The Witch's Stone (2 page)

“Agnes was well known through these parts as a bit of a nutter,” Bristol explained. “She accused people of stealing from her, spying on her, for years. There’s never been any validity to her claims.”

“But she was so…” Hillary hesitated, groping for the right word, “Broken. My God, there was so much blood.” She shivered, unable to stop herself.

“I’m sure finding Agnes the way you did must have been very frightening. Especially after all that you’ve been through.”

Her spine turned rigid despite the sick sinking in her belly. “What I’ve been through?”

“Part of ruling you out as a suspect means looking into yer background. I know about Randall Myers.”

The air sucked from her lungs as if she’d been kicked. “I see,” she managed barely above a whisper.

“You must understand, what happened to Agnes was nothing more than a terrible accident.”

Hillary nodded, her cheeks hot. Absently, she massaged the palm of her right hand with her thumb.

“I’d appreciate if you kept Randall Myers to yourself.” Even speaking his name made her skin crawl.

“What I learn in the course of my investigation is no’ for public knowledge, I can promise you that. You’ve no need to worry there.”

Maybe she didn’t. Bristol had been very kind to her so far. He’d been polite and respectful while questioning her. Very different from her last experience with the police.

She tried to smile, but the expression felt awkward on her face. “Thank you.”

“Will you be staying on a bit?” Bristol asked.

“I’m not sure,” she told him, grateful for the change of subject. “I’d planned to stay three weeks, but without the journals there’s no point.”

“It’s lovely country here. You might enjoy just playing tourist.”

“I might,” she said without conviction. Her possibilities were drying up. “I’ll certainly stay to attend the funeral tomorrow.”

“I’m sure Agnes would have appreciated that.”

“Do you think so?”

“No.” A wide smile spread out over his ruddy face. “She’d probably say you were wasting yer time.”

Hillary chuckled. “Probably.”

“You know, her nephew, James, will likely be inheriting everything, journals included. I could introduce you. He might be willing to let you have a look at them. He’s an academic like yerself. A literature professor if memory serves. I’m sure he’d be sympathetic.”

A tiny ember of excitement sparked within her. She’d pretty much written off the trip to Scotland as a waste of time and money, but this nephew might help salvage her plans. “I’d appreciate that.”

“No’ at all.” He stood, and Hillary would have sworn she heard the chair groan with relief. “I must be off, but I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Thank you.” And she meant for more than offering to introduce her to Agnes’s heir. It had been a long time since anyone had treated her with the respect he’d shown once they learned she’d killed a man.

Hillary stood in the doorway of the Seilach Inn, out of the steady drizzle, and watched Inspector Bristol drive off. The damp air chilled her skin, but strangely soothed as well. She needed the fresh air to clear Randall from her muddled brain. Somehow he’d even managed to follow her across the ocean.

She swallowed hard, remembering the lies and accusations, and that overwhelming sense of hopelessness as her marriage and career had come crumbling down around her. Her face turned hot and her breath seemed to lodge in her throat. She had to get into the open where she could breathe.

She returned to her room, grabbed her jacket and hiking boots, then stepped out into the cool air. After a few deep breaths, her heart rate slowed and the trembling in her hands lessened.

Her footfalls crunched across the gravel lot as she left the inn behind and followed a worn path into the forest. The heady scents of wet wood and earth tickled her nose. Still, she couldn’t seem to keep the memories of the past two years from replaying in her head.

She stopped walking and squeezed her eyes shut, fighting to push Randall back to that shadowy corner of her mind she worked so hard to avoid.

Think of something else. Get back on task. Think of Anne and remember why you’re here.

After all, according to Joan Howard, the inn’s proprietress , somewhere in this stretch of forest Anne Black had met her end at the hands of an angry mob. Joan hadn’t provided an exact location, just that it happened somewhere along the edge of the property line that separated Agnes’s land from the inn’s.

