Highland Peril Read online

  The jewels were not among the seeds.

  “Elizabeth. She stole the jewels,” Christian said in a low, deadly voice.

  Hadn’t Elizabeth stopped repeatedly on the path from Castle Dunnottar to adjust the bag in her worthless hand? She must have dislodged the jewels when she stopped, leaving them behind for retrieval at a later time.

  “The wretch!” Christian hissed. “Where can the jewels be?”

  “We do not have the luxury of looking for them right now. We must reunite the Crown with the other regalia before the English realize they are missing and come looking for them.”

  Christian, her hands fumbling and clumsy, quickly wrapped the Crown in swaths of linen, then she and her husband placed the Crown lovingly under the floorboard. They gazed for one long moment at the relics under the kirk floor before Reverend Grainger replaced the board. Helping his wife to her feet, he looked at her with alarm and intensity in his eyes.

  “What are we going to tell people when the relics are unearthed?”

  “I do not know,” she replied. “Perhaps we can locate Elizabeth and force her to tell us where she has hidden the jewels.”

  “She has promised to disappear and never to reveal her whereabouts to us.”

  “There must be someone who knows where she is. Perchance a family member? I seem to recall Elizabeth having a sister.”

  But Elizabeth had planned carefully, despite the short time she had to do so. She had disappeared, along with her sister, and once they reached their destination they would never tread upon Scottish soil again.

  Oliver Cromwell was in control of the land of the Scots. Christian and her husband, the Reverend Grainger, went about their daily duties—she working in the house and in the garden, he exemplifying the ways of God and keeping his flock on the path to righteousness.

  One night Christian crept out of their home and through the darkness to the kirk, looking over her shoulder all the while to make sure she hadn’t been seen or followed by an English soldier. Once inside with the door safely bolted behind her, she walked in silence to the place where the Honours of Scotland were still hidden. Kneeling down, she pried up the floorboard and laid it to her side. She reached into the hole and gently pulled out the bundles wrapped in linen, gazing at them with urgent reverence. She must hurry. She had brought with her another bundle of linens. She unwrapped the relics one by one and rewrapped them in the fresh, clean linens.

  She replaced the wooden floorboard, then slipped out the back of the kirk and returned home by a different path, still in darkness, still watching and listening for Cromwell’s soldiers.

  During the long years of the war with England, Christian stole away in the darkness of the night often to rewrap the Honours in clean cloths, and to satisfy herself that they were safe under the kirk floor.

  Though Christian and the Reverend rarely spoke about the gems Elizabeth had somehow removed from the Honours, on the nights that she rewrapped the relics her husband would wait for her in the darkness. In the quiet of their bedroom, they would wonder softly when the theft would be discovered. Their clandestine attempts to locate Elizabeth had failed, and they wondered if they would be held responsible. But when the morning came they would resume their daily duties once again, deferring any further discussion of the Honours until the next time Christian would visit the kirk in the darkness.

  * * *

  After Elizabeth left Christian and the Reverend Grainger, she waited in the wood and watched them drive away, the deep charcoal night settling around her in the stillness. But she could not afford to tarry. Joan would be waiting for her.

  She hastened to her sister’s house, which sat along a faint dirt track on the other side of the wood. Elizabeth knew the way, even in the darkness. Holding her skirt and feeling for the trees, which reached out to block her way, she scanned the path in front of her for the candle that Joan had promised to leave burning. Before long she saw a tiny pinprick of light. A nervous, churning feeling began to seep into her body. She and Joan would never be able to return to Kinneff or the surrounding countryside after this night. Her deception would be discovered in a few short hours—she and Joan needed to vanish before then.

  As the pinprick of light grew into a dull flame, Elizabeth quickened her steps. She peered through the darkness, which seemed to have intensified as she drew closer to the house. Would Joan be wavering in her commitment to join her? Would she resent Elizabeth for putting them both into the precarious situation of having to flee Scotland?

