His Bloody Project: A Historical Thriller

Roderick’s memoir begins with an explanation that he is writing at the behest of his advocate, Andrew Sinclair, who has asked that he write an account of his crimes. He explains that he is guilty of the murders, but that he carried them out for his family’s benefit. He goes on to explain the layout of Culduie, which is comprised of nine houses and belongs to the parish of Applecross, a short distance from the town of the same name, where Lord Middleton (who owns the land Culduie sits upon) lives. Roderick and the other residents of Culduie are crofters, or tenant farmers who work small plots of land belonging to the nobility. Lachlan Mackenzie and Roderick’s father have feuded since before Roderick’s birth, and Roderick recounts being frightened of Lachlan as a child.

Detailing his family history, Roderick describes how his mother and father married after becoming close following a shipwreck in which Una’s and John’s brothers were both killed. They first had a daughter named Jetta, who was followed by Roderick within a year. While Roderick’s father is religious, Jetta and Una are both superstitious and claim to receive prophetic visions. Roderick feels that he and Jetta share a special bond, although they have contradictory temperaments, with Jetta being extroverted while he is withdrawn, like their father. They were followed many years later by the birth of twin siblings, who are two years old at the time of Roderick’s crimes.

He describes feeling distant from his peers at school, who bully him for appearing stupid thanks to his reluctance to speak out loud. Nevertheless, he excelled in his studies and recalls a day when Mr. Gillies asked him to stay behind after school and implored him to continue his education after finishing his required schooling, which Roderick refuses on the grounds that he must attend to his family’s croft.

Roderick then pinpoints the beginnings of his crimes at the time of his mother’s death, a year and a half before the murder of Lachlan Mackenzie. Una died in childbirth at age 35. Although the child survived, it was sent to live with relatives in another village. Una’s death cast his family into an inescapable gloom and highlighted his father’s predisposition toward melancholy and emotional distance. Jetta, the happiest member of the family, exhibits the greatest change in behavior as she becomes incredibly depressed. John grows even more fervently religious and regards Una’s death as the consequence of his own sinfulness.

One afternoon Roderick is left to mind the sheep grazing on a plot of land shared among all the crofters. After being stung by a wasp, he goes to a waterfall to wash himself and swim. Distracted from his task, he is surprised to hear a sheep bleating in distress. Quickly dressing, he runs to find the animal slowly sinking into a bog. Grabbing it by the hoof, he pulls the sheep out of the bog but its back leg is injured in the process. He decides to put the sheep out of its suffering by splitting its skull with a peat iron, although he misses on his first swing and mauls the sheep’s face in the process. With dread, he discovers markings on the sheep’s fleece indicating that it belonged to Lachlan Mackenzie.

That night a meeting is held between the Macraes and Mackenzie, who is accompanied by his brother Aenas, at Kenny Smoke’s house. The meeting is mediated by Calum Finlayson, the parish’s constable (a position elected by the crofters to represent the nobility’s interests). Roderick gives an account of how he came to kill the sheep—remaining mostly truthful but downplaying the extent of his distraction—and accepts responsibility for the sheep’s death, offering to “do whatever is required to compensate Mr. Mackenzie for its loss” (34). Lachlan Mackenzie is unwilling to accept this apology and, although Finlayson orders the Macraes to pay Mackenzie the price the sheep would have fetched at market, he desires additional punishment for Roderick, which is denied. The group disbands with John Macrae agreeing to pay Lachlan one shilling a week for 35 weeks.