The Dog House (Harding's World of Romance) (2 page)

“I
t’s also mighty cold,” Alistair continued, obviously from a generation which didn’t understand marketing. “You’ll want a good supply of whiskey to see you through the chill.”

“He’s a bit old-fashioned,” Connie had apologised, taking
Fiona’s hand. “You know that sherry will do just as well.”

And so the next day
Fiona had moved in with her boxes of books and notes and a bottle of sherry, and the day afterwards she had gone to fetch the dog in her old and unreliable Vauxhall hatchback.

“He’s just a big, overgrown puppy really,” the owners had gushed fondly. “He went through a few hands because people found him a bit hard to control, but that was because they tried to keep him indoors
, in a flat. He needs a bit of space to roam is all.”

As she climbed awkwardly back over the wall to drop back into her garden, she found the guilty dog waiting patiently for her return to smother her with licks. It was impossible not to forgive him as he nuzzled against her for affection and she found herself smiling ruefully as she caressed the shaggy head. Then she laughed aloud.

The concealed notebook which she had found in Mackenzie House before the renovations had been written by Campbell after he had been kicked out by his wife for his incessant drinking. As an inside joke to himself, he had titled his collection “Notes from the Dog House.”

Fiona
looked up from the incorrigible mutt to the old house, which went by the original name of Silverbeck Cottage, and spoke to the dog. “Livingstone, I think we’ve got a new name for the cottage. Welcome to the Dog House, where I think we’ll be spending a fair bit of time this year, you and I.”

Colin Parker helped himself to another glass of champagne as he wandered among the wedding guests on his family’s estate. By Scottish standards, it was a fairly warm summer afternoon with only a few picturesque clouds in the blue sky. Everything was perfect for the wedding, apart from the unexpected intervention of the strange dog earlier.

He had already delegated the task of investigating the intruder to his estate manager, Bruce
McTavish. Colin prided himself on throwing perfect parties and he wanted to make sure that there wasn’t a breach in the wall somewhere to allow similar incidents in the future. More champagne flutes had been produced immediately and the interruption had been fairly minimal, so there was nothing more to be done about it. He didn’t like to dwell on little problems when there was so much to enjoy.

Today
it was the gathering of many of his old friends for Andrew Harrington and Helena Smythe’s wedding. He had been glad to offer the use of the castle and grounds for the wedding and reception, not only because it was ideal for such occasions but because it had been a base for so many enjoyable summers throughout his school years with Robert Aiken and Andrew. All three had been close friends at an exclusive school down in England, but both Robert and Colin’s families owned properties in Scotland and they had spent most of their summers in the highlands.

Colin drained his glass and waited for the bub
bly to perk up his spirits, which were in danger of drifting toward the unwelcome thoughts that a wedding invariably brought on. Andrew was the first of the three of them to become engaged, and it was hard not to see this as the beginning of the end to their carefree lifestyles and a solid step into responsible adulthood.

At thirty-one, his father would have argued, it was far more than time to put away childish things, but the three schoolmates had managed to retain their Peter Pan ways until now and Colin had no desire to leave that behind. All three men had their financial futures assured, so it was hard to
imagine taking on some dull, office-based job merely for respectability when there was so much fun to be had. Colin had taken over the running of the Loch Murray property from his parents when they retired to the warmer south, and he was nominally in charge of the family’s charitable trust fund, both of which failed to satisfy his father but did not interfere in Colin’s social life. He saw no reason to change, particularly to give up his bachelor ways as Andrew had suddenly chosen to do.

As if reading his mind, Robert Aiken threaded his way through the gue
sts to seek him out. Like Colin and, until fairly recently, like Andrew, Aiken was a confirmed bachelor who believed in making the most of each day and living fully. And like Colin today, his enjoyment of the party seemed to be slightly tempered by the loss of the third member of their cohort.

Robert swept two champagne flutes from the table in passing and greeted Colin by passing one to him to replace the empty glass that Colin was now holding.

“To old friendships surviving,” he proposed as he emptied his glass in a few swift swallows.

Col
in grinned approvingly and followed suit. Feeling rather revived, he looked about him with more appreciation. “I suppose it’s a good occasion to cause a reunion,” he accepted grudgingly, glad to see so many old friends catching up with each other. “We wouldn’t get such a big turn-out for a golf tournament, eh, Aiken?”

“Ah, but it would be a well-selected group,” Aiken returned, allowing one regretful sigh to escape his lips before he turned on his smile again.
“Although with fewer well-dressed women.”

His eyes drifted over the crowd, lingering on the tapered waists and bravely-bared backs being shown by many of the fairer sex. Colin shook his head warningly.

“It is never wise to pursue fair maidens at weddings,” he warned his friend. “It gets them all thinking about happily-ever-afters and when their turn will be.”

Robert sent him a sly smile
that gave his lean features a rakish look which women seemed to adore. “It also gets them amorous,” he reminded Colin, turning back to admire a slim redhead in a low-cut dress. “Now don’t go trying to spoil my fun just because you brought a date. Where is she, anyway?”

Colin looked around the garden vaguely, trying to spot his companion for the event. “She isn’t really a date,” he said firmly, unable to find her. “
But you know what Bridget’s like when there’s a big social do. She has to find herself on the invitation list, and she can be awfully insistent when she wants you to be her escort. She’s quite independent once she gets in.”

Just then the woman in question reappeared, dragging a friend along by the arm.
Bridget was an attractive, vivacious brunette, a socialite from the London scene. Her companion was shorter and curvaceous and new to the men.

