by Molly Macrae
“Do you know if Gillian’s just away from her room,” she asked, “or is she gone for the day? I hope I haven’t wasted a trip. I thought I was meeting her here this afternoon, and I brought some of our new scones from the tearoom as a treat.” And I’m smiling like a loon and talking too much and now he’s staring at me. She lowered the bag and the wattage of her smile.
“A treat, you say.” Tom Laing took the bag from her hand. “Or could it be a bribe of some sort?”
“Sorry, a what?”
“You have bribes in America, aye? I reckon they’re something like baseball; a national sport.”
Likes to hear himself talk, Janet thought. And bait his audience. But not on my time. From years of practicing on problematic library patrons, her face settled into lines of polite disinterest. “Nice to meet you again, Tom,” she said, reaching for the scone bag.
He moved the bag to his far hand and held it so that she would have to reach around him to get it. “Gillian’s gone for the day.”
“Ah.”
“But I’ll see she gets these.”
“Thank you.”
He nodded down the hall toward the entry. “As I’m heading toward the door myself, shall I walk you out?”
“I’m sure I can find the door, but thank you.”
“Aye, well, as I said, I’m going that way.” Tom Laing started down the hall. Annoyed, Janet followed. Tom slowed so that he walked beside her, annoying her further, and then he took a scone from the bag and bit into it. “Not bad,” he said around the mouthful.
Every muscle of Janet’s professional courtesy strained to keep her from swatting the scone from his hand and grabbing the bag. Kicking his shin crossed her mind, too.
When they reached the lobby, he made a sweeping gesture with what was left of the scone. “What do you think of it?” he asked, then popped the last bite in his mouth.
“Think of what? The artwork? The lobby? The school?”
He swallowed and brushed the back of his hand across his mouth. “The lobby?” he echoed, mimicking her pronunciation. “Why would I ask what you think of the lobby?” He gestured again, this time the fingers of his empty hand splayed. “The paintings and drawings. The photographs.”
Janet saw no reason to let her annoyance with this man upstage the artwork. “There’s a lot of talent here,” she said. “It’s a lovely show. I don’t see how Daphne Wood can be anything but extremely impressed.”
Tom went to stand in front of three photographs and seemed to be studying them intently.
“The photographs are particularly nice,” Janet said.
“Some of my best.”
“They’re yours?” She knew she sounded incredulous, but he didn’t seem to notice. And just because she thought his photographs were stunning didn’t mean her opinion of him needed an upgrade. On the other hand, there was no need to be purposely rude. “They’re beautiful. Where is that?”
“Sgail Gorge,” he said. “Or as we’re calling it again, Glen Sgail, and it’s about bloody time. One of the most beautiful places on earth. We owe a debt that can’t be repaid to Gillian’s father for all he’s done.”
“The presentation to Alistair and the ceilidh will be nice, though,” Janet said. “And isn’t the whole Daphne Wood author-in-residence thing a tribute to the work he’s done?”
“The ceilidh will be a load of bollocks with all the tradition stripped out of it. The author-in-residence ‘thing,’ as you call it, is another story. Anyone who doesn’t make the most of this opportunity has bollocks for brains. Your shop won’t be doing too badly selling her books, I reckon.”
“Speaking of books,” Janet said, proud of herself for not speaking her mind, “I’d better get back to them. Your pictures are wonderful, Tom. All the artwork is. The light and the white walls in this lobby”—she gave the word the full Midwestern treatment—“set everything off beautifully. The whole school is lovely.”
“Smoke and mirrors, that’s all it is,” Tom said. “Just the planners wanting to give the impression the building belongs here. It doesn’t. Like so many new things in Inversgail, it’s nothing but a transplant. See ya.”
Not if I see you first and find a place to hide, Janet thought. Tom Laing certainly saw nothing wrong with being purposely rude.
