Song for a Lost Kingdom, Book I

by Steve Moretti

  Friedrich Lang knew she had taken the precious instrument. How long before Tara figured it out?

  And now Walter knew her secret too. She thought about him and Maria, and about Walter’s wife Grace and their two kids, both about Adeena’s age. They had grown up together. Grace had even been something of an aunt to her. Walter worshipped his wife, but Maria had a passion that must have been hard for him to resist - especially when they were alone for long stretches out of the country, making music together. Adeena didn’t like what Walter had done, but she understood the emotions that drew musicians together.

  Adeena touched the rough surface of the Bam cello flight case. A spike of adrenaline shot through her. It was becoming a forbidden pleasure. It felt like it was calling her. Taking the Duncan Cello had been wrong on every front, and there was no way to justify it. She realized that she could be arrested and maybe even serve time for what she had done. She might find a way to spin some kind of story about having restorative work done on it, creating a prop for security purposes, or some other lame excuse.

  But deep down, she knew she had to make things right.

  Even though she struggled against it, she kept her hand on the cello case unable to escape its pull. A few inches away lay the doorway to another world, one that was beginning to feel more where she belonged than her own reality. Katharine’s cello and her music were expensive artifacts, intriguing historical curiosities for galleries and museums. The Duncan Cello might be worth millions to a collector and the music might be the ticket to jump-starting a frustrated old composer’s career.

  But no one understood their true value.

  Adeena finally found the strength to lift her hand. She knew the cello and the music were worth fighting for and that somehow they played a part in the story of her family – her grandmother, her father, and herself. If she had to be incarcerated to sort things out, well . . . she might just have to do that.

  Her phone beeped and vibrated on the counter. It was probably Philippe texting her back. Before she could answer it, there was a knock on the door. Adeena looked over, confused. She went to the door and opened it wide.

  Philippe stood in the hallway, smiling. He was dressed in a dark suit and purple tie.

  “Surprise!”

  Adeena laughed. “You don’t give a girl a chance, do you? Come on in.”

  “I got reservations for a new place on the Market. It just opened,” he said as he walked into her apartment. “Gourmet pasta, fresh seafood flown in every day, all with French wines paired with each course. The chef is from Le Cordon Bleu. He just arrived from Europe.”

  “That sounds good,” she said. “I’m starving. Just give me a minute to put something on.” She gave Philippe a peck on the cheek and turned towards her room. “Pour yourself some wine.”

  Philippe watched Adeena as she turned and started towards her room. Just as she approached her bedroom door he called out to her. “What’s that?”

  She stopped by the Bam cello flight case. “You mean this?” she said pointing to the oversized black case.

  Philippe looked at her seriously. “That’s not your case.” His smile was gone. “I hope it’s not what I think it is,” he said sternly.

  Adeena hesitated. Had there been a news release? Did everyone know she had the Duncan Cello? “I just, uh, . . . I needed to have Guy Harrison do some touch-ups on it,” she said weakly. Trying to fool Philippe was like trying to swim across Wolfe Lake in lead boots.

  “Adeena, do you have any idea what you’re doing?” he asked. “Friedrich Lang told me you took the Duncan Cello, but I didn’t believe him. I thought he was just trying to threaten me, that he was just an old fool! Oh my God, Adeena!” he groaned.

  She turned and walked back towards him. She took his hand and held it in hers, looking up into his face. “Can I at least try and explain this to you?”

  FOR THE NEXT fifteen minutes, Adeena told Philippe one more time, everything about her experience with the Duncan Cello, and what happened when she played the lost score that her grandmother had sent to her. He listened as she described her performance and how she became Katharine Carnegie, the composer, singer and cellist. She told him how Robert Duncan had designed the cello for Katharine, and that she had two brothers –George and Sir James Carnegie, the Captain and how they ended up on opposite sides of the 1745 uprising in Scotland.

  Philippe studied her curiously.

