Chapter Six

Marianne

Edinburgh— Friday 3rd August 1877

T he interior of St Giles brought me up short as I crossed the threshold, for though I had never been inside, it felt familiar. The cathedral was a vast echoing structure, the vaulted ceiling of the nave soaring so high above us that it could barely be made out in the gloom, intimidating, and much bigger than any church I had ever entered. There was so much space, so few places to hide, and the glimmer from the various stained-glass windows I found oppressive rather than impressive.

Aware of Mr Sutherland behind me trying to close the door softly, I forced myself to take a few steps further in. The church had undergone extensive renovations in the last few years, I knew, and my sensitive nose twitched at the smell of newly sculpted stone that mingled with the musty smell and a depressing sense of the urge to repent that I associate with all places of worship. Which explained the feeling I'd had, that I'd been here before. Religion, in the institution from which I had escaped, was deemed to be soothing to troubled souls. I had never found it so, but perhaps that was because it was not my soul that troubled me.

There were a few figures scattered about in the open pews beyond the transept, closer to the altar, but one of the aisles on the left was empty and slightly less exposed. Mr Sutherland followed my lead, his tread light for such a big man.

‘I promise that I intend you no harm, Mrs Crawford,' were his first words to me, spoken softly and with a mind to the acoustics of the place.

‘I would not be here with you if I thought so,' I replied. And yet, what on earth was I doing here at all, with a man who was always looking over his shoulder, and who looked too closely at me? I should be avoiding him at all costs, yet here I was, conniving with his desire for my company. ‘What is it you want from me?' I asked, thinking it might help me to understand what it was I wanted from him.

‘I thought it was a case of what you want from me ? Why I'm here in Edinburgh, wasn't that what you wanted to know?'

I took my time answering, concentrating all my attention on him. He baffled me. I was here because I was convinced, though I had no idea why, that I ought to be here with him. What I got from him was the same, a strong sense of his wanting to be with me, but nothing more, save that I felt—no, safe isn't the right word, I felt anything but safe. I felt jumpy, as if I was expecting something exciting to happen. Jittery was the word Mrs Oliphant would use. My blood was tingling with anticipation. I wanted more—more of this man's company, I mean, and that was such an unusual feeling—these days, unique.

I had been silent too long. He had been studying me, just as I'd been studying him. It didn't make me uncomfortable, it wasn't as if he was analysing my features for signs of my condition! It made me blush. It made me acutely aware of myself. And of him.

‘Would it help,' he asked me, ‘if I told you that my intentions are not in the least improper?'

No, I imagined replying, for my own thoughts are extremely improper. As if I would say such a thing, but the idea of it made me smile. Then he raised his brows, wanting to know what had made me smile, and I felt my cheeks getting hotter. ‘Not that it is at all relevant, but you have already told me you are not married. And neither, as it happens, am I.'

‘Really, Mrs Crawford?'

‘An employer's wife can confide in a widow, Mr Sutherland. I would not be so popular if I was Miss Crawford.'

‘Do wives commonly confide in their governesses?'

‘The role of wife and mother can be very lonely. I am a very good listener.'

‘And wise counsellor?'

‘What do you mean?' The question startled me out of the conversation.

He spread his hands, shaking his head. ‘I am interested, that's all. I have never been married, but I'd always assumed that a wife would confide in her husband. The idea that she'd be lonely...'

‘When a man comes home from whatever business takes him out all day, he wants to see his wife in a pretty gown smiling across the dinner table, listening to his tales of the outside world. He isn't interested in the mundane domestic world she inhabits, the exhausting task of raising his children, and the painful task of bearing them. I listen, Mr Sutherland, but that is all. My days of providing counsel of any sort are over.'

Too late, I realised my mistake. Had he missed the implication? I couldn't understand my outburst. I couldn't understand why I had even answered his questions. I was so intent on trying to find a way to change the subject, his next one caught me off guard once more.

‘I'm lost now,' he said, looking anything but. ‘Are you saying you have been married, or what?'

‘No, I have never been married, and I never want to be!' I had spoken too loudly. I clasped my hands tightly together, taken aback by my own vehemence. I ought to walk away from this conversation and this man, but once again my feet refused to co-operate.

‘I didn't mean to upset you,' he said softly. ‘I beg your pardon.'

‘I am not upset.' I spoke through gritted teeth.

‘I'm sorry all the same,' he said.

