The Posy Ring Read online

  Praise for Catherine Czerkawska’s writing

  ‘A powerful story about love and obligation…a persuasive novel, very well written.’ John Burnside

  ‘Moving, poetic and quietly provocative.’ Independent

  ‘Clear-eyed, succinct…a much more substantial piece of work than its slim page count suggests.’ Rosemary Goring, National

  ‘Take any aspect of the novelist’s art and you’ll find it exemplified here to perfection.’ Bill Kirton, Booksquawk

  ‘Heart-warming, realistic and page-turning.’ Lorraine Kelly

  ‘Beautiful – lyrical and sensual by turns.’ Hilary Ely

  ‘Blisteringly eloquent.’ Joyce Macmillan, Scotsman

  ‘A romance of Scotland’s great Romantic. There is a pastoral beauty… their courtship is drawn gorgeously. The Jewel finally gives voice to Jeany Armour, the girl who sang as sweetly as the nightingale, who was muse, mother, wife and lover to Scotland’s national poet. This is her song.’ Sunday Mail

  ‘Uplifting…does much to put right the wrongs of historians. The characters come to life beautifully on the page…Serves as a superbly researched biography of a deeply admirable woman who until now has been…unjustly neglected.’ Undiscovered Scotland

  ‘Beguiling and enchanting…Czerkawska is an excellent storyteller…Full of suspense…and lush sensuality, so you can almost feel the grass brushing against your skin, and smell the honeysuckle in summer evenings.’ Scottish Review

  ‘A beautiful historical novel.’ Edinburgh City of Literature

  ‘Czerkawska tells her tale in a restrained, elegant prose that only adds to its poignancy.’ Sunday Times (season’s best historical fiction)

  ‘A compelling read, with a satisfying blend of history, nature and romance.’ Amanda Booth, The Scots Magazine

  Also by Catherine Czerkawska

  fiction

  The Curiosity Cabinet

  The Jewel

  The Physic Garden

  Bird of Passage

  The Amber Heart

  Ice Dancing

  A Quiet Afternoon in the Museum of Torture

  non-fiction

  The Way It Was

  For Jean: Poems, Songs and Letters by Robert Burns for his wife, Jean Armour

  plays

  Wormwood

  The Price of a Fish Supper

  Quartz

  Burns on the Solway

  The Secret Commonwealth

  THE

  Posy Ring

  book one of

  the annals of Flowerfield

  Catherine Czerkawska

  Published by Saraband,

  Suite 202, 98 Woodlands Road,

  Glasgow, G3 6HB,

  and

  Digital World Centre, 1 Lowry Plaza

  The Quays, Salford, M50 3UB

  www.saraband.net

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Copyright © Catherine Czerkawska, 2018

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without first obtaining the written permission of the copyright owner.

  ISBN: 9781912235063

  ISBNe: 9781912235070

  This is for my late and much missed mum,

  Kathleen Czerkawski,

  who loved vintage long before it became fashionable.

  PROLOGUE

  The islands of Scotland are home to a fair mixture of dark-eyed, dark-haired folk and it is popularly supposed that they are descendants of survivors of the Armada debacle, sailors who came ashore in Scotland, either voluntarily seeking sanctuary or unwillingly as victims of storm and shipwreck. We should, however, remember that the native Celts are as likely as not to be dark, although there are red-headed Scots and fair-haired Vikings here in plenty.

  Tales of the Armada and Spanish treasure may have been exaggerated by subsequent generations, although there is certainly some evidence of the wreck of a Spanish galleon in Tobermory Bay. Those Spaniards who were unfortunate enough to founder off the coast of Ireland might, had they survived, have told a tale of the wholesale slaughter of those who surrendered, albeit at the hands of government troops rather than the natives, who may have been more disposed to be sympathetic. The fate of those who landed in Scotland was a little different.