  Elizabeth knocked one time on the thin wooden door of Joan’s house, the sisters’ agreed-upon signal for Joan to open the door. If anyone else had knocked on her door in the dead of night, Joan would have feared bandits. Or worse.

  Joan opened the door and, taking Elizabeth’s arm, pulled her younger sister into the house without ceremony. She slammed the door.

  “Are ye ready?” Elizabeth asked, breathless from her trek through the wood.

  “Aye.”

  “Then extinguish the flame and let us leave.”

  “Do ye have the gems hidden in the folds of thy frock?”

  “Nay. I had to bury them closely under the ground outside the castle.”

  “What?” Joan hissed. “How are we to retrieve them?”

  “When we stop at dawn, I will draw a map to allow thee to find them. I will not forget where I hid the pouch, along the ground near the castle, but if danger or death should befall me, thou will be able to find the gems and live in comfort into thy dotage.”

  “Are ye sure the mistress and the Reverend Grainger know nothing of this?”

  “I am sure.”

  “Let us go.” Joan reached for two small bundles, which lay on the floor beside the door. She handed one to Elizabeth, kept one for herself, and blew out the candle.

  The sisters stole away to the north, along the edge of a stream that flowed through the wood. They were walking toward the land belonging to Castle Dunnottar, where they would retrieve what Elizabeth had hidden not so many hours before. As the dawn brushed the sky with strokes of the lightest pink, they turned away from the water and plunged deeper into the nearby wood. There they would take turns sleeping and staying alert for robbers or other threats. Though Joan had made sure to place a sharpened knife in each of the bundles, both sisters knew they would be doomed if ever they were required to defend themselves.

  Elizabeth slept first. She slept lightly, waking with each slight noise in the underbrush. But she slumbered again quickly each time, secure in the trust she placed in Joan to alert her if any danger should present itself.

  When she awoke with a clearer head, she motioned for Joan to lie down. Though it would be uncomfortable on the ground with just leaves on which to rest her head, Elizabeth knew Joan would be able to sleep quickly. While Joan slept, Elizabeth reached into her bundle and pulled out the quill and small inkwell she had asked Joan to include. Tearing a small piece of cloth from her apron, she used the ink-dipped quill to draw a rough map to the gems. She hoped such a map would not be necessary—for if it were, it would mean she had met her demise.

  Once Joan awoke, the sisters ate a small meal of cheese and soft bread in the pleasant cool and dim light of the wood. They spoke little, since their voices would carry on the wind. Elizabeth knew her mistress and Reverend Grainger would not send anyone to look for her because of the circumstances under which the gems had been taken from the castle, but she feared that others meaning harm would come upon them if their voices were heard. They dared not light a fire for cooking, so, aside from the inkwell and quill, the bundles the sisters carried contained little more than food they could eat easily and without flame. The weather was still mild, so neither Elizabeth nor Joan worried about cold while they slept on the ground.

  Once the ink dried on the cloth, Elizabeth rolled up the map and tucked it into her waistband.

  “If anything should happen to me,” she whispered to Joan, “thou will find the map here at my waist. Use it to find the gems and
build a life of comfort for thyself.”

  Joan nodded solemnly. She hoped she would never have to use the map, because she did not like to think of life without Elizabeth. She was the timid one—Elizabeth was the brave one. She knew she would likely not survive if Elizabeth came to harm.

  As night fell, the sisters secured their bundles and set off quietly through the wood. They stayed within the relative safety of the trees until darkness enveloped them in its velvety shroud. Elizabeth longed to walk by the water so she could drink, but she would be patient and wait a bit longer. The wind blew the clouds to and fro, sometimes blocking out the moon and stars, sometimes allowing the nighttime illumination to guide the sisters’ steps.

  “’Tis not far now,” Elizabeth said to her sister in a low voice.

  She thought she heard Joan respond, but when she turned around to ask her to repeat what she had said, she realized that the only steps she heard were her own. Joan had stopped moving.

