Chapter Nine
That night, Araminta sneaks out of the house after dark as if she’s meeting her lover.
Another note appeared after the funeral, this time on Aunt Eilidh’s desk.
Dismiss the staff at nine, wait until ten and come to the watchtower at St Columba’s.
Win. At least this time she needn’t lie to the coachman, Araminta thinks, as she puts her gloved hands into the pockets of her thick winter coat and cuts across the square and down to the graveyard.
She has trouble finding the door of the cylindrical watchtower in the absolute darkness but when she knocks the nun opens it quickly.
‘Do you want to visit Great Aunt Eilidh’s grave?’ she asks Winifred, who she identifies in the dark doorway as much by the familiar oniony smell as by her face.
‘Don’t be silly,’ Winifred snaps, ushering her into a round room lit by a single candle.
The windows are shuttered. A stairway rises to the upper floor which, Araminta surmises, must enjoy a view over the graveyard.
‘I thought it better to meet here. Safer after we were assaulted the last time. Closer too. For you, in any case,’ Winifred explains.
‘Meeting at different locations means there will be no pattern to follow.’
Araminta decides not to comment on what she sees as her great aunt’s strange obsession with being observed. ‘I thought the watchtower would be in use at night,’ she says. ‘Edinburgh being famed for resurrection men.’
Winifred is pragmatic as ever. ‘I gave the watchman a few shillings and bid him leave for an hour. It’s a sair fecht to dig up a grave in this weather. The ground is as good as stone. Did you bring the map?’
Araminta confirms that she did. Too large for her pocket, she concealed it in the sleeve of her coat.
She now fumbles with the buttons as Winifred takes the candle and leads her up the staircase into a room where, Araminta imagines, from the placement of the only chair, the watchman must usually sit at the window from dusk till dawn.
There’s a low fire in the grate and a table with a jug of small beer, a pottery cup, two scraggy carrots and an onion.
Araminta moves the vegetables so she can lay out the map.
She places the scrap of Carmichael thread on top.
Winifred chuckles at the perfect fit. ‘See,’ she says.
‘Eilidh made good progress. She’d have done this herself if she hadn’t been taken. ’
Araminta thinks things would be far easier if Sister Winifred came to the house.
‘I’ve questions,’ she says. The candle is flickering for the windows are not sound. ‘Do you know who the people are in the oil paintings in the drawing room?’
Sister Winifred looks up. ‘You mean the Anne Forbes’?’
‘Is she one of our ancestors?’
The old nun sighs. ‘Anne Forbes was a painter. A skilled portrait painter, in fact. She remains renowned. She worked in oils.’
Araminta thinks that the paintings are rather high on the wall to be able to make out the signatures. She supposes she might have Douglas fetch them down.
‘There are several women and two men in that room,’ she says.
Winifred squints as if envisioning the walls.
‘Yes – two are by Anne Forbes, unless my sister moved or sold them. They’re of our paternal grandparents.
Then there’s one by Catherine Read – a talented lass – of my maternal grandmother, I believe.
She’s the one who caused all the trouble – Berenice.
I don’t know who painted the others though there’s one of my mother as a lass.
A male artist, I expect,’ she adds with a dismissive snort.
‘Most of the subjects are elderly, from memory, but forebears, yes. They came from the old place, I think, up north.’
‘Our family seat?’ Araminta asks, feeling rather grand and hopeful.
‘I’d hardly call it that, dear. It’s a ruin now.’ The old nun returns her gaze to the map. ‘You made these pinpricks, did you?’
Araminta nods.
‘You shouldn’t have. What if the map is found? You must start thinking ahead.’
Araminta ignores this comment. Winifred isn’t going to explain anyway. ‘Do you know the places that are marked?’ she asks instead.
Winifred nods. ‘It’s good Eilidh left this. You can follow her footsteps. I’d try Edinburgh Castle first.’ She puts her head to one side. ‘Find that clue and move on to the second location.’
‘Which is?’
Winifred peers. ‘It looks like it’s out towards the bowling green.’
‘And what do these clues lead to, Sister Winifred?’
The nun walks to the window and takes a seat. ‘How uncomfortable,’ she says, squirming. ‘It hits one exactly in the wrong place.’
Araminta sighs. ‘We buried her today, you know. Out there.’
‘I know.’ Winifred gives a cursory glance out of the window.
‘The funeral went well.’ Araminta does not let her great aunt off the hook. ‘There were a lot of mourners.’
Winifred turns the chair to face back into the room.
‘I’m not surprised. We knew all Edinburgh in our day.
Eilidh was always skilled in society. She was direct, which is not to everyone’s taste, but for those who liked plain talking she was a godsend.
She’s left you a good start, my dear. That’s the main thing.
We didn’t get this far together. I must see if I can get you an introduction at the castle. ’
‘I don’t need an introduction. I’m acquainted with the colonel of the regiment. The Scots Guards.’
Sister Winifred is clearly impressed. ‘Excellent,’ she says.
There’s an awkward pause before Araminta speaks again.
‘Are you a Jacobite?’ she lets out. She can’t keep it in any longer for it’s been on her mind.
This old woman who talks in riddles might not be entirely harmless.
She wonders if she’s being lured into some terrible plot. If Colonel Fraser might clap her irons.
‘There’s no such cause any longer,’ Sister Winifred replies calmly. ‘Jacobites, indeed.’
‘But were you one?’
‘My dear, I wasn’t even born at the time of the last uprising. Neither were my sisters.’