  He said very little during her explanation. When she was finished, he moved over and sat down on the sofa. He put his head back and stared at the ceiling. He looked lost in thought as he rubbed his temples and shook his head in frustration.

  “Ohhhh my,” he said at last. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Adeena asked.

  “You! You, Adeena. You steal the cello, and now you tell me you’re . . . I don’t know what you’re trying to say. You’re time travelling?” He gazed out the condo windows towards the dark sky.

  “You don’t believe I word I’ve said, do you?” she replied.

  “Adeena! C’mon!” he sang out, exasperated. “You’re not really going back in time. You know your history, you know the music. You are just dreaming all this stuff. Do you not understand? None of this, all these stories you’ve told me, none of this is real!”

  “You think I’m crazy,” Adeena replied. “Don’t you?”

  “I didn’t say you were crazy, but do you not think that maybe it’s just all happening in your mind?” he said, standing up and straightening his tie. “Let’s go talk about it over some wine. We’ll have dinner and we can sort this out.”

  Adeena looked at him like he had just murdered her dog. “Philippe . . .” she said putting her thoughts together. “You have no idea what I’m going through. You’re right. I might be going crazy, or, this might really be happening to me. Either way, I need you. I need you to be really with me on this.”

  Philippe was silent. He seemed to be reviewing his options. “Okay. I’ll try. Are we going?”

  “I need to know. Do you believe me or not?” she said, her laser eyes boring a hole through his skull.

  He hesitated a long while before he answered tentatively, in a barely audible whisper. “I don’t think I can, Adeena. I just can’t believe that could really be happening.”

  She felt herself losing control. An inner tension grew from tiny pebble to blazing comet in a nanosecond. Why couldn’t he just be there for her, when she needed him most? If he could not or would not, she wanted him gone. “I don’t want you here. Please leave me alone.”

  “Adeena. You need help. Let me take you somewhere, take you to see someone. But first, let me take the Duncan Cell back to the Gallery before you get arrested.”

  “No! Just leave, leave me alone! I’m crazy, right? Your fucking wacko criminal girlfriend,” she screamed. “Right?”

  “Adeena . . please . . .”

  “LEAVE!”

  He hesitated for a moment, and then took a few steps towards the door. He stopped for a second, looked at her, shook his head and walked out the door.

  ADEENA SOBBED AS she opened the Bam cello case.

  Philippe was probably right. She needed help, and none of this was real.

  Yes, she knew the history, and she knew the music. As she lifted the Duncan Cello from the confines of its inner case, she felt like she was losing control. Katharine was becoming stronger and Adeena weaker. She needed the oxygen that only the Duncan Cello and the lost score could provide.

  Her eyes filled with tears as she began to play - a junkie unable to resist her next fix.

  LADY JEAN STOOD before Adeena, holding a steaming pot with the same blue inlaid flowers and leaves as the cup Adeena held in her hand.

  “Katharine? More tea, dear?”

  Adeena looked up at her and nodded. “Yes. Please.” She was seated at a wide oak table with bright sunlight streaming through the long, narrow windows that provided a view of the spectacular ornamental garde
ns in the castle’s courtyards.

  Around the table sat Katharine’s brother George and James Drummond. Both ate heartily of the breakfast laid before them: thick hocks of ham and roasted pork, hard-boiled eggs, toast, oatmeal cakes, marmalade and what looked like a pint of dark ale parked in front of each of their overflowing plates.

  “Eat hardy. Aye, the road could be with both of ye a lang time.” Lady Jean admonished, and then turned to George. “Ye have chosen wisely. Yer brother, the Captain, not so well.”

  George smiled at her analysis as he finished his breakfast. “His mind was made up years ago,” George said, finishing off a thick piece of ham, “as a child it would seem. The history he learned in Glasgow was twisted to paint a glorious picture of a Union ripe with riches and opportunity. They neglected to tell him that his family fought and died for ‘or two hundred years to preserve Scotland.”