3
On Monday evenings, the four women met at Nev’s, a pub that wasn’t on the High Street, and didn’t look like much on the outside. Tucked between Smith Funerals and the Inversgail Guardian, Nev’s didn’t advertise itself to tourists, but welcomed anyone who discovered it, along with their dogs. At some point in the past, the sign with the pub’s original name—Chamberlain’s Arms—had disappeared. Came down in a storm, some said. Stolen by outlanders, said others. Taken down for repainting, still others said. Locals didn’t need the sign, though, and Danny, the publican of most recent record, saw no reason to bring it out of the cellar where it gathered dust in a dark corner.
Janet called their Monday nights at Nev’s their quality of life check. Christine called them their weekly wind-down with occasional whisky.
“It’s an honest place,” Christine had said when she proposed the meetings. “We can be honest at Nev’s and admit that not every moment of our new lives is Scotties, scones, and purple heather.”
“Meetings at Nev’s will provide the antidote to the dreich that’s bound to creep up on us from time to time,” Tallie had said, using her favorite weather word from her childhood summers.
Janet and Summer had easily agreed. Nev’s gave them greetings from locals and occasional smiles, a chance to unwind or unburden, a game of darts if anyone liked, and neutral ground. Nev’s provided ale and whisky, too, and comforting pub food to go with them. Rab MacGregor, true to his nature of being variously here or there, joined them sometimes, but not always. They’d been coming into Nev’s on Mondays long enough to have a “usual” table near the door to the darts room. Summer occasionally joined the players, and Tallie usually went along, to cheer her on.
“You’re feeling guilty about something,” Christine said that evening.
“Am I?” Janet asked. “I wonder why?”
“You might be trying to hide something.” Christine studied Janet more closely. “Aye, that’s probably it. It’s what usually makes you look guilty.”
“People read me like a book these days. I’m not sure I like it.”
“But it’s appropriate,” Christine said. “So let’s not get sidetracked by that complaint. Unburden on us. That’s what these evenings are for.”
“It isn’t much, really,” Janet said. “Just that feeling—”
Christine stood up. “Sorry, Janet. Dad’s having a time getting Mum’s coat off over there. I’ll be right back.”
Meeting at Nev’s also gave Christine a chance to get her parents out of the house and down to their old local for a bit of company. Her mum didn’t always remember that Christine wasn’t just home on a short visit from America, but she knew Nev’s and recognized a half pint when she saw it.
The music on the sound system switched from plaintive vocals, in what Janet assumed was Gaelic, to an even more plaintive fiddle piece. She sat back, half listening to Tallie and Summer laughing over solutions to hypothetical burning issues, and half listening to the music. A fairly dreich piece, she thought, and perfectly lovely. Nev’s didn’t go in for real musicians. The times they’d tried live music, tourists had flocked in. There would be live music at the library Friday night, though, and Janet was looking forward to that.
She wondered about Christine’s question. Am I feeling guilty? No, not really. Or only partly. What she felt, she decided, was the odd mixture of guilt and annoyance that comes when a message one leaves isn’t clear or goes astray. So she’d missed Gillian that afternoon. Then she’d gotten back to the bookshop and found Tallie being rushed off her feet by a surprising flurry of customers. Those missteps were compounded by her dislike for Tom Laing. The walk to and from the school had been otherwise refreshing, but
considering the outcome, she felt she’d made a bad decision in going. She disliked making bad decisions more than she disliked Tom Laing. But she also disliked ruining a pleasant evening at Nev’s with negative thoughts, so she closed her eyes and attempted to push them away using what she’d gleaned from her book about empathy meditation.
The next thing she knew, someone was touching her shoulder, and she heard Tallie stifle a giggle and say, “She’s snoring.” Janet opened her eyes. Christine and Danny the publican were nose to nose with her.
“Are you all right, then, Janet?” Danny asked. When she nodded, he and Christine stood up. “Good, because Christine reminded me, none too subtly, I might add, that tonight marks four months you lot have managed to stay in business, much to my considerable surprise.” He smiled at Christine and received a good-natured snarl in return. “No, really, much to my considerable pleasure, and so I’d like to stand you a round of drinks in congratulations.”
