“When I warned her never to perform the cantata again, lest it embolden the traitors amongst us who would destroy the Union, she refused. In her fury she inquired if I was ‘King Kong’ a line of royalty I am ignorant of, but I believe was meant as an insult to my person.
I forbade her from ever playing that instrument again and to find something more suitable for a lady ~ a cittern. I had her score confiscated and placed it in my keep, where it will remain and cause no more harm to the preservation of the Union.”
Adeena closed her eyes and replayed the scene from Kinnaird in her mind. She smiled as she remembered calling the Captain ‘King Kong.’ With a start she opened her eyes and stared again at the pages.
This journal was a record of her travelling to the past, the pages changing whenever she became Katharine. Or at least whenever she interacted as Katharine with her brother, the Captain - Sir James Carnegie. Adeena thought about all the times this had happened. She flipped through the pages, looking for entries for December 1745.
Found it! She read the words slowly:
“16, December, 1745
The Master of Sinclair shall be shown no mercy. That he is my aunt’s husband matters not. Lady Margaret has conspired with him, and with sister Katharine to pass secrets to the enemy, traitors against the Union. John St Clair will be hunted down as one would a rabid dog.
Alas, I must comply with my forthright orders to join General Cope in England to lend aid in killing the Jacobite incursion. We will cut off the head of the snake, and bring the Young Pretender to the Tower. When it is all over, and the threat to the Union lanced once and for all, I will return to Kinnaird. By then my aunt will be widowed, I pray. And my brother George, joined again to his senses.
As for Katharine, she will either renounce her traitorous love for the swine James Drummond, or she will be disavowed as a Carnegie forever.”
Adeena closed the diary. She thought about the story her dad told her of how her grandmother had ‘borrowed’ this journal from Kinnaird. Adeena chuckled. Her grandmother was a lot like her. Thinking came long after doing.
And Adeena was beginning to realize what she must do.
27
JACKIE LOOKED ACROSS the sea of magazines in the hospital gift shop. From the life changing concerns of making your eye shadow last all day to the amazing secret of brownies that don’t need butter - she searched for something, anything - that might help her deal with the cards in her hand.
Her daughter had a rare and medically-impossible growth in her brain. She had rejected a proposal of marriage from a man Jackie once dreamed would be the father of her grandchildren, a respected professional who proudly shared her French-Canadian heritage. Instead, Adeena was smitten with someone dead for more than two centuries.
And that wasn’t the worst of it.
Despite Jackie’s reluctance to admit it, somehow it seemed her daughter travelled to the past and re-incarnated as another woman, the same one William’s poor mother had been haunted by all her life.
And then there was the final straw - learning that Adeena could never have children. That was the toughest blow of all.
Brownies? Eye shadow? Yeah, why not? Might be as good as anything else at this point.
“I don’t believe it,” her husband sang out from the far end of the magazine rack. “Look at this!”
She turned around and glanced at the cover of the magazine William held up as she moved closer. It was a man in traditional Scottish dress, raising a sword dramatically to the sky while the sun rose boldly behind him. He stood in front of a castle that looked familiar.
William approached her. “Isn’t this the guy from Kinnaird? What was his name again?”
Jackie adjusted her reading glasses. “Sacrament!” she exclaimed. “That’s Angus, from the dinner party.” She giggled to herself recalling her outrageous flirting session with him. He had tied himself in knots while she probed around the edges of his middle-aged fantasies. She had left him with a tiny peck on the cheek and told him to go find ‘the one’. He’d looked crushed when she walked away, but perhaps she’d given his ego a boost. He certainly gave her’s one.
“And look at this,” William said, pointing to a smaller inset picture on the cover of the History Scotland magazine he held up. “It’s about the Battle of Culloden.” He read the subtitle to Jackie. ‘Unpacking the Pivotal Battle in a New Light.’
Jackie stared at Angus on the cover, under the headline. ‘Castle Economy: Bringing History to Life is Big Business.’ The man glared at her, ready to defend his country. She smiled again. He might look tough to the world, but underneath, he was more interested in finding a woman who understood him. Hopefully she’d helped him on his journey.
“Should we get it for Adeena?” William asked as he began leafing through the pages of the glossy magazine.
“Absolutely,” she smiled with a twinkle in her eye.
ADEENA WASN’T SURE if she could do one more damn medical test. It’s just a simple ’procedure’ they would explain, as they injected more dyes into her, strapped her to yet another machine and found new ways to scan, photograph and x-ray her head.
Enough! I’m fine!
She glanced down at her left hand thinking of the diamond ring. Giving it back to Philippe was the last thing she could recall before she woke up. She hadn’t heard from him since and wondered how he was doing.
At least now he could find someone who might give him a family. A woman who didn’t struggle just to know what century she lived in. The leather-bound journal sat on the night stand beside her, like a door that opened to her other life. She wanted to let it go, cast it aside and just be content being Adeena Stuart - musician, composer, modern woman. But she was numb inside, and wasn’t sure she could feel anything, anymore.
She closed her eyes and felt forces struggling within her for control.
