The doorbell rang. Jean sprang for the couch and sat down on its edge just as Minty sailed past the sitting room door.
“Are you sure it was Angus?” Rebecca hissed.
“If it wasn’t him, it was his identical twin.” She was going to have to tell Alasdair about this. Although she would have told him even without that crack about “making a report.”
From the entry hall came the sound of the door opening and Minty’s voice, exuding if not warmth, then at least neutrality. “Ciara. So glad you could join us. And Keith. What a lovely surprise. Zoe, take Miss Macquarrie’s coat.”
Again the crash of cutlery. Zoe hurried into the hall as Keith ambled into the sitting room and saw the two women sitting on the couch. “Oh. Hi.”
“Keith Bell,” said Jean, “Rebecca Campbell-Reid from Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh.”
“We’ve met,” Rebecca said. “Keith’s staying at the Reiver’s Rest.”
“Oh. Hi.” Keith pretzeled himself into an armchair and held a paper folder out to Jean. “Here. Have a press kit. I didn’t get to talk to you yesterday.”
No kidding. Saying, “Perhaps I can talk to you and Ciara after lunch,” she took the folder. The cover was printed with “Ferniebank Conference and Healing Centre. Getting in Touch with the Secret Wisdom of the Past.” Inside were elevations, floor plans, maps, testimonials, all of which spun across the surface of Jean’s mind like snowflakes across a blacktop and vanished. She tucked the folder next to her backpack in the space between the couch and the legs of an end table.
“Naw, after lunch won’t work,” Keith said. “We’ve got to go into Hawick, you know, regional police headquarters, to make a report about the inscription. Some detective inspector’s coming all the way from Edinburgh, big whoop.”
For a split second, Jean was actually grateful to the thief with his nasty little chisel. But then, if not for him, she and Alasdair wouldn’t have lashed out at each other.
Minty led Ciara through the doorway while in the background Zoe retreated, clutching Ciara’s Abominable Barbie fake-fur jacket. “. . . all right between you, then,” Minty was saying.
“We had a bit of a miscommunication is all,” answered Ciara. “No harm done. Shannon’s with our clientele now, showing them round Floors and Kelso, with high tea at the Abbey Close.”
“The Abbey Close does a—nice—tea,” stated Minty. “Drinks?”
“Pink Zinfandel, please.” Ciara sat down on another armchair, the ruffles on her blouse palpitating gently. “Hello, Jean. Hello—Rebecca, isn’t it? We met at the Granite Cross a few nights since. Your husband was piping.”
Rebecca nodded, smiled, and said nothing about Ciara’s past affiliations.
“Keith?” asked Minty. “Juice? Malvern water? Ah, wine?”
“I’m fine with water.” Keith’s colorless eyes followed her as she once again trekked across to the dining room. In a bigger house, Jean thought, Minty would have had buttons and bells to summon the servants. But then, this way she could keep a close eye on the peons at their work.
The clock clunked, whirred, and played the melody of the Westminster chimes, followed by one emphatic dong. Now that Jean wasn’t trying to dredge it up, the memory appeared. She’d heard that same clock strike yesterday, in the background when Keith called her at the office. That was no mystery, with Ciara staying with the Rutherfords. She’d probably urged him to set up his own interview, so that her project would get even more column inches.
Ciara’s blue eyes were fixed on her. Something moved in their—shallows, Jean thought waspishly. Condemnation, perhaps. Or simple curiosity. She returned the stare. Yes? No? Maybe?
Ciara tossed her head, and again her earrings, cascades of tiny gold stars, tinkled behind the red curls. “Dreadful, isn’t it? The inscription and all. And there’s me, rewriting my lecture in mid-stream. Alasdair . . . Well, Alasdair’s dealing with it, I’m sure.”
“He’s dealing with it,” Jean said, even as the echo of his “Damn and blast!” ran through her body like an aftershock.
