‘Guessing? You can guess?’
My voice must have been sharp. She glanced up at me, then with a little gesture as if smoothing the air, said uncertainly: ‘It was nothing as anyone knew. Nothing to tell you.’
‘What was it? Gran, dear Gran, you must tell me, you really must. I’ve a right to know anything, anything at all.’
‘It’s true, you have,’ she said, then, as if reluctantly, ‘all right. All I can tell you is what they said in the village at the time. There was gipsies camped in the lonnen – you remember Gipsy Lonnen?’
‘Yes.’ It was a lane near Rose Cottage, a short cut to the station that the village rarely used.
‘They were there that time, when she left. In the lonnen, with tents and a caravan. And they’d gone next day. So folks said she’d gone with them.’
‘They would. Maybe she did. But that doesn’t mean it’s anything to do with me, with who fathered me, I mean. I was six years old when she left.’
‘Yes. Well. The tale went that it was one of them, that she went with him some time when they’d been there before, and that when she left she went back to him. That’s all. I told you it was nothing. Folks will say anything, and next time round they’ll believe it.’ She touched my hand again. ‘I’m sorry, love. That’s all there is. And now that she’s gone, we’ll never know.’
Silence again. I stood up and went to the window. It was still light, the tranquil blue-grey twilight of the Highland summer. Somewhere a thrush was singing. I turned and spoke gently.
‘Ah, well, it hardly matters now. I’m myself, and owing no one, except you and Granddad and Jon. Thanks for telling me, and let’s forget it.’ I went back to the chair and sat down. ‘Okay, Gran. Now, have I got this right? You want me to go to Todhall and get your things from the safe before someone else finds them.’
‘That’s it. But there’s more.’
‘More?’
‘Aye. Now I’ve got my own place here, I’d like fine to have the rest of my things sent up. The furniture, I mean, and some of the stuff that I left for your Aunt Betsy to use. Not all the furniture, I’ve neither room nor need for the beds and such, but there’s my sideboard, and the good bits and pieces in Betsy’s room, and some of the pictures and ornaments, and my rosebud tea set, and his rocking chair. I don’t need the table, there’s a good one here, and plenty chairs … I’ll make a list. I’ve talked to her ladyship about it, and you’re welcome to go there and take what you want. She’s sent word that the men are to keep away till she tells them. So you’ll go, won’t you?’
‘Well, of course I will. I’ll go just as soon as you like.’
‘And keep a good eye on the movers, lass, there’s not one of them I’d trust an inch not to break my rosebud china.’
‘I’ll watch them, never fear.’
‘There’s just one thing—’
‘Yes?’
‘The safe’s locked,’ said Gran, looking guilty, ‘and I misremember where the key is.’
I laughed. ‘That’s useful. If I have to get one made to fit – is Bob Corner still at the smithy?’
‘He is so, but whether he can turn his hand to anything as wee as that … Ah, well, I’ll try to think on about the places I might have put the key, and you could look about. But it might take you a day or two.’
‘That’s all right. Can I stay in the cottage, sleep there? I don’t want to have to stay at the Black Bull and walk two miles each way.’
‘It’s all right, you’ll do fine at home. It’s just as your Aunt Betsy had it, and your room’s still as it was. Annie’s been in to keep it aired and decent, but you’ll be sure to air the mattress—’
I laughed. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll have the place liveable-in in no time. But what on earth is the village going to say when I arrive on my own out of the blue and open the cottage up?’
‘It’s that far from the village that they mayn’t even notice. Not that I’d count on that while the Miss Popes are still there, nosy old bodies. And Miss Linsey, who’s no better, and daft forbye. But’ – a twinkle as she looked me up and down – ‘I’m wondering if they’ll connect this smart young lady Mrs Herrick with little Kathy Welland that always had dirty knees and her hair in a fine tangle. If you keep yourself to yourself for a few days—’
‘I’ll do just that. And I didn’t have dirty knees when I was sixteen, and going to the Sec! No, they’ll know me all right, and they can think what they like. Now look how late it is. You ought to be asleep, and so should I. Would you like a hot drink or anything?’
