Her father had believed the dream, had sold all he possessed to buy a passage on the first brave voyage. But the golden dream had turned a nightmare. Both the English and the Spanish had opposed the Scottish settlement at Darien, and nothing there remained except the natives and the empty huts of those who would have built themselves an empire.
The Duke of Hamilton had been outspoken in condemning those who’d played a hand in Darien’s undoing, and he looked at her with newfound kindness as he said, ‘It was by God’s grace that you did not travel with them, else you, too, had lost your life.’ He thought a moment. ‘Would you then be kin to William Paterson?’
The merchant and adventurer who first had dreamed of Darien, and who had set its fateful wheel in motion.
She said, ‘I believe he is a distant cousin, but we have not met.’
‘That is, perhaps, as well for you.’ He smiled, and settled back to think. ‘So you would travel north to Slains?’
She had glanced at him, not daring yet to hope…
‘You will have need of one to guide you, and protect you from the perils of the road,’ he had continued, still in thought. ‘I have a man in mind who might be like to suit your purpose, if you are content to trust my judgment.’
She had asked, ‘Who is the man, Your Grace?’
‘A priest, named Mr Hall. He knows the way to Slains, he has been there on my behalf before. And you would have no cause for fear,’ he’d told her, ‘in his company.’
No cause for fear. No cause for fear.
She slipped again upon the horse, and Mr Hall stretched out a hand to right her in the saddle. ‘We are here,’ he said, encouraging. ‘I see the lights of Slains ahead.’
She shook herself awake and looked, eyes strained against the evening mists that swirled upon the barren lands around them. She could see the lights as well—small dots of yellow burning in the blackened spears of turrets, and unyielding walls. Below, unseen, she heard the North Sea raging on the rocks, and closer by, a dog began to bark a sharp alarm, unwelcoming.
But when she would have held her horse back, hesitant, a door swung wide and light spilled warm across the roughened turf. A woman came towards them, in a widow’s gown of mourning. She was not young, but she was handsome, and she walked towards them hatless, without shawl or cloak, and heedless of the damp.
‘Your arrival is most fortunate,’ she told them. ‘We shall presently be sitting down to supper. Bed your horses in the stable, you will find my groom to help you,’ she instructed Mr Hall. ‘The lass can come with me. She will be wishing to refresh herself, no doubt, and dress.’ She held a hand to help the girl dismount, introducing herself. ‘I am Anne,’ she said, ‘Countess of Erroll, and, till my son’s marriage, the mistress of Slains. I do fear I’ve forgotten your name.’
The girl’s voice was hoarse from disuse, and she had to clear her throat before she spoke. ‘Sophia Paterson.’
‘Well, then,’ said the countess, with a smile that seemed at odds with the bleak landscape at her back, ‘I bid you welcome home, Sophia.’
CHAPTER 4
SOMEBODY WAS KNOCKING at the cottage door.
It took a while to register. Still half-asleep, I raised my head a little stiffly from where it had lain the past few hours across my arm, outstretched along the hard wood table. My laptop computer had grown tired of waiting for me to go on, and had switched to the screen-saver, infinite stars rushing at me and past me as though I were hurtling through space.
I blinked, and then remembering, I tapped a key and watched the words scroll past. I hadn’t really believed they would be there. Hadn’t really believed that I’d written them. I’d never been a fast writer, and five hundred words in one day was, to me, a good effort. A thousand words left me ecstatic. Last night, in one sitting, I’d written twice that, with such ease I felt sure it had all been a dream.
But it hadn’t been. Here was the evidence, plain black and white on the screen, and I couldn’t help feeling the way I might feel if I’d opened my eyes to discover a dinosaur in my front garden. With disbelieving hands, I saved the document again and hit the key to print.
The knocking came a second time. I scraped back in my chair, and stood, and went across to answer it.
‘I didna mean tae waken ye.’ Jimmy Keith was all apology, although he had no reason to be, given that it was, as near as I could tell, the middle of the day.
I lied. ‘You didn’t, that’s all right.’ I clenched my cheeks to hold the yawn back that would have betrayed me. ‘Please, come in.’