For Faughie's Sake (21 page)

Was Bernard dead or alive? I was hooked like a big pike, caught up in the story.

‘There was an inquest,’ Jenny continued, which at least answered that question.

‘A lot of debate went on about the injuries on Bernard’s body and the time it took me to reach home – there was a discrepancy of thirty minutes. I don’t know what happened during that half-hour, I have no memory of it; the doctor said I was in shock. I was never accused, it wasn’t a criminal case so there was no jury, but you can be sure that I was tried in every house in this village – and found guilty in some of them. The Procurator Fiscal returned a verdict of death by misadventure.

‘Luisa never saw it that way, of course, and made sure everyone knew how she felt. At the gala day she caused a terrible scene. In front of the whole village she cursed me for a kelpie and threw fish at me. Believe me, you can wash and scrub as hard as you like but in a small place like this the smell lingers a long time.

‘Luisa made my family’s life a misery. She told everyone I was a murderess; huh, she wanted them to drown me as a witch. It might have been hundreds of years ago but when it comes to drowning women for witchcraft, this village has form.

‘She wore black every day, she even shaved her head to remind everyone of her grief. Of course they felt sorry for her, but they didn’t believe I had murdered him. Or at least I hope they didn’t. You never really know up here. It got so bad mum and dad had to bar her from the shop. Others thought we had been too harsh on the poor distraught woman and stopped shopping with us in solidarity with Luisa. They bought everything from Inverness. It was a disaster; my parents were on the way to losing their business. That’s why I had to go away to London.

‘I came back every year for Christmas – she couldn’t stop me doing that. The first few years she came and stood outside the shop as a protest. Some years she’d shout at me in the village and some years she’d just blank me; there was no telling how it was going to go, but she never gave up hating me. I think I told you before why I came back?’

‘Yeah, your dad died and your mum had flu and you stayed to help, that was it, wasn’t it?’

‘It wasn’t the whole story. I did stay until mum got better but at that time I started receiving anonymous letters. No, not what you’re thinking. It wasn’t Luisa; they were too eloquent. At first I didn’t know who it was. It was frustrating because I would have liked to have replied. The letters were clever and interesting. I wanted to speak to this person.’

‘Did you find out who was sending them?’

‘It sounds creepy, but the letters started to mention that they had seen me in the village at a certain time or place, so I knew they were watching me.’

‘That is creepy.’

‘I wasn’t scared, I was fascinated. One day I got dressed up and went out, paraded myself around the village, then walked up to the old quarry. I knew that if my mystery correspondent was going to follow me all the way out there they’d have no hiding place. Obviously it was Walter. You knew it was him, didn’t you?’

I made a reluctant face but admitted it with a nod. We moved on.

‘He was so clever. If he had written, “Meet me at the quarry at such and such a time”, I probably wouldn’t have gone. He let me decide if we were going to meet. That’s Walter.’

‘So that’s when it started. Wow! Yours must be the longest courtship on record.’

‘It didn’t start. Nothing started. Remember, there was still Luisa to contend with. She was older, and even more bitter. Walter was a big mammy’s boy. He would never confront her, never stand up to her. He said he couldn’t make her suffer any more than she already had; it would kill her. I wished it would. He said we couldn’t risk meeting again until she passed. She had a bad chest infection and the doctor had hinted that she might not last the year. We’d have to gird our loins and content ourselves with secret billets-doux.’

‘Who’s Billy Doo?’

‘It’s French for love letters. We developed a system of dead letter drops, leaving them stuffed in a dry stane dyke up on the Bengustie Road.’

‘Like spies.’

‘Some letters got lost: strewn across the moors, eaten by a sheep, or maybe blown on to the loch and out to sea. Luisa relapsed a few times but always recovered and five years later, except for sneaky glances when he passed me in the village, nothing had changed. Ours was a relationship of the imagination. I needed more than that.

‘I wrote and asked him to meet me in Inverness – there was a history conference on at the college there, he could pretend to go to that. I wanted us to run away. I had the shop and he had Luisa but we weren’t shackled to this place, we could leave, I had to convince him of that.