Danny Macquarrie was yet another reason Christine enjoyed their Monday evenings at Nev’s. Tall and broad, he had served with distinction in the Royal Navy and then come home to Inversgail. Even after a brilliant naval career, Christine claimed he had occasional fits of inadequacy, stemming from the time she’d pushed him off the harbor wall when they were small and she’d had to jump in to rescue him.
She’d also confided in Janet that they were both independent enough, stubborn enough, and set enough in their ways that the casual and quiet relationship they’d settled into, since she’d returned, suited them. She and Danny had what she called an uncluttered relationship. “We’ve known each other since we were weans,” she said. “We’re happy with the amount of time we spend together, and equally happy keeping our friendship free of strings and the snarled mess strings so often make.”
Danny’s relationship with Nev’s appeared to be just as casual, and he kept its true nature quiet, too, so that many of his patrons had no idea he owned the place and wasn’t just one of the barmen.
Christine helped Danny bring pints of the local ale, Selkie’s Tears, to the table. Five, because Rab and Ranger materialized, as if out of nowhere, in time to join them in a toast to their business. The toast earned a round of applause from other patrons. Another fiddle piece merged into a lively accordion tune and they drank their celebratory pints, the picture of relaxed contentment. Right then, Summer looked content, too, Janet thought. Then Janet caught Tallie watching her watch Summer and she knew what her daughter was thinking—I told you so.
James Haviland, editor of the Inversgail Guardian, stopped by their table with Martin Gunn, one of his reporters, in tow. James was an unassuming sort of renaissance man about Inversgail. He wrangled the paper, played fiddle in a ceilidh band, threw darts not quite like a champion, and when he sat and knit his fingers over his stomach, he looked like a favorite uncle about to tell a story. Janet knew the younger man, Martin Gunn, by sight and his apparent devotion to Nev’s and darts, but nothing beyond that.
“Are you playing at the library Friday, James?” Christine asked.
“Fair warning,” James said, “I am. Fancy a game, Summer?”
Summer shrugged, but got up and took her pint with her.
Nev’s was filling up. Christine went to check on her parents. Rab and Ranger had dematerialized. Janet looked around for them and saw Gillian and Tom walk in, Tom’s hand at the small of Gillian’s back.
Tallie saw them, too. “Good,” she said. “Here’s your chance to catch her.”
Gillian and Tom stopped at the bar, and while Gillian gave their order and paid for their drinks, Tom looked toward the darts room. He might have seen them at their table near the door, but Janet detected no flicker of recognition. When he had his drink in hand, he said something to Gillian, patted her backside, and took himself off to the darts, leaving her standing at the bar.
“She looks a little bummed,” Tallie said, after Tom passed them.
“He’s a big bum,” said Janet. “Hop up and invite her over here.”
“Hopping.”
Gillian was one of the bookshop’s best customers. Janet and Tallie knew that, because she’d told them so when she first introduced herself. She was one of half a dozen or so self-proclaimed best customers, and Janet had decided early on that it didn’t matter whether those customers spent their entire paychecks in the shop or only came in once a month to browse; anyone who believed that firmly in their love for Yon Bonnie Books was indeed a best customer.
“It was from you!” Gillian said when she came back to the table with Tallie. “Tallie told me the scone that saved my life this afternoon was from you, Janet. Bless you. Tom let me think he had it left over from his elevenses, the great numpty.” She sat between them and took a long swallow from her pint of something darker than the Selkie’s Tears.
“I’m glad you got it and liked it,” Janet said. “Did you get the message I left, too?”
“With Tom?”
“On your phone.”
Gillian brought her phone out and shook her head with each flick of her finger as she scrolled. She was a few years older than Tallie, with an attractive touch of gray starting to frost her temples. The movement of her eyebrows, as she continued flicking through her phone, gave the impression she was getting more and more lost in her trail of messages. When Christine rejoined them, she put the phone away.
