Fields of Blue Flax (17 page)

‘Yes, that’s nice of you, Gerry. So?’

‘Well, I was telling Doug and he said you might not be too pleased about the car thing and…’

‘Why the hell not? It’s not like you’ve bought her a brand new Mercedes - or you’re having an affair or anything.’

‘Precisely! Sometimes I wonder if Doug’s overly sensitive about these things.’ He frowned. ‘Do you reckon he’s ever had an affair?’

‘How the hell would I know, you’re his friend. Don’t think that’s the kind of thing Mags would confide in me.’

Christine picked up their empty glasses and bent down to load the dishwasher. ‘That Angie woman, was she not the one you introduced me to when I had that crown fitted? Bit older than me, grey hair, dumpy?’

Gerry glanced at his wife’s back at she stacked the dishwasher. ‘Er, I can’t remember exactly if she was in that day, possibly. Yes, she might well have been.’ He brought over the last of the dishes. ‘I’ll do these. You go and get the telly on.’

Chapter Thirty

25th June 1860

Margaret Barrie lifted her head from the pillow and looked at her husband curled up beside her, sound asleep. She slipped out of bed without disturbing the sheets and tugged the curtain back a fraction. A low mist hovered over the fields of blue flax and a weak sun was breaking through the clouds to the east. She tiptoed towards the wooden cot where the babies lay, back to back. Jane snuffled and thrust her thumb into her mouth. Elizabeth lay on her side, unmoving. Margaret had to admit she was a bonnie baby, but she could never love it, not like her own. Margaret stretched her hand down towards her nose to check she was breathing. A light, warm puff of breath tickled her hand.

She went to the door, pulled on her boots and her coat, picked up the basket and unbolted the lock slowly. She slipped outside and pulled the door behind her.

She looked east and calculated that it must be about five o’clock; David got up about six, so she had enough time. She walked along the street and crossed the main road into the woods. She stepped over fallen branches and grass moist with morning dew. Soon she found what she was looking for around the mossy tree trunks. The long, broad leaves were damp, still covered with tiny droplets of water. Margaret took care to remove any flowers before she put them into the basket. She spread a cloth over the top.

She looked towards the clearing. She would meet him in the cottage later. He would have a bowl of soup and
if he had time, perhaps a seat in the garden first, with his pipe, gazing at the tree house. The tree house he said he had built for her, but she knew it was really for the other one, the one with long slender legs to climb up there. How could she, his wife, with her great fat thighs, possibly climb a tree?

Margaret hurried back out of the woods and over the road, checking to see if anyone was up yet in the village. A wispy plume of smoke puffed up from the cottage at the end of the street but everyone else would soon be cleaning out their grates and setting their fireplaces to light.

Then she spotted Bob Grieve, the gardener from the manse, emerging from his cottage next door. She paused, but he headed in the other direction, up the road towards Forfar. Margaret continued with caution up the street, wary of seeing another neighbour. She quietly opened her front door. Silence. Good, the girls had not yet woken.

‘Are the bairns still sleeping, Margaret?’ He glanced over his steaming porridge to his wife, who was standing at the sink washing the pan and spurtle.

‘Aye. That new one seems to calm Jane doon, dinnae ken how.’

David picked up his horn spoon to dip again into his bowl. ‘Did you say you’d meet me at the cottage wi’ my dinner? Mak’ it easier for me to get back quickly to the farm if you could.’

‘Aye, I’ve tae mind Agnes’s wee boys a’ morning so she’ll mind the girls when I bring you your soup.’

‘Grand. Thanks, Margaret.’ He pushed back the rickety chair from the table and went to the door. ‘See you at the cottage then.’

She nodded and took his bowl to the sink. She looked over at the cot, hearing one of the girls begin to stir, then bent down to pick up the basket of leaves and hung it up high on a hook.

In the little cottage in the woods, she lit the fire she had set the day before and began to chop onions. She had dug up two big ones the day before to provide the oniony flavour that ramsons should give. She peeled the potatoes, chopped them up small and plopped them into the pan. She had probably about an hour before he arrived so she had to work fast. The wee boys had been playing up and Agnes took longer to settle them so it had been later than expected when Margaret was able to leave the girls at her cottage.

