The Secrets of the Glen (Scottish Highlands #2)

Chapter 31

They left the house along with Nick, who followed them with Olive pulling on her lead. Robyn could hear Olive panting.

Nick set off, jogging. He waved as he passed by. Robyn waved back. She glanced at Marty. He suddenly stopped. ‘Do you think Gayle would like to come too? I forgot to ask her.’

Robyn shook her head. It was kind of him to ask, but she knew that Gayle had a few more things on her mind than their beautifully manicured lawn and their flower borders – like a pile of bills, and her poor mum. Robyn said, ‘I think she’s busy. Perhaps another time.’

‘All right.’

They fell in step again.

‘Oh – we’re not taking the car?’ Robyn asked as they passed by his small van parked outside.

‘No. I’m not gardening today, so I won’t need my stuff in the van. I thought it would be nice to walk.’

Robyn looked back at the house. So much for having breakfast with David. She knew how long Gayle’s road was. Once they got to the end, then presumably they’d have a bit of a walk up the drive to The Lake House.

‘I know a little shortcut,’ he said. ‘But mum’s the word.’ He tapped his nose.

Robyn thought that the old-fashioned phrase was rather funny coming from one so young. Which reminded Robyn – she had a question. ‘How old are you, anyway? If you don’t mind me asking.’

‘Twenty.’

‘Are you enjoying your part-time course at college?’

‘I am, yes. I’m just a bit worried that there won’t be the gardening work around when I’m finished and want to go full-time.’

‘But I thought you took over your father’s business?’

They’d got to the end of the drive and turned down the street.

‘I did – yes. But the people on his round are all getting on in years, and some don’t have the money from their pensions to pay me, so I’ve ended up doing their gardens and getting paid in apple pies and strawberry jam.’

‘Pardon? They pay you in pies and jam?’

‘Yeah – I suppose you’d call it bartering, just like what you’re doing with Gayle.’

‘You mean the redecorating in exchange for staying there.’ That wasn’t by choice, Robyn wanted to add. She frowned.

Marty halted when he caught her expression. ‘I can pay my way at Lark Lodge. I have some savings.’

After hearing he was doing people’s gardening work for almost nothing, she felt bad for making Marty pay for his room when she knew Gayle would have let him stay there for nothing; although she reminded herself she was paying Marty very generously for the gardening work – in cash. She resolved to increase his rate.

‘I’m sure you’ll land some new clients,’ Robyn said. ‘But in the meantime, you won’t have to use your savings, Marty, to pay for your room. After what I saw you’ve done to the front garden at Lark Lodge, I decided that you’re worth a lot more than your current rate.’

‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes.’

Robyn was factoring in his room and board, and adding that to his final bill for the garden work – she just wouldn’t tell him. She’d already sat in her room last night and counted out the cash she’d be giving him. She’d just have to count out some more.

Robyn tried not to think about where the cash had come from. There had to be a simple explanation. Vacation work – that was it. Perhaps she had been paid in cash. But who would have paid a student that much cash for a temporary job?

Robyn really didn’t want to think about the other possibility – that the cash wasn’t hers.

Nothing will make sense until I remember , she thought. Whilst part of her didn’t want to remember, it had now been four months since the accident, and her memory wasn’t coming back. If there wasn’t a physical reason for it, as her doctor at the hospital had intimated, then what was her subconscious protecting her from? She now wondered if it was something she’d done rather than someone she was running from.

‘I’m so pleased to have Gayle’s gardening work. It will tide me over until some more work rolls in,’ said Marty.

Robyn nodded, thankful for the distraction from her thoughts. She had an idea. ‘Have you seen the new estate going up on the outskirts of Aviemore?’ She knew it was a silly question. Nobody could miss the flags outside the entrance to the development just off the main road.

‘Yes – Nick was telling me all about it at dinner yesterday evening. That’s where he works as a site manager. He said that I should come along, and he’d introduce me to some of the residents, and see if they are interested in any gardening and landscaping work.’

‘That’s really kind of him.’

‘I know.’

Robyn was aware that Rose and George’s garden had been landscaped by the developer, but only because they were next door to the show home, and anybody viewing the show home could look out of the window into their garden. It would not make a good impression for potential buyers if the adjoining property’s garden was not looking its best.

However, for the rest of the properties on the estate, apart from the front gardens, which were laid to lawn, the back gardens were not, leaving lots of potential gardening and landscape work for Marty if homeowners were interested. Then there was the maintenance of the gardens – mowing lawns, trimming hedges. There would be all sorts of gardening jobs that needed doing.

Marty said, ‘I hope I can pick up some more work. I’m not complaining about some of my father’s old clients – the pies and homemade jam are lovely, but I can’t exactly live on those.’

