Jamie MacLeod

by Michael Phillips

  Jamie’s initial reaction was fear, but it was quickly and unaccountably replaced by something akin to pity welling up in her heart. She could tell the man before her had borne much in his life. Intuitively she sensed that the granite features which tried to turn a brave face toward life’s heartaches must one day give way and crumble beneath his feet. And that would indeed be a terrible day for one such as this, whose emotions were hidden so far in the depths of his being.

  Her thoughts had no liberty to progress further, however, for the moment she heard the deep voice speak her own name, the initial dread returned tenfold upon her.

  “Are you ready with your report, Miss MacLeod?” boomed the voice of Edward Graystone. There were no words of introduction or welcome.

  Her voice trembled as she spoke.

  “Aye . . . I mean, yes, sir—that is, your Lordship . . .”

  She stopped, feeling the redness flood her face.

  “Continue,” he said, taking no note of her discomfiture.

  “Master Andrew is doin’ weel,” Jamie went on nervously, trying to force calmness into her tone. “He seems t’ be adjustin’ t’ the change in nurses. He’s eatin’ jist fine; he has been a wee bit fussy today, but that’s nae doobt frae—”

  “Has he any needs?” the laird cut in gruffly.

  “Needs?”

  “Yes,” he answered a little impatiently. “The factor and I shall be going into Aberdeen tomorrow, and it is customary for the senior staff to give me lists of purchases to be made. As I am accompanying the factor on this occasion, I will see to it personally. You are in charge of the nursery. Therefore, it is your responsibility to assess the boy’s needs and make me aware of them.”

  “I will tend to it this evening,” Jamie replied, her nerves as well as her tongue calming somewhat. “I’ll give it to Miss Campbell in the morning.”

  “I shall be leaving well before that. Leave the list with Miss Campbell tonight and she will see that it gets to me.”

  “Yes, your Lordship.”

  His eyes narrowed slightly at her words. She had not yet noticed that rarely did anyone address him by his title, and when they did the words usually met with a similarly odd reaction in his face.

  He then turned his gaze in turn upon each of the others who had not yet been questioned, and Jamie breathed an inward sigh of relief. It did not strike Jamie as curious that the man seemed to care nothing about her background, although he was entrusting his very son to her care. For the present she had too many other things on her mind. But such questions would eventually come to her, giving her cause to wonder just what this man felt for his own son—if anything, for he seemed to treat his son’s care with the same emotionless concern for mere business that he did his horses.

  Suddenly Jamie realized they were being dismissed. Coming to herself, she also realized her cheeks were still burning. With a flicker of fear, she hoped the man had not noticed. He said not another word to her, and soon she found herself standing out in the hall with the others. The library doors swung closed, and MacKay and George Ellice immediately turned down the corridor without a word.

  Staring at the closed library doors, Jamie could not keep her mind from wondering what a man like the laird was doing now that he was alone. Perhaps he had dropped limply back into the great leather chair, at last relaxing the tough exterior stance of the powerful laird. Or had he walked around his desk to the adjacent wall lined with bookshelves, there to choose a book to read before dinner—perhaps Ivanhoe or A Midsummer Night’s Dream or a selection from Burns?

  Yet as much as she tried to picture the taut, uncompromising figure as turning toward some more relaxed and human pursuit, the image remained in her mind of the only posture she had seen him in. For all she knew he still stood planted firmly behind that desk, hands gripped at his back, dark gaze fixed forward. What was he seeing now? Now that the faces before him were gone, upon what distant images were those penetrating eyes focused?

  No, she thought, he does not look like his son. But there was something she had seen in him, something she could not quite identify, something—

  Suddenly she remembered whom the man did look like!

  She had forgotten until now. There had been a black-cloaked man, an awesome presence, stepping from a gleaming black carriage drawn by two lively chestnuts . . .

  With a shudder at the remembrance of that childhood memory, she forced herself back to the present and sought out Dora’s friendly company as they returned to their quarters.

  23

  An Afternoon’s Excursion

  Several days later Jamie found an opportunity to renew her acquaintance with George Ellice when the factor had returned from Aberdeen and was again at the house.

  “I thought I saw something in your eyes I knew!” he said upon discovering that the new nurse was none other than Finlay MacLeod’s own granddaughter. “But I swear, I never would have known you!”

  The change was indeed an astounding one, for all George Ellice could recall from his past visits up the mountain was a smudge-faced little girl who had often served him tea in the old stone cottage. And now here stood facing him, if not a full-grown woman, certainly very nearly one. Why, she even speaks with a degree of refinement! he said to himself.

  Most anxious to learn what had become of her in the time since her departure from the region, he asked if she could come for a visit. “And I, or rather my wife, will serve you tea this time.”

  “I will look forward to that,” replied Jamie.

  It came, therefore, as no surprise when she received an invitation three days later. She bundled up little Andrew, sought out Sid, who was harnessing the horses to the wagon for a ride into the village, asked if she might have a ride to the factor’s cottage with him. Soon she was seated beside the tight-lipped groom bouncing down the road away from the mansion.