  “Why are you not following me?” Elizabeth hissed.

  Joan did not reply. An icy spear of anxiety ripped through Elizabeth’s body. Peering through the darkness, she could see by the faint light of the moon that Joan was standing quite close by, stock-still.

  “Whatever is the matter?” Elizabeth asked in her quietest whisper.

  She could barely make out Joan shaking her head. Then Elizabeth heard it, too. A twig snapping.

  They were not alone in the wood.

  Was it a man or an animal? Elizabeth could not know. She took one tentative step backward toward Joan, then another, then another. In a moment she had clasped Joan’s hand, which was trembling and clammy. Joan squeezed Elizabeth’s hand, whether for reassurance or for a signal of danger, Elizabeth did not know.

  It took Elizabeth a moment to realize she had stopped breathing. She took in a deep breath as quietly as she could, clenching the muscles in her torso. She listened and heard it again. Another twig snapping.

  Joan dropped Elizabeth’s hand and fell to the ground, curling into a ball, her head tucked inside her arms.

  Elizabeth was torn between joining Joan on the ground, standing to face whomever—or whatever—was nearby, and running farther into the wood. Before she could decide, she heard the distinctive click of a musket.

  The danger came from man, the most dangerous animal of all.

  Fully aware that the sisters were within the lines of entrapment formed by Cromwell’s soldiers, Elizabeth made a quick decision. Raising her voice, she spoke into the darkness.

  “Hullo? Who’s there?”

  “State your name,” came a man’s deep voice.

  “My name is Jane, m’lord, and this is my sister, Margaret. We have become lost and we are hungry. Perchance you could assist us?” Elizabeth could sense Joan looking up from her place on the ground.

  “Whither are you going?” the soldier asked in a gruff voice.

  “To Edinburgh.”

  “Thee and thy sister are going in the wrong direction. Turn around now and haste ye to the south. ’Tis the land of Castle Dunnottar you have chanced upon.”

  “Might ye have a bit of food you could spare?” Elizabeth asked, her courage a thing of wonder to Joan.

  “I do not,” the soldier said. “Now go, before someone else sees you.”

  Knowing how lucky they were to have escaped capture—or worse—by Cromwell’s soldier, Elizabeth and Joan turned and walked quickly through the wood in the direction from which they had come.

  When they reached the spot where they had spent the previous day, they stopped.

  “What shall we do now?” Joan asked, her voice tremulous.

  “I do not know,” Elizabeth replied. “We must try to remain calm. We will figure out a way to get back onto Castle Dunnottar land.”

  “But the soldiers…they will see us,” Joan said.

  “We will figure out a way,” Elizabeth repeated.

  But as the day grew long the sisters were forced into the realization that there was no way to get back to Castle Dunnottar without the near-certainty of being discovered and captured.

  They could not return to Joan’s house because the mistress and the Reverend Grainger might be looking for them there. They could not return to the town of Kinneff for the same reason. As understanding dawned on them, Elizabeth felt the stirrings of fear. She and Joan had made an irreversible choice, and they must now continue with their plan to leave Scotland, with or without the gems that would ensure their comfort for the rest of their days.

  The sisters could not stay idle in the wood. They were sure to be seen by soldiers or people from Kinneff, who would certainly wonder what they were doing there. All they could do was make their way south, as the soldier had directed.

  They continued walking night after long night and sleeping in hiding places during the days. Rarely did they see other people, but when the forests thinned and they came upon a hamlet or a village, they walked quickly and quietly through the lanes and alleys while curious villagers were asleep.

  Their supply of food, which Joan had so carefully prepared, soon vanished. The sisters were forced to resort to eating berries and grasses from the woods as they walked at night. Occasionally they would come upon a pen of goats or sheep, and they would take a drink of milk, praying the noises made by the goats would not wake the sleeping farmer.