Minty returned, Zoe at her heels with the tray. Zoe served while Minty pulled forward a smaller chair and seated herself, her hands with their plain gold wedding band folded tightly in her lap. “Bad news indeed about the inscription. Good job we have the bits that we do. The one with the ic and j, the one with the ac, and three others from the left edge, all in the museum.”
Zoe flinched, almost throwing Ciara’s wineglass into her lap. Deftly, Ciara fielded it.
“That will be all, Zoe,” instructed Minty. “Tell your mother luncheon in ten minutes.”
Again plowing straight through the underbrush, Jean asked, “So y’all have the stone inscribed ac, then, the one that was in Wallace’s pocket when he died?”
“Why yes, I do,” Minty replied, ignoring Jean’s second-person plural. “Ciara, if you’d like to donate the icj to the Stanelaw Museum, the two pieces could be fitted together. The entire inscription should have been removed to the museum long since. But that was P and S’s decision, to risk damage and even theft by leaving it in situ.”
“The museum’s welcome to keep the pieces for the time being,” said Ciara graciously. “A shame the villains struck just now, but it was all to a higher purpose.”
Right, Jean thought. Funny how the air seemed to be leaching from the room.
Rebecca looked from face to face. Ciara eyed the row of photos on the mantelpiece, her auburn brows tightening. Keith inspected either his fingerprints or Ciara through his glass of water. Minty said, “Publicity. The more the fairy-tales about Ferniebank are publicized, the more likely it is to attract hooligans like that Derek Trotter. I told P.C. Logan that boy needs questioning.”
Wondering if Minty meant “publicity” as a dig at Ciara, Jean repeated, “Fairy tales?”
“Isabel Sinclair,” conceded Minty, “was a lady-in-waiting to Mary, Queen of Scots. She died in a fire at the castle in 1569, soon after Mary stopped there on her flight to England.”
“A Catholic queen, fleeing to a Protestant land at a time of religious ferment,” said Ciara. “No wonder she was done to death in 1587.”
“Her messy relationships lost her Scotland as much as her religion did do,” Minty said.
Rebecca smiled, not mentioning that her PhD dissertation considered Mary’s role in sixteenth-century politics, including her supposed plots to overthrow her cousin Elizabeth of England—a distinct possibility, with Mary’s son James being next in line to childless Elizabeth’s throne.
“And Isabel’s ghost has walked at Ferniebank ever since,” concluded Ciara, her smile at Minty more cheery than cheeky. “But then, there’s more to Isabel’s story than Wallace printed in the brochure. His grandfather Gerald, typical Victorian gentleman that he was, plastered sentimentality over bothersome historical truths.”
Minty reclaimed the floor by raising her voice the merest fraction of a decibel. “In any event, our museum has a burning-glass that is said to be the one with which Isabel ignited the fatal fire.”
“It survived the fire?” Jean asked.
Minty smiled. “I’ve brought it here until I can consult with Alasdair about security issues at the museum. I’m sure he’ll recover from the embarrassing theft of the inscription quite quickly.”
Jean pressed her lips together, not that she had any effective retorts, and caught Rebecca’s lifted eyebrow. They’d seen Minty, outside the museum, putting a small box into her handbag. That must have been the burning-glass. Some nerve, to regard the museum as her own private treasury.
“I’ve got a friend who’s a dab hand at psychometry,” said Ciara. “If he’s holding an artifact, he’s sensing what happened all round it. I’ll be bringing him along in time, so’s he can have himself a go at the burning-glass. And the bits of inscription as well.”
Minty’s alabaster complexion grew just a bit ashen at that. Rebecca’s mouth turned down in a frown, probably because she was trying not to smile. Keith chewed pensively on a fingernail.
Feeling more breathless by the minute, Jean went on, “Thank goodness Gerald Rutherford made sketches of the complete inscription. And Wallace had some skill with a pen, didn’t he? Last night I found a drawing he did of the dig at Ferniebank. Is Angus an artist, too?”
