Chapter 2
Better be courted and jilted
than never be courted at all.
—“The Jilted Nymph,” 1843
Thomas Campbell, British poet (1777–1844)
St. Bride’s Church
Douglas, Lanarkshire, Scotland
Present Time
If things had gone differently, she would be on her honeymoon in Argentina right now, instead of tromping around Scotland with her twin sister, Elisabeth. That morning, Isobella had written in her journal the exciting header: Visiting tombs of Douglas ancestors, which reminded her of her engagement, in that both were dead. However, it was the sisters’ first day in Scotland, and she was driving to the village of Douglas to visit St. Bride’s Church, where Sir James, the Black Douglas, was buried.
Isobella drove slowly down Main Street, passing buildings that looked much as they had when they were built during the Middle Ages. She turned into the parking lot and imagined the quaint, slate-gabled church bustling with medieval life—armored knights and fair ladies with tall headdresses hurrying to attend their weekly worship. Only now those noble warriors lay buried beneath mail-clad, cross-legged effigies, entombed in abbeys and small parish churches.
When they entered the kirk, she and Elisabeth crossed a large marble slab at the entrance to the Douglas mausoleum. It contained three canopied, medieval burial tombs with damaged effigies recessed in walls. Isobella stopped to give her eyes time to adjust to the diffused light, her gaze resting upon the exquisite stained-glass windows. A sense of a supernatural presence enveloped her as they paused to look at a glass box that held a silver case containing the heart of the Black Douglas.
“Since his death, the Douglases have carried on their shields a bloody heart and crown,” Isobella said, so overcome with emotion that she could almost hear the ancient heart beating. She glanced around the dilapidated choir to the north wall and saw the effigy of Sir James, the Black Douglas that lay below a finely cut, fifteenth-century pointed and arched canopy.
The effigy, carved from sandstone shortly after his death, had been a splendid example of medieval artistry and as grand as any found in Westminster Abbey. Sadly, the once gracefully carved effigy was now badly worn and its facial features chipped and impossible to make out. Neither sister spoke as they read the plaque on the wall.
The Good Sir James of Douglas
killed in battle with the Moors
in Spain, while on his way to the
Holy Land with the heart
of King Robert the Bruce,
25th August 1330
Isobella was touched to see that someone had left a bouquet of Scottish heather on Douglas’s tomb. “After almost eight hundred years, he is so beloved he gets flowers.”
Elisabeth, who was busy inspecting the foot of the effigy, said, “I find it sad that half of one of his legs has broken away.”
Isobella studied it for a moment. “Thankfully, enough remains that you can still see his legs were crossed.”
Puzzled, Elisabeth asked, “Is that supposed to be something special? The crossed legs, I mean.”
“Crossed legs denote a Crusader. They cross above the ankle for one Crusade and below the knee for two,” she replied, knowledgeable because of her recent degrees in Celtic studies and archaeology.
“So he went twice.” Elisabeth stared at the effigy and sighed. “My, he must have been quite a man.”
She had no more than finished speaking when Isobella was overcome with emotion once again, as if strings in her heart that had never been touched began to vibrate. Without realizing it, she placed her hand on the cold stone of the effigy. How deeply, inexplicably sad she felt for this powerful man whose life had changed history and whose death at the age of forty-four had been both noble and tragic. I’m so sorry. Without being conscious that she did so, she moved her hand to the place where the beating heart of Douglas would have been, had the stone effigy been a mortal being. She found the place numinously warm. A waft of spine-chilling air passed over her, and she knew the spirit of Douglas resided here.
“Oh, my God!” She let out a frightened squeak and jerked her hand away. For a moment, she was frozen in place, gasping for breath and feeling as if something had traveled straight to her heart, completely bypassing her sense of reasoning. The next instant, she was overcome with acute distress touching her heart so powerfully that she began to cry—not soft, gentle weeping, but anguished sobs and great gushing tears.
And she was unable to stop, in spite of the curious look Elisabeth gave her. “Good Lord, Izzy, why are you crying?”
“I can’t help it,” Isobella barely managed to say before more tears drowned the words in her throat.
Elisabeth put her hand on Isobella’s arm. “What’s wrong? Please tell me you aren’t thinking about that jilting jerk Jackson.”
Isobella shook her head. “No, it isn’t that.”
“Good,” Elisabeth said and handed her a Kleenex, while patting her on the back. “Then, why are you crying?”
“I don’t know. There’s just something about his story that’s so tragic and sad. The way he died in Spain… how they embalmed his heart… his body boiled in a cauldron of vinegar until the flesh fell away so they could bring the bones back to Scotland for burial here in the kirk.
