Beneath the Abbey Wall (42 page)

Don needed to deal with one pain at a time, and the pain of his lost boy would wait, but never vanish. Thoughts of Joyce filled his days and nights; awake and asleep, it was always the same regrets and the same great big burning shame.

“I never knew, not till it was too late.” Don murmured this to himself, but Jenny heard.

“She always regretted lying to you,” Jenny said, although she knew there was no comfort in the thought.

“She only lied to me about defying her father. All the rest she told me when she returned from India.”

Jenny had often wondered if Don had known they had a son. Now she knew.

“And it was me who threw her out and . . . ”

“You were no' yourself after the war, all those burns and everything, then you was locked up in thon institution . . . ”

He held up his hand to ward off the interruption from Jenny. “No, I said something unforgivable . . . ”

She saw he needed to tell someone, only she wished she wasn't the one who had to listen. She wanted it over. She had had enough. But she cared for Don, so she said nothing, only nodding and inserting an
Aye,
or a
Terrible,
or a soft soothing noise as though she were hushing a frightened mare, while he recounted the saga of himself and Joyce McLeod, née Mackenzie.

“Joyce didn't show me the letter from her father—the one where he banned her from marrying me, threatening to disinherit her. She insisted we get married. So we did. But we told no one.”

He wished he was drinking more than tea but held onto his vow to give up the spirits. “Then, only a couple o' weeks after the wedding, I found the letter. I was furious, and sick to the
stomach. What could I give her? I had no job, not then, I had no money—only renting thon pokey wee house that's now mine. She said money didn't matter, but I was ashamed I couldn't provide for her. And I may have been poor back then, but I was rich enough for a bottle of whisky.”

Many bottles, he remembered.

“Not that I'm using this as an excuse, missus.” Don looked into Jenny's eyes as he said this. “But I was hurting bad, a terrible pain it was, and I wasn't sleeping . . . ”

The memories of floating in a burning sea of oil and debris, of his fellow sailors, some with their hair on fire, perishing within arm's length of him, and the terrible struggle to avoid being sucked under in the whirlpool the ship created as she sank to her death in the Dardanelles, was as vivid as if it had happened yesterday, not forty years since.

“So there was I, newly married, drinking, nursing my grudge at her
making me marry her when we didn't have to,
was how I put it, and all the while not noticing what was happening.” He rubbed his chin. He ran his fingers through his thick dark grey hair. He was steeling himself to say the unsayable.

And Jenny, watching him closely, could almost read his mind. Not the words, but she read that something she did not want to hear was about to be said.

“One morning, she was sick in the kitchen sink—she couldn't make it to the lavatory, which was outside in the courtyard in those days. I asked her what was wrong and she said, ‘There's nothing wrong, it's wonderful news.'”

He could still hear her voice, in that posh educated accent that he so hated way back then, he could hear her saying
wonderful news,
and it had filled him with terror.

“If you're saying what I think you're saying . . . ” He remembered staring at her pale face; her bright eyes, looking into his,
desperate for his approval. And he remembered, could never forget, how his words—slow, deliberate—had pierced her, almost as fatally as his filleting knife that had ended her life.

“‘I know an auld nurse,'” I told her. “‘She can put an end to all that—for a financial consideration.'” He was sitting as he said this, watching Joyce. Watching her slump onto a wooden kitchen chair, one hand on the table to stop herself falling.

Then he had delivered the coup de grâce—
“Now I know why you were so keen to marry in spite of your father forbidding it”
—and left the house without another word.

He returned a few days later to a note saying she had gone to Assynt, to her family home. He had embarked on a drinking session that lasted seventeen days, ending up in a police cell, where a doctor subsequently had him committed as a possible suicide threat. That, along with his burns, which had not healed properly, made the doctor sign the form sending him to the Princess Louise Hospital for Limbless Soldiers and Sailors.

“Even though I hadn't lost a limb, I was crippled wi' pain and I needed the counseling. I was nearly two years in thon place. I saw so many men worse off than me that I grew right ashamed o' myself.” He shuddered at the memory. “I wrote to Joyce. But there was no reply.”

“She was in hospital herself that year. No' in her right mind.”
And she never wanted anything to do with her wee baby,
Jenny remembered. “Then she took off to India.”

“Where she, quite rightly, behaved as though the marriage had never happened,” Don said.

“And where Archie Smart was waiting, his father having told him Joyce had had a bairn—and no known father for her child.”

“She told me, years later, she had married him to keep the peace and avoid a scandal that would ruin her father's reputation.”

“Her father was a good man. If he'd known, he'd have
stopped her.” Jenny McPhee said this, not quite believing it.
You should never say you know what the dead would have wanted. Who knows what's in another's mind?
was her belief.

“The wonder of it all is how she forgave me.” Don leaned back in his chair, his eyes resting on a circular gap in the canvas where the flue of the fire reached out to the heavens. He was still in awe of his late wife's capacity for forgiveness.

When he said this,
she forgave me,
Jenny heard the lifting of his voice and was glad. She too knew of Joyce's capacity for forgiveness but wished Joyce had not included Archie Smart.

