‘Mr and Mrs Gilver, is it not?’ said the round, smiling woman as she plied her kettle and drew her griddle pan onto the flames. ‘Parents to the nice young man who’s stolen Miss Mallory’s heart away.’
‘Mrs Gilver,’ I said. ‘And Mr Osborne, a friend of the family.’
‘And today the wedding day!’ the woman said. ‘You must be very proud. And you’re getting a lovely girl to call your own.’ It was a welcome thought, and one that had not struck me before this, so many years since I had given up all thoughts of daughters.
‘Do you have any children?’ I said. ‘Have you seen them marry yet?’
‘Four boys to my name,’ she said. ‘And four fine lasses wedded onto them.’
‘How lovely! Do you have grandchildren?’
‘I have seven!’ She was beating me into a cocked hat at this game. ‘Two away at the big school, three in the wee school here, one a babe in arms still and then there’s Grizzle.’
I was not sure enough of what this extraordinary name could possibly be to attempt to repeat the sound, but I felt sure that ‘Grizzle’ must be the artistic toddler and accordingly I enquired into her age and current whereabouts and, before too long had passed, Mrs Roderick was at her back door, calling the child in from play.
‘She’s needing to be got washed and brushed for the wedding anyway,’ the woman said. Indeed, the stout little person who arrived in from the garden was lavishly filthy and tousled. Her grandmother tutted and set about her with a flannel, dipped in the kettle and wrung out hard, scrubbing energetically and scolding the child in Gaelic.
‘You will have to stay indoors and stay clean once your granny has got you dressed up for the wedding,’ I said.
Grizzle, so buffeted and jostled by her grandmother’s repeated scrubbing that she could barely keep on her feet without staggering and certainly could not speak in a steady voice, nevertheless replied, ‘I can stay clean outside. It’s not muddy.’
‘It’s dusty,’ I said. ‘What do you like to do best inside? Can you read?’
‘Nearly,’ Grizzle said. It was an admirable attitude.
‘I used to like to draw pictures,’ said Alec. ‘If I was ill with a cold or if it was raining. Do you like drawing?’
‘I can draw!’ Grizzle said.
‘Houses?’ I said. ‘I used to draw houses. And people.’
‘I can draw cows and sheep and deer and horses and rabbits and mice and birds and cats and dogs!’ Grizzle said all in one breath.
‘That you can,’ her grandmother said.
‘And I can draw the kelpie and the feannag and the bodach and—’
‘Hush now,’ her grandmother hissed softly. ‘Don’t show off.’
‘Oh but I’d love to see your pictures,’ I said. ‘Golly, horses are the very dickens to draw.’
Grizzle had to wait until her face was shining like a polished apple and her hair was scraped into pigtails so tight I was sure her scalp must be stinging, but at last she escaped her grandmother and went off into an adjoining room, returning a moment later with a familiar-looking calfskin book, whose pages were gilt-edged and whose cover was stamped with an ornate ‘1935’.
‘A diary?’ I said. ‘What a pretty one. Was it a Christmas present?’
‘The bodach found it thrown away,’ said Mrs Roderick. ‘And we let the bairnie have it. I’ve no use for paper and the school gives jotters.’
‘Might I see it?’ I asked Grizzle. She was only too happy to display her work. I caught one tantalising glimpse of a page filled with writing as she leafed through and then spent the next ten minutes admiring a zoological garden of animals all of which looked remarkably similar. We had a little help from the fact that the beasts of the air were drawn amongst fluffy clouds, those that crept upon the earth were depicted against a garish green quite unlike the grass of these hills and the creatures of the deep were superimposed upon a strident background of azure blue.
‘Is this a … sealion?’ I said, of a particularly shapeless blob.
‘A beastie,’ said Grizzle. ‘It’s a—’
Mrs Roderick had fidgeted more and more as the private viewing wore on and eventually, at this moment, she broke in.
‘Come away,’ she said. ‘You’ve got your frock to get on and it’s pressed and laid out. You just stay and enjoy your tea, Mrs Gilver, and you too, Mister.’
