William thought about his daughter’s chances of making a spot on the orchestra. Not very good, considering the fierce competition that Walter warned him Adeena would face. “I don’t know, Mum,” he said, not wanting to falsely raise his mother’s hopes. “It’ll be tough. She’s so good, and it’s always been her dream, but I don’t know if she’s, if she is . . . ”
He paused, thinking about his daughter.
“If she’s what?” Margaret Rose demanded.
“I’m not sure if she’s competitive enough. Well, not competitive, but you know, focused enough? Walter told me the music director, Lang, I think it was, yes, Friedrich Lang. He’s apparently a real son-of-a-bitch.”
Margaret Rose took hold of her son’s arms and looked at him intensely.
“I can help ‘er,” she said. “I hae something for Adeena that was taken from us a long time ago. Ah finally think I know where it is.”
“Finally found it? Found what?”
“Ah saw it in mah dream, Will,” she said to him, still holding both his arms. “When Jackie gets here, we’re going to Kinnaird to help Adeena.” She turned away and looked out to the sea before adding quietly, “And hopefully, save our family.”
3
PHILIPPE LEVESQUE REACHED into his suit pocket again, feeling for the velvet case. It held the diamond ring he bought that afternoon. As he crossed Sussex Drive towards the National Gallery, he wondered what Adeena’s reaction would be tonight. He was sure she would have only one.
About time!
He crossed the street in front of Notre Dame Cathedral and gazed up at the colossal bronze spider sculpture gracing the Gallery’s front entrance.
“Salut Maman!” he sang out cheerfully to the towering arachnid noticing for the first time its sac of white melon-sized marble eggs suspended high above his head in a braided nest.
Maman indeed. He smiled reading the sculpture’s official name carved onto a metal sign at the front of the Gallery. Maybe not that many, but a few eggs would be perfect. He chuckled wondering if he would prefer a boy or girl first?
Inside the Gallery, Philippe impatiently showed his ID and got a visitor’s badge. What a lot of bother! Adeena could just as easily have met him in the foyer after he texted her when he left his office:
On my way. Been thinking about us all day.
Her response had left him deflated.
OK.
That was it? “Ok?” Shortly after she had added:
In my office working.
Romance wasn’t Adeena’s thing, Philippe rationalized, but she’s dedicated to her work and she’ll make an amazing wife. He admired her passion for music, art and history. Yes they were very different and their relationship often stormy, but Adeena’s creative side inspired him and drew him to her, almost it seemed, against his own will.
“Philippe!” a cheerful voice rang out as he clipped his Visitor Badge to the lapel of his silky Italian suit. He recognized the voice and immediately felt better.
“Tara!” he responded, looking up at the woman in the tight-fitting skirt and stylishly cut matching tweed blazer. They hugged warmly and kissed each other on both cheeks. He pulled her aside into a vestibule beside the coatcheck area. He wanted her opinion on his choice of diamond.
Philippe pulled the velvet ring case out his pocket and held it before her.
“Ohhh… at last!” Tara exclaimed with a dazzling smile. “I had such a good feeling when I introduced you two, I knew she wouldn’t be able to resist your French charms.” Then her face tightened. “Adeena’s had a bad day you know. The audition was rough. The big kahuna didn’t even stay until the end,” Tara sighed. “Hope she’s okay.”
“Yeah, me too.”
He had been telling Adeena not to get her hopes up too high. He knew how difficult it was to get a spot on the NAC Orchestra. As a reporter at the Ottawa Citizen, he’d written a background piece on the music director, Friedrich Lang, and found him arrogant, calling Ottawa a “pretentiously dull little city”. Lang later asked not to include that in the story, and while he complied, Philippe kept the whole recording anyway.
“Thanks for the head’s up,” he said to Tara handing her the ring that had cost him three months’ salary. “I knew this might be a bad day for her. That’s why I planned to give this to her tonight – so she could forget all about Monsieur Lang.”
