Royally Dead

by Greta McKennan

  Pete came back into the room and said, “Your turn,” to Aileen. He sat down next to me and heaved a sigh that sounded like relief, unless it was anxiety for his brand-new girlfriend.

  It seemed like Officer Franklin took a long time questioning Aileen. I could feel myself getting more and more worried that she’d be led out of here in handcuffs. Pete didn’t help matters. He spent the time twisting his hands together in his lap, standing up and pacing around the room only to sit back down again, and checking his watch every few minutes. If I were judging his innocence on behavior or body language, I’d have said without a shadow of a doubt that he was guilty.

  Finally, McCarthy engaged Pete in a discussion of yesterday’s Phillies game, and Butler joined in as well. Talk of fastballs and changeups and one spectacular catch at the wall made the time pass more quickly.

  When Aileen entered the living room at long last, she wasn’t wearing handcuffs. Thank goodness for that!

  She plumped down on the easy chair and said, “One interrogation down, how many more to go?”

  No one answered her.

  Chapter 19

  After Officers Franklin and Butler left with the flask, Pete and Aileen took off for a walk, leaving me at home with McCarthy. He accepted my offer of tea and followed me into the kitchen.

  He sat down at the kitchen table and smiled up at me as I puttered around putting the water on and rousting out the mugs and tea bags. “So, I can’t help noticing a certain bliss in the air, despite another police interrogation. I’ve been wondering when things would come out in the open.”

  I plunked down a mug and offered him his favorite Earl Grey tea. “Don’t tell me you saw that coming? I live here and I was taken by surprise.”

  He scrolled through a bunch of pictures on his camera and then held it out to me. The photo showed Pete and Aileen at this very table, engaged in conversation over an ordinary bowl of popcorn. Aileen leaned forward, gesturing with one arm. Her face was animated; her black stage makeup couldn’t conceal the intensity of whatever hilarious thing she was saying. Pete sat back in his chair laughing, his eyes lit up and fixed on Aileen as if she were the only person in the world.

  There was a softness in McCarthy’s face as he looked at the picture. “This was a couple of weeks ago, when I was waiting for you to come down.” He turned off his camera and picked up the mug. “Sometimes you can see things better in a photograph than when it’s happening in front of your face.”

  I sat down across from him with my own mug of tea. “Well, I just hope this new thing doesn’t mess up the dynamics of our house. Nothing like romance to tear down a good friendship.”

  He busied himself with his tea bag, dunking it up and down in his mug. “I guess we’ll see.”

  I was lost in thought, picturing Pete and Aileen either isolating themselves in their newfound love or breaking up with disastrous consequences to the camaraderie of our household. Things change, I reminded myself. Life is never static.

  I glanced over at McCarthy, who was drinking his tea in unaccustomed silence, for him. He looked at me and said, “Do you suppose Pete will become the newest member of the Twisted Armpits?”

  “No, but he’s their biggest fan. Although…he does play guitar, but it’s more acoustic. He and Aileen could strike out as a folk music duo and blow everyone’s minds.”

  We laughed together over the thought of Aileen playing folk music, although I knew she could if she wanted to. She could do anything.

  I realized I hadn’t shared the tale of the Royal Pains with McCarthy. I would ask Aileen’s permission at some point before letting him in on the secret.

  McCarthy hurried through his tea and got up from the table. “I need to get these pictures off to the paper. It’s not really a breakthrough in the case, but it’s news nonetheless.” His eyes crinkled up at the edges when he smiled that smile I loved. “Thanks for calling me for backup and giving me the scoop. You know how much I love getting news first.”

  “I’ll let you know when I’ve got anything else.” Suddenly, I didn’t want him to leave—not yet. “Actually, I do have something you might be interested in.” I got up from the table. “I got some pages from Margaret Oliphant’s diary that I think might have something to do with Ladd Foster. Want to take a look?”

  “Does a monkey want a banana? Of course I want to have a look.” He waited while I ran upstairs and collected my laptop. I plunked it down on the table and called up the pages Julie had sent me.

