by Zoe Tasia
“Mom, Tate is acting weird.”
I joined Jess on the bench. “Weird?”
She scooted closer. “Yes, I think something’s wrong with her.”
“Why do you think that?”
Jessie lowered her voice and leaned toward me. “She seems bored with everything. She loves horses and riding as much as I do and cried when we moved. After her lessons ended, while she was waiting, she’d be at the fence struggling not to pet the ponies when students rode by. Today, she watched me jump a couple of times and then wandered off. Gavin told me it was fine as long as she didn’t do anything silly like play with the farm equipment. I told him she wouldn’t, so we rode more.”
“Maybe she’s just outgrown her fascination with horses. Did anything else happen?”
“Later, Mrs. Samms called us in for lunch. When she saw Tate wasn’t with us, she was surprised. She said that Tate had been in earlier and Mrs. Samms had loaded her up with a plateful of snacks for all of us. It took us ages to find her. I was scared and ready to call you. Finally, we found her just outside the forest sitting on the wall. I could have sworn someone was with her, but Mrs. Samms and Gavin didn’t see anyone.”
“Are you sure you didn’t imagine it, Jess?” I asked.
“Tate’s the one who likes to pretend, not me,” she said, her tone weighed with exasperation. The usual sigh and eye-rolling that didn’t accompany the remark unnerved me more than anything she had said. She paused a moment, and continued. “The plate of cookies Mrs. Samms gave Tate was supposed to be enough to share with me and Gavin. It was empty! Then she was so tired walking back to the house, that Mrs. Samms thought she had gotten into the pesticides, but Tate said she hadn’t. We sat down for lunch and, Mom, she ate again. You don’t let her have a lot of snacks in the afternoon because she’s always too full to eat her dinner later.”
“Where is she now?”
“She’s inside napping—which is something else she never does.”
Tate lay so still on the bed. Prone, like a corpse. The second the thought entered my head, I banished it. I woke her for dinner. She ate and looked better for the rest, but Jess was right. This wasn’t at all like my Tater Tot. Tomorrow, we would find the doctor and see what he said.
THE NEXT MORNING, WE caught the bus into town and easily found the clinic, possibly the most recent addition to the village. The cordial receptionist said the doctor was out checking on Conall’s aunt, but should be back within an hour. I said I would be back then. The girls and I walked to the library where they were issued their own cards and soon were seated at a table, Tate with a stack of books and Jess with a teen magazine.
Fiona introduced me to her mother, a woman with stylishly coiffed, short hair and a gorgeous taupe pant suit of such a quality that it must be designer. She was unlike any other librarian I had ever seen. Her makeup was expertly applied and her cupid bow lips, a flattering scarlet. Once I settled the girls, I came back to the front desk.
“I told Mum what you were interested in,” Fiona said.
Mrs. Campbell, or Courtney, as she insisted I call her, said she would be fine with me digging through some old records and would take me to the basement and get me started whenever I was ready. I explained that Tate wasn’t well and I’d have to put my search on hold until I could take her to the doctor and get to the bottom of whatever ailed her. Though the librarian could have modeled or been on one of those British soap operas, she didn’t put on airs. Courtney said this morning she had tried the usual venues for finding someone, but found no record of a Greg Gillie.
“Perhaps he has changed his name. My mother didn’t name me Courtney, but I certainly wasn’t going through life as Agatha.” She shuddered and I have to say, I would have changed my name too if my mom saddled me with that.
We left and beat the doctor back, but, as I predicted, there were new patient sheets to fill out. After a short wait, the receptionist, who was also the nurse, escorted us to a small room in the back and took Tate’s vitals. The doctor, a surprisingly gregarious man, came in and introduced himself. Dr. Murphy’s hair was a shaggy brown and he had that pudge around the middle that men often get after ten years of marriage. I explained my concerns and, after he examined Tate, he asked me some questions.
