‘Of course not, Mrs Moore.’ He grips the handle, squeezing the side panels to release a catch that clicks smartly, and frees a vicious, serrated blade, encased inside the walking stick. Their eyes meet. ‘Ah. Thank you,’ Araminta says. ‘How helpful.’
Chapter Thirty-Two
Grizel Campbell feels that her boarding house has been overtaken. She’s never had a guest quite like her old friend for the quantity of visitors and the long list of requirements. This morning already a basket of conserves and pickles has been received from the convent as if Grizel’s cook does not make her own most acceptable comestibles, and the doctor has called to check Sister Winifred’s bindings. Messages come and go at an alarming rate. Bella is run ragged, though the girl seems cheerful and appears to like the old lady in the top suite. Grizel does not recall that Sister Winifred required so much attention in the old days.
She watches from the drawing room window as the McKenzie carriage pulls up. Mr Brodie and the coachman cursorily check the empty laneway behind the building, and then more carefully, the fringes of Queen Street Garden. Grizel wonders what exactly they are looking for. It seems unlikely Mr Thom will return, what with Mr McLevy enquiring after him and the neighbours alerted. Then as Araminta and Eleanor are handed down, she opens the door before they knock. Behind the women, the butler and coachman are carrying two large parcels. It’s beginning to feel as if Winifred is taking over. The nun has still not divulged what she’s up to and Grizel remains suspicious. Her folk were Hanoverians from the off and the mention of Jacobites the last time Araminta called is uncomfortable. She keeps returning to it. Any mention of Charles Edward Stuart feels at best ill-advised and, at worst, a downright embarrassment.
Nonetheless, Grizel says, ‘Come away,’ opening the close doorway and leading the party upstairs.
She lets everyone enter the bedroom ahead of her. Winifred is sitting up, reading another of Mr Thom’s books. She never used to read half so much, as Grizel recalls. As young women the pair of them gossiped about their parents’ friends and Mr Hume’s strange pink turban and the move to the New Town which both families made in the same year. At first the girls missed the hubbub of the old place and declared themselves bored by the New Town’s emptier streets and classical vistas. There used to be more fun, she thinks. Giggling especially.
‘Visitors,’ Grizel announces briskly, and Winifred puts down the book.
‘Araminta,’ she greets her great niece, ignoring everybody else, especially Mr Brodie though she pulls her bedjacket closed.
Brodie and Davey prop the painting and the mirror carefully against the wall.
‘Whatever are you doing? Poor Mother,’ Winifred says when she sees the picture.
‘Clementina McKenzie,’ Araminta announces.
Grizel bristles. It’s such a Jacobite name.
‘She’s the thirteenth,’ Araminta adds. ‘I need your help.’
She motions to Brodie to move the mirror into place. Grizel’s lips tighten as the painting reveals its secret, though Winifred gives a chesty laugh. She reaches out to her great niece. ‘Help me up,’ she says. Araminta does so. Winifred winces but does not complain as she pulls the sheets aside and steps out of bed. In thick bedsocks she pads across the floorboards. ‘Clever,’ she says.
‘Do you know where it is?’ Araminta asks.
Winifred shakes her head.
Araminta sighs. ‘It doesn’t even look Scottish to me. Does it look Scottish to you?’
Winifred’s eyes widen, the idea dropping that Berenice perhaps hid the Queen’s Honours somewhere unthinkable. ‘Surely not England,’ she gets out.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ Grizel says, unable to hold back.
Winifred and Araminta turn, as if noticing her for the first time.
‘What is it, dear?’ Winifred asks.
Grizel’s expression is frozen. Araminta thinks the old woman’s face reminds her of a bead-eyed blackbird about to peck a worm. ‘I won’t have this Jacobite nonsense,’ she says. ‘Not in my house.’
‘What do you mean?’ Winifred asks. ‘This isn’t a picture of the Bonnie Prince and even if it were, it’s over a century old.’
‘They burned it down. I’m sure there are those who’ll never forgive that,’ Grizel spits.
‘Burned what down?’
Grizel gestures towards the reflection. ‘The palace,’ she says. ‘The redcoats razed it in 1746. It’s a ruin now. There’s not even a roof and the palisade is completely gone.’
‘You know where this building is?’ Araminta surmises.
‘It doesn’t look like that any longer. It’s Linlithgow Palace,’ Grizel replies. ‘My aunt lives in the town. I suppose the Jacobites will go on about what happened forever. The gates of Traquair House being locked. Linlithgow open to the skies. All that Stuart nonsense. But they lost the conflict. They brought it on themselves. Things might not be perfect but the Hanoverians are the future.’ She turns to Winifred. ‘I thought you’d know better! Really I did.’ Her eyes are burning.
‘Linlithgow,’ Araminta repeats, unsure where this place might be.
‘Mary Queen of Scots was born there,’ Winifred recalls. ‘It’s a couple of hours’ ride from Edinburgh. I’ve never been.’
