“I’ve got to make managing director first.”
“Ye always did want recognition,” he said. He looked away toward the lake. “It’s not only for myself that I ask. Ma starts the chemo next week.”
“Cor,” she said.
“It’s in both her breasts,” he said. “She’s keeping all brave about it. She says it’s the Laird that’s terrified. At least he and I have that much in common.”
“I can’t remember her sick a single day.”
“Good peasant stock.”
She looked at him for the bitterness, but he’d said it with pride.
“Sir Harald’s become that dependent on her,” he said.
“He’s as in charge as ever.”
He looked into her eyes. “Ma says he’s got to have his arteries cleared out. Blood constriction to the brain’s made him a bit daft, but not so anyone but she and his banker could notice. Yet.”
Her father ailing and dependent was an image she couldn’t manage. “They were planning to keep all this from me.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time.” He opened the door and they stopped in the scullery and kissed again. “I hope I’ve given ye at least three good reasons to come back soon,” he said.
“One good, two scary,” she said, and kissed him long and deeply. Maybe all three scary, she thought.
CHAPTER 8
March 21, 1998
It had been an exhausting day of ledgers, land maps, and financial statements, and when Ambrose Timmons finally rose from the cluttered dining table, the weight of responsibility for Cairnoch had shifted from Harald’s shoulders to Els’s. Timmons, ever the discreet family banker, barely acknowledged Harald’s confusion and memory lapses, but Els’s anxiety for the future and determination to shield the Laird’s dignity grew with his every stumble.
“I believe I’ve earned a little lie-down,” Harald said when they adjourned to the Great Hall. “Have a good trip, both o’ ye.” He embraced Els and shook Timmons’s hand firmly, but his ensuing climb up the stairs was a labor.
Els saw Timmons to his car.
“’Tis a huge relief,” he said, “knowing you have the picture now. Should anything happen.”
“I can’t very well run this place from New York and do my job,” she said.
“You’ve a good man in Jamie McLaren,” Timmons said as he slid into the car. “He’ll step up.”
“I’ll spend more time with him when I’m back next month,” she said.
Winter had loosed its grip, and on the Munro, the violet haze was creeping upward in the wake of retreating snowfields. Beyond the lake, a ring-necked pheasant strutted among daffodils that glowed in the late afternoon’s slanted light.
She opened the door to what had once been her mother’s bedroom and tiptoed over to the bed where Burtie lay. Through the closed door connecting to Harald’s bedroom, she could hear him snoring.
Burtie opened one eye. She had shrunk but was as steely as ever. “Going, are ye?” she asked.
“I’ve a meeting in London in the morning.”
“So you’ve said.”
“I’ve asked Mary Partridge to come in every day for a few hours.”
“No need for that.”
“Just until you get your strength back.”
“She’ll be fussing all o’er me.”
“Exactly,” Els said. She started to kiss Burtie’s forehead, but something in Burtie’s downturned mouth deterred her and she patted her arm instead. “See you in a few weeks.”
Just as the door was closing, Burtie said, “Have a good meeting, luv. And tell him he’s to come see me as soon as he’s through the lambing.”
Els smiled, more comforted than annoyed that nothing got by Burtie, even though more and more was getting by her father.
As soon as Tommy, the youngest McLaren, dropped her at the Aberdeen airport and pulled away from the departures pavement, she sprinted to the car park and into Mallo’s arms.
When he set a breakfast tray on the foot of the bed, she sat up and laughed at the mess they’d made of his tidy bedroom—clothing strewn about, an empty glass overturned in a patch of sun on the rug. The room smelled of wood smoke, coffee, and oranges. He’d put a single daffodil in a tiny vase on the loaded tray.
“Where did you find juice oranges?” she asked.
“I hear it’s what the posh hotels serve in America,” he said, and handed her a glass of pulpy fresh juice. Even on the coldest mornings, he walked around the house naked until he’d had his second cup of coffee.