“Well Mrs. Shaw, your daughter’s underweight, but not excessively so. Other than that, everything else seems to be normal. Is she eating?”
“She eats well. In fact, she’s eating more than she usually does.”
“I want to take some blood and get a urine sample to send off to the mainland. Has she had a recent growth spurt in height? Allergic reactions? Has something new or different entered her life?”
I shook my head no to each question. The doctor stepped out and soon the nurse rejoined us. Tate didn’t complain about the needle, which was atypical. She sat and shivered on the table. When we came out, Jess wanted to know what happened. I told her what the doc said, and we decided to eat an early lunch then go back to the library. Fiona ran a teen program at one-thirty. I hoped to do some research while the girls attended the program.
COURTNEY WAS HAPPY to take me downstairs to the morgue, the place where back issues of the newspaper are kept. As she led me down there, she told me something about the newspaper. “The first newspaper here was printed—and I do mean printed, because originally there wasn’t a press—in the late eighteenth century. We’re lucky enough to have many copies of the original issues. At first, it was one page of information about town occurrences, births, deaths, and such. Information from the mainland was incorporated as well. My ancestor, Phineas Campbell and his family handwrote the issues, one per family. It was unusual that this small an island had a newspaper. From what I can tell, reading Phineas’s journals, he tried to get one started, but no one wanted to take it on, so in the end, he did it himself. Just prior to the move to the island, he had retired from the world of publishing and had a large family who was willing to humor him and help with what was basically an expensive hobby for him. He seemed to be pretty fair-handed with the news, though he did put considerable items about his family and articles about parties they held. Eventually, a press was purchased and the paper was named The Shrouded Isle Chronicle, usually shortened to The Chronicle.
“Phineas was a bit of a character and some of his editorials are pretty funny. The newspaper has stayed in the family all these years. I don’t know how much longer that will be. Fiona isn’t interested in running it, and she’s my only child. I have two brothers, but they rarely come to the island. I’m hoping maybe one of their children will be interested. I’ve been planning on inviting them all over for one of the hols but, so far, all my plans have fallen through. Since the paper, even now, isn’t very big, we’ve been able to transfer all of it on microfiche, and I have some of it loaded up on the computer, not that many islanders read it from there. You’ve probably discovered that tech doesn’t always work that well here.”
I nodded. Jessie had given up on playing games on her phone. It’d been kinda nice not having her glued to it.
“The films are stored by date in here.” She slid open one of the seven shallow drawers of a gray cabinet and plucked out one film. “The power switch for the microfiche reader is on the right side. If you want to copy anything, the power switch for the printer is on the left side of it.” Courtney demonstrated how to use it. “Once you get the magnification and clarity adjusted, it’s pretty simplistic. It’s much like putting a slide under a microscope. Well, I’ll leave you to it.”
I started by looking for recent mentions using the name Greg Gillie. That proved completely futile. Then I tried local hero. I had more luck with that. Over the last thirty years, twelve children had been lost in the woods and several of the accounts, including the oldest, spoke of a dark-haired man who led them out. The children weren’t the only ones who saw him. Some of the adults did too. One account with a quote read, I met the man at the edge of the forest. My Jamie’s wee face was tear-stained, but he seemed fine, o
ther than being as dirty as a lad can get. The dark-haired man didn’t say a word. He just set Jamie on his feet and pushed him toward me then whirled around and vanished. I think he was a guardian angel.
I went through some more issues and then decided to leave off until another day. I rubbed my tired eyes. Mrs. Campbell rejoined me as I was putting things up.
“Any luck?”
“Of a kind. I couldn’t find the name, but I did find a stranger in the forest who helped lost children mentioned.”
“Oh that, I think the children fabricated it. It is a bit of a legend here. The gist of it is that a good man, who lost his child, haunts the woods. I don’t put much stock in such things.”
“Hmmm—at some point I’d like to read some of the earliest papers. I can’t believe you’ve managed to save them all.”
