Sleepless in Scotland

by May McGoldrick

  Phoebe needed to see Ian and beg him to let this go. She’d never completely related to him everything that happened in the Vaults. She should have saved him from specific details this time too. She never should have mentioned her hat being thrown down the well after her.

  She waited until Mrs. Bell and Mrs. Young left for church. She wanted to resolve this while they were gone.

  The breeze coming in the window pushed at a napkin on the breakfast tray that had been brought up for her. Millie crossed the room and draped a shawl over her shoulders.

  “I’m going to need a few minutes with the captain in private,” she pleaded as they were getting ready to leave the room. “I’ll meet you in the garden after I speak with him.”

  Millie put her back against the door. “I am not making that mistake again. Yesterday you made the same promise and look what happened. You meet with Captain Bell, and I’ll wait outside the door to his office.”

  “Honestly, Millie.”

  “Stop.” The gentle command sounded so much like their mother’s.

  The quiet strength behind the words resonated with echoes of Millicent Wentworth, the abused wife of a slave-owning squire who rose like a sapling from the charred fields of his cruelty and became an oak tree for many who suffered under his lash. Millicent, who in a moment of destitution, married again with a promise to care for the broken Earl of Aytoun. Millicent, their mother, was the bond that held the Pennington family together.

  And Millie was so much like her.

  “You think you’re protecting me, but I know you too well. You are far too surefooted to fall into any well. Someone pushed you. That’s why Captain Bell went back out there.”

  Millie was too smart not to realize what was going on. And considering Ian’s reaction, Phoebe wondered who at Bellhorne, other than Mrs. Bell, wouldn’t know.

  “I love you, little mother.” She linked arms with her sister as they left the room.

  “I know you do.”

  A breeze whistled down the corridor, and Phoebe stopped by Sarah’s door. Thoughts of Sarah’s mother, her own mother, and the twists and turns of their relationships hung in the air. The foolishness of youthful complaints nagged at her. Phoebe wondered if her friend knew how Fiona Bell suffered because of those meaningless final words.

  “I miss her.”

  “She was your best friend,” Millie said.

  Her hand raised with the recollection of how Sarah would burst through the door before she could even knock, always ready for a new adventure.

  “I always had to compete with her.”

  “Compete with her?” Phoebe drew her hand back and pulled the shawl tighter around her.

  “For your attention. For the joy of doing things with you. For the pleasure of hearing and reading your stories. For your trust in sharing the trouble you always seemed to find. For your friendship.”

  For a moment Phoebe couldn’t breathe, the truth in her sister’s statement squeezing her heart.

  “Oh, Millie.”

  “I know . . . I know you’ve always loved me as a sister. But when Sarah became your friend, I was no longer your confidante. I wasn’t the one you’d run to when you had a secret to share or when you wanted to talk about your most recent heartache or when you just needed a shoulder to cry on.”

  Phoebe batted away a tear and wrapped her arms around her sister, hugging her tightly. “You never said a word.”

  “I never resented your feeling for her. I understood. But after she died, I thought we might regain what we always had. And we have. But only up to a certain point.”

  She wanted to deny all of this, but Millie’s words were like a surgeon’s scalpel, peeling away the lie and exposing the truth. In her relationship with Sarah, there was no sibling conflict, no petty arguments over ribbons or shoes, no worry about setting a bad example as the older sister. With Sarah, she could be herself. Millie was so astute. It was only after her friend was gone that Phoebe rediscovered the treasure of friendship with her younger sister.

  “I’m sorry, Millie. I’m sorry for every moment of pain I’ve caused through my neglect of you. No one has been as unfailingly true to me as you.”

  “I should never have said any of this.” She drew back. “The truth is you’ve changed and matured so much in these last three years.”

  Phoebe laughed, but tears rolling down her cheek betrayed her emotions. “Matured? Hardly!”

  Millie brushed away the droplets. “Now I feel guilty for having upset you. Yesterday, when I thought I’d lost you, I was undone. Lost. And now . . . someone tried to hurt you.”