He was, I could tell that he meant it. I wondered if he'd leave now, but he made no move, looking at that moment just as baffled as I felt. I found that reassuring. I tried to assess his thoughts but with little success, and so instead I tried to understand my own motives. I don't believe in fate, but my instincts were telling me that I was meant to know this man. Why?

Was it a simple case of finding him attractive? I thought myself immune to such feelings, my body numbed for ever by the betrayal and scars that had been the result of my first and only experience of love. What I mistook for love. Was my body finally healed enough to make its own demands, even if my mind was damaged for ever? I did not wish to recall that other man, nor to compare him with Mr Sutherland. This was different. Not love, that I would never risk, but allure? Magnetism? Was it that which made me seek him out, and which kept me in his company even when I knew it was unwise?

It was not Mr Sutherland who made me feel unsafe, it was his effect on me. I liked the way he looked. He was a tall man, and well built, but he was not one of those men who use their size to intimidate. I shivered, the pleasant kind of shiver, recalling the heat of his hand through his gloves, and wondered, what would it have been like had he removed his glove? What would his touch be like? His lips?

Once again, I realised I'd been silent, and that I was being silently studied. Could he read my thoughts? At that moment, as our eyes met, I felt it, a tug, like a rope tightening between us, the absolute certainty that he too felt this—this compulsion. That we were two haunted, hunted souls destined to meet.

It was a ridiculous and fanciful thing to think, especially in a church, but the conviction took root, and allowed me at last to focus on what mattered—not what I felt for the man, but why I gravitated towards him. ‘We have strayed far from the point of this conversation,' I said. ‘Which was not for you to question me, but for me to question you. Were you in the gardens yesterday, by accident or design?'

‘I didn't arrive with the intention of speaking to you,' he answered, taking his time, choosing his words carefully, which was something of a habit with him. ‘If the ball hadn't been thrown in my direction I wouldn't have spoken. But it did and I'll confess I was glad it did, for I wanted to speak to you, and once I had spoken to you, I wanted to speak to you again. I was curious about you and if you don't mind my saying, I got the strong impression you were curious about me. Even if you did turn down my invitation to meet again,' he added with a faint smile, ‘here we are, after all.'

I had regained control of myself, and saw no harm in admitting that much. ‘A man who is afraid of the law, but who is not a criminal, is interesting.'

‘I'm not afraid of the law.'

‘You didn't want that policeman to see you.'

‘I didn't think he'd recognise me. I just didn't want to stand out. Look, I'm not trying to lead you a merry dance, I promise you. I'll be blunt, shall I?'

‘I would appreciate it.'

‘I'm here in Edinburgh on a job of work, the nature of which is confidential. I have no intentions, honest or wicked, save what I've already confessed, to get to know you a bit better. I am—I am drawn to you. That's the description that I keep coming back to, whatever that may mean.' He shrugged, looking sheepish. ‘There you have it.'

Drawn. The very word I had used myself to describe my reaction to him. It was reassuring and yes, it was slightly thrilling, to hear him articulate something akin to what I was experiencing. That he did so, I think against his better judgement, persuaded me that my instinct to trust him was sound, and that I could therefore indulge my wish to further our acquaintance. That sounds calculated, but it was rather caution born from experience. I cannot emphasise strongly enough how unusual this conversation was for me.

‘What is the nature of your work?' I asked him.

‘I'm a detective.'

‘A detective! So you are a policeman after all!'

‘Not exactly. I'm a private investigator.'

‘Good grief!' I had not even considered such a thing and was once again on my guard. ‘What are you investigating? Not me, I presume, though it would explain the number of questions you have thrown at me.'

‘I told you, I'm interested in you, it's just my way. As to why I'm here—it wouldn't be right to tell you that, not at the moment. My clients rely on my complete discretion.'

I could barely see his face in the flickering candlelight of the church, but my inner senses were on full alert. He was wary, but he was not lying. Despite what I have been accused of in the past, I am not a mind reader. I certainly cannot read people's thoughts precisely, but I am acutely sensitive, far more than most, to feelings, and at times, this gives me insights that have been seen as malign, even sorcery, when they most definitely are not.

My skill was more adept when a person was unaware of my interest. Rory Sutherland was very much aware that I was studying him, and his feelings were complex and confusing, as my own were becoming. Caution warring with heightened interest, mainly. ‘If you are a detective,' I said, trying to focus on what he had told me rather than what I was experiencing, ‘then why did you want to avoid that policeman? Don't the police and private investigators work together to solve crimes?'