‘Seeing as I’m here on my native heath, as the saying is,’ said Gran, primly, ‘I’ll take a wee dram, and you’ll find the bottle at the back of the press there, where Kirsty won’t find it without I see her.’
‘Okay. I’ll get a glass. Two glasses, if I may?’ I got to my feet. ‘And don’t worry any more, Gran dear, I’ll get your treasures safe for you, and anything else you want from home. You just think on, and we’ll make a list in the morning.’
4
I walked along to the House next morning.
I went, as I had always done, past the stables and the walled garden and into the yard behind the house, where a stout, middle-aged woman was pegging some tea towels out on the line. This must be Morag; Gran had told me that the only other ‘help’ now was a girl of sixteen who came mornings, and I could hear the vacuum cleaner going somewhere behind an upstairs window.
Morag, who was new since my last visit to Strathbeg, did not look in the least like the apprentice that Gran had described to me; she was well into her forties, looked immensely capable, and I thought I would have backed her clootie dumplings against anyone else’s haute cuisine anywhere.
She turned as I approached.
‘Good morning,’ I said. ‘I’m Mrs Welland’s granddaughter Kathy. You must be Morag? I’m sorry, but I don’t know your other name. It’s Mrs –?’
‘Morag’ll do fine. So you’re Kathy.’ We shook hands. She looked me up and down, not rudely, but with a sort of cautious appraisal. ‘You’re welcome, I’m sure. Her ladyship said you might be coming down.’
‘Is it convenient now? I really just called to see – I could come later, but I may be going south again tomorrow.’
‘It’s all right, come away in. You might as well come this way now you’re here. It’s through the kitchen.’
‘I know. It’s the way I’m used to.’
She gave me another look where I thought I saw a touch of sour approval. ‘Aye, well … And how’s your grandma?’
‘Glad to be home again. Hospitals are good places to get out of. You know, this feels a bit like home to me, too. The kitchen looks just the same, and you’ve been baking … It smells good.’
A tightening of the lips that might be meant for a smile. ‘Scones. I’d a mind to send some up to Mrs Welland, but she’d maybe no’ think they were good enough.’
‘She’d like it fine, I’m sure, and I’d certainly appreciate them, if you’d let me take them up. Thanks very much.’ I tried a touch of diplomacy. ‘It’s nice that she can be so easy in her mind, with you here. Do you come from somewhere in the glen?’
‘No. I’m from Inverness, but I like it fine here in the summer. The winter’s another thing, but there’s a while to go yet before that. Well, if you’ll bide a bit while I see to the oven …’ She lifted the baking sheet out and began to set the delicious-smelling scones out on the rack to cool.
‘The house is very quiet, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘Where are the children? I’d have liked to see them. William wasn’t much more than a baby when I was here before, and Sarah was in her pram. Are they out?’
It seemed that they were. ‘Himself’, as she called Sir James, was down by the river after the fish, and the Major was along with him. Mrs Drew had gone up to the village to meet the Bank – I would mind, said Morag, setting the last scone in place, that Monday was the day the Bank came to the glen – but her ladyship was in her room writing letters. I’d mind t
he room? The wee sitting room by the side door? I did? Then did I want to go through now, or would she tell her ladyship I was here?
I hesitated. ‘Would you mind telling her, Morag? I don’t like just to walk through if she’s busy.’
That nod of approval again. She wiped her hands on her apron, took it off, then led me along the well-known passage to the green baize door, that traditional barrier between the back and the front of the house. I could not guess what Morag had heard about me, nor what she had expected, but it was obvious that, in her view, I had quite properly kept to my own side of that barrier.
