Deborah Crombie - Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James 09 - Now May You Weep

Chapter Six

O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad: O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad: Tho’ father and mither and a’ should gae mad, O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad.

—robert burns,

“Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad”

It was the longest meal in Gemma’s memory. John and Louise had hustled them all into the dining room while Donald was still in the drive, on the grounds that the celery and Brie soup should be eaten immediately.

“As soon as the cheese melts, that’s the secret,” John pronounced, with more urgency than any soup warranted.

They were halfway through the first course before Donald returned. “Sorry about that,” he said, sliding into his seat beside Hazel, but his smile looked strained.

No one gave in to the temptation to ask him the woman’s identity, nor did he offer any explanation, and the clinking of spoons against china grew unnaturally loud. Heather watched him with open speculation, Martin with frank curiosity, Pascal with a detached amusement. Hazel didn’t look at him at all.

But when John and Louise came in to take the soup plates, Louise smiled at Hazel, touching her shoulder lightly as she reached over the table. Was there a thawing of sympathy in that quarter, Gemma wondered, now that Hazel appeared to be the party wronged?

And was there a certain smugness to Heather Urquhart’s smile? How much did she know about Donald’s relationship with Hazel? Could she have engineered a deliberate sabotage? Not that it hadn’t been in Hazel’s best interest to see Donald in his true colors, Gemma reminded herself. But the sight of her friend’s face, tight with misery, made her doubt her own judgment.

John brought in the grilled salmon, which was indeed as good as he had promised, but Gemma, watching Hazel push her portion about on her plate, found she had lost her appetite.

Rather to Gemma’s surprise, Martin Gilmore made a valiant effort at conversation, questioning her about her job, and Pascal about his interest in moths, with more sensitivity than she had credited him with. The atmosphere eased a bit, and Donald joined in with an occasional comment, although Gemma noticed his wine consumption was more than generous.

“What about your kids?” asked Martin, turning back to Gemma. “You said you had boys?”

She nodded, her lips curving up in an involuntary smile. “Kit’s twelve, and Toby’s four.”

Martin’s eyes widened. “You can’t possibly have a twelve-year-old. You’re—” He stopped, a blush creeping up to the roots of his hair. “That sounded dreadfully rude.

I only meant—”

“I’ll take it as a compliment,” Gemma told him. “And although I could have a twelve-year-old, Kit’s my . . .

partner’s . . . son.” She was never sure what to call Kin-

caid. Partner seemed rather stiff and formal, significant other as if he were an object in a shop, boyfriend made her feel like a giggly teenager, lover somehow didn’t seem appropriate for polite company. But whatever she called him, she wished he would ring her or answer his bloody mobile phone. She was beginning to wonder if he was deliberately avoiding her, but she couldn’t imagine why.

“A blended family?” said Pascal. “How very modern of you.”

Gemma shrugged. “Hectic might be a better description. I never realized how much more complicated life was with two children rather than—” Too late, she caught a glimpse of Hazel’s face and wondered if she was thinking of the woman and child who had come to see Donald.

But before she could rectify her mistake, Martin com-pounded it.

“You have a child, too, don’t you, Hazel? A daughter, I think you said. Have you a photo?”

“I— She—” With a wild look at Donald, Hazel stood, rocking the table so that the wineglasses sloshed precariously. “I— I’m sorry. Not feeling well,” she blurted out, and ran from the room.

Hazel was out of the house and into the garden, gulping cold air as if she were drowning. The light had almost gone, but the sky still glowed palely in the west.

Fool, she told herself furiously. She’d been a fool to come here, and now she was making it worse by the minute. And Gemma, what must Gemma think of her?

Why had she ever listened to Donald?

At least he’d made leaving easy for her, the bastard. She would go now; Gemma would understand. And Donald—

a door slammed and she heard footsteps behind her.

“Hazel, will ye let me explain?”

“You’ve no need to explain anything to me.” She tried to say it calmly, reasonably. “I came to Scotland for a weekend, and I’m going home in the morning. End of story.”

“Hazel, we need to talk. If you’ll just let me—”

Whirling around to face him, she found she was shaking with fury. “All right, then. Who is she, that woman?”

“Her name’s Alison. But she’s not important—”

“Not important! And was that your child? Some other little unimportant thing you forgot to mention?”

“God, no.” He sounded genuinely shocked. “You think I would keep something like that from ye? Alison—she’s just someone I went out with a few times, and she took it a wee bit too seriously—”

“Women have a habit of taking you a bit too seriously—I should know.”

“Can ye no forget what happened thirteen years ago?”

He was angry now as well, his tone no longer beseeching.

“You never gave me a chance, Hazel. I told my father I didna want the bloody distillery. I walked out. Did ye know that? But you were gone, without a word, without an address. When I rang your parents, they wouldna speak to me—”

“That was only fitting in the circumstances, don’t you think?” She knew she sounded like a shrew, but anger kept her safe, kept her from taking in his words. “So if you walked away from Benvulin, why are you still there?”

