by Linda Ford
“I’m relieved to hear it.”
Mrs. Walker came to stand with them. “I do hope you’re not too tired to enjoy this evening’s festivities.”
“A nap has restored me, thank you.” She raised her glass. “Here’s to good food, good drink and good company.” The others followed suit.
Maddie quietly moved away from them before they would notice her. She needn’t have worried as Mrs. Walker began describing the local families to her friend.
The next moment, her three children trooped in with their nanny. They were clad in dressing gowns and slippers, their faces scrubbed and shiny.
Harry spoke for the group. “We’ve come to wish you good-night, Mama and Papa.” Their father had traveled with Mrs. Mason to join his family for the weekend.
Maddie had to admire the way the children’s manners had improved in the short while the nursemaid had been with them. Mr. Gallagher also spent a good portion of each day with them, taking them on horseback rides or organizing ball games out on the lawn.
“Good night, my darlings.” Mrs. Walker bent down, offering each one her cheek for a kiss. Their father patted their heads as each one approached him.
Lisbeth reached up to put her arms around her mother’s neck.
“You look ever so pretty, Mama.”
“Thank you. Careful, sweetling, with Mama’s coiffure.”
“You smell good, too.”
Her mother eased away from the girl’s embrace. “That’s because your mama is going to a ball.”
Maddie felt a pang at the sight of the children’s affection for their mother.
“Good night, Great-aunt Millicent and Uncle Reid,” they chorused when they had finished bidding their parents good-night.
“Good night, children.” Lady Haversham smiled regally. “Now, mind you get to bed on time and tomorrow you shall hear all about the ball.”
Mr. Gallagher knelt down and gave them each a hug.
Soon the first guests arrived. Maddie forgot about her earlier discomfort as the hall filled to overflowing. The local gentry appeared a mixed bag, with titled dignitaries from Glasgow, Edinburgh and London mingling equally with the local lairds, whose pride came from their living in the area for many generations.
She wasn’t formally introduced to anyone but when the orchestra began to play, she found herself asked onto the dance floor by a local laird named Duncan McGee. He appeared to be in his fifties, with steely gray hair and muttonchop whiskers. He wore a dark frock coat and kilt in a blue-and-green plaid.
After being led in a vigorous Highland jig around the dance floor, he didn’t wait for her permission but took her hand and swung her around for another tune. Maddie hadn’t danced in years, but she preferred dancing to standing or sitting along the sidelines, knowing no one there except Lady Haversham’s family.
After the fifth or sixth dance—she’d lost count—she could hardly breathe and felt she would faint if she didn’t sit down. She glanced at Mr. McGee’s florid face, amazed at the man’s stamina. Of course, he didn’t wear a corset, she told herself.
“A fine pair we make, eh, lassie?” His gray eyes twinkled into hers as his rough palm squeezed her hand. She managed a wan smile, wondering where his wife was.
“I believe I’ll sit this one out,” she said.
He was ready to take her in his arms again but stopped and peered down at her. “Deen oot, are ye?”
When she managed to ascertain that he asked if she was “done out,” she nodded. “Indeed.”
“Well, coom along, then, we’ll get you a wee dram. That’ll fix ye up straightaway.”
“If I may just sit this one out, I should be fine.”
But he insisted on getting her some refreshment. She finally prevailed upon him to get her plain lemonade. He came back after a few moments with a glass of iced lemonade for her and a tumbler of whiskey for himself.
He took a healthy swallow and smacked his lips. “Finest malt in the land,” he said with a wink. “Distilled right here along the Tay.” He drained the glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve.
Maddie took a careful sip from her glass, wondering how she could excuse herself politely from this energetic gentleman.
He signaled a passing waiter. He placed the empty tumbler on the man’s tray and took two more. “Best be prepared.” He winked again. Before the waiter had moved more than a few paces away, McGee downed one of the glasses. He held the other one in his weathered hands between his knees and leaned forward.
Maddie inched back in her chair, away from the smell of the whiskey on his breath, her knees tightly locked, and wondered yet again where his wife might be.
“Ye hail from down south, do ye?”
“Yes, London.”
“Bet yer happy to be up here where you can breathe some pure air.”
She smiled. “Oh, yes. The air is very fresh here.” She took another small sip and looked past the laird to the crowded room. She hadn’t seen Mr. Gallagher since the music had begun. Perhaps she could excuse herself to check on Lady Haversham. She craned her neck, but didn’t see the older lady, either. Reluctantly, she turned her attention back to the laird. “Are you family of the present owner of Taymouth Castle?” she asked, referring to the largest landowner of the region.
He scowled. “Ech, nay. I be of Clan Mackay.”
