The other two men were silent. All of them knew how difficult this was going to be.
“Kaye Gerston was planning to come and speak out,” Andrew said, “but she’s in hospital in Inverness.”
“Since when?” Duncan asked.
“Yesterday.” Andrew had driven her there himself, just hours after Fiona had walked out of his life, perhaps forever. It looked as if Kaye would recover enough to be released early tomorrow morning. He wasn’t sure that he would recover at all.
“She would have been a powerful influence,” Iain said.
“Aye, but there will be others who’ll speak out for what’s right.”
“It looks like people are beginning to arrive,” Duncan said. “It would be best if we didn’t sit together.”
“Is Mara coming?” Andrew hesitated. “And Fiona?”
“Yes. One of the local teenagers is watching April, but I think there’ll be a number of children here. For their sake, you’re going to have to douse any fireworks before they go off.”
Andrew watched his friends take seats in different aisles. The church was old, and it carried the musty smell of centuries of prayer and worship. It’s architects had carefully eschewed the sentimental or emotional, preferring stern gray stone and a design as rigid as a Calvinist’s spine. But the emotion and sentiment were hidden here. They were impregnated in the air, worn into pews that had held both the newborn and the dying. Centuries of men and women had mourned in this place, even if they had managed it with Scottish stoicism and dispatch. Young people had committed themselves to each other and to God on the very place where he stood.
And now Andrew was asking for a different kind of commitment. He was not a particularly religious man and not a superstitious one. But he was glad that they had chosen the kirk as their meeting place. It seemed only right.
The villagers filed in slowly at first; then the tempo picked up, until people were sliding to the center of the pews to make room for newcomers. There was an air of suppressed excitement. Children, scrubbed within an inch of their lives, bounced on pews and signaled each other across the room. Old women leaning on canes and old men moved slowly down the aisles to find seats. He tried to greet them all and thank them for coming, but the task grew too large as the time neared to start.
Andrew glanced at his watch. It was almost seven. Mara still hadn’t arrived, although Billie had come in to sit beside Iain.
Fiona was nowhere to be seen.
Andrew wondered what he would do when she did arrive. He hadn’t seen her since she’d left his house two mornings ago. He didn’t know what she’d thought or felt. He had been harsh, so harsh that his own words still rang in his head. But he couldn’t take them back, because they were true. Until Fiona believed in him and in herself, they had no future together.
All too well he understood self-doubt and the terrible price is exacted.
He looked toward the door, but it wasn’t Fiona who strolled into the kirk. David Gow, looking as if he belonged in a glossy magazine advertisement, took a seat halfway into the room.
Andrew had no doubt why Gow was here. Next week this meeting would be portrayed in Gow’s newspaper as a quaint attempt by the village of Druidheachd to keep progress at bay. Gow was a brother in spirit to men like Carlton-Jones and Surrey. He used whatever was at his disposal to better his own lot.
The question now was how many of the villagers were like him?
Andrew shook another hand or two, then started toward the front. The room grew quiet. He was undisputably the moderator. The meeting was about to begin.
Normally he wore his kilt for formal occasions, but he hadn’t wanted to be accused of even a hint of drama tonight. Instead he was wearing a suit pulled from the back of his closet. The suit was a dark tweed prison and the tie a silk hangman’s noose. But he was willing to endure the worst punishment to set the right tone.
At the front he resisted yanking at his starched white collar. He waited until the room fell silent. Then he stepped over to the lectern.
At that precise moment, Mara and Fiona walked in.
He didn’t begin, as if, like a good host, he was waiting for his newest guests to be seated. But the truth was that he couldn’t speak. His mouth was as dry as a stale scone, and his throat felt as if the scone was lodged there. He had expected to feel some sense of detachment, some sense that he had been right to risk their relationship in order to make his point clearly and finally. Instead, all he felt was fear. Because as he faced Fiona in the crowded church, he realized just how much he loved her and what his life would be worth if she turned away from him forever.