“Hey you,” a familiar voice rang out. It was Dad, with Mom not far behind. “How you feeling?”
“Fine, but bored out of my skull.”
“Well, this might help. We got you some new reading material,” her dad said, triumphantly handing some magazines to her. “Look at this!”
Adeena studied the cover of the magazine on top. Was that Kinnaird in the background! “Where’d you get that?”
Her mother sat on the bed. “The gift shop, downstairs.” She pointed to the magazine Adeena held. “That’s my friend Angus.”
“Your boyfriend Angus, you mean,” her dad chuckled. “You should have seen your mom flirt with him!”
Adeena smiled. “Really? Mom!”
Her mother batted her eyes in feigned shock. “Hey! I was just doing my job. I needed to keep him distracted so your dad and grandma could steal stuff from the castle.”
“I think you might have enjoyed your job a little too much, my dear,” her dad smiled. Her mother was blushing as her dad revved up the story. “That was the night we found the diary and the music Grandma wanted you to have so badly. She seemed to know where it was hidden.”
No matter how hard Adeena tried, the past kept intruding. She bit her lip as she started flipping through the pages of the glossy magazine. Seductive images of the Scottish countryside and stunning pictures of medieval castles jumped off the pages. This wasn’t helping her stay in the present. This was the past calling her back.
She closed the magazine and set it aside. She let out a long sigh and closed her eyes. “I just want to go home.”
Her mother reached for her hand. “Soon, belle. Dr. Lochiel has a new test they want to run first.”
“Oh shit!” Adeena exclaimed. “Come on! I’ve had enough damn tests. What’re they looking for now?”
Her mom, sitting on the edge of the bed looked worried. Instead of the lecture Adeena was expecting, there was only silence. Her parents looked at each other like they shared some horrible secret.
“Has Dr. Lochiel talked to you?” her mom finally asked, turning back to Adeena.
“Well, yeah. He said I mig
ht have a tumour, but they weren’t sure.” She heard her own words, as if for the first time. A tumour? In her brain? Why wasn’t she completely freaking out?
Her dad moved closer. “Adeena, something bad is happening when you,” he hesitated, “whenever… whenever you play that cello and …” His voice trembled and he seemed unable to finish.
“If you are travelling back and forth somehow,” her mother interjected, “to another time and place,” she paused looking at the monitoring machines, before turning back to Adeena. “Well, it seems to be producing some serious side affects.”
“It’s killing you!” her dad blurted, choking back a sob.
Adeena knew he was probably right. She closed her eyes and whispered, more to herself than her parents. “It’s because I don’t belong in this time.”
Her dad looked up, his eye full of tears. “What? Adeena, why do you say that?”
She was hurting him. He displayed his emotions for all to see. Her mother, maybe being in the same hospital she worked in professionally, seemed to handle hers differently.
“Belle,” her mother said softly, “what do you really want?”
Good question.
Adeena noticed her mother’s eyes were growing wet now. I’m such a wonderful daughter, sharing my joyful existence with my lucky parents, Adeena thought closing her eyes.
What do I want? I wish I knew.
Her dad sat down on bed on the other side of her and touched her arm. She opened her eyes and studied his face. It was so earnest. And so sad.
“Pumpkin, you’ve made Grandma proud,” he began quietly. “You’ve exposed Lang for what he was. And you got the music published. It was lost to the world, and you brought it back. Made it famous - for all time.”
For all time. The lost score now had its own history - a record of performances across the centuries. How many musicians had studied it, played it, made it part of their repertoire? How many men and woman had been moved by it, connected to its emotional core? “I wrote that music,” Adeena said. She fought back tears herself, not wanting to cause even more distress. “And I know how crazy and messed up you think I am, but I wrote it as two different people, in two different times.”
Her parents nodded. Whether they believed her story or just wanted this all to go away she could not tell. “There are two versions of me, each one needing the other to complete the music and to…” she stopped as an image of James angrily leaving his tent swept across her mind.
“To what?” her mother asked. Her dad’s face contorted into pained confusion.
“To save a good man,” she answered. “Someone that doesn’t deserve to die. Someone we both love.”
“Both?” her parents exclaimed in unison.
“Katharine. Katharine and I. He might be the only one anywhere, in any time, who really gets me,” she said looking out the window. “James feels my music, more than any person I’ve ever known. He gets it even more even than I do. He seems to know where it comes from.”
Adeena turned back to her parents. She hung her head slowly and now she could hold back no longer, tears beginning to stream down.
“Everything that matters most to me,” she sobbed, “is in the past.”
WILLIAM WAS BEGINNING to dread one of the things he loved most. History.
Doomed men fighting for lost causes. Bitter rivalries that had tore apart families and even nations, now reduced to long-forgotten curiosities. And the unfinished tumults of time that had wracked his mother, now threatened his daughter.
“No Adeena, you’re wrong,” he said slowly. “Your life is here. It’s here and now.”
Jackie wrapped her arms around Adeena, trying to console her. William touched his daughter’s head, rubbing the back of her neck gently. He whispered “We don’t want to lose you.” Why couldn’t he break this family cycle? “Just let it go.”
