As my eyes grazed on the strange symbols, I found my fingers had wandered to the necklace. Was it me, or did I sense a crackle as I rolled it between my thumb and forefinger, like there was static in the air, that feeling before a storm? Unlike the horses, I didn’t feel afraid.
Instead, my mind became effervescent, excited at the thought of what other treasures might lie in wait inside the merchant’s estate.
Picking up one end of my trunk, I began to pull it the rest of the way down the snowy track.
The merchant’s house consumed me as soon as I emerged from the trees, a mansion of terracotta brick and shimmering glass, dozens of crenellated chimney pots twisting up into the grey, feathered sky.
I dropped my trunk beside a tree in wonder, drawn towards the flattened arch in which the massive front door was embedded. To the left loomed the round tower I’d seen from the wagon, set on a small hillock, a tall spiky tree growing up closely to one side. The tower had three small clover-leaf windows running roughly vertical up one side but despite its height, failed to hold my attention. Instead, my eyes were drawn back to the sweeping panes of the manor house, staring at me like the unblinking eyes of a wasp.
How on earth did such windows stay in place? Cascading panes of diamonds, glittering black. The sight made me feel suddenly dizzy.
So stunned was I by the architecture that I didn’t notice that the door had been opened until someone shouted to me. A short and wiry man with dark skin was standing on the step, waving me in impatiently.
‘Are you Alexander Plaustrell?’ I asked as I walked briskly to the door.
But the man didn’t seem to hear me. Instead, he bowed fleetingly in a way that suggested servitude rather than manners, all the while fluttering his fine-boned hands like a sparrow taking a dirt bath.
I decided that he must be a servant though he was dressed extravagantly in a cotton shirt and red bloomers which stopped just above his skinny knees. He stared down disapprovingly at my bare, dirty feet as he ushered me across the threshold.
‘I’m Iseabail McCleod,’ I explained as he led me into the magnificent hallway. The ceiling and walls were completely encased in shiny walnut panels and an elegant staircase swept down from the upper levels, its balustrade ending in a flawless curve. ‘The merchant is expecting me.’
‘Santa Maria!’ he tutted, looking down at the pristine floor which was laid with an eye-crossing design of chequered tiles. ‘Attento al mio pavimento!’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, feeling too weary now to be ashamed of my naked feet. I realized that the servant hadn’t understood a word that I said, nor had I deciphered anything that had passed from his impatient lips. What would I do if Plaustrell was not here and his daughter could not speak my language? Suddenly I felt faint and badly needed to sit down.
But then, without warning, a gangly dog the size of a pony flew down the stairs, closely followed by a wild-haired child.
‘Whitefoot, Whitefoot!’ the child cried out in Gaelic as she hitched up her yellow dress to navigate the stairs. She looked to be about eight years old, and despite her mass of hair was still smaller than the dog. I assumed her to be the merchant’s daughter. ‘Come back here!’
The dog paid her no mind and bounded towards an archway, its paws skittering to turn on the smooth tiles. But then it changed direction sharply and ran straight towards me, knocking me clear off my feet. I fell hard on to the polished tiles.
‘You naughty thing!’ cried the girl, attempting to pull the dog off me. But it was licking my face, great rivulets of slobber running down my neck. ‘Get off that dirty peasant!’
Finally, the girl managed to extract the dog whilst the servant pulled me back on to my feet.
‘My name is Iseabail McCleod,’ I said, trying to neaten my smock. I was quite unharmed but now felt light-headed, compounded no doubt by the confusion of the girl’s welcome. ‘I’ve travelled many miles – at the behest of Alexander Plaustrell.’
The girl gaped at me in disbelief as the servant hauled the dog off to another room. Then she walked around me briskly, wrinkling up her nose as she took in my rough clothes and dirty feet. Thank goodness I’d had the sense to leave the seal-skin trunk outside. Finally she came to a halt right in front of me, her sweet, musky perfume invading my nostrils. ‘Prove it!’ she ordered.
I pulled the pearl from underneath my smock, hoping it would serve as evidence of my identity.