Going through the green door was like going back in time. It was all just as I remembered it. There was the wide hall, carpeted with worn and faded rugs which had once been valuable, and cluttered, rather than furnished, with enormous cupboards and chests rather in need of polishing, and a long table littered with gloves and newspapers and copies of the Scottish Field and a gardener’s trug of hand tools. Against the once-crimson walls hung pictures in heavy gilt frames, painted it seemed mainly in shades of sepia and Vandyke brown. All familiar; I had dusted or polished every item. Familiar, too, was the big bowl, full of water for the dogs, that stood on the floor by the drawing-room door. I had refilled it scores of times, carrying it carefully from the cloakroom by the front door. But never, I thought, as carefully as I would carry it now that I could recognise it for what it was, an immensely valuable piece of blue-and-white Ming. Beside it lay a half-chewed bone, presumably left there by William’s puppy.
The sitting room door was ajar, and Morag pushed it open to let a shaft of sunshine through onto these dim splendours.
‘It’s Kathy Welland, m’lady.’
Lady Brandon turned and laid down her pen, then got up from her writing table and came, smiling, to meet me.
‘Oh, Kathy, good morning. Thank you, Morag. Kathy, how nice to see you, and how well you’re looking. Come in. What a lovely day, isn’t it? Sit down, my dear, and tell me how your grandmother is.’
For all the years that had passed, and all that had happened in them of change, both in myself and in the world at large, I felt awkward as I went forward to shake hands. Last time I had been in that sunny little room it was to clean out the fire and do the dusting. But Lady Brandon, easy and kind as always, and of course vastly experienced, saw us both smoothly through the moment, and soon had me settled with her in the sunshine of the bay window, answering her questions.
She was a slightly built woman, too thin for her height, but with the elegance that this gave her. I noticed with wry amusement that she was dressed very much as I was, silk blouse, tweed skirt, woollen jacket. Uniform, almost, this side of the baize door. It didn’t stop me feeling tongue-tied, and wanting to sit on the edge of my chair, but as she talked on, charmingly, about Gran, I found myself relaxing into naturalness and even ease.
‘I’m hoping to call and see her soon,’ she said. ‘Perhaps this afternoon? Do you think she’s up to it?’
‘I’m sure she’d love to see you, my lady. She looks a bit thinner than I remember, and for once she admits to feeling tired, but she keeps saying there’s nothing much wrong with her, except what the flu left behind.’ I hesitated. ‘I can’t help wondering – this talk about tests at the hospital. She won’t say anything to me, but I did wonder, do you know anything about it, I mean, if there might be something serious?’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know anything about that, but I do know that Dr McLeod isn’t worried about her.’
‘He said so?’
‘Yes. So I think you needn’t be too anxious. I don’t think your grandmother will be an invalid for very long. Were you planning to stay and look after her? I’m sure she’ll love having you here. How long can you stay?’
‘I’ve got a fortnight due to me, though I could take longer if I needed it. But actually I’m going south almost straight away. You see’ – at her look of surprise – ‘it’s Rose Cottage. Because of the plans to alter it, I mean. She’s a bit anxious to get the rest of her things sent up, now that she’s got a place of her own here. She wants me to go down straight away to see to it.’
‘I see. But is there any hurry about it? They won’t do anything at the cottage until we give them the All Clear. I promised her that.’
‘Yes, I know. But – well, there’s something she’s worried about, and she wants me to see about it, and I think that – I mean, if her mind was at rest—’ I faltered into silence. I did not think I could explain about Gran’s ‘treasures’ lying forgotten in their hiding place.
I need not have worried that she would pursue it. She said quickly, ‘It’s all right, my dear. It’s your grandmother’s affair, she must do as she wants. Of course she would like her own things about her, and it’s good that she has you to see to the move for her. Moving house, even only half a house, is a frightful job.’
‘It is only half a house, anyway – less than half what’s there, I think. We made a list, and I’ve brought it for you to see, because she says she can’t remember just what was already there – belonging to the Hall, I mean, when they moved in. Things like the big press in the back kitchen, and the table and chairs – she’s leaving those anyway – and, well, here’s the list. That’s as much as she can remember of what’s hers. If you would look at it, please, my lady, and see if it’s right?’
‘I’m sure it is. There’s no need – very well, as you’ve gone to the trouble. Let me see it.’
