by Lynn Kurland
She put her hand on the wrought iron gate in front of her and studied the place that would be her home for at least the next week. It boasted a grim sort of austerity, a look that would have been right at home in a BBC adaptation of a Gothic novel. It was tempting to speculate on how few amenities she might find inside, but she forbore. As long as she encountered only ghosts in formal dress instead of Norman Bates in a kilt, she would be fine.
Besides, it was November, it was rainy, and it was Scotland. What else did she need? It was tempting to burst into song right there in the street, but perhaps later when she was better rested and more able to convince any potential constabulary that she was just happy, not punch-drunk.
She adjusted her backpack over her shoulder, took a no-nonsense grip on her suitcase handle, and let herself inside the gates. She shut them behind her, then suppressed a yawn on her way up the path to the front door. She ached with weariness, but promised herself somewhere flat to lie down very soon.
The inside of the place was no more welcoming than the outside, but she wasn’t there to live, she was there to sleep at night after spending her days dreaming her way through the Scottish countryside. As long as she had a bed, a bathroom, and a place to stash her stuff, she would survive.
She greeted the owners who manned the desk as if it were the last thing that stood between them and inevitable destruction, signed what was necessary, then happily accepted her key and directions to her room. The climb up the narrow staircase was an adventure, and there was more Victorian austerity waiting for her inside her bedroom, but she ignored it. She had ignored all the one-star reviews the inn had earned, so she probably deserved exactly what she was getting. None of that mattered at the moment. She had a turret room, she had rain, and she had Scotland.
Life was very good indeed.
She shoved her suitcase into a corner, dumped her backpack on the bed, then left her room to look for the bathroom. The floorboards creaked badly enough that she wasn’t entirely sure she wouldn’t go right through them, but fortunately her mission was accomplished without trouble and she was soon back in her room, wondering if anyone would notice if she just took a minute or two to sit on her bed and rest.
That was a mistake, she decided a couple of hours later as she woke with her face plastered against her backpack. She’d thought that taking a sleeper north would have given her a chance to sleep off a bit of her jet lag, but apparently that hadn’t been the case. Freezing her backside off earlier that morning while waiting for the rental car place to open hadn’t done the job, either.
She sat up, waited until her head cleared, then decided the best thing she could do was just power through the mental fog. She could sleep later.
She staggered back downstairs, considered asking for suggestions from her hosts, then thought better of it. There wasn’t anyone at the desk, and those were either pot lids or swords being used in the dining room. She had absolutely no desire to investigate which it might be. She had a phone and knew how to use it. That would just have to do.
She pulled up a travelers’ guide to the village of Benmore and its surrounding environs, scrolled through the possibilities, then looked out the front-door window at the rain. That she suspected the blurriness of the scene wasn’t entirely due to the rain led her to believe that maybe she would be better off limiting herself to the village for the afternoon. She could leave anything farther afield for the next day, when she would actually be awake enough to get to it safely. For the moment, a good walk was probably the most sensible choice. She left the inn and its Great Expectations vibe behind her and went off to explore.
She walked through the village and enjoyed the illusion of being a local simply out for a leisurely stroll. She passed a post office, a touristy kitsch seller or two, and a shop that proudly proclaimed itself Fergusson’s Herbs and Sundries. She was an over-the-counter sort of gal when it came to medicine, and she wasn’t sure she needed any sundries, so she decided to give the place a miss and keep going. She yawned her way past places she supposed she wouldn’t remember in the morning, but made a mental note about the location of the two pubs she’d seen on opposite ends of the main street. No sense in not knowing where to get dinner, if she could stay awake long enough to eat it.
All in all, the village was a very charming place with people seemingly going about their lives in an ordinary, unremarkable way in spite of their spectacular surroundings.
She thought she might envy them.
She noticed a little grocery store tucked into one corner of a weathered building and decided a quick boosting of her blood sugar might be a good idea. She made sure she knew which direction to turn once she left the shop, then went inside.
She wandered up and down the aisles, not exactly sure where to start or what she wanted. It would have been easier to shop if she hadn’t felt as if she were walking through thick fog, but there wasn’t much she could do about that. Jet lag was, no matter how much willpower a person had, absolute hell.
She picked up a couple of things with wrappers she thought she might successfully remove without undue fuss, then staggered over to the checkout line. She was unfortunately behind a trio of well-dressed women who seemed less interested in paying for their groceries than they were in pestering the cashier. She looked around herself, hoping rather desperately for a chair she could use until they had finished. There was no chair to be found, so she settled for the sturdy support of a steel post. She leaned, closed her eyes, and hoped she could stay awake long enough to get herself back to bed.
“What are you lassies about?” a weathered voice asked.
“We’re hunting, aren’t we, girls?”
“Grouse season is over,” that same well-worn voice said tartly, “which perhaps ye don’t ken.”
Emma opened her eyes at that. The last thing she wanted was to get downwind of something that sounded very much like a shooting party at Pemberley. She looked at the three women standing in front of her, facing off with the no-nonsense granny manning the cash register, and considered the players there. She couldn’t say she knew much about hunting past what she’d seen on TV, but she suspected that heels that high, skirts that short, and jackets that flimsy were definitely not on the What to Wear list of any person worthy of being trusted with a shotgun.