  McCarthy looked on with interest as I showed him the scans of Margaret’s handwritten diary entries. He listened in rapt attention as I laid out my theory that Margaret had a baby whose father wasn’t Judge Tremington and gave him up to Mrs. F., who may have been Mrs. Foster. I pointed out the similarities in the names of Margaret’s child Edward Stuart Oliphant and Ladd Stuart Oliphant Foster. I showed him a picture of the Oliphant crest and he compared it to the photo he’d taken of Ladd’s whiskey flask. He laid down his camera on the table and looked at me in something approaching awe. “This is a fascinating story, a true historical mystery. Do we know who the father was?”

  I shook my head. “I need to check back in with Julie to get some earlier pages from the diary. She hasn’t read all of them because wading through the handwriting is so time-consuming. She told me that Margaret didn’t name her lover, although she wrote about him giving her some gifts. I can’t remember what.”

  “Can you ask her now?”

  I glanced at the clock. It was coming up on eight-thirty. With a start, I realized I hadn’t had anything to eat since my lunchtime burrito. No wonder I was feeling so hungry. I pulled out my phone and began typing. “I’ll send her a text and then I need to get some food.” I pressed Send and pulled the refrigerator door open. “You probably haven’t had any dinner yet either.”

  McCarthy checked the clock like I had and jumped up from the table. “I need to get these pictures over to the paper so they can run them tomorrow.” He scooped up his camera and gave me a quick peck on the cheek. “Let me know what you hear from Julie.” He breezed out of the room, leaving me feeling somewhat forlorn. The abrupt absence of his boundless energy left the kitchen feeling cold and empty. I called to Mohair and scrounged a bit of supper from the fridge. After filling the cat bowls, I sat down to a cold turkey sandwich with nacho chips on the side, where they belonged, and scrolled through the images from Margaret’s diary again. What did it matter if Ladd was related to Margaret Oliphant anyway? Could that have had anything to do with his death?

  I finished my simple dinner and scooted upstairs to try to finish my work on Corgi’s kilt so I could get him in for a fitting tomorrow. I went ahead and texted him to fix a time. Nothing like a deadline to spur me on to completion.

  I had only basted two more pleats when my phone rang. It was McCarthy. I let it ring a couple of times while I toyed with the idea of not picking up. I really needed to focus on this kilt. But how could I ignore McCarthy? I picked up, of course.

  “Daria, I’ve got something you’re gonna want to see. Herman Tisdale came by while I was out and dropped it off. I’m going to swing by and pick you up.” He hung up before I could even remember that Herman Tisdale was the announcer from the Highland Games who had been a drinking buddy of Ladd’s.

  McCarthy pounded on my door before I even had a chance to set the rest of the pins in the pleat I was working on. I hurried downstairs and threw open the front door.

  “I had to leave it at the Chronicle because it’s not technically mine,” he said as he swept me out the door and down the walkway to his car.

  “What is it?” I asked, a bit out of breath as he hustled me into the car.

  McCarthy threw the car into Drive and peeled out from the curb. “Herman Tisdale stopped by the office today to drop off a book for Taffy, who’s supposed to be writing an obituary for Ladd Foster. Tisdale said Ladd gave him the book at the Highla
nd Games and asked him to have a look and give an opinion on it. Tisdale stashed it in his car and then, in the chaos surrounding Ladd’s death, he forgot all about it. He discovered it this afternoon when he was cleaning out his car, and he thought Taffy might want to look at it for material for the obit. I just happened to see it on her desk, and she told me how she came by it.”

  He pulled up in front of the Laurel Springs Daily Chronicle offices and hopped out of the car. He practically dragged me into the newsroom and through a maze of cubicles and piles of file boxes. He bypassed his own cubicle and led me to one next to the window that looked out onto the disappointing view of the dumpsters in the back parking lot. A young woman with cropped brown hair wearing a pair of tortoiseshell cat-eye glasses sat at the desk. An unlit cigarette dangled from her lips as she clicked the keys of her computer.

