Like Chaff in the Wind (28 page)

Chapter 36

2007

“He’s a sweet boy, isn’t he?” Eva said, waving at Isaac.

“Not sweet enough to like it that you’re waving at him in front of his mates,” Magnus said, grinning at how his grandson chose to ignore them, detouring as if by chance in the direction of the football pitch.

“Oh.” Eva dropped her hand, looking somewhat flustered. “I didn’t know.”

“No big deal.” Magnus shrugged and settled himself on the bonnet to wait. “Hi,” he said once Isaac had joined them. “Your Dad called. He’ll be picking you up before dinner.”

Isaac nodded eagerly. “We’re going to see Spiderman 3.”

“Spider who?” Eva asked.

“Action hero,” Magnus said.

“Ah,” Eva nodded, looking none the wiser.

Isaac disappeared upstairs the moment they got back from school, mumbling something about painting the sea, and needing more blues and greens. Eva followed him to the studio and came back down a bit later, nodding when Magnus offered her a cup of coffee.

“He just grabs a brush and throws himself into it,” she said in an impressed voice. “I was up there for what? Fifteen minutes? And already there’s a sea on the canvas. That boy is going to be world famous some day.”

“He would prefer to be a football player, he doesn’t even like to talk about his painting.”

“Not all that strange, is it?” Eva said.

John looked flustered when he appeared just before four.

“This early?” Magnus said. “He hasn’t even had his cake yet.”

John sat down on a chair and poured himself some coffee. “I just had to get away. This client of mine is driving me nuts.” He shook his head at the cake. “No thanks, I have to be a bit careful,” he said, patting himself on his very flat stomach.

Eva smirked and Magnus huffed, serving himself a huge slice.

“Isaac?” Magnus raised his voice, “Come on down, son. There’s cake.” There was no reply and Magnus shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

John regaled them with a series of anecdotes starring his new client, making both Eva and Magnus laugh when John swore that next time that excruciating barnacle of a man requested another change in his security setup, he’d cram the system code down his throat.

“Where is that boy?” John looked at his watch.

“Probably immersed in his little sea,” Eva smiled, “or otherwise he’s arranging his paint tubes again.”

John broke off a piece of cake. “We have to go,” he said through his half-full mouth, and Magnus nodded and got to his feet.

“Isaac?” Magnus stood by the stairs. “Isaac, come on down. If you don’t hurry, there won’t be any cake left because your Dad will eat it all.”

“I haven’t even had a whole slice,” John protested.

“Isaac?” Magnus frowned, taking the stairs two treads at a time, with John at his heels.

Isaac was sitting on the floor, and in his lap was a small picture. John threw himself across the room towards his son.

“Isaac? What are you doing?”

Isaac just stared through him before lowering his eyes to the wooden frame he held between his hands. He smiled dreamily at it; a small painting in blues and green, all of it swirling together towards a point of extreme depth and light in its centre.

“
Herre Gud
,” Magnus gasped. “Where on earth…”

“I thought we’d burnt them all.” John attempted to prise Isaac’s fingers off the frame. His arms shook, his hands trembled and he sat back, his face the colour of boiled cod. “Oh God,” he moaned. “I just can’t be near it.”

“Let me,” Magnus made a grab for the painting. Isaac wrenched himself free and flew to his feet, backing away with the picture held to his chest.

“Isaac, come here,” John said, “come here and give Offa the picture.”

“I can see her,” Isaac whispered, his brown eyes huge. “I see her, in there.” He peeked at the painting again.

“Who?” Magnus asked. “Who do you see?”

“Mama.”

“Oh, Jesus,” John whispered, and extended his hand to Isaac. “Give me the painting, Isaac, we have to destroy it.”

Isaac shook his head and moved so that the large table stood between him and the two men. He put the painting down.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, tracing a whirl of blue with a small finger. When Magnus came too close, Isaac retreated below the table, clambering over the old-fashioned trestle legs.

“Isaac,” John’s voice begged, “just get away from it, don’t look at it son.”

Magnus was beginning to panic, a cold sweat breaking out along his spine as he remembered a long gone afternoon when he’d seen a man fade away in front of his eyes in this very room – and all on account of a whispering magic painting. He kneeled and began crawling towards the boy.