Robyn eyed him as they walked down the street. It was a beautiful spring morning, quite different from the winter in the Scottish Highlands. She loved waking up to the dawn chorus and the sunshine. Spring had brought with it warmer weather, even though it was only April.

They cut through a lane between houses, which led to the shores of a loch. And there, in a beautifully serene setting on the bank of the loch, was a large, detached residence. They’d emerged from the lane at the back of a property that she guessed fronted the loch. ‘Is that The Lake House?’

‘Yes, that’s it.’

She looked at the high garden wall and imagined they’d have to circle the wall and then walk up a long drive to the house. Robyn looked at her watch. She sighed.

‘We won’t be long. Look, I’ve got a key.’

‘A key?’

He stopped at an iron gate in the wall. ‘We can get straight into the gardens from here. Saves a long walk round to the front of the house.’

As he unlocked the gate, Robyn whispered, ‘Are the family here, do you think?’ She didn’t know why she was whispering. It occurred to her that the family might not take too kindly to a nosy stranger wandering around the grounds of their house.

‘No, they’re not here.’

The house was huge. ‘How can you be so sure?’ Robyn asked, her voice hushed as they walked into the grounds.

‘The family haven’t been back here since the accident on Christmas Day. I don’t know if they’ll ever return.’

‘But they keep paying you to look after the grounds in their absence?’

‘Oh, yes. It’s their holiday home, and they are rarely here, so it’s normal to be working here when they’re not around.’

Robyn followed Marty down a winding, cobbled pathway between trees. They emerged from the trees. ‘Oh, wow!’ was all Robyn could say when she saw the beautifully manicured lawn and the huge variety of established plants and flowers. The flower border that ran along the garden wall was much deeper than the one Marty had planted at Gayle’s house. It looked like the garden of a stately home that would be featured in a magazine, or like a National Trust property that people paid to visit.

‘So, this is the back garden,’ said Marty.

Robyn had already guessed as much when she saw the house, which had a large conservatory and a flagstone patio with cast iron garden furniture.

‘Come on.’

Robyn stood and stared at the house.

Marty turned around when he noticed she wasn’t following. ‘What’s the matter?’

Robyn didn’t know. She just felt peculiar being there.

‘Look, I can assure you there’s nobody home. Come on.’

Robyn stepped out from the shade of the trees and followed Marty across the lawn. She spied a cream-coloured wooden structure with a door and windows either side. It looked like a summerhouse.

‘The gardens are beautiful,’ Robyn gushed as she followed Marty across the lawn, her eyes drawn back to the house. As they walked around, she continued to compliment the grounds, but her mind was elsewhere. There was a familiarity about the place that she couldn’t put her finger on.

‘It really is enchanting.’ Robyn wasn’t talking about the garden, but the house. She found herself staring vacantly at a pile of dead leaves. She looked up at Marty, who had crossed his arms over his chest and was looking rather peeved.

‘So, you think this pile of rotting leaves is enchanting?’

‘Well, it has got a kind of ...’ Robyn gesticulated with her hands, ‘nice shapeliness to it.’ She cringed.

‘You’re not really here to see the garden, are you?’

Marty unfolded his arms and took her hand. ‘Come on.’

‘Where are we going?’

They headed towards the house. ‘You’ve been fascinated by it since we walked into the garden.’

They stepped onto the patio outside the French doors next to the conservatory, whereupon Marty knelt and lifted a worn door mat. Robyn saw him pick up a key.

She looked at him, surprised. ‘They leave a key under a mat?’

‘Yeah – I discovered it once, when I’d mowed the grass and was sweeping up the patio. I dislodged the mat, and that’s when I’d found the rusting key. I reckon it’s been there years, and they’ve forgotten about it.

‘And it still works?’

‘Yes. I cleaned it up, and put it back under the mat.’ He unlocked one of the French doors and motioned her inside. ‘There’s really not much to see, just a lot of white dust sheets.’

Robyn stood motionless on the mat, peering inside.

‘Aren’t you coming in?’

Her stomach was churning, and she had no idea why. It felt like something bad was going to happen. ‘But we’re trespassing.’

Marty’s expression clouded over. ‘Do you want to see the place or not? There might not be another opportunity.’

She took a deep breath and stepped into the house.

She cast her gaze around a small study.

‘This is William Ross’s study.’

Books lined one wall. There was an old oak desk, a chair, and a couple of wing-backed chairs on either side of the French doors. It reminded her of Gayle’s father’s study. Robyn had been working her way through Gayle’s house, redecorating one bedroom at a time. At some point, she’d start on the rooms downstairs. But the study was not to be touched. Gayle wanted it to remain as it was.