“Trying to make me a regular customer?” she said. In the past year, she’d visited Cairnoch as often as trips to London and rare holidays allowed, but she could count on one hand the number of nights they’d spent in the manager’s cottage that came with his job. She resisted the growing pressure to transfer, fearing she’d be out of sight, out of mind as soon as she left Coxe’s immediate orbit.
Mallo joined her on the bed, savored a sip of the orange juice, and held up his glass. “When we’re married, we’ll have this all the time.”
“Married, is it? Where was the bended knee, the sparkly ring?”
“Are ye such an old-fashioned girl under all those power suits? It’s those novels ye read with bucklers swashing and wenches pretending to be coy.”
He set their glasses on the tray, put it on the floor, and yanked away the bedcovers, releasing a funk of sex. He knelt and gathered her against him; she felt the confident beat of his heart. “Neither of us should be kneeling unless both of us are,” he said. “The fact is, I can barely remember when ye weren’t a part of my life. I no sooner lost me dad than I found ye. Then yir mum went away, and there we were with but two parents between us.”
“I never thought of you as a brother.”
“Ye were no sister to me, either,” he said. “More like a voice inside me to keep me straight on what’s worth gettin’ into trouble for.” He held her closer. “The fact is, now I’ve found ye again, all these big plans—my political career, making Cairnoch sound again—depend on us sticking side by side. So tell me now if I’m a hatstand. Are these fantasies I’m cookin’ up all in me own head?”
“You’re completely, totally, utterly a hatstand,” she said. He relaxed his grip and sagged away from her, and she pulled him tighter. “But not about any of that.”
He let out his breath. She leaned back enough to look him in the eye. His expression was guarded.
“I can’t leave New York yet,” she said. “This year they really owe me.”
His border collie, Seamus, whined to go out. Mallo climbed off the bed, let him out the kitchen door, and returned, trailing fresh air. “A year today, Spring Equinox 1999, or as soon as ye have that title,” he said. “Whichever comes first.”
She stood up and embraced him. “Don’t expect a raft of children,” she said. “Proper mothering genes don’t run in my family.”
“Now who’s a hatstand?” he said. “I’ve seen ye with the pups and lambs often enough to know better.” He lifted her chin and looked at her. “Will we have each other, then? I feel the need to hear it.”
“Aye, and forever,” she said, and pulled him back to the bed.
CHAPTER 9
November 1998
Els burst through the door of the Aberdeen airport into the raw November evening and scanned the waiting cars. Instead of Mallo’s Lotus, the family Rover sat at the curb.
Tommy McLaren got out of the Rover, went around to the passenger door, and helped Burtie to stand. Els was shocked to see how diminished she was, how the airport’s greenish lights painted purple shadows beneath her eyes.
Dragging her luggage, Els hurried across the roadway and embraced Burtie, who seemed more coat than woman. “I hope I’m not too late to catch part of the celebration,” she said. “The plane captain announced the voting results, but I can’t wait to hear the details.”
“Get in, luv,” Burtie said. She sat down and pulled her feet into the car with some effort. Tommy took El
s’s luggage without his usual cheery greeting.
Els closed Burtie’s door and climbed in the other side. “Just think,” she said, “with what’s happened today, by next summer we might have a Scottish MP in the family.”
Tommy pulled the Rover into traffic. Burtie stifled a sob and took a balled hankie out of her sleeve.
Els grabbed her hand. “Something’s happened to Father.”
Burtie shook her head, unable to speak. Els met Tommy’s eyes in the mirror and saw catastrophe in his gaze. She gripped Burtie’s hand tighter.
“It’s Mr. Malcolm,” Tommy said. “All we know is what the inspector said when he rang. We came straightaway to fetch ye. There was a rumpus at the pub where he was drinking with his mates, cheering the results. A bloke who was backing unity in the referendum took today’s vote personal. He had a knife.”
Invincible Mallo. No tough could ever be his match, she thought. “He’s in hospital, then?” she said. “Step on it, Tommy.”