Tara opened the velvet-lined case. The one carat diamond shimmered brilliantly, radiating the overhead tungsten lights in a thousand different directions. The flawless crystal was surrounded by a double halo of sparkling diamonds encrusted delicately on an 18-carat platinum band.
Tara’s face flushed and her eyes grew wet as she closed the ring case and placed it back in Philippe’s hands. She gave him another kiss on the cheek.
“Go give this to your wife.”
CRATE NUMBER 3212-11 had been carefully packaged in Edinburgh four days ago for shipment to Ottawa. The logo of the National Museums Scotland, a stylized interpretation of St Andrew’s Cross, had been burnished into the thick plywood lid. A carpenter at the museum had finished work on the crate only last week, and the sweet aroma of freshly cut pine filled her office as Adeena carefully used a screwdriver to undo the long blue wood screws that held the lid firmly in place.
She felt like a child opening a Christmas present while everyone was sleeping as she lifted the heavy wooden lid, looking around to make sure no one was watching through the glass doors of her office.
She knew Tara would have a fit. Rare artifacts, especially those that formed the showpiece of a heavily promoted Gallery exhibit, had a long list of security and handling protocols. Still, Adeena felt compelled to do this.
She just had to see this piece.
She set the lid down on the floor and looked at the tightly wrapped contents of the crate. A large manila envelope was taped on top of the foam packing. The envelope was labeled: Duncan Cello – Documents.
The wretched audition she had endured earlier in the day faded away as she opened the envelope and began to read the papers inside. Robert Duncan had created this instrument in his workshop near Abeerdeen, Scotland in the 18th Century. The fact that it was the oldest surviving cello ever made in the UK, and that it sat only a few feet away from her, about to be seen in North America for the first time, filled her with a sense of nervous anticipation.
Adeena studied a glossy black and white photograph of the nameplate:
Robert Duncan. Maker.
ABERDEEN, 1736
She poured over the cello’s history and origin. Most fascinating were theories of why it was made in the Italian style of Antonio Stradivari, better known by his Latinized name - Stradivarius. The documentation theorized that Robert Duncan travelled to Italy and may have learned his technique in Florence or Cremona, home of the Stradivari family, before returning to Scotland to set up his own workshop in Margaret Leith’s Court, Upperkirkgate.
She gathered the papers and photographs together and looked over at the open wooden crate. A yearning she hadn’t felt in a long time swept across her. What it would it be like to play this cello?
Except for few minor alterations over the centuries, it was the same instrument created more than two hundred and seventy years ago: the same thick canted neck and fingerboard wedge, and decorative white lines scratched around its edges. It was even the same ink purfling on the belly and the back that Duncan himself added when he triumphantly completed his finely crafted creation so many years ago.
Adeena stood up. She had to see this for herself. The cello was still carefully wrapped and wedged inside the wooden crate. It was nested inside thick foam padding.
As she bent over and prepared to remove the top layer, there was gentle tap on her office door. She froze then looked over to see Philippe smiling through the glass.
Shit.
He opened the door, beaming like a school child as he bounded into her office.
“Ready to go babe?” Philippe asked, as she stood up and stiffly receive
d a hug from him. She felt guilty for acting so cold, but the gears in her brain were moving in a completely different direction.
“Yeah,” Adeena responded, glancing down at the wooden crate holding the cello she wanted so badly to see and to touch, if only for a second. She stepped back from Philippe and pointed to the crate.
“You know what’s inside there?” she asked.
“No. What?”
“It’s the star of our new exhibit,” she said as if announcing a winning lottery ticket: “The Duncan Cello!”
“Cool.” Philippe replied, reaching into his suit jacket to check on something in his pocket. “Our reservations are for seven-thirty. We really gotta run.” He kissed her cheek. “C’mon, let’s go!”
Adeena was frozen to the floor.
