Light & Dark

by Margaret Thomson-Davis

  Lorianna went over to hover anxiously outside the study door. Then, unable to stand the harrowing sounds any longer, she opened the door and looked in. Suddenly she was too horrified to cry out: beyond sound, beyond thought, hot bullets exploding in her head, she stumbled into the room, seized a heavy metal ornament and brought it crashing down on Gavin… . His skull cracked like an eggshell. She heard it.

  Clementina was still shrieking, but when Gavin slumped heavily down on top of her, his body obliterating even her face, the shrieking stopped.

  Blood was oozing from his head and ear as Lorianna dropped the ornament.

  Mrs Musgrove was in the room now. ‘Keep quiet and just stand there until I come back,’ she commanded. ‘I will take the child upstairs.’

  Lorianna couldn’t move. She stood watching as Mrs Musgrove pushed Gavin’s body aside, lifted the unconscious child and carried her from the room.

  Gavin’s eyes were open. He was staring at her in incredulity and reproach. Mrs Musgrove returned and shut the door behind her, saying, ‘She’s all right. I’ve put her to bed.’

  Still Lorianna could neither move nor make a sound.

  ‘And I have sent Lizzie for Kelso. Come through with me to the sitting-room and I’ll pour some brandy.’

  They were both sitting silently sipping brandy when Robert Kelso arrived with the maid. Lorianna rose, swaying to her feet, staring tragically at him.

  ‘Oh, Robert!’

  Mrs Musgrove rose, straight-backed and sharp-eyed. ‘Get back downstairs, Lizzie, and don’t dare to breathe a word of this to anyone.’

  ‘What’s happened?’ Robert asked the housekeeper, at the same time crossing the room to take Lorianna into his arms and press her head against his chest.

  Mrs Musgrove looked away, her mouth twisting.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’ he repeated.

  ‘Mr Blackwood’s dead. She’s killed him. He was trying to rape the child.’

  A sickened expression contorted his features for a moment and then they were calm again.

  ‘Well?’ said Mrs Musgrove.

  ‘We shall have to send for the police.’

  ‘Do you want her to hang?’

  ‘I didn’t mean to kill him,’ Lorianna whimpered. ‘I didn’t mean it, Robert.’

  He hushed her gently and then said to the housekeeper, ‘They will have to know.’

  Her mouth twisted again. ‘So this is all you care about her? I might have known.’

  ‘What are you talking about, woman? We have no choice.’

  ‘Of course there is a choice; there has to be a choice. We must get rid of the body. You will have to take it away and bury it somewhere on the estate.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘They’ll hang her!’

  ‘Shut your mouth, woman!’

  Lorianna was sobbing now, clinging to him and trembling violently.

  ‘Hush, flower,’ he soothed. ‘I won’t let anyone hurt you.’

  ‘You’re just like the rest, all talk,’ Mrs Musgrove sneered.

  ‘But when it comes to the point—’

  ‘Be quiet, I said!’

  ‘You’ve got to help her.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  ‘She hit him on the back of the head with a metal ornament.’

  After a pause he said, ‘It’s got to look like an accident.’

  ‘How can it?’

  He paused again. ‘Leave it to me. All you have to say is that he went out riding and didn’t return.’

  Lorianna clung tighter than ever, her voice rising in panic.

  ‘Oh, Robert, I’m so afraid.’

  ‘Remember,’ he repeated to Mrs Musgrove. ’He went out riding.‘ Then to Lorianna, ‘Hush, my flower.’ Rocking her back and forth in his arms like a child, he soothed her with soft whispers.

  26

  It had been hot and sultry all day and there was hardly a breath of air. The branches of the trees hung motionless, not a leaf stirred.

  Wattie McLeod peered up at the sky. Earlier it had been copper-tinted; now dark clouds had rolled in one on top of the other.

  Usually, if it was a really dark night and no moon, the wide open hills were safe. On a moonless night the woods had an impenetrable blackness and a poacher would need the eyes of a cat to see to do his work. But if it was bright and he could see his way he avoided the hills because a watcher could spy him miles off.