  Many days later the sisters reached a bustling town. Daring to venture in from the woods in a dire search for food, they took care to behave as the townsfolk would. They walked arm in arm, smiling and chatting as though they belonged. Although they received a few curious glances, they were left to themselves. Because they were still in Scotland, they weren’t afraid to speak aloud on the streets. They would not be persecuted for their manner of speech as long as they were still inside their homeland. The farther they traveled south, however, the more difficult it would become to allow their voices to be heard in public. Once in England, they would have to be very careful who they spoke to.

  * * *

  It was many weeks before Elizabeth and Joan reached England, and when they arrived they found that Scots were reviled and unwanted. They roamed the countryside looking for accommodation and employment, and it was several months before both young women found work—Elizabeth in a tannery and Joan in a manor house as a laundress. Both women worked every day from before dawn until after dark and found their work difficult, demanding, and exhausting.

  At night the sisters would talk about the gems they had left behind in Scotland. They would wonder aloud whether the gems had been found. They would speak wistfully about how their lives could have been different if only they had not been thwarted in their attempts to recover them.

  Though Joan never married, Elizabeth eventually wed the tanner for whom she worked. Theirs was not a happy marriage, however, and Elizabeth would visit Joan often and bemoan her lot in life. The sisters always planned to someday follow the map drawn by Elizabeth long ago, but they never left England. They led meager lives, the sisters who were once full of hope and expectation.

  Joan died a young woman, childless and alone save for Elizabeth. She never knew the sadness that followed Elizabeth for the rest of her short life.

  As the war between England and Scotland came to an end, Reverend Grainger and Christian were finally able to unearth the Honours from the hiding place where they had lain unmolested during Cromwell’s siege. When it was discovered that several gems were missing from the Honours, a great hue and cry went up. The couple were questioned many times about the provenance of the gems, and both insisted they had been stolen by their former employee, Elizabeth. When the authorities went in search of Elizabeth and her sister, they found to their great dismay that Elizabeth and Joan had disappeared, along with any information about the whereabouts of the gems. The trail the sisters left went cold at the English border. Authorities surmised that Elizabeth and Joan had changed their identities and disappeared, never to be seen again in Scotland.

  CHAPTER 1

  As m
uch as I love Seamus, he can make me crazy.

  Don’t get me wrong—living in the Scottish Highlands suits me better than I ever dreamed it would when he first suggested we leave Edinburgh. I enjoy working in the antique shop and I don’t even mind running the gallery when he’s been bitten by the painting bug and can’t tear himself away from his latest creation.

  But when he asked me to “whip up a wee snack” for him and a client, I had to put my foot down.

  “I’m not your maid, Seamus. Whip something up yourself.”

  He spread his big hands out, pleading. “Please, Sylvie. I don’t have time.”

  “Neither do I. Just take him over to the pub.”

  “It’s pouring out. There’s no need to go out in this weather when we have stuff to eat here. I promised him real Scottish food.”

  “Well, that’s your problem. You know I can’t cook anything, let alone anything Scottish.”

  “Just slice up some of the haggis in the fridge and fry it.”

  “I’ll burn it. Remember what happened last time?”

  He nodded, grimacing. “It was as hard as a rock.”

  “Why do we need to feed him, anyway? What’s so special about him?”

  “Keep your voice down,” Seamus cautioned, looking over his shoulder through the door to the shop. “He’s up from London. Looking for a painting that reminds him of his childhood. There’s one he seems to like, but it’s expensive and I’m trying to butter him up.”

  “Well, you’ll have to butter him up without haggis, I’m afraid.”

  “Fine. Just get us a couple drams, would you?”

  I glared daggers at my husband. “All right. But if you sell that painting, you have to take me shopping in Edinburgh.”

  He smiled. “You know I will, love.”

  “You’re lucky I’m so nice.”

  He chuckled as he walked back into the shop, shaking his red head. “Care for a dram?” I heard him ask the man from London.

  I went into the house and poured two measures of whisky, put them on a tray, and carried them back into the shop. Seamus was pointing out a small detail on a painting when I walked in.