The woman behind the counter was dressed very sensibly in a sweater and a stern look, and she had to have been every day of eighty. If anyone would know about the local grouse season, Emma suspected it would be her.
“Make haste, gels,” the granny said. “There’s another customer behind you. Come up from the south, too, did you?”
Emma realized she was the one being spoken to. “Ah, actually no,” she managed. “I’m here from the States.”
“Are you here for the hunt?” one of the girls demanded.
Emma looked at her blankly. “The hunt?”
“She doesn’t know what we’re talking about,” one of the trio said, “though I’d be suspicious of her reasons for coming this far into the woods, no matter what she says.”
“I’m just here for the scenery,” Emma protested.
“Well, there’s scenery enough in the area,” one of the other women said shortly, “but keep your eyes off the prize.”
The proprietress made a sound of impatience. “He’s not a prize, and I don’t think he fancies being hunted. Leave him to his peace in the forest.”
Emma listened to the trio discuss why an apparently eligible bachelor shouldn’t be hiding in the woods and had to admit she was tempted to suggest that those girls perhaps rethink their plans. Guys who holed up in the boonies generally seemed to have good reasons for the same. She envisioned their quarry being an old man, grizzled and lacking critical grooming implements like a razor and shampoo. A bit like Bigfoot, only in a kilt.
“But he’s rich,” one of the women said.
“Gorgeous,” said another.
“Rich.”
“You already said that, idiot.”
“Is he American?” the third one said, looking slightly confused. “Or British?”
“He’s Scottish,” the first one stated firmly.
“No,” said the second woman just as firmly, “he’s—”
“A Sasquatch?” Emma asked.
The huntresses in heels turned three almost identical scowls on her, then gathered up their purchases and started toward the door in a huff. They hadn’t gotten outside before they were back in deep discussion about a new strategy for obtaining a sight of the very rich and elusive recluse in the forest.
Emma looked at the woman manning the register and attempted a smile. “Sorry. Couldn’t help myself.”
The woman smiled. “I’ve no argument with what you said. Those gels that come up from the south—” She shook her head again. “Not sure they know what they want.”
Emma knew exactly what she wanted, and that wasn’t some guy who had ditched hygiene for too much time alone with nature. She put her things on the counter, then looked casually at the woman ringing them up.
“Is there really a guy hiding in the forest around here?” she asked. “I’m not interested in him—just interested in not getting mugged by him.”
“These woods are full of all manner of strange things,” the woman began, then she looked over at the door when the little bell jingled. She glared at the man standing half inside the shop. “We’re closed, ye wee fiend.”
“But Mrs. McCreedy, the sign says you’re still open.”
Emma had to admit the guy had a point. He also had on some sort of official jacket. Maybe he would know how many innocent tourists the hermit in the woods had scared the hell out of so she would know what number not to find herself added to.
Mrs. McCreedy, apparently the shop owner, pointed a bony finger at him. “I’ve decided to close up early, Hamish Fergusson, just for you. And so you don’t have to ask, aye, ’tis because you fair frightened the life from me last week.”
The man named Hamish stuck out his chin. “You were speeding.”
“I was on my bloody bicycle!”
“Speeding—”
The woman might have been every day of eighty but she could certainly fling a water bottle like a major league pitcher. Hamish Fergusson ducked back out of the shop and pulled the door shut to protect himself. Emma managed to stop gaping long enough to retrieve Mrs. McCreedy’s weapon of choice and return it to her. Who knew when she might need it again.
“Thank you, lass. Very kind.” Mrs. McCreedy smoothed her hand over her hair. “That lad is annoying, but what can you do?”
“Run him over with your bicycle next time?”
Mrs. McCreedy laughed, a happy sound tinged with what Emma was fairly certain was potential delight over one Hamish Fergusson lying in a ditch. “Aye, I think I just might. You’re staying at Southerton’s inn, I understand.”
Emma blinked. “News travels fast.”
“Small village,” Mrs. McCreedy said pleasantly. “From America, did you say?”
“Seattle,” Emma agreed.
Mrs. McCreedy nodded. “Lovely place, that. You’re here on holiday, then?”
“Yes,” Emma said, “mostly. I needed a change of scenery.”
“I understand that,” Mrs. McCreedy said with a nod. “Plenty of scenery here for the viewing, especially if you’ve a strong stomach for things of a more . . . magical nature.”
“Really,” Emma said dryly before she realized Mrs. McCreedy wasn’t kidding. She blinked. “You’re serious.”
“Highland magic saturates these hills, lass. Now, if you’ll have my advice on where ’tis to be found, I think I can point you in the right direction.”
“I think I might like to know where it is so I can avoid it,” Emma said honestly. “I’m not much of a believer in supernatural things.” Actually, she wasn’t any kind of believer in anything that smacked of anything remotely paranormal.