He laughed at that, a snarling, vicious sound that was loud enough to echo, reminding us both of our surroundings. ‘Solving crimes is something the police do selectively, in this city.'

The bitterness in his voice startled me. The black wave of anger and regret that enveloped him took me utterly aback and took me right back too, to the countless nights when my own anger at the injustice of my treatment was my only defence against despair. Before I knew what I was doing I stepped closer, putting my hand on his arm. ‘Mr Sutherland, whatever it is that ails you, you can conquer it.'

His gloved hand covered mine. He looked at me with such bleakness that my heart contracted. ‘The case I'm investigating now is of no interest to the police. What ails me is unfinished business that must remain unresolved for ever.'

We were close enough for me to feel the warmth of his breath, to smell the faint trace of soap on his skin. My gloved hand was enveloped in his, held but not constrained. I didn't feel trapped, and again I cannot say just how important and unusual that was. On the contrary, I wanted to close the gap further between us, to ease the pain that brought back so many memories of my own. ‘The past, if that is what it is, is best left behind, Mr Sutherland.'

‘Aye, I know that, it's why I shouldn't be in Edinburgh.'

‘But you said your case...'

‘Brought me here.' He gave me a strange look then turned away, making a pretence of studying the ancient stonework. ‘It's the last place I should be, all the same. I love this city—sacrilege for a Weegie to say, but there it is. It's where I made my name, and it's where my name was blackened. If they find out I'm back...' His voice cracked. ‘Well, I'll just have to make damn—blooming sure that they don't find out.'

‘They? I don't understand, do you mean the police have forbidden—is your presence here illegal?'

‘No. It's complicated. It's not the police, so much as—no, I'm sorry, I truly am, but there's no point in my saying any more.'

‘But—but surely—you have told me almost nothing. Is your life in danger?'

‘Ach no, it's not that serious.' Mr Sutherland turned towards me, trying and failing to summon a semblance of a smile. ‘I'm sorry, I didn't mean to tell you any of this.' He was gathering himself together again, tucking away the dark emotions that had escaped his restraint, and my goodness that felt so horribly familiar. ‘I have no idea why I just blurted that out. As you pointed out, it's all in the past now.'

But it clearly wasn't. Haunted. Hunted. No wonder I felt such an affinity with him. ‘Who are these people?' I asked, with difficulty refraining from tugging at his sleeve. ‘The ones who blackened your name? And why—how—if you did not commit a crime? I don't understand.'

He sighed heavily. ‘My crime was not to listen to the advice I'd been given. To interfere when I'd been told not to. In short, I ruffled the wrong feathers, and the chickens came home to roost, so to speak.'

In short, I ruffled the wrong feathers.

Precisely what I had done, and with the same result. I very much wanted to know more, but I could tell from the way he set his mouth firmly that persistence would lead to resistance. ‘I know what that's like,' I said, willing him to understand just how sincerely I empathised. ‘It's clearly a painful subject, but if you wish to confide in me, I assure you, you can trust me.'

‘Aye, I know, I can trust you. Intuition,' he added, before I could ask, ‘I've good instincts in that department. But I've already told you more than I should have, and it's getting late. You shouldn't be out and about in this area, it's not safe. I think I'd best see you home.'

I remained rooted to the spot. ‘But—but if you have been threatened—if it's true that you could be in danger—then this case that has brought you here to Edinburgh, it must be very important to you?'

‘Oh, it is,' he said, giving me a look I could not interpret. ‘Much more important than I thought when I took it on.'

I allowed him to accompany me to the Grassmarket, because he seemed determined that I needed chaperoning, and it was easier to accept that than to argue with him. We passed Flora flitting up Victoria Street on her way to earn her keep. I smiled, a friendly smile I thought it was, but it startled both her and Mr Sutherland, who asked if we were acquainted. I answered honestly enough that we were not. He saw me to the entrance of my close, and would have escorted me up the stairs to my rooms had I permitted him to do so. I bid him goodnight.

Once inside I opened my window without lighting the lamp, and spotted him immediately, on the other side of the Grassmarket gazing up at my tenement. He nodded, though I did not acknowledge seeing him, and then took himself off towards the Cowgate. Where was he lodging? What on earth had he done all those years ago, to result in his exile from Edinburgh? And what was this case of his that was important enough to make him risk returning? We had made no arrangements to meet again, but I retired to bed that night certain that we would.