‘At the last moment Luisa had one of her wheezing attacks and he couldn’t leave her. I think she smelled a rat. I wanted to give up then. I knew I was too young for that kind of abstinence; my loins were fed up with being girded. I cursed Walter for his weakness and cursed his mother for destroying my life. Yet Luisa and I had so much in common: we both loved Walter and we both spent our lives wishing each other dead.’

‘So your wish came true?’

‘She died two years ago.’

‘You’re kidding; only two years ago!’

‘She was nearly ninety. The old witch hung on as long as she could. I think she suspected. By then both Walter and I were council members. I don’t know why we hadn’t thought of it years before. Luisa still had all her marbles and she did not like it one bit but she was too feeble to do anything about it. Being council members meant we were able to meet in public, talk, be normal with each other. It was a good way to get to know him. I mean, I knew him through the letters obviously, but all those years I longed to hear his voice, see his wee mannerisms, look into his face.’

I shook my head in disbelief, ‘And all those years you made do with pen pal Billy Doo letters.’

‘Och now, don’t underestimate the power of the written word. I still have all the letters. Sometimes I take one to bed with me. I hold it like this between my hands, as if I’m praying, and then I put my hands between my knees. Sometimes it’s the only way I can get to sleep.’

After a respectful wee while I was eventually able to bring the conversation around to the Steven situation. Jenny’s advice was to let him join Ethecom: fill his boots, knock himself out. There was nothing I could do to stop him anyway. I couldn’t argue with that but she suggested that
I
should go and work for them as well.

‘No, Jenny, you go too far. I’m not working for those firkers!’ I squawked.

Jenny laughed, ‘Hah, I see what you did there. “Firkers” as an insult.’

‘Isn’t it?’ I asked. ‘It was you I firkin learned it from.’

‘Hey,’ she shrugged, ‘Doesn’t firkin bother me. I love it when one of my new words take off. It makes me feel influential.’

‘Pfffff, not that influential. There’s no way I’d work for those hippies.’

‘But don’t you want to know exactly what it is that Steven’s getting into? I’m serious, you should work with Ethecom. You might find out what they’re really all about.’

‘Oh right. I get it. Be your eyes and ears?’

‘No. And yes. Their green technology is a big part of our sustainability argument. They’ll be called to Luxembourg to give evidence, so we need to keep them on side. I happen to
believe they’re a bunch of decent hard-working folk, but I could be wrong. If you think there’s something sinister about them then you owe it to yourself to do a bit more research. Get close and you’ll find out one way or the other. But you never know, you might like them. You need to make more friends here, Trixie, I can’t be here for you all the time, not now I’m so busy, and anyway you need to be putting down roots. Friends and family, that’s what binds you to a place. And if you find out anything bad – anything that would be detrimental to Faughie – we can work out a way to shut them down.’

‘So while I’m busy spying for Faughie, for queen and –’

‘I’m not the queen,’ she said graciously, ‘just the Interim Leader.’

‘– country, my son misses out on a university education?’

‘You know as well as I do that nothing will drive your Steven into the arms of Ethecom quicker than his mum telling him he can’t. So, encourage him. Join Ethecom yourself, talk it up, that should take the rebellious shine off it for him. Let him get it out of his system. He’s got all summer; a few months of back-breaking shit-shovelling will soon make him realise what a cushy option university is.’

‘And what if he decides he loves it?’ I challenged.

In response Jenny laughed, ‘Well then, would it really be so bad for Steven to find what makes him happy?’

I couldn’t think of an answer.

Me and Bouncer sprachled round to Dinah’s fifty-roomed but-and-ben. I’d already promised myself that, no matter what, there would be no drinking today. A walk was be good for the dogs and I was keen to get Dinah’s perspective on the Steven problem. Although my wee pal Jenny was older, and arguably wiser than me, she’d never had a kid; she’d no concept of what it was to be the mother of a wayward son. I knew Dinah had personal experience.

Before we started our walk Dinah handed me a pair of mud-spattered green wellies.

‘You’re going to need these I’m afraid.’

‘Why?’ I asked, ‘it’s hardly rained all week.’

‘Hmm, you haven’t been here in a while, have you?’

