by Joan Aiken
“Your gout didn’t trouble you in the desert?” she could not resist asking.
“All the time!” he said in a reproving manner. “On innumerable occasions the pain has been acute. But of course one cannot let oneself be deterred by such considerations!”
“At least your attention must have been distracted by the scenery?” she suggested demurely. But he would not permit this.
“On the contrary! I am such a wretched invalid that sometimes even the most magnificent prospect is not sufficient to divert my mind from my sufferings. When I recall the quinsy that attacked me on Mount Elbruz—”
“Shall you be returning there, do you think?” she inquired wistfully.
“Most certainly I shall. Next summer if I am spared so long. Meanwhile I am occupied in making ready the winter and spring issues of Selkirk’s; and in putting together a volume of my verse.”
Val had greatly admired the occasional verses which were scattered here and there through the travel books and said so. He was visibly pleased, and she felt their friendship had advanced another notch.
“And now, Miss Montgomery,” he said, when the coffee had been brought in, and the waiters had withdrawn, “do please tell me about the untoward events in your life which have caused this—for me so delighful—change in your plans.”
“Oh, Sir Marcus, I shall be glad to. It is all so inexplicable!” And, without further delay, she told him the whole story, beginning with Nils’ visit to New York.
At one point during the account, when she was explaining about Nils’ arrangements with the Knuckle, Sir Marcus stopped her for a moment with uplifted hand, to inquire, “I beg your pardon, my dear, but what, did you say, is your brother’s name?”
“Hansen.”
“Nils Hansen?”
“Yes.”
“Ah. Pray proceed.”
At the end of her tale he said, “A coincidence—but no more of one, really, then the kind which attracts two filings of similar metal to a magnet: the article from London which I was hoping my clerk would have ready for me today was a piece of reporting promised by your brother. He is a very able journalist.”
“Oh—you know him?” she exclaimed.
“I have only met him once, briefly. But I have read his work in the Morning Post. And I understand him to be a highly reliable correspondent. That is why I was so surprised that his article was late; he has a reputation for punctuality in professional matters.”
“What do you think can be the explanation for it all, Sir Marcus?”
He reflected.
“I fancy that the young man who spoke to you—Lord Orville—was probably correct in his guess. Your brother may have thought it best to disappear for a while—perhaps he has fallen foul of some highly placed and powerful individual about whom he has written in—unflattering—terms.”
“But—leaving his children? He might do that, but it seems so unlike my sister-in-law.”
“You say she is a niece of Louisa Carsphairn? She may have been relying on her aunt to take charge of the bairns.”
Val thought this unlikely. “Then wouldn’t she have left them with her aunts in the first place? Or at least written to them, or left word for me?”
“It seems,” said Sir Marcus, “that the pair must have been obliged to leave at very short notice. Perhaps a letter went astray.”
“And then,” pursued Val, “what part do you suppose is played in all this by Lord Clanreydon?”
“Ah,” he pondered, “yes, that is an interesting problem.”
“Do you know him? Lord Clanreydon?”
“I have met him once or twice. Clever—very clever,” Sir Marcus said fastidiously. “His origins, I understand, are veiled in obscurity—the colonies, I believe—and yet he has soared right to the top, both in politics and in polite circles. I understand that a substantial Whig following are canvassing him as the next prime minister.”
“Do you like him?”
“I must confess—no. In fact,” said Sir Marcus roundly, “I detest the fellow. I find something—I can only use the Scottish word unchancy—about him.”
“Oh yes! Sinister!”
“And yet it is hard to define precisely what is wrong.”
“What do you think I ought to do next?” Val asked, after a pause.
“I do not see that there is anything more you can do, my dear child, other than what you have already done. You have—very properly and commendably—arranged for the children to be cared for in more suitable conditions. With that, your responsibility ends. You say that you and your brother have always gone your separate ways—he has done nothing for you at any time; you are under no obligation to hunt him out, since he did not choose to make contact with you. And, in fact, your hunting or raising a hue and cry may be directly contrary to his interests, if he wishes to remain hidden.”
An immense relief flooded through Val at hearing Sir Marcus say this, since it coincided with her own feelings. Presently she asked, “What was the article he was supposed to write for Selkirk’s Magazine?
“It was to have been a piece of reporting about the London murders—about the Bermondsey Beast.”
“Do you think it possible,” suggested Val, after pondering this information, “that, in the course of his investigations on this subject, Nils might have discovered something—something which has led to his disappearance?”
