by Wendy Holden
“I didn’t screw her.”
“Oh no? What about all those scratches and squeeze marks on your back?”
Jett’s protestations and excuses that Sveti had been a dermatologist before the war in Kosovo and was giving him some free treatment cut no ice with his wife.
“A dermatologist?” Cassandra hissed. “She’s got a face like a pizza. Probably thinks cathiodermie is an Irish barmaid.” She was, Cassandra suddenly decided, sick of playing host plant to a parasitic philanderer. The last strumpet had sounded. She’d had enough.
Seeing the genuine light of battle in her eyes rather than just the drunken rage he had privately come to think of as the Warninks signals, Jett panicked. A large house in Kensington and a lavishly subsidised lifestyle seemed to rise up before him and disappear out of the window.
“Um,” he stuttered. “I can explain…”
Cassandra held up a hand. “And besides,” she spat, “what the hell do you want with dermatology anyway? You’ve got skin like an old teabag that’s been buried for years. Just look at you.”
Jett bristled. He stared at his wife with a mixture of fear and loathing. Finally, squeezing through the decayed and dripping cells of his brain came the dim memory that attack was the best form of defence.
“You’re jealous,” he hurled back. “You can’t bear to think another woman finds me attractive.” As Cassandra stared at him in disbelief, he wondered whether he had got it wrong. Perhaps defence was the best form of attack. “So what harm does it do?” he wheedled. “It’s not as if you give two hoots. I’m not hurting anyone.”
“That,” snapped Cassandra, “depends whether you’re wearing your Five Gates of Hell penis strap or not. I imagine that could hurt quite a lot.”
“How do you know about that?” Jett demanded as what colour there was in his face drained out of it. “Been opening my post again, I suppose?”
“Never mind how I know. The point is,” Cassandra said, feeling suddenly exhausted, “it’s over. Our marriage. I’ve had enough.”
“I’d say you haven’t had anything like enough,” Jett said bitterly. “That’s the problem.”
“You’re a dead loss,” snarled Cassandra. “Or, to be more specific, you look dead and you make a loss. I can’t afford to have a sponge like you hanging round me any longer.”
“Dead loss?” expostulated Jett. “What about the band getting back together? The TV deal?”
“TV deal?” snorted Cassandra. “You mean that cowboy outfit wanting to make a fly on the wall documentary about your shitty band re-forming and going on the road? Hardly your own chat show, is it? Fly on the wall documentary my arse—fly on the fly is what they should make about you.”
Desperate, Jett produced his trump card. “So what about Zak? How’s he going to feel when he finds we’re splitting up?”
“Delighted,” Cassandra returned triumphantly. “I’ve already discussed it with him and he’s thrilled. Very keen it should go through as soon as possible, in fact.”
“Bastard.”
“Sadly, no,” Cassandra said. “I wish he was but, unfortunately, my child has a father. You.”
“Worse luck,” said Jett, to whom it had now become evident that resistance was useless.
“For you, yes,” spat Cassandra. “Zak, as a matter of fact, was the one who alerted me to your antics in the first place.”
“What?” Jett’s hands clenched and unclenched as best they could while sporting a row of rings like knuckledusters.
“Oh yes,” Cassandra said. “Asked me why does Daddy have Sweaty in bed with him when you’re not there, Mummy? I had to tell him it was because Daddy was frightened of the dark. He thought that was pathetic and that I should divorce you.”
“I bet he did,” Jett snarled. “He’s set the whole thing up. I knew it.”
“How dare you?” shrieked Cassandra. “Typical! You’d blame your own eight-year-old son rather than take responsibility for your inability to keep your trousers zipped.”
“Yes, because as far as he’s concerned, us splitting up means two lots of Christmas and birthday presents for him. Can’t you see?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” snapped Cassandra, recalling that, now Jett came to mention it, Zak had raised the matter of presents during the divorce discussions she had had with him. Quite frequently, in fact.
