An Extract from :

A Double Death on the Black Isle

Achnafern Farm was not much different from many on the Black Isle, but there was a definite air of prosperity. A neat row of four single storey stone farm cottages stood facing a large cobbled square with byres and barns and milking sheds completing the other sides. A little way off, nestled in the lee of the woods, looking out over the fields towards the distant hills that still showed a deep mantle of snow, stood a substantial two-story farmhouse, also built in stone.

A good half-mile away stood Achnafern Grange, an elegant Georgian country house, multi-windowed, three storied plus attics for the servants, the home for generations of same family. Achnafern, the farm, the grange and estate took its name from the Gaelic words describing the surrounding farmland and woodland.

Allie Munro was born in one of the farm cottages. He was now foreman of the estate as had been his father before him. His grandfather had been head ploughman in charge of the teams of horses. Fifteen years ago, Allie, his wife Agnes, their son Fraser and baby Alistair moved from a farm cottage to the big farmhouse.

Even though it was a tied tenure, the house gave him a distinct feeling of pride. He had done well for himself. Not that he would ever let anyone know this. For all the inconvenience, the drafty hallways and the five bedrooms and a study used as the farm office, it was the status of the place that mattered. Now that was all about to vanish.

Agnes Munro had hung out the washing, had tidied up the breakfast, had finished making broth, was now baking a cake and trying to keep herself fresh and tidy before the big event. Her son Fraser, mooching in the chair, feet up on the hearth rail, doing nothing but getting in her way, was ignoring her.

 “Now don’t be making arrangements over Easter,” she was doing her best to keep her annoyance with her eldest son out of her voice, “I need you to help me clear out the house. We’ve that much stuff, and it’s a wee cottage we’re flitting to.”

“She’s a right cheek thon madam, ordering us out of the house we’ve been in for years.”

“Don’t go talking of your betters like that.”

“Ma, Patricia’s no better than you or me.”

“She’s the Laird’s daughter.”

“She’s a stuck up tart.”
At that his mother exploded.

“I’ll no have yer smutty talk in my kitchen. You know nothing. You come back here after ten years, and you’re none the wiser for your time away. She’s a good lass thon. And as for stuck up, who’s the one who helps me out-- taking me to town every fortnight? Patricia. And to the Black Isle Show every year? Patricia. She buys my eggs every week and pays fair. She never forgets Christmas, nor my birthday. Unlike some!”

Fraser Munro at least had the grace to look shamefaced at that. “I’ve been away in some strange places most of the time.”

“Don’t tell me that in the last ten years the army never had a postie.”

“Anyhow, it’s still no right. She canny just up and tell us we have to leave.”

“It’s the estate’s house, and well you know it. And I’m warning you one last time … it’s none of your business.”

She bustled around the Rayburn, banging pots, piling more wood into the fire, making an already hot kitchen almost unbearable. “We have a perfectly nice wee house to move into; much less work for me. You’ll be off back to the regiment soon enough, so with only your brother at home there’ll be plenty of room in the cottage for the three of us.”

She didn’t catch his look. He had yet to tell them, but the army had had enough of Fraser Munro’s insubordination, his drunken sprees and his fighting--this from a Highland regiment notorious for fighters.

The clock in the hallways struck the half hour. Agnes Munro started to panic. She hadn’t picked the roses.

“The cake will be ready in half an hour.” She told him. “Mind and take it out the oven.” She had had her doubts this would happen. “I’ll set the alarm clock to remind you.”

“For heaven’s sake mother, I’m no that useless.”

She didn’t say what was on the tip of her tongue and hurried upstairs, threw off her apron, dabbed some powder on her nose, smudged on a small amount of lipstick, smacked her lips, put on the single strand of pearls Allie bought her for their silver wedding anniversary, put on her best coat then perched her best Sunday hat on top of the new home perm hoping it would stay put because it was often windy down by the old cathedral.