  It must be borne in mind that the great Spanish expedition followed on from the execution of the Scottish queen by her cousin Elizabeth. If the politics of the time were complicated in England, they were doubly so in Scotland, with something of a divide between Highland and Lowland allegiances. Even that division, like all such history, is far from clear, being open to misinterpretation and prejudice.

  Without knowing the personal tales of the survivors who reached these small Scottish islands in comparative safety, we can only guess at the nature of their lives thereafter. Some were returned to Spain and of those, a great number perished on the voyage. A few remained. Their stories seem to be lost in the mists of time and even official records may have been deliberately falsified for the safety of all concerned. The Spaniards were, after all, the enemy.

  From Island Tales by the Rev. Bartholomew Scobie (Edinburgh 1900)

  ONE

  Daisy glimpses the house as the ferry nears the island, a brief, tantalising hint of grey stones that seem to have become a part of the hillside, embedded in it, as objects become embedded in ancient trees. She was on the island only once before, and she’s hardly even sure that she recognises the house, not until she’s on the lane, peering in through the rusting wrought-iron gates on the landward side. Memory plays tricks but she knows that she must have seen it three times, all those years ago.

  Thrice. Like a charm.

  Her father wouldn’t willingly have pointed it out to her on the way to the island. She’s sure of that now. So the first sight must have been as they climbed the hill, when they had been intent on the task in hand. She had seen it briefly, in passing, but there had been no time to stand and stare. All the same, it comes back to her with a peculiar intensity as soon as she sets foot in the narrow lane that leads to nowhere but the hill. She can feel her father’s hand in hers, his fingers calloused from the fiddle, and the smooth band of his wedding ring. He smells of Imperial Leather soap and some mysterious, indefinable herbal scent, and he has tied his mane of dark hair back into a ponytail. She remembers the perfume of flowers and wanting to pick them. She was always picking wild flowers in those days and always disappointed that their blooms drooped so quickly in their jam jars of water. She had tried to pull away from him, drawn to campion and vetch, but he had said, ‘No, Daisy. Maybe later. But let’s do what we’ve come to do first, eh?’

  He had it stored away inside his T-shirt, the wish.

  ‘Next to my heart!’ he had said, with a grin that was no grin at all, folding up the white silk with the words written on it. She had copied it out laboriously, sitting at the folding table in the warm van. In marker pen so that it would fade slowly. That was the way the magic worked. As the words faded, so your wish might come true.

  ‘It’s worth a try,’ her father had said, with a little grimace. ‘Anything’s worth a try.’

  She was worrying about the scarf that belonged to her mother, a white silk scarf, a precious possession. But her father said it didn’t matter and scarves were replaceable.

  Now, she remembers the lane with its profusion of flowers and this house, glimpsed only in passing back then, behind its wrought-iron gates. She had badly wanted to stop an
d look at it, momentarily entranced by some quality of mystery. She was a great one for stories, a great reader, even then. ‘Daisy always has her nose in her book,’ her mother would say. The house, glimpsed so briefly in passing, looked as though it belonged in a story. She had wanted to stop and gaze at it, drinking it all in, but her father had pulled her onwards.

  She had sensed a kind of panic in his voice.

  ‘No. No, Daisy, we can’t stop here.’

  ‘Why not? It’s an interesting house.’

  ‘Because somebody might see us.’

  ‘Who? There’s nobody here. It looks empty.’

  ‘It isn’t empty, Daisy. It isn’t an empty house. I think somebody lives in it.’

  Even then, even as a child, she had thought he seemed both certain and nervous. As though he knew who lived there. As though he didn’t want to be seen by whoever might be looking out of those windows. It had been raining that long-ago morning, the kind of torrential Scottish rain that people call ‘stair rods’ after a dry spring, but the sun had come out and the air in the lane was hot and humid and sweet-smelling. The lane was full of flowers: late bluebells, early meadowsweet and, above them, a riot of creamy honeysuckle and wild roses, pink, white and every shade in between. And birdsong. The birds were singing their hearts out after the rain. They had disturbed them as they walked, and she could hear the beat and flutter of their wings among the leaves.

