We Hold These Truths

‘We don’t tend to have gargoyles in Scotland,’ I said. ‘The theology’s different.’ Dee was just getting out of her side of the car. She squinted up at the eaves of the church.

     ‘Sure, no stone monsters there,’ she said. ‘Kinda disappointing.’ The church near Beauly was isolated, clearly visible from half a mile down the road. I pointed up to the lintel.

     ‘Look. An interesting year for your country.’

     ‘1776. Oh, sure.’

     ‘You have to admit, it is a pity about all that tea.’

     ‘When are you going to let that go? No taxation without representation. Now, are we going in? Oh look, a lizard.’ A large hollow metal lizard adorned one side of the former church, now an art gallery. She studied it, head to one side. ‘We certainly have a large variety of reptiles in Florida.’

     ‘Don’t I know it! I remember the snake episode. How you put that wee thing outside.’

     ‘I am not cursed with a fear of snakes. I established it was harmless… probably a baby.’ She preceded me through the door of the gallery, lowering the hood of her jacket. We were alone apart from the attendant, struggling downstairs from the gallery with an artefact of some kind.

     ‘I’m afraid the land of your ancestors is like this… pretty much all year round,’ I said. She signed her name in the visitors’ book, propped up on the broad sill of one of the diamond-paned windows. She gazed out at the graveyard beyond, rising up a steep hill.

     ‘Beauly is the seat of the Highland, or ‘Lovat’ Frasers,’ I said. ‘History’s usually written by the winners… the same reason you get MacKays in Sutherland. Robert the Bruce gave lands to the chiefs who’d supported him at Bannockburn.’ She did not reply. Dee moved over to one of Allan MacDonald’s landscapes.

     ‘Intense,’ was all she said.

     ‘I think you get a better perspective if you stand back,’ I said, surveying the winter scene from the other side of the one large room. The pews were long gone. I tried not to think of where a couple would have stood to get married. The rain pattered on the roof. Dee pointed to the lizard, just visible from one window, and smiled.

     ‘Who says ya don’t have gargoyles?’