She was seated now, a pale-faced waif with her chin held absurdly high. He wanted to lope down the aisle, toss her over his shoulder and flee Druidheachd forever. He wanted to forget what was right and settle for what was safe.
Instead, he cleared his throat and began.
“For those of you who dinna know, my name is Andrew MacDougall, and with the support of the minister of this kirk, I’ve called this meeting to discuss the events of the past months.”
At first he spoke slowly and carefully, searching for the right words. These were not people who would be convinced easily. Many of them were the descendants of stubborn men and women who, in the early nineteenth century, had avoided the wholesale exile of Highlanders known as the Clearances.
The people sitting in this kirk were wary as well as astute. They made decisions with the same skill and care with which they made their livings. Scots had an international reputation for parsimony, but Andrew knew the truth about that. Scotland was a harsh land, and throughout history it had been a poor one. For centuries the Highlands had been poorest of all. After the Clearances, those who had remained had not survived through luck. They had learned to husband their resources, trade on their own unique talents and make careful, considered decisions. The old ways were important in Druidheachd, because the old ways had stood the test of time.
He tried to present his concerns without emotion, but when he spoke about what the village and the land meant to him, the emotion crept in. He had tried not to glance at Fiona, but against his will, his eyes sought her then. Her eyes were luminous, and despite everything else that was between them, he knew she supported him in this.
Just as he had expected, the debate began the moment he finished. A stranger, a man in a costly gray suit, rose to his feet. “I would like to speak, if I may. I represent Mr. Carlton-Jones and Mr. Surrey. And I would like to address this.” He held aloft the sheet of facts and figures that each person had received at the door.
Iain had prepared the document carefully. There was nothing in it that couldn’t be verified. It was an indictment of the business practices of the men in question and an unvoiced prediction of what would happen to Druidheachd if enough villagers sold their property.
Iain stood, too, and Andrew held up his hand to silence the man in gray. “You’ll be welcome to speak in due time,” he said. “But this is a meeting for the citizens of this village and the surrounding countryside, and until they’ve had a chance to be heard, I’ll have to ask you to be seated.”
The man protested. Andrew stood his ground. A murmur swept the room, but no one spoke in defense of the man’s rights.
“Iain,” Andrew said, “have you something to say?”
Iain came to the front. The murmur grew louder, then died.
“There are many ways for a man to attain what he most wants,” Iain said. “One of them is to spread rumors that belittle anyone who stands in his way.” He let his words sink in before he continued. “I could do that as well as any man, but I’ve chosen instead to fight this issue with facts. You have those facts before you. Now, if you have any questions for me, I’ll answer every one of them.”
There were questions, and some of them were overtly hostile. Andrew had expected as much. Iain handled them all with aplomb. He explained in clear language what had happened to the towns that had fallen prey to developments such as the one
Carlton-Jones and Surrey envisioned. With figures and examples he backed up his claims that Carlton-Jones and Surrey’s developments were among the most destructive. “It comes down to the simplest of values,” he said at last, when there were no more questions. “Each of you must separate what is truly important from what, in the long run, is inconsequential.”
“Easy for you to say, isn’t it, Iain Ross?” A matronly, woman in the second row lumbered to her feet. Andrew recognized her as Darla MacBride, a local busybody with the tongue of a viper and the disposition of a hedgehog. Compared to others sitting in the pews, Darla’s family was relatively new to the village. Only two generations of MacBrides resided in the kirkyard.
“None of this has been easy for me to say, Mrs. MacBride,” Iain said evenly. “I’m deeply concerned about what’s happening here.”
“And why is that? Is it because those English gentlemen can pay more for our land than you can? Everybody here knows that you want it for yourself!”
“Everybody here doesn’t know that,” said another female voice. “Iain Ross and his father before him have managed their land wisely and well. He’s a fair and intelligent landlord, and I’ll not have you malign him this way!”