  ‘No. No, Daisy, we can’t stop here.’

  ‘Why not? It’s a lovely house.’ But his fear had been infectious, and they had hurried on.

  *

  Today, she has parked the blue Polo in a muddy clearing, hardly a lay-by at all, uncertain about parking at the house and unsure about being able to turn around at the other end of the lane. She feels a throb of anticipation, and there it is. The house again, just as she has remembered it without really remembering its exact whereabouts: a huddle of stone walls half hidden at the end of a green lane, beyond rusted iron gates. A faded wooden sign, to the right of the gate, has the single painted word: Auchenblae, just visible, although another winter will probably obliterate it completely. The house feels undisturbed, sunk deep in time. Dreaming. She puts her hand into the pocket of her jacket and brings out the heavy bunch of keys that the solicitor has given her. They feel too ancient, too large and unwieldy to be the keys to any real house. She imagines herself walking along the soft, mossy driveway. But she is in two minds. Should she climb the hill or explore the house? Which should she do first? Does she want to climb the hill at all? Why is she so reluctant? Why is she hesitating?

  She dredges up the memories of that previous time.

  It had been hard to breathe beneath the stunted island trees. Airless. And besides, she had been holding her breath. Now, she has no very clear memory of the climb. Her memories of the walk are just a jumble of green leaves, the track winding on and on through willow and birch, rising beneath their feet. She had grown tired in the airless lane. The hill had seemed steep, but probably wasn’t. Just that she was smaller back then. Maybe he had carried her for a little while, giving her a piggy-back. It was what he had done so often, her tall father, carrying her easily.

  ‘Gee up,’ she would have said, clinging to his ponytail. ‘Gee up, horsey!’

  Viola Neilson. That was her grandmother’s name, the grandmother she had never met, never known. Jessica May. That was her mother’s name. Jessica May Neilson, born in 1960 when Viola was forty and still unmarried. A nine days’ wonder, surely, on this island. A scandal. But Viola was alone in the world with inherited money and a house and she wanted the child. She could and did make her own arrangements. Sweet Jessica May. Daisy remembers her mother’s warmth, her gentleness, the flowery scent of her, as though she had somehow absorbed the scent of her own name. Sweet May. Thinking about it now, she can see that Jessica May must have inherited Viola’s determination at least. Perhaps the mildness had been deceptive after all, or reserved only for her husband and her small daughter.

  Home for Daisy at that time was the van. Warm and cluttered. If it had been shabby and a little less than clean, she didn’t remember. Children seldom notice such things unless they impinge on their comfort. And the van was comfortable, with cushions, throws, the scent of patchouli and ylang-ylang. Joss sticks. Candles. Nineteen-year-old Jessica May Neilson had met Rob Graham when he was playing the fiddle at a folk festival on the island. Bravely, she had stood up and sung with him at an open mic session in one of the pubs. It must have been love at first sight. A coup de foudre, the French call it. Irresistible. Soul mates right from the start. But Daisy had never been able to talk to her mother about it. Jessica had died too soon, much too young, so she had only her father’s word for it, and Rob’s account had been patchy at best. ‘She had a voice like a skylark. She sang and the sun came out. She was magic.’

  Daisy had used her imagination – and the few surviving photographs – to fill in the rest, to fill in the gaps in her knowledge of the pretty woman, long red hair blowing in the wind, smiling indulgently at Rob. But there is so much she doesn’t know. So much still to find out. And perhaps the key is here, now. Along with this bunch of ridiculously heavy iron keys that weighs down her pocket.

  When Rob left the village with his fiddle, his bodhrán and his suspect cigarettes, he took lovely Jessica May with him in his painted van. She left without a backward glance. She left her mother, she left her home, she left the village. She would sing and Rob would play, ‘Gypsy rover came over the hill, down to the valley shady.’ It was their song. ‘He whistled and sang till the green woods rang, and he won the heart of a lady.’