It was too late. Bright light poured from the painting, noise rose in waves around them, and Magnus was incapable of moving, the floor heaving like a sea serpent’s back below him. Behind him, John was screaming, for Isaac, for Magnus to do something. Isaac leaned into the painting, a wide smile on his face as his hand reached for an object or person unseen.

“No!” Magnus’s fingers closed around Isaac’s ankle. For an instant he held his grandson suspended, halfway here, halfway in the funnel of roaring painful light, and then with a tug Isaac was pulled free, sucked shrieking into nothingness.

“No! Isaac!! Noooooo!” John howled, high-pitched sounds that tore at Magnus, carried through the open window, and had Eva rushing up the stairs.

“What happened?” she panted. “My God, Magnus, where is Isaac?”

”He’s gone!” Magnus set his shoulders to the table and upended it, sending paints, brushes and jars of turpentine to crash against the floor. “You hear? He’s gone! A seven-year-old boy! I should have set fire to the whole fucking room!” He cursed and kicked, and the little painting sailed in an arc across the room to land by Eva’s feet. She bent to pick it up.

“…
I have heard the mermaids singing
…” she quoted, collapsing to sit on her knees.

“Don’t touch it!” Magnus said, throwing himself towards her. “Don’t even look at it. Oh God; Isaac!” He picked up the canvas and ripped it apart, strong fingers tearing at the fibres. He fell forward until his forehead hit the floor, hid himself in his arms, and wept.

*

Isaac screamed when he was sucked into the painting. He no longer wanted this, and he tried to claw himself free from the funnel of light. Everything narrowed, his body stretched, and he was torn from where he was to skydive to somewhere else. He fell…and it hurt and he was scared, and all around him time roared, a constant sound of voices and clamour.

He landed with a dull thud. Something in his leg snapped. Isaac lay on his back and slowly the whirling stopped, the ground below him became solid and he could breathe again. He began to open his eyes, hoping that he would be back in Offa’s house, but his nose told him he was outdoors. He could hear birds and creaking branches, the soft flutter of leaves, and when he allowed himself to look he knew he was very far away from home.

He was lying on his back in a heap of last year’s leaves, and above him he saw the huge spreading branches of old trees with the sky a clear pale blue beyond. He tried to sit up, but his leg hurt and he lay back down. To his shame he could smell he had peed himself, and the damp cloth stuck uncomfortably to his crotch.

“Mama?” he called. He’d seen her, there in the picture, so she should be here. “Mama?” he repeated, receiving nothing but a gust of wind in reply. Isaac Lind rolled onto his side and cried.

A hand on his back made him start and he tried to move away, only to whimper when his broken leg was jolted by his movements.

“Shush, laddie,” a voice said, “shush.” Isaac turned to face a very round man with mild blue eyes and scraggly, reddish hair.

“Who are you?”

The man laughed, studying him with interest. “I’m Simon Melville, and you are?”

“Isaac. Isaac Lind.”

*

Simon swallowed back on a surprised exclamation. His eyes flew over this Isaac, taking in a small lad with surprisingly short hair and strange clothes.

“Lind you said?”

The lad nodded.

“And where did you come from?”

“I don’t know,” Isaac stammered, his eyes filling with tears. “I just fell through the painting. I saw my Mama and I fell.”

“The painting? You fell through a painting?” Simon couldn’t keep the disbelief out of his voice.

Isaac nodded in confirmation, holding up his hands in an approximation of the painting’s size.

“And would your Mama be an Alexandra Lind?” Simon asked, ensuring his voice remained casual. In his chest his heart raced, a painful pressure building from halfway up his windpipe and all the way to his mouth.

“Yes,” Isaac said, and Simon smiled at the hope that shone through the dark eyes. “Is she here?”

“Nay,” Simon shook his head. “But she’s coming. Soon, we hope.” He wrinkled his nose at the smell emanating from the boy. “You’ve pissed yourself.”

“I know, I’m sorry.”

“Not to worry.” Simon swept the laddie into his arms. “It happens.”

