The Bagpiper's Ghost

by Jane Yolen

  Jennifer whirled about. This close, Mary MacFadden was almost solid, though as white as a marble statue. She had regular features that didn’t quite add up to beauty but certainly had charm. Only her eyes were dark, emitting no light.

  Jennifer was surprised at how calm she felt in the ghost’s presence. Not frightened at all.

  “Who called?” the Lady in White said.

  Suddenly Jennifer was frightened. Somehow the ghost had heard her. Her knees began to tremble.

  “I suppose I called you,” she told the ghost. “And I meant it when I said your brother’s a pig.” She wondered briefly if that was a smart thing to say. After all, she didn’t want to make the ghost angry. But it’s the truth, she thought. Andrew MacFadden is a pig! And just as suddenly, she wasn’t afraid anymore.

  “Your brother kept a message from you all those years ago, as you know, and he still won’t give it up. But he told us the secret without meaning to, back at our house. He said, ‘In the stane a token of luv. Three from the bottom and four above.’ Do you know what that means?”

  It had been two hundred and fifty years, after all. Iain the piper had forgotten. What if Mary’s memory hadn’t lasted that long, either?

  For a moment, a shadow passed over that shadow face, a quick flicker, and then gone. “Och, aye—I remember. The token in the stane wasna there. I looked at the time, but it wasna there.” She shook her head. “Nae, that’s nae richt. There’s something else troubling me.” She gave a sad little shadow smile.

  “Where is the stane?” Jennifer asked again.

  “Our stane,” Mary MacFadden whispered. Then she turned away and ran like the haar, like the sea mist, over the brown scrub grass to the back side of the little church, her feet never touching the ground.

  Jennifer had a hard time keeping up. But she got to the church just as Mary MacFadden was counting the stones.

  “One, two, three.” She was going left to right along the bottom of a set of stones that was all but hidden behind a small stand of broom. Then she counted four up from there and placed her white hand over that stone. The stone was covered with a fuzzing of green lichen and moss.

  “Here.” Her hand was as insubstantial as the rest of her. She turned with a puzzled expression and said to Jennifer, “But I canna seem to open it.”

  Jennifer gawped at her. “Open a stone?”

  “Noo I recall it. On the day Iain went off wi’oot a word, I came here to find if he’d left me something in our stane. We always left things here. A rose. A ribbon. A white pebble. Tokens of our luv. But never luv notes. He couldna write, ye see. Or read. But I couldna slide the stane open. It had been harled over, and I couldna put my hand in.” Dark tears ran down her cheeks. “And then he was gone forever.”

  Gone forever.

  The words burned in Jennifer’s mind. If she didn’t get the stone open in time, Peter would be gone forever, too.

  “Let me try!” Jennifer’s fingers scrabbled without success on the stone.

  She could hear the piper and Peter quarreling outside the gate. She could hear Gran’s voice trying to quiet them. The dog was suddenly howling. Only the horse was still.

  And then the church bell began its inexorable toll.

  Midnight had begun.

  Fourteen

  Midnight Magic

  Jennifer pushed at the top of the stone and at the bottom. She hammered with the heel of her fist in the middle. She tried to pry around the edges—top, bottom, sides. Nothing worked. The harled stone wouldn’t move.

  Her fingers hurt from trying.

  And the bell kept tolling.

  Think, she told herself. Slow down, Jennifer, and think. This is magic, not stonemasonry.

  She hadn’t a sledgehammer or a steel levering bar. And she doubted that the piper would lend her his ghostly sword.

  “What else?” she whispered to herself. “What else beats stone?”

  Meow.

  She looked down at her feet. The white cat was sitting there, slowly washing its back leg.

  “How did you get in?” Then she remembered that she’d left the iron gate ajar just a sliver.

  The cat left off washing its hind leg and looked into the distance, through the Lady in White. She put out a white paw.

  Jennifer remembered the cat making just that motion earlier, when Molly and she had been playing Stone, Scissors, Paper. “Of course!”

  Stone breaks scissors.

  Scissors cut paper.

  And paper …

  “Covers stone,” she whispered. “I need paper.” Then she remembered the piece of notebook paper in her pocket, the one with all the notes about ghosts and green ladies and banshees scribbled on it.