Again Ciara’s eyes focused on the mantelpiece, then darted in Jean’s direction. Jean met her gaze evenly. Yes, I saw you with him. Is something going on behind Minty’s back? Or does Minty really know and see all?
Ciara looked away. If Alasdair was right about Ciara’s abilities—and he was rarely wrong, even when he was infuriating—she hadn’t caught a hint of Jean’s telepathic transmission.
“As an artist,” Minty was saying, “my husband has a tendency to dot his t’s and cross his i’s. But then, there are very few people whose abilities live up to their self-images. Much better to bear their shortcomings without complaint. Luncheon is served. If you’ll excuse me for a moment, Zoe will show you to your places.”
Jean and Ciara bounded to their feet. Jean’s thigh muscles twinged and she lurched into Ciara. They spun away from each other, two magnets touching negative poles. “Sorry,” said Ciara, and headed onwards, Keith in tow.
Jean was left with an impression of softness, soft fabrics, soft pillowy flesh. A man could get lost in a body like that. It’s a jungle in there. For a moment she felt dizzy.
Rebecca took her arm. “You’re sure you’re all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine, thanks, I just got up too fast.” Jean plowed on toward the dining room. The table gleamed with what might have been Minty’s third-best service, painted pottery and stainless steel ranged around a vase of flowers so fresh dew clung to the petals. Rebecca sat down across from Ciara, Keith rather crammed in next to her. Jean found herself seated at the foot of the table, while Ciara had the guest of honor slot on the right hand of Minty. Inhale, Jean told herself. Exhale.
Zoe stood bracing the door open and balancing a tray. Beyond her, Jean saw a heavyset woman, swathed in an apron reading “Cookery at the Glebe,” scowling with the effort of daubing morsels of food onto myriad small plates. As though that wasn’t enough to identify Polly, the bandaged left hand did so. Her drab hair, encased in a net, looked like mouse sausage.
Minty reappeared, seated herself, and announced, “I’m organizing the catering for the new conference and healing center. Today we have a tasting menu of dishes. Zoe.”
Zoe started distributing the plates as though she was bowling and trying to make the spare, then hurried back for more.
Jean considered the array. Right now she would have done just fine with bread and water, although the mingled aromas were quite appealing. Despite its acid coating, her mouth began to water. When she saw Minty lift her fork, she followed suit. Inhale. Exhale. Prepare to swallow.
“We have haggis wonton and plum sauce,” said Minty, “haggis tortellini with a spiked salsa verde, haggis beignets with diable sauce, haggis pakora, and haggis dumplings.”
What Jean swallowed at first was her incredulity. Rebecca was making little hiccups, trying not to laugh. Minty wasn’t joking. Piled in artistic mounds on the plates, decorated with sauces, enclosed in pastry, was haggis in all its liverish glory.
“And we have,” Minty went on, “a clapshot of diced root vegetables—potato, turnip, parsnip—al dente, with a sprinkling of parsley, as well as salad lettuces fresh from my garden. The water is the new select brand from the springs near Balmoral. Enjoy.”
Considering her mood, Jean expected the food to taste like ashes. Or at least like it sounded, an unholy combination of ethnic foibles. But no. It was good. It was delicious, even. Minty had chosen well—the salad and vegetables cleared her palate between bites of richness.
Propping himself on his forearm, Keith put his head down and ate, apparently having lived in Scotland long enough to overcome squeamishness about the national dish. Unless his body shape indicated that he simply never got a decent meal.
Minty nibbled. Rebecca tasted and nodded. Ciara made appreciative foodie rumbles, interspersed with soliloquies about hiring therapists for massages, hypnotherapy, color readings, and the like—why, she was already getting applications—understandable, as Ferniebank had long been associated with natural healing energy.
Jean hoped so. After centuries of feuds, raids, blackmail, kidnappings, arson, protection rackets, and outright terrorism, healing was necessary. Healing all around.