She rolled up the leaves and sliced them as finely as possible. They were thicker than ramson leaves so would need to cook a little longer. The fire was burning nicely and she had just put the water into the pan when she realised she had forgotten the salt. Why was there nothing like that in this cottage? She would have to hurry home.

When David’s father had died, his estranged elder brother had tried to take the cottage, but, having then pilfered the family’s meagre savings, he headed for Canada. So his mother remained at the farm steading at Corrie and David kept this cottage, though Margaret had removed much of the furniture for their own home. She had only used it a couple of times, but once the girls were older, she would bring them out here to play in the woods.

She stirred the last of the leaves into the pan, set it on the swee which hung over the fire and rushed out the door. She hesitated then decided to lock it, just in case. She put
the key deep into her pocket then strode through the trees before running quickly up the road towards home. Puffing, she poured some salt into a little poke of brown paper then retraced her steps. Fortunately there was no one about, the men all out working in the fields, the women all busy in their homes. She noticed a couple of small children playing at the other end of the street, but that was the only sign of life.

As she reached the glade, she heard someone approaching from the other direction. Margaret recognised the distant sound of a man whistling; it was him. She ran to unlock the cottage, shutting the door behind her. The tiny kitchen smelled good, a strong onion smell. Adding that piece of cow heel to the soup had been a good idea, it looked really appetising now. She added the salt and reached for the wooden spoon to taste. The spoon was at her lips when she remembered. With a start she dropped the spoon and rushed to the door where he sat on the step.

‘Why did you shut the door, Margaret? I thought it was locked.’

He sat there, muck from the fields on his hands, his boots filthy.

‘I like it here fine enough, but I still wonder about intruders. You ken those folk frae Oathlaw will be oot soon looking for mushrooms.’

He shook his head. ‘Food o’ the devil.’ He pulled off his boots, stood up and came inside.

‘That’s a fine smell, Margaret. Is it ramson soup?’

‘Aye,’ she said, glancing at him then turning quickly back to the stove. ‘Aye, ramson soup. Sit doon, I’ll get you a bowl.’

He sat down at the little wooden table on the only chair in
the room. ‘Got to get another chair for this place, Margaret.’

She nodded and ladled out a brimming bowl of soup. She carried it over to him then stood at the door, looking out into the sun-speckled woods.

‘It’s late for ramsons, is it no’?’

She shrugged and looked round at him. He was spooning in mouthful after mouthful of soup. After a morning working in the fields he always ate like a starving man. She clasped her hands tightly together and looked away.

First she heard the thunk as the spoon dropped to the floor. Then a long, guttural cry of agony. She turned and saw him drop to the floor, clutching his stomach. ‘Cannae see! My stomach,’ he groaned. ‘Gonnae be sick…’

She rushed to get a cloth and put it under his head and he vomited into it, writhing like a mad animal.

She spun round and went to the front door.

‘Margaret,’ he croaked, ‘Dinnae leave me…’

She walked round into the garden and looked up at the tree house, wringing her hands. She nodded, affirmation before her that she had done what needed to be done. This was where the two of them had come, ‘just to learn, like at the school’, he had said. Davie was bright enough but his reading was atrocious and he could barely write his own name. She had taught him about books, helped him with his reading, he insisted it was nothing more.

But no one would make a fool of Margaret Barrie. Charlotte Whyte might be seen as superior to her, but she was no true lady after what she had done. And she, Margaret, had the upper hand: she was the one Elizabeth would call Ma, not Miss Charlotte, and that served her right. For she must have been a willing victim, not just an innocent seduced by her husband.

Margaret shivered as she thought of the two of them together in the cottage. The minister’s daughter and her Davie who she’d always taken for a good, noble man. Well, he’s paying for it now. She tipped her head to the side and listened. Silence. Slowly she rounded the corner to the front door and peered in. There was blood mixed in with the vomit by his head. His eyes were open, but she knew he was dead.

She pulled him towards the door, cursing the fact he was so heavy. She dragged him over the moss and grass to the leaning hazel tree opposite. Here she stopped, beside the fresh colony of mushrooms she had spied earlier. She let go of his hand and his arm dropped to the ground like a corpse on a hangman’s noose. All the way back to the cottage, she kicked up the vegetation to hide her tracks.