Chapter 37

The
Regina Anne
arrived in Edinburgh on the twenty-seventh day of May, and had he been able to, Matthew would have gathered his family in his arms and leapt ashore, instead of having to wait while the ship was moored and the gangway dropped into place. As it was, he was first off anyway, exhaling loudly when he had the solidness of his homeland below his feet. More than two years away… He turned to help Alex and hugged her hard.

“We’re back.”

She just nodded, bending to place a hand on the ground.

“A word,” Captain Miles said to Matthew, snagging his sleeve. Matthew threw him an irritated look; he was in a hurry to be off, had his head full of things he needed to arrange. Transport to Edinburgh, room, horse, deliver James’ letter and Bible to his wife, mayhap drop in on Minister Crombie, and then set off for home. “Go canny.” The captain nodded in the direction of the further end of the wharves. Matthew followed his eyes and saw someone duck out of sight.

“Me?” he asked with some surprise.

“Well, it’s definitely not me, and the moment you jumped off the gangway he popped up, gawking at you.” Captain Miles threw a look at Alex, busy making her farewells. “Your brother seems a most tenacious man.”

“Aye,” Matthew said, all exuberance draining out of him. Any further discussions were cut short by Alex, who embraced Captain Miles before kissing him on the cheek.

“Don’t forget,” she said, and the captain promised that he wouldn’t, he’d personally deliver Alex’s letter to Mrs Parson next time he came by Jamestown.

*

For most of the slow ride from Leith to Edinburgh, Matthew was mute. At first Alex assumed this was due to an overload of emotion, but his continued silence woke an uneasiness inside of her.

He paid the drover, unloaded family and belongings from the cart, and set off up the hill, telling Alex they were making for Minister Crombie’s home.

“We’re staying with him?” Not that Alex minded; she liked the minister in question, a gaunt man who was sensible and kind, tempering a strong faith with a general acceptance of mankind’s multiple weaknesses.

“If he’ll have us,” Matthew replied over his shoulder. His eyes darted all over the place, and he was walking at a pace that had Alex running, a very exhausting exercise through Edinburgh’s steep, narrow closes.

“What’s the matter?” she puffed, wrinkling her nose at the odour that wafted their way from the Nor Loch.

“Nothing.”

“Matthew!” She stopped halfway up a close. He exhaled and set down his burdens before turning to face her.

“It might be unsafe for us here, and as yet I have no arms, no horse.”

“Oh, hell; why can’t Luke Graham just fall into a vat of boiling syrup and die?” Alex scowled at the cobblestones, the dirty gutters, the enclosing walls. “It’s him, isn’t it? Again!”

“I don’t know, and it may all be fancies.” Briefly he explained about the man in the harbour, taking her hand to hurry her along while he spoke. “Once we’re out on the moors it’ll be alright,” he finished. “I doubt city rats will be comfortable out there, in the open.”

Minister Crombie was delighted to see them, assured them they could stay with him, and went on to say it was an open secret that Luke Graham had men watching for the potential return of his brother.

“Oh,” Alex gulped. The tall man of God threw her a worried look, swept his bony hands down his long dark coat.

“For what purpose, I don’t know, but I doubt it is to welcome you home. Ah well; you’re safe here, and by tomorrow you’ll be gone.”

“Yeah; all alone on the road to Cumnock with a band of paid assassins on our tails,” Alex muttered, fingering the spider web of faint scars on her left arm.

“Tonight; we leave tonight,” Matthew said. “Can you help me find a horse?”

“What? Now?” Minister Crombie looked out at the overcast afternoon, bushy eyebrows pulled low over his eyes. “Mayhap, but it might come dear.”

They returned a few hours later, Matthew with a sword on his belt and a dagger for Alex as well as a musket. Yes, he assured Alex, he’d delivered the letter to James’ wife, had told her as much as he could of what had befallen her husband, and had with relief turned the weeping woman over into Minister Crombie’s capable care while he went to buy them a horse.

With them came yet another minister, and Alex did a discreet eye roll before arranging her features in a pleasant smile. Sandy Peden was not her favourite among Matthew’s boon companions, not by a far stretch, but she could see how animated Matthew was by the presence of his friend and preacher, and so she held her tongue.