From the kitchen came Zoe’s voice. “. . . putting it about that she and Shan had ‘a bit of a miscommunication.’ The neck! Ciara phoned to say Shan could have the morning out, didn’t she? I knew that woman was bad news when Grandad’s Nero died the day she moved here. Poisoned, he said.”
“That dog was near as old as you,” Polly returned, “and like to die any moment. You know your grandad, nothing ever just happens, there’s always folk plotting against him. Going on about Wallace killing Mum. The idea.”
“It’s Ferniebank, isn’t it? Val’s saying that Isabel left a curse, and I believe her.” Zoe’s voice rose. A frantic hiss was either a teakettle or Polly warning her daughter that the walls had ears.
Interesting, Jean thought, with another look at Ciara that this time was more of a glare. Did she tell Shannon to take the morning off because she knew she’d have Angus with her? But then, they were hardly jovial companions. And the mention of poison . . . Filing those nuggets, too, in her “something’s rotten in the state of Ferniebank” in-basket, Jean pitched Val Trotter’s curse in on top.
Ciara’s voice rose and lightened as she careered among her enthusiasms, not muzak to Jean’s ear, but experimental music, clunking one minute, soaring the next. She spoke about the archaeology of standing buildings and conservation versus restoration. She considered aspects of cultural resource management. She expressed concern about environmental impact studies at Ferniebank—the hospice drains, for one thing, might still be teeming with every bacterium known to man, including little numbers like the Black Death.
“You’re very quiet, Jean,” said Minty.
“A journalist has to listen,” Jean returned with a bland smile.
“Tell us about your work,” Rebecca asked Keith.
He mumbled about how the wiring in the castle had probably been done by Edison himself, and how the plumbing wasn’t much better than the original latrines, then warming to his subject, said, “You know what’s cool? There’s a garderobe in one of those mural chambers off the Laigh Hall, and it’s still got a slate lid. Man, can you imagine plopping yourself down there on a cold night, a stone seat and a draft whistling up your butt from beneath. Constipation would have been a real problem, but then, the hospital was right there, and medicine back then meant bleeding you or giving you a purgative. That garden wasn’t just to look pretty, they had herbal remedies and tonics and stuff to put hair on the seigneur’s chest so he could help himself to the peasant brides.”
Minty’s brows went ever so slightly lopsided, and with an audible gulp, Keith slumped back down. “Zoe,” instructed the lady of the house. “Dessert.”
Zoe cleared away the dishes, then doled out not haggis with chocolate sauce, thank goodness, but a simple mousse garnished with berries, everyone’s reward for good behavior during the culinary infomercial. Jean passed on coffee. The meal had filled some of the void in her stomach, reassuring her that she was not going to lose structural integrity. No need to upset the delicate equilibrium with caffeine.
Piling her napkin on the table, Ciara said, “Thank you, Minty. That was delicious. I’m sure our clients will relish every bite. Now I’m obliged to get on to Hawick and some po-faced detective inspector named Delaney. It being my fate. That sort of man keeps recurring in my life.” She looked at Jean.
Jean deployed her bland smile once again, her teeth clamped together, even as she thought Delaney. That was the detective who had dismissed Alasdair’s concerns about Wallace’s death. Good. If he was coming down from Edinburgh, the theft of the inscription had raised Ferniebank above his event horizon.
Chairs scraped. Voices muttered. Jean managed to stand up. Minty, her arms spread in a “we are the world” sweep, said, “Jean, Ciara, how good that the two of you can be so civilized.”
Jean shared a quick glance with Ciara. They had, she estimated, a second thing in common—irritation with Minty’s noblesse oblige. But Ciara needed Minty more than Jean did, which made her sneaking around with Minty’s husband even more puzzling.
Jean needed fresh air. She needed to move around. She needed Alasdair, on so many different levels. Right now she wasn’t going to ask herself what he needed, over and beyond to salvage his self-respect—and perhaps his reputation—by solving at least one of the accumulating Ferniebank mysteries.