“Miss Els,” Tommy said, “we’re headed for the morgue.”
Inspector Grainger ushered them into a small basement office that smelled of burnt coffee and formaldehyde. Burtie sank onto a chair. When Els declined to sit, the inspector leaned against the desk.
“The suspect followed Mr. Burton to the car park,” Grainger said. “Witnesses report that he was inebriated and argumentative. Mr. Burton tried to reason with him, defuse the situation. The suspect stabbed him twice, once in the chest and once in the neck. ’Twas the neck wound that did him in, sliced an artery. Despite the medic’s efforts, he bled to death in ambulance.”
He went on to explain that the procurator fiscal would make his ruling, but given the number of witnesses and the obvious cause of death, there would be a criminal proceeding but no inquiry. The suspect had fled the scene but was a known quantity and would surely be apprehended soon. While he described arrangements for releasing the body, Els stared at the anatomical drawing on the wall and thought of the life that had coursed through Mallo’s muscles, his strongly beating heart.
She kept her arm through Burtie’s, though she wasn’t sure who was supporting whom, and when they entered the identification chamber, all she saw was white—walls, lights, sheet. The cold invaded her bones.
“Show us,” she said, and the attendant rolled back the sheet.
It wasn’t Mallo lying there but a gray approximation with blue lips and a gash below his left ear. The only part of him that looked normal was his hair. She took his hand, as cold as the metal table, and made their secret sign, and when she let out her breath, the plume hovered over his face and dissipated. This is how it is when a soul departs, she thought. He’s waited for me. She took a quick breath, hoping to trap a wisp of Mallo’s essence.
Burtie nodded to the attendant and turned away, and the man carelessly replaced the sheet, leaving Mallo’s hair exposed, an ember in the bleached space.
The sun filtering through the pines cast a feeble light over the coffin draped with the blue-and-white Saltire, the banner of Scotland. Cairnoch staff, past and present, their families, and many villagers gathered with Burtie and Els near the open grave, while Harald stood apart, his face stony. The few of Mallo’s political cronies who’d shown up uninvited clustered as far from Harald as possible.
Els had taken charge of all the arrangements, including pressing Harald to let her bury Mallo in the family graveyard. Only when she’d said, “It’ll go easier on Burtie to have him close by,” had he reluctantly agreed.
She stared into the empty hole, its sides impossibly straight and tidy. The gravedigger had done his best for Mallo, a favorite among them all—even Harald, once.
Since leaving the morgue four days before, Els had been clenched—an attempt to hold on to the numbness she knew was keeping savage grief at bay. Now, she felt as if she were outside her own skin, observing herself with a bowed head, unable to recite the familiar prayers to a God who’d let one of His least worthy creatures take the life of one of His finest.
The priest intoned the final words of committal and sprinkled holy water over the coffin. His face awash in tears, Mallo’s uncle Jerry Grimes and Richie Ahearn, a fellow stonemason, folded the Saltire into a tight triangle and presented it to Burtie. Cradling it like a newborn, she walked past Harald—he offered his arm, but she ignored him—and went up the path toward the house. The other mourners fell into line behind her, leaving only Els and the burial men who were waiting by the fence to close the grave.
She forced herself to go to the Great Hall, bracing for the condolences of those who thought Mallo was but her childhood friend. Only Burtie knew they were lovers; they’d kept their pledge to marry a secret from all.
Early the next morning, she hiked to the Crag. An eagle rode the thermals high above, and as she followed the bird’s effortless soaring, she began to cry out the tears that had been frozen inside her. Much as she wanted to believe it was Mallo up there, flying so free, watching over her, she felt the certainty that he was really gone seeping into all the spaces the tears had occupied.
The numbness gave way to anger. Anger was supposed to be hot, she thought, but her rage was feral and icy. She raged at God, at Scotland, and most of all at Mallo for leaving her.
