The Secret of the Stone House (8 page)

Even now, Emily found herself amazed, knowing that the Elliotts were her relatives from the past. Should she tell Geordie? Wouldn’t he be surprised to find out he was her great-uncle and that Molly was her grandmother? It was a rare gift seeing her gran as a small child. Molly had recognized Emily as a kindred spirit right from the beginning, when as a baby she had first smiled at her.

“What are you grinning about?” Geordie’s voice startled her.

Emily jumped up, brushing the grass off her clothes. “Just at how pleased I am to be here,” she said.

“I’m glad you’re here too, lass,” Geordie said as they walked around a patch of flowering chamomile.

“Tell me why you’ve decided to build the house so far from your other place,” Emily asked.

“There’s a better well over there,” he said. “We’re also going to have easier access to the main route to Wolseley. Now that we have neighbours, we have a common trail we use.”

“Neighbours?” Emily asked, surprised.

“Yes, there must be twenty families or so in the area. Some folks from back home have joined us.”

“I guess I hadn’t noticed.” She’d have to take a closer look across the landscape on her return.

Geordie continued his explanation. “It’s also a nice flat spot, sheltered from the wind.”

“Yes, it is,” Emily agreed as they caught sight of the proud stone house surrounded by a nest of chokecherry bushes and green ash to the south, and caragana on the west. Poplar bluffs rimmed the other sides of the yard. The house’s grandeur was already evident.

“You sure work fast,” she noted, amazed to see how much of the stonework was completed, and that they’d started on the rafters.

Geordie looked at her in surprise. “You haven’t been here since last Tuesday.”

“Oh, no,” she said. “Your time goes by so much faster than mine. It was only yesterday for me. That explains why things have changed so much. Four years have passed for you, but for me, it’s only been three months.”

Geordie looked at her in astonishment.

“Good thing my time doesn’t change too much while I’m here,” she added.

“Come on then,” Geordie called, striding towards the house. “Time’s a-wasting.”

They skirted the remaining piles of sand and stones, passing masonry tools, and ducking under scaffolding. Geordie led her up a plank to the main door. She stared in awe at the freshly placed stones of the wall, running her hands over them. Stepping inside, she felt the instant coolness of the somewhat hollow interior.

“The kitchen,” she said.

The sunlight streamed through several windows criss-crossing the wood floors in the open expanse. There were no interior walls yet, only the supporting posts and beams.

“Yes,” Geordie answered. Then he pointed out where the other rooms would be as they toured the first floor. “The parlour will be over there, and a smaller bed-sitting room next to it.”

Emily recognized the space as the current living room and the office.

“And this will be the dining room,” Geordie continued.

“Where’s the fireplace?” Emily asked, walking over to the spot where it was in the house now.

He looked warily at her, as if wondering how she could know about something they hadn’t already done. “We’ll build it once we have the roof on.”

Emily nodded. Then she noticed the stairs.

“Careful,” he cautioned. “The railing isn’t on yet.”

“No problem,” she said, scampering upwards without hesitation. “They don’t squeak,” she said after a few moments.

Geordie seemed offended. “When the Elliotts build stairs, we build them solid!”

Emily smiled. “They squeak in my time.” She pointed out the one that she always avoided when she snuck down them. It was solid now.

Grabbing a hammer and a couple of nails, Geordie pounded them into the tread to make sure it was firmly in place. As they continued up, Emily marvelled at the huge expanse that would be the three bedrooms and the bathroom on the second floor. She named the four rooms as she paced them out.

“Bathroom?” Geordie raised his eyebrows. He listened intently as she explained.

“We’ll not being having the likes of that in here.” He seemed appalled at the very notion. “We’ve a sturdy outbuilding that is more fitting for such coarse things, and the tub in front of the kitchen stove suits us fine. This is a bedroom.”

Emily chuckled at his olden-days notions. She let the subject drop, excited now to be near the top. She entered the attic. A large wooden beam stretched above her down the centre ridge. From this spanned a few rafters.

“Don’t go too close to the edge,” Geordie warned.

Ignoring him, Emily went straight to what would be her bedroom, and leaned out of what would be the dormer. As she did so, she glanced down at a window opening on the floor below her. She was surprised to see the width of the stone wall and that it was actually two walls with gravelly rubble in between. She’d never considered the broadness of it before and how the builders might have achieved the sixty-centimetre width. She’d assumed they’d used big rocks, positioning them to the required thickness by staggering smaller rocks in between them for a close fit and filling the spaces with mortar to achieve a plumb, relatively flat surface on the outside and inside of each wall.

“Aye, lass,” Geordie noticed her interest. “The wall has two faces. We wanted a good sturdy one.”

The scene that greeted her through the window was similar to the one at home. She could see out across the pasture to the outcropping of rocks, although there were more bushes and bluffs blocking the view.

“This is where I sleep,” she said, turning to Geordie.

“In the attic?”

She nodded, striding across the newly constructed floor, the smell of fresh lumber mingled with the dampness of mortar and the soft afternoon breeze. Gazing out the opposite window opening, she noted the new henhouse and the enclosure that held the pigs, hidden by trees. Neither of those buildings existed anymore in the farmyard of her current life.

“Well, that’s it, then. You’ve seen it all,” Geordie said at her elbow.