  “Aye,” Lady Jean said. “Your aunt, the Countess Lady Margaret, tried everything to give your brother a proper education, by those who knew the history of the Carnegie family. Your brother became chief of the House of Southesk when your father died, but alas, he never learned its history. Instead he developed a hatred for the Jacobites who seek to preserve it.”

  James listened to all of this without saying a word. He finished up his breakfast and drank deeply from the tankard of ale before him. He wiped his lips with a linen cloth, laid the empty pewter vessel on the table.

  “Today, we start for Edinburgh. The capital will soon be restored,” he said.

  Lady Jean beamed at his confidence. “Yer father, and yer grandfather - the whole Drummond and Gordon clans in fact, will be watching. They are counting on you, James,” she warned. “Ye must not fail them.”

  James nodded. “We will do them proud before the week is nigh. I found another one hundred and fifty men from Perthshire to march with us, along with more than two thousand who have already joined us. And now, we have support of the Farquharsons, the MacGregors, Stewarts, Menzies and the Robertsons. They all pledged their allegiance to the Prince last night,” he paused, glancing at Adeena, “after the ball.”

  Adeena watched the back and forth between James and his mother. As Lady Jean continued to talk, explaining to George how she had been praying for this day since her husband had died twenty-five years ago, James caught Adeena’s eye. He seemed to be pointing his head slightly to the right, as if he wanted her to follow him. Lady Jean sat down beside George, took his arm, and began explaining how her husband had been part of the Jacobite group that had almost captured Edinburgh Castle during the 1715 rising, some thirty years before.

  Adeena stood up. “Excuse me for a moment,” she said. George and Lady Jean barely heard her as she left the table. James was not far behind.

  OUTSIDE OF DRUMMOND Castle, Adeena saw men preparing for the march. They had amassed supplies of oatmeal, cured beef, salted herring and salmon, along with barrels of brandy and ale, and were loading them onto wagons that would follow behind the men on their trek towards Edinburgh. The brindle stallion Balgair, was tied to a post and she smiled at the sight of him. He glanced over at her and snorted loudly, raising his head high in the air.

  “Now, you be careful what you say to her, Balgair!” James laughed as he drew up and stood beside her.

  Adeena chuckled. “Don’t worry. He only says nice things to me.”

  James gave the horse’s nose a good rub. “Katharine, I may be gone for some time. I want you to know that I will watch over George. I will do my best to protect him.”

  “Thank you, James,” Adeena said. She moved closer and scratched the side of Balgair’s sturdy neck. He seemed to appreciate it and stamped his front hoof. She glanced at James. “Your mother puts a lot of pressure on you, doesn’t she?”

  He smiled. “Your brother the Captain may be fierce in battle, and General Cope may have canon and fodder aimed at my head, by it is my own mother who truly gives me fright.”

  Adeena laughed. “I can see that. I guess you grew up hearing all about your duty and finishing the work of your father?”

  “I did, My Lady,” he replied. “From the age of seven. That is when he died and I became head of my family and took his title, Duke of Perth. I’ve known my responsibility, and my duty to all those who came before me, for a very long time indeed.”

  “Is that why you fight now? Why you are leaving for Edinburgh?” she asked.

  James looked at her with some confusion. He seemed to be thinking, uncertain how best to reply.

  “Katharine, you have given me a renewed spirit to believe that what I do is necessary and indeed required to help restore the Kingdom – the lost Kingdom of my father and his father, and all the members of the House of Drummond before me,” he replied. He paused a moment, looking at her. “But Katharine, you probe deeply. You seek to understand me, do you not?”

  Adeena studied him. His blue eyes, long hair and soft features belied the savage strength she had seen him display when he saved her in the forest. “I guess I do James,” she replied. “I want to know what drives you to take up this fight.”

  He looked away. Maybe this was not the way a woman in the 18th Century talked to a man.