  “I am too much trouble.” She took her sister’s arm, and the two of them started for the stairs. She’d not wanted to upset anyone and somehow managed to get everyone riled up. “I’ve been to Bellhorne many times, and I know no one who might have a grudge against me. I’ve done no harm to anyone. What happened was surely a random act by someone passing through.”

  Phoebe wanted to say exactly this to Ian. Everyone needed to stop worrying. She’d heard from the housekeeper that on Sundays, Mrs. Bell liked to have guests from the village join the family for an early dinner. She didn’t want to disrupt the family’s routines any more than she already had.

  When they came to Bellhorne, Phoebe hoped they could be helpful. But she’d failed. Passing through the gallery, she felt the eyes of the ancestors glaring down at her.

  The sisters descended to the great hall, and a flurry of activity in an entry foyer arrested their progress. The outside door stood open, and Mrs. Bell hurried in with Mrs. Young at her heels.

  Shafts of light from windows above the galleries encircling the great hall did little to illuminate the spacious dark-paneled room. Standing in the shadow of a tall column at the base of the stairwell, the two hesitated.

  “Oh, no,” Millie whispered. “They’re back from the service too early.”

  “I hope she’s not unwell.”

  Mrs. Bell was hastily removing her hat and coat, and her voice carried to them. “Find her for me, will you, Alice?”

  The cousin came into the great hall and spotted Phoebe and Millie. Looking first over her shoulder and finding Mrs. Bell questioning the housekeeper, she immediately hurried over to them.

  “She knows what happened yesterday,” Alice said softly to Phoebe.

  “How?” Millie asked.

  “No sooner had we arrived and were entering the church, several of the parishioners approached us and expressed their relief that our guest had been found alive.”

  Phoebe had heard from the maid helping her dress this morning that everyone at the estate and nearly the entire village had helped out with the search yesterday afternoon. “As exciting as the Lammas Fair, it was,” the girl told her, adding with a blush, “when you were found, I mean.”

  Alice took Phoebe’s hand. “Once Mrs. Bell heard the news, she was adamant about leaving that very moment. She’s sick with worry about you. She wouldn’t believe me when I told her you were safe and well.”

  There was no point in considering what to say or not say with their hostess only a few steps away. “I’ll put her mind at ease.”

  Phoebe left her sister and Alice and walked to the foyer where the housekeeper looked greatly relieved to see her approaching.

  “Mrs. Bell,” she called out. “Good morning.”

  Phoebe had no chance to get into formalities, as the older woman whirled at the sound of her voice and burst into tears.

  “You’re alive,” she cried. “You’re here. Thank heavens.”

  Phoebe closed the distance between them, wrapping her arm around her. This was the drama she was hoping to avoid. “Of course I’m alive. Nothing to fear. Nothing. I’m right here.”

  “When they told me . . .” She clutched Phoebe’s hand. “They wouldn’t . . . I didn’t . . .” She couldn’t finish her sentences.

  “Mrs. Bell. You can see I’m perfectly well. Hale and hearty.” Phoebe worried about the ailing woman. Her breaths were beco
ming short and labored. She looked helplessly at Mrs. Young. “I’m right here with you.”

  “But to simply go like that . . . taking you away from here . . . I couldn’t bear it . . . in the well . . . gone . . . never to come back to me . . . never.”

  Tears streamed down the wrinkled face. The words continued to come in fragmented spurts. She didn’t seem to hear anything Phoebe said. Alice and Millie appeared beside them. Millie was offering her a handkerchief, Alice opening the door just down the corridor.

  Tears of her own burned in Phoebe’s eyes. Witnessing the grief in Ian’s mother squeezed her heart. She wondered if Mrs. Bell was thinking about her or if some of this anguish had to do with her missing daughter.

  “Come into the morning room where you can sit for a moment,” Alice suggested. “The sun is shining bright in there, and we’ll open the garden doors, just as you like.”

  “I can’t. Not without you,” she protested, clinging to Phoebe’s hand. “I can’t.”

  “I’ll come with you. We’ll go together.” Phoebe motioned to her sister to take the other arm of the woman.

  Alice murmured to her that she was sending the carriage for Dr. Thornton.

