Cauldstane (23 page)

‘Was it just too painful to face clearing out?’

He sighed and said, ‘I couldn’t handle all the guilt.’

‘
Gilt?
It’s certainly not a style of décor I admire.’

Sholto chuckled. ‘No, my dear.
Guilt
. I felt guilty. I mean, just look at it all! You’d have to get rid of
everything
. There’s nothing here of any value, but it meant the world to her. It
was
her world. Meredith was always on stage, even in here. But she was miscast as a country wife.
Femme fatale
suited her better. I didn’t want to sift through the seedy remnants of that life, nor could I entrust the job to anyone else.’ He waved his stick in the direction of the bookcase. ‘Those diaries, for example. They should be burned. Don’t open them, Jenny, not unless you’re very broadminded.’

‘You know you could
just get a firm to take everything away?’

‘After I’d destroyed all the incriminating evidence, you mean? Ye
s, that’s what I should have done. What I should still do. Lord knows, I don’t want the boys to have to deal with it when I’m gone.’

‘Would you like me to make a start for you? I don’t think there’s anything here worth selling apart from the furniture, but the clothes could be given to charity.
I could sort them out for you. There’s quite a vogue now for vintage clothing and jewellery. If you don’t want to keep any of the journals or scrapbooks, what about the photos?’

‘Burn the lot, Jenny. If you’d be so kind. I don’t know who else to ask and I can’t face doing it myself. Scared of what I might find. What I know already
is bad enough. Perhaps if we get rid of all her stuff,’ he muttered, ‘we might be able to get rid of
her
.’

I turned sharply and looked a
t him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘
Oh, nothing. It’s just a tired old man’s paranoia. I sense her still, you see. Her presence. Especially in here. And it’s not a comfortable feeling, let me tell you! Meredith could be malicious. Vengeful, even. I thought her death would be the end of… well, of all the unpleasantness, but sometimes I feel as if she’s still tormenting me.’

I pulled out the stool from under the dressing table and pushed it towards him.
‘Why don’t you sit down? You must be feeling tired after your climb upstairs.’

‘Thank you, my dear. You’re very kind.’

I relieved him of the poker which I stood in an empty waste paper bin. Once he was seated, I swallowed and, trying to sound casual, said, ‘Actually, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you and it relates to what you’ve just said. About Meredith’s “presence”.’

He looked up.
‘You don’t mean to say you can sense it too?’

‘Yes, I do. So does Alec. And although I don’t think she’s consciously aware of it, I believe Zelda has also been affected by Meredith’s ghost.’

‘Ghost? It’s surely not as bad as that!’ He searched my face, but I said nothing. ‘
Is
it?’

‘Do you believe in ghosts, Sholto?’

He didn’t answer immediately, but gave me a shrewd look, then choosing his words carefully, he said, ‘Let’s say I have an open mind. I know plenty of people – quite sane – who say they’ve seen or heard a ghost. I myself have seen some strange things in my time. On expeditions you put it down to the silence and the isolation. Or starvation. You think you must be seeing things. But I will say this. Much as I loved her, I’ve never sensed my first wife. And I never, ever thought Cauldstane might be haunted before Meredith died.
Cursed
, yes. There’s the ancient MacNab curse and it’s blighted many a relationship, one way and another, like poor Coral and Alec. But it was only after Meredith died that odd things started to happen… Have you seen something then?’

‘I believe so. And I’ve heard things
. And I can’t account for what I’ve seen and heard. So I’ve been talking to a man who knows about these things. I didn’t mention where I’m staying. In any case, you can rely on him to be totally discreet. He’s a Church of England minister. I said I wanted to know if there was anything one could do in a situation like this. To bring peace to a troubled household.’

‘W
hat did he say?’

‘He said it’s something the Chur
ch can deal with. It’s called deliverance ministry. It’s not like exorcism. It’s a question of blessing a place with prayer and holy water. There’s nothing sensational about it,’ I said, glancing round at the heavily-curtained room. ‘He said the main thing is to let in the light.’

‘Is that so?’

‘It might be worth trying. If you were open to the idea.’

‘
I see.’ Sholto was thoughtful for a moment, then said, ‘What was it the Bard said?
There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Probably very true. I’ve never been a particularly imaginative man, but I hope I’ve always been open-minded… Was your fellow offering to come and sort us out?’ Sholto hesitated. ‘Is he – er – expensive?’

