Bruar's Rest

was puzzled by her apparent shock. ‘Isn’t this what you wanted?’
    ‘It’s what you bloody wanted, not me.’ There, she’d said it, and she meant it.
    ‘But the other day, it took all my strength to fight you off. You’re not telling me that was the feelings of a sad lonely wife, because if so, it was a funny way of showing it.’
    His blunt words clarified everything. Now that the truth was revealed, she realised all she’d been doing in Ballyshan was living a lie. ‘I know what you’re saying, Michael, but the uncertainty of whether he existed seemed to leave me in limbo. All this time my imagination sent me off on roads of wild dreams of being your wife, living here like a lady, but the truth is, I’m a true-blood tinker. We don’t marry outside our own. My Bruar is dead, and half of me with him. Do you want half a woman?’
    ‘I’ll take a fraction if you’ll say the word. God almighty, Megan, surely you know the heart of me? Who cares for you as I do? I love the wild tinker in you!’ He folded the letter, putting it back into his pocket, but through heartbroken sobs she asked for it. ‘Why, if you can’t read or write?’
    ‘It’s all I have of my Bruar. Please let me keep it Michael, it’s the only thing left to say that he’s finally gone from me.’
    He told her defiantly it wouldn’t do her any good because of her illiteracy. She said that didn’t matter. Grudgingly handing it over, he left her to think things out. After all, he thought, it had been wrong of him not to show respect, or a flicker of melancholy at Bruar’s death. Yet it hurt him to know that a memory from her past would share their bed; if she decided to stay, that is.
    She pushed her arms into a warm coat and was soon heading up onto the boggy ground. Here her pain could be given free rein, she could grieve naturally. Ghosts of her past relatives painted scenes of her forbidden love, they whispered in her ear, shame on you for not finding Bruar yourself. Needle-tongued spectres told her that with Michael there could never be a future, nor a present for that matter, because something was missing in their relationship. Whatever it was, she’d no idea, but maybe the truth was that Bruar was never meant to be shared, dead or alive.
    Michael didn’t follow her, which was just as well, because she’d found routes through the bogland that no one had ever walked on before. The seclusion was welcome. The green and mystical Ireland was like Scotland, and yet at that precise moment she craved to be home. At least in such wild terrain her savaged heart might find solace in its similarities to her homeland. Try as she might, though, Bruar’s spirit would not rest, and somehow a future with Michael seemed impossible. Her mind was made up; come the weekend she’d ask to be taken to Dublin.
    How pained and lost he seemed after his agonising wait, as his face searched hers for an answer. When she saw this, it wasn’t in her nature to hurt him. ‘I’ll wait for the right moment,’ she promised herself.
    She yearned to leave but her comfortable surroundings and the beautiful heather-filled moorland offered her a place of peace, to dream of times past and those never to come again. Anyway, who did she have in Scotland who cared about her? With Rachel and Nicholas in America, and Bruar gone, there was nobody apart from old Doctor Mackenzie, who was probably dead for all she knew. Buckley would be very much alive, however, with his catlike ways, and would certainly be prowling around. He was another good reason to stay.
    Summer was almost upon them, and still she delayed her answer to the ever-patient, doting Michael, who did not press her, much as he wanted to. Then, one morning after breakfast, he summoned everyone into the kitchen where he dropped a bombshell!
    ‘I wonder what he’s doing now,’ she thought, listening to him giving his orders. Mrs Sullivan was just as much in the dark. One by one they gingerly stepped into the warm kitchen, to see a bottle of champagne and several tall-stemmed glasses.
    ‘My,’ said Paddy, scratching his head and removing a faded cloth cap, ‘I wonder what the celebration is.’
    ‘Might be that new stallion he’s been on about. I reckon he’s bought the beauty,’ said Johnno, lowering his voice as Michael strode into the room, smiling from ear to ear.
    ‘Well, me hearty fellas, I have a fine bit of news for you all!’ Striding over to Megan, he took her hand and kissed it.