She paused. All right, so she had occasionally pondered the problem of socks losing their mates, but that was most likely a dryer issue, not ghosts in her laundry. As for anything odd happening in her current locale, Scotland was drenched in history, not things that went bump in the night.
Surely.
“I wouldn’t wander overmuch on MacLeod soil,” Mrs. McCreedy said, obviously not offended by any inadvertent expressions of doubt.
Emma pulled herself back to the conversation at hand. “MacLeods,” she repeated, wondering if she needed to be writing that down. “Are those local landholders?”
“Aye,” Mrs. McCreedy said. “The laird James and his brother—his cousin as well—own most of the land in the area.” She looked off into the distance for a moment or two, then seemed to come back from wherever she’d been mentally— no doubt wandering over that MacLeod soil—and looked Emma full in the face. “I think I won’t say anything else.”
Emma wanted to point out that she hadn’t said anything at all, but decided that wouldn’t be polite. “I don’t suppose you would have a map that might tell me which paths I should avoid, would you?”
Mrs. McCreedy looked a bit startled, if such a thing were possible for a woman that seasoned. She continued to look at Emma as if she’d just seen a ghost, then reached under her counter and produced a single sheet of paper. She looked at it for a moment or two in silence, then folded it up and held it out with a hand that shook just the slightest bit.
“This will be what you need,” Mrs. McCreedy said. “No charge.”
Emma took the map and forced herself not to unfold it and have a look at it right there in the store. The terrible nature of not knowing surprised her with its intensity. Just what did her new map show? Treasure? Haunted castles?
Reclusive millionaires?
The possibilities were endless and past tempting to contemplate, but she didn’t want to look like the gawking tourist she most definitely was. She smiled instead and tucked the map into her jacket pocket.
“I’ll return it,” she promised. “Thanks so much.”
Mrs. McCreedy nodded, but said nothing else. Emma wasn’t one to endure uncomfortable social situations any longer than necessary, so she escaped the store before anything else weird happened, pulled the door shut behind her, and started back up the street toward her hotel.
She only made it half a block before she couldn’t take the suspense any longer. She looked around her in her most surreptitious fashion to make sure she wasn’t going to be interrupted, leaned casually against the corner of a building to get out of the wet, and unfolded the map.
Well, that looked a bit like the village, a determination that was made quite a bit easier by the label of Village placed on the appropriate spot. That was, however, the only thing about the map that made any sense at all. She didn’t want to concede anything that might make her sound crazy, but she had to admit that what she was holding in her hands looked remarkably like a treasure map. She saw a handful of things that could have represented castles or large houses, but the rest was a smattering of Xs, as if some crazy teenager had spent the past year digging around in his father’s backyard, looking for loot.
The map wasn’t an original, though it looked as if the original had been hand drawn. It was a photocopy, and obviously not fresh off the copier. In fact, she supposed that if Mrs. McCreedy had charged her for it, she might have been tempted to return it and ask for a refund. It was so creased she could hardly see what lay in the folds, and unfortunately those folds seemed to be obscuring the exact location of some of the more prominent Xs. She stared off into the distance for a bit, wondering what she might find there with a bit of effort, then she realized she was doing exactly what Mrs. McCreedy had been doing in her shop while talking about those MacLeod landholders—
She decided quite suddenly that maybe she’d just had enough fo
r the day. A Gothic inn, bounty hunters in short skirts and heels, and now a treasure map delivered by the local green grocer. All of that would have seemed nothing terribly out of the ordinary if she hadn’t been wandering around in a fog. All she needed was a good night’s sleep and things would look much better in the morning.
She turned and walked back to her hotel. She didn’t believe in omens or portents or things of a paranormal nature. She had come to Scotland because there was sky and heather and mountains that reflected on the waters of still lochs. She had more photographs of the same than she wanted to admit to buying, but pictures had been all she’d been able to manage at the time.
Now, though, she had the real thing within reach. What she wanted was to take her view of those raw Scottish elements and hammer them into gold and silver, to immortalize them somehow. She hadn’t decided exactly how that was going to happen, never mind how she might use it to salvage her business, but perhaps that was something better left to think about in the morning as well.
She paused and looked up at the gray sky for a moment or two. It was odd that she’d chosen the village of Benmore to land in. The name of the place had come to her a few months earlier, almost as if she’d dreamed it. She knew that wasn’t the case, but maybe it didn’t matter how she’d wound up where she was. She was there and she was going to make the best possible use of her time.
She got back inside the inn, then managed to get to her room without trouble. She kicked off her shoes, brushed her teeth, then dug around for pajamas before deciding that was just too much trouble. She shucked off her jeans and felt her way into bed. She realized that she still had on her coat and she hadn’t managed to get any dinner, but she was too far gone to care.
She pulled her coat up to her ears, snuggled down in spite of the springs that poked her in the back, and surrendered to the pull of sleep. Her conversation with Mrs. McCreedy echoed in her mind, but she didn’t have the energy to even shake her head over it. Maps, recluses, and warnings about magic? Those were all probably things the villagers trotted out simply to keep the tourists happy.