Adeena released her mother and hung her head. She took a few deep breaths, trying to regain her composure. “There is something wrong,” she said in a barely audible tone. “Something I have to fix.”
“You can’t change the past, Adeena,” William pleaded.
“I published the score, didn’t I?”
“Yes, but you can’t save James Drummond. He’s wounded at the Battle of Culloden and dies at sea. Prince Charles is defeated, driven into exile and dies - alone.”
Adeena didn’t seem convinced. “I know. But that doesn’t matter.”
Jackie was shaking her head. “Why? Why? Can you please tell us? Your future is not with someone who dies in battle as a young man. Someone who’s already been dead a long time.”
“I can’t explain it,” Adeena replied. “Grandma used to tell me stories, about our family. Stories about the pain she went through.” She turned to William. “Dad, you told me about those letters you found from your grandmother, Faith. You know how much our whole family has suffered, for so long.”
William recalled the letters between his mother and his grandmother. Tales of despair, of crushing poverty, near starvation, and wanton cruelty by a cast of horrible agents. His grandmother Faith claimed it could all be traced back to the ‘risings’ so long ago. “Those are just stories, Adeena. Most folks lived through hard times back then.”
“No dad, not like that. We’ve suffered because our family honour was disgraced,” Adeena said. “Grandma knew it. She told me stories, over and over again. I think that’s why she sent me that music. She wanted me to make things right.”
William had had enough. “Oh my God Adeena! You’ve already done what you could do. You have made a difference. You published the music. That’s what she wanted.” He softened his tone. “We’re here and we’re a family that cares about each other. Your grandmother is gone. The past should be studied, not transformed into something it was never meant to be. Something it never can be.”
“You’re wrong!” Adeena burst out. “I can’t live without trying.”
“But it’s killing you!” Jackie shouted. “How is that making things right?” She grabbed the leather journal on Adeena’s night stand. “You are not Katharine Carnegie! Let her go!”
TARA TOOK A moment to get her bearings.
The three-hour interview was finally over. She had done well. Extremely well.
To think she was a candidate for the top position at the Gallery was almost more than she could comprehend. The Duncan Cello incident was questioned. However, the committee agreed it was a ‘gutsy’ idea. What a sensation to have one of the staff members use it without permission! And then to reveal it was the goal all along to highlight the first modern performance of the Carnegie score on the same cello that had been used in its very first premiere in the 18th Century. And to use it to bust a plagiarizing composer.
Brilliant! They all agreed.
The free publicity and the viral social media aftermath was more effective than millions of dollars of paid advertising. The exhibit was now the hottest ticket in Ottawa. Tara had propelled the National Gallery into the focus of international media attention and created a sexy profile for the highbrow institution.
They credited her management of the whole affair with the kind of ‘new thinking’ they wanted more of in their next Director. Her parents, career superstars themselves, always told her she was a natural leader and that she should pursue this kind of advancement at all costs.
But was it all coming too fast? So much pressure and responsibility came with the Gallery’s top job. Was there more to life than being chained to a big desk? She’d missed out on so many things thanks to the steam roller in her head relentlessly pushing her to reach ever higher and higher.
Am I doing it for me or for my parents? Or am I just rolling mindlessly down the tracks they set for me a long time ago?
As she reached her office her cell phone chimed. She looked at the display: ‘Blocked’ number.
“Hello?” Tara answered.
“Hey, Tar.”
“Dee?” Tara asked, “I was so worried. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, yeah fine. What about you?”
Tara wasn’t sure how much to tell her. Their lives seemed to be headed in opposite directions. “Good. You coming home soon?”
There was a pause at the other end. “I don’t know. I think they like having me here to practice their torture routines. They have so many of them. They like to call them ‘procedures’ and I’ve got another big one tomorrow.”
“Well, soon as you’re out I’m taking you away. Want to go to New York? My treat.”
“That sounds good,” Adeena replied without much excitement. She waited a second and then added, “I know this is probably nuts, but I have a favour to ask you.”
“Sure, no problem. What do you need?”
“Is there anyway…” Adeena hesitated almost a second before continuing, “anyway at all, that maybe, you could bring…” Tara could sensed the trepidation. “…the Duncan Cello to the hospital?”
Tara took the phone from her ear and looked at it, shaking her head in disbelief. She laughed before putting it back to her head. “Are you completely out of your mind my dear?”
“There’s a strong possibility of that,” Adeena sighed. There was another long pause before she added, “there’s someone who needs my help. Someone I met.”
Tara processed the words without understanding what they could possibly mean. The last time she had seen Adeena was when she broke off her engagement with Philippe, handing him back his ring. Tara had seen the pain on his face. “Someone you met? Who?”
“Have you got a few minutes?”
“Sure,” Tara said closing the door to her office. She settled herself on a leather chair. “Tell me the whole story. Your life is my favourite reality show.”
For the next half hour Tara listened to a story that began to scare her. Adeena had always lived on the edge of the real world, but this was just too much. She travelled back in time and became another woman? She was doing it because of dreams her grandmother had, and only Adeena could ultimately save their family?
Song for a Lost Kingdom, Book I Page 31