‘There’s no computer,’ Robyn observed, thinking, talk about old-fashioned .

‘They don’t come here to work. Mr Ross told me that once. It is purely a holiday home.’

‘What’s he like?’

‘Who – Mr Ross?’

Robyn nodded as she followed Marty out of the study into the hallway. The décor, along with the house, was not unlike that of Gayle’s home – it was just on a much grander scale.

‘William Ross is a very nice guy. I met him just a handful of times when I was a little kid accompanying my father here, helping out with gardening during the school holidays. I remember a good-humoured man who always had time to stop for a chat and ask after my mum. He always gives a generous Christmas bonus. They were nice, down-to-earth people, from what I remember, but I rarely saw them. They mostly only spent Christmas here.’

‘That’s a shame. I think they’re missing out. I love spring here.’ Robyn suspected she’d love the Highlands in any season.

Marty smiled, echoing her thoughts. ‘I love this place any time of year. But then I’m biased. I’m from here.’

As they chatted, Marty opened several doors off the hallway. Robyn popped her head around the kitchen door, then the lounge. She could see the outline of a huge flat-screen television beneath a dust sheet. There was a TV in the dining room as well. She paused, staring at the long dining room table, imagining them all seated around it on Christmas Day, eating their final meal together before the accident on the ski slopes changed their lives forever.

Marty stood in the doorway too. He sighed. ‘It’s so sad, what happened to his daughter. I just don’t get it.’

She turned to look at him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘There was an avalanche. There’s normally an avalanche risk forecast between about the middle of December to mid-April from the SAIS.’

Robyn looked at him blankly. She didn’t recall hearing about the avalanche on the news when she was in hospital, but then she had been faffing about, trying to locate the television controls. She had missed part of the news story.

‘Oh, right. You don’t know what that is. It’s The Scottish Avalanche Information Service, who assess the potential for them in six areas – the Cairngorms is one of them, but the winters have been so mild lately with not the same level of snowfall there used to be, so I’m thinking it came as a bit of a surprise.’

Robyn shrugged. ‘Perhaps it’s something to do with climate change.’

She stepped back into the hall as Marty closed the door. She’d been admiring the décor in each room, and it was giving her ideas for the rooms downstairs in Lark Lodge. Marty was right: there wasn’t that much to see – white dust sheets abounded everywhere.

‘How long has it been like this?’ Robyn’s voice carried down the wide expanse of hallway like an echo. Then she remembered. Nobody had returned since Christmas. ‘What’s in here?’ she asked. They’d walked straight past a door.

‘No – don’t open that one.’

‘Why?’ Robyn said ignoring his protestations. She opened the door. There were just more dustsheets.

Marty came striding down the hallway as she was just shutting the door. Then something caught her eye. In the sea of white shapes, something stood out that caught Robyn’s attention. One of the pieces of furniture was uncovered. Robyn was just opening the door wider when Marty slapped his hand over hers and pulled the door shut. ‘I think you’ve seen enough down here. Why don’t we go and look upstairs?’

She looked at him in bewilderment. He gestured in the direction of the stairs. She turned as if to follow but as soon as his back was turned, she opened the door again and stepped inside the room.

As she expected, Marty was right on her tail; his head appeared around the door in an instant. ‘What are you doing? I thought we were going upstairs?’

‘I just wanted to see this room – what’s the problem? This room is just like all the others.’ She threw her hand in a wide arc around the room.

‘That’s my point exactly.’ Marty sighed heavily. ‘So why don’t we go up—’

‘What’s that?’ Robyn’s gaze wandered back to the uncovered sofa that had caught her attention in the first place. Her attention lingered there as she moved towards it to take a closer look.

‘There’s nothing to see, honestly. Let’s go upstairs.’

Robyn glanced at Marty, who was holding out a pleading hand.

On the floor next to the sofa was an empty plate with crumbs on it and what looked like the remnants of a sandwich. There was an open carton of orange juice. She walked around the back of the sofa to discover a sleeping bag laid out along the sofa, with a cushion placed at one end as a pillow. Moving along the sofa to the end, she felt something underfoot. Looking down, she saw that she was standing on a strap of some kind. Bending down, she pulled a large rucksack from under the sofa. Robyn hoisted it up in front of her and held it up.

Marty looked at her sheepishly– it belonged to him.

‘I thought you said you were going home to collect your stuff after breakfast?’

‘I didn’t actually say I was going home, did I?’

Robyn let the heavy rucksack drop out of her fingers, making a dull thud on the carpet. ‘I suppose you’re going to tell me that you can explain?’