  “Taffy, this is Daria Dembrowski, the seamstress.” He turned to me. “Taffy Deroue edits the obituaries. As we suspected, no family members have come forward with an obit for Ladd Foster. But Taffy’s really good at writing as well as editing them, so she’s working with Herman Tisdale on Ladd’s.” He turned back to Taffy, barely containing his enthusiasm. “Show her what Tisdale dropped off. He said Ladd told him it had been in the Foster family for generations.”

  Taffy shifted the cigarette to the other side of her mouth and shuffled a few papers off a small book bound in cracked leather. It looked really old and fragile, like it should be in the Tremington Museum instead of under a random pile of papers on a newspaperwoman’s desk. Taffy handed the book to McCarthy and turned back to her screen.

  McCarthy handled the book gently, almost with reverence. He opened it to the title page so I could see it was a book of poetry that looked like it was in Gaelic, by someone named Alasdair.

  The small volume of poetry sparked a memory. “Julie said Margaret wrote about a book of poetry and a ring her lover gave her. Those items weren’t in the trunk that contained her wedding dress.” I leaned closer. “I’ve never heard of Alasdair.”

  “Me neither. I looked him up. He was a poet in Scotland in the eighteenth century who wrote in Gaelic even after the Jacobites were crushed in the Forty-Five and the language was suppressed. He was known as the Great Bard, or in English, Alexander MacDonald. Interestingly, he was a Gaelic tutor to Bonnie Prince Charlie.” He pointed to an inscription on the facing page, written in English. 'Remember me, my love.’ Short and sweet. It was signed, ‘C. E. S.’

  “I’m guessing we’ve found Margaret’s book of poetry,” McCarthy said.

  “C. E. S. must be Margaret’s lover, and the father of Eddy.” I reached for the little book and gently flipped through the pages. “I remember that Margaret wrote about taking care of a wounded soldier on the boat to America. She didn’t want to change his dressings, but she did it for C. E. I took that to mean her lover. C. E. S. must be the same person.”

  I flipped through to the back of the book, where a faded envelope was tucked between the endpapers. I eased it out and held it up for McCarthy to see, my breath coming faster. “This might be a love letter to Margaret.”

  He grinned at my growing excitement. Meanwhile, Taffy typed away, oblivious to the historical revelations taking place behind her.

  I eased the envelope open to find two pieces of paper inside. One was a thin piece of writing paper closely written by hand in old-fashioned handwriting. The other was a thicker piece of typing paper with text that looked like it had been produced on an old manual typewriter. I started with the handwritten letter.

  It wasn’t a love letter.

  The handwriting looked the same as what I had been reading from Margaret’s diary. But I didn’t have to guess. The first line read, “From Margaret Oliphant Tremington, to Edward Stuart Oliphant Foster, on the occasion of his eighteenth birthday.”

  I was right about Mrs. Foster.

  I held my breath as I continued to read:

  My dearest Eddy,

  You are a man now, and a man should know where he comes from. Your parents will have told you that you were adopted, and now I will tell you of your true parentage.

  You are my son, conceived in love when I was still in Scotland, before ever I met Judge Tremington. You were not born into the sin of adultery. Your father fled Scotland after the Rising, as did I. He went to France while I took ship to America. You may have guessed at your noble blood, but now I will lay all doubts to rest. You are the natural son of Charles Edward Stuart, whose name you bear, along with my own. You may never be king of Scotland and England, but in your heart, you may know that the blood of kings runs through your veins.

  I ask that you keep your royal heritage alive through the naming of your sons, granting each of your firstborns throughout your generations with the names Stuart and Oliphant, as a testament to the love between two people torn asunder by the disaster of war.

  I gave you birth and then gave you up, but I never gave up on loving you. I pray you will think kindly of me, as I think ever fondly of you, my firstborn son.

  Your mother, Margaret Oliphant Tremington

  I laid down the letter in awe. I had pulled aside the curtains of time and history and gotten a glimpse into the heart of a young woman forced to relinquish her firstborn son.

  I whispered to McCarthy, “Her lover was Bonnie Prince Charlie!”