‘But the McKenzie women. Our legacy. We’re Jacobites. Aren’t we?’
‘All that is only a story now. Though we served the Stuart queens.’
Araminta thinks that if Aunt Eilidh was a plain speaker, she wishes she could have had another few hours with her. Sister Winifred is a different beast. She changes tack. ‘What about your grandmother? The woman who caused the trouble? Is that what you said?’
‘Berenice McKenzie and her sister, Mhairi. You cannot serve two masters, Araminta. Two causes. That’s the lesson of their lives.’
‘They took the side of the Young Pretender then?’
Winifred relents. ‘They did,’ she admits.
‘They were highly educated women. Mhairi had been schooled in France. The Auld Alliance. She was a beauty too, by all accounts. Berenice was my grandmother – a classics scholar. Their children thought they might get away to America after Culloden for many who supported Bonnie Prince Charlie managed to flee across the Atlantic. But the pair of them died for what they’d done in the end. Berenice immediately and Mhairi after.’
‘They were executed?’
‘After a fashion.’
‘What do you mean?’
Araminta crosses her arms. She’s sick of Winifred not giving a civil reply to a civil question. Everything the old nun says feels like an evasion. Sister Winifred pauses, then senses she’ll have to give something away.
‘It’s hard to imagine what it was like in 1746.
After the Battle of Culloden. Some people still had hope, I imagine.
The great iron gates of Traquair House had been closed with an oath they’d only reopen when a Stuart monarch took the throne.
The house was a royal hunting lodge before the earl and his family had it.
They didn’t think it would take long, I expect, when they swore the gates shut.
Perhaps they’ll never open. They’ve been locked for almost a century. ’
Araminta doesn’t care about Traquair House. ‘I’ll not be made a traitor to the Crown,’ she says baldly. This is a sentence she never thought would cross her lips. In Richmond, stating such a position had always been entirely unnecessary.
‘Oh, quite the reverse,’ Sister Winifred says. ‘The McKenzie women will never betray the Crown, my dear. How could we?’
‘Berenice and Mhairi did.’
‘In more ways than one,’ Winifred confirms. ‘They made an error of judgement.’
Araminta thinks back to the family bible. The little diamonds. ‘Their names are marked in the bible. Yours and mine too,’ she recalls.
‘Many of our female relations, all the way back another century before that too. Did Mrs Archer, not teach you any history? Really, it’s too bad. She said you were talented at mathematics. At classics. We thought you were prepared.’
‘I’m not sure anything could have prepared me for this,’ Araminta bursts out.
‘You and Aunt Eilidh supervising my education but never showing your faces. I’ve been an orphan most of my life.
Do you know what that means? I’ve had nobody.
I’ve been an object of pity. If Johnathan hadn’t loved me .
. .’ Her voice trails. ‘I’m so grateful to him .
. . now I find this . . . and you won’t even tell me. Everything is a riddle.’
Sister Winifred sighs. ‘We did what we thought was best. Will you go to the castle? Find out what this building is and look for the clue.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘You’ll know it when you see it. Keep your eyes open.’
Araminta sniffs. ‘If I find this clue, you’ll tell me everything? Promise you’ll answer my questions. Directly?’ She holds out her hand.
Sister Winifred stares at it before shaking. ‘I’ll try,’ she says.
Araminta lays her finger on the map. ‘This is the garrison chapel. The castle was used as a prison after the defeat at Culloden. They held Charles Edward Stuart’s mistress there.’
‘You mustn’t believe everything you read, my dear,’ Winifred gets up.
‘Jean Cameron was not the Bonnie Prince’s mistress.
The Hanoverian press merely said that to discredit her.
Why they’d have had that poor man exhausted, the number of mistresses he was supposed to have.
Mind you, the chapel as the location for a clue would make sense.
Churches endure. Berenice set clues that would last: thirteen of them.
Though I scarcely expect that she thought her breadcrumbs would linger unsolved this long.
She was clever. She quite outwitted us. These I believe are clues eight and nine.
As I said, Eilidh did well in unravelling the mystery. You’re over halfway.’
‘Clues number eight and nine of thirteen?’ Araminta surmises.
The nun nods. ‘For the twelve disciples and our Lord. Thirteen at the table for the last supper. Berenice was a churchgoer. Honestly, she was probably more devout than I am.’ She sighs once more for she cannot explain.
The shame still stings. ‘When I took orders some years ago, we were merely at clue number four.’ She continues. ‘Eilidh has done extremely well.’
Araminta lets this information sink in. ‘But it’s almost a century since 1746,’ she says. ‘That means each clue has taken more than a decade.’
‘In the beginning they didn’t even manage that,’ Sister Winifred admits. ‘It was my sister Aoife who cracked the first. That took decades alone. As I said, Berenice was clever – no one since has matched her intellect. Numbers eight and nine,’ Winifred repeats, clearly pleased. ‘Excellent progress.’
Araminta decides to leave further questions until she has been to the garrison chapel. Sister Winifred has made a deal and pinning her down will be easier when she has something to barter with.
‘I’ll go on your ridiculous treasure hunt tomorrow,’ she promises and makes for the door. Then she turns. ‘What’s Hingy’s House? A child warned me of it, when I was visiting you the last time.’ Edinburgh, it seems, is a city of endless stories.
Sister Winifred looks up wearily. ‘It’s where the city’s hangman resides. Close to Haddow’s Hole – the old jail at St Giles’. I shouldn’t worry about it. It’s only a superstition.’