Blast her! She knew I couldn’t do that.
Or … I could, of course. And Mummy would likely do it, quite graciously, out of obligation and apology. But it was blackmail. It wasn’t as if Mother hadn’t anything to do all day other than work on a matching set of needlework cushion covers for the twenty-four eighteenth-century dining-room chairs that were being auctioned at Sweet’s. She was closing down a country estate for her nearly-eighty-year-old mother, in the swift aftermath of her father’s lingering and debt-ridden illness.
‘It’s nothing to do with my mother,’ I said.
‘That’s true,’ Ellen agreed. ‘Well, then, you do it. You bring Euan round in your mother’s car.’
I sat silent, glowering at her. She returned my stare coolly. Of course the simplest thing to do would be to go and try to make peace with Mary. I wished that didn’t also feel like the hardest thing to do.
Then Ellen said, ‘I expect you dinnae ken how to drive.’
‘I can drive,’ I said.
Mummy had given me a handful of useful lessons in her racy little Magnette, but the last time was at Christmas.
‘She’ll test me before she lets me take it on my own. I’d need to practise …’ I spoke through my teeth, trying to piece together a plan that would put me behind the driving wheel of Mummy’s car – preferably without having to steal it – the next morning if necessary. ‘I haven’t been allowed out this week.’
Ellen rolled her eyes. ‘You’re like a flipping princess.’
I sat pouting, torn between feeling affronted and rebellious. Ellen got out her tobacco pouch and lit her pipe while she waited for me to come to a decision. There was no one about at that moment but it felt very clandestine. I watched her with envy – not at the pipe’s existence, but at her sure and casual confidence in lighting it. She wasn’t thinking about it, what it would look like as she smoked, or whether or not anyone would care. She was just being herself.
‘I’ll do it,’ I said.
Ellen blew out a slow stream of smoke and then laughed. ‘Just for a wee while, till we find some other way for him to get here. Our uncle has a pushbike he can borrow maybe. Or our cousins the Camerons might help; they’re coming to Bridge Farm to help with the flax, and they have a van. That’s how we got you to the hospital.’
She smoked calmly, finishing her pipe.
‘Has your dad found any more trace of Dr Housman?’ I asked. ‘His clothes?’
‘Not a thing.’
‘And the police – have they been round again since Solange found that note?’
‘Oh yes. Wanting to poke through every piece of rag we have with us.’
‘I’m worried they’ll try to arrest somebody.’
‘Somebody? Euan? Aye. Mammy and Daddy have been raging about whether we should get away from that. But the police have no reason to arrest anybody – they stood right in front of us trying to find a reason, and they couldn’t. Mammy told ’em she’d haul the Water Bailiff into Sheriff Court herself for beating Euan. Of course she won’t – I dinnae think she could. But Euan bothering the librarian a wee while has nothing to do with the missing scholar, and that beating makes the hornies look bad. And if we pack up and leave the day, it’ll look like Euan did do something, when none of us has done a thing. And …’ She put the pipe away. ‘And Strathfearn will defend us. Your gran. Your mam. You and your Lady Bountiful play-acting. Mammy thinks we’re safer here than running.’
‘Well, my brother Sandy will defend you too. He’ll be here soon – you’ll like him.’
‘He’s the one got thrashed for nosing about the log boat, aye?’ Ellen said. ‘Runs in the family! You know, your grandad tried to dig that log boat out of the riverbank when he was a young man – my own grandad helped him. They had a team of men and horses working on it. But it goes too far into the peat and they were damaging it. So he left it there for the tide to work at.’
She knew the damnedest things about Strathfearn.
‘I bet Sandy will want to look at the log boat again before we leave for good,’ I said. ‘Like you looking at the Reliquary. One last time. Just to make sure it’s still there.’
‘Och, there’s sure to be something else for him to find some day,’ Ellen said. ‘We don’t ken half what’s buried in the peat.’
And as we spoke, it occurred to me that right now she knew more about the Murray Collection than anyone else in the house.
I stood up. ‘It’s raining anyway and you’re not doing much, are you? Come with me and let’s see if they left anything behind when they moved the Murray Hoard to the Inverfearnie Library.’
Ellen laughed. ‘Oh, aye, Lady Julia. Show off your estate.’
‘Oh, come on.’
I was starting to see that she laughed and poked fun when she was actually quite interested.
Selfishly pleased to have her to myself, I took Ellen all over Strathfearn House, nosing into every single room that we found wasn’t locked. It was a good deal more freedom than I’d ever had there before; of course my brothers and I hadn’t ever been allowed to nose into the guest bedrooms and the gunroom and the billiard room. There wasn’t anything of interest in any of them now; mostly bare except for the furniture and paintings marshalled together in unappealing ranks in the former drawing room and the Long Hall, all labelled for auction.
We lingered in the tower room where Grandad’s museum had been. All his glass cabinets stood there empty, gathering dust and dead flies.
By sheer coincidence Ellen and I spoke together, and we both said the exact same thing.
‘This makes me sad.’
We turned to look at each other. After a moment Ellen gave a single nod.
We peered out of the cobwebbed windows. From this high room, there was a clear view of the ruined towers of Aberfearn Castle, soaring above the birches where the Fearn meets the Tay.
‘Did you work with Grandad here, in this room?’ I asked.
‘We mostly worked in his study when I was drawing. But I went up and down the stairs for him, fetching things from the cabinets sometimes.’
‘He gave you the keys?’
‘Aye, he did that,’ Ellen said with straightforward pride.
‘Gosh. You are lucky. Did he pay you?’
‘Och, I wouldn’t have taken money from him. He taught me all about typological dating. And he gave me Pinkie.’
Ellen walked over to the cabinet that used to hold the wonderful little black and silver cup.
‘You asked about the pearls in the Reliquary,’ Ellen said. ‘Look here.’
She knelt on the floor by the empty cabinet. The boards were old, wide planks of smooth dark wood. They didn’t quite lie flat against each other; in one or two places the cracks between them were nearly half an inch wide. Ellen laid her index finger against one of the gaps, pointing.
‘You can only see from here,’ she said, moving over to let me kneel beside her. ‘Get close to the floor and look along the gap where I’m pointing.’