  Tonight he felt in his bones that there was a summer storm brewing. A gust of wind would come and blow the cloud clear of the moon and there would be a flash or two of lightning. Then he would be able to make his way in the woods all right.

  Sure enough the leaves were beginning to gently rustle. Might not be much of a wind—not a gale, at least, and that was good. He had to be able to hear when a rabbit was moving in its burrow and when it was likely to bolt, so that he could grab it the moment it was in the net. With the ‘oak’s mysterious roar’ overhead, and the moan of the gale as it rushed through the hawthorn, it wasn’t so easy to make out the low, thumping sound of a rabbit in its warren.

  As Wattie reached the woods a peal of thunder rumbled and cracked high above and lightning sizzled over the tree-tops. Then came a few hesitant droplets of rain that soon changed into a hurried pattering. He hunched into his long coat and sought temporary shelter in the hollow of a big oak tree. There he listened as the rain rose to a roar within the forest. He waited until it gradually diminished once more to a soft pattering on the leaves and was just about to step out and get on with his work when his sharp ears detected another alarming sound: someone was approaching on horseback. Quickly he shrank back into the tree again. And just in time. The horse passed too near for comfort and the rider was unmistakably Robert Kelso, the grieve.

  Then something else caught Wattie’s eye—there was a large bundle slung over the horse in front of Kelso, covered with a plaid. Hardly daring to breathe, he watched the grieve dismount and lift down what he could now see was a body. Still holding the body, Kelso looked around as if wondering where best to lay it down. Eventually, he chose a spot with the head resting back against a boulder. Then, leaving the horse beside the body, he walked away with the plaid slung over his shoulder.

  Wattie waited for a long time before stealthily moving from his hiding place and going over to peer closer. The dead man, he discovered, was the master of Blackwood House.

  No poaching tonight, he decided. Safer for him to he home tonight and as many folk knowing as possible. He wasn’t going to he mixed up in this dirty business. The thought of going to the police never occurred to him. The less he had to do with the police and the further he kept from them the better—that had always been his policy.

  He stayed at home the next night as well, because there were police all over the place and they had found the body. A riding accident, they were saying it was. Let them say what they liked, as long as they steered clear of him. He felt uneasy though and drank more than usual to steady his nerves. He didn’t feel like talking to anyone and was standing alone in the Railway Tavern in Bathgate when one of the Blackwood horsemen came up to him.

  ‘It’s a bad day all round, eh?’

  ‘Oh, aye? And how’s that?’

  ‘You know what I’m talking about—the accident! The place has been hotching with police these past few nights.’

  ‘Police don’t worry me,’ maintained Wattie.

  ‘A likely story!’

  ‘Aye, I could tell them a story, right enough.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘A queer sort of accident,’ Wattie said darkly. ‘Aye, very queer.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘I have my reasons.’

  ‘Are you saying you know something the police don’t?’

  ‘Never you mind what I know. What I know and what I see is my own business.’

  But of course people never did mind their own business and the man he had spoken to must have babbled to the police, because the next thing
Wattie knew they had called at his cottage and taken him away for questioning.

  Mourning didn’t suit Lorianna. The high-necked black dress seemed to drain from her every last shade of colour and her face was a dead white mask in which her full red mouth paled into insignificance. Even her normally glossy hair, warm in colour as rich brown earth looked dull. Only her eyes, large and luminous, still caught and riveted the attention.

  She had been confined to bed; she didn’t know for how long, since she had been dazed rather than calmed by Mrs Musgrove’s regular administrations of laudanum. The housekeeper had moved into the dressing-room so that she could be near her during the night. Sometimes Lorianna cried out in her sleep and jerked awake, sweating and trembling from a nightmare. But there was something nightmarish about Mrs Musgrove herself. Her tall, black-clad figure seemed always to be hovering over Lorianna and she had discovered that the housekeeper not only had a powerful personality but also possessed the physical strength of a man. Dazed though she was, Lorianna had tried to get out of bed but Mrs Musgrove had physically restrained her, had actually held her down on the bed.