At this her eyes immediately softened. ‘Thank the Lord that you arrived safely,’ she said, mesmerized by the white pearl. She looked up at me with joy, a wide smile spreading across her lips. ‘Welcome, dear Iseabail McCleod!’
Then she flung herself at me, her ringlets smothering her face as she pushed into my smock.
I swayed taking the weight of her, suddenly feeling hot as well as faint.
But I could not hold her for long. And whether it was the exhaustion of my long journey – or the mossy undertone of her cloying perfume – my legs buckled and I fell back to the floor, taking her with me.
When I awoke I was in a bed, a huge one surrounded by curtains. Shafts of daylight slotted through the gaps but whether it was the same day or next, I had no idea.
I sat up, causing my head to throb, finding a fine white cotton nightdress had replaced my rough smock.
Unsteadily, a hand came through one side of the curtain, laying itself gently on my arm. The hand was tanned, veiny and old and was shortly followed by a matching, wrinkly face.
An old woman had been sitting on a chair by the bed and now she stood to press both hands gently on my chest, indicating that I should lie back down. Her skin was so crinkled that it was hard to make out her features and I wondered if she might be one hundred years old.
I did as she indicated, my head as heavy as a rock. Now I remembered arriving in the merchant’s house and I wondered if I had struck it on the tiles when I fell to the floor the second time; I prayed that the child had not been hurt too.
The old lady put a cool flannel on my forehead, all the while mumbling incoherently in the foreign language. I realized that I had not injured my head at all but was in the midst of a fever. The nightdress was stuck to my chest with sweat and my throat stung, raw and dry.
The ancient maid stood stiffly and pressed her hands to her own chest. ‘Sylvia,’ she said with a wary smile, her voice rolling and melodic. Then she left the room, returning moments later with the girl in tow.
The child was excited and looked to launch herself at me again, but Sylvia caught her deftly by the sleeve. The girl glanced up sharply at the nurse but was chastened enough to approach the bed with reserve.
‘How are you, dear Iseabail?’ she said, shooting Sylvia another angry look. The old lady curtsied and retreated with backwards steps from the chamber, her head bowed so that only the top of her grey cap was visible.
The girl pulled back the bed-curtains fully and sat down eagerly on the edge of the mattress. ‘Sylvia said that you have taken a fever.’
‘Yes,’ I croaked, my throat aching badly, though I was now distracted by the magnificence of the bedchamber unfolding behind her.
‘Papa said this might happen,’ said the girl wistfully, touching my brow. She looked down at me with olive-brown eyes, her tawny cheeks framed by thick ringlets. ‘That people from remote places easily catch diseases.’
‘Diseases?’ I whispered, alarmed, remembering how the merchant’s letter spoke of the plague taking his wife.
‘Oh, Sylvia says it is nothing to worry about,’ the girl assured me. She spoke with authority and seemed very grown-up for a child. ‘Just a sniffle, no doubt caught from one of those dreadful taverns. But don’t worry, this house is a place of healing, you will be recovered in no time.’
I nodded, though personally I had found the roadside taverns to be the height of luxury – I had been fed thick, meaty stews, slept on straw-stuffed mattresses. But these extravagances were trifling compared to those found in the merchant’s house.
He
re I was now, lying on the softest bed and being waited on hand and foot by a servant! But the opulence of the bedchamber made me worry that my trunk had been found. What if it had been hauled upstairs with all its simple, fetid contents rattling about inside?
I attempted to sit up to look but the girl tucked the sheets firmly back around my neck. ‘Now you must keep warm,’ she said, taking sole charge of my convalescence. She was wearing the perfume again but my blocked nose rendered it less pungent. ‘The snows are here early – and the berries forecast a hard winter.’
‘The berries?’ I said, my throat aching with every word.
‘Yes, the berries!’ said the girl, like she was teaching me a fact. ‘So many of them this autumn – a foreteller of a cold snap, that’s for sure.’
I nodded again, thinking how this must explain the early snowfall.
