Highland Laddie Gone

“Drambuie!”

“Precisely. As I say, in an excess of good spirits, I told the conspirators that Dr. Dawson was a British secret agent.”

“Oh, my God. Geoffrey, somebody is going around killing people at this festival! How do you know you didn’t put Cameron in danger?”

“Your concern for the prince of pancake syrup is most touching, but there is something in your indifference toward my well-being that I don’t quite like.”

“You could be wrong, you know. Lachlan Forsyth may have killed Dr. Campbell in an attempt to cover up his illegal activities. Is he a U.S. citizen, do you think? If convicted of a crime, he could have been deported.”

“Back to Scotland-the air fares to which you were lamenting at the National Trust booth earlier? Oh, worst of fates!”

“Hush. Be serious for a minute. He may not have wanted to go back to Scotland. Maybe he’s wanted for being a con man there.”

“Really clever people do not kill their enemies. They outwit them. My faith in Lachlan is unshakable. You, on the other hand…”

“I’m going to talk to Lachlan Forsyth. Now that we know what the fraud was… Say, how did Colin Campbell know that the organization was a fraud?”

“Common sense!”

“Not entirely. Knowing what an old bully Campbell was, I’ll bet you anything he had it out with Lachlan last night.”

“Perhaps.”

“I’ll talk to him first. Then I’ll check for witnesses to that quarrel.”

“Go to, then. Have you no further need of a Watson? I thought I might go and observe the country dancing. For purposes of choreography.”

“Fine. If you see Cameron, tell him I’ll find him later.”

“Perhaps you’d like to compose a singing telegram?”

Elizabeth, at a loss for a clever rejoinder, made a face at him and hurried away.

The pageantry of the festival hardly registered with Elizabeth now. Her mind was too busy with shades of gray. Did Lachlan Forsyth kill Dr. Campbell in order to protect his con operation? Did one of the conspirators do it out of misplaced patriotism? Or, in the heat of a quarrel, did Walter Hutcheson do it after all? What’s Heather to him or he to Heather?

The meadow was getting hot again as the mid-afternoon sun bled the color out of the landscape. Elizabeth was glad that she had given up wearing her tartan; it was really too hot. Besides, she wasn’t sure anymore what it meant. In all the previous festivals, it had meant: I am Scottish; this is the badge of my culture.

But the one thing Cameron did-besides make her heart turn over when she looked at him-was to make her un easy about the significance of that culture. Every time she knew some bit of Scottish history or tradition and Cameron did not know it, it made her wonder just what they were preserving so carefully with their little groups. Perhaps it was culture of a sort, but it wasn’t Scotland. Elizabeth, who had been a sociology major, considered the disparity. What did it remind her of? A culture artificially preserved like… Latin. The language so carefully nurtured in the Vatican was a piece of culture preserved like a fly in amber; but modern Italian was a living culture, Latin that had been allowed to evolve. One was dead and the other was alive. Less colorful, maybe (how would Cameron look in a kilt?), but still alive, the real thing.

She decided that she wasn’t surprised about Lachlan Forsyth’s con game. She remembered how the festival folk had spoken approvingly of his being a real Scot. He wore the kilt, spoke some Gaelic, and knew all about the plaids and the history. He was, in fact, a professional Scot. Now that she had Cameron to compare him with, it was obvious to her that Lachlan was up to something. He was too good to be true.

He wasn’t there.

The canopied souvenir stall was as busy as ever, with tourists two-deep at the record bins and pawing through the woolens, but the only person behind the counter was a little blond boy. Elizabeth’s purpose wavered as she looked at the wonderful bits of bric-a-brac at the stall: thistle-patterned china, toy Nessies, a case of jewelry. Maybe she should get Cameron a MacPherson scarf: he ought to know his own tartan… She waited patiently in the same spot for several minutes until the boy behind the counter had time to notice her.

“Where is Mr. Forsyth?” she called out.

James Stuart McGowan shrugged. “I don’t know. He said he was taking a break, but it’s been over an hour. Can I help you?”

“I just need to talk to him. Can you tell me which way he went?”

He nodded toward the crowd encircling the stall. “My visibility isn’t too great here. He lives in a silver AirStream, though, and it’s parked in the campsite.” He looked at her closely. “You were here before, weren’t you? Talking to him about which hand to eat with, or something?”

“Yes,” said Elizabeth, deciding not to correct his version of the conversation.

“I thought so. Right after you left, he wrote something down on a piece of paper, and he said he’d give it to you if you came back. Let’s see… where’d he put it?” He looked up at her slyly. “Of course, I should be spending my time attending to real customers.”

She sighed. “Give me a scarf in the MacPherson tartan.”

“Hunting or dress?”

“Dress. Now find me that paper.”

“Here it is. He wrote it on this paper bag. Just the right size to put the scarf in. Will that be cash or charge?”

When Elizabeth had completed her purchase, she walked away from the crowd and examined the four words scrawled across the paper bag. She smiled. He really was a sweet old man. And as for the message… she hoped that she would have the occasion to use it.

* * *

Lachlan Forsyth’s AirStream trailer was easy to find. Its windows bore stickers of the Scottish lion, the flag of Scotland, and one bore the legend Ecosse-French for Scotland. On its bumper was the usual assortment of Highland games bumper stickers. Elizabeth wondered if he lived in the contraption year-round, or if he had some other home during the winter months. Surely he couldn’t spend his whole life going from one festival to another? Technically, of course, he could: in the Sun Belt states, festivals went on right through the winter months. It seemed like an empty sort of life, though. What could be fun and exciting for a weekend might be a form of insanity if one tried to live it on a regular basis.

Elizabeth shuddered. To spend one’s life in a kilt, rehashing long-forgotten battles… Was Lachlan taking a detour around the twentieth century or was he planning to amass an S.R.A. fortune and leave Brigadoon far behind? Impossible to tell. No one really knew Lachlan Forsyth. His kindness and his comic-book Scottishness would keep you enchanted until he went away; and when the spell wore off, you realized that you didn’t know the first thing about him.

Elizabeth knocked on the trailer door.

No answer.

After a few minutes of impatient waiting, she knocked again, louder this time. But there were no sounds from within, and no sign of life. Sign of life? Elizabeth tried the door handle. It was securely locked. Even in Brigadoon, the threat of twentieth-century vandalism pervaded one’s consciousness, she supposed.

By standing tiptoe on the top step and leaning over to the left as far as she could, she could just manage to get a grip on the tiny metal windowsill and peer inside. No one was there. And no body, she thought to herself with a sigh of relief. Now, where else could he be?

Elizabeth decided to check the clan tents in case Lachlan had gone visiting. Maybe she’d even find him at the MacPherson tent: he had seemed to enjoy talking to Cameron. Strangers in a strange land, and all that. As she walked past the rows of campers, she saw the MacDonald banner flying in front of one of the campers. The Hutchesons. Heather. Might he be visiting Heather? She was another Scot, after all. Surely someone as steeped in