“It’s so moving. Oh, I don’t know what is wrong with me. I feel compelled to tell him I’m so sorry for the way everything turned out. I wish he could have lived longer and happier.”
Elisabeth nudged her. “Maybe we should go. You’re acting weird. Now I’m starting to feel a bit creepy. Stop sniffling, or you’ll get dehydrated.” She rubbed her arms. “It’s getting cold in here, and I want to get back to Edinburgh in time for dinner. A good bottle of wine will do us both good.”
Only Elisabeth would worry about dehydration at a time like this, Isobella thought, but she fell in step beside her twin, who would soon start her last year of residency at Johns Hopkins. Elisabeth always walked faster, because she was accustomed to walking down long hospital corridors. She had a long stride, while Isobella, with her anthropologic mind and tendency to take in everything around her, took her time ambling along.
Elisabeth reached the car first. “Gracious, Izzy! You’re as pale as a ghost. Are you okay?”
Isobella was light-headed, but she didn’t say anything. Elisabeth would want to talk about it and take her pulse and temperature and maybe pull out her stethoscope right in the middle of the parking lot, so Isobella shook her head and said, “Maybe I’m hungry. I didn’t eat much at lunch.”
Elisabeth mulled that over and held out her hand. “Okay, give me the keys. I’ll drive. You look like you’ve had all the blood drained out of you.”
That was a good description of the way she felt, Isobella thought. She walked around to the passenger side and opened the door. When she sat down, the hair on the back of her neck stood out. A cold shiver traveled across her body. She had the disquieting feeling that the two of them were not alone.
Elisabeth put the key in the ignition. The sky began to darken. Thunder boomed, and the trees began to sway and bend. Leaves flew every which way as jagged flashes of lightning ripped across the sky. An earsplitting clap of thunder was followed by pounding rain that pelted the earth with great fury.
Isobella held her breath as an odd greenish glow lit up the shadowy darkness of the trees with a pale, ghostly radiance. Another flash, and she saw a vision of herself standing beneath the trees with a basket of eggs in her hand. The sound of a man’s laughter rode on the wind.
Then, as suddenly as it came, the storm stopped. The sun was shining, and all was quiet. She wondered if Elisabeth had heard the laughter. Judging by the expression of stunned bewilderment on her sister’s face, she had. Elisabeth’s hands flew up to her face, and she let out a long-held breath. “Did you see what I saw?”
“I saw a thunderstorm.”
“And a greenish light,” Elisabeth added, “and the sound of…”
“A man’s laughter,” Isobella finished. “Did you see the girl with the bonnet of eggs?”
Elisabeth spoke with an unsteady voice, “It was you, Izzy. She looked exactly like you.”
“I thought so, too, except that she was dressed in a gown from the Renaissance period.”
Elisabeth’s face was pale, her voice barely above a whisper. “Izzy, what have we gotten ourselves into? Things like that don’t just happen.”
“And yet it did. We both saw it,” Isobella said, surprised at the calm acceptance that washed over her. Something was going on here, and it had to do with Scotland, this kirk, and the Black Douglas.
“You don’t think it was something supernatural, do you?”
“That’s exactly what I think,” she said, and quoted Samuel Coleridge, “‘Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice and close your eyes with holy dread, for he on honey-dew hath fed, and drunk the milk of Paradise.’”
“Thanks. That was so comforting,” Elisabeth said. “I don’t believe in the supernatural. There are no such things as ghosts. When people die, they stay dead. What we heard was the wind blowing, not laughter.”
Isobella turned her head to gaze out the window. “You will notice that, in spite of the thunderstorm, our car is bone dry and there isn’t a drop of water anywhere on this entire parking lot.”
Elisabeth paled. “Oh, Izzy, I’m scared. We don’t belong here. I wish we hadn’t come. Whatever spirits are lurking are not happy with our coming. They want us to leave, and they are going out of their way to make it known.”
“If they wanted to get our attention, they would do something we couldn’t explain.”
The words were barely spoken when the car started. Elisabeth gasped. “Oh, my God!”
“Now what?”
“The car is running.”
“That means you are supposed to put it in gear so we can drive back to Edinburgh.”
“You don’t understand.” She opened her hand. The key was lying in her palm. “What do we do now?”
“Put the key in the ignition, I guess. You will need the key to turn the car off.”
Elisabeth was about to insert the key when the motor stopped. “I need a drink. A big, stiff one.” She started the car with the key this time and burned a little rubber leaving the parking lot.