An Ocean Apart (3 page)

Alicia smiled. “You're right, but mine are more exceptional circumstances.”

“Of course they are. Tell me, how is George?”

“Like everyone else around here—totally exhausted, even though I think he's actually secretly enjoying his return to active duty. Nevertheless, if you've been retired for ten years, suddenly to have to start working again really comes as a jolt to the system. Not that he's hugely overtaxed. The new managing director at Glendurnich, Duncan Caple, is doing a wonderful job running both the business and David's marketing division, but George just feels that as he's the chairman and major shareholder
and
David's father, he should give support where he can, especially as the whisky market seems to be in such turmoil at the minute. I don't really pretend to know that much about it now, but there do seem to be an ever-increasing number of licensed trade dinners and marketing launches that George has to attend on behalf of the distillery.”

Alicia paused for a moment, placing her elbow on the arm of the chair and resting the side of her face in her hand.

“But do you know, Jane, what we both find
so
energy-sapping is having to go back to a hectic daily routine we thought we'd left behind years ago! Having to get
up
in the morning, having to get children ready for going back to school, and then having them here all the time meant that one was always on call to entertain them. Heavens, just before he went back to school, Charlie had me out on the lawn operating the clay-pigeon trap! Can you imagine it? I'm absolutely hopeless with mechanical devices, and he kept shouting at me, ‘Come on, Granny, you're useless!' as I launched off clays one after the other at about the level of his knees!” She laughed and sat forward in her chair. “Actually, come to think of it, this is about the first time that I've sat down and indulged myself for about a month!”

“Oh, I'm sorry, Alicia,” said Jane, “and I come barging in and disrupt your peace.”

Alicia waved her hand dismissively. “Don't be silly, my dear. This is exactly what the doctor ordered.” She looked at Jane with a quizzical smile on her face. “Well, isn't it?”

Jane gave a surprised expression. “My word, that's intuitive of you.” She smiled. “Of course, you're right; Roger did ask me to drop in to see you, just to find out how you all were. That's why I had a quiet word with Effie beforehand, just in case my timing wasn't very good.” She paused for a moment. “She said that David is still keeping very much to himself.”

“Yes, he is,” Alicia said quietly. One of the Labradors had moved from his position by the fire and now lay at her feet, his head resting on her shoe. She bent forward and stroked his sleek black crown. “You know, the appalling thing about this whole affair is that he's going through something which neither you nor I have experienced. He has lost his life's partner. It's just so unfair.” Alicia's tone had suddenly changed to one of anger and frustration. “Think of the many friends we have of our age who have lost their husbands or wives. That in a way is expected. But neither you nor I know what it's like, because it hasn't happened to us.” She stopped talking and combed a loose strand of grey hair behind her ear with her fingers, her eyes looking at a point somewhere behind Jane's head. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean that. I think that that is the first time I've said it out loud. It's just that it makes me feel … well … so guilty.”

“But that's natural,” Jane said caringly. “The pain of losing someone close to you always seems to manifest itself in anger or guilt. But there is a positive side to it, and that is that David is extremely lucky, at forty-three years of age or whatever, to still have both his parents around to give their support. How could he have devoted so much time to looking after Rachel if you and George hadn't been there to pick up all the loose ends? Friends are great, but parents are better. And I'm sure that he's fully aware of that.”

“I know, I know, but one just feels so useless. I wish that there was something, well, active that I could do to help him. If only he would let himself talk about it once in a while, but he just seems to bottle himself up. As far as I'm aware, he hasn't mentioned Rachel's name since the funeral. Outwardly, it's as if she never existed, but inwardly, I know he's in turmoil. It's a terrible thing to say, but sometimes I feel like grabbing the poor boy by the shoulders and giving him a jolly good shake.” Alicia took a deep breath. “And then giving him a huge hug.”

In the moment's silence that followed, Jane was aware for the first time of the wind and rain beating against the four large double-paned windows of the drawing-room. She looked over her shoulder and upwards at the black storm-clouds that spread themselves oppressively across the sky, and thought to herself how cruelly the elements accentuated the tragedy that had befallen this household. Her instincts told her that she shouldn't follow this line of conversation any further. Enough had been said for the moment, and it would serve no useful purpose to either Alicia or herself to continue it. She turned from the window and shook her head.