  “That is a question which I often ponder myself,” he said finally, after a long pause. “and one which no one, save Rosalyne, has ever asked me before.”

  “Rosalyne?”

  “My first love, in France,” he replied. “We spent the summer together when I was a boy of ten and eight years.”

  “Eighteen?”

  “Yes. I met her as a boy. I left as a man.”

  “What happened? To her?”

  “She was a widow, older than me, and . . .” his words trailed off. He turned and looked at Adeena. “My mother, my brother John and I, we all needed to return home from France, to Scotland, back to Drummond Castle where I was born. I had been away for more than ten years. I was like a stranger when I returned to this place, but alas, the land was deeper inside of me than I ever imagined.”

  Adeena wasn’t sure what he was trying to say. “What about Rosalyne, I mean. What happened to her?”

  James’ face tightened. “The fever. It took her, not long after I left Paris. Our letters were few, but they live sacred in my memory. After she was gone, I took to running Drummond and worked more than ten years on a plan for the township of Crieff with everything I had learned in France.”

  “For her?” Adeena asked.

  “She was never far from my thoughts,” he replied. He took his hand and laid it on her shoulder. His touch was strong and firm. “I have neigh talked this way before, not since I was with her.”

  She reached for his face and stroked his cheek. “James, you’re a good man. I think I’m beginning to know your heart.”

  He drew her into his arms and pulled her closer. “You do Katharine, because you are there.”

  She closed her eyes as they held each other. The world of past and present collided in her head. Whether this was real or a dream, she could not tell. But all she could feel now was James. She felt like she could hold him a long time.

  “Katharine, we need to be on our way. Release your prisoner!” The voice came from George who now approached them. She smiled as James relaxed his hold on her.

  “Yes, my laird,” she replied. “As you command.” James let her go and moved towards Balgair, checking on the fittings of his bridle and saddle. She noticed another horse, a brown mare, being trotted towards them by a soldier dressed in the red colours of the Perth regiment.

  “Katharine, I want you to stay here with Lady Jean, until you receive word from me,” George told her. “We are meeting the Prince at Scone Castle and then plotting our route to Edinburgh.”

  “Scone Castle?” she asked.

  “Yes, the House of Scone,” James interrupted, stepping forward, holding Balgair’s reins. “The Prince’s father, King James the Eighth, stayed there almost thirty years ago. It is where all our Kings have been crowned for the last five hundred years.” />
  George kissed his sister on the cheek. “I will send word soon,” he said. “Stay here until you hear from me.”

  “I will,” she said. “Be safe George, take care of yourself.” He nodded and walked towards the brown mare.

  James stood before her. “I want to carry something from you into battle with me,” he said.

  “From me?” Adeena asked, confused.

  “Just your words, the ones that live within me,” he said. He held a sheaf of paper that he had extracted from his saddlebag. “Give me your mark, Katharine, that I may keep it always close.” He handed the paper to her and a quill that he used for his daily journal.

  Adeena took them and bent over the wooden table that sat beside her. She thought for a moment.

  Forever I will wait for you.

  She looked at it and then over at James, now saddled on Balgair. He wanted her ‘mark.’ She bent over and hesitated, and then signed the note. She looked down at what she had written:

  Katharine

  Adeena took the paper and handed it to him. He read it slowly, closed his eyes for a long moment and then bowed his head to her. He folded the note, placed it inside his uniform and turned the reins of his horse towards the road.

  As she watched him ride away, the morning sun filled her eyes with a brightness that overwhelmed her. She wondered how long it would be until she saw him again.

  The sun grew brighter still until she felt it completely absorb her.

  PHILIPPE WANDERED THROUGH the ByWard Market in a state of confusion.

  He was not used to this feeling. He was usually in control. As a reporter. it was usually he with inside knowledge, or a strong hunch to follow, a puzzle he could solve by following clues, like a scavenger hunt that eventually led to his journalistic prize.