“I do not want to say yes—but it is possible,” Sir Marcus replied. “The murders, as you know, have been a series of most revolting and atrocious crimes; mad, sadistic injuries have been inflicted on six women of a certain type—streetwalkers, not to mince matters—who were also strangled. All manner of wild rumours have been flying around about the affair: that the assassin must be a trained medical man—because of the expert nature of the injuries; that he is a person from the very highest circles of society—from bits of gossip the streetgirls themselves have let fall; that he must be a man of high intelligence and ability—in order to have escaped from the scene with such speed, as he always does, and to have committed so many identical crimes without being apprehended; that he might even be a member of Her Majesty’s government—since the region in which the crimes have been committed is not so far, as the crow flies, from Whitehall. Some theories even have it that there are two assassins working together, because on one night two murders were committed three miles apart yet within such a short space of time that it hardly seemed possible one man could have perpetrated them both. Gossip has not spared the highest in the land—even the Prince of Wales and Mr. Gladstone have been mentioned in this context, the latter because of his rash, if benevolent, propensity for attempting to reason with women of this type and bring them to a consciousness of wrongdoing. If your brother did indeed possess new evidence relating to the Bermondsey Beast, Miss Montgomery—he was certainly in possession of extremely dangerous material.”
“Oh my gracious,” said Val. Even to her ears it seemed a singularly inept remark.
Sir Marcus looked at her thoughtfully.
“You are very worried about your brother?”
She tried to answer honestly.
“I’m puzzled. I’m concerned. And I’m very worried about the children. Not to mention their mother, poor little thing. Where can she be?”
“I will put the question in a different way. Are you very fond of your brother?”
She felt something move inside her—it seemed like piled-up emotions from all the way back to her childhood. The claret that she had drunk, the warm, relaxed atmosphere, the unwonted freedom and expansiveness of their evening together all combined to give force to her answer.
“Fond of him? I hate him! I hate him! I always have!”
There was a pause, after she had spoken.
Feeling bitterly ashamed, yet immensely relieved to have got it out honestly, she sat twisting her coffee cup in its s
aucer.
At last Sir Marcus remarked in a meditative tone, “I did feel that there was something rather singular, you know? Here are two people vanished clean away and yet, although you took the proper steps, and indeed acted most creditably, you appeared, in a way, so matter-of-fact about it all, so calm and unconcerned. And yet it seemed plain, also, that you are a warm-hearted person.”
“I have always, always hated him,” said Val again. “He treated me with miserable cruelty as far back as I can remember—all the time that we lived together. He was constantly tormenting me, quietly persecuting me, punishing me for faults that he invented, for breaking rules that he made. I can still hear his sneering voice, ‘You’ve been bad again! Now I’m going to punish you.’ When he went off to England with my mother, it was as if the clouds had rolled away and the sun had come out. My only fear was that he should ever come back.”
Tears gathered in her eyes. She put both hands over her face.
“I felt so wicked for hating him. And when I saw him with my father, later on—in London, in Scotland, and when he came to New York this time—I tried to like him. He was so high-spirited, cheerful, friendly—I ought to have been able to like him. But I couldn’t.”
“It was courageous of you to make that admission,” said Sir Marcus.
She wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and looked at him resolutely.
“No. I must apologise for boring on about my own affairs. It was very ill-bred and inconsiderate.”
“Don’t spoil it now! Pray don’t distress yourself. You have been in a lonely and anxious situation, after all. What are you going to do next?”
“Well—first take the children to Ardnacarrig. There at least they’ll be in good hands.”
“I wouldn’t just be so certain of that,” said Sir Marcus cautiously.
Her heart sank.
“What do you mean?” Then she asked, “Have you been there? Do you know Kirstie’s aunts?”
“Och, yes. Any time these twenty years. I own a little property between Wolf’s Hope and Ravenswood, not far away, so in some sort we are neighbours. And of course Louisa and I have interests in common; we have met in Constantinople.”
“You know Kirstie too?”
“I met her once or twice before she married—a fair little frightened thing, lacking sense.”
“What might be unsuitable for the children at Ardnacarrig?” Val wanted to know.
“I ask myself whether you will think old Elspie a proper person with whom to leave the bairns.”
“I thought she was Kirstie’s old nurse!”
“Ay, she is that. But she is more. It’s a complicated relationship. And I fear she may have become somewhat wayward—captious—in her old age. She has had much to try her. However I don’t wish to prejudice you in advance. I hope she will take kindly to the children. Perhaps all will be well.”
“What can I do if it isn’t?” Val murmured, more to herself than to him.
“Why, bring them back to Edinburgh, I suppose. But Ardnacarrig is very beautiful—it is a fine place for children. Much more healthy than this dank old city.”
“Sir Marcus,” said Val, “forgive me for troubling you further, but that reminds me of something else I wanted to ask you. Can you recommend a good—a really good—doctor? I’m anxious about the little girl. I know nothing about children, but I’m sure all is not well with her. She seems somehow backward—deficient in responses.”
“Humph.” He pondered. “If you were staying on in town there’s half a dozen I could recommend. With my own wretched health, I’m always running to one practitioner or another. But, as you say you’re off in the morning to Ardnacarrig—”
“Yes?”
“Why—I can’t do better than recommend my own godson, David Ramsay. He’s a bright young spark of a doctor who had hardly but just started up his practice here, and was doing well enough, poor lad, when his mother took sick of the consumption. So he’s e’en gone back to Wolf’s Hope to be with her till the end; it won’t be so long now, I fear.”
“Poor boy,” said Val compassionately.
