A Kind of Grief (12 page)

“So then she'll be finished her studies, and she'll move in with me and ma granny.”

“Will the wedding be before Christmas or next year?” Joanne asked.

“April,” Hec explained. “The light's perfect an' the trees just right and—”

“Hec, a wedding is more than photos.” Joanne laughed.

“Aye, there's the church ceremony an' all that, but . . .”

McAllister switched off again.

The farm sale would be signposted, Calum had explained when Joanne said she might not remember the turnoff.

Sure enough, there was a
SALE
sign. The notice was fixed to a board, which was fixed to a fence post, which was close to disintegrating back into pulp. Joanne thought to herself that if you didn't know where to look, it would be missed. Then again, everyone in the county—and beyond—was curious about the farm, now a place with a lurid history, always to be mentioned with
Isn't that the place where . . .

Visibility was poor; little could be seen except short stretches of the road ahead as it twisted and climbed through low-lying cloud. There were no farmsteads, fences, sheep, or militant ranks of Forestry plantations in sight, just bog cotton and ferns and heather rolling across the hills like a mantle of rotting carpet.

To an outsider it was a remarkably unremarkable landscape at the best of times, Joanne was thinking, and this was definitely not the best of times.

Three miles up the tarmac road, they came to the five-bar gate leading to the property. It was open. Tracks from other vehicles making their way to the auction made the drive muddy, and Joanne knew that the ruts and puddles hid holes too deep for a saloon car. She drove slowly, carefully, wishing she had a vehicle like Alice Ramsay's Land Rover.

Reaching the farmyard, they were surprised at the number of cars and vans and at least two tractors, one with a trailer with chickens in coops and the cockerel in a coop of his own; Alice's chickens had already been sold.

Joanne backed into a narrow space in the line of cars along the garden wall and switched off the engine. She took a deep breath and said, “Right, let's join the body of the Kirk.”

McAllister smiled at her use of one of Don's favorite phrases. Glancing at her, he could see she was nervous.

She sensed his scrutiny and nodded. “I'm fine. It just all seems . . .”

“Such a waste.” He knew.

And she knew he knew and put her hand out to touch his.

Hector clambered out the back of the car, leaving his duffel bag inside but with a camera concealed under his mackintosh to keep it dry. He was delighted with the scene: locals in their Sunday-best overcoats and hats, farmers in their wellie boots and tweed jackets with nonmatching deerstalker hats, some with fishing flies embedded in the band. He loved the backdrop: tumbledown outbuildings, the new slate roof on the barn glistening black and grey and petrol green, and the old cobblestones, treacherous in rain but a photographer's delight. “This is really atmospheric.”

Joanne opened the boot to change her shoes for wellies. McAllister adjusted his hat to an angle that Joanne considered French. They set off towards a roofed but semiderelict former barn where much of the goods had been set out.

The auctioneer had finished with the garden implements and was moving on to the furniture. His assistant called out a lot number. The bidding began for a well-loved kitchen table and a set of mismatching chairs, now looking like the relics of a bombing. Joanne half-listened as the price rose swiftly and still ended in what she considered a bargain; the wood was oak, and with a polish, the table would be handsome.

She and McAllister looked around at the crowd, some of whom were bidders and some of whom were just plain curious. The very ordinariness of the crowd struck her.
Yet some of these people condemned Alice as a witch.
Joanne shivered at the thought. Then, looking at the individuals in the crowd, seeing the ruddy-cheeked Highland farmers, the women out for an enjoyable morning's entertainment, she was more charitable.
Don't be so judgmental,
she lectured herself.
Gossip can't kill.

The roof on the barn was obviously new, the concrete floor clean. She found herself gazing at the wooden beams, fancying she could smell the wood. The thought came like a poisoned dart.
She hanged herself from one of these beams.
Panic flashed from her stomach to her throat. She dug her fingernails into her palm. Remembering her doctor's advice, she took a conscious breath and swallowed.

The realization that panic tasted of bile distracted her. She needed tea. Or water. There was no one she recognized to ask, and she certainly wasn't about to ask McAllister. Then, from across the room, standing between two wardrobes and a sideboard, she caught Calum Mackenzie waving at them. She waved back.

