Finding Fraser (40 page)

Having learned my lesson from Genesie and
her knitting needles well, I sat quietly and nodded as the bus rocked side to
side.

 
“And mind, I’m from Stirling, m’self, and
I were there when that young movie star fella came to town to premiere the
thing. You know he never stepped out of his big black car, not even the once?
Kept them limousine windows dark as the devil’s arse, never mind all them folk
around, waitin’ to see him, all who’d put their lives on hold while he filmed
his movie.”

She made a noise in the back of her throat.
“He tries to claim he’s Australian, yeh know, but the man is American through
and through.”

She nodded her head at this pronouncement;
as if this was the worst insult she could come up with. Rant over, she gathered
up her needles and the wooly project she’d been working on. The bus wheezed and
farted and as we slowed, she reached down for her knitting bag, her former
placid expression completely restored.

“Where ever yer headed, ye’d do worse than
to stop in Stirling for an hour and visit the shrine tae the Wallace,” she
said, as I stood up. “It’ll gi’e yeh an education, if now’t else.”

So, that’s what I did.

A Fleeting Foray…

2:00 pm, Sept 1

Cathy’s Café, Stirling, Scotland

A brief pause in the journey——a
final fleeting foray into the past, as prescribed by a wise woman I met earlier
today.

A few thoughts on the best way to spend
the last days of a journey:

Let spontaneity rule the day, as you
never know what’s behind the next corner.

Look past the standard tourist fare and
seek out locations where real people live their lives. Common ground can be
found in the craziest places!

Listen——to any local willing
to share a bit of their story. You will learn more than you think——and
you will thank me.

And now I go to learn more of the
Wallace, and his role in the shaping of the country.

About time, wouldn’t you say?

- ES

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I’d
told myself when I stepped off the bus that I’d just take a quick look at the
Wallace monument, and then head south again.
But
the first thing I saw when alighting in Stirling was an Internet cafe. I
reasoned a quick look at my email wouldn’t hurt. I had decided not to tell
Sophia when I was returning just yet—prolonging the inevitable, I suppose.

I splurged and caught a cab from the bus
station. Stirling was almost like a smaller version of Edinburgh; with a
medieval center to its old town, topped by a castle at the end of a long,
winding road. The castle looked interesting, perched above the city like a gray
eagle. A single building stood out from the rest, shining like gold in the hot
afternoon sun.

“It’s grand, innit?” said the cab driver, as
he wound me through the city and away from the castle. “It’s called the King’s
Gold, but is really just a limestone wash. The whole great hall has been
reconstructed, though—ye really ought to take time to see it.”

“I have to get to Edinburgh today,” I said,
staring back over my shoulder regretfully. “But maybe just a quick look.”

“Ach, weel, tha’s a shame, tha’ is,” said
the cabbie. “Enjoy looking around the castle. And as for the rest, yeh can
allus return next year, aye?”

“Aye,” I said, absently. “Aye.”

It was the off-season rates that pulled
me in. And the stories of the Bruce and the Wallace and all the other heroes
who had tread the soil of Stirling, in its place between the Highlands and the
Lowlands of this great country. I found myself a student again. Just trying to
learn something before heading back to America.

It’s amazing how quickly the days can pass,
especially when one is already “an overstay”…

Ten days after I had first stepped off
the bus in Stirling, I found myself among a crowd standing at the base of the
Wallace Monument.

It was the last significant landmark remaining
for me to visit in the area. I had spent several days exploring the castle and
the town of Stirling, with its jails and its refurbished townhouses and
interpretive centers. It seemed everywhere I wandered I could learn something
new. But there, among a busload of late-season tourists listening to a man
portraying one of Wallace’s soldiers explain his part of the uprising, I knew
it had to be my last day. I’d used up the last of the ‘little bit extra’ I’d
saved over what a plane ticket would cost, which was at a premium since I was
buying so last-minute. I had enough to catch the bus to Edinburgh, and perhaps
buy dinner, if I was lucky.

I looked up at the tower, feeling faintly
disappointed. I hadn’t realized until I arrived that, by Scottish standards at
least, it was practically new. Built in the nineteenth century by Scottish
patriots who felt that Wallace had never been given his due, it towered above
the surrounding countryside. But it was built closer to my time than his, and I
felt a little sad that this comparatively new edifice would be my last
experience in Scotland.

Still. The description noted that at least
seven significant battlefields could be viewed from its turrets. It sounded
impressive. It looked impressive. I climbed all the way up the crag to see
these very views.

But I never saw a single one.

You’d think, being practically a modern
building and all, the patriots would have thought to put a reasonable staircase
into the thing. But no—Scots practicality won over all, and the only way
to scale the two hundred forty six steps of the tower was by spiral staircase.

A tight, dark spiral staircase.

I would have been fine—or if not
completely fine, at least able to make it to the top—if there had been a
window half way. The stairway was clear when I started up, and I didn’t run
into anyone as I climbed. But the first room into which the stairway emerged
was packed. Inside, a weird William Wallace hologram spoke of the battle.
Across the room, admirers encircled the man’s mighty broadsword in its
illuminated glass case.

I could feel my heart begin to squeeze in my
chest. I knew I was at least half way up the tower, and I knew the top would be
open to the air. But in front of me, a large man clutching a melting ice cream
cone lumbered toward the tight staircase. I couldn’t take my eyes off the sight
of his substantial buttocks bulging below a straining leather belt. A climb to
the top meant his ass would be my view all the way up that tight, dark,
twisting stair.