  They were married long before Daisy was born. Her mother had emphasised that. ‘We were married a whole year before you were born, Daisy Daisy.’ Her father still does that: the affectionate doubling of her name like the old song about the bicycle made for two. Not that it would have made any difference to Daisy whether they were married or not, but it seemed to make a difference to Jessica May. They had travelled about and Jessica May had home-schooled Daisy for a while.

  ‘I always thought,’ said Rob, many years later, ‘that they would meet again, make up the quarrel. Viola didn’t approve of me, the little she knew of me, which wasn’t much. She presented your mother with an ultimatum. Bad move. They were so alike. But Viola would have loved you. I’m sure of it. I never thought it would go on that long. I tried to persuade your mum to do something about it, but she liked to do things her own way. At first she didn’t want to contact home and then she didn’t feel she could. Too much water under the bridge. She was afraid, I think. Afraid of rocking the boat. Afraid of upsetting things.’

  When Daisy was eight, Jessica May had fallen ill, fading away as though somebody had enchanted her. Daisy remembers her mother growing thinner and frailer. Somebody had taken her warm, vibrant mother and left this strange attenuated creature in her place. A changeling. At the end, it was as though all that was left in the van was love. Love and pain. And then there was nothing, because her mother had been taken to hospital where everything was clean, white and impersonal. Hard-edged. Nothing like the van with its sprawled cushions, its crocheted throws.

  It was then that they had copied out the words of the wish, writing them carefully on white silk, sailing to the island, labouring up the track that led to the Clootie Tree at the top of the fairy hill: Dunblae.

  ‘Do you think it’ll work?’ she had asked and her father had said, ‘It’ll do no harm to try.’

  At the top of the hill, she remembers, the atmosphere changed. The track was a friendly place, breathless with heat, loud with birds. But the top of the hill was a different matter entirely. Even then, as a child, she had been aware of a certain foreboding. Later, she learned the word ‘numinous’ and knew that it described the hill. But it was more than numinous. It was other-worldly in no good way. For the first time ever, she had been afraid of a place, rather than afraid of a per
son or an event. The place itself frightened her. The tree – bending with the prevailing wind, clinging onto life amid the rocks – frightened her. If her father had not been there to reassure her, she would have taken to her heels and run back down the track, back to the van that was and always had been their sanctuary. The tree was a gaunt and ancient hawthorn and it was festooned with rags, the clooties that gave it its name. They fluttered from its many hoary branches, bizarre washing hung on lines. Wishing rags. Although she had no words to describe it at the time, the visit had stayed with her. As an adult, she realised that it was the intensity of the emotion that had unnerved her. Each piece of cloth was imbued with an individual sorrow, a sense of longing, like their own for Jessica May to be well again. She could feel it. The panic and desperation were almost tangible. The desire for the restoration of some balance. Some hope for the future.

  ‘Where is it?’ her father asked.

  She pulled the silk scarf from her backpack.

  ‘Here it is.’

  He was tall enough to tie it onto the tree, pushing other pieces of rag aside to make room for it.

  ‘What now?’ she asked. ‘What do we do, Dad?’

  For the first time ever, he seemed to be at a loss. ‘I don’t know, hen.’

  ‘Should we say a prayer?’ Ever since her mother had fallen ill, the van had been in one place, a permanent campsite. And Daisy had been going to a proper school, a small primary school where they sometimes went to church, where the priest sometimes visited, where they said prayers.

  ‘I don’t know any prayers.’

  So Daisy said one. ‘Our Father who art in heaven…’

  ‘I didn’t know you knew that.’ He stroked her hair.

  ‘We say it at school.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s the right prayer for a place like this,’ he said uneasily. ‘Do you, Daisy?’

  ‘What do you think we should say then?’

  ‘Your mother would know. But I’m afraid I don’t.’