‘Oh, I’m sure there’s no charge, but my friend
said the matter is very serious and must be dealt with by your local priest.’

Sholto looked blank for a moment
, then started to laugh. ‘Oh, dear me, no! That’s quite out of the question!’

‘You could trust
him to be discreet. Apparently the Church is quite used to dealing with matters of this kind and they have people who are trained especially for it. But in the first instance, you have to approach your local priest. He will set the appropriate wheels in motion.’

‘Haven’t spoken to him in twenty years,’ Sholto said, grim-faced now.

‘I don’t think that really matters. You don’t even have to be a believer. They say deliverance ministry will work anyway.’

‘I dare say, but James
Kennedy will not be crossing the Cauldstane threshold  in
my
lifetime.’ Sholto’s angry face softened. ‘How Meredith would have enjoyed all this!’ He looked up and addressed the portrait over the bed, the woman in a ball gown, smirking behind her harlequin mask. ‘You might be dead, my dear, but you’re certainly not forgotten.’

He struggled to his feet
and tottered towards the door. Grasping the handle for support, he turned to face me. ‘Jamie Kennedy was my minister and a friend. A bachelor. Perhaps not overburdened with intelligence, but a handsome devil. Loved music. He also loved Meredith.’ Sholto waved his stick in the direction of the bookcase that housed the journals. ‘November 1990, if you want the sordid details.’

He
turned and left. A few moments later I heard the soft tap on the stairs as he made his painful descent.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

I rang
Rupert to let him know that under no circumstances would the local minister be setting foot over Cauldstane’s threshold. I didn’t tell him why. He was dismayed and anxious on my behalf. This was a circumstance he hadn’t foreseen and I could say nothing to account for Sholto’s refusal, other than that it was a personal, not a religious matter.

I managed to convince Rupert
I was in no immediate danger, but that wasn’t really what I felt. I knew I
was
in danger and I believed Alec was too. This time Meredith’s murderous plan had failed. Who knew what she might try next, and when? I understood why Alec wanted me to leave. I could even see why he wanted to sell up. Over the next few days I witnessed his steely determination to implement a simple but drastic plan. First he was going to cut me out of his life, then he was going to cut out Cauldstane.

I didn’t flatter myself
that the stillbirth of our relationship was a major loss for him, but observing his efforts to persuade Sholto to sell was like watching a man cut out his own heart.

~

So I mounted a counter-campaign. I didn’t share my plans with Alec, who I felt sure was avoiding me. When we did cross paths, he was civil, but no more. I didn’t tell him about my conversation with Sholto in Meredith’s room. Alec had predicted his father would have nothing to do with the minister, so his lack of co-operation came as no surprise. I decided to spare Alec the reason for the estrangement. He hardly needed more evidence of Meredith’s depravity, or the ways in which she’d hurt and humiliated the MacNabs.

Instead I talked to Fergus, Zelda and even Wilma about ways in which Cauldstane could be rescued financially, if not spiritually. If I
could come up with an alternative scheme, perhaps Sholto would listen to me as well as Alec. If nothing else, my business plans might buy some time, time in which I could try to convince Alec that Meredith could be beaten. Or if she couldn’t, that he didn’t have to concede defeat.

Not y
et.

~

Taking a notebook, tape measure and my camera, I went back up to the third floor and found the lumber room. As I sorted through the fascinating and occasionally hideous junk, I could have done with a flashlight to augment the dismal light provided by a single bare light bulb. Generations of MacNabs appeared to have consigned their white elephants to the third floor and I was searching for anything that could be turned into money.

Zelda had told me Meredith found old paintings “depressing” and had banished many family portraits. These I found stacked against the wall
, but far more interesting was a collection of assorted paintings wrapped carelessly in dust sheets. I lingered, amused, over a pair of his ’n’ hers portraits done by the travelling painter Fergus had mentioned. I hoped the artist’s fee had been as modest as his talent. The nineteenth-century MacNab and his lady had either both been blessed with massive shoulders and arms, or the artist had painted their elegant heads far too small. The effect was comic, yet somehow endearing. Mrs MacNab wore a slightly anxious expression that suggested she had less than complete confidence in the man painting her.

