The Legend of Lady MacLaoch (6 page)

CHAPTER 10

I
lay disoriented on a green velvet settee—surrounding me were books, loads of ancient books. It was obvious I was in some sort of library, but I couldn’t figure how on earth how I had gotten there.

I made myself sit up, my body feeling used up and weak from the claustrophobia attack. Some of the books were tooled leather, others gilded with gold. None, though, had the glossy covers of the twenty-first-century books that line the shelves at modern-day bookstores. In the center of the room, a large reading table held a glowing lamp, despite the brightness of the late-afternoon sun through the window behind me.

I rubbed my arms, hoping to get rid of some of the fatigue that was clawing at them, and it was then I saw him. My resident jerk was leaning against the doorjamb, slightly out of view next to a massive wooden bookshelf, observing me.

“Diabetic or claustrophobic?” he said in greeting.

I was too tired to banter with him. I managed, “Claustrophobic.”

He nodded. “Did you just discover this?”

“No,” I said softly, hoping that there was an exit other than the one he was currently taking up.

The MacLaoch nodded again. “So ye say ye have had attacks before, and yet I found ye in the smallest, darkest room in the castle. Did someone push ye in there?”

I could see where this was going and it wasn’t a warm washcloth across my head and a stiff drink in my hand, which were what I really needed. I said, “No, but I am persistent,” and stood, hoping my legs could and would carry me from the place.

“Aye, I can see tha’. I’m just wondering why a woman who boldly claims herself to be a Minory descendant would willingly persist her way into a MacLaoch castle and pass out in our dungeon. Did ye no’ think tha’ maybe we’d just push ye into the hole and leave ye? We’ve done worse to your lot.”

I narrowed my eyes. “I suppose you should have thought about that when you saved me earlier on that cliff—though I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt, as you didn’t know then what family I belong to. But really? Leave me in the dungeon? Over a fairy tale?”

MacLaoch raised his eyebrow at me. “Ye think it’s a fairy tale? It’s more like a curse, Ms. Baker.”

“I suppose it matters what side you’re standing on. Though either way, it’s the twenty-first century, and this castle is open for tours—I doubt people would still come if my body were rotting in the dungeon.”

“The fairy tale,” he said. “Is tha’ why ye are so persistent to find a MacLaoch? To cure what ails him?”

I leveled my gaze on him for a moment, really taking him in. I was surprised that he was getting worked up over my being there, so I tried again to explain myself.

“Look,” I said, “I’m here to do family research. I was raised in South Carolina, as were four generations before me, and I just discovered this last Christmas that, by blood, my father’s line is this Minory character.” I stuck to the
o
pronunciation.

“South Carolina.”

“Yes, South Carolina, since the mid-eighteen hundreds.”

He just squinted at me as if trying to solve a mathematical equation he wasn’t so sure he knew all the variables of. I noticed the way his jaw muscle flexed and relaxed, as if it were helping him digest the information.

Exhausted, I pointed toward him and asked, “Is that the exit?”

He took a moment to look at the doorframe he was standing in. “Aye, it is.” Then he looked back at me.

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Unless you are going to offer me a moist towel and a stiff drink, I have no reason to stay.” Then I added (because sometimes I remember that I do have manners and I should use them), “And I don’t want to take up any more of your time—my apologies for the intrusion.”

Instead of moving as I approached him, he stood still and his gaze intensified. “Why are ye here? Why now?” His voice was low and barely audible. “And how in god’s name did he get to America?”

It was as if I had stepped into a separate conversation, which he was having with himself—one so intense that he had completely disregarded that I was real and still present.

I looked at him, exhausted, and simply answered with nonsense: “Dunno, fate?” I pointed at his chest. “Move?”

MacLaoch stood back from the doorway, allowing me a narrow path to pass by him. My shoulder brushed his chest and for just that instant my insides quivered as if he were made of electricity. I paused in the next room.

It appeared to be a formal dining room and looked out from the second story onto the castle gardens below. There were four doors on the opposite side of the long dining hall and no exit sign. My gut instinct told me to take the first door, but I was also highly aware of a set of eyes on my back waiting, and a charged silence that I was having a difficult time making sense of.

I pointed to the first door and looked back at him. “That one?”

“Aye,” he simply said. I noted the darkness in his demeanor had returned, but something else lingered. Something that seemed to have awakened since I first met him out on the cliff. Curiosity? Wonder? I suspected a third option, something I didn’t understand because it didn’t make sense: hope.

I strode to the door, opened it, and felt a small surge of elation as I
stepped into the hallway I had seen before. From my vantage point, I could see the grand staircase and the large front doors marked Exit.

“Ms. Baker,” the MacLaoch said from behind me.

I turned back to him. He stood watching me, his eyes dark and glittering.

“Yes?” I asked.

“Come back tomorrow—when the castle is officially open—and I’ll
personally
give ye a tour of Castle Laoch and the legend tha’ haunts us.”

“I don’t think so,” I said, and I moved quickly down the stairs and out the front doors, back to Will and Carol’s along the main road.

• • •

F
reshly showered, I curled up on the window seat in my room, which looked over the road below and Glentree harbor in the near distance. I picked up my pen and wrote in my journal, logging the day’s events as I had planned to do in order to remember the trip and keep track of clues for my research. But by the time I got to the boat tour in my narrative, my hands were shaking so badly that I had to put my pen down.

