The Secret Gift (23 page)

Brodie ended the call with a promise to contact her just as soon as he had any further news.

After a quick breakfast of porridge and tea, Libby headed for the village church, bursting to tell Sean MacNally, the one person she could tell, her good news.

“This is brilliant, Libby. Very clever of my predecessor to have performed their marriage there.”

“Can you tell me where to find this Balnakeil Church? I would like to go there myself, to see it.”

Sean showed Libby how to find the ruin on her Ordnance Survey map, where it was marked with a simple cross symbol, some three miles outside the village.

The Old Church, as it was called by the locals, was tucked away on a curving stretch of pure white sand that faced onto Wrath Bay. Libby stood on the headland above the beach and shaded her eyes, looking from the endless sea past the church, up to the stark white towers of Castle Wrath that stood high on the cliff above her.

It was the perfect place for the sanctuary. For though the roar of the open sea could be heard in the distance, here, somehow inexplicably, the shore was surrounded by a quiet calm, sheltered, it seemed, by heaven’s own hand. Sean had told Libby that the church was indeed an ancient one, founded by a Saint Maelruhba in the eighth century. The present building, or what remained of it, dated from the late sixteenth century. It had fallen into disuse some two centuries later, around the time of the English Civil Wars, when the castle had been abandoned for a time, soon going to ruin itself. The weathered stone walls of the now roofless church ruin were clad in ivy, and its backdrop was the wild and unspoiled sea. Libby couldn’t imagine a more peaceful resting place.

Among those buried in the churchyard were the ancient Mackay chiefs and their families, and others who had lived for hundreds of years in this place. There was a large stone marking the final resting place of a man called Rob Donn, the Gaelic bard who Ian had told her was related to Libby on her mother’s side. Others were clansmen fallen in battle, the crew of a ship that sank off the treacherous waters of Cape Wrath in 1849, and even a notorious highwayman whose gravestone was complete with skull and crossbones. And there was another, now familiar name that was carved upon one of the more distinctive headstones.

Lady Isabella Mackay, wife of Calum Mackay, chieftain of the Mackays of Wrath, died this day, the 17th of January, 1800. A devoted wife to one, a loving mother of twelve, and doting grandmother to two and twenty. She loved this place in life, and so she reposes here in death, in the very shadow of the great castle she helped bring back to life. Ne’er afore a more noble lady ... ne’er again a more beloved wife.

Libby found herself smiling softly at this most touching tribute. What would it be like, she wondered, to be loved so truly, so deeply?

This was her place, the one Libby had been named for, Lady Isabella, whose crystal Libby wore around her neck. She noticed that someone had placed a bouquet of wildflowers—heather, gorse, and a single white rose, now withered and dried—at the base of the granite stone.

Libby tugged at the chain and pulled the stone from beneath the heavy wool of her sweater, clasping it in her palm. The crystal felt warm against her skin even though the day was chill. Once again, the stone seemed to glow with its own inner fire.

Could it be it was trying to tell her something?

“Good day to you, lass. A fine day, is it no’?”

Libby turned to see the man, Gil, whom she’d met by the field of standing stones on that day that seemed now so long ago.

“Oh, hello, Gil. It is a fine day indeed.”

She watched as he reached to sweep away the withered bouquet from Lady Isabella’s gravestone, replacing it with a fresh one.

“Do you tend to the graves here?”

“Aye. Who else would be after doing it? I’m the ghillie of this estate, have been nearly all my life, though not many come any longer to this forgotten church. What brings you here, lass?”

Something about the man, something in his eyes, profound yet bright, seemed to whisper to Libby that she should trust him. Even the stone had changed to a soft, reassuring green. Libby decided to take a chance.

“My mother and father were married in this church.”

“Indeed?” He blinked, clearly startled. “You’re ... you wouldna be ... you’re Matilde’s daughter?”

She nodded, smiling. “You knew my mother?”

“Oh, aye. How could I no’ when I’ve lived here all my life?” He doffed his tweed hat, scratched his graying head. “So tell me of your dear mother. She is well?”