Before I knew what was happening, my legs
had propelled me forward. I elbowed past the man and his ice cream and flung
myself down the stairs. I pushed past at least two families on the way down,
and one woman had to clutch her child’s hand to prevent him falling down behind
me. “I’m sorry,” I muttered each time, but by the time I got to the bottom, I
was in full-out panic mode. I ran out through the door, past the performer
still in full voice as a soldier and down the winding path through the trees.

I’d run almost all the way down the crag
before lack of oxygen and muscular exhaustion slowed me to a walk. I was
panting and trying not to cry, and collapsed onto a bench near the entrance to
the gift shop to try and collect myself.

I dropped my head into my hands, and went
straight for the heart of the matter. My claustrophobia was one thing, but this
had been so much worse. The kindly Genesie-clone, the cab driver—even the
cranky bus driver. Every step that had taken me away from Nairn, away from all
I had grown to love, was making me sadder and more desperate. Knowing this was
the last stop before the airport in Edinburgh had obviously flipped some kind
of switch inside my head.

I took a deep, shuddering breath. Going back
to Chicago—I could no longer think of it as home—wouldn’t be that
bad. I would find a way to get back here.

I would.

And right then, the police arrived.

I’m not sure how it happened. One minute
I was sitting on the bench, trying to get a grip on myself, and the next a
police car had pulled up beside me.

Since the six-month tourist visa time limit
had passed, I had been a little nervous when I caught sight of a policeman, but
really? I wasn’t
that
worried. If
someone did find out I’d overstayed my welcome, I could always play the
ignorance card. Sitting there on the bench below the Wallace Monument, I was,
if anything, less worried than I had been since I’d left Nairn. I was, after
all, on my way to the Edinburgh airport.

I did feel a little guilty, remembering
Matthew, the sweet airport employee who’d refunded me the ticket money in
Inverness all those months ago. But I was on my way, and his airline was still
the one who was going to take my money and fly me home.

Of course it was.

So when the police car slowed down beside me
and the window scrolled down, I couldn’t have been less concerned.

“Are ye all right, Miss?” the policewoman
asked me.

And I bolted like a rabbit.

I have no idea why. I’ve always wondered,
when watching various cops and robbers shows, why the robbers would run for it,
especially when there was never any question they’d be caught. On camera.

Didn’t stop me. I took a straight right turn
and headed into the field, the ‘Bad Boys’ theme ringing in my head. “Dammit,
Hamish,” I muttered, as I picked up speed. I hated to think the only thing I’d
taken from our relationship was a pop-song fixation.

The field, I knew, backed into a wood. I’d
seen it on my way up with the cab driver, and I’d run through part of it once
already, on my way down from the monument. If I could make the wood, I could
hide there until the police lost interest in me, and then hop a bus before they
knew I was gone.

It was an excellent plan.

Behind me, I could hear a strangled cry, and
someone yelling “Wait! Stop!”

I didn’t stop.

As I ran, I saw a goat standing behind the
low rock wall separating my field from the next. He had four horns on his head,
and looked like someone had splashed his white coat with black paint. He seemed
entirely unperturbed at the sight of a stranger blundering past.

For the past six months, I had been riding a
bike twice a day, not to mention the miles walked between tables at the cafe
and up and down the fields with Morag. I not only had panic on my side, I had a
bit of muscle.

And I would have made it—I really
would have—but for the kissing gate in the field.

Obviously, I knew kissing gates. I’d learned
how they worked the very first day I’d met Morag, and I’d even been quite
memorably kissed up against one. The gate below the Wallace monument attached
to a stile on either side; perfect for leaping over if one was a human, less so
for cattle. Or goats.

Not at all worried, I took a flying leap
over the stile, but somehow managed to clip the toe of my Converse between the
two sides of the gate. Seconds later, I was being sat-upon by a large
policewoman, who was possessed of a substantial body mass, but was very damned
fast, for all that. She pulled my arms behind my back and cuffed me. Considering
I had just been through a major bout of panic-driven claustrophobia, I didn’t
take to the cuffs very well.

“I cannae uncuff ye, Miss, until ye give me yer
name,” she said, when I paused for breath.

This left me so confused that I forgot to
feel panicky. “Don’t you know my name?” I gasped. “Why would you arrest me if
you don’t know my name?”

“You’re not under arrest, madam. That is—I
would prefer if you’ just assist me by telling me your name.”

“It’s Emma Sheridan,” I said, hanging my
head. “Can you please just take the cuffs off?”

“Look, luv,” she said, kindly. “I dinnae
know who you are, but even in America, ye must know that if ye run from the
police we
will
chase you. No why
would ye think I’d want to arrest ye on this fine day?”

“I—I’ve overstayed my visa. But I was
heading to the airport today, I swear.”

The policewoman looked thoughtful. “Well, I
have to say we’re not generally in the habit of arresting tourists, especially
on their way home. But ye
did
run, so
let’s just walk back to the car and get this sorted, a’right?”

In the end, I was ignominiously perp-walked
back through the Wallace Monument field. The spotted goat viewed me balefully,
chewing. The police officer, whose name was Doris, carried my backpack and
helped me over the fence to the waiting police car.