Chapter Fifteen
It hadn’t been—absolutely it hadn’t been—Jamie’s fault; he was obviously completely exhausted by the drive and, well, if the expected first night of passion had boiled down to nothing more than him dragging it in and out a few times, at least, Anna thought, he’d made some effort to mark the occasion of their homecoming. If not the bedsheet.
“I’m sorry,” he had the grace to say as they lay, silent and several feet apart, in the darkness. “I’m afraid I wasn’t really in the mood.”
Anna reached across and squeezed his hand. “You’re tired.”
“Yes, and I was just reading the most depressing report about how the curtain walls are going to need completely rebuilding. I’m afraid,” he added, “that the wedding probably can’t be as lavish as we’d hoped.” Anna said nothing. “Still,” Jamie concluded brightly, “you need to discuss all that with Nanny. You’ll see her at breakfast.” So saying, he turned over and went to sleep.
***
Anna woke up alone. Jamie, she imagined, had gone to inspect some decaying part of the castle or other. She hugged her knees to her chest beneath the covers as she tried to preserve the precious pocket of warmth between her thighs and her stomach for as long as possible. In the cold air outside the bed, she could even see her breath.
Thin grey light divided the curtains, and as Anna stared at it, she noticed that the line didn’t seem to be increasing much in brightness. If anything, it had faded slightly, as if the day had dawned, thought better of it, and gone away again. And what on earth was that odd noise? That strange, wailing sound, like a soul in torment, coming from the direction of the window. The wind trapped under one of the panes? Christ, but it was loud. As the ghastly yowling seemed to reach a peak of high-pitched, hopeless misery, Anna, suddenly deciding not to go and check, took the boldest action she was capable of and stuck her fingers in her ears.
She yawned. She really must get up now, find out what Jamie was up to. A cold wave passed through her stomach as she remembered this morning held her first encounter with Nanny. Fighting the urge to burrow back beneath the blankets, Anna told herself sternly not to be so stupid. Reluctantly, she peeled back the covers and shuddered as the cold rushed to embrace her like a long-lost relative. Perhaps she would brave the plumbing first, and have a bath to warm up…
After wandering aimlessly about the seemingly endless corridors in search of the breakfast room, Anna found Jamie in what, to judge by the long oak table in its centre and heavy, dark, carved sideboards against its walls, was a dining room. It seemed to be a different room to that where, over breakfast, Geri had confessed to taking Miranda’s place on Thoby’s wedding night, but without the milling people, deafening clang of the chafing dishes, and, most of all, the electric light which had definitely been on then, it was hard to say. The silence was absolute, interrupted only by the bad-tempered spatter of rain against the windows. Outside, nothing could be seen but fog. That much, Anna thought, she could remember.
Jamie sat calmly at one end of the table blowing the dust off a pile of ledgers, documents, and receipts. “There you are,” he remarked distantly, noting something down in a margin. Somewhere in his tone, Anna felt, lay rebuke.
“What time is it?”
“Ten past nine.”
“Christ. I had no idea. Sorry.”
“Didn’t MacLoggie wake you up?”
Anna started. The thought of the bent old man creeping into her bedroom to lay a clammy, whisky hand on her sleeping arm…she suppressed a shudder
. “No, he certainly did not.”
“But surely you heard the pipes.” Jamie looked at her with surprise.
“Oh yes.” Come to think of it, she had heard some rushes and rattles and gurgles, counterpointed by the occasional distant explosion, immediately after their abortive lovemaking. Still, noisy plumbing was preferable to no plumbing at all. And the eccentric-sounding pipe layout may have had something to do with her recent experiences in the bathroom, experiences she intended to bring up with Jamie. But in the meantime she was determined to put a brave facecloth on it.
“Oh, and there was the most appalling yowling noise an hour or so ago,” Anna added. “Horrible row. Like a cat being tortured to death.”
Jamie looked annoyed. “Yes. That’s what I mean. The bagpipes. When the laird is in residence, MacLoggie plays under the windows every morning at six. Has done for centuries. His family, I mean.”