“How are you, Gillian?” Christine asked, “You’re looking a little haunted around the eyes. Has this whole visiting author song and dance got your knickers in a twist?”
Gillian’s smile looked haunted, too. She took another swallow of her drink and then answered with a game lift of her chin. “After more than a year of planning, and months of preparation and keeping a vigilant eye out for pitfalls to pave over, I can truthfully say that I am ready for the term to finally be over.”
Christine stared at her. “Term one only started last week, didn’t it?”
Gillian nodded. “Small problem, eh? Well.” She nodded, again, and took another swallow. “A few more hurdles to get over and then everything will be fine. I’m sure it will be. And here’s what I keep telling myself: It’s as well to remember that Daphne has been living alone in that cabin of hers for a long time.”
“Decades,” Janet said.
“Can you imagine?” Gillian asked. “I’m a bit of a nature girl, myself. In fact, Dad and I often took her rambling with us. But the way she lives now is light-years beyond a weekend hill walk.”
“She isn’t entirely off the grid, though,” Tallie said. “She writes, she gets published. She does interviews. She’s acclaimed by reviewers. Readers love her. She might live like a recluse, but she hasn’t cut herself off.”
“Even so,” Gillian said.
“Even so, what?” Tallie asked. “Is there something you’re trying to tell us? Or trying to not tell us?”
“Only that we shouldn’t be surprised if she’s—” Gillian measured an inch with her thumb and index finger then squinted at them and brought them together so they almost touched. “I reckon she might have become a wee bit eccentric over the years. She and I were inseparable, did you know that? I spent a lot of time in her house and she spent even more in mine. Dad called us the two musketeers.”
“Wonderful,” Janet said. “How eccentric is a wee bit?”
“Not much.” Gillian rummaged in her bag and came out with several sheets of folded paper. “But she has a few—” Gillian waved the papers as though diminishing or dispersing whatever it was that Daphne had a few of, then handed them to Janet.
Janet unfolded the papers and saw the list Sharon had stormed into the shop with that morning. She handed them to Tallie.
“You aren’t going to read them?” Gillian asked.
“Sharon stopped by first thing today and let me read hers,” Janet said. “But thank you, it’s good to have a copy of our own.”
“Ah.” Gillian traced the grain of the table’s wood with a finger and didn’t say any more.
“I’
m not really worried by some of what’s on the list,” Janet said. “For big signings, having a person on hand to open the books to the title page and someone to get the right spelling for names is fairly standard procedure. And a lot of authors are particular about the pens they use for signing. Although, if they’re so particular, then it makes sense for them to supply their own. But the rest—”
At that point, Tallie, who’d been reading the list, whistled and passed it to Christine.
“The others didn’t see Sharon’s copy,” Janet said, hoping that explained Tallie’s whistle and Christine’s dropping jaw. “Does Daphne really expect to have everything else on the list at the signing? What’s she going to use all that for? Unless she’s planning to do a program of some sort, but this would be the first we’ve heard about that. Maybe none of her requests are as totally outrageous as Sharon seems to think they are—”
“Oh, I think they might be,” Tallie said.
“Anyway,” Janet said, “it leaves us wondering where all this is supposed to come from. Your grant? Because we can’t supply it.”
“A ceramic bowl with fresh water?” Christine read aloud. “What’s that for? This isn’t eccentric, Gillian, it’s barking mad.”
Gillian looked at the three of them and put a hand to her mouth. The hand wasn’t enough to stop a squeak that turned into a laugh. For a brief moment, Janet thought they’d been let in on a joke, although not a particularly good one. When Gillian’s laugh threatened to become hysterical, she knew better.
“Gillian,” Janet said, then more sharply, “Gillian.”
Gillian pointed at Christine. “She said ‘barking mad.’” She started to laugh again, but Christine employed the best quelling look in her Elizabeth II repertoire. It was enough to make Gillian draw in a breath and straighten her shoulders. “Barking mad,” she said, looking at Christine, then Janet, and then Tallie.