‘I suppose I haven’t. Now that the machair is open again I never come this far round.’

‘I think you’re in for a surprise.’

The last time I had been down here, when I’d bumped into Dinah and MacIntyre, the field this side of the loch was picturesque with the last of the bluebells, pink heather flowers, yellow coconut smelling broom blossom and random bright red poppies. Since then something apocalyptic had happened. The beautiful wild flower meadow had become a slurry pit. From the castle all the way down to the loch the long grass was drowning in thin brown mud and smelled foul. The dogs didn’t like it. I heard the sound of their feet plopping and sucking as they gingerly attempted to walk through it, little Mimi’s long fur dragging and weighing her down.

‘FFS. What’s happened here?’

‘You remember your father and his spade?’

I wasn’t used to thinking of Jackie as my father so it took a moment.

‘Jackie did this?’

Dinah shrugged.

‘I can’t prove it of course, but he was in the grounds with a spade.’

‘But I don’t understand, there must be literally tons of mud in this field, how could one man do all this damage?’

‘You underestimate your father, Trixie.’

This was getting a bit freaky, Dinah constantly referring to Jackie as my dad. ‘I’ve done a bit of research. Jackie Robertson, better than anyone, knows the watercourses in this area,’ said Dinah, ‘above ground and below, he knows what culverts and ditches take water to the loch – and how to divert them. Dam an underground stream here, bung up a soakaway chamber there and hey presto: the lochside becomes a flood plain. I’m sorry to say it, Trixie, but your father is the only person with the specialist local knowledge to achieve this. He also had a motive.’

‘But they have the machair back now,’ I blustered. ‘No, it just doesn’t make sense, Jackie wouldn’t do a thing like this.’

Even as I was saying it I remembered Jackie’s improbable explanation for carrying a spade, some story about ferreting, and heard the conviction dwindle and fade from my voice.

Later, when we were in Dinah’s kitchen drinking coffee and she was plying me with biscuits, I asked her what she thought about Steven joining Ethecom, telling her what Jenny’s advice had been.

‘I agree with Jenny,’ she said. ‘Roddy always does precisely the opposite of what I want. To annoy me he managed to get himself expelled from some of the most expensive schools in the country, no mean feat, and now he’s lord only knows where, doing lord only knows what. The only clue I have is from his credit card bills. I worry about him so. At least you know where your son is, and he won’t come to any harm in Inverfaughie.’

‘I know, but, och, I’m so stupid!’ I wailed. ‘Why did I ever ask him to come up here? His dad’s going to go nuts. It’s all my fault.’

‘Now, Trixie, you have to stop blaming yourself. That’s classic single-parent guilt. A top Harley Street psychiatrist has assured me that Roddy’s behaviour isn’t my fault. Teenagers are pre-programmed to be rebellious and horrid. It’s all part of growing up.’

I sighed and wondered how much Dinah had paid her Harley Street psychiatrist for that pearl.

‘Dr Ramana explained that young people are growing all this new white matter in the frontal cortex,’ said Dinah, holding her fists to her forehead and miming a bulging brain. ‘It affects their insight, judgement, all that kind of thing. That’s why, once they’ve
outgrown the cute little boy stage, we as mothers apparently can no longer do anything right.’

I nodded in recognition and resignation and carried on munching my biscuit.

‘The good news is that Steven and Roddy will eventually return to human form. I know how painful it is right now but please: talk to me about it any time, a trouble shared and all that.’

‘Thanks Dinah.’

‘You’re welcome. That’s what friends are for. Another bickie?’

‘Cheers.’

Dinah buzzed around the kitchen filling the machine to make another pot of coffee while the dogs lay curled up together in Mimi’s basket.

‘You and Jenny seem to be good friends.’

‘Yes,’ I said, reflecting on how Jenny had finally let me in on the big secret, ‘we are.’

‘That must be lovely,’ said Dinah.

The big secret that everyone else in the village knew. Well, not
everyone
: not incomers or tourists or film people, and not Dinah, but everyone who belonged.

‘Yes,’ I said, feeling a tiny wee bit smug and a bit sorry for Dinah, ‘it is.’