“Colin,
Rabbie, this is Emma,” Bridget announced happily with a grin that suggested that she had also partaken of the champagne. “Emma, these are the men I was telling you about.”

Emma smiled at each man in turn. “So you are the tall, dark and handsome one,” she said to Aiken, earning her a slight nod
of amusement. “And you are the blue-eyed charmer. What an enticing pair you make.”

“Ah, but we’re missing the smooth-talking blonde,” Colin apologised regretfully, batting those famous blue eyes under his thick, slightly curly hair. “We’re not the trio we once were.”

“Good thing that there are only two of us looking for dance partners then,” Emma said lightly.

Bridget clamped firmly onto Colin’s arm and Emma blinked up at Aiken invitingly. The two men shrugged their shoulders and grinned at each other before escorting their respective partners
toward the live jazz band that had started playing in front of the marquis. Weddings weren’t completely without their uses.

Chapter Two

Fiona and Livingstone managed to keep out of trouble for nearly a week before the next incident occurred.

During that week they had managed to
work out a sort of routine that kept both of them happy while Fiona made progress with her writing. In the mornings they would go for long hill walks, following footpaths up through wood and bracken to reach the open heather of the higher ground, broken here and there by rockier ridges and fast-flowing streams. Livingstone was free to release some of his boundless energy while Fiona thought about what she was reading in the notebook, trying to tie the poems and notes to the landscape that she wandered through.

In the afternoons Livingstone seemed content to rummage in the large, overgrown garden while
Fiona sat in front of her computer, notes and books strewn about her as she jotted down her latest impressions and ideas about Campbell’s life.

She had discovered the notebook tucked away in an old trunk in the attic of Mackenzie House. Her thesis research had been largely historical, compiling old records and mentions of the historic building before it was renovated, but her earlier areas of study had also included literature. Now she was happy to put both of her passions together in one book, trying not to feel daunted by the pressure of being the first one to present the newfound Campbell verse.

Mackenzie House, where Campbell had apparently spent some time after his exile from Edinburgh, was in the little town of Braeport, down the coast from Fort William. Braeport was the nearest town to the village of Glen Murray, only twelve kilometres away, and Fiona had spent months there during her work at Mackenzie House. She had chosen Glen Murray knowing that it wasn’t too far from the hills where Campbell had also walked, but now she was delighted to find reference in his notebook to Glen Murray itself, making her choice of the Dog House even more pertinent.

Glen Murray was a small side valley running in from the sea. Steep hills on either side protected the narrow glen which was home to a tiny village of the same name, a few farms and, at the end, just before the road ran out against the rocky end of the valley, Loch Murray and the castle grounds.
In her ramblings along these ridges, high above the valley floor, Fiona let herself be swept away by Campbell’s evocative descriptions as he travelled through the same unchanged scenery. Then Livingstone would bark at a bird or small rodent and Fiona would come back to earth with a thud.

Of course she had flicked through the notebook when she first found it, but her supervisor had soon taken it away to have it c
arefully copied onto microfiche in case it became damaged, and to keep her focused on the task at hand. The notes had only just been returned to her and every day she woke excited to delve further into the faded pages with their spidery writing.

She had to admit that the first part of the notebook was dark, reflecting Campbell’s mood as he found himself far from home in the desolation of the highlands in late autumn.
To be sure, Braeport would have seemed like the end of the world after his social life in Edinburgh, but Fiona was also starting to suspect that he had still loved his wife when she turfed him out, and that it was this loss that he was expressing in his bleak and beautiful descriptions of the hills.

“It’s a good thing I have you here to keep me grounded,” she told Livingstone fondly as they returned from one of their long walks, muddy and tired. “Otherwise I might just slip back one hundred and fifty years, into the romantic past.
And possibly start to feel lonely, exiled and depressed.”

Livingstone gave her leg an affectionate bump with his motley, bear-like head, enjoining her to play with him a moment more as she let him into the back garden.
Fiona gave in easily, picking up an old ball and throwing it for him as she looked in satisfaction at her new surroundings. Like Campbell, she had come a long way from the vibrant student scene in Edinburgh and might also come to find this austere landscape lonely by this winter, but right now it wasn’t hard to see the romance in it all.

This time her musings were cut short by a cheeky squirrel
that dared to run down a tree and dash across the garden floor in front of Livingstone. Immediately the dog lost all interest in the game, tearing after the rodent that scampered easily up the stone wall and into the nearest tree. Livingstone’s heavy paws pushed away another section of loosely-piled stones and he managed to scramble his awkward way over the wall and back onto the forbidden castle grounds where he promptly forgot about his quarry and set off to explore.

Fiona
groaned and headed after him, following his route over the crumbling wall as she made a mental note to have it repaired more solidly. Her hopes that he might stay in the vicinity of the squirrel were quickly dashed as he once again headed straight through the woods toward the castle.

To
Fiona’s relief there had been no communication from the castle occupants. She could only hope that they had somehow failed to make the connection between the new tenant of the gatehouse and their poorly-behaved wedding guest. She herself had tried to block the event from her mind rather than deal with it, but the necessity of taking some sort of action was now being brought home to her as she found herself yet again thrashing through tightly-knit bramble and swearing as her hair caught on the prickly branches.

Then a line from Campbell came back to her, making her smile at its appropriate nature although it could be used to describe the dog as well as the underbrush: “The untamed gorse, that no man ever
praised though it follow but its nature…”

He had probably been describing himself with his alcoholic ways, but
it suited her attitude toward brambles just now.  And there was something pleasing about identifying with a poet, no matter how forgotten he may be.