She and the child disappeared into the other room again. I hesitated, wondering if we would have time to read the entries before they returned, but Alec was bolder. He took the book from my hands, ripped out the written-upon pages with one wrench and got to his feet.
‘Must dash,’ he called. ‘See you at the wedding.’
‘Lovely bannocks!’ I added and dove out after him.
Grant was standing in my bedroom like a pillar of fire when the two of us hurried in minutes later. ‘Do you know what time it is?’ she said. ‘Madam.’
‘Time to read Lady Love’s diary, that washed ashore in her writing case,’ I said, as Alec tipped Bunty off my bed and began spreading the pages in order.
Grant spent exactly half a minute in further resentment, then slipped over to stand beside us, hungrily reading.
The first pages were filled with new year’s resolutions and garden notes concerning how graft buds were faring in the frosts and how saved seeds were faring in the damp. It was all very dull and reminded me of listening to Hugh on evenings when we dined alone. Then in the third week of January came something quite different.
Sam asked again. And again I had no answer. I have been happy here my whole life through and yet to follow in the footsteps of the great plant-hunters of the past, to go to lands that even Tradescant never knew, and find there strange and beauteous blooms to give my name to? For Maelrubha’s name to live on, despite me? What a thing that would be.
‘She was going on this plant hunt to the new world then?’ Alec said. ‘It should have occurred to us that it was all arranged too quickly for Spencer and McReadie. “Sam” is McReadie, isn’t he?’
‘I think so,’ I said. ‘Rather unusual to go off round the world with one’s gardener. I can’t imagine it myself.’
Grant had been reading ahead and now she gasped and pointed a shaking finger at a page dated 28 January. Alec and I bent close.
‘I hardly know how to write what has happened today,’ Lady Love had scribbled in untidy script with much blotting.
Sam has declared his love for me. Of course, I knew he was fond of me. I am fond of him. But this afternoon in the peach house, he declared a true serious attachment to me, an intention to divorce his wife, a desire for me to divorce my husband, and he actually proposed. He got down on his knees on the damp tiles and proposed that he and I marry!
‘Good Lord above,’ I said. ‘This is incendiary! This has been sitting in a village house in a little girl’s drawing book for four months and no one read it?’
‘We must be getting close to a motive now,’ Alec said.
‘I thought I would laugh,’ the entry went on.
But somehow, standing there, looking down at his dear face so sincere and so affectionate, the last thing I wanted to do was laugh at him. I felt what I can only describe as a surge of excitement. He is so vital, for all he is my age and more and we were children together. Lachlan has been an invalid for twenty years and lately has withdrawn even from pleasant evenings together, almost from conversations with me. He would rather be with Dickie than with his own wife.
‘Oh God,’ said Alec. ‘He was going off with Dickie practising his walking for her birthday surprise.’
I nodded but was too engrossed in the next entry to answer.
Sam kissed me! We were pruning, chatting as we always have when we work in the garden together, and suddenly he seized my hand and pulled me towards him and kissed my lips. I wrenched away, of course, but then I stood very close to him and looked deeply into his eyes and for a moment I swayed towards kissing him back. In my mind, I swayed and perhaps I leaned forward physi
cally too! Then a door opened on the terrace and I sprang away. I do not know who it was and I do not know if we were seen. But afterwards, when we were in the potting shed, oiling our secateurs and sharpening the long loppers, Sam pressed me harder than ever. He said he knew my feelings were the same as his and he knew that we could be happy, two adventurers together. But I could never do such a thing to Lachlan. I made vows for better or for worse, in sickness and in health. I could never.
‘Plants, plants, plants,’ Grant said, under her breath, running a finger down the next few pages, then, ‘Aha!’
A most extraordinary thing has occurred. Somehow Lachlan has learned of Sam’s feelings and desires. But that is not the extraordinary thing! He is not opposed to the plan. I do not know what to think. My husband of so many years is not opposed to the plan to divorce and for me to marry my gardener and go off to New Zealand with him. It is hardly flattering.
‘He what?’ said Alec, catching up.
Of course, it’s chivalry. Lachlan thinks I should not be tied to a cripple.
‘But it can’t have been chivalry!’ I said. ‘Lachlan was learning to walk again.’
