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“I know. I know.
You want another bedtime story. This is four nights in a row, Ian. Is this
to be a regular thing now?” Mac folded his arms across his chest and
sighed.
“I enjoy it and it
does help me to sleep better. I stop thinking about all the bad things and
concentrate on your stories. Please?” Ian grinned.
“All right. I was
thinking about one of my ancestors. Her name was Aggie. She lived in the
highlands, not far from here. She was a gardener and grew roses. People
came from all over Scotland to buy her roses. Even the kings and queens
purchased them. She experimented with a lot of different colors and sizes.
Some of her neighbors said she was a witch because she had roses on her
bushes that were the size of a man’s head.” Mac held out his hands to show
the size. “In one corner of her garden, hidden from everything else, Aggie
had planted a very special bush. She’d wrapped the roots in an old tartan
kilt and had made sure it was well watered and had plenty of sun. She
hoped that these roses would be the largest roses she’d ever grown. She
didn’t want anyone else to know. They’d surely accuse of her of being a
witch.”
“Was she a witch?”
Ian bit his claw.
“No. Of course
not. She just had a green thumb. Raccoons don’t usually become gardeners,
do they?” Mac blew a puff of breath out. “One morning she went to the back
of the flower garden to see how her special rose was doing and she saw a
few buds. Aggie became very excited. It was working. The buds were as big
as her fist. Hoping to help the flowers grow, Aggie started singing to
them.”
“What did she
sing, Mac?”
“She sang old
Scottish songs, ones that we don’t know today; songs about the rain and
how green it is and all that rubbish.” Mac scoffed. “A few days later when
Aggie went to see about her roses, she ran to the back of the garden. She
let out a scream when she saw what had grown. It wasn’t a bad scream. It
was a surprise type scream.”
“Oh. You mean like
this. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.”
“Ian! Stop that
right now. You’re supposed to be going to sleep. Yes, like that. Growing
all over the rose bush were tartan roses. The bush had absorbed the color
of the tartan kilt into the roots. Aggie was delighted. When the king sent
his messenger to collect roses, Aggie gave him a dozen of the tartan ones.
The king was so thrilled that he made sure Aggie had all the old tartan
kilts in the castle. Soon every rose in her garden was tartan. There were
Stuart tartans, McDonald tartans and Bruce tartans. Her favorite was the
Royal Stewart dress tartan rose.”
“Is that a true
story? If it is, how come we’ve never seen any of them around here.” Ian
frowned.
“Because all the
other raccoons in the highlands thought that Aggie was a witch. They
didn’t believe her story about the kilts. They thought she must be doing
it with magic and had her hung. Poor Aggie.”
Ian started
laughing. “How is she your ancestor if she was hung? You never mentioned
that she had children. She must have or you couldn’t be her descendant.”
“Oh. Uh…um…I
suppose I forgot to mention that. Aggie had six children, three little boy
raccoons and three little girl raccoons. The villagers thought they might
turn into witches and had all of them hung too, all except one of the
laddie raccoons, Geordie. He managed to escape and told the story to his
children, who told it to theirs and so on. It’s quite the family legend.”
“I see. If you say
so, Mac. Thanks for the story. I’m off to sleep now.” Ian rolled over and
curled in a ball. “Good night.”
Mac thought about
his ancestor, Aggie and the tartan roses, but soon fell asleep too. |