Maddie glanced at his tartan. “Oh. I thought it was the Campbell pattern.”
“Nay, lass.” He smoothed the tartan over one knee. “The Mackay has the blue line, see. The Campbell is a broken black thread.”
“Ah, yes.” She noticed the difference in the two blue-and-green plaids.
He finished downing the third tumbler. Grabbing her by the wrist, her lemonade scarcely touched, he pulled her to her feet again. “That should do ye for the next round. Come along, lassie, the music’s awastin’.”
“Mr. McGee—” She barely managed to set her glass down before it spilled over her gown. Protesting against more dancing was useless. The man was either hard of hearing or willfully deaf to her weak protests.
Maddie’s heart sank. The dance was a waltz, and she felt an aversion to being held in this stranger’s embrace. But he held her close—too close—the rough wool of his coat chafing the exposed skin of her upper arms. She bit back a wince as one of his rugged shoes stepped on her slipper.
“Ouch.” She pulled back but he didn’t seem to notice. Her toes throbbed as he tugged her along to the music.
Suddenly a large hand clapped onto McGee’s shoulder, separating him from Maddie. Her gaze traveled up the black-clad sleeve to Mr. Gallagher’s forbidding features. “Excuse me, sir, but this dance was saved for me.”
* * *
Reid set the laird firmly aside, making certain he didn’t fall. Seeing the man hauling Miss Norton around, oblivious to her discomfort, had angered Reid beyond reason, and he was struggling inwardly not to cause a scene.
Reid had stayed away from the dance floor most of the evening, remaining in the billiard room after dancing an obligatory dance with his sister and enduring another with her talkative friend, Cecily. But finally, he’d returned to the great hall.
Not wanting to appear too anxious or eager, he’d begun a circular tour of the large room, his progress slowed by the crowd. His eyes scanned the dancers, in search of titian hair and a bronze-colored gown that complimented it so well.
He’d stopped in midstride, catching sight of Miss Norton before she disappeared behind another couple. He wove through the dancers as he made his way toward her.
She was held—crushed seemed a more accurate description—against—what was the fellow’s name? McGee? Reid had met him earlier. Although Miss Norton smiled, her expression seemed strained. Her color was high. Then he caught a flash of pain in her features when the laird lurched against her. Reid pushed past the remaining couples
and grasped McGee by the shoulder.
Reid disengaged Maddie’s hand and enfolded it in his own. Her large tawny eyes went from alarm to relief. He frowned, taking in the sight of her flushed cheeks. “Are you all right?”
She nodded. “Only a bit of a headache.”
He glanced around the crowded room. “It is infernally hot in here. Would you like to go outside for some air?”
“Yes...please...” She rewarded him with a grateful smile, a smile that never ceased to turn something around inside him. He stifled the desire to hold her in his arms, and instead, took her by the elbow and began negotiating a way out of the room.
When they finally gained the garden, he found her an empty bench. He remained standing and silent, giving her time to recover herself. In truth, he was afraid to look too closely at her. The first sight of her earlier in her evening gown had stunned him. There was no denying she was beautiful...and wholly feminine. The gown revealed a creamy neck and perfectly sculpted shoulders, slim bare arms, a small waist.
He swallowed, his mouth as dry as the Libyan Desert, and shifted his gaze off into the dark yard behind her. “Feel better?”
She nodded. “Much.”
“It was pretty smoky in the billiard room and not much better in the hall.”
She agreed. “It was getting harder to breathe.”
He eased himself beside her on the bench and glanced sidelong at her. “Mr. McGee seemed to be holding you in a death grip.”
A small laugh erupted from her, and he felt pleased to have made her laugh. “Yes, a little.”
“Couldn’t you escape him?”
“Well, he asked me to dance and then just kept dancing. He seemed not to hear anything I said. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings.”
“So, you risked being crushed by the drunken lout?”
“I... I kept hoping his wife would show up and claim him.”
“I’m told the good laird has been a widower of some years and is in eager pursuit of a second Mrs. McGee.”
Her smile died. “Oh.”
“He’s said to be worth quite a fortune.” He eyed her in the dim light, wondering how she’d react to the information.
“I’m sorry I shan’t be able to accommodate him.”
He sensed a feeling of relief. “By the time we return, he’ll probably have found himself another hapless young lady.”
She made no reply. Dusk enfolded them and only muted sounds followed them from the ballroom. “You know you’re really too nice for your own good.”
She looked down at her gloved hands. “There is too much unkindness in the world as it is.”
“I’ll agree with you there. But many times people will interpret a person’s kindness as weakness and take advantage of it.”
Her gaze was steady and serious. “That’s a chance I’m willing to take. In the end, the Lord’s love is stronger than any ill treatment I receive at an individual’s hands.”