  The ride from the house to the factor’s cottage was lovely, especially in the afternoon summer sun. The road that wound toward the village was lined with tall birch trees, whose leaves were just beginning to show signs of approaching autumn. The drive through the immediate grounds of the estate was about three-quarters of a mile long. At that distance stood a massive iron gate and a small gate house. Beyond the gate ran the chief road connecting Aboyne and Rhynie. MacKay would take this road to the right to reach the village. But before he did, some 200 yards before reaching the gate house, he led his team off the tree-lined estate drive to the right where, a short distance away, was located the factor’s home. Stretching out on either side of them Jamie could see gentle green hillsides, and beyond them vast acres of wheat and barley and oats.

  In less than ten minutes they were pulling up before the Ellice cottage, a gray stone affair with a slate roof and a neatly clipped, fenced yard. George was just coming from the small equipment shed to the side of the house as they approached, and walked forward to greet Jamie.

  “Welcome to you, lass!” he called.

  Returning the greeting, Jamie stepped down from the wagon and let Sid hand Andrew down to her. Thanking him, he turned his team around and then urged them on down the road.

  “Come in, come in!” said Ellice as Jamie stepped onto the porch. He seemed very enthusiastic about their visitor. “Mrs. Ellice,” he called inside, “our guest is here!”

  His words were hardly necessary, for she was already less than a pace from the door herself.

  “Glad to have you, Jamie,” she replied. “It is all right with you if I call you Jamie, isn’t it? We’re rather informal in our home.”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” Jamie replied. “I am so glad to meet you at last, Mrs. Ellice.”

  The factor’s wife was short like her husband, but a good deal rounder. Her gray hair was braided and wrapped around her head, framing a round, deeply creased face.

  “And you brought the bairn, too!” exclaimed Mrs. Ellice, whom Jamie soon found to be delightfully animated and expressive. “I must hold him! Oh! but there’s the kettle. Let me get tea ready
first!” She bustled to the stove but continued to chatter away.

  At length the three were sitting around the table partaking of tea and oatcakes, and a special shortbread Mrs. Ellice had prepared for the occasion. Andrew tried to grab at everything in sight and quickly lost interest in his oatcake for the greater fascination of flatware and china. Finally Mrs. Ellice took him in her eager arms.

  With his wife’s attention thus diverted, the quieter George seemed to decide he could join the conversation.

  “You caused a bit of a stir up here last winter, you know,” he said. “I had given you up for dead.”

  “I didn’t know anyone paid much attention to us up on the mountain.”

  “Well, that may have been true to a degree. Still, when everyone was missing there was considerable speculation about what had happened. We all just assumed you’d somehow been lost in the storm.”

  “I nearly was,” said Jamie.

  “When your grandfather didn’t come down at his usual time for supplies, and after the weather had cleared a bit, I sent two of the younger fellows up and they found not a soul. We thought the worst, of course, but could do nothing till the snow melted. When spring came we found not a trace, except what we thought might have been a grave. What actually happened?”

  Jamie proceeded to tell them of her grandfather’s death, of her decision to leave Donachie, and her eventual rescue by Robbie Taggart.

  “I was on my way here, to your house,” Jamie explained. “I had planned to come and tell you everything. But I wasn’t quite sure of my way, and then the blizzard came up all of a sudden and I lost my bearings, and by the time Robbie found me, he said I was clear over on the wrong side of the mountain. I don’t even know where I was. I’m sorry for the trouble I caused.”

  “Considering how severe the storm was,” said Ellice, “I’m only glad you are safe. Miraculously, we only lost a few sheep. Your cow was fine. And it was probably well you left when you did, for we truly might have lost you if you had stayed, especially alone. The blizzard got worse and worse for several days after that. It was one of the worst storms in several years.”

  “Things seem to have turned out all right for you,” said his wife.

  “I should say!” said George, still astonished at the change that had come over her. “I tell you, Jamie MacLeod, I would not have recognized you had I seen you walking down the lane out in front of the house here. I did not know you when you came into the library the other day, though there was something curious about you I couldn’t put my finger on. Even when I heard the name it didn’t register! You’ve really changed, grown.”

  Jamie laughed. “Well, thank you. That’s very kind of you!”

  “It’s more than the speech, though that’s part of it. Someone must have taken great pains to help you.”

  “Yes. Mrs. Gilchrist in Aberdeen took me under her wing, you might say.”

  “Well, she did her job well. There’s a certain refinement, a—”

  “Now, George,” interrupted Mrs. Ellice, “that’s enough. You’ll embarrass the poor girl!”

  Jamie laughed again. “Let’s just say the Lord has been with me all the way, even when I didn’t know it, leading me in the ways He wanted me to go.”

  “Well, I’m glad He sent you back here,” said Mrs. Ellice. “It is fitting that one of Aviemere’s own should be caring for the boy. Does the laird know of your previous connection with the estate?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose not, if you didn’t even know.”

  “It’s a shame he doesn’t take more interest in the lad,” said the factor’s wife, “although I’m sure he has his reasons.”

  “Does he blame the child for the mother’s death?” asked Jamie. “She did die in childbirth, isn’t that what Miss Campbell told me?”

