The museum itself comprised seven stone and thatched former crofter cottages depicting everyday life on the island one hundred years ago. One had even been inhabited up to 1957. Each croft depicted something different: one was kitted out as an actual house, and a mangle and spinning wheel made a reappearance, much to Rocco’s amusement. There was also a weaver’s house, a smithy and a local shop, and everything was set out as though it were an actual village, and was surrounded by farm implements, small boats and carts.
Giselle and Rocco spent a considerable amount of time in each of the crofts, reading the information boards and learning about the tough lives the people lived and the hardships they endured in a demanding landscape.
‘There’s one thing that stands out above all others,’ Rocco said thoughtfully, as they entered the small gift shop full of books and guides, tartan, tweed and knitted gifts. ‘The sense of community. Everyone had to muck in and help the others.’
‘It’s a theme amongst islanders,’ Giselle replied.
‘One big family?’
‘Kind of.’
‘I’m beginning to get it,’ he said. ‘I think I’m beginning to get Skye.’
‘But you’re still going to sell the castle.’ It was a statement, not a question.
He shrugged helplessly. ‘Skye isn’t my home.’
Not wanting to talk about it anymore, she cast around for something else and caught sight of the cemetery. ‘Shall we go visit Flora MacDonald’s grave now?’ she suggested and pointed to the white spire-like monument visible in the distance.
Rocco readily agreed, and they set off up the hill. The gradient wasn’t steep, but even so, the elevation still gave them a glorious view. The cemetery was surrounded by a rough stone wall and they walked through the gate towards Flora’s grave.
‘Pretty nice for a final resting place,’ Rocco said. ‘So, she brought Bonnie Prince Charlie to Skye. Then what?’
‘Charles Stuart hid on Skye for several weeks before eventually boarding a ship to France. They never saw each other again. She was captured and imprisoned in London but released soon after. She married a MacDonald and lived in Kingsburgh House, and when she died, she was buried here.’
Her gravestone was a narrow white monolith, topped by a Celtic cross. Stone edging surrounded both it and a chunky stone casket. Whether she was interred inside it or buried beneath it, Giselle didn’t know. A plaque on the front of the monument read, ‘Preserver of Prince Charles Edward Stuart’.
‘She was a real heroine,’ Rocco said. ‘Is it her bravery that appeals to you, or her audacity in smuggling her prince to safety?’
‘Her prince,’ Giselle echoed softly. ‘I think she was in love.’
‘With Charles?’
‘If she did do it for love – and I don’t mean love of her country or her king, but love for him as a man – then it’s up there with the other great love stories like Anthony and Cleopatra, and Romeo and Juliet. She loved him so much that she helped him escape, even though she probably knew she’d never see him again, and that it might even cost her her life.’
‘Do you think she was happy in the end? That she found love again?’
‘In those days, love and marriage didn’t necessarily go hand in hand,’ Giselle replied wryly. ‘She mightn’t have had any say in the matter. Single women, even ones of Flora’s fame, didn’t have it easy in the eighteenth century. She lived in North Carolina in the Americas for a time, with her husband and sons, but at some point she left him and returned to Skye, where she died. So maybe she didn’t find love again. Maybe she couldn’t forget her prince and came back to the place she felt closest to him. They say she was buried in a shroud made out of a bedsheet that Bonnie Prince Charlie had slept in.’ Giselle felt tears pricking the back of her eyes and she blinked them away, feeling foolish.
‘That’s beautiful, and sad,’ Rocco said. ‘I feel honoured to be here.’
‘As far as I know, there’s nothing in the archives to suggest she was in love with him. The consensus is that she was simply a staunch Jacobite supporter, which was why she acted the way she did.’
‘But you don’t believe that?’
Mutely, Giselle shook her head. She hoped Charles had felt the same way about Flora. Giselle wanted to believe that life had conspired to keep them apart, and not that her love had been unrequited. Giselle hoped one day she would experience the kind of love she believed Flora had felt for Charles Stuart, and she prayed her own personal prince would love her in return.
‘Claire informs me you’re coming back on Wednesday.’ Beverly’s voice rang out of the speaker on Rocco’s phone. ‘That’s good to know,’ she added, and he heard the admonishment.
She was miffed he hadn’t kept her updated, that she’d had to hear it from someone else.
‘Actually, I’ve changed my mind. Skye’s Highland Games take place on Wednesday and I’d like to be here for them.’
Beverly was silent. Had they been cut off, or had he actually managed to render his mother speechless? If so, it would be a first.
‘I wasn’t aware you had an interest in sport,’ she said eventually.
Rocco didn’t, but this was different. After he’d dropped Giselle off earlier (with a chaste peck on the cheek), he’d hurried back to the castle to look up what a Highland Games consisted of. He hadn’t told Giselle he was thinking of going to Skye’s games, but he hoped she would accompany him.