This smugpity was a novelty, but tainted by Jackie’s guilt, it quickly melted. I wanted to reach out to Dinah, to share her troubles and halve them. After all, I was the daughter of the person who had caused them.

‘I’m so sorry about your polo field, Dinah, I really hope it wasn’t Jackie who did it, but if it was I’d like to apologise on his behalf, on behalf of the family.’

‘Thank you, that’s sweet of you, Trixie.’

‘I’m sure when the groundworks start they’ll drain it off, no harm done in the long run.’

‘There aren’t going to be any groundworks,’ Dinah said quietly.

‘No, I mean when they start the landscaping …’

‘Mr MacIntyre has pulled out of negotiations.’

‘What?’

‘Oh, he blustered a lot to save face, but it’s over. The council giving permission for the new Bengustie wind farm was the last straw for him. He’s following up the New Zealand option. One would imagine that if Faughie remains a tax-free haven it would be the perfect location for a billionaire but he’s used to getting exactly what he wants. If that isn’t assured he’s out.’

‘I’m so sorry, Dinah. What are you going to do?’

‘What can I do? The National Trust was my fallback, but even paying a much-reduced price they’ve bailed out too. With the uncertainty over Faughie independence they say they can’t fund it.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ I repeated.

‘I don’t know where to go next. My agent can’t even look for another buyer, not while there’s a swamp at the front door. The Environment Agency don’t have watercourse maps for this area. They’ve told us that, as it’s likely to be underground, it would take weeks, months perhaps, to locate the source. Whoever did this is holding all the cards.’

‘I’ll speak to Jackie; I’m not saying he did it, I’m sure he didn’t, but if he knows about the waterworks I’ll ask if he can put things back the way they were. I’m sure he’ll help.’

I was sure of no such thing, but I felt the urge to be optimistic and supportive.

‘I hope so, but there was something else I was going to ask you, Trixie.’

‘Fire away.’

‘I wondered if you could get me some face time with Jenny. We want to tender the estate to Faughie with the same price structure as we offered the National Trust. Given the income they’re generating from the whisky water tax, they’ll soon be running an operating surplus. We’re marketing the castle to them as a parliament building or even a presidential residence. After all, the castle is at the heart of Faughie history: Faughians have fought and died for this castle for hundreds of years; it belongs to the people, don’t you think?’

I gulped in amazement at her seemingly unconscious hypocrisy. If the castle belonged to ‘the people’ then why had her family held
it for so long? And if their forebears had already fought and died for it why would ‘the people’ need to pay for it?

‘Do you think you could pitch it that way to Jenny? I’m sure she values your opinion.’

I almost laughed.

‘I realise we’re in back-scratching territory, Trixie, and I wouldn’t be unappreciative of your efforts.’

What the hell was she talking about?

‘We could discharge Harrosie. I’m not sure how many years are left on the lease but we’d convert to freehold for a nominal amount. With the boom in tourism we would expect to see the value of property in Faughie rocketing. Predictions of 150 per cent increases in net worth are conservative. I know you’re not planning to stay so you’d be able to achieve an enormous profit and finally buy your place in Glasgow. And you’ll be mortgage free.’

My ears pricked up at those three words: ‘Glasgow’, ‘mortgage’, ‘free’.

‘Obviously I could only afford to do this once I’d sold the estate. It would be conditional upon Jenny and her committee approving the sale. You’d really have to sell it to her.’

Again I felt the urge to laugh, but this time I also felt a rough grain of indignity beneath my skin. Did Dinah believe for one minute that Jenny would fall for it? If so, she was seriously underestimating her, but then, all Dinah knew of Jenny was the sweet little old lady who’d sold her dolly mixtures in the shop all those years ago. Did she think Jenny was corrupt or vain enough to want a fifty-roomed presidential residence? And the idea of me trying to persuade her was laughable. Jenny would see through it a mile away. Not only was I indignant on Jenny’s behalf, I was also insulted that Dinah had assumed she could buy my loyalty. This was bribery and corruption, bare-faced cash for questions. But in terms of getting me the hell out of Faughie – it was the perfect solution.