  “This had better work,” she told the cat, because she knew she didn’t have time for anything else. The midnight toll was going relentlessly on.

  Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out the paper and placed it carefully over the stone—third from the bottom and four from above.

  The paper fit exactly.

  Then she leaned her weight against the paper, whispering passionately, “Paper covers stone. Paper covers stone. Paper covers …”

  Her hand suddenly slipped into the stone as if the stone were made of not-quite-jelled Jell-O; cold Jell-O, two hundred or more years cold.

  She gave herself no time to be amazed. She had no time for anything but action. The midnight bell was still tolling, though she’d lost count of how many chimes had actually rung.

  Feeling around, her fingers touched something inside the stone, something that was hard and round. Carefully she drew the token out. When she was entirely free of the jelly-stone, she stepped away, wiping her hand on her shirt.

  The paper floated to the ground.

  She looked at what she held in her hand. It was a ring of gold, with an inscription encircling the outside. Holding the ring up toward the moonlight, she managed to read: “Even death will nae part us.”

  “I think,” said Jennifer, turning, “that this belongs to you.” She held the ring out to the Lady in White.

  Mary MacFadden took the ring, read the inscription, and for the first time smiled. “He said that often. He must hae told the goldsmith what to write.” Her eyes lost their black shroud look and reflected the moonlight.

  Jennifer thought, I was wrong about her. She’s very beautiful.

  And then the bell rang again.

  “Hurry,” Jennifer said to the ghost. “Oh, please, Mary MacFadden—hurry!”

  The Lady in White turned and ran toward the piper, her small feet inches above the ground. Not a blade of grass moved as she passed over.

  “Gran—open the gate!” Jennifer cried. “Open it. She’s got the token, she’s got the ring.”

  Gran’s head jerked up. She said something to the piper, spun about, and pushed open the gate. And all of them—piper, Peter, Gran, the dog, and the horse—raced into the graveyard.

  Peter was fast, but the piper was faster. He met Mary MacFadden by her gravestone. Picking her up in his arms, he twirled her around and around till her skirts billowed out and made a soft shussshing. He kissed her brow and then her nose and then both her cheeks.

  They broke apart and stared at each other and laughed, the sound suddenly louder and more perfect than any tolling bell.

  Then the piper set the Lady in White down carefully, as if she were made of precious glass—for surely, Jennifer thought, she’s no longer flesh and bone. He slipped the ring onto her finger.

  “Even death,” he mouthed to her, “will nae part us.”

  Mary MacFadden turned then and, glancing over her shoulder, addressed Peter.

  “I fergive ye, Andrew,” she cried. “Yer my brother, my twin soul, and I fergive ye from the bottom o’ my heart. Ye meant fer the best, but ye were wrong then. And yer wrong noo.” She turned back to Iain and raised her beautiful, shining face to him.

  He bent down to her and kissed her again, though this time on the mouth, first lightly, and then with a grea
t passion.

  At the moment of the kiss, the two literally became one, their ghostly shapes coalescing into a white pillar of mist that rose higher and higher, until it was lost against the whiteness of the solstice moon.

  Jennifer felt hot tears cascading down her cheeks as she watched them, and she cried out, “You’re safe, Peter. Safe.”

  Just then the horse whinnied, the dog howled, and Gran cried out, “No, Jennie lass. No.”

  Jennifer turned then and saw that it was not Peter staring out at her but the furious eyes of Andrew MacFadden.

  “What hae ye done, ye meddlesome lass? Ye’ve lost me my ain sister.” He raised a fist to strike her.

  And the last bell of midnight tolled.

  At that very moment, a hubbub began outside the gates, as if hundreds of people were suddenly gathering there. A mob of them.

  Peter put his head back and laughed grimly. “As ye lost me my sister, so I’ll tak yer brother frae yer side. The Sluagh is come, and I’ll gae wi’ them. Ye’ll ne’er see me again.”

  “The Sluagh?” It was one of the words on her piece of paper. Desperately she tried to remember what the Sluagh was.