“Oh—not all. Some were lost, but we do have many. Fiona’s finishing up with the discussion.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome to look again another day. Though it rarely happens, I do like to be here when someone is in the crypt. The papers aren’t valuable—at least not to anyone but me. I want to keep them safe.”
“I understand that.” I had made a note of the more recent sightings and decided I would try to find a family member who was around then, maybe even one of the missing children, and talk to them about it. In the meantime, I think a visit to the forest is in order.
On the way out, I picked up a leaflet listing various library activities. Later in the month, a summer movie night was scheduled. As we walked back home, the girls spoke of the teen event. They seemed to have enjoyed it, though Tate was quiet. I had hoped Tate had planned to get together with some of the girls from the library, but she hadn’t. Jess said that when she mentioned that she had been at Samms Farm helping Gavin, she got some envious glances.
“Don’t let it go to your head, young lady,” I said.
“I won’t. Gavin’s sister is coming for a visit this weekend. He asked if Tate and I would like to meet her—maybe even hang out. She’s his only sister, and he said she always complains about not having anyone to do girly stuff with. Is it okay if we go?”
“Get the details and I want to talk to his mother first, but it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool.”
Tate pleaded being tired and left to curl up in a chair in the bedroom to read. Though I wanted to check her temperature, I resisted, reminding myself that the doctor said she was fine.
After my oldest fired off a text, I asked, “Jess, how was Tate at the meeting?”
“Quiet. Some of the girls she met at the party were there, and they tried to talk to her, but she didn’t say much. She didn’t answer any of the questions about the book, and it was one she liked. It’s just weird, Mom. Tate loves to be the center of attention.”
“I know, Jess. We should get back the blood work and results sometime next week. Hopefully that will tell us something.”
KAY CALLED AND SAID something came up so she wouldn’t be by today, so I spent the afternoon doing some light housekeeping. I didn’t want things to get out of control. The girls helped by dusting the bedrooms and sweeping the floors. I bundled up the sheets and did what laundry we had then worked on the bathrooms and the kitchen. There’s something so satisfying about sitting back at the end of the day in a tidy, clean house, I thought, as I sipped my cup of tea.
The girls decided to investigate the shed to see what other games and such were there. They found a couple of bikes, but the tires were flat and probably needed replacing. I vowed to ask around in the village for where I could get them repaired so the girls and I could ride. The tires were the wide type and the bikes old but sturdy, as they would need to be, considering the condition of the roads.
Kiera came over for a couple of hours which was unusual. We generally saw her in the mornings, but it had been a while, and the kids were so happy that she was okay that they lavished her with attention. She allowed the kitten to pounce on her tail and bat her ears. I still couldn’t get over how large she was. When she was ready to go, she went to the door and meowed loudly.
I asked the girls what they wanted for dinner, and we decided on something simple—soup and grilled cheese sandwiches. I paid special attention to Tate. She ate all her food, but I had to jostle her twice when she started to doze off. I found some board games, and we played.
“How about we have a game night party and invite a few of the girls you’ve met over?” I asked.
Tate and Jess were enthusiastic about the idea, and it would give them an opportunity to talk to the villagers on the girls’ own turf. My phone rang, and I stepped outside to talk since the girls were singing. Seeing that Tate had perked up a bit, I didn’t want to hush them. I checked caller ID. It was the lady who owned the cottage.
“Hello, Mrs. Grant.”
“Hello, dear, I wanted to call and see how you were getting along.”
“The cottage is wonderful. We met Kay early on and she’s been taking good care of us. There was also a ceilidh, so we met many of the villagers.” A thought occurred to me. “Mrs. Grant, do you know someone named Greg Gillie? He lives in the forest behind your cottage.”
“Gillie, now that name rings a bell.”
“So, you know him?”