She took the paper. A brief silence as she studied, or pretended to study, the list we had made, and I looked around me at the familiar room. Pretty, washed-out chintzes and a Chinese carpet. A big bowl of flowers on a stand, and more in a vase on the mantelpiece, beside an assortment of fragile-looking china that I remembered all too well. Photographs everywhere, in silver frames. There were various ones of the children at different stages of growth, and of their mother, Mrs Drew, as a girl, as a debutante, and then as a bride. Beside her, on the bureau, was one of her brother, the dead son, Gilbert, young and smiling, in uniform, dark-haired and dark-eyed. Like me. Like an older brother. And indeed, he had been the nearest I had ever had to a brother; he had sometimes come down to the gardens when I had been there with Granddad, and I had been allowed to follow and admire him as his own sister never would – to retrieve the ball when he practised his bowling at the makeshift nets, to watch when he climbed the big cedar by the tennis court, to wait with the net while he fished the beck beside Rose Cottage …
I tore my eyes from the photograph and my mind away from what I was thinking. Had thought before; had tried not to think. Lady Brandon was folding the paper and she handed it back to me. ‘Well, please thank your grandmother for letting me see this, Kathy. I’m sure it’s absolutely right. To tell you the truth I’ve quite forgotten what’s there, and I don’t know if an inventory was ever made, but please tell her that she’s welcome to anything she wants to take.’
‘And it’s all right for me to stay there while I’m seeing about the moving?’
She assured me that it was, and I thanked her, and said how much Gran appreciated having her own place here in Strathbeg, and how well she seemed to get along with Kirsty, and then for some minutes more we talked about the new plans for Tod Hall, and what might happen to Rose Cottage. I gathered that nothing had been settled there; the cottage might simply be relet, if there was a ready taker, or even sold, ‘always providing that your grandmother doesn’t want to go back there. I know how one feels about a place that has been home for so many years.’
I thought that there was some personal feeling there for her, but said nothing.
She smiled at me, as if reading my thoughts, and added: ‘I don’t know if your grandmother knows, but we’re not leaving the place entirely. I’ve persuaded my husband to keep part of the south wing, the bit that overlooks the rose garden, and we’re having a kitchen put in there – you remember the old flower room? The joiners are working on that now. The main conversion is to be done by a big contractor,
of course, but we did want to give our part of the work to local people, and the Pascoes always do such a good job.’
‘I’m sure the village will be pleased you’re still there.’ I said. ‘The Hall will be missed, I know.’
‘I have such memories,’ she said. There was a short silence, and I wondered if I should go, but then she smiled at me again, and said, gently: ‘I haven’t said, Kathy, how very sorry I was – we all were – to hear of your loss. It has been hard for you, I know.’ I made some sort of response, and then she asked me about my work in London, and whether I planned to go back to teaching, and the conversation slipped easily back to everyday things.
She went on to offer me coffee, but this I declined, more to save Morag’s feelings than for any other reason. So I merely thanked her, took my leave, and went back through the green baize door to have coffee and newly baked scones in the kitchen with Morag.
5
At seven minutes to three on a warm June afternoon the train from Sunderland rattled into Todhall station and stopped with a jerk and a long, sighing puff of steam. On the platform was a porter I didn’t recognise, a youth of perhaps sixteen, who would have been a small boy when I was last at home, but the old station-master just emerging from his office, watch in hand, was Mr Harbottle, who had been there for as long as I could remember. He did not see me, being busy consulting his watch, and nodding over it with satisfaction. The two-fifty-three was, as usual, exactly on time.
‘Toddle!’ shouted the porter, though no one but myself was alighting in the sleepy afternoon, then, ‘Toddle, miss?’ as he opened the carriage door for me, and reached a hand out to take my case.
Coupled with his engaging grin and outstretched hand, it made a tempting invitation, but I controlled myself, saying merely, ‘Yes. Thank you,’ and stepped down to the platform. I handed him my ticket, and turned to speak to Mr Harbottle, but he was already on his way along the platform with his green flag at the ready, to exchange some no doubt vital information with the engine driver whom he only saw four times a day and would not see again until five-fourteen, when the Earl Grey (as the stubby black and green engine was rather grandly named) pulled its coaches back to Sunderland.