When she left, Mrs. Munro pulled the back door to as quietly as she could.
It’s ridiculous I should be hiding from my own son, she thought as she went into the garden. She selected some flowers for the Joanne’s corsage, lily of the valley for the children. There was not much available in her garden, spring being always late in the Highlands.  She snipped some narcissus filling out the bridal bouquet with ferns. Not her choice but it was what Patricia wanted.
Patricia’s wedding day, not how I pictured it, but as long as she’s happy. Mrs. Munro sighed with her whole body. It was hard for her to hold back her disappointment at Patricia’s choice of husband. He was a man Mrs. and Mr. Munro hardly knew, but they had heard enough over the years.
Mrs. Munro would never have voiced her thoughts to anyone, only her husband knew how she loved Patricia. With Mrs. Ord Mackenzie in a hospital in Edinburgh ‘for her nerves’ the doctor had said, the baby girl had been given to Mrs. Munro to look after, suckled by Mrs. Munro until she was weaned, and lived with the Munros almost as their daughter until she was nearly three. Only then had Mrs. Ord Mackenzie become aware of the gossip about their only child being raised in the farmhouse and taken Patricia to live in Achnafern Grange.

“By then the damage had been done,” Mrs. Ord Mackenzie told her daughter – often.

Only when Fraser heard the toot of the car horn and the squeak of the garden gate--one more job he hadn’t done-- did he stir himself from his chair to go to the window. Like the beast of prey he was, he always pounced on his mother’s vulnerabilities.

He stood, the rush from his hangover making him swear. He watched Patricia get out of the Landrover, hug his mother, take the basket of flowers and put it in the back. She made a quick neat three point turn, and they were gone.
“Now what the hell is that all about?”

Glad of the peace with no mother to nag him, ask him why he wasn’t helping his dad, giving him jobs to do around the house or telling him off for getting in her road, he dozed in the chair for a good forty minutes. He became aware of the smell of the cake. He ignored it. At first it was a slight scent of burning, then a full-blown blast of incinerated sugar and butter and eggs. He ignored it. Eventually the smoke forced him out of his chair. He opened the oven door, grabbed a tea towel, and took out the cake and chucked it, tin, tea towel, burnt offering, into the sink. He left the smoke-filled kitchen, grabbed his coat and cap, deciding to make for the village, then, remembering he would have to walk, remembering he was furious with his father because he would not let him borrow the farm Landrover, remembering he would have to help with the flitting this weekend, he felt a surge of rage, a sudden, blinding red rage.

“Thon bitch.”

Yet somewhere within him, if he had had the slightest desire to examine his soul, he would have recognized that the sight of his mother and Patricia hugging was what did it. His rage was a rage of bright green jealousy.

 

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An Extract from :

A Small Death in the Great Glen

He dressed the boy’s body whilst it was still warm. Getting the clothes back on was easy. Such a skinny wee thing, the body weighed next to nothing. No, no weight at all.

Dark came around five o’clock this time of the year and an hour or so later most people would be home in front of the fire. No moon either, luckily. Time to move, in the deep dark before anyone came looking; now was the time to get rid of him.

He hefted the boy in a fireman’s lift over his left shoulder. Feet against his back, head and arms dangling down in front. His nose rubbed against the wool of the child’s jacket. The body had lost its smell; that sweet savory tang of boy had gone.

The old greatcoat had once been home. He had slept in it, sheltered in it, flames and flying embers had singed it but not penetrated the thick felted wool. Just the job.

Carefully he draped the coat over the body, fussed with the folds, arranging the collar to cover the head, making sure no stray hand or foot poked out. He gave a slow birl, checking the effect in the hall mirror. Fine. Looked natural enough.

The streetlights, dim and far apart, were on one side of the road only. Large sycamores overhung the footpath, a sighing tunnel of black. He walked confidently, out for an evening stroll, his burden lightly carried. Not far to go. He met no one. But anyone noticing him and his bundle would never look twice.

The last part was tricky. An exposed track, a hundred yards or so, ran up to the canal. Gorse, whin and elder bushes would give no cover. Luck was still with him. He reached the lock, peered through the dark, nothing, no one, not a sound.

Holding it by the arms, he lowered the bundle. Feet, body, head then arms, it slipped down into the vortex. No splash, just a sigh as the water closed over the wee soul sending out ripples that set the stars dancing in the still water.

The man, clasping his hands, muttered a prayer, smiled a half smile, put the greatcoat on. All done, thank goodness.