Reid said nothing, not sure if he wholly agreed with her but admiring her all the more for her convictions. “It sounds like you’re soon to have a birthday,” he said instead, remembering his aunt’s words to her earlier. He cleared his throat. “When is it to be, if you don’t mind my asking?”
She looked away from him. “It hardly matters.”
He’d probably done the unpardonable, broaching the subject of a woman’s age. Nevertheless, he was curious, all the more so at her reticence. “You should at least have the day off.”
“I feel as if I’ve had every day off since I came to Scotland.” She half turned to him on the bench. “I want to thank you again for the holiday, Mr. Gallagher.”
Even though the light was dim, Reid felt her smile radiate toward him. He was coming to know that smile well. It was wide and generous, always grateful, as if she was not used to receiving good things of people. The thought gave him pause. He stared at her in the gathering twilight, the notion growing in him that he wanted to make her birthday a special day.
His ears caught the strains of another waltz through the open doors, and his thoughts turned back to his earlier purpose. “Are you up to dancing one more dance? Perhaps if we dance out here, it won’t be so uncomfortable?”
He waited, his breath held.
She looked at him. “I—”
He stood and held out his hand.
“Yes, I’m...quite recovered.”
She placed her hand in his and stood.
He wrapped one hand around her slim waist, feeling the satiny texture of her gown. Her other hand came up to rest on his shoulder, her fingertips brushing his collar.
At last she was in his arms. He had to restrain himself from drawing her too close. After all those days of dreaming and imagining, he was finally reliving the experience. The memory had not exaggerated the reality. She felt fragile, like the most precious treasure. The cool air caressed them and the music floated out to them as they went around in time to the music. They could have been all alone in the world.
He had not held a woman in this manner since he’d danced with Octavia.
He wouldn’t think of that. He refused to think beyond the moment. What was his intention in this folly? All he knew was that he had had to feel Miss Norton once more in his arms, to...what?
To see if the sensation he had felt some days ago had been real or imaginary. But now that he had succeeded...what would follow?
He glanced at her face to discover if she was feeling anything near to what he was feeling. But her eyes were focused somewhere over his shoulder. Back and forth, round and round they went, and he wished the music wouldn’t end.
Because he knew he wouldn’t allow himself another moment like this one. It was too dangerous. This woman threatened to destroy the carefully erected life he’d built for himself for the past decade. At the center of that life stood Octavia, his beloved wife, soul mate, the woman he was bound to love.
He took Miss Norton around again as the music came to its conclusion and then slowed as the last chord died out. Reluctantly he stopped and held her an instant longer. Their arms fell away from each other, and they stood like a pair of shy schoolchildren, with tentative smiles and awkward gazes.
Laughter and voices came through the open French doors as couples broke apart. “I—thank you.” She murmured the words, her head bowed so he couldn’t read her eyes. Then she was moving away before he could stop her. His every impulse wanted to follow her, but he restrained himself, watching the crown of her titian hair until it disappeared out of sight.
* * *
Maddie hurried away from Mr. Gallagher, skirting the crowded hall until finally finding an empty room where she could remain unseen. She put her hands up to her warm cheeks, glad of the darkness. The muffled strains of the orchestra reached her ears, and unconsciously she began to sway to its rhythm, reliving those moments in Mr. Gallagher’s arms.
Even though she hadn’t dared look into his eyes once during the dance, she had felt his gaze on her. She’d been afraid to raise her head, afraid he’d read what her eyes would convey to him—her yearning...and love.
She’d felt cherished in his arms, more cherished than she’d ever felt since she’d left home so many years ago. Since then she’d been a lonely pilgrim, in the employ of strangers, sometimes appreciated by them, sometimes not, but there had always been that wall of separation between employer and employee, that invisible line that couldn’t be crossed.
What was it that was happening between Mr. Gallagher and her? Was she the only one experiencing it? Why had he asked her to dance—and such an intimate one? He could have asked her for a polka or quadrille, but he’d chosen the waltz. Was it only his innate sense of politeness, that sensitivity he displayed not only to her but to every human being he came in contact with?
She swallowed, afraid of the emotions he awoke in her. For if they weren’t reciprocat
ed, she was in for a nasty fall, far more devastating than what she’d felt when the only suitor she’d ever had had jilted her. She’d been only eighteen then. She made a small, strangled sound. If she’d thought herself brokenhearted then, what would she feel now that she was a woman, a woman who had been alone so many years, who knew the cold, hard ways of the world?
And if her feelings were reciprocated? No, it couldn’t be. Mr. Gallagher had made it plain to her he loved his late wife. She remembered his words with chilling clarity. I’m still married to