She wanted to lecture him about this instrument, and its role in the musical renaissance of 18th Century Scotland. Where had it been played? Pubs? Royal halls? Castles? Who played it, and what music did they perform?
But he wouldn’t really care she thought, and they were already late. “Okay. Fine.” she responded with resignation.
She grabbed her jacket and followed him out the door. As she turned off the lights, and locked the door, she took one last look at the open wooden crate, through the shadows in her office.
The treasure inside would have to wait a little longer.
PHILIPPE HAD CHOSEN Le Café for the atmosphere and its cuisine drawn from across Canada. He had even reserved a table with a panoramic view of the Rideau Canal. But the fact the restaurant was inside the National Arts Centre, and that to get there they had to walk past Southam Hall where she had auditioned this morning, left Adeena feeling like she’d been punched in the gut.
Again.
It felt wrong to be back here so soon after this morning’s debacle. The Duncan Cello had worked wonders in changing her mood, and now Philippe had dragged her back like his own little cave woman, to the scene of the slaughter.
“I love the way they do the beef tenderloin here,” he crooned looking over the menu at the restaurant.
She thought she might actually start screaming.
What was she doing with him anyway? She couldn’t make it as a musician and she only had her job at the Gallery because of Tara. And the ‘love of her life’ had no idea of who she was, or that she felt like crawling inside a hole at this very moment to die a slow painful death, decaying into rotting flesh as birds pecked her eyes out.
A smiling waiter arrived with a chilled bottle of Moët & Chandon and poured them both tall glasses of the French cuvee. Philippe lifted his glass to propose a toast.
“To us!” he offered.
Adeena glared at him.
As she struggled to raise her glass up, the voices in her head began to scream. Should she throw the champagne at him, or smash the glass on the marble floor? What would he do if she hurled it against the picture window that looked out on the Rideau Canal?
Instead, still holding the champagne flute in her hand, she started to cry, releasing a swollen river that had finally breached its dam.
A THIN-CRUST pizza baked in a wood fire oven until the crust was slightly burnt, topped with ripe tomatoes, tender basil leaves and fresh buffalo milk mozzarella was a simple meal. Served at an opportune moment with a bottle of French champagne, it could be the catalyst for lasting peace between the bitterest of warring nations.
Philippe knew he had been a fool.
No, a complete asshole. He had gotten so caught up in the engagement ring, reservations at Le Café, and trying to turn Adeena’s failed audition into one of the most memorable nights of her life, that he never stopped to think about what she was actually going through.
His Italian suit jacket lay draped over an office chair, its precious diamond cargo still secure inside the front pocket. He had removed his tie and undone the top button of his shirt as he looked over at Adeena, happy to be back in her office, reaching for a second slice of the pizza he had picked at the ByWard Market.
She grinned at him as she washed down the pizza with more champagne from a plastic glass.
“Thank you,” she said to him after she drained the glass in two gulps. Finally, she was looking like the Adeena he had fallen in love with.
“You’re welcome,” he replied. “I’m really sorry, babe. I thought I could help you forget the aud––”
“Shhhhh,” she interrupted standing up and coming closer to him. “It’s over. Let’s not talk about it.” Adeena had cried as they had walked back to the Gallery, along the canal and then up Mackenzie Avenue. Every time she began to beat herself up he stopped her, and told her how special she really was.
Philippe stood up and pulled her towards him, wrapping her in his arms. He could feel her breathe deeply, her full breasts swelling against him. His passion was growing as he pulled her close. Their faces met. He wanted her now, to consummate this evening right here in her office. But he wanted it on her terms.
“You were going to show me that cello?” he said, struggling against his own desire.
“You really want to see it? Now?” she asked doubtfully.
“Yes,” he lied, trying to conceal the lust building inside him.
She gave him a light peck on the cheek. “All right!”