“Oh.” Anna blushed furiously. So that was what the ghastly noise had been. Dr. Johnson’s sudden flight was starting to make sense.
“Yes. The MacLoggies have been pipers to the Anguses for as long as anyone can remember. Far back into the mists of time.”
Mists was right, Anna thought, glancing at the grey cotton wool beyond the windows.
“But darling,” Anna said, “does he have to do it so early?” She wondered where she might get a cup of tea or even, luxury of luxuries, a slice of toast. The rack in front of Jamie was empty.
“Early!” Jamie sounded indignant. “He usually does it at six. This morning he did it at eight as a special favour. You were very honoured.”
Anna plastered what she hoped was a suitably awestruck expression across her face and drew out a chair to sit down. She promptly jumped about seven feet in the air as she suddenly became conscious of something massive and frightening in the doorway behind her.
“Nanny,” Jamie said as the figure moved slowly forward like a juggernaut. “This is Anna. My fiancée.” It was difficult not to notice the apprehension in his tone.
“How do you do,” stammered Anna, whose tongue suddenly felt as dry and rasping as a piece of biltong. Call her a scaredy-cat, but there was something ever so slightly intimidating about the large, thickset, late-middle-aged woman before her. Perhaps it was the huge and hairy mole nestling beside the thick boxer’s nose. Perhaps the eyes, like ice chips behind glasses as thick as a crateful of bottle bottoms. Perhaps it was the line of her mouth, as flat and unrelenting as that on a switched-off life-support machine; perhaps the few strands of hair scraped back to expose the huge and pouchy face. Perhaps it was the way the very dining room seemed to shrink in her presence. Because this woman came from the other end of the childcare spectrum from the apple-cheeked, lavender-scented, Brideshead Revisited variety of cradle-rocker. Nanny looked as if she could bite the bollocks off a brontosaurus. And frequently did. In an act of instinctive self-protection, Anna spread her fingers out across the table, so the ring shone as best it could in the gloom. But if Nanny saw it, she showed no sign.
“Nanny’s an extraordinary woman,” Jamie said appreciatively as the vast figure, armed with an order for a cup of tea which was as much as Anna dared ask for, left the room.
“Yes, she looks it.” Anna, feeling the colour slowly start to return to her face, realised Nanny also looked like the last person on earth she wanted to discuss her wedding with.
“She can see things we can’t. Fairies, ghosts, images from the past and the future. She’s got second sight,” said Jamie admiringly.
Just as well, thought Anna. If those glasses are anything to go by she obviously hasn’t got first. She lapsed into depressed silence. Jamie, meanwhile, returned to perusing his papers. Anna watched him as, handsome brow furrowed in concentration, he ran his finger slowly up the page.
“What are you looking at?” It seemed reasonable to try and strike up a conversation with her fiancé on their first morning in their future home.
“Just checking the figures for the deer herd.”
Looking round the dining room, it seemed a miracle there were any deer left. The walls bristled with antlers. Above large dark oblongs which she imagined must be paintings, hundreds of stags’ heads ran like a frieze round the room. She jumped as Jamie abruptly closed the deer book. Her hopes of engaging him in discussion were swiftly dashed as he instantly opened another.
“What’s that one about?”
“Refurbishment.”
“Can I help?” Anna asked eagerly. At last, something she knew about. The annual university ritual of rolling white paint over the walls of dingy student rooms would prove to be useful experience after all. She could come to Jamie’s emulsional rescue.
“Any good at roofing?” asked Jamie, a shade sarcastically. “And there are a few walls that need rebuilding as well.”
By the time Nanny returned with the tea, which was tepid and thoroughly stewed, silence had descended once more. Seeing Jamie turn to yet another ledger, Anna tried again. Third time lucky.
“Er…”
“Tenants’ complaints,” rapped out Jamie before she could get the words out. He did not sound as if he wished to discuss what they were.
Silence. As Anna replaced her cup in its saucer, the noise seemed window-shattering. Perhaps that was why so many of them were broken.
“Um, about tenants’ complaints,” she ventured.
