Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
T he next couple of days were a continuous blur of press interviews, radio appearances and other assorted media coverage.
Campbell and I found ourselves labelled ‘The Odd Couple’—an intellectual, distinguished archaeologist obsessed with his work and a young, twenty-something disgraced social media influencer. We were even compared to Indiana Jones and Lara Croft. I knew that would’ve made Logan smile, if he hadn’t been furious at me.
Journalists were fascinated with Victoria’s heart-breaking story: a young woman deceived by her married lover, only to discover a lost treasure whilst contemplating ending her life.
Once we’d uncovered the Celtic cross, Campbell and I had returned to Portree, where Campbell had then contacted Gabriel Jamieson. ‘We have to do this properly,’ he’d said, parking up at the rear of the guest house. ‘Jamieson was in possession of Victoria’s first letter about the cross.’ A mischievous smile crossed Campbell’s face. ‘And call me childish, but I will get some satisfaction from telling that nasty piece of work our good news.’
What had followed had shocked us both.
Gabriel admitted Victoria was in fact Chrissie’s great grandmother, but Chrissie had been adopted at birth and was never told about her biological family connections. Apparently, Gabriel had done some family tree research of his own whilst working in the library and discovered his ex-wife’s background details, but had neglected to share them with her. I had to assume that poor communication had been one of the reasons they’d split up.
Campbell had pressed his loud speaker button on his phone, allowing me to listen to the rest of the conversation. ‘I discovered Victoria’s letter when Chrissie and I broke up. She just grabbed a few things and upped and left. I was the one who volunteered to begin sorting things out.’ Gabriel pulled an irritated face. ‘She was always a bit of a hoarder and never used to have clear outs of anything; old papers, ornaments, clothes. She’d just stick things in the loft and forget about them.’ He shrugged. ‘That was when I came across Victoria’s letter by accident,’ Gabriel admitted.
Campbell shot me a wide-eyed look.
‘It was while I was doing research on this Victoria McPherson, that I found out she’d been a keen amateur archaeologist all those years ago. I also read up about her fascination with the Skye Lovers’ Cross.’
‘And what about McPhail?’ asked Campbell. ‘Where does he fit in?’
There was an awkward silence.
‘I thought he might be able to help me find the cross. His reputation’s well-known.’
‘You can say that again,’ muttered Campbell with a disgusted expression.
Gabriel murmured down the phone in agreement. ‘I dropped McPhail an email, not thinking for one minute someone like him would reply.’
‘Aye. Well. Greed is his middle name.’
‘I know that now,’ confessed Gabriel. ‘As soon as he arrived on Skye, he was trying to take over and suggesting all sorts to try and locate the cross. It was rather unnerving.’
Even though Gabriel assured us he would inform his ex-wife about her late great grandmother’s letter, due to the level of publicity we suspected would surround the find, Campbell and I decided not to take any chances and hurried from the guest house car park to the Old Dog and Duck, where Chrissie was on shift.
Chrissie displayed a myriad of emotions as I handed her Victoria’s letter and Campbell showed her the cross and explained what had happened.
She looked like she’d been struck by a bus, unable to decide whether to look at the cross, me or Campbell. ‘But this is… This is crazy. I’d no idea about my biological family, let alone who my great grandmother was. And as for this letter…’
‘That’s because your ex-husband never told you he found the letter when you split up, nor about his investigation into your real family. He wanted to try and locate the cross for himself.’ Campbell flashed Chrissie a look as we stood huddled away from the bar. ‘We’re going to suggest Victoria gets the recognition she deserves, somehow.’
Chrissie nodded, emotion swimming in her sky-blue eyes. ‘I think that’s a lovely idea.’
She made a point of looking around herself, then she placed one manicured, jewelled hand on Campbell’s surprised arm. ‘I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m more than happy for this thing’—I felt my brows shoot up at her description of the stunning cross— ‘to go into a museum, but any remuneration for me would be welcome.’
Chrissie pinned Campbell to the spot with a loaded glance. ‘You’re going to be a man in demand. Fame, recognition, it’s all yours now you’ve had your reputation reinstalled,’ she purred. ‘I always knew you would.’ She bathed him in a big smile. ‘Fancy meeting up for some dinner later? We’ve got a lot to discuss.’
Campbell eyed Chrissie’s hand for a few seconds and then gently lifted it from his arm. ‘Thank you, Chrissie, but I don’t think that’s a good idea, do you? I reckon Conall wouldn’t approve. We’ll keep you posted on what happens with the cross, though.’
Sudden anger flared in her eyes and Chrissie muttered, ‘Suit yourself. Your loss,’ and whirled back to the bar.
And so, while the press were still hungry for photographs and writing about Viking tokens of love lost for centuries, Chrissie had seized the opportunity to give interviews about her great-grandmother and how she’d never known she was related to such a special and resilient woman. She’d laid it on quite thick.
McPhail had, by this time, vanished abroad, keen to escape being tarnished by Gabriel’s attempted deception. The rumour around Skye was that he’d flown to Spain in an attempt to find some rare Armada pistols.
I had three days left and then I would be leaving Skye for good and returning to London. My insides were still tangled up like one of Portree’s fishing nets at the thought of never seeing Logan again, but I tried to focus on the here and now.
Campbell told me Logan had replied to his text about locating the cross, wishing us congratulations, but that had been the extent of it.
Justine, meanwhile, had been in her element the last few days. She’d rung me using her colleague Sasha’s mobile phone, seeing as I’d blocked her number, telling me she ‘forgave’ me for my ‘creative outburst,’ and saying that we needed to talk urgently. Apparently, the BBC wanted to discuss me presenting a new kids TV show about treasure hunting, and an upmarket jeweller in Mayfair was keen to have me model their latest range of Celtic inspired earrings and rings.
‘But what about the travel guide?’ I asked her, incredulous, down the phone. ‘Do the publishers still want to go ahead with it?’
Justine had let out a tinkly laugh. ‘Are you crazy? Of course they do, sweetie! You and that silver fox Campbell and the cross are the talk of the town. This travel guide of yours was going to do well, but Primrose says that after your video and finding that treasure, the pre-orders have gone stratospheric! People think you’re a principled, upstanding young woman.’
‘I am a principled, upstanding young woman!’ I protested, incredulous.
‘Yes, yes. Of course you are, darling. Well done, you!’
I couldn’t have cared less if River Banks sky-jumped out of a plane in front of a million people, strapped to Timothee Chalamet. Victoria’s struggles, combined with my despondency over Logan, had crystallised what I wanted to do and where I wanted to be. Everything before—my desperate need for social media hits, likes and adoration—seemed so empty and vacuous now.
Logan and Skye had woken up something inside me that I never knew existed, and the prospect of returning ‘home’ made me feel queasy, the hectic, frenetic pace of London no longer a match for the salty air or the poetic thunder of the waves.
And there was no Logan in London.
There was nothing that I could do about it, though.
It was almost time to say goodbye.