Sir Marcus fell silent. She noticed a sad, withdrawn expression on his face, and forbore to disturb him. They sank into one of their old silences. But presently he roused himself, wrote an address, and gave it to her.
“There. Wolf’s Hope is only a couple of hours’ ride from Ardnacarrig. I’ll write, myself, to Davie and ask him to call on you and examine the child.”
“You are very good! I wish I could make some return for your kindness.”
“Why,” he said, “you can.”
“Then I will, very gladly. What can I do?”
“While you are at Ardnacarrig—I expect you will be staying a few days to see the bairns settled?” She nodded. “Do you think you might find time to go and visit Davie’s mother—Helen Ramsay—at Wolf’s Hope? Could you do that? And give her my remembrances?”
“Of course I will,” Val said. “But if she is as ill as you say—will she want to see a stranger?”
“When you know the Scottish countryside a little better you’ll understand that one would have to be dead, not merely dying, not to enjoy a visitor from distant parts. Particularly my dear Helen!”
“Then I’ll go. And I’ll tell you about her when I come back to Edinburgh.”
“That will give me something to look forward to.” He added in a different tone, “I would really be most grateful.”
Val rose to leave.
“The gratitude is all on my side, Sir Marcus. It has been a great pleasure to dine with you,” she said with a return to formality. “I have enjoyed this evening more than anything since I came to England.”
His death’s head face broke up again into its disarming smile, and he said something, half to himself, which was to puzzle and disconcert Val for weeks to come. Could she have caught it correctly? She thought he said, “Ah, we’ll make a human being of her yet!”
“And now, Andie will drive you back to Mrs. Gourlay’s.”
“Good night, Sir Marcus. Thank you again.”
As she went down the steps, he called after her, “Not my remembrances. My love.”
Chapter 10
They were up and away long before daylight, since Ardnacarrig lay over fifty miles from Edinburgh, and the journey, in a heavily loaded coach, would take them at least a day; possibly longer, if it snowed and they were obliged to spend the night in Dunglass or some other town along the way. The coach, a massive old family conveyance, seemed to be serving as carrier for all the surrounding neighbourhood, so far as Val could make out, for besides the children and herself and their belongings, its interior was crammed with stores purchased in Edinburgh: bales of rough cloth, barrels of oil, portions of agricultural machinery, mutton hams wrapped in cotton, wooden chests of tea, a huge sack of salt, bales of sacking, bundles of wax candles, and packets of seed.
“There’s hardly room for us,” Pieter said, looking wonderingly round the inside; and Val thought that if the horses could do fifty miles a day pulling that load, they must be remarkable animals. However they certainly looked solid and big-boned enough. The driver, Jock Kelso, was a taciturn, grey-headed, lean man with a bad limp, who saw to the loading up with dour, silent efficiency, and said merely, “Ou, ay,” when Robina screeched instructions at him. “Tak’ care o’ the leddy an’ the bairnies, now, Jockie man! Remember they’re frae the south an’ they’ll be grewie, shilpit bodies; gin the snaw comes, pit up the avers and find a beild in some tavern; dinna gae yer ways i’ the mirk; an’ bide a wee while in some clachan for bite an’ sup—I hae pit ye up a pickle victuals i’ the buist—”
“Whisht, whisht, ye fashious wumman,” grunted Kelso, wrapping himself in a whole series of greatcoats and plaids; he then climbed to the box without taking any more notice of Robina, or of his passengers, and cracked his whip. Ignoring this, Robina
jumped up into the carriage to embrace the children once more and supply them each with a hot brick to keep their feet from freezing; then they were off.
For the first part of the journey they were all glad enough to go back to sleep, wedged in among the bales and bundles, while the coach rumbled on its way.
When dawn finally broke, and the children began to stir and rub their eyes, they had traveled a considerable distance and left Edinburgh well behind them. They were now passing through flattish country, with, on their left, occasional views of the sea behind hillocky dunes, and rolling grassy hills over to their right. This seemed to be rich farmland, with tidy hedges and prosperous-looking villages set round greens, large fields with sheep and cattle in them, plantations of trees, and dovecots in front of the big, old-fashioned farmhouses. Yesterday’s snow had melted, save on the distant hilltops, and the day was clear and sunny but bitterly cold; a keen, searching wind seemed to find its way through every cranny in the ancient vehicle, and Val longed to get out and walk. But the ponderous horses maintained a trot at a pace that was just faster than the children could have managed. They did walk ahead as far and fast as they could whenever Jock stopped to breathe the horses, and in that way managed to keep from freezing. The wind came scouring at them from the sea, and the few leaves that remained on the bent, twisted, gale-worn trees were all tarnished to a curious dead-gold colour by the salt in the air.
By midday great cliffs, rising on the left, had cut off their distant view of breakers rolling in, and the road turned inland. Val had learned from Robina, though, that Ardnacarrig lay close to the sea, in its own bay, and she was glad of this for the children’s sake, remembering halcyon holidays spent with her father on Long Island beaches. So at some point along their route the road must find its way back to the coast.