“Yes?”
“Well, I’ve got one. There’s something very wrong with the water supply.”
“What do you mean?” She’d got his attention now. His head had lifted, at least.
“When I ran my bath this morning, it was absolutely filthy.”
“Filthy?” Anna was conscious of both Jamie and Nanny staring at her in amazement. “It can’t be,” Jamie said. “It’s as fresh as a daisy. Comes straight out of the local burn.”
“Well, this looked as if it came straight out of the local pub. Horrible dirty brown. Looked just like beer.”
A fork clattered dramatically and possibly deliberately to the floor. Nanny bent to retrieve it. A faint creaking sound accompanied her efforts, and Anna cast an awed glance in the direction of her corset. Evidently a triumph of civil engineering, it was probably holding back as much raw force as the wall of the Aswan dam.
“That,” said Jamie, casting a nervous glance in Nanny’s direction, “is because all the water here runs through peat. There’s nothing wrong with it. On the contrary, it’s some of the best and freshest around.”
Not for the first time since arriving at Dampie, Anna wanted the floor to swallow her up. Still, there was one saving grace. At least she hadn’t mentioned she’d flushed the toilet several times as well, unable to understand why the pee wouldn’t go away.
“Oh dear,” she said, grinning apologetically. “I can see I’ve got rather a lot to learn about Skul. Perhaps you could tell me a few things.”
“Absolutely,” said Jamie, recovering his equilibrium instantly. “Skul is a fascinating island. Besides the castle, there’s the Old Man Rock, the Mount o’Many Stanes, the Cairns of Bogster, and Mad Angus Angus’s Burn.”
Was that like a Chinese burn? Anna wondered, trying not to notice Nanny’s massive red hands as she cleared the last of the plates away. “How interesting,” she said.
“Yes, well you should certainly explore the lie of the land a bit,” Jamie continued. “After all, you’re about to become mistress of the place.”
A strange feeling—as of her heart soaring and her stomach sinking simultaneously—gripped Anna. Then a stray ray of light, bolder than its fellows, suddenly shot through the gloomy dining-room window and scored a direct hit on the ring on her finger. The stone may have been old and slightly yellow, but it still packed a considerable punch. Both she and Jamie gazed at it, Anna in a kind of dazzled delight; Jamie slightly more speculatively.
“Yes, that would be lovely.” Anna beamed
. A walk with Jamie round the island would be absolutely the most romantic introduction to her new home. Perhaps, she thought, they could even take a picnic. One glance at the weather brooding outside the windows, however, and even one of Anna’s newly optimistic bent was forced to admit that looked unlikely. She glanced away from the grey mist pressing up pleadingly against the panes as if wishing to be let in to get warm. Some hope. In the space of a single breakfast-time, it was already evident to Anna that Dampie’s most testing social challenge was the ability to hold a conversation whilst suppressing ones teeth from chattering with the chill. It could, she reasoned, hardly be colder outside than it was inside. “When shall we go?” she asked.
“We?” Jamie looked astonished. “I’m awfully sorry, but I’ve got a few things to sort out this morning. Turns out that yet another section of roof caved in last night, this time over the old wine store.”
“Oh no.” Anna looked at him, her eyes wide with concern. “Does that mean all the drink for the wedding…?”
Jamie looked even more astonished. “Well, actually, the cellar was empty. The point of it is that the wine store connects to the kitchen and we don’t want the roof there collapsing in on Nanny.”
Aware that Nanny was clearing up the rest of the breakfast things as slowly as possible with the obvious intention of listening to every word of their conversation, Anna tried hard to look as if this was absolutely the last thing she wanted. Not that Jamie noticed.
“No,” he was musing. “I think the last wine in there was taken out for my father’s twenty-first birthday party, as a matter of fact. For the wedding we’ll most probably get in some boxes of plonk from Tesco’s in Inverness…” His voice died away as his glance once again settled on Anna’s diamond ring. “Because unfortunately we won’t be able to afford champagne. Not unless we sell something…”