  Now the housekeeper, by sheer force of will, was trying to keep the daily routine in operation as if nothing had happened. She was sitting opposite Lorianna at the window of the sitting-room, hardcovered notebook and pencil in hand.

  ‘Madam,’ she repeated, ‘you’re not concentrating.’

  ‘I beg your pardon.’

  ‘You must think only of each present moment. You must concentrate.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Life has to go on.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘As I was saying, we shall have to buy more dress material. Miss Clementina needs mourning clothes too.’

  ‘I cannot bear this,’ Lorianna said suddenly. ‘I must see him.’

  ‘Who, madam?’

  ‘You know perfectly well.’

  ‘If you mean Kelso, it’s impossible.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He has been arrested.’

  For a moment or two Lorianna stared at the older woman in bewilderment. ‘Arrested?’

  ‘He was seen. And they found blood on his clothes.’

  Lorianna rose to her feet, swaying slightly.

  ‘I must put things right immediately. Ask Jacobs to bring the carriage round.’

  ‘What can you put right, madam?’ said Mrs Musgrove, rising too.

  ‘I must tell the police the truth so that they will release Robert.’

  ‘They won’t release him now, no matter what you say.’

  ‘Of course they will. They must.’

  ‘No, madam. Even if they believed you, he is still an accessory to murder. You would both hang.’

  ‘Hang?’ The word was an incredulous high-pitched whimper. ‘Hang Robert?’

  Her heart had begun to race wildly in her chest.

  ‘If you leave well alone, he’ll have a good chance with a good lawyer.’

  ‘But I can’t just … I can’t just …’ She began to sway like a drunk woman.

  ‘It’s all right,’ said Mrs Musgrove. ‘I have seen him, and he says to tell you just to keep quiet and do nothing. He will be all right; he knows what he’s doing and his lawyer says they will never convict him.’

  ‘But I … I …’ Her mind was refusing to function. ‘I …’

  Mrs Musgrove gripped her arm. ‘I think you should go back to bed.’

  ‘No …’ She tried to prise the hand away and was unexpectedly revolted by the slippery contact of silk mittens.

  ‘No, leave me alone!’

  ‘You are ill.’

  ‘Send for a doctor, then.’

  ‘The doctor has seen you and he told me to ensure that you had plenty of rest and quiet.’

  ‘Send for him to come again, I want to speak to him… . Or the minister… . Send for the Reverend Marshall. I need to speak to somebody.’

  ‘You can speak to me, madam.’

  ‘No, somebody else. I need help and advice.’

  ‘I can give you all the help and advice you need. And I am advising you that what you need just now is to keep quiet. You will do him no good by trying to tell what really happened. Once you do that, he has no chance at all. Nor have you.’

  Lorianna fought to quell her rising panic. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I shall say nothing to anybody. But one thing I must do, Mrs Musgrove and that is go to see Robert. Where is he?’

  ‘In the Calton Jail in Edinburgh.’

  She could not bear to think of Robert in jail. He needed the freedom of the hills and the woods, the rivers and the lochs.

  ‘How can a visit be arranged? I must find out immediately.’

  ‘Well, if you must go …’

  ‘Yes, I must.

  ‘Then it will have to he done very discreetly.’

  ‘That was why I suggested the doctor or the minister. Did the Reverend Marshall not have something to do with prisons at one time?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘Then he will know and be able to advise me. Send for him at once, Mrs Musgrove.’

  ‘Very well, madam.’

  Within the hour the Reverend Marshall, a tall grey-bearded man, had arrived in the sitting-room and was offering his hand to her.

  ‘How are you, my dear?’

  Mrs Musgrove remained to hover beside Lorianna.

  ‘Madam has been in a very shocked and overstrained condition sir, especially since she heard that her grieve has been arrested for the crime. She cannot believe that he is guilty; he was always a good and trusted employee.’

  ‘I wish to speak to him,’ Lorianna said. ‘Could you arrange it?’

  ‘I have tried to advise madam against such a rash course of action, sir,’ interposed the housekeeper, ‘but she is so distressed by the whole affair.’