ADEENA GINGERLY LIFTED the foam packing from the wooden crate. She had read that the Duncan Cello was still used by members of the Ancient Music Ensemble of Scotland, and was played at important recitals. The tone was said to be truly exceptional. She removed the last of the packing material and set it aside.
There it lay before her, a simple wooden instrument, created three centuries earlier. It seemed to call out to her.
Adeena looked over at Philippe, sitting on the couch.
Somehow he always managed to redeem himself. It had been three years since she met him at a party Tara arranged to celebrate Adeena’s newly minted Masters’ Degree in Musicology. Philippe had walked her home in the rain, her head spinning from mixing beer, vodka and tequila. Just as they reached her place around 3 AM, completely drenched, she felt her stomach retch and she vomited uncontrollably on the street. Philippe didn’t flinch. He helped her make it up to her apartment, cleaned her up and tucked her safely into her bed.
She looked back again at the cello.
“Well? Are you going to play for me?” Philippe asked.
It was breaking every protocol Tara had given her about handling museum artifacts, but this was a working musical instrument. Adeena just wanted to be sure it had survived its trans-Atlantic journey in good shape.
“Yes I am,” she finally responded as she carefully lifted the cello out of the wooden crate. “Do you like Bach?”
After getting a bow from her own case, Adeena sat on a chair beside Philippe and positioned the Duncan cello between her legs. With no endpin, it took a little bit of an adjustment from the way she held her own cello . But surprisingly, it was completely comfortable. It even felt strangely familiar, like an old acquaintance she had not seen for a while. As her bow touched the strings and she began to play, a feeling of joy enveloped her.
Adeena closed her eyes. She could feel the music flowing through her. Bach’s timeless creation filled her small office with a haunting echo. The cello responded to her as though she was making love with it, effortlessly creating layers of colours, tones and shades that she had struggled to find with her instrument. She saw Magdalena’s score in her head, the individual notes rushing past her like stars on a clear night, each one flowing through the cello, brought to life by her fingers and bow.
When she was done, Philippe stared at her transfixed. A passion she had rarely seen in him, burned in the wells of his eyes.
“Are you an angel, Adeena?” he whispered. “Your music, you… is it from Heaven?”
Philippe took the cello from her. He took Adeena in his arms and raised her to him, bringing their faces together. He kissed her deeply and she hungrily accepted all that he offered.
4
THE EI
GHT MILES from Usan to Kinnaird is a fairly easy drive if you know where you’re going. Jackie Stuart had been in Scotland less than twenty-four hours, but she was happy to be back in her familiar role as navigator for her directionally-challenged husband. William was a brilliant history professor at Carleton University, but he had trouble finding the house across the street, never mind something as obscure as the castle his mother had arranged for them to visit this weekend.
“Turn left here - Southesk Place,” Jackie told William as he ran out of road and appeared about to drive straight into the frigid green waters of the North Sea.
William smiled. “You don’t want to see if this thing will float?”
Jackie squeezed his leg. “Not with these heels on, darling,” she joked, sizing up the oncoming roundabout. “Take the first turn, the A92, right here.”
She looked over her shoulder to the backseat where Margaret Rose sat clutching her purse ready for battle. “William says we’ve got the Macduff apartment for the whole weekend, Mum?” Jackie asked, hoping to understand what her mysterious mother-in-law was up to. “Apparently it’s the best set of rooms at Kinnaird?”
“That’s right Jacqueline,” she confirmed, adding after a pause, “Gonnae be busy though. Workin’.”
Jackie looked at William. He shrugged. Although Jackie was a psychiatrist at the Ottawa Hospital and accustomed to the delusions of older patients, this was indeed a special case. “Busy doing what, Mum?”
“Findin’ somethin’ that belongs to us. Somethin’ lost a lang time ago,” Margaret Rose said, drawing out lang. “And I’m gonnae need yer help, dealing wi’ the soldiers, Jacqueline.”
Song for a Lost Kingdom, Book I Page 3