“Would you believe this weather for May?” She glanced up at the silver carriage clock on the mantelpiece above the fire. “It's only a quarter past five, and it's nearly dark.” She did a double take. “Oh, my word, Alicia, a quarter past five! What am I thinking of?” She put her hands on the arms of the chair and pushed herself to her feet. “Poor Arthur has been sitting all this time in the back of my car, and I promised him that I would only be a moment. He'll probably have eaten his way through the dog rack by now.”

Alicia rose stiffly from her chair. “My dear, you should have brought him in. The boys would have loved to have seen him.”

“No, he would only have caused chaos. He's not as well-behaved as your dogs. Anyway, we had a lovely walk on the moor earlier on this afternoon, and he was soaking wet.”

“Well, he's lucky to have such a devoted mistress to take him out on a day like this. I have to admit that I've been totally feeble. The boys' walk today consisted of my going to the front door, opening it and pushing them out for ten minutes. I am certainly not going out in weather like this!” Alicia went over to one of the windows and unhooked the cords that held back the huge room-high damask curtains. “And I really don't think that it is going to improve very much either. Better just to shut it out, don't you think?” she said, pulling the heavy curtains across the window.

Jane walked over to the middle window to do the same. As she unhooked the first cord, she looked out of the window at the darkness falling on the gardens of Inchelvie House. They were, even on this day, quite beautiful. Protected on either side by giant beech- and oak-trees, the long lawns swept majestically down to the dark frothy waters of the fishing-loch, their regularity split by meandering herbaceous borders with azaleas and rhododendrons in the early stages of bloom. Daffodils, still flowering due to the prolonged winter, bravely held their yellow heads high, a small splash of colour in defiance of the all-encompassing greyness of the day. To the right of the lawns, where two parallel paths ran between neat box hedges to the wall garden, Jane noticed that distinct changes had been made to the layout of the garden, the dark rich soil recently dug over to form two new flower-beds symmetrical to those on the west side of the lawn. She was about to turn and remark on this to Alicia, when a movement in the flower-bed farthest to the right caught her eye. She pressed her face closer to the window, cupping her hands around her eyes to cut out the light from the drawing-room behind her.

“Alicia, there seem to be…” Jane felt Alicia's arm brush hers as she came to stand beside her. She too cupped her hands over her face.

Alicia continued for her. “… two men standing out in the wind and rain digging holes in the garden and getting extremely wet.”

“What
are
they doing?” She screwed up her eyes in an attempt to accustom her sight better to the fading light.

Alicia laughed. “My dear, don't you recognize them? It's David and Jock—you know, Effie's husband. They've been out there all day planting roses in that new flower-bed.”

Jane turned and looked incredulously at Alicia. “In weather like this? What on earth for? They could end up catching double pneumonia if they're not careful.”

“I tell you, it's more than my life's worth to try to stop them. For the past five months, that garden has been David's greatest therapy.”

“Really? In what way?” Jane said, turning back to look out the window to where the two men were working.

Alicia drew one of the curtains across the window. “Do you remember when David gave up work at Glendurnich last December and moved Rachel and the family here from The Beeches after her first course of chemotherapy?”

“Yes, of course,” Jane said, standing back from the window to allow the other curtain to be drawn across.

“Well, at that time George thought that it would be a good idea if David had something to occupy his mind, so he asked him to help look after the estate.” Alicia moved away from the window and leaned against the back of one of the sofas, her arms stretched out at either side to support her. “Anyway, it became pretty clear to David that the farm manager was coping quite well without his input, and it just happened that while he was looking for some papers in the farm office one day, he unearthed these old plans of how the Inchelvie gardens looked when the house was first built. Apparently, some of the original flower-beds had vanished, I think probably sown out in grass about the time of the Great War, when manpower was scarce. So, on an impulse, David took it upon himself to reinstate the garden to its former glory, and that is where he has quite literally spent every free minute since. Whenever Rachel was receiving treatment in Inverness or just in the house asleep, David would head out to the garden, pore over his old drawings, and start digging away.” Alicia laughed, raising herself from the back of the sofa. “Somewhere along the line, he roped in Jock to give him a hand. I don't think the old boy has ever worked so hard in his life.”