  The family certainly trusted this doctor, Phoebe thought, deciding he must be more dependable than she was giving him credit for.

  Guiding her, encouraging her to put one foot in front of the other, the two sisters shepherded the aging woman to the morning room, where she collapsed on the nearest sofa, clutching her cane with one hand and Phoebe with the other.

  Searching for a distraction, Phoebe turned to her sister. “Perhaps Mrs. Hume could have some tea sent in.” With a nod, Millie hurried out.

  “All is well. Try to catch your breath,” she said soothingly. She propped a pillow behind the older woman.

  “Your face. My dear, look at your face. The horror you must have endured.”

  A cool, frail hand caressed the scratches and bruises on Phoebe’s face. The dark eyes brimmed again, and droplets followed the paths the others had marked.

  “Please be assured that I’m perfectly well. Fully recovered.” She took Mrs. Bell’s hand and placed a kiss on her palm. “Thankfully, your son found me and brought me back.”

  “My Ian,” she whispered. “He brought you back.”

  “He did indeed. And the scratches you see are the worst of it. And by tomorrow we’ll hardly notice them.”

  “Ian brought you back. What happened to all the dresses?”

  Phoebe smiled weakly, realizing the mother’s mind was once again drifting elsewhere. The lace curtains by the open windows swayed to the whispers of the wind, and Mrs. Bell’s head turned in that direction, as if expecting someone else to enter.

  “I asked him, you know. I begged him. But he won’t bring her back.”

  Words in Ian’s defense struggled to burst from Phoebe. She wanted to tell her that what he did was not by choice. But she couldn’t, so she remained silent, respecting his confidence.

  “I know he can’t force her. He wouldn’t be able to. And I wouldn’t want it. No matter how much he tries, or how desperate I get. It’s beyond his control.” She rested her hand on Phoebe’s. “But now you’re here. We can plant a rosebush together.”

  Phoebe held the fragile fingers between her own. Ian’s mother hovered between two worlds, two conversations, two periods of time. It was difficult to guess from one moment to the next where her attention might shift. It appeared that thoughts of her and Sarah became muddled at times.

  Phoebe still had no idea of how Sarah’s initial disappearance had been explained to the mother. A trip to America took preparation, months of planning. She never recalled Sarah talking of it, and without doubt she would have done so. How Mrs. Bell could accept something so preposterous was puzzling.

  “It was my fault she went to Edinburgh,” she told her, her breath catching.

  Releasing Phoebe’s hands, she absently picked up her cane, which was leaning against her leg. The head of the stick was made of ivory, with intricately carved leaves culminating with a large, partially opened rosebud.

  “My stubbornness drove her to it.”

  The pain in the older woman’s voice cut into her. She knew this much from Sarah’s letters, the last of which arrived just before the disappearance. Phoebe was in Hertfordshire with her parents at the time. Her friend had been complaining that her mother was insisting she go to London for the season. Sarah didn’t want to go. She didn’t need to travel so far to find a husband. She was happy in Fife. But Fiona wouldn’t listen, and they’d quarreled. So though her heart wasn’t in it, she wrote in her final letter, she’d come to Edinburgh to shop and be fitted for dresses. Sarah signed off the letter, Blast the ton! Phoebe remembered laughing as she read it.

  But she hadn’t laughed for very long. The news came soon enough that her friend had gone missing. And then the rumors began.

  Mrs. Bell’s attention was drawn to the windows again. This time she focused on the breeze ruffling the leaves on the roses in a vase. “She visits me, you know. Quite often. In my dreams. Sometimes, right here in this room.”

  Yesterday, Phoebe had experienced the same sensation. Everywhere she walked, memories of Sarah were with her. And she felt alive in them.

  “I drove her off, but she has already returned. Her favorite place is among the roses out in the garden.” Ian’s mother smiled sadly.

  She held the ivory rosebud to her lips, kissed it, and Phoebe felt a lump the size of a fist forming in her chest.

  “I know Ian can never bring her back, but she is with me here. That’s why I hate to leave.”