Next,
I opened up a trunk that contained nothing but old clothes and an overpowering scent of mothballs, but another contained paintings, and of a superior quality. There was a set of small landscapes, very good and probably very old, by an artist whose name I couldn’t read, but it looked Spanish. I transcribed the name as best I could and took photos of each canvas. I thought these might be worth something as a collection – not a life-changing amount admittedly, but if I could find a few assets that could be turned into cash, it might put new heart into the MacNab men. Fergus had said he could get started with a few cash injections and that’s what I was hoping to find: valuables they’d overlooked, forgotten or didn’t even know they had.

I got excited about an
unsigned and probably unfinished portrait of a barely recognizable – and nude – Torquil MacNab. It looked like a Lucian Freud. Might he have known Torquil? Perhaps Torquil had become ill before the portrait could be finished. He didn’t look a well man in the picture, but that could be because it was painted by Freud. I carried the canvas out into the hall where it was lighter, took several photos and made a note to ask Sholto what he knew of the painting’s provenance.

I continued to rummage until another
painting stopped me dead. It was a portrait of a solemn young man, dressed in late eighteenth-century style, sitting in a chair, surrounded by a still life of books and papers. His hand rested on a brightly patterned Turkey rug. The painting looked slightly familiar, but I concluded that might be because it was in the style of Henry Raeburn, Scotland’s greatest portrait painter. I looked for a signature. When I couldn’t find one, my heart beat a little faster. Raeburn didn’t sign his canvases, or at least only one is known to be signed. But surely even Meredith wouldn’t have relegated a Raeburn to an attic? I looked for the characteristic single dab of white highlight on the tip of the nose that appears in all Raeburn’s portraits. It was there.

Of course it could
be a fake, or just a painting by an artist unknown to me. But I did know Raeburn’s work and this canvas looked familiar, so I assumed it must be a copy. A pity, because an original would be worth a lot of money. Again, not enough to put Cauldstane in the black, but a significant amount nonetheless.

I photographed the canvas and made a note of its dimensions. Armed with my photos, notes and a consuming curiosity, I was ready
to do some research and make some enquiries.

~

I headed downstairs intending to make myself a coffee, but as I approached the kitchen, I heard the snuffling sound of suppressed tears. It could only be Wilma and that put me in a quandary. She wouldn’t want me to know she’d been crying. On the other hand, I didn’t like to just walk away. I had a suspicion I knew why she was crying and the chances were, she knew more about the latest Cauldstane developments than I did. It would take a lot to make Wilma cry at work. Whatever news she’d been given must have been bad. Convinced no one should have to cry alone and hopeful that I could help, I knocked on the door.

‘Wilma
, can I come in?’ I realised it was the first time I hadn’t called her “Mrs Guthrie”. I didn’t wait for an answer and walked in. She struggled to her feet and quickly pushed a hankie into the pocket of her apron. Avoiding my eye, she said, ‘Can I get you some coffee, Miss Jenny?’

‘
Thank you, but how about you sit down and I’ll make us both a cup? You look like you could use one. Or even something stronger.’

H
er eyes filled with tears again and she sank back onto a kitchen chair. ‘You’re very kind, Miss Je—’

‘It’s just Jenny. Well, actually, it’s Imogen, but Jenny will do. And if you don’t mind, I’d like to call you Wilma, because I think of you as a friend now and I call my friends by their first names.’

A sad little smile twitched at the corners of her mouth. I thought I might be making some progress. As I waited for the kettle to boil, I said, ‘How long have you been here, Wilma? Working for the MacNabs, I mean.’

‘I’ve
lived here all my life and I’ve been working for the MacNabs since 1968,’ she said with a touch of pride. ‘My mother, Annie Guthrie was Mr Torquil’s cook and I used to help her and the housekeeper.’

‘Your mother’s name was Guthrie
too?’

Wilma blushed.
‘I never married. My mother was Mrs Guthrie and there was some confusion when Mr Sholto took over Cauldstane. He thought I was Mrs Guthrie, the cook. It was understandable because my mother took ill and died during poor Mr Torquil’s last illness and I stepped in. I did explain to Mr Sholto eventually and we had a wee laugh about it, but somehow the name stuck.’ She shrugged. ‘I didn’t mind. That’s the thing with a family like this. And a place like this. The continuity. That’s what we all try to preserve. That’s what matters. In the long run.’