  The Reverend Marshall patted Lorianna’s hand. ‘Don’t worry, my dear. I know the prison chaplain and will speak to him straight away. I shall be through in Edinburgh tomorrow anyway. A terrible business! I must say I was shocked when I heard about Kelso. I find the charge hard to believe myself. Many a time I’ve had a chat with him, you know, when I have been doing my parish rounds. We used to stop and pass the time of day when we met on the road.

  ‘I was watching him at the Highland Games recently and thinking what a fine figure of a man he was. Good at his job too, by all accounts. Many a gentleman farmer around these parts envied your husband for having such a good man to run things for him.’

  ‘You will arrange for me to visit him?’

  ‘He will be allowed visitors, there is no problem there. But I will see that your visit is a private one—for that I shall speak to the chaplain.’

  Lorianna closed her eyes. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Would you like me to say a prayer?’

  She nodded. Dazed with the dregs of laudanum and with her suffering, she stood with eyes closed, the drone of his voice acting as a soporific.

  Mrs Musgrove’s hand tightened round her arm again, hard fingers bruising tender flesh.

  ‘I ought to put her to bed, sir. All this has been too much for her.’

  Lorianna was aware that she was being led away. ‘I shall hear from you tomorrow?’ she whispered. ‘I am depending on you.’

  ‘Yes, my dear,’ the Reverend Marshall gazed at her pityingly. ‘Try not to worry.’

  Worry seemed such a mild and inappropriate word. She could think of no word adequately to describe her condition. She felt she was dangling on the edge of a black pit, unable to contend with what was at the bottom but without the strength to stop herself from slowly sliding in.

  ‘Stay there until I come back,’ Mrs Musgrove snapped. ‘I must go and see him out.’

  Suddenly Lorianna’s anxiety tipped over into fear. ‘Don’t you say anything to him about me.’

  ‘Say anything about you, madam?’

  ‘There is nothing wrong with me; I am perfectly fit to travel to Edinburgh. But whether I am or not and whether he arra
nges anything or not, I intend to go. Nobody is going to stop me from seeing Robert, do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, madam.’

  And so it was arranged. Eventually she and Mrs Musgrove set out in the closed carriage with Jacobs up in front.

  The word ‘prison’ to Lorianna had meant Robert being restrained, shut away and kept from his wide open hills and the countryside he loved. She had not been prepared for the sight that met her in Edinburgh.

  Princes Street was the main street of the city and was dominated on one side at the west end by Edinburgh Castle, perched high above on a rock. But at the other end of the long street, directly facing the carriage as it progressed, was Calton Hill. High against the skyline monuments jutted; the Observatory, the Dugald Stewart Monument, the National Monument, the Nelson Monument in the shape of a giant telescope, the obelisk of the martyr’s monument in the old Calton burying ground. And there, creeping up the side of the rocky hill like a black fungus, was the Calton Jail, more castellated than the castle with its crush of square and round turrets, towers and high walls.

  ‘I did say you should not have come,’ Mrs Musgrove said, as if sensing Lorianna’s horror. ‘This is no place for you.’

  A nerve fluttered in Lorianna’s cheek and her voice shook. ‘This is no place for Robert.’

  Lorianna kept her black veil over her face, but this did not protect her from the all-pervading smell of the place. She thought that as long as she lived that terrible prison smell would remain in her nostrils.

  What was it? The musty dampness of the walls? The rats, mice and beetles that scurried about inside them? Urine and faeces from innumerable chamber pots? The concentrated stench of human bodies? A combination of all of these things, but something more. Something indefinable and unique to the place—a sickness in the air.

  It penetrated even to the chapel vestry where she waited and where eventually Robert was brought to her.

  The door shut behind him leaving them alone, and she stood looking at him. The mean little room, his shabby prison rags, nothing could demean him or detract from what he was: her beautiful man.

  Enfolded in his arms for a blissful minute, nothing mattered any more. It was all a bad dream and nothing had any reality. Everything that threatened them—the hangman, the prison, the warder, the police, the courts, the judge, the jury, the whole of society itself—was of a different world, a world of ignorance and lack of understanding and cruelty beyond all comprehension. Nothing was real and true and good except him, and their love for each other.