And Cherry is happily settled. If Mallory means to accept that Gilver boy, then my girls will no longer need me here. I will speak to Mallory this evening when she returns from her house party. Perhaps the attraction will have worn off. I cannot say he was enormously appealing the one time I met him. His father’s family is unobjectionable, I suppose.
‘His father’s family?’ I said hotly. ‘His father’s family? What about his mother’s family? What a ruddy cheek.’
‘Ssshh,’ said Alec. ‘Read on. And don’t skip the bits about plants, Grant. If we had paid more attention to the plants in this case it would have done well for us. Patience, honesty, bleeding heart and forget-me-nots were planted in the manse knot garden for Lachlan to pine by after Lady Love had hopped it.’
‘Oh!’ I said. ‘And whatever McReadie was grubbing out of the knot garden here in the depth of winter was probably just as blatant. If he planted it as a message of love, anyway. Why did we ignore the oddness of him doing that, Alec? We knew it was important.’
‘Never mind rehashing it now,’ said Grant. ‘Look at what comes next.’
Mallory is truly in love. We must invite his family on a visit for it seems that there is no stopping it. He is younger than I thought. Very stodgy young men sometimes do seem middle-aged before their time. But Mallory set my mind to rest on one score. She admires the mother greatly.
‘The mother!’ I said, but I was mollified.
Apparently, she’s a very original, enterprising and modern type. My Mallory thinks she’s a marvel and plans to learn at her elbow, by all accounts. It seems that for all my affection and attention, I have been lacking as a role model. Detectives are much to be preferred to gardeners.
I was embarrassed now and perhaps Grant and Alec were too, for we all read on in silence. The next entry was absorbing and unsettling. It was very strange to read the woman’s thoughts as she recounted events we knew were leading so very soon to an unknown and unbearable end.
10 February. Help is at hand. My dear David is coming up for my birthday. The sweet old thing rang up in a flap and said he had to speak to me urgently and could not tell me what it was over the telephone. I said I was delighted because I needed to speak to him too. He is on the train this minute and will be with me tomorrow. I am going to lay it all at his feet and ask his advice. If he says Lachlan must be allowed his chivalry, if he says there is nothing shocking these shocking days about such a misalliance as Sam and me, if he says my girls would be fine without me … such a lot of ifs! But if he does, then I might – I really might – do this mad thing. I might go. To New Zealand! As Mrs McReadie!
And then the thunderbolt. But it would throw everything off, wouldn’t it?
12 February. My dear old David arrived yesterday but we did not have our tête-à-tête until this morning. It began like a farce, with yet another man declaring his devotion to me. Hardly news, but it surprised me that he would suddenly make it overt after all this time. I’ve known for years and thought we were past the crisis when it might make waves. But then came the bombshell. David knows why Lachlan wants me gone. It’s not chivalry at all or anything like it. He is as chivalrous as he is heroic. He’s not giving me my freedom. He is getting rid of me. Well, he is not getting rid of me. I refuse to be made a fool of. I shall not go. I shan’t tell Sam until after my birthday if I can avoid it. And then I cannot imagine what will happen. Perhaps he would like to go to New Zealand anyway. Will he still send me back plants and seeds after I’ve disappointed him so?
‘No he will not,’ I said. ‘He will kill you for disappointing him so.’
‘And then what does she write?’ said Grant.
‘That’s the last entry,’ Alec said. ‘Look: the back of this page has Grizzle Roderick’s best attempt at a seagull on it.’
‘Because by the next night she was dead,’ I said. ‘Killed by Samuel McReadie. He truly believed he had persuaded her and when he discovered that she meant to refuse him he struck out in rage and disappointment.’
‘As we said all along,’ said Alec. ‘It was a spurned lover. McReadie killed what he could not possess.’
‘And Spencer definitely knew that,’ said Alec. ‘He meant to kill McReadie out in the wilds of Borneo or somewhere where murders go unpunished.’
‘They go quite unpunished in Applecross,’ said Grant; an inarguable point. ‘But what on earth did Mr Spencer tell her, madam? That caused her to change all her plans.’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘It’s hard to imagine what he could have found out, in Oxford, that would reveal that Lachlan wanted rid of his wife.’