  “The grim parade o’ the dead,” the dog shouted. “Jennifer lass—dinna let the madman oot.”

  But Peter had already started for the gate, faster than Jennifer or Gran or the dog.

  Only the horse could still get there in time. He barreled ahead of Peter, his mighty hooves gouging divots out of the brown grass. Then he slammed his great shoulder against the gate. As his shoulder touched the ironwork, he flung his head back and screamed. It was an awful, high-pitched sound that seemed so unlikely coming from such a large animal.

  A magic creature can’t touch cold iron, Jennifer thought, remembering the burn mark on the dog’s back. Oh, horse, oh, Thunder, how badly have you been hurt?

  Thunder limped away from the gate and stood, shuddering, by the wall. But he’d done what he’d set out to do, and the gate was closed.

  Jennifer could smell the singed hair and burnt flesh all the way from where she stood.

  “Lucky I’ve brought my unguent,” Gran said as she walked over to the horse. She opened her purse “There’ll be a great need fer it this nicht.” The horse trembled slightly as she began to rub the oily stuff into his burnt skin.

  Peter stopped by the ironwork gate, hands at his sides. He put his head back and howled. It was a worse sound than any the horse had made, and the little hairs on the back of Jennifer’s neck stood straight up.

  But that howl didn’t stop the progress of the Sluagh, the doomed souls, who marched in a grim, shuffling line beyond the cemetery walls.

  Fifteen

  Forgiveness

  By the time Jennifer got to the gate, half the Sluagh had passed by. But there were still plenty for her to see, a long twisting line of doomed souls slumping along.

  There were soldiers in kilts with swords sticking out of their chests. A woman with a noose around her neck, eyes bulging wide. A mother and two children horribly burnt, the puckered scars still red and raw. Three men in long black coats and white collars, thin garrotes encircling their necks. Two women in ball gowns with broken bottles in their hands. A farmer in a slouched hat, a knife in his eye. A fisherman in a bright yellow slicker, half his face eaten away.

  There were hundreds of others, all equally, horribly dead. As they marched along, they were accompanied by a strange babble, of which Jennifer could occasionally understand a word—of pain, of horror, of regret.

  She turned away. Her stomach and chest were tight, the way she felt right before getting sick. She was afraid she might throw up, and she didn’t dare. Not here. Not now.

  Instead, she sought Gran’s eyes.

  “Look away, Jennifer, ’tis nae a sight fer a bairn,” Gran said, as she massaged the burn ointment into the horse’s shoulder.

  “Who are they, Gran?” Jennifer said in a whisper.

  “They’re the unshriven dead, the unburied, the unmourned and unloved. Those who killed themselves or were left to die alone, by accident or by design. Dinna look more, Jennie lass. If ye do, they can call ye oot, and then ye’ll have to gae wi’ them. And I couldna bear that.”

  But Jennifer was no longer looking at the Sluagh. Instead, she was staring at Peter, for he’d turned away from the sight of the marching dead, too, and was weeping loudly, his hands over his face.

  “Mary forgave you, you know,” Jennifer said to him. “She loved you as much as a twin can love. Closer than ordinary brother and sister. I know. I’m a twin, too. But Mary had another life—as the piper’s own true love. You denied her that.”

  Peter nodded and took his hands down from his face. That face was old, lined, haggard. “But how could she fergive? I lied to her. I harled over her token. When McGregor never came back, she died o’ her grief, thinking he’d never cared fer her. And I, who had killed her, died wi’ her, though I lived on forty more years and had a family o’ my ain who begged fer the love I couldna give them. Forty more years preaching God’s words, and I the biggest sinner o’ them a’.” His fists went to his temples.

  Taking his hands in hers, Jennifer said, “If God can forgive you and your sister can forgive you, surely you can forgive yourself, Andrew MacFadden.”

  He looked at her with hooded eyes. With tired eyes. “Fergive mysel? And how do I do that, lass?”

  “On your knees, I guess,” Jennifer said. She pointed dramatically to the ground. “On your knees.”

  He sank to his knees and held his hands up toward the sky or toward heaven or toward the place where his sister had disappeared. Jennifer was never to know exactly which.