‘I can’t wait to show you around when you are better,’ the girl went on. ‘The gardens, the tower . . . and the library, the chapel . . .’ But then she stopped to snatch breath. ‘But listen to me . . . jabbering on when I have not even yet introduced myself!’
At this she sprang up from the bed and took a dramatic curtsy.
‘My name is Maria. Miss Maria Plaustrell. Aged seven and a half,’ she breathed. ‘Papa is still away travelling but I’ll help you find your feet.’
‘Maria,’ I said, my own voice seeming faraway inside my fever-ridden head. ‘I don’t think that I have heard that name before.’
‘It’s Italian,’ she explained, collapsing back on to the bed. ‘Just like me and Papa – like all the servants. Well, apart from that wretch of a stable boy – he comes from down in the village.’
I looked at her quizzically.
‘Italy is a warm country in Europa,’ she explained. ‘Full of art and beautiful churches. We lived in Venice – a spectacular city that floats on water.’
I tried to imagine such a place, puzzled at why the merchant would move his entire household from this wonderful city to the frozen moor that lay beyond the lattice glass.
‘Venice is a plague pit,’ said Maria, reading my mind. ‘Papa brought us here to escape disease – and because of the mineral spring, of course.’
She stood again, this time to fetch a glass tumbler from the dresser. She held it up to the light. It was filled with sparkling water.
‘My health back in Venice was not the best but the waters here have worked wonders,’ she said wistfully. ‘Papa says they can cure almost anything.’
‘You are sick?’ I said with concern.
‘I have bouts of weakness,’ explained Maria. ‘But doesn’t everyone? That is why we all drink the water here, to keep healthy. In fact, we use it for everything – in cooking, laundry and, very importantly, bathing.’
‘Bathing?’ I croaked.
‘Yes – a branch of the spring feeds directly into the bathhouse,’ she said proudly. ‘I myself take a hot bath every day . . . for my condition.’
Hot baths? Whoever heard of such a thing! The only wash I ever took was in the freezing burn that gushed down the gully into the bay.
‘Sylvia will prepare our baths with restorative herbs and fragrances,’ Maria went on. ‘You will be required to take them too – we have strict cleansing routines here, to prevent the spread of diseases.’ She approached the bed to press the tumbler to my lips. ‘Drink now – it will make you feel better.’
I took a sip but the water just tasted ordinary. Much like our spring at home, though it maybe held a slight aftertaste. Noting I had had my fill, Maria drank down the rest of the water in one gulp.
I smiled in appreciation as Maria put down the empty glass and wiped my lips with a cloth. She was watching me carefully.
‘Why, you have such white teeth,’ she said finally, leaning towards me to see better. She seemed very pleased by this.
‘It is common for my people,’ I managed to reply, thinking of what Marcus Amanza had said.
‘And your skin is so clear,’ she continued, stroking my cheek like it was precious silk. ‘No sign of disease.’
I noticed as her forehead caught the light that her skin there was slightly pockmarked.
Then her eyes fell to the pearl that was still around my neck. ‘Did Papa give you that?’ she said, staring at it.
‘The sailor that brought me from the island was instructed to do so,’ I mumbled.
‘It’s lovely,’ she said dreamily, her fingers reaching out to it. But she stopped short of touching the stone. ‘Papa told me to look out for it – to make sure that the girl who arrived at the door was the one that had been chosen.’
‘What country are we in here?’ I said, changing the subject and pulling away, fearing she might take the pearl from me. ‘Your father’s letter said something about borderlands but I didn’t quite understand.’
At this the girl stood and strode energetically towards the window. ‘Well, that all rather depends on the day!’ she smiled, her curls bouncing as she leant across the wide sill to point out through the leaded glass. ‘To the south, we have England!’ she announced dramatically. ‘Ruled by the terrible Elizabeth, ready to chop off our heads for being true to the Old Faith.’
At this Maria turned to make a gesture across her throat, using a forefinger as if chopping it through with an axe.