She retrieved the pan of soup and deposited the contents in the mulch underneath the large beech tree in the garden. She piled some branches on top then went back inside and took a pan of boiling water and scrubbed the wooden floor so there was no mark on it other than the odd burn from fallen candles.

She raked over the fire then opened a window just a crack, went to the front door and stepped out. She locked the door behind her and, empty basket in hand, trod her weary way home. She got inside, scrubbed her hands, stoked up the fire then went next door to fetch the babies.

It was not yet dark but the sun was low; there was a chill in the air. Margaret pulled her shawl round her shoulders and went next door to Agnes’s to ask if she could listen in for the girls crying – she wanted to go through the woods to look for Davie. He should have been home ages ago.

Agnes’s husband Billy said he would go with her and they set off down the road together. Grieve was just coming out of his house with his pipe.

‘Fine evening, is it no’?’

Margaret said nothing. She stood, her head stooped, eyes fixed on the road, as Billy explained what they were doing.

‘I’ll come along wi’ you.’ He glanced up at Margaret’s face, pinched into a frown. ‘He’s maybe had a pint over in Corrie and fell doon into a ditch.’

The three of them entered the wood, murky in the dying light. They tramped swiftly over the damp vegetation. As they approached the clearing, Margaret slowed down. She began to look around as if she could hear something.

‘I thought there was a noise, but it’s maybe just a rabbit.’

Billy and Grieve headed towards the leaning hazel tree.

‘Look! Here! And he’s…’

They both knelt beside him, and Grieve touched a hand to Davie’s cold forehead.

Slowly, Margaret walked towards them. She breathed deeply then bent over him. ‘Davie!’ She clapped both hands to the sides of her face.

Billy pointed to the mushrooms. ‘They’re deadly webcaps – he must’ve thought they were penny buns!’

Margaret nodded. ‘What will I dae, what will I dae now, these two babies and…’

‘But Margaret…’ Grieve stood up and looked at her. ‘You ken Davie hates mushrooms, he wouldnae touch them, never mind eat them.’

‘No, you must been thinking o’ someone else,’ said Margaret. She stood up straight and said, matter of fact, ‘Shall we try an’ get him home?’

A couple of hours later, the body of David Barrie was laid out on the wooden table in his cottage in Tannadice village. There were four men around him, a dram in each of their hands. Agnes from next door and Elspeth, the cook from the manse, were sitting beside Margaret on the bed. The babies had been awake all evening with the commotion, but both had finally fallen asleep in Agnes’s arms and were now tucked up in their cot.

There was a knock at the door.

Grieve answered it. As he opened it, the candlelight flickered to reveal a tall black figure.

‘Mrs Barrie, I have come to pray for your husband’s soul.’

Margaret and the women sprang to their feet and the men slipped their drams behind their backs.

‘Thank you, Mr Whyte. Come away in, please.’

The minister removed his hat and strode over to her, mouth pursed in zealous resolve. ‘Mrs Barrie, before we pray, I feel it incumbent upon me to talk about his burial. He shall be buried in the churchyard alongside his father, if that is satisfactory?’

There was silence in the room as everyone looked at her.

‘That is kind, thank you.’

A low buzz of conversation resumed in the dingy room. He leant down to speak to her close. ‘I think perhaps we might find this is for the best. Now we may all be at peace.’ The long hiss of a sibilant S lingered then faded away.

She looked up at him and felt his eyes penetrate her soul.

Chapter Thirty-one

2014

Mags went upstairs to the study in the attic and wrinkled her nose. What on earth was that smell? It was reminiscent of joss sticks burning at student parties. She went to the window and found it was open a couple of notches, then picked up a box of matches from the desk. She started searching through drawers till she found what she was looking for. Cannabis. Doug had stopped years ago, before Lottie was born and vowed he would never smoke dope again. But he was obviously so fraught, he was smoking to try to calm down. What the hell was he so bloody stressed about?

He had just left ten minutes before in Gerry’s car and hadn’t said a proper goodbye as he rushed out the door, even though they wouldn’t see each other now until Sunday. Mags tucked the package back where she had found it, underneath a packet of staples, and decided she would speak to him about it once he was back from the dental conference.