  Awareness formed and descended like a heavy cloak over Phoebe. She stared at the woman’s thin frame, and at the lined face, and at the eyes that constantly searched the room for Sarah’s presence.

  This mother, burdened by the guilt of pushing Sarah away, felt responsible for her daughter going away and never returning. A terrible burden to bear.

  But how much did Mrs. Bell know? And what did she mean, Sarah had already returned to her? Questions piled on top of each other, daring Phoebe to speak, but she forced them to remain unasked.

  “It’s not really a deception if one willingly believes it.”

  Phoebe wanted to ask her directly what she meant by “deception.” She peered at her closely.

  “Today, when all those people in the kirkyard began saying things. Asking about you. Wanting to know what happened to you.” Her dark eyes were wide, but she wasn’t looking at Phoebe. She continued to study the walking stick as if the answer to some profound secret could be found in the delicate curves of the leaves and petals. “I didn’t think my heart could take it. Not you. Not again.”

  This was exactly what she’d feared last night and this morning. Phoebe didn’t want to add more worry and more unhappiness to this woman’s life.

  “Ian. My Ian would never recover if something happened to you.” She patted Phoebe’s hand. “You’re different. How he feels about you is different.”

  She opened her mouth to reply, but words were lost as her heart soared.

  “You’re the one, you know. Sarah always thought so. As did I.”

  Phoebe had come here to offer assurances and calm an agitated mother. But their positions had somehow become reversed. Tears no longer lay on the older woman’s cheek; they were now coursing down her own. Ian’s mother was giving her blessing.

  And what about Sarah? Mrs. Bell was calmer now, but the earlier confusion in her mind weighed on Phoebe. What did she mean about willingly believing?

  “Why did you say that Sarah is with you here?” she managed to croak, wiping her face.

  A gentle breeze blew in, lifting the curtain.

  Phoebe glanced up at the window as a warm, invisible hand descended on her shoulder. Fingers pressed gently as they trailed across her back, distinct and undeniable. The tingling remained on her skin like the kiss of sunlight on one’s face in the spring. And then, unexpectedly, a sense of peace slippe
d into her heart.

  Sarah was here.

  Mrs. Bell caressed the carved rosebud. “I think you know why. But I’m very tired, my dear.”

  “Please, let me help.” Phoebe asked, recovering her composure, “Do you wish to go up to your rooms? Should I call for someone?”

  The older woman leaned against Phoebe’s shoulder. She rested for a few moments before she spoke. “It must stop.”

  “What must stop?” she asked, not daring to make any assumptions.

  Fiona drew back and took a deep, shaking breath.

  “The pretending. Tell him I know Sarah is dead. Tell Ian I’m ready to grieve for my lost girl.”

  Chapter 14

  Starting with the nomads’ camp, Ian and his men had combed through the Auld Grove so thoroughly that a three-legged rat wouldn’t have escaped them. They’d gone out looking for vagrants, poachers, Highland Travelers, anyone who might have camped or passed through in the last couple of days. But there was no one. Early this morning, Ian and Raeburn had gathered another group of men and searched again. In daylight, the outcome was the same. Nothing. Whoever pushed Phoebe into the well had disappeared without a trace.

  “I suspect a poacher,” Raeburn told him as they walked back across the fields. “The neighbors have been complaining of vagrants coming through from Kirkcaldy, and a man on the road with a chorred cock-pheasant can be a dangerous creature. If getting caught means the noose or transporting, I have no doubt he’d give her a push and be off like a rabbit. Lass or lady, it’d make no difference.”

  Ian hated to think that anyone walking through the fields and farms of Bellhorne was not safe, whether it be Phoebe or one of his tenants. But the same was happening in towns and cities all over Britain. The poor were getting poorer, and a hungry man—especially one with a family to feed—would take great risks even for a meager meal.

  His thoughts went to Phoebe’s articles about the unequal distribution of wealth in Scotland. Less poverty led to less crime, she argued. But whoever pushed her had to know she would die in that well. During the war, Ian had never killed because he was hungry, but many a man had died by his hand in the fight for survival. Men do what they must to live. Still, if he got hold of this one, the rogue would be sorry he was ever born.