“With the walls of Glendon House in view,” Joan had said on Hillary’s first night at the inn. They’d been sitting by the fire in the parlor after a dinner Hillary couldn’t quite bring herself to eat, Agnes’s battered body and that God-awful stench still too fresh in her mind. “Anne shouted a final curse as the men strung her up. They say that as she strangled, the tree they hanged her from withered and died. And within the next seven years, the families of each of the men who participated suffered a great tragedy.”

Joan did love her spooky legends. Not that Hillary minded. She’d always found local folklore fascinating. She enjoyed comparing the similarities and differences from one region to another, the mix of fact and hearsay.

The question was, how much of Anne’s legend was fact, and how much was simply a good tale for the tourists? Without those journals Hillary would never know.

A woman named Anne Black had been tried and acquitted of arson and vandalism charges in 1915, but what had driven a group of men to turn vigilante and string her up despite the court’s decision?

While belief in witchcraft was not unheard of in some rural areas of Britain even into the early twentieth century, Hillary had never heard of a case coming to such an extreme end. Agnes had promised that Roderick’s journals would explain everything, but the odds of actually getting to see those journals were growing slim. 

A flash in the gloom caught her eye and she stopped walking. A small light, there for an instant, then it was gone.

What the hell?

Another flash, this one a little left of the first. She narrowed her gaze. A round yellow glow shone through the trees like the beam from a flashlight.

Was there someone else in the woods?

The light disappeared.

Her heart rate kicked up and a shivery cold, slick and horribly familiar, settled over her.  She struggled to pull herself together.  So what if she wasn’t alone? Surely, other people walked in this forest. But rational thinking did little to calm the swell of panic expanding inside her chest.

The light returned, closer this time. There had to be someone out there, coming toward her, but she couldn’t see anyone.

“Hello?” she called out.

No answer, and the light vanished again.

Hillary turned to start back to the inn, but froze. Another light had appeared directly behind her, so close she had to squint against the brightness. She peered into the forest murk, but couldn’t see anyone past the bright yellow glow.

“Very funny,” she shouted, forcing her voice to sound mildly annoyed rather than filled with the terror coursing through her.

No answer.

Two people, one on either side of her, and neither of them spoke. Surely, if she were dealing with a couple of hikers one would have said something by now. She started away from both lights, remembering Agnes, bloody and broken.

As she walked, the sensation of being watched slithered up her spine. With her jaw clenched tight, she struggled to keep from running. Ahead of her, the trees thinned. She could make out the large stone walls of a house. Where was she?

A branch snapped to her right.

Close, too close.

She picked up her pace to a half jog, glancing over her shoulder as she came to the edge of the trees, then struck something solid. The impact sent her stumbling backward. A tiny yelp escaped her as she slipped on the wet ground. She landed with a splat on her backside, jarring her entire body.

A fresh wave of panic washed over her. She tensed, waiting for whoever had been following to pounce.

Nothing.

On a trembling exhale, the tension gripping her eased. She glanced around to be sure she was truly alone, and her gaze fell on a small woman pushing herself up from the muddy ground.

“I am so sorry.” On rubbery legs, Hillary stood and scrambled over to the woman. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

“Dinnae worry yerself, I’m fine,” the woman said, sitting back on her knees. Hillary guessed the woman to be close to her own age of thirty-two, maybe a few years younger. Mud and bits of yellow grass clung to her brown corduroy coat. The wind whipped her dark red hair about her head as she peered up at Hillary. “You must be the writer.”

Hillary shook her head. “History professor.”
Not anymore.
“I’m Hillary Bennett.” She held out her hand.

“Sarah Miller.” She took Hillary’s hand and let Hillary help her up.

“I’m so sorry about this.”

Sarah smiled. “Just a wee bit of dirt, really. No harm done. Ye’re here to write about Anne?”

Hillary frowned. “You know about that?”

“Aye, Culcraig’s a small village, and with what happened to poor Agnes…”

Of course, no doubt people were talking. Nausea swirled in Hillary’s belly at the idea that she was once again fodder for gossip.

“So are you writing a book about Anne?”

Sarah’s question interrupted her dark thoughts. A book had been the hope. Who knew what the reality would be? “I came to see Agnes’s journals. If there had been any truth to her claims, I might have considered something more.”