They both walked over to the third window. It was now almost totally dark outside, but once again they cupped their hands around their faces to look out the window. The two figures had now moved closer to the house, and were dimly lit by the weak shaft of light that came from Jane and Alicia's window. David, bareheaded, with his hair plastered flat by the rain, stood talking to Jock, who, enveloped in a huge yellow fisherman's raincoat, peered from the shelter of an equally large sou'wester at the plastic-covered paper that David held in his right hand.

Alicia and Jane moved back from the window, both instinctively feeling that they didn't want to be caught looking out at the two men. Alicia turned and smiled at Jane. “The anger that that garden must have absorbed over the past five months has to be immeasurable.”

She drew together the curtains of the remaining window and shut out the day.

Chapter
  
TWO

George Inchelvie closed the file on his desk, put the top on his fountain-pen and clipped it into the inside pocket of his tweed jacket. A squall of wind and rain hitting hard against the office window made him turn around in his chair to look out at the row of young silver birches, planted the previous year to give future shelter to the distillery's new car-park, as they waved their thin branches in submission to the battering that they were receiving.

He glanced at his wrist-watch. It was half past four. He pressed the intercom button on his telephone, and immediately the soft Highland tones of his young secretary lilted through the system.

“Yes, Lord Inchelvie?”

“Mhairi, I'm going to leave the office early today. I have a meeting in Dalnachoil this evening, and I want to get home before the weather gets any worse. Do you have any messages for me?”

“Let me just check, my lord.” He heard the sound of turning pages crackle through the intercom. “No, I can't see anything.”

“Right. You have confirmed with the Whisky Association that I'll be attending the conference in Glasgow next week?”

“Yes, and I've booked you into Devonshire Place for the Tuesday and Wednesday nights.”

“Well done. If you could make sure that it's a twin-bedded room, just in case Lady Inchelvie wants to come down to Glasgow with me.”

“Very good, my lord.”

“Thank you very much, Mhairi. I'll see you tomorrow.”

“Good night, my lord. Make sure you drive carefully, now.”

“I will do, Mhairi,” he said, smiling to himself at the young girl's motherly concern. He clicked off the intercom and leaned over to pick up the walking-stick that lay at the side of his desk. He rose from his chair, supporting himself both on the stick and on the edge of the desk, and stood for a minute, anticipating the sharp pain that would shoot down his left leg once he started walking.

He had never given much thought to the wound he had received in Holland during the war, even though at the time the bullet had only been two inches off shattering his spine, but now the incessant cold and wet weather, coupled with his advancing years, seemed to aggravate it more than ever before.

He swung through ninety degrees on his heels so that he was in line with the coat-stand, then, with the fingers of his free hand pressed deep into the base of his back, he took a step forward. It was like a hot knife jabbing into his left side, but he kept moving forward, knowing that it would ease off steadily after each step. He made it to the coat-stand, took down the old tweed overcoat and shrugged it onto his shoulders, and passing the stick from one hand to the other to maintain his balance, he placed the battered homburg on his head and opened the door of his office.

Making his way slowly through the open-plan trading hall of Glendurnich Distilleries Ltd., he headed towards the large glass double doors at the far end which led out into the reception area. He did not like the new layout of Glendurnich's offices but, even as chairman, he had felt that any criticism might be taken as being stuffy and nostalgic. During his more active days with the company, little had changed in the interior of the building since his great-great-grandfather Alasdair Corstorphine had produced the first bottle of Glendurnich Malt Whisky in 1852. Then it had been a rabbit-warren of small oak-panelled offices linked by narrow passages providing direct access to the distillery itself, and therefore constantly bustling with management, secretaries and distillery workers. George had always felt that, by design or default, it was this format that had created the autonomous structure on which the company had built its history of success, one which had been precipitated in 1882 through a chance sampling of Glendurnich's Finest Malt by the Prince of Wales in one of the many London clubs that he frequented. Within a week, the whisky's name had been brought to the attention of the discerning populace through the gossip columnists of every national newspaper. The future king, it was reported, had taken such a liking to Glendurnich's product that “now he feels that there is a worthwhile reason to visit his mother at Balmoral on a regular basis.”