The Inheritance Read Online Free PDF Page A

against the cliff, and the bitter north wind would be howling outside the tower walls.  I wondered if the fireplace built into the wall opposite the bed was enough to keep the winter chill at bay. 
    There was an old tapestry hanging over the chest of drawers and I walked over to examine it.  The once vibrant colors were now faded, but I could still make out the picture.  There was a fair -headed maiden in a white gown handing a sword to a knight who was kneeling before her, holding his helmet in his hands.   His horse was behind him, and he seemed to be heading off to battle.  I wondered if Isobel had worked on that tapestry, or if it had belonged to her mother-in-law who occupied this room before her. 
    We left the room and went back down the spiral staircase.  On the second floor Danny opened one of the connecting doors and we were in the main part of the castle.  Most of the furniture was gone, but some pieces remained , and we wandered through the ruined rooms trying to imagine their purpose and who might have visited them.  The Great Hall still had a few trestle tables and carved wooden chairs, and there was a monstrous fireplace, large enough to roast an ox on one side of the room.  Some old banners hung around the huge room and sad-looking eyes of deer heads stared at us from their place on the walls.  Anything of value had been looted a long time ago, and most of the rooms were bare and dusty.
    “Can we go outside?” I asked feeling uneasy. 
    “This place gives me the creeps.”
    “There is one more thing I want to show you before we go,” said Danny lea ding me back through the side door and down the stairs of the tower.  We stepped out into the summer sunshine and I took a deep breath of relief.  I was glad to escape that lonely castle.  It seemed full of ghosts, especially the ghost of Angus McBride, who was the last one to live among them. 
    Danny led me around the side of the castle and opened a door built into a stone wall.  Inside was what must have been a walled garden.  It was neglected, but I could see how beautiful it must have been in its day.  The garden was overgrown , and multicolored roses burst from unpruned bushes, their fragrant heads turned up to the warm sun above.  The walls were covered in lichen and crumbling in some places, but the garden was full of color and the heady scent of flowers and I wanted to linger.  We made our way down a gravel walkway until we found an old wrought iron bench, and sat down among the profusion of flowers growing all around us. 
    “This must have been beautiful once,” I said , trying to envision what the garden looked like when the castle gardener had lovingly tended it.  Did Isobel walk here and dream of the children that she would one day have, or pine for her husband when he left the castle to join the young king?
    “Danny, did Isobel have children before she disappeared?”  My curiosity about her was peaked, and I wanted to know more about her life.
    “No, there were no bairns.  John was desperate for an heir since he was the only son, but they never had children.  After his death, the estate passed on to a cousin.  John was arrested and tried for treason and died without leaving a legitimate heir.”
    “ What about an illegitimate one?”
    “There was some talk of him having a bastard o r two, but no one knows the truth.”
    A sudden thought stuck me.  “Am I the last of the line?”
    “No, there are plenty of McBrides left in these parts, but you are the last of your branch of the family.  Does that make you sad?”  He looked kind of sad himself at the thought.  I suppose it did make me sad.  I also felt a little ashamed at living all this time and having no knowledge of my family history, which seemed as exciting as some of the works of literature I’d read. 
    We sat in companionable silence in that forgotten garden until it was time to lock up the place and head back.

 
     
    October 1744
     

Chapter