‘Whatever it was, presumably he heard it from McReadie’s son. That’s the connection.’
‘Did they know one another?’ said Grant.
‘Dolly McReadie says not,’ I told her. ‘But they must.’
‘Perhaps they merely bumped into one another or passed in the street,’ said Alec.
‘But would they even recognise one another?’ said Grant. ‘Had they met?’
‘Too late to ask Spencer, but we could still ask Roddy McReadie,’ said Alec. ‘If he hadn’t made some excuse to miss the wedding we could have asked him today.’
I stared at him. ‘Do you think it’s the same thing?’ I said. ‘The thing Spencer found out and the reason Roddy McReadie is staying away?’
‘What sort of thing could that be?’ said Alec.
I shrugged, but there was a germ of an idea in there somewhere. ‘What did you just say, Grant?’ I asked, turning to her. ‘About them knowing each other? Bumping into one another?’
But before Grant could answer, my bedroom door opened and there stood Mallory.
She took my breath away. The dress was not peculiar at all. It was not vampish, nor overly modish. It was simply a very pretty white satin and lace dress that fitted her like a glove and made the most of her figure. The veil and headdress were elegance itself on her smooth curls, and her flowers, naturally, were exquisite. She was the perfect picture of a bride.
Except for her expression, which showed extreme distress.
‘Mallory, my dear, what’s wrong?’ I said.
‘What’s wrong?’ she repeated, aghast. ‘Dandy, it’s twenty-five minutes past two. Everyone’s waiting for you!’
23
Alec had a point. I managed to get myself dressed, hatted, painted and powdered in ten minutes flat, although for the rest of the day I was never quite comfortable; finding my stockings twisted and my undergarments not quite sitting true against my form. Perhaps I can credit my physical discomfort, however, with keeping me alert through the interminable wedding service. And I shall always be grateful for that, because it was during the ceremony that so many shadowy notions burst into glaring light inside me. A perfect fireworks show went on behind my eyes as I sat there in the front pew of the Clachan church watching my son
be married.
He melted my heart, standing waiting at the altar in his new suit, his brother as stiff as a board at his side, and when I turned to glance in Hugh’s direction I was amazed to see what looked like a tear or two in his glaring eyes. I told myself there was a great variety of seeds and specks of chaff floating around after the morning’s haymaking and turned back from this most startling sight.
When the pianist, an energetic woman with her sleeves rolled up and wearing very sturdy shoes to help her pedal foot, broke into ‘Here Comes the Bride’, a ripple of excitement and wonder passed through the congregation. Of course, no one turned. It is thought scandalous in a Scottish church to turn one’s head and greet a bride with smiles. The poor thing must pace her way to the altar on her father’s arm looking at everyone’s hats.
I did shoot a look from the corner of my eye – that much is allowed. She had recovered enough from finding me so very recently so very unprepared as to be smiling again, a ready open smile, perhaps not quite bride-like; but then the shyness and simpering of brides is tiresome. Donald met her with just such another ready open smile and suddenly I felt sure that they would do quite nicely, these two. They were friends, for which a lot can be said when one lives in close quarters.
As Lachlan handed his girl over to my boy, I watched him closely. He had lived at close quarters with his Lady Love, and also with the Tibballs, and now was alone except for a housekeeper. I turned as far as was appropriate – the rules slacken a little once there is nothing to look at – wondering where Mrs McReadie was sitting. She was alone too now and—
The first of the fireworks went off in my head. Mrs McReadie was not alone. She lived with Lachlan. Lachlan had wanted rid of his wife and was perfectly happy for her to go off with the gardener. The reason he did not find it shocking that a woman of Lady Love’s class might get entangled with a servant was suddenly obvious to me. And, as if to drive the last nail home, I remembered Lachlan telling McReadie to ask ‘Dolly’s’ advice about his long sea journey and McReadie’s quick frown of annoyance. Perhaps the man could stomach the notion of a cabinet reshuffle but did not want to be faced with the bald fact of his master using the familiar name.
A Step So Grave Page 29