  “Aye. And that’s what we’re thinking,” replied Ellice. “But who can say for sure about such things? He’s very close-mouthed about himself, the laird is. Speaks of nothing but business, even to me, and there’s not many closer to him than I am. Shed not a tear (at least that anyone saw) when his wife died. He was always a private person, even before her death. But afterward, he turned into himself and shut out the whole world. Been that way now for almost two years. You can just see the stiffness and the turmoil about him just to look at the man.”

  “The man’s in pain, no doubt about that,” added Mrs. Ellice. “But ’tis more than that.”

  “Why do you say that?” asked Jamie, her curiosity about the laird rising steadily.

  “Can’t put my finger on it exactly,” she replied. “But I’ve been around stoic men before. Most men are stoic in one way or another—why, heaven knows, I’m even married to one!”

  She laughed and patted her husband’s shoulder affectionately.

  Jamie smiled. The camaraderie between the pair was apparent, and reminded her vaguely of the loving relationships in the Gilchrist home.

  “Even the most stoic of men,” she went on, “manage to let it out one way or another. But not the laird—except when his wife was alive. But even then . . . well, I can’t explain it. I don’t even know myself. There’s just more there than meets the eye, as they say. I’m sure of it.”

  “Let’s not spread any doubts about the laird,” chided her husband gently.

  “I wouldn’t dream of doing that!” Mrs. Ellice returned quickly. “But don’t you think Jamie ought to know these things, caring for the lad and all? He’s the one who suffers the most—poor thing! Why, Jamie, maybe you’re the one to break through to the man.”

  “Oh, I doubt that!” said Jamie, shuddering as she recalled the intractable stare of the laird.

  Two hours later, as Jamie walked back to the mansion with little Andrew, her mind was filled with the many thoughts and emotions the visit had evoked. As she considered the laird, she hardly knew whether to feel pity or anger. Then the words of the factor’s wife came back to her, and she found herself wondering whether anyone would ever be able to break through the man’s intimidating presence. A meek girl like me . . . why, I’d be the last person to do that, she mused with a smile.

  But she did know who could break through! Yet since first meeting him she had not once remembered to take the laird to the One who could help him. So as she walked along, with the laird’s son toddling ahead of her, she silently lifted up a prayer to the God whom she knew would somehow reach the master of Aviemere.

  Her thoughts then turned to her grandfather. Speaking about him with George Ellice had not been easy. Several times her voice caught on rising tears. It had been just less than a year since her grandfather’s death, but it seemed much longer. So much had happened. She had grown by years, not months. She had been but a child; now she was nearly a woman, with a child in her care—the child of the laird upon whose land she and her grandfather had toiled for so many years on Donachie! But the year had passed quickly, and she realized now that much of the old aching was still there. She had only glossed over it by not thinking of it. How she missed him!

  And she missed Robbie Taggart!

  If she had thought of him more frequently than her grandfather, perhaps it was because there was still a hope she might see him again. She had learned a little about love since seeing him last, especially from talks with Emily. And whether he could ever love her or not, she found herself longing for the sight of his face. But Emily had cautioned her that gratitude and friendship could occasionally get confused with love between a man and a woman.

  Oh, there was so much she still had to learn! Life could be so confusing! How was one to know what true love really was? Had she loved Robbie? Could she love him again? The memory of his laughing eyes and warm voice still gave her a thrill. But he had been around the world, and she had never even set eyes on a city the size of Aberdeen! What must he have thought of her?

  Yes, I have changed since then, Jamie mused. But will that be enough? And what will it matter if we never meet again?

  So deep were her thoughts that she took no note
of the woman approaching from among the trees on the side of the road.

  “Jamie . . . Jamie MacLeod?” the woman called, approaching with a nervous gait, as if she did not want to be seen.

  Jamie stopped and turned, puzzled. She did not recognize the woman, and her appearance told her she could have nothing to do with the estate. The woman came closer, glancing about nervously. An odd glint in her eyes put Jamie immediately on her guard, and she quickly caught Andrew up in her arms.

  “Jamie MacLeod?” the woman repeated, coming now quite near. From her clothing Jamie could see she must be a poor tenant or worker in the village.

  “Aye,” Jamie replied hesitantly.

  “Gilbert MacLeod’s daughter?”

  “Aye,” repeated Jamie, trying to keep her voice level, though by now her heart was pounding in the presence of the mysterious woman.

  “I thocht so, frae my sister’s description o’ ye, but I wadna o’ kenned ye frae what I knew o’ ye afore.”

  “Before?” said Jamie, curious but still hesitant.

  “’Tis ten years an’ more syne I last seen ye—ye dinna remember, do ye?” She continued on without waiting for a response. “’Course ye dinna! Ye couldna. What were ye, six or seven then?”

  “You mentioned my father?”

  “Aye, I did, lass! We was frien’s, yer father an’ me an’ my husband.”

  “You knew him . . . well?” asked Jamie, taking a step closer and beginning to forget her previous caution of this rather frightful looking woman. She was eager to hear anything about her father.

  “We did. An’ ye yersel’ supped at my ain table mony a time, though I can see ye dinna remember. The name’s Iona Lundie.”