“I don’t know him personally, dear, but the man who built the cottage was a Gillie. Unfortunately, his family perished without an heir. The closest relative was the wife’s sister. This sister is one of my ancestors and through whom the house continued to be passed down. If you look at the fireplace, the name is carved on the mantel.”
I remembered seeing the swirls and thought it was just a decoration. “Oh, so he must be some relative of yours.”
“Perhaps a distant one by marriage. I inherited the cottage because my da was an only son, and he had all girls. I’m the last still alive.”
“Would you mind if I looked at your family tree? What of it you have?”
“Of course not, I’ll send it to you. Our tree is very detailed. I wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t at least mention the names of the parents of the man who built the cottage. How did you meet this Mr. Gillie?”
“I’ve seen him a couple of times now. A few times in the forest, and he came to Conall’s aunt’s party. I didn’t get to talk to him long then. For some reason, although everyone else in the village was invited, he wasn’t.”
“Who was the party for?”
“It was for Conall McNeil’s aunt.”
“Conall—goodness. Has he married yet? If I remember, he was quite attractive, but it’s been a couple of years since I have seen him.”
“No. He’s single.”
“Well, he and his family were always an odd sort. Conall’s family has been plagued with accidents.”
“What kind of accidents?”
“Well, Conall’s grandda was found just inside the forest with his neck broken. It was ruled an accidental death, but there were a lot of questions, like why he was in the woods in the first place. Then Conall’s brother was found in the woods, too, shot by his own gun. That one was ruled a suicide, but Conall was furious and swore it wasn’t. Many violent deaths, mainly of the males in the family. Perhaps if this man was in the woods, Conall thinks he was involved in his brother’s death.”
“Something to think on for sure, but you don’t know Greg—Greg Gillie?”
“I’m an old woman. Perhaps I do and have forgotten. You have naught to worry about a Gillie. We Scots may be of stern stock, but we are honorable.”
“Oh, I wasn’t inferring otherwise—”
“Aye, I know, lassie.” She chuckled. “You’re a worrier, aren’t you?”
“Being a single mom, I have to be,” I said in a stilted voice.
“Enjoy the cottage, and I’ll email you my family tree. If you can find out how your gentleman friend is related, I would appreciate it.”
I tried to explain that he wasn’t exactly a friend but she followed her statement with
a goodbye and hung up before I had a chance.
Chapter 12
THE NEXT MORNING, THE girls began planning the much-anticipated party. I limited the guest number to four, each girl could invite two friends and I hoped, for their sake, that the invitees would show up but comforted myself that they probably would out of boredom and sheer curiosity. The television was equipped with a DVD player and we had brought many of our favorite UK DVDs, since US DVDs wouldn’t work with a UK DVD player.
I let the girls decide what they would play and, from there, we would decide what to serve. I loved themed parties and had thrown many for the girls and friends in the past. Luckily, I had a husband who enjoyed such things too. I did have one.
I blinked to keep the tears at bay and wished for a more stalwart personality. Surprisingly enough, the girls decided on an older movie. They wanted to show Princess Bride. I tried to convince them of something more recent that perhaps not all the kids had seen, but they were adamant. We set about making head bands with the name of characters upon them so the kids could play a game guessing which character they had on their band based on the answers to questions they asked one another—a game we often included at parties.
“Can we go to town, Mom?” Jess asked.
“I suppose. Why?”
“We want to look around and see if anything in the village would work as party favors or games.”
“Okay, but you only have two hours. Are you sure you’re both okay with taking the bus down on your own?”
They both scoffed at me. Tate frowned. “Mom—we’ve been riding buses back and forth to school for ages. I think we can manage this teeny bus.”
I hid a smile as Tate sternly regarded me.
“Okay.” I gave them money and walked down the path with them to the bus stop. I thought to go to the library, but was sick of looking at microfiche and wanted a break. Luxuriating in the clawed tub sounded perfect. I’d found some bath salts in the cupboard and looked forward to a soak with a book in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. But first, I’d do some exploring in the woods.