Libby looked at him, shook her head. “I’m afraid she passed away. Last month.”

The look on his face told her that he was truly, genuinely sorry to hear it. “I’d no idea ...”

“I only discovered she was from the village when I was going through her things. She left me a photograph, and this crystal stone. I’m told it was once Lady Isabella’s stone ...”

Gil nodded, smiling softly. “Aye, and so it was. Now it is yours, as it should be.”

“Gil, how did you know my mother was married here at this church? No one else seemed to know of it in the village.”

“Because, lass, I was here for the ceremony.”

Libby felt a shiver take her. “You were?”

“Oh, aye, though none else knew of it. Your father asked me to stand up with him, and I was proud to do it. Ah, but it was a bonny, bonny wedding, too.” He smiled, looking at the church ruin, his eyes turning a wistful, misty blue. “The bride, your mother, she wore a lovely gown, all pale ivory silk and light as a cloud. Her mother’s gown, I believe, and she looked so lovely, just like a fairy maiden. It was held at dusk, just before the night, and they’d brought candles, so many candles, to light the sanctuary. Their wedding march was the sound of the sea, their congregation the birds who nest in these ruined walls. Ne’er have I seen a man more in love than your da wit’ your mam. They thought, truly thought, that once they’d wed all would be well with the families.” He shook his head. “But unfortunately, ’twas not to be.”

Libby felt the cool sting of tears as she listened to him. She could see inside the church from where she stood, and clearly imagined the candles flickering in the wind, the soft rush of the sea breaking on the shore as her mother and father plighted their troth to one another in this ancient, beautiful place. They must have been so full of hope, so full of love for each other.

“I wish I’d known him.”

Libby hadn’t realized she’d spoken the words aloud.

“Ah, your father, he was a good lad. Back then, he was the sort who believed in things, believed he could change them, believed he could make a difference. He had great plans for this estate and the village, too. He loved this place almost as much as he loved your mother. Your mother and he, och, they were meant to fall in love. But some people, they just can’t understand that love is a fated thing. You’ve no choice, no say in the matter whatsoever. Fate doesn’t care what side of the silver spoon you come from.”

He was speaking of Lady Venetia, Libby knew.

“The accident that took him, your father, it devastated this place. It has ne’er been the same since. But it will. Because you have the stone. Just as the legend says. You have brought the stone back and you will make it so because you are his daughter. You are the daughter of the Mackay. Look at the stone, lass. See how it glows against your hand. It speaks to you. Like Arthur’s Excalibur, it tells that you are the one, the one who will save this place.”

Libby saw that the stone had changed yet again, now glowing orange and pink like an ember in the fire. She felt a tingle that swept her from head to toe. It was as if this man could see, as if he knew everything, and listening to him, she truly began to believe.

“Do tell me, lass. Tell me of your mother’s life in America. She was happy?”

“What?” Libby was still enthralled by the glowing stone. “Yes. I think she was happy. She had a good life, but she never forgot Scotland. She would sit on our front porch and stare out at the sea as if she was trying to look all the way to it. When I, or my fath—” Libby caught herself, explained. “I was adopted by a man named Charles Hutchinson, who married my mother after she left here. He brought us to America to live. Until my mother passed away, I never knew he wasn’t my real father.”

Gil’s expression stilled. “Oh. Did she love him very much?”

“My fath—” She corrected again. “Charles?” Libby thought about it, thought about her childhood and thought about the woman her mother had been, the woman Libby was just coming to know. “In a way. I believe she did love him, but it wasn’t a passionate love like the one she shared with Fraser Mackay. I would call it a ‘comfortable’ love, one that provided her with support, a home, a place to raise her daughter. It was a happy home. I can never remember words being raised in anger. But they never had any other children. It was always only me.”

“Then he was a good man, this Charles Hutchinson, a good father to you, as well. I think Fraser would have been pleased to know that your mother found someone who so admirably took you and her into his heart.”

Libby nodded. “Yes, I would like to think so. Perhaps he even had a hand in my mother meeting him.” She looked at him. “Is he buried here?”