Not only had I nearly gotten killed once and passed out twice, I had also learned about an ancestor who may or may not have been mine. It was true that the difference between the two names was just a single letter, but it was also a fact that the difference between
kilter
and
killer
was a single letter. A single letter was not anything to be dismissed, especially if I intended to be 100 percent certain where my bloodline had originated from, and that one letter would be a sticking point when I went asking for historical information about the Minarys. There would be at least one person at Castle Laoch who would not believe me should I go there to use the expansive library for research. Unfortunately, that was where I felt I would have the most luck finding information about Iain. But if the man I had met was part of the castle management, as I suspected, I probably could avoid him by going straight to the clan historian.

I just hoped he wasn’t as superstitious as the rest of this island appeared to be.

CHAPTER 11

T
he next morning I quietly made my way through breakfast as Carol rushed busily about, attending to the other guests, a whole troupe of German tourists loudly and boisterously enjoying their breakfast. This allowed me to avoid Carol—not that I was ashamed of not taking her advice but rather, because I didn’t need the extra comments, especially the way the day had turned out.

I was halfway down the stairs when Carol’s voice pulled me back. “Oh, Cole! Wha’ are your plans today?” she asked, wiping her hands on her apron as she came down to me.

“Uh, I hadn’t really—”

“If ye’re going tae be about tonight around nine,” she interjected, obviously not caring what I did have planned, “there’s a spot of live music in the hotel next door. Good Gaelic music, not that contemporary crap. I have a nephew, Fletcher, who’s playing in the band.” She squeezed my shoulder. “You’ll be up then?”

I had been prepared for some sort of rebuke for my excursions yesterday, thinking that Glentree was a small town, so it would only be a matter of time before she found out. I wasn’t ready for this.

“Um, sure, I’ll be up. Are you and Will going?”

She laughed at that. “Och no! We’re tucked in by eight. Thought ye might like tae meet my nephew and see some local music, ye know, have fun.”

I laughed to myself, once I understood. When you’re single, you can smell these setups coming a mile away. “What does he play in the band?” I asked.

“Och, I’m no’ sure wha’ it’s called in English, I think the fiddle.”

After trying not to commit more than my just a toenail to the evening festivities, I made my way back to the documents room at the Glentree library.

It was a beautiful, overcast Scottish day, and the curls in my hair did their unruly thing and bounced on the breeze. I hoped that the clan chieftain went to the library often enough that Deloris could act as a liaison of sorts for me. The MacDonagh brothers also seemed to think that the chieftain was open enough to sharing information with the locals, so the Deloris avenue seemed like a good way to go.

“Ah! You’re back,” Deloris called as I stepped into her domain. She popped out from the shelves to meet me at the counter. “I hear ye went out with the MacDonagh brothers on a tour yesterday—I met up with them early this morn’ and they ha’ nothing but thanks for sending ye their way.”

“I did, they are quite the pair, those two. They nearly upset the boat when I mentioned why I was here in Glentree.”

“Aye, those two would get excited about a close reference to the Minory name. Sorry about that, aye. Hopefully they behaved themselves?”

I smiled, remembering their bows and formalities. “Yes, they were nothing but gentleman. They did mention something that made me come to see you again. They mentioned the chieftain of Clan MacLaoch is open to sharing the history of Castle Laoch with local people. Do you think you could request some materials for me?”

“Oh, aye. I suppose I could—what materials are ye thinking of?”

“I think I want to know more about this Minory family—it is so close to Minary that I just want to be able to cross it off the list of possibilities. Do you think you could ask for any historical references they might have on that last name? Or if they have boxes of historical material, I’d be happy to sort through it and save you the trouble.”

“Sure. Though I have tae ask, have yae no’ thought about going tae Castle Laoch yerself and asking? Ye could tell them that I sent ye, they should be obliging enough.”

“I. Well,” I blundered, “The truth is, I’m not sure that all of the MacLaochs hold your sentiments toward the Minory-MacLaoch legend. I would hate to ruin the chance to look at those documents just because I’m looking for an ancestor who shares a strikingly familiar last name.”

“Oh all right, but I hope it wasn’t the MacDonagh brothers who’ve gotten you scared tae talk with the MacLaochs? They’re a nice lot, they are.” Then she seemed to think better of what she said. “Well, except for that Eryka woman. Truthfully, she’s not a MacLaoch, no matter how desperately she wants to be.”

“Who?” I asked.

Deloris waved her hand. “Never mind. I’ll make a request for you on those documents and let you know when I get them.”

• • •

Just as I was finishing lunch in my room back at the bed-and-breakfast, the phone rang. I answered ready to tell the person on the phone they had the wrong number, especially if it was my mother.

“Good afternoon to you!” Deloris said, and before I could respond, she excitedly continued. “After ye left this morning, I called up tae the MacLaoch castle tae see if I couldn’t arrange tae have some documents sent down. Well, we got tae talking, the Castle Laoch historian and I, and I explained who ye are and what ye are looking for, paying mind that it’s spelled with an
a
. Though I’ll tell ye, he pushed that notion right out the window. He said to me, ‘Minary with an
a
? Tosh! It’s nae spelled with an
a
; it’s an
o
, and I’ll tell her myself if I have to.’ Well, that’s his opinion, and since he spends the majority of his time secluded away with his ancestry books and such, I’m not surprised that he’s so convinced of it—knows nothing else, aye? The long and the short of it is that he said he’ll see what he can find and, if we should be so inclined, we could go by this afternoon to pick up what he’s found. Would ye like tae accompany me? Would be no bother tae pick ye up.”