For two days Els slid between fury and a kind of blankness, avoiding everyone. She hiked every trail on Cairnoch’s grounds and slept in the bothy, aching for the heat of Mallo’s body spooned against her back. Her only company and confidant was Harald’s favorite pointer, Ariel, and she poured out her grief and love to him and took comfort in his sympathetic eyes.
When she finally returned to the house, she found Burtie in the sitting room swabbing and polishing hard enough to have raised a sweat.
Burtie stopped and ran her wrist over her brow. “Got to get this done while I still can.”
Perhaps Mallo’s death had erased Burtie’s best reason to keep fighting the cancer. Perhaps she knew her remaining days were few, even welcomed the end, and would keep that from Els too. Even though Els and Burtie hadn’t spoken of Mallo in front of Harald since the falling out, they’d often discussed him when alone in the kitchen or garden. Since his death, however, Burtie had been unwilling or unable to say his name. Adrift and alone in her grief, Els longed to hear stories of Mallo, afraid they’d be lost forever when Burtie was gone.
Never one to ask useless questions, Burtie appeared untroubled by Els’s two-day disappearance. “Ye’ve plenty right to yir sorrow, lassie,” she said. “He would hae made ye a prize husband, no doubt about it.”
Els looked at her, wondering if Mallo had told her their plans, but Burtie shook her head and pulled at the rag.
“Ye think I could hae missed all that fire and secret smiling right under me nose these last years? Ye think I don’t know me own boy, and you like me own bairn as well?” She ran the cloth over a spotless tabletop. “Yir father and I’ve no spoken about you and him, but my own opinion is he would hae rejoiced for such a son-in-law, regardless of the politics.” She walked over to Els, took her by the shoulders, and shook her gently. “Ye cannae heal yir heart by hanging about all peely-wally. Ye’ve got to get on wi’ yir own life.” When her plane lifted off from Aberdeen, Els knew she would never again arrive home with the joyous anticipation that had filled her last two years. On the flight from London to JFK, she opened her briefcase and sifted through the papers and printouts, all urgent a week ago, that she’d ignored during her whole time in Scotland. She stared out the window and wished it were possible just to keep flying westward, reeling back time zone by zone, until the entire week had been erased, the assassin’s hand never raised. When she looked down at her work again, two hours had passed. She’d chosen career and ambition over love, and now they were all that remained.
part three
CHAPTER 10
Nevis, West Indies
November 1999
While Hargrave Teal shuffled documents with stubby pink fingers, Els felt as much as saw the olive-green waves crash in
to the seawall and throw spray clear across the road to the car park that separated his restored colonial building from the Charlestown harbor. All the boats were gone. She wondered where Iguana might hide from a hurricane.
“Sign here, and again over here,” Teal said. “There’s the ticket.” He straightened his stack of executed documents and glanced at the yellowed sky.
Tony Hallowell paced near the windows. “Don’t drag this out, Gravy.”
“We can’t afford an error, now can we?” Teal said, winking at Els.
She scrawled her signature on the citizenship application and passed it back to him.
“As we agreed, everything on the property conveys with the sale,” Teal said. “With one exception.”
Els looked at Tony.
“My client believes,” said Teal, “that certain highly personal items pertaining to her may have been in Mr. Griggs’s possession, and she requests that you return them.”
“I thought she’d never been here,” Els said.
“Quite right.”
“What sort of personal items?”
“She declined to supply a list, but said you’d know if you found them.”
“When I’m not allowed to know her name.”
“I grant, it’s a bit unusual.” Teal fingered his gold cufflink. “It’s the only remaining issue.”
“She sounds as crackers as Jack. Must run in the family.”
“In point of fact, no beneficiary of Mr. Griggs’s estate is of any relation to him.”
“There’s more than one?” she asked.
Teal pressed his lips together, as if he’d said too much. A gust of wind slammed the building.
“Very well, then,” she said, “I’ll keep a really sharp eye out, and you’ll be the first to know, Mr. Teal, if I stumble across anything matching this precise description.”
The Moon Always Rising Page 7