Her father scowled, and Mrs Farquhar let out a loud giggle. Mr Farquhar merely looked affronted.

  At the end of the evening, Angus MacAllister took leave of her without fine words or any display of gallantry beyond, again, a simple kiss of the hand. They did not have any kind of private moment together, though he engaged briefly her eyes with his own and she thought she saw something of a smile there. She wondered if he approved her; if not, if the sight of her repulsed him or her conversation at dinner had disgusted him, would he withdraw from the arrangement? Dr Menzies had implied that neither party was to be considered honour bound, that the wedding would go ahead only if each approved the other upon meeting.

  She supposed therefore she could speak up now and say that this man was too wild-looking, too rough, too large; but she knew as she watched him through the open front door of the manse, walking away, shoeless again, down the path to go she knew not where, that she was not going to do any such thing. Her father had done her a great favour in allowing her to reject the match he had desired for her, and shown considerable generosity and care in bringing her all the way to this wild land. There was no way that she could back out now, even if her intended husband had proven ugly or disfigured. He was neither, and nor did he seem actually vicious, so she was going to have to do it. She was really going to have to get married to him in the morning.

  Her stomach fluttered uneasily. So, she returned to wondering whether perhaps he would decline her; and as she formed the thought, she realised that she did not want him to.

  Still, she was very far from being pleased or excited at the prospect of her wedding. Her most positive feeling was a kind of faint curiosity, mingled with dread at the very great and irreversible step she was taking. If she let herself think too long on the significance of what she was about to do - pledging herself, eternally and immutably, to a complete stranger - black panic started to well inside her. She struggled not to think about it at all.

  #

  Bridie was to spend her last night as a maiden in the guest bedroom of the manse, while her father was to sleep over the stables with the outdoorsman. There was no other room in the house, Mrs Farquhar explained apologetically, as her child and its nursemaid slept in the other bedroom.

  Her father bowed his thanks - Bridie suspected he was more comfortable with staying in the stables, rather than be a guest under a gentleman's roof - and said, "Before I retire, madam, if I could, I'd speak a few words with my daughter in private."

  "Oh! Of course," said the obliging Mrs Farquhar. "I'll leave you alone." And she left, taking her candle with her, and closed the sitting room door on them.

  The only light now was the glow of the grate, and the persistent summer twilight glimmering through the windows.

  "Well, child?"

  Bridie looked at her father's shadowed face. "Father?"

  "Are you satisfied?"

  "With... Mr MacAllister? Aye, he seems a very - he seems to be everything Dr Menzies described him to be."

  "Do you truly want me to leave you in this place, to become one flesh with this man?"

  She gathered her resolve, her heart thumping, and lifted her chin. "Aye, father. I do."

  "He looks to be a great big fellow, to be sure, and he was wearing more fine ornaments tonight than Callum Dobbie could buy you in a lifetime. But remember our Lord said, Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth."

  "Do you disapprove of Mr MacAllister to be my husband, father? I would not marry him without your blessing."

  Her father was silent for a moment, then said, "I did not like to hear him mock the minister, Bridie."

  "Oh! Father, I'm sure he was not mocking, he was just - "

  "And I was shamed that my daughter should give him cause to."

  "I - " For one moment, Bridie was about to defend herself. Then she hung her head. "I'm very sorry, fath
er."

  "I hope that you'll not parade your knowledge in such a way once you're married, child."

  "No, father."

  "Were we at home, mind, I'd take the strap to you for that display of disrespect."

  She knew that. It had been a long time now since she had last felt the strap, though in her heart she knew she had deserved punishment for her part in what had happened with Lord John.

  "Ah well," said her father, after a silence, with a deep sigh. "Tomorrow morn I hand you over to the care of another man, and you'll be his to discipline when needs be. I'd advise you, Bridie, not to make too many bold remarks like you did tonight. Your husband might like your impudence now, but it will be a different matter once you're wed. And his arm looks to be a fair way stronger than mine, for sure."

  "I'll be good, father."

  Her father regarded her for a moment longer, then gently took her head between his hands and kissed the crown. "Sleep well, child. You have an important day tomorrow."

  #

  But Bridie could not sleep, of course. She lay under sweet-smelling clean sheets and blankets, a luxury after a week of lumpy inn mattresses and dubious linen, gazing at the grey glow in the sky through the unshuttered window, fighting the swirling panic that threatened to drown her. She wished she had had a chance to have just one single conversation alone with her betrothed, so that she did not need to be so afraid of the unknown. Her mind went back to her conversation with Lady Crieff, and her ladyship's theory that no woman could truly know a man before their wedding; that all meetings generally took place in company, and that feelings could grow. But would Lady Crieff really have been prepared to marry a man unseen, or at least on an acquaintance formed over one uneasy supper-party?

  It did not matter. She had affirmed her consent to her father, and short of a change of mind on Mr MacAllister's part, she would be married by this time tomorrow. Bridie closed her eyes and prayed, trying to be thankful that she was no longer facing either of the prospects that had terrified her, and yet had seemed inescapable; a bookless life of drudgery chained to Callum Dobbie, or ruin and disgrace at the hands of Lord John Dunwoodie.