“Fraser? Aye.” He pointed across to the corner of the graveyard. “Just there.”

Libby walked in the direction he pointed, coming to a granite obelisk that looked more recent than most of the other stones in the cemetery.

IN MEMORY OF FRASER IAN CALUM MACKAY, LAST OF THE MACKAYS OF WRATH, A BELOVED SON WHO WAS TRAGICALLY TAKEN FROM THIS PLACE BY THE WRATHFUL SEA THIS STONE LOOKS UPON AND FOR WHICH THIS PLACE IS NAMED.

It was followed by a passage from the Bible. There was, Libby noticed, no mention made of his having left a widowed wife, or the child she had then carried.

Libby took a breath, spying a clump of still blooming heather just on the outside of the cemetery, fading violet against the coming dullness of winter. She knelt to break off a sprig of it and closed her eyes in silent tribute, laying it at the foot of her father’s memorial, all the while wondering how different her life might have been had this man, her father, lived to make the difference he’d so wanted.

*

Libby spent quite a lot of time over the next several days with Sean MacNally, sitting at the small table in his kitchen, detailing a sort of preliminary list of improvements that could be made to the village if her case to regain the estate succeeded.

The capital to help fund the improvements would come mostly from the village itself, by way of the sale of certain properties to tenants who had lived on the land for generations. Those who couldn’t afford to buy their properties outright could be helped with mortgages and grants arranged by the Highland Council by way of a special program that had been established and had, in the past, assisted other communities in buying out portions of other estates.

Libby’s first priority was the school, and the purchase of an updated computer system, with capability for the Internet and a world of resources that this corner of the world had as yet no idea even existed. From the convenience of their computer monitors, the children could visit museums as far away as America, could read books from online libraries. There would be up-to-date textbooks and maps that showed the actual current layout of the globe. The ones they now had hanging on their walls showed East and West Germany as still separate.

After the school, there would be other improvements, and a planned effort to boost tourism in the area, with signposted historic walking trails, a village museum showing life through the centuries, and a bookshop that would carry guidebooks and other titles of interest to the village.

When they were finished, the list they’d compiled took up more than several neatly scripted pages. They forwarded it to Hamish Brodie’s office so that it could be presented at the initial hearing before the Sheriff Court.

All that remained was for the news of the hearing to break.

And when it did, it broke in a big way.

Libby was sitting at the White Heather café with Angus MacLeith, sharing a lunch of lentil soup and ham sandwiches, when Graeme came in, striding straight across the dining room for their corner table. His face immediately betrayed that something was very, very wrong.

He slapped the letter with the instantly recognizable letterhead of Hamish Brodie on the table before her. “What in the bloody hell do you think you’re about?”

“Oy!” Angus immediately stepped in. “You’d better just take a moment, Mr. Mackenzie, and calm yourself.”

Graeme’s outburst had drawn the attention of the other lunch patrons.

“Now why don’t you take a seat and tell me what this is all about?”

“Apparently Miss Hutchinson thinks she has some claim to my home. She has filed an injunction in court attesting that she is some missing Mackay heir who suddenly, magically, discovered the legacy of the Wrath estate.”

Angus had taken up the paperwork and was looking through it. “This is true, Libby?”

She nodded, looking at them both. “I didn’t know of it when I came first here. I never knew it but my mother had been married to Fraser Mackay. I never knew that I was his daughter. I only found out about the legacy after I arrived in the village and started to uncover the truth.”

Angus was still flipping through the pages. “These documents certainly seem to support that, Mr. Mackenzie.”

“Graeme,” Libby began, “I had no idea this would have anything to do with you. You’re the castle caretaker. It’s my father’s mother, Lady Venetia Mackay, that I seek to stop. She has been acting as the trustee for the estate since the death of my grandfather, only what neither of you, what nobody in this village realizes, is that she means to sell the entire estate to a Dutch mineral drilling company that will come in and no doubt start evicting tenants to build a facility. She sold the rights to the castle only because she had to protect it. It is written as such in the Mackay trust. But the land of the estate is not protected and can be disposed of however she might wish.”