“Thank you for showing it to me.”

“You’re welcome!” he smiled. “Would you like to help me feed the pigs now, then?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Maybe some other time. I must get back.”

“Och, you’re missing a real treat,” he grinned at her.

As they descended, Emily savoured every moment, trying to imprint what she was seeing in her mind, so she could compare it when she got home. Once outside again, she looked up at the stone house, admiring it.

“I can hardly believe I get to see my grandparents’ house being built.”

“Tell me how they came to own it,” Geordie asked, as they began walking across the yard.

Now was as good a time as any to talk about the family relationship, Emily thought, but how should she approach it? “My grandmother grew up in it,” she began. “She was the youngest in her family and the last one at home, so when she married she and her husband, my grandfather, took over the house and looked after her father until he passed away.”

Geordie listened with rapt attention. “And how did her father come by it?”

Emily paused for a few moments, trying to decide how to tell him. “Well, this is the tricky part,” she said, watching his face. “He built it.”

“But he couldn’t have, my father did...” Geordie’s eyes widened. “Do you mean to tell me...?”

Emily nodded. “Yes, we’re related.”

A shudder ran through Geordie’s body as if someone were walking on his grave. “That can’t be possible,” he said, stepping away in shock.

“It can be and it is,” Emily said, gently.

He seemed oblivious to Sorcha, who had just joined them, looking for attention. Staring at Emily in fear, he shook his head. Abruptly, he walked off. Bewildered, the dog followed him.

“You’re trying to put some kind of spell on me,” he said over his shoulder. “I don’t know for what purpose.”

“Wait,” Emily called, starting after him.

“Just stay away from me,” he ordered, quickening
his pace.

“Please, just think about it,” she pleaded. “How could I possibly know about the fireplace?” Instantly, she knew that was the wrong thing to say.

She watched him head towards the henhouse with Sorcha racing ahead. How could she convince him she meant him no harm? And how could she prove their relationship?

CHAPTER SEVEN

As Geordie put distance between them,
Emily turned away sadly. She didn’t have time to try to explain and he didn’t seem to be in the mood to listen. She trudged home, her shoulders slumped as she thought about her conversation with Geordie, her parent’s divorce, and the whole idea of the auction and the loss of so many things tied to her grandmother’s life.

When she reached the big rock, she climbed up top and sat looking over the prairies. A slight breeze whispered past her. The morning sun warmed her back and soothed away her unhappiness. She let the peacefulness surround her until she became calm again.

In the marsh, a furry brown muskrat slid into the water and swam to the other side, then disappeared into a mound of reeds and mud. Ducks skidded to a halt on top of the water, and then paddled about. They always made her laugh when they upended, stretching their heads into the water to reach their food.

Peaceful once more, Emily rose and descended to the ground. Gently she placed the oval stone into the crevice of the rock. A sudden thought went through her mind. What if for some reason she got stuck in the past? Would she able to handle it? She decided that although she loved to visit, she wouldn’t want to live the rest of her life in those conditions. She couldn’t imagine not having running water or an indoor bathroom, or even a grocery store nearby. The very thought of all the hard work they did made her feel tired. She also felt hungry.

Back home, Emily walked around the huge stone house examining it from all directions. A feeling of admiration welled up in her. She came around to the main door to find Aunt Liz standing on the porch watching her.

“Why the sudden interest in the house?” she asked.

Emily joined her aunt on the step. “I guess because we won’t be coming back again for a long time.”

Aunt Liz seemed to understand how she felt. “So everything is taking on more meaning for you.”

“This house is so much a part of our heritage,” Emily said proudly.

“Yes, it is.” Aunt Liz seemed sad.

“Couldn’t we keep it somehow?” Emily suddenly realized how important this was to her.

“I’m afraid not, sweetie.” Aunt Liz gave her a hug. “You know, we’ve already made arrangements for Gerald to buy the place.”

Suddenly, her mom called from the doorway, “Breakfast is ready.”

“Did Mom make it?” Emily asked.

Aunt Liz nodded. Emily groaned. Her mom wasn’t the greatest cook in the world.

“It won’t be so bad,” said Aunt Liz. “It’s only cold cereal and toasted bagels.”

“Good thing!” Emily went into the kitchen
with a grin on her face. She polished off a bowl
of Cheerios and a cinnamon raisin bagel with choke-cherry jam.

“You have quite the appetite this morning,” her mom commented, passing her the milk.

“A little walk in the morning helps,” she admitted.

“Great, then you’ll be energized to help carry the boxes out of the veranda and set them on the tables for tomorrow.”

Emily’s first instinct was to complain, but then she thought of all the work the Elliotts did. Shuffling a few boxes around didn’t seem like such hard work compared to hauling stones to build a house. As her mom and aunt set up tables, Emily loaded herself up.

“I think we should set the tables in shorter rows, vertically,” Kate suggested. She stood with her hands on her hips and surveyed the tables they’d set up so far.

“That will make it too confusing,” Aunt Liz said. “We want people to be able to get around them easily and not have any traffic jams.”

“Well, leaving them in one long row makes people have to walk the whole length.”

“And what’s the problem with that?” Aunt Liz sounded exasperated.

“Well, maybe they don’t want to see everything. I think it would be better if we did it in sections.”