“That Anne was a witch?”

“That Anne was hanged as a witch.”

Sarah chuckled. “One and the same, really. Did you see the journals?”

“No. Do you actually believe Anne was a witch?

“Anne had a gift. She tried to help the people of Culcraig, but they were ignorant to her ways.”

A very different version of the legend Hillary had heard so far. According to most of Culcraig, Anne had been in league with the devil, cursing her neighbors, and bringing death and destruction to the whole village. 

“What gift was that?”

Sarah sat on a boulder next to her. “She could see curses, and lift them.”

More local lore. Were she not cold, soaking, and deeply embarrassed, she might have enjoyed hearing more. “That would make Anne a cunning woman. She would have been revered in the village. They never would have hanged her as a witch. She would have been their protection from witches.”

The corners of Sarah’s mouth pulled into a slight smile. “Ignorance and fear make people do horrid things. What were you running from the now?”

Heat stung Hillary’s cheeks. “I wasn’t running.”

“Nor were you walking.”

“I saw someone with a flashlight and I thought they were following me,” she admitted. Her cheeks burned hotter. It sounded weak, even to her.

Concern darkened Sarah’s eyes. “Who did you see?”

“I actually didn’t see anyone. Just the flashlight.”

“Hmm.” Sarah’s lips thinned. “Perhaps it was Anne following you.”

Great, Sarah was making fun of her. Well, no more than she deserved for sending the poor woman sprawling into the mud.

“I think I’ll head back. Sorry about that.” She pointed to mud streaking Sarah’s coat. “I’ll pay to have it cleaned.”

“You dinnae believe me?” Sarah’s smile widened as if she knew the punch line to a joke she’d yet to tell. “Look around you, Hillary. Do you no’ see where you are?”

Hillary’s gaze followed Sarah’s sweeping arm. The stone dwelling she’d seen as she burst from the trees was now clearly visible over the wide expanse of tangled grass.

Glendon House.

“And this.” Sarah pointed to the gnarled tree next to the boulder, ancient and brittle, without so much as a bud to hint at life within the twisted branches.

“Are you trying to tell me that this is the tree where Anne was hanged?”

Sarah nodded and she patted the pale rock beneath her. “It’s The Witch’s Stone.”

“To mark the place of execution.” Hillary couldn’t keep the awe from her voice as she placed her hand on the cold, smooth stone. Could this actually be the location of Anne’s death?

Sarah chuckled. “Still so sure it wasnae Anne you saw in the woods?”

At that moment, Hillary wasn’t sure of anything.

Caid signed the registry and gave Joan his credit card. His eyes stung in protest as he forced them to remain open. He'd managed a little sleep in the car, but Alex had insisted on talking to him a good portion of the drive. Now his head and shoulders ached with exhaustion.

"It's sorry I am about Agnes," Joan said, as she ran his card through the little black machine for confirmation. She smiled at him, at least he thought she did. The corners of her mouth naturally turned down so even when she smiled she looked to be frowning. "Such a shame. It's good you've come home to see her laid to rest, though. Family should be together at a time like this."

Caid wasn't so tired that he missed her probing. Raised in Edinburgh, Culcraig had never been his home. As a child, there’d been a few dutiful visits to Glendon House, but Agie had hated his father, so she’d made their stay as unpleasant as possible.

Perhaps it was his father's proprietary view of her home that had made her such a misery to be around. Caid imagined his father demanding explanations for any missing or moved items had irked the old woman.

Well, if she’d left the house to some religious cult that would show him, wouldn’t it? The idea pleased Caid immensely.

As for his family being together during this difficult time, surely Joan noticed he was registering here, while his mother, father and brother stayed together at Glendon House.

"I've read yer books," Joan continued. "And I think they’re marvelous."

"Thank you." He offered a hint of a smile.

"It makes all of Culcraig proud to know one of our own has such a talent."

"That’s kind of you to say, but I think--"

"Oh, this blasted machine," Joan snapped. "The slightest weather and it acts up."