2015
Fiona glanced in her rear-view mirror to see the janitor locking the gate to the playground. The first morning at school had gone much better than she’d expected. Jamie had bumped into two of the boys from his football club in the playground as they went towards the school entrance. Once he had found his classroom and the teacher had welcomed him as the new boy, Fiona had slipped out the door, looking over her shoulder at him. He was setting out the pencils from his pencil case on the desk.
She was sure he would settle well; he was a robust boy, even after losing both his dad and Pete within a few years. Thank God for the stability of Granny and Pa, Fiona thought, as she drove onto the ring road and headed north. She had texted Mrs C and Doug to say she’d pop up for coffee and, though they were disappointed Jamie wouldn’t be with her, they were looking forward to seeing her again after two months.
Fiona turned left for Alyth and thought about all the threads she still hadn’t tied up. She was keen to continue the research into her dad’s family but thus far had found nothing in the archives room. And since she didn’t have specific dates, it was taking too long. She had to concentrate on her research for the Tay Bridge project.
She thought again of the photo of the grave. She didn’t like to email the Swansea librarian again, but the gravestone inscription had freaked her out, even though her mum had said there might be a plausible reason. And she still had no idea how she could find out more about the photo, and whether the boy on it was actually Pete’s son. He looked so like him, she felt sure it was. Did he have another family on the other side of the world?
She parked the car in Alyth and went into the florist’s to get flowers for Mrs C. She had been emailing Fiona every now and then with news of kitchen calamities since Pete had left, telling her how much she missed Jamie and his drawings. Fiona put the flowers in the car, checked her watch and saw she had some time to kill; there was no use getting up to the hotel before ten when they’d still be in the middle of breakfasts and check-outs. She walked along Commercial Street, pausing to look over the road at a large stone building. Though it was now an antique car restorer, it had formerly been a jute mill. A couple of years ago she had volunteered to help on a school trip from Glenisla and they had taken a tour of the building.
She had found it fascinating, finding out about the hardships of the jute workers in the nineteenth century. Linen, made in part from local flax, had originally been the main textile produced, but after flax imported from the Baltic states became too expensive, the supply of Angus flax was insufficient, and cheaper jute was imported from India. By the 1880s over a million bales of raw jute were unloaded in Dundee for the mills all over the county.
On the school trip, the children had been told how the coarse jute fibres were wetted and mangled, then spun and woven. Then there had been the major discovery that whale oil softened the harsh jute strands. From then, the entire process became easier and Dundee’s whaling industry expanded alongside the jute. Why had she not remembered that before, when she’d had to ask her dad? He was so dippy in daily life but what an amazing memory he had for history – well, apart from specifics about his own family history.
Fiona got back to the car and drove north to Glenisla. As she neared the hills, she stopped her car and got out, looking back down the glen at the rolling hills and the sheep and the scattering of tiny cottages along the river. She breathed in deep; she missed living here. It had been such a good three years, the best time since Iain had died.
* * *
‘Fiona, how are you?’ Mrs C ran to the car and hugged her as if she had been away for years.
‘Good, thanks. Lovely to see you. Nice hair!’
‘Yes, well that new girl at the hairdresser’s asked if I wanted a wee rinse so I said why not. It was a bit too purple at first but it’s calmed down. More lavender now.’ She took Fiona’s arm in hers. ‘Come away in.’
Fiona turned to look across the road at the cottage. ‘Looks just the same, is it being well looked after?’
‘Yes, though she doesn’t keep it as nice as you did, Fiona.’
They walked inside and into the kitchen.
‘I’ll get us some coffee and we can sit in the lounge. Doug’ll be back in a few minutes.’
A portly chef appeared from the larder. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘You must be Fiona. Mrs C’s told me all about you.’
‘This is Billie, he used to work here years ago but then he went to Gleneagles. Now he’s back here, just had his first weekend with us. Tom couldn’t handle it all, he left and went to Glasgow.’ Mrs C clattered about setting the tray with mugs and a plate of shortbread.
‘Scones’ll be out in two minutes if you want to wait for those?’ Billie pointed at the oven door.
‘Yes, please,’ Fiona said, looking around. ‘The kitchen looks different, really organised. Did you see it when Pete was in charge?’
Billie shook his head. ‘Nope, but I know I had a hard act to follow. Customers are still talking about that review.’
Fiona smiled. ‘Can I take that for you?’ She lifted the tray from Mrs C. They went through to the lounge, followed by Doug.
‘So tell me all about Dundee and Jamie,’ said Mrs C. ‘How’s school going?’
Fiona told them about Jamie’s first morning, and chatted about what they had been doing during the summer holidays.
The door opened and Billie appeared with a plate of steaming scones. He handed a folder to Fiona. ‘When I was doing a big clear-up on Sunday, I found these in the kitchen office, tucked away under the huge volume of environmental health regulations. I presume it’s Pete’s.’
Fiona frowned and reached for the folder. When she opened it up she found pages of recipes. ‘I’ve never seen this before, but it’s his handwriting.’
She stopped at a page that said Mum’s Scones. Then on the back was Hilary Gibson’s Macadamia Ginger Shortbread and lots of scribbles annotating the recipe. She forced herself to shut the folder and return to coffee and chat as Billie went back into the kitchen.
After an hour or so, Fiona said she had to leave and there were hugs at the door. She waved and drove off down the road then, when out of sight of the hotel, stopped on the roadside and reached for the folder, inspecting every page. Some were handwritten recipes, some cut out of magazines, and there were three more recipes from either Hilary or Mum. And then, on the final page, she felt her stomach tighten as she read the words Sam’s Flapjacks. Fiona scrutinised the recipe and realised it was the same one he used to make for Jamie, a regular flapjack recipe but with generous helpings of chopped apricots and white chocolate chips. Not for the first time she found herself thinking, who the hell is Sam?