“My father died and left his shares to me. What did you expect me to do? Go live in a bloody monastery?

You’d married—”

“How did you know?”

“Heather. But you didna say two words to your own cousin at your mother’s funeral, and you didna ask about me.”

“I—” The sound of voices drifted out to them from the house—the rest of their party had moved into the sitting room for coffee.

“We can’t talk here,” Donald said urgently, as if he sensed her weakening. “Come back with me, to Benvulin.”

“No! How can you ask that, of all things—”

“Then walk with me.” With a feather touch on her arm, he guided her towards the path that led into the wood.”

“Donald, no—”

“Don’t be afraid. I know the way, even in the dark.”

The trees swallowed them, and at the first turn of the path, the lights of the house vanished from view.

When he stopped, she whispered the question that had consumed her. “When you learned where I was, why didn’t you come to me then?”

“And you newly wed? I thought you’d made your choice.”

“Then why did you change your mind, these last few months?”

He looked away, his profile clear in the faint light that filtered through the trees. “Did you dream about me, Hazel?” he said softly. “Over and over again? Did you have to stop yourself calling out my name when you were in your husband’s arms?” When she nodded, reluctantly, he went on. “It was that way with me. And I began to see it wasna going to change, no matter how hard I tried—

and I did try. We were meant to be together, whether we like it or no.”

“It was no accident, that day in London, was it?”

“Well, I couldna verra well ring your doorbell, could I?” He took her hand in both of his, raised her palm to his lips. “You canna deny this, Hazel. And it’s more than the flesh, whatever this is that draws us together.”

She made a last desperate stand. “But my daughter—I can’t do this to her—”

“What kind of life are you giving your daughter, lying to your husband and yourself? What kind of wife will you be, knowing what you felt when I kissed you this morning? And do you think I wouldna love your daughter as my own?”

She was lost. She knew it before he pulled her to him, knew it before her body responded of its own will. She knew it as they slid to the ground, the smell of crushed ferns rising around them in the darkness.

Carnmore, November

It was well past midnight when Will’s mother sent him for the priest. He’d seen the look that passed between his mother and the nurse, seen his mother nod and turn her face away.

In spite of Nurse Baird’s care, his father’s condition had gradually worsened. Charles labored for every breath, and it seemed to Will that in the last few hours the flesh had sunk away from his bones.

It had not snowed since the storm two nights earlier, and the night was still and clear. The diamond-hard air seared his lungs as he slipped and slid his way down the track towards the village. In the sky above, the stars blazed, looking near enough to touch. God’s eyes, his mother had told him when he was small, watching over them all. The idea had frightened him, and on nights when the starlight fell upon his bed he’d hidden his head beneath his blankets.

Now he tried to find some comfort in the idea of God looking down on his father, but it only made him wonder if God knew his father had not been a very good Catholic.

Oh, he’d gone to Sunday mass, had even donated towards the building of the new chapel, but that was an expected part of life in the Braes. Had it ever been more than a social duty on his father’s part?

Will thought of his dad as he had seen him most often, in his office at the brewery, spectacles sliding down his nose, reading the books he brought back from Edinburgh.

These had not been books of which the church would approve, Will suspected—Darwin, Huxley, Robert Owen, Haeckel. And once, when Will had questioned him about the Jacobites, his father had said that Catholicism was responsible for a good part of Scotland’s grief. That was the sort of opinion one kept to oneself in this part of the Highlands, when one’s family’s loyalty in the ’ was a matter of honor, and Will had never repeated it. But God, now, what if there were no keeping secrets from God?

The track leveled out and Will quickened his pace, more surefooted now. Would it matter if he prayed?

Could he intercede for his father? And what if Father Mackenzie prayed as well?

He ran now, into the village, down the path to the chapel house, snow flying under his boots, and slid into the door with a thump. Panting, he banged hard with his fist, the words in his mind forming a silent chant. Please don’t let him die, please don’t let my father die.

He waited until Louise’s breathing steadied and slipped into what it would infuriate her to call a snore, then he eased out of bed. Pullover and trousers he’d left within easy reach on a chair, but he’d been careful to remove his belt and empty his pockets as a preventive against telltale jingling.

Once dressed, John crossed to the window, taking care to step over the creaking floorboard. He cranked open the

casement and perched on the sill, leaning out to light his cigarette. It was a vice he seldom allowed himself, but considering the evening, he felt he deserved some small compensation.

A bloody disaster, the whole thing, and just when he needed Donald’s good will more than ever. Damn Callum! It must have been Callum who had told the woman where to find Donald, but why would he have done such a stupid thing?

Not that John had ever fathomed what made Callum MacGillivray tick. He gazed down at the moonlit garden.

All was still and quiet. The lights were out in the barn and the other bedrooms in the house, although he hadn’t heard Donald come in.

