Page 59 of The Midnight Secret

‘He asked if you would telephone him once you got over here,’ Gladly said, his eyes kind.

‘Aye, I must...’ she breathed.

‘But first things first. You’re to do nothing before you’ve had a hot bath and warmed up,’ Colly said. He was hunched over as the driving rain pelted him, quickly soaking through his clothes. She knew she ought to give back his coat; she had little need of it herself – wet was wet – but her mind was as scattered as her body was spent.

They rounded the head of the loch, staggering uphill towards the castle’s rocky perch, past moss-addled rowantrees, silver birches and thick clumps of rhododendron. Now that they were closer, faces were visible at an upstairs window. Effie could just imagine Bitsy and Peony sitting there with sour expressions on seeing that she had not only returned but sailed in like a corsair.

They walked in, an impressive oak staircase immediately rising in front of them, a bull’s head – motif for the MacLeods – mounted on the wall. The women appeared suddenly at the top step, so refined in their day dresses and stockings, hair set into neat primps. They stopped in apparent alarm at the state of Effie. The difference between them all had never been more acute now she had reverted to her natural feral state: barefoot, hair tangled, weatherbeaten.

Veronica moved first, running down the stairs and removing the dripping macintosh. Effie was shivering uncontrollably, the dress a sodden rag bunched around her bare thighs.

‘Come, we’ve put you in the Lewis suite. There’s a bath drawn. We’ll get you warm in a jiffy.’

Effie nodded, even though all she wanted was to find the telephone and hear Sholto’s voice telling her it was all going to be all right. But would it be? She had woken this morning to bright skies and optimism for her future, but everything had changed again, the ground no firmer beneath her feet than that heaving, swirling sea. First she had been taken from Sholto and now he had been taken from her. It felt like an omen, a karmic lesson being delivered that the world would not bend to their will. Love was not enough.

Veronica wrapped an arm around her, peeling her away from the men. She felt Archie’s eyes on her back watching her go and she turned briefly, catching hold of his bleak look. This wasn’t the ending either of them had wanted.

‘Sholto?’

‘Effie.’ She heard the sigh of relief in the word, as if she was comfort. Home. She closed her eyes and could see him, exhausted and tense in his library, just as she was exhausted and tense in the library here. She would give anything to see him right now, to hold him.

‘Gladly just told me about your mother...How is she?’

There was a pause. ‘Not well, I’m afraid. The doctor says she suffered a significant trauma. She’s still with us, but...not as she used to be.’

Effie bit her lip, not quite sure what that meant, not wanting to press. His voice was right in her ear, but she felt the distance between them. ‘I can come back,’ she said in a small voice.

There was a long pause.

‘...No.’ The word was soft, its message sharp. ‘I’m sorry. I...’ She heard him take a deep breath and knew he was steeling himself to say what had to be said – the very conversation he had refused to have with her when he’d returned to Oban in November. ‘It’s just that...it’s very difficult here at the moment, and the doctor has advised no...no undue stress.’

She closed her eyes, knowingshewas the undue stress. ‘I understand.’ Her voice was a whisper.

‘...Do you? I mean do you know I want you to be here, but that it’s just...’ She could hear his struggle to hold back his emotions. To do the right thing. Place head over heart. ‘...She’s my mother.’ His voice cracked and she saw in that moment the scale of his conflict, the very thing she had seen all along and he had sought to deny. He had thought he could turn his back on his family and choose his happiness over their wishes, but death hovered now, a spectral shadow casting them all into gloom. He could no longer run. He had to decide between them.

‘Sholto, of course I do. I lost my mother when I was young...I would giveanythingfor another day with her.’ Tears were sliding down her cheeks but her voice was steady, if thick. ‘You must be with her. You must.’

There was a long silence and she knew he was struggling for composure too. They both knew what they were saying: for as long as his mother lived, Effie must stay away; but there was no hope after death either, for to reunite would be to disrespect his mother’s memory. He was checkmated, unable to move freely in any direction. Effie would never be good enough for his family, and his defiance in insisting otherwise had come at too high a price.

Neither of them spoke for several long moments as they listened to each other’s breathing, reading their thoughts.

‘...What will you do?’ he asked flatly.

‘You mean, where will I go?’ She could hardly stay here at Dunvegan. James MacLeod was the consummate host, but his parents – good friends of Sholto’s parents – would take an even dimmer view of her now, in light of the countess’s illness. She could spend no more than a night here. ‘Back home to Lochaline, I expect.’

But it wasn’t home. She had spent less than a week there in total. It had been a landing point only; a springboard that had propelled her from St Kilda to Dumfries House.

‘My father’s there at the moment anyway,’ she added. He had gone to stay with Old Fin for Christmas and Hogmanay, feeling strange about staying alone on the Dumfries estate with no sign of Effie. ‘I’ll call and tell him to stay.’

Sholto hesitated. ‘He’s very welcome to continue to make use of the cottage.’

She closed her eyes, feeling every pause, every polite word like a sabre swipe, though she knew Sholto was trying not tohurt her. On the contrary, extending use of the grace and favour property was a kindness, but if she was no longer working for the earl – and how could she now? – nor together with Sholto, then her father couldn’t possibly remain there without her.

‘Don’t worry about us. We’ll be fine,’ she said quietly. ‘But would you...would you send on our things?’ She didn’t think she could bear the prospect of returning to Dumfries to pack up. To be there and not see him...

‘Of course. I’ll have someone see to it straight away.’

She heard him flinch, his eagerness to help her in any way misplaced here.

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