‘To the north, Scotland!’ she said, pointing to the opposite, windowless wall of the bedchamber. ‘Thankfully it has a Catholic queen. But the borders are really neither one nor t’other – its people obey only laws of their own. And up here on the moor we are mostly left to our own devices.’
The next few days passed in a blur of cold flannels and hot broth. My fever worsened but, just as the nurse had predicted, it wasn’t of the dangerous kind. The girl attended me as well as the old lady, bringing me infusions concocted from plants from the garden, marvellous herbs that calmed my flaming throat, a boiled flower head that stilled the ringing in my ears.
Maria said she had learnt all these things from her papa and I asked if it was true what the wagon driver had said, that her father was one of these apothecaries.
‘What exactly did that wretched man say?’ said Maria, spooning a wobbly liquid into my mouth with a flat spoon, visibly rattled.
‘Nothing much, believe me,’ I said, wiping my lips with a cloth. ‘He was pretty insufferable to tell you the truth – hardly spoke a word the whole way from Oban.’
‘Good,’ said Maria, seemingly pacified. ‘Because those villagers tell hateful lies.’
‘He wouldn’t bring me up to the house though,’ I said, watching her carefully.
Maria put the spoon down and smoothed her dress. ‘Wouldn’t he now?’ she said shortly. ‘Well, that’s because he’s not allowed to . . . we don’t allow just anyone to visit, you know. We strive to keep their vile phlegm at a distance, their deadly diseases from our door.’
‘But he seemed to be afraid of something . . .’
‘The villagers don’t like the posts on the moor, that’s all,’ sniffed Maria, regaining composure by tucking a piece of hair neatly back into her cap. I had to remind myself that she was just seven and a half years old. So much younger than my sister Eilidh, yet the way Maria spoke, the way she held herself was so much more grownup. ‘But they are just decorated stones – brought back by Papa from abroad. Anything different seems like witchcraft to those stupid villagers!’
I wanted to ask about the horses – why had they been so afraid to enter the estate? It must have been something other than strange symbols etched into a pair of posts that made them rear up like that. But Maria was in full flow.
‘Besides, the whole valley down there is riddled with Protestants,’ she announced whilst holding up the set of beads dangling around her collar. ‘These are called rosary beads and Catholics here wear them in prayer.’
‘I’m afraid that we don’t wear them on the island,’ I replied. ‘But we still pray to the Lord,’ I added quickly.
‘It must have been hard to leave your family a
ll the way out there,’ she said, lowering her beads. ‘Your mother and your father?’
‘Oh, I don’t have a father,’ I said coolly, taking the opportunity to tuck my own necklace tightly under my nightgown to avoid further scrutiny. Although it was just a piece of leather and a sea-pearl, I was becoming rather fond of it. ‘And my mother and younger sister . . . well, we said our goodbyes.’
I thought that it was best not to mention Artair – or my absolute intention to return home – because the little girl already seemed to have grown quite attached to me.
‘But I am here now, Maria – and I will be a good companion to you, that is, as soon as I am well.’
‘I know I can’t replace your sister,’ said Maria. ‘But we will have great adventures. And we have a marvellous library at our disposal!’
Despite my lingering headache, the mention of a library caused my head to surge with adrenaline.
‘I’m afraid I can read only a little,’ I said, leaning back heavily on to my pillow. ‘And mostly only in Gaelic.’
‘All the important books are written in Latin,’ explained Maria. ‘But don’t worry, Father Ronan will arrive soon to instruct us both.’
‘I am to be educated?’ I said, the thought swimming before my eyes.
‘Certainly,’ said Maria. ‘And you will be moved into your proper room tomorrow . . . this one here belongs to Papa.’
‘This is your father’s bedchamber?’ I said, shocked, sitting up sharply.
‘Of course,’ said Maria, taking the opportunity to plump up the pillows behind my back.
‘I mean . . . I knew this wasn’t my sleeping quarters,’ I blurted out. ‘But I never dreamt that they belonged to—’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Maria. ‘Get some rest now. In the morning, I will show you round properly. Now I must go for my bath – Sylvia will have heated the water by now.’
The Pure Heart Page 4