Sandy was a relatively new acquaintance for Alex, having become a recurrent guest at Hillview only during the last few months before Matthew’s abduction, but Sandy and Matthew went years back, even if Simon – who wasn’t too enchanted by this very impassioned minister – had confided to Alex that he couldn’t recall them being more than casual companions in their youth.

“Minister Peden,” Alex said, curtseying to the minister.

“Alexandra,” he replied with a slight nod. A nondescript man of medium height with a shock of fine mousy hair, his saving grace was his eyes. Large and luminous, two grey pools fringed with the longest and fairest lashes Alex had ever seen, they studied her with amused respect. “An admirable rescue,” he said, nodding in the direction of Matthew.

“Purely for egoistical reasons,” Alex replied, and Sandy burst into laughter.

“Aye well, men like Matthew Graham don’t grow on trees.”

“No they don’t; one in a million, I’d think.” She smiled at her husband and excused herself to do something about her hollering child.

*

Matthew followed her out of the room with his eyes, thinking that women like her were quite rare on the ground as well. With a private smile he re-joined the heated discussion between the ministers, and over the coming half-hour, Sandy and Minister Crombie took turns in filling him in as to what had happened in his homeland during his absence.

“Evicted from my living, no less,” Sandy blustered. “Thrown out of my own kirk, as have most of our fellow Presbyterian brethren, and then what do we have but a religious war in the making? Again, I might add.”

“Now, now,” Minister Crombie said. “We don’t know that, dear Sandy, do we? And it might behove you to at times curb that tongue of yours, mayhap even scrape your foot and bow symbolically in the direction of the powers that be.”

“Hmph!” Sandy snorted and left the room.

“That bad?” Matthew asked.

“No, not yet,” Minister Crombie said. “But it’s getting difficult. The king – or at least his parliament – intends to push us all into Episcopalian rites, and the first to go are of course us, the ministers who refuse to kowtow to his Anglican beliefs and the Book of Common Prayer.”

“But he promised not to!”

“A king does as he pleases,” Minister Crombie said. “Ah well, it need not concern you, at least not yet.” He leaned forward and patted Matthew on the leg. “I am that glad to see you back home. I’ve prayed – for you and your remarkable wife.” He opened his mouth to say something more, but there was a commotion at the door, and they got to their feet, Matthew’s hand dropping to his sword.

“Ha!” Sandy Peden manhandled a young man into the room. He held him in a choking grip, ignoring the guttural sounds that signalled the man had problems breathing. “I found him sneaking about outside.” Sandy released his prisoner to fall face first to the floor.

“Ah, did you now?” Matthew pulled his knife and advanced on the man, who squealed and tried to crawl away. It didn’t avail him much, and once Matthew had explained just what he was going to do to him should he choose not to speak, the unfortunate man told them everything, words spilling like a garbled waterfall from his mouth. Matthew released his hold on the greasy hair and stood up.

“If I leave now they won’t know, and if you can keep this rascal under lock and key until tomorrow or the day after, they’ll never catch us.”

“No,” Minister Crombie agreed, looking rather green around the mouth – no doubt due to the ruffian’s admission that their task was not only to kill Matthew, but also his wife so as to ensure there remained no witnesses alive.

“I’ll ride with you,” Sandy said, “and so will my brother.” Matthew nodded his curt thanks, and in less than an hour he had a small company assembled, consisting of himself, Alex, Sandy and his rather impressive brother, and John Brown, a most devout neighbour from down Cumnock way.

“I wish I could come with you,” Minister Crombie sighed, “but with my piles, well…”

“Oh,” Matthew said, not wanting to know. He helped Alex up on the horse, swung himself up behind her, and nodded a farewell to Minister Crombie.

“God speed,” the minister said in a hushed voice, “and don’t cross the Clyde at Lanark – they’re bound to ride in that direction – well, unless I convince the constables to collar the wretches first.”

*

“More than one lookout,” Alex said through chattering teeth several hours later. It was sometime between midnight and dawn, and the light from a waning moon silvered the moors, throwing everything into different shades of grey through black. It was cold, her calves cramped after nearly two hours hidden behind the thicket, but right now she was very grateful Matthew had insisted they spread out and hide, leaving decoys in place round the fire.