He gestured to an open space near the kitchen equipment, then pointed with his forefinger to the pictures stacked on the dresser. She nodded and began to edge towards him. “Excuse me. Sorry.”

McAllister followed. The crowd parted to let them through, though not without some curious looks and some muttering. Strangers this far up the glen were unusual.

A wee round woman was sticking to Calum like a limpet mine. Joanne recognized his mother from their brief encounter at the garage. When Calum was in conversation with friends, acquaintances, and professional contacts, his mother had the good sense to say little, but she would watch the speaker, follow Calum's replies with an “aye” or “that's right” or, most frequently, a smile and a chuckle that said,
That's ma boy, isn't he grand?
It wasn't that Calum didn't notice, just that he accepted that she was his mother and this was how she was.

A pretty young woman—too healthy and capable-looking to be called beautiful—a few inches taller than Calum, also caught the wave. Joanne smiled back. With a flutter of a raised hand, Elaine introduced herself as Calum's fiancée.

“How are you, Joanne?” Calum asked when at last she made it over to them.

“Where's your manners, Calum?” his mother hissed. “It's Mrs. Ross to you.”

“Actually, it's Mrs. McAllister.” Joanne smiled. “But as Calum is a friend, I told him to call me Joanne.”

To Mrs. Mackenzie the idea of friendship between a man and a woman of differing ages and differing social status was outside of her understanding. Therefore somehow wrong. She said nothing, but Elaine, who'd overheard the exchange, knew that later much would be made of Joanne Ross McAllister.

“Elaine.” Calum's fiancée formally introduced herself. “Calum's told me a lot about you.”

“And you. He's really proud of you,” Joanne said. “This is McAllister.”

“Your husband?” Mrs. Mackenzie asked. She looked up at him. Seeing no indication of status, she was about to dismiss him. Then she remembered he was the editor of a newspaper. “I'm Calum's mother,” she said. “My Calum's done right well for himself. When he was at school, he passed all his exams wi' top marks. An' one o' his essays was printed in the paper an' him only fifteen. Then he was champion o' the junior golf team. That's before he was made chief reporter and—”

“Next lot, number ninety-seven, cameras and equipment,” the auctioneer announced.

Hector pulled at the editor's sleeve as if he were a wee boy trying to get the attention of his granddad. “Will you bid for me? I'm scared I'll mess it up.”

Thanks, Hec, for saving me from that woman
, McAllister was thinking.

Calum spoke up. “I'll bid. None o' the locals will go against me. What's your limit?”

“Who'll offer me five pounds?” the auctioneer asked.

“Five pounds is fine,” Hec said.

“Wait,” Calum told him.

“Come on, ladies and gentlemen. An excellent wee camera, German-made. And lots of equipment, extra lenses. Three pounds? No? Who'll start me at one pound?”

“Ten shillings!” Calum shouted.

“Come on, the bag's worth more than that.” Still no reply. And the sound of rain on car roofs drumming a tattoo made the auctioneer want to finish before the pubs closed. “Ten shillings. Sold to Calum. Now, this nice mirror, antique, looks like . . . five shillings?”

“Ten shillings?” Hector's eyes were popping.

“Wheesht,” Joanne told him. But she could see him trembling and the raindrops coming off his mackintosh like a dog shaking off the rain. “Maybe you should bid for me too, Calum.”

“What do you want?”

“The drawing of the bird skeleton, the one in the plain wood frame.”

“The one used in evidence in court?”

“Was it?”

“Nasty old thing, thon,” Mrs. Mackenzie muttered. Calum nudged her with his elbow. “But there's no accounting for taste,” she added.

“I'll bid for it,” McAllister said.

They waited as a few more items were presented—an Edwardian water jug and bowl, brass fire tongs and dustpan set, a half tea set. “Royal Doulton,” the auctioneer said, but still couldn't raise more than five shillings. “Sold to Nurse Ogilvie,” he announced.