  He was reading the typewritten page. “What a story!” He held it out to me. “I’m assuming this is the same letter, typed out at some later date.”

  I glanced at it. “Yeah. And get this—Margaret’s wishes are still being followed. Ladd’s full name is Ladd Stuart Oliphant Foster. I wonder if he has a son.”

  “Nope,” Taffy called out over her shoulder, without even turning her head. “He wasn’t married. Unless he has a child out of wedlock, of course.” She kept on typing.

  McCarthy chuckled. “From what I saw at the Highland Games, I wouldn’t be surprised if there are any number of Stuart Oliphant Fosters running around out there.”

  I ran my finger over the handwritten lines. “Ladd was the descendant of Bonnie Prince Charlie, who tried to claim the throne of Britain as his own. Aileen said he told a story of being descended from Scottish royalty.” I pulled out my phone and took a picture of both the handwritten letter and the typewritten page, as well as the book of poetry.

  McCarthy took a couple of pictures as well, and then folded up the papers and slid them back into the envelope. He slipped it back into the book and put it down on Taffy’s desk. “Your friend Julie would love to hear this story,” he said to me.

  I nodded, enjoying the thought of her enthusiasm over this fascinating mystery of history. “Morris Hart would be interested as well. He got the story all wrong in his novel.”

  “And you’re going to call him up and set him straight?” McCarthy asked. Was that a hint of jealousy in his voice?

  “Somebody’s gotta do it.” I searched through the contacts on my phone. “Here we go.” I fired off a quick text under McCarthy’s watchful eye. I didn’t know why I was tormenting him like this, or why I was enjoying it so much. “Are you going to put this whole story in Ladd’s obituary?” I asked the silent Taffy.

  She shuffled the book aside on her cluttered desk. “I have to do some fact-checking first. Sure, it looks like an ancient document that tells a story that will forever change the fabric of history as we know it, but you never know, it could be a fake. It has to be authenticated. That’s my job.”

  I hid a smile at her dramatic declaration and thanked her for sharing the book with me. I privately hoped Julie could swoop in as soon as possible to rescue this important relic of history from the chaos of Taffy’s desk.

  McCarthy led me out of the Chronicle’s offices. “Shall I spin you home?”

  The Chronicle was in the heart of the downtown district, only a few blocks away from my downtown residential neighborhood. “We could just walk, if you
want.”

  He grinned and accompanied me out the door and down the sidewalk. “I thought you might have work to do, or bestselling authors to contact.”

  “Already did that. I have to finish basting Corgi’s kilt for a fitting tomorrow, and then I’ve got Breanna coming over to pick up her wedding gown. Her wedding is coming up next week, you know.”

  “I wasn’t invited.” He took my hand as we walked. “I don’t do wedding photography, generally, so I don’t get to go to many weddings. Who wants an obnoxious photographer hanging around when someone else is taking the wedding photos, right?”

  I squeezed his hand. “Just what I was about to say!”

  He smiled down at me, his eyes crinkling up at the corners the way they always did. For some reason, this time the sight took my breath away.

  McCarthy walked me to the door, but I didn’t invite him in. I really did have to finish basting Corgi’s kilt. But we lingered on the porch for a few minutes, still holding hands. I didn’t quite want to let him go.

  “Thanks for sharing that book with me, Sean. It was fun to unwrap history like that.”

  He took my other hand as well. “Who else to share it with than my favorite historical seamstress?”

  He leaned in close and kissed me gently. At that moment, a car screeched around the corner and roared up to the curb in front of my house. A red car with black flames painted on the hood. Aileen flung out of the driver’s seat and bounded up the steps.

  “I forgot the cord for my amp.” She blasted into the house, leaving McCarthy and me laughing on the porch in her wake. He squeezed my hands and released me. “Happy basting, then. Goodnight.”

  A smile played on my lips as I watched him stride down the sidewalk, whistling. I was almost knocked over by Aileen on her way back out the door.

  “Have a great gig,” I called after her, but she was already gone.