“Mmm,” Matthew agreed from where he was sitting beside her, eyes never leaving the five men who were slinking down the hillside towards the little campfire and the blanketed humps around it. “Fools,” he breathed into her ear. “Look at them, like sheep to the slaughter.”

Alex suppressed an urge to burst out in loud, nervous laughter. Sheep? Very well armed sheep – even from here and in the dark she could make out the odd glint on an uncovered blade.

“Stay here,” Matthew said, and then he was gone, leaving Alex to keep her eyes peeled on the path, just in case there should be more than five.

A shape moved swiftly down the slope. Matthew, she realised after squinting for a while, and at his back was John Brown – or a shape she assumed to be John, it was impossible to make out. Someone sent a stone bouncing, there was a hissed curse and everything froze. The five ambushers shrank to crouch, Matthew and John disappeared into the shadow of a crag. One of the horses nickered, but down by the fire the shapes remained immobile – well, they would, given that they consisted mostly of twigs and stones. Alex swallowed, threw a look up the path. No one there.

They were almost at the campsite by now, five shadows that communicated with hand movements, no more. And behind them came Matthew and John, moving as stealthily as foxes. A rustle and Alex bit back on an exclamation. Something was coming up the path, but once it got closer Alex relaxed. Things moving on four legs weren’t her major concern at present. She returned her attention to the dell. Any moment now…

It was unfortunate that just as the trap was closing, Rachel should wake from sleep, crying loudly. The would be attackers whirled in the direction of the sound, saw Matthew and John Brown advancing on them, and threw themselves in a concerted effort against them. From their hiding places came the Peden brothers, rushing to join the fight, and Alex couldn’t stand it, to sit here crouched while only yards away her husband and their friends were fighting a far too even battle against the bastards who wanted them dead, so she placed a screaming Rachel under a bush and launched herself into the melee.

“Get away!” Matthew barked. “Stay away, Alex!”

“In your dreams,” she shouted back. But she kept to the fringe of things, not wanting to get in the way of all those blades. Still, every now and then one of the combatants would stumble into range, and it was with a certain satisfaction that she felt her foot connect with someone’s nether parts, a howl indicating that specific person wouldn’t be moving very much any time soon.

Matthew was everywhere, and it was his sword that brought the fight to an end, the apparent leader shrieking for mercy as the blade dug into his uncovered neck. There was a moment when Alex thought Matthew was going to slice his throat wide open and kill him then and there, but to her relief Sandy popped up by Matthew’s side, and whatever it was he said was enough to make Matthew lower the blade and spit the ruffian in the face. And then it was all over, the five men hogtied and dragged forward so that their faces could be studied in the light of the fire, now kicked into life by Matthew.

Rachel was still sobbing, the odd half-hearted wail escaping from her between her energetic pulling at the breast.

“Bad timing,” Alex told her. “What was I to do? Nurse you and let your father fight it out on his own?”

“I wasn’t alone, Alex,” Matthew said with a smile in his voice.

“No, but I helped.”

“Helped? You’ve left the man maimed for life,” Sandy put in. “Not that he will live for all that much longer.”

“What? You’re going to kill them?”

“Of course not. That would be a grievous sin, a permanent taint on our souls. No, we will ride back with them to Edinburgh, and there turn them over into the tender care of the constables.” Sandy looked the men over with a certain disdain. “They’ll hang, as they should, ruffians that they are.” He turned back to Alex, a wrinkle appearing on his brow that had her sighing inside.

In difference to Minister Crombie, Sandy Peden had made it his own little mission in life to ensure the foreign Mrs Graham was properly instructed in all aspects of the Presbyterian faith, lecturing her for hours on the Bible, the relative importance of men and women, the qualities of a good wife, and she could see yet another speech coming on. She looked to Matthew for support, but her husband was busy inspecting knots, rearranging bedding, seeing to his new horse – anything, in fact, that made it impossible for her to catch his eyes. Sandy was already at it, his beautiful voice berating her for the unwomanly behaviour she’d just displayed. Alex pretended to listen, her eyes on her nursing child.

She glanced over to where her husband was still busy with Ham. She could make out no more than the general shape of him, but that was enough to tell her he was stiff with tension, and to Sandy’s evident surprise she stood, handed him the by now sleeping Rachel, and walked over to join Matthew.