the thought. “Then there’s the canal, and another good thirty mile o’ that, before you reach Fort William on the coast.” He squinted up at the sky. “And they always say in the west that if you can see the hills, it’ll rain as sure as can be.”
“And if you can’t?” Isobel asked.
“Then it’s raining already.” He smiled.
“Then we’d best get started,” she answered briskly. “Since it is a fine day now, obviously it is going to rain!”
“Aye,” he acknowledged. “If that’s what you want?”
Without looking at Vespasia, Isobel repeated that it was, and accepted the boatman’s assistance into the stern of the small vessel, most of it open to the elements. It was the only way in which they could begin their journey.
They pulled out into the open water, but stayed closer to the northern shore, as if the center might hold promise of sudden storm, and indeed several times squalls appeared out of nowhere. One moment everything was dazzling with silver light on the water, the slopes of the mountains vivid greens. Then out of the air came a darkness, the peaks were shrouded, and the distance veiled over with impenetrable sheets of driving rain.
They sheltered in the tiny cabin as the boat rocked and swung, flinging them from side to side. They said nothing, so cold their limbs shook, teeth clenched together. Vespasia cursed her own pride for coming, Isobel for her cruel tongue, Omegus for his redeeming ideas, and Gwendolen for wanting a shallow man like Bertie Rosythe and falling to pieces when she realized what he was.
“Do you suppose Gwendolen was still in love with Kilmuir?” Vespasia asked when they finally emerged into a glittering world, the water a flat mirror, burning with light in the center, mountains dark as basalt above, and drifts of rain obscuring in the distance.
Isobel looked at her in surprise. “You mean she realized it that evening, and the grief of losing him returned to her?” There was a lift of hope in her voice.
“Did you know her, other than just socially during the season?” Vespasia questioned.
Isobel thought for a few moments. They passed a castle on the foreshore, its outline dramatic against the mountains behind. “A little,” she answered. “I know there was a sadness in her under the gaiety on the surface. But then she was a widow. I know what that is like. Whether you loved your husband wildly or not, there is a terrible loneliness at times.”
Vespasia felt a stab of guilt. “Of course there must be,” she said gently. It was not Isobel’s right to know that it afflicted her, also—a different kind of loneliness, a hunger that had never been fed, except in brief, dangerous moments, a shared cause, a time that could never have lasted.
“Actually I thought Kilmuir was a bit of a cad,” Isobel went on thoughtfully. “I’m not sure that he was any better than Bertie Rosythe, really. But it’s natural to remember only what was good about someone after they are dead.”
Vespasia studied Isobel’s face and saw doubt in it and something that looked like guilt as she stared across the bright water with its shifting patterns, and not once after that did she look back at Vespasia, nor raise the subject again.
They stayed the night ashore, and continued the next day, reaching Fort Augustus by evening. They parted from that boat and set out on the canal at sunrise in another. The biting cold, the sense of claustrophobia on the long, narrow boat, and the knowledge that they were moving ever farther from land familiar to them, even by repute, eased some of the tension between them.
But above all was the dread of meeting Mrs. Naylor and having to tell her the truth. They spoke, to break the silence of the vast land and the strangeness of the situation. They sat closer to each other to keep a little warmth, and they shared food when it was offered them, and laughed self-consciously at the inconvenience of the requirements of nature. They filled the long tedium of waiting for locks to fill or empty, stretching their legs by walking back and forth in the bitter wind, staring at the white-crowned hills.
Some time after dark on the fourth day from Inverness they arrived in Fort William, and again found lodgings. They were shivering with cold and exhaustion, and wretched beyond even thinking of how to move on from there to Ballachulish. They huddled by the fire, trying to get warm enough to think of sleep.
“Why, in the name of heaven, would Mrs. Naylor come here at all?” Isobel said wretchedly, rubbing her hands together and holding them out before the flames. “Let alone stay for a year and a half? No wonder Gwendolen never mentioned her. She was probably terrified in case anyone discovered she was insane!”
“Did she never mention her?” Vespasia asked, although Isobel’s remark was sensible enough. She had wondered herself why Mrs. Naylor was not living in her very attractive house at Muir-of-Ord. If one wished seclusion, that was surely far enough from most society.
“Never,” Isobel said frankly. “Which you must admit is unusual.”
A new realization came to Vespasia. She had not appreciated before that Isobel had known Gwendolen so well that such an omission would be noticeable to her. In fact, there was rather a lot that Isobel had not said, but perhaps her own desire for Bertie Rosythe’s affection was deeper than it had seemed at Applecross.
“Yes,” Vespasia said aloud. “Yes, it is.” Actually she wondered why Mrs. Naylor had not come to London with Gwendolen to chaperone her and give all the help she could in gaining a second husband as soon as it was decent to do so.
“Exactly.” Isobel tried to move her chair even closer to the fire, then realized that it would place her feet practically in the hearth, and her skirts where a spark might catch them, and changed her mind. “I’m dreading meeting this woman.” She looked up at Vespasia candidly. “Do you suppose she might actually be dangerous?”
Vespasia weighed in her mind the need to continue their journey to the end, wherever that might be, and her growing hunger to know the truth of Gwendolen’s reason for taking her own life. She was becoming concerned that what they had seen at Applecross was only a small part of it. The more she considered it, the less did it seem a sufficient reason.
“I suppose it is possible,” she answered. “What did Gwendolen say about her family, if she did not speak of her mother at all?”
“Very little. It was all Kilmuir, and I suppose even that was only how much she missed him.” Isobel frowned. “Naturally, she did not speak of the event of his death, but one would not expect her to. It would have been in very poor taste, distressing for her and embarrassing for everyone else.” She shivered again and wrapped her cloak more tightly around her shoulders. “I have to confess, she behaved as I think I would have myself in that. I cannot fault her. It is simply odd that with a mother still living she never referred to her at all. However, if she’s quite deranged, it would explain it completely.” She puckered her brow. “Do we really have to continue until we find her?”
“Do you wish to turn back?”
Isobel pulled a rueful little face. “I wished to turn back as soon as we left Applecross, but not nearly as much as I do now. But I suppose since we have come this far, I should hate to have it all be in vain.” She smiled and her eyes were bright for a second. “When it gets unbearably cold, miserable, and far from anything even remotely like home, I think of how furious Lady Warburton and Blanche Twyford will be if I complete this and they are obliged to forgive me, and it gives me courage to go on.”
Vespasia knew exactly what she meant. The thought of Lady Warburton being charming because she had no choice had warmed her frozen body and put new vigor in her step more than once.
She smiled. “What was he like, Kilmuir?”
Isobel turned away, a shadow falling between her and Vespasia again, as clearly as if it had been visible. “I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do,” Vespasia insisted. “You knew Gwendolen far longer, and far better, than you have allowed me to suppose.”
Isobel stared at her, her dark eyes wide and challenging. “If I did, why is that your concern? I am going to do my penance. Is that not enough for you? You, of all people, can see what a bitter thing it is!” She took a sudden sharp breath. “Is that actually why you are here, to make sure I do it all? Is that why Omegus Jones sent you?”
Vespasia was taken aback. The accusation was so unjust it caught her completely by surprise. “I came because I thought the journey could be long and hard, possibly even dangerous, and the ending of it the most