Well, he’d have to chance it. He flicked his fag end into the flower bed below and drew back into the room, listening. Louise slept on, making tiny whuffling noises in her dreams. John stopped once, holding his breath as the house made an infinitesimal shift, then he slipped out the door. It was getting late, and he had an appointment to keep.

Carnmore, November

Will was too late. He knew, the instant he saw his mother’s bowed head and the nurse’s comforting embrace, but he refused to believe it. Dropping to his knees beside his father’s couch, he shook the unresisting body, shouting, “No! Wake up!” But his father’s face, blue-white as the marble Madonna in the church, remained still.

It was the priest who disengaged his hands and led him to a seat by the fire. “It’s all right, son,” Father Mackenzie said gently. “This is what God intended for your father. You’ll learn to accept it, in time.”

Watching as Father Mackenzie took the unguent from his case and knelt beside his dad, making the sign of the cross, Will felt his anger sink deep inside him, hardening into a fiery core.

What use had he for a god who would take his father from him? There was no justice in it, and no pity. His father had been a good man, a kind man, who had lived by his principles and bettered the lives of those around him.

If that had counted for nothing, if God had chosen to punish him for his beliefs, then Will was finished with him.

He would have no part of such a god.

Gemma drifted in and out of troubled dreams in which a phone rang endlessly as she searched for Duncan and the children. She had tried ringing home again before she went to bed, but the line had once more been engaged.

Nor had her wait for Hazel’s return proved any more fruitful, although she had outlasted all the other guests in the lounge before finally giving up and making her way back to the barn alone.

Now she rose towards the surface of awareness, sensing Hazel’s presence in the room, but she could not quite rouse herself to full wakefulness. Sleep claimed her again.

Some time later, she heard a door close—or had that been part of the dream as well?

The early dawn had come when the sound of a gunshot echoed in the fringes of her consciousness. Just someone potting rabbits, a dream voice reminded her, and reassured, she sank deeper into the clinging fog. Then, a few minutes later, she came fully awake with a gasp.

Had she heard a shot? She sat up and turned on the light. Hazel’s bed was empty, although the indentation in the duvet indicated that she had at least rested there. But

her overnight bag was gone, as were her bits and pots on the dressing table.

Gemma jumped out of bed, barely noticing the frigid flagstones beneath her feet, and checked the bathroom.

No toothpaste, no toothbrush, no shampoo hiding in the corner of the tub. Back in the bedroom, she pulled aside the curtains and peered at the still-shadowed drive. The red Honda was gone as well.

Fighting the beginnings of panic, she shoved on jeans, sweater, and boots, then looked round the room once more for a note. Surely Hazel wouldn’t have abandoned her without leaving a note? Unless she’d gone to Donald Brodie’s for a spot of illicit sex . . . but then why take all her things?

She grabbed a jacket and went out into the drive. The sun hovered behind the screen of trees to the east, casting deep shadows in the garden. There was no sign of life from the house, and she hesitated to knock anyone up so early. Her fears would sound absurd, surely, if she voiced them to anyone else.

Donald’s Land Rover, she saw, was still parked in the drive—had he gone with Hazel in the hire car?

She rocked on her heels for a moment, trying to decide what to do. Well, she could at least investigate the gunshot, put her mind to rest on one score, and perhaps by the time she came back the house would be astir.

Starting towards the track that led into the woods, she pushed away the nagging fear that Hazel and the gunshot were somehow connected. Pure paranoia, she told herself firmly, but her mouth went dry and her heart gave a painful squeeze.

Gemma slowed her pace as she entered the trees, listening, scanning automatically for signs of a disturbance. Halfway along the path she found something, an

area of crushed bracken and bluebells, as if something heavy had lain there. But there was no sign of violence, and she breathed a bit easier as she came to the end of the wood.

From that point, the path was bordered on one side by the meadow and, on the other, by a tussocky mix of bracken and heather. She almost turned back, almost convinced herself that her fears had been groundless, but she couldn’t quite silence the nagging disquiet.

And then she saw something, a few yards farther along the track, a flash of red half hidden in the heather. An abandoned sweater or jacket, Gemma told herself, but a wave of dread made her stomach lurch. Realizing she had halted, she forced herself to go on, one deliberate step at a time. And as she drew nearer, other shapes began to attach themselves to the splash of scarlet—a white strip here, a brown patch there.

Suddenly, the shapes shifted and coalesced, and she knew what she was seeing.

The red was a kilt, the scarlet Brodie tartan, and below it were dark green hose and sturdy brown boots. Above the kilt, an Arran pullover that had once been cream, but now bore a stain of deep red in its center. And the face, auburn-bearded, Donald’s face . . .

“Oh, no. Please,” Gemma whispered, only then aware that she had clamped her hand to her mouth. She felt her knees give way and she sank to the ground, unable to tear her gaze from the sightless eyes staring into the morning sky.