It was the longest speech I’d ever heard Wilma make and I was pleased to see it had a calming effect on her. I set a cup of coffee in front of her
, then sat down beside her with mine. She stared dolefully at her mug, as if the effort of lifting it might prove too much. I nudged the sugar bowl towards her, saying, ‘Did Sholto give you some bad news?’

‘It was
Mr Alec. Mr Sholto would never have got through the speech. I do believe Mr Alec had a tear in his eye when he left. Och, we both did!’

‘What did he say?’

‘He didn’t give me my notice. He said they’ll need me until the last box is moved out of Cauldstane.’ That pride again. ‘But he said the castle is going on the market. And soon. Of course, the new owners might wish to keep me on – Mr Alec said he was going to advise that they should – but he thought it only fair to give me as much notice as possible that I would lose my job. And… my home. I stay in the wee lodge at the gate,’ she explained. ‘I used to share it with my mother and father. Now there’s just me.’

‘Wilma, if you don’t mind my asking, how old are you? I think you must be
a lot older than you look.’

‘
Och, away with you!’ she exclaimed, but I could tell she was pleased. ‘I’m
sixty
,’ she said, lowering her voice.

‘N
ot a good age to be seeking a new position.’

‘No, b
ut Mr Alec says I can start looking immediately if I want to. And if I don’t find one, he says I’ll be provided for. Of course, I wouldn’t accept charity, but it’s very kind of him to think of me, especially when he has so much on his mind and his own heart must be broken in two.’

It was my turn to well up now and I blurted out my thoughts without considering their wisdom. ‘I don’t think they’ll find a buyer, Wilma. And if they do, chances are, they’ll want to keep you on. Sholto will give you a brilliant reference.’

‘I don’t wish to sound ungrateful, Miss Je—
Jenny
. But I don’t know if I could bear to see another family under this roof. Or some
foreign
gentleman. Cauldstane isn’t mine, but I’ve never lived anywhere else. I’m not sure I could bear to see it occupied by anyone other than MacNabs.’

There was something about the way Wilma said “occupied” that made me think of barbarian invaders. ‘I know what you mean
. Maybe a clean break would be less painful for you. But Cauldstane might never be sold. In fact, I’m going to talk to Sholto about various ideas I’ve been discussing with Fergus.’

Her eyes brightened. ‘You mean b
usiness plans?’

‘Yes. I think there are ways in which
the MacNabs could make Cauldstane economically viable. But they’d need to raise some cash first. Then they’d have to invest that in making Cauldstane pay its way.’

‘You mean, opening it up to the public?’

‘Well, that would be one way of making money.’

‘Och,
you should talk to Mrs Fontaine! She and I have been planning a cookery school for
years
. She says we should have a café that serves snacks during the day and a restaurant to serve dinners in the evening. There’s nowhere to get a decent meal round here if you want anything more than a fish supper.’

I blinked.
‘Zelda wants to open a restaurant?’

‘Aye
, it’s her dream. She’s even got a name for it.
The Auld Alliance
.’

‘Referring to the historic connection between France and Scotland
? How clever!’ I laughed, delighted. ‘And she’d serve a fusion of French and Scottish food, I suppose?’

‘Aye
, that’s right. She said folk would pay handsomely to eat in a castle. Her idea was to convert the library into a dining room.’

‘
But what would you do with all the books?’

‘Mrs Fontaine said she’d leave them there. It would be cheaper than re-decorating and everyone loves to see old books, even if they don’t read them.’

‘It’s a brilliant idea, Wilma!’

‘Aye
, and Mrs Fontaine would be bound to make a success of it. She ran her own restaurant in France.’

‘What did Sholto
say?’

‘He said he thought it
might
work, but…’

‘But there’s no money.’

‘Mrs Fontaine can put up some of the capital, but she says she doesn’t have anything like enough to go it alone.’

‘And in any case, converting Cauldstane to include a café and restaurant
should be part of a bigger scheme, to make the castle a multi-purpose business venture.’

‘Aye
. We need a Master Plan. And a millionaire,’ she added with a sigh.

‘Well, don’t start packing your bags yet, Wilma. I do have a few plans and I’m going to
badger Sholto and Alec until they give in or throw me out. Fergus has a vision of this place working. So does Zelda, apparently. And I can see so much potential! We just have to persuade Alec and Sholto. They mustn’t be allowed to give up.’