A prosecution witness at Alice's trial, Joanne was thinking. She watched as the nurse made her way to the bookkeeper to pay for the china. With her was a young man, tall and very thin, his skin white in a redhead way. She sensed a nervousness about him, reminding her of a highly strung greyhound, one that had been overraced and was now on its last legs. Then, as though sensing someone was watching, he turned around, scanned the crowds, and seeing Joanne, one of the few strangers at the gathering, he paused.

She could feel him trying to place her. And almost smiled as if to say
friend
. Then he was gone.

Next came a set of tools—hammers, a hand saw, a bow saw, various screwdrivers and pliers, all in a nice folding wooden box with compartments of various size. The auctioneer expected brisk bidding, as they were all of superior quality. Three competing bidders dropped out when they saw who was determined to have them.

“Twa pund an' five shillings? Do I hear ten? No? Sold to Mr. Novak.”
Bang
went the hammer.

Calum leaned closer to Joanne. “Mr. Novak, it was him who had helped Miss Ramsay renovate the house.”

Mrs. Mackenzie heard her son even though he had spoken quietly to Joanne. “Another one o' they foreigners,” she commented loudly. “And, so I heard, she and him spoke German thegether.”

“Mum.” Calum was smiling when he chastised her. She took no offense. Or notice.

“Next, this wee drawing—some o' you will recognize it.” The auctioneer's assistant was holding it high. A murmur ran around the steading. “Nice frame, though no so sure about the picture.” That raised a laugh. “Five pounds? No? Three? One pound?”

A local antique dealer nodded.

“One pound thirty shillings?”

Now McAllister joined in.

“Two pounds?”

Another figure, male, standing in the gloom of the far corner, raised a hand.

The auctioneer continued. “Three pounds?”

McAllister.

“Four pounds?”

The stranger.

“Five?”

McAllister.

Joanne was staring at the other bidder. There was something about him. “Calum, do you know that man? The other bidder?”

Calum stared, then whispered, “Aye, it's Dougald Forsythe, the man from the Art College. But why would he be here?”

McAllister didn't hear. Thank goodness, Joanne thought. She was uncertain how her husband would react but knew it would be on the high end of the wrath scale.

The bidding had reached twenty pounds in about fifty seconds. Then forty pounds. There had been a buzz of conversation amongst the onlookers and not a few comments on the reappearance of the art critic, but when the bidding reached fifty pounds and kept climbing, the intakes of breath over every ten-pound rise in the bidding was as clear as the hissing from a flock of geese.

At eighty pounds, Joanne said, “Stop, McAllister, I don't want it that badly.” But her husband was dogged when he wanted something. He had his hands in his pockets, she knew his fists would be clenched, and his voice had dropped to almost a growl. She knew when that happened to let him be.

At one hundred pounds, he dropped out.

“At one hundred and ten pounds, to the gentleman in the far corner . . .” The auctioneer looked at McAllister, who shook his head. “Going once, twice, sold.”

A huge upswell of voices greeted the price. Even the auctioneer had to pause to recover his breath. He took out a large spotted hankie, wiped his forehead, and nodded at the equally astonished spectators. This was a tale he and they would be telling for a long time to come.
One hundred and ten pounds for a scribble o' a deed bird that they ca' art
—that would be the least of the comments. Already one wag had called out, “Aa' daft them southerners.”

“Psst, Hec.” Joanne bent over to whisper to him, right in his ear, as she sensed Mrs. Mackenzie's interest. “Get a photo of the man who won the bid. But don't let him, or McAllister, know what you're doing.”

“I won't.”

When it came to his profession, she trusted him absolutely and knew from past experience that once Hector was decided, he was as obstinate as her husband.

“What is it about that drawing?” Elaine asked, stunned by the price.

“Absolute nonsense, if you ask me,” Mrs. Mackenzie replied.

Elaine had put herself deliberately between Calum's mother and Joanne and had addressed the question to McAllister.

He shrugged. “No idea.” Then he went out to stand under the barn eaves, light a cigarette, and ponder on the same question.

“Lot one hundred and seven, some oil paintings and three watercolors o' the glens, nicely framed.” They were being sold as a job lot, as the auctioneer had earlier decided they were too hideous to fetch a decent price. The antique dealer joined in at five pounds, and Joanne put up her hand.