  “I do repent o’ my wickedness, Lord,” he said. “And if Mary can fergive me, then I do fergive myself as weel.” Suddenly he pitched forward onto his face, and lay there stiffly as the sun rose over the eastern cemetery wall at three-thirty in the morning.

  Three hours had passed so quickly. It was morning already.

  Morning. Too late, then, Jennifer thought. She couldn’t move. Not an inch. She felt as if she’d been cast in stone. Harled stone.

  Just then, the dog came over and started licking the back of Peter’s neck, his great tongue sloshing up into the hairline and then down under Peter’s collar.

  Peter shuddered and sat up. “Leave me alone,” he cried, pushing the dog away roughly. “You’re wetting me all over, you snot rag!”

  “Not till ye fergive me,” cried the dog. “I put ye in danger. And all because …”

  “Peter!” Jennifer cried. “You’re back. Oh my gosh—it worked! It worked!” Unbidden tears began cascading down her cheeks. She wiped them away with her fists.

  Peter looked puzzled. “What worked? Have I been away?” He got to his knees. “Why do girls always cry at the silliest things? And when are we going to see the ghosts, Jen? I thought that’s why we came out here.”

  “You idiot—you were a ghost yourself,” Jennifer said. “We thought we’d lost you. And it’s the night after the first time we came here.”

  “Will ye both fergive me?” the dog howled.

  They looked at him, and Jennifer said, “Forgive for what?”

  Peter added, “Spill it, dog. This had better be good.”

  The dog groveled at their feet and whimpered. “It’s nae a pretty tale.”

  “Pretty or not,” Jennifer said, “out with it.”

  “Aye, yer richt. Best said than sorry.” He nodded his head, ears flopping. “The piper McGregor was my master, and I followed him to war. I was loyal, see. Dogs are. It was a lang, cold jog we had. Mile after mile of it. But when the battle itself came—the sleet, the drums, the pipes, the screams—och, how I ran. Freely do I admit it noo. I ran and ran all the way back hame, where I bumped into the wizard Michael Scot, who was moving forward in time. He kenned me, he did, kenned me fer a coward. It seemed to please him.”

  Peter said in a stunned voice. “McGregor? Battle? What has that to do with anything?”

&
nbsp; Gran had come over and heard the confession, too. Hands on hips, she glared at the dog. “So when ye kenned they were twins—Peter and Jennifer—and heard the ghostly bagpipes playing, ye thought to mak amends with yer auld master, is that it?”

  The dog hung his head. “Yes, yes.” He whimpered. “I never thought to hurt young Peter.”

  “Well, nae harm’s done that doesna leave a scar,” Gran said. “Besides, all’s well noo. Fer all o’ us. Even ye, ye greetin, self-abusing hound. Confession’s gud fer the soul, they say.”

  “If dogs have souls,” Jennifer added angrily.

  “Och, they do that,” Gran said. “All living things do. It was what interested Michael Scot in him, o’ course.” She reached into her purse and pulled out the handkerchief again. “I wonder how much himsel’s had a hand in today’s doings?”

  Just then Thunder limped over to them, the cat fast asleep on his broad back.

  Peter didn’t seem to be listening. Instead, he was staring at Gran and the horse with its burnt shoulder, and the sleeping cat. His jaw gaped open. “What are they doing here, Jen? Did you let them know? You shouldn’t have done that. It was supposed to be a secret.”

  “I’ll tell you everything later,” said Jennifer. “But let’s get back home first. I’m starving.”

  “That’s funny—I’m starving, too,” Peter said. “I feel as if I haven’t eaten for a day at least.”

  She laughed. “You haven’t.”

  “No, really,” Peter said. “I always feel what you feel. That’s what being a twin’s all about, I guess.”

  “Something like that,” she agreed, smiling. Then she held out her hand and yanked him to his feet. They headed for the gate, the dog trotting placidly and silently at Peter’s side.

  “We had better study more aboot twin magic,” Gran said to Thunder. “Power is power, but double is trouble. We might nae be so lucky next time.”

  The cat opened one sleepy eye in comment. Then horse, cat, and old woman followed the twins through the gate and home.

  A Scottish Glossary