Don looked across at Jenny and, for the first time, smiled. “Joyce told me that all that mattered was love and that this time we would be together—as much as was possible. When Archie came back in a wheelchair, she wouldn't abandon him, saying he was as injured as anyone.”

And she didn't just mean his legs, Jenny knew, for she had once asked Joyce and received the same answer.

“And her old father sent the foreign manny to look out for his lass.”

“And from what I hear, he did his best,” Don added.

“Aye, he did, but I hear he's beside himself that he didn't do more.” Jenny was wrung out. She wanted to be left alone. She had grieving to do. Her Chrissie, Joyce,—and Neil.

Don noticed. Joyce had taught him to.

“We're planning a memorial service for Joyce,” he said.

“Let me know where and when, I'll be there.” Now it was Jenny smiling for the first time in a long time. “She was a good woman, your Joyce.”

“Aye. She was.” He stood, settled his hat on his head, tilted it back, and said, “Thanks, missus.”

And the matter of Neil Stewart would never be mentioned again.

T
en days after Christmas, a parcel arrived, addressed to Misses Annie and Jean Ross. The Canadian stamps were as fascinating to the girls as the content of the box: books, Canadian Mountie badges, and child-size beaver skin hats with earflaps.

For Joanne there was a gold chain with a gold maple leaf charm. There was no letter, just a postcard of the Rocky Mountains and one word—
Sorry
.

She did not reply and burned the parcel wrapping with the return address.

*  *  *  

Almost six weeks had passed since Don McLeod returned to work, and Fiona felt the difference; the phone rang more, she had more classified advertising to type up, and it was brighter and lighter and easier working at the
Gazette
. Even Mrs. Buchanan seemed cheerful.

Fiona would never tell, but she knew Betsy had made at least two very expensive long-distance calls to Australia. Betsy had also told her she had good news and would be leaving the
Gazette
but not to say anything to anyone, especially not her mother.

I'm grown up now,
Fiona had almost told Betsy.
I don't tell my mother everything.

The phone rang.

Fiona answered, “
Highland Gazette,
how may I help you?” in
exactly the tone and phrase their teacher had taught them at the Technical High School.

“My name is Mrs. Wilkie. Neil Stewart was my lodger. I want to . . . ”

“Mr. Stewart is not longer with the
Gazette
. He . . . ”

“I know that, you silly girl. I'm phoning about something he left behind.”

“Perhaps you should be calling the police station,” Fiona said, trying her best not to be rude, even though the woman had called her silly.

“Och, forget it,” the landlady said, and hung up.

Fiona thought nothing of the call and told no one.

Mrs. Wilkie decided to keep the bicycle. And the handbag. But she threw away the photograph of a baby.
All babies look alike when they're wee,
she thought.

*  *  *  

In late February when the first snowdrops were pushing up from the cold, cold earth in bright green shoots, Don McLeod met Angus McLean in the solicitor's office.

“I have a letter from a solicitor in Canada,” Angus began. “In it is a certified copy of the birth certificate of Ian Donal Mackenzie McLeod.”

Don said nothing, just waited.

“The solicitor informs me that his client, Ian McLeod, also know as Neil Stewart, wishes to claim the house in Ness Walk belonging to his late mother, Joyce McLeod, née Mackenzie, and asks that when the matter is settled, I sell it on his behalf.”

Again not a word from Don.

“The letter also states that no further claim will be made on the estate of the late Mrs. McLeod, and the client, who wishes to retain the name Neil Stewart, will sign a document to that effect.”

There was a pause. Angus looked at Don and waited for a response.

“Nothing else?”

“No. I'm sorry.” Angus felt a surge of compassion. He looked away, not wanting to seem inquisitive.

“See to it.”

Don stood, put on his hat—he was without an overcoat even though the remains of the snowstorm were still lying, and said, “Good day, Mr. McLean. And thank you for dealing with this”—he pointed to the letter—“this matter.”

He walked towards the
Gazette
. Paused. Glanced down Church Street. Heard the chimes ring out eleven o'clock.
They'll be open,
he told himself.

And he walked to the Market Bar.

Highland Gazette

December 1, 1957

A memorial service to give thanks for the life of the late Mrs. Donal McLeod née Mackenzie will be held in Inchnadamph Parish Church, Sutherland, on the 15th of December.

All are welcome.

Highland Gazette

January 26, 1958

Mr. Peter Kowalski is delighted to announce the birth of his son, Andrew. The grandfather, Mr. Gino Corelli, wishes to add his heartfelt thanks to the staff of Raigmore Hospital. Mother and baby are well.

Once again I want to thank Tran Duc and Li Ly of MangoMango, Hoi An, Vietnam. Thank you for the coffee, the table where I write, the wonderful food, and most of all, the love.

To John Spittal of Perthshire, thanks for the company and for showing me your tree.

To Romay Macintyre of Netherton, the Black Isle, thank you for wonderful breakfasts and the room with a view.

To the Mekong writers: Jennifer, Jennifer, Ruth, and Robyn and that inspirational guide to life, happiness, angst, and writing, Jan Cornall—thank you Jan. “Lang may yer lumb reek.”