Darla sat down, making disgusted noises that carried to the last pew.
“I have no wish to own so much as one more blade of grass,” Iain said. “In fact this is as good a time as any to announce that I’ve just donated Ceo Castle and the land surrounding it to Historic Scotland, to be managed as a national historical site.”
“Couldn’t pay the taxes, I suppose,” Darla said.
“If I couldn’t pay the taxes on property that’s belonged to my family for centuries, why would I try to buy property in the village? Have I need of it for another home, perhaps?”
There was no response from Darla, but another rumble of voices ensued.
Iain took his seat. Andrew waited for the next speakers to emerge. They did, in fast succession. One woman’s voice trembled audibly as she tried to explain why she had just sold her family’s property to Carlton-Jones and Surrey. A man stood up to announce that he hadn’t sold and didn’t intend to. The debate raged on.
Andrew lost his patience in the midst of a particularly virulent speech by a man he’d often drunk with at the pub. The man was defending his right to do anything he bloody well pleased.
“Of course you’ve the right,” Andrew said. “You’ve also the right to bray like a blethering jackass any time you choose! Just pardon the rest of us for no’ going along with you. Some of us are more interested in what happens to our friends and neighbors than whether we’ll have enough quid to bet on the soccer matches!”
Had anyone been foolish enough to drop a pin, it would have sounded like a bomb. Andrew’s eyes swept to Fiona again. He expected to see censure. Instead, her eyes were dancing. She lifted her hands and began to applaud. Fully half the room joined in.
* * *
Duncan was the eighth speaker. Mara leaned over to whisper in Fiona’s ear as he strolled to the front. The stroll was high drama. Except for Iain, everyone else had spoken from their seats.
“Does he no’ look bonny tonight, our Duncan?”
“You think he looks bonny all the time, Mara.”
“Aye, I suppose. And will his son be as bonny, do you think?”
Fiona turned and searched Mara’s face. Despite the serious nature of this meeting, she looked completely serene. “Are you pregnant? Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Aye. Duncan does no’ know, of course. I knew better than to tell him while the clouds hung heavy over Druidheachd.”
“Mara, that’s great!” But even in the midst of her congratulations, Fiona pondered Mara’s last statement. “You know more than you’re saying, don’t you? Everything’s going to turn out right, isn’t it?”
“That depends. In a moment the men of midnight will have done all they can, just as it was predicted they would. But there’s one here who’s yet to speak. One whose destiny is tied up in the village now that her past has been resolved. One who needs to explain to these good people exactly what Druidheachd is, and what it means.”
“You can’t mean me!”
“Aye. And you’ve known you must speak since you walked through the door. For my son and for the daughter Billie carries. And for your own weans, Fiona.”
Duncan began, and Mara turned away to watch him. Fiona hardly heard a word he said as she sorted wildly through Mara’s revelations. A son for the Sinclairs and a daughter for the Rosses. She wondered if Mara was sure. She wondered if Billie knew.
And then there was her part in this. Her own part, and one she was terrified to play out.
She had ached to speak almost from the first. No one had talked about the mysterious, mystical appeal of Druidheachd, of its history, its secrets. No one had painted pictures of the mist-shrouded peaks of Bein Domhain, of Cumhann Moor with its eerie landscape and its ghosts of lovers long dead. No one had spoken of Andrew’s darling, not even Andrew. They had talked of taxes and property values, of duties to neighbors.
But no one had talked of the things that set this one tiny village apart from hundreds of other Highland clachans.
There was a spattering of applause, and she realized that Duncan had finished. But before he could be seated, Darla MacBride began to shout. “You’re not even one of us, Duncan Sinclair! You were raised in America. You’ve no right to speak here.”
Duncan began a response, but he stopped when Fiona stood and started down the center aisle. “Fiona?”
She was halfway to the front before she knew she was on her feet. Anger had carried her forward, as well as the knowledge that, for once, she knew her own destiny as well as Mara did.
“I’d like to answer Mrs. MacBride, if I may.” She reached Duncan’s side. He didn’t sit down. He nodded curtly, but he stayed beside her as if he expected her to collapse. She turned to him. “I’m all right. Go on.”
He looked apprehensive. She touched his hand. “Go on,” she said. He shrugged and started down the aisle. Only when he was seated did she turn to face the audience.
There were so many of them. For a moment she faltered.
“She’s got no right to speak here, either,” Darla MacBride said loudly.
It was all the courage Fiona needed. “Don’t you think so?” She forced herself to look out over the audience again, and her fear evaporated. She was shaking with anger, yet for all their faults, these people were hers. She had grown up without them, but they belonged to her and she belonged to them in a way that she would never belong to anyone else.
She moved slowly toward the first pew. The room had grown still again. Even the babies had quieted, and the little children watched her with their mouths open.
She lifted a hand and touched the opposite cuff of her blouse, a cuff that neatly hid the truth about what she had endured. She fingered the double thickness of fabric, and strangely, it gave her courage. She had endured. Like this wonderful old village, she had endured. And the fire and its aftermath had given her a clearer vision of Druidheachd’s future than she might have had without it. She, of all people, knew what it meant to lose roots, family, history.
“Duncan was born here. I was born here,” she said. Her voice was clear and strong. She was sure it had reached the back pews.
“So what if you were,” Darla said. “That means nowt to me!”
For the first time since she’d walked to the front, Fiona looked at Andrew. He wanted her to sit down; she knew he did. He didn’t want her to suffer, not for this, not for him. But he couldn’t know that she wasn’t suffering.
She was never going to suffer again.
She turned her gaze to Darla. “I almost died here, Mrs. MacBride. And that matters, don’t you think? That gives me the right to speak as one of you. I was meant to grow up here, but I wasn’t given that chance. This village and everyone in it was erased from my life, just as it’s about to be erased from yours. Well, I’m back, and
now I know exactly why I am. To tell you exactly what you’ll lose if you continue this madness.”
Even Darla MacBride fell silent.
Fiona began to paint the picture she saw in her mind, but with words. She described what it had been like to leave as a small child and come home as an adult. She talked about her first glimpse of Bein Domhain, her first ride on the loch. She talked about the majesty of the old buildings, the music of the tiny burn, the way that the clouds met the earth and cleansed everything in their path.
“There’s magic here,” she said. She walked over to stand directly in front of Darla. “Magic that not everyone can see. The measure of whether someone deserves to speak at this meeting is not how long they’ve lived here but how much of that magic they’ve touched.”
Darla drew an audible breath.
Fiona turned away from her and smiled at Mara. “There are ghosts here, and fairies. There’s a mysterious creature in our loch who far too rarely blesses us with her presence. But there’s something even more important. There’s tradition, and kindness and a wealth of memories. And there’s history that will be destroyed if we let Druidheachd change too quickly.”
She was almost finished. She had only one thing left to say. She gazed around the room. “Whatever you decide, someday you’ll have to explain your position to your children and grandchildren, your nieces and nephews. Will you tell them that magic died one summer, and you sold the remnants for a few pieces of silver? Or will you tell them that the magic is still here, and that they have only to reach out their hands to find it?”
Her cheeks were flushed; she could feel their heat. But she had never felt better or stronger. She hadn’t intended to look at Andrew again, but her traitorous eyes sought his for one quick glance.
His expression was inscrutable, but his hazel eyes blazed fiercely with pride.
CHAPTER 17
No sunshine in the world was more beautiful than Scotland’s. From the moment the sun rose on Monday morning the village was bathed in a golden glow that gilded the gray stone houses and plucked rainbow hues from the lovingly tended cottage gardens. Hollyhocks swayed in the sun-warmed breeze, and roses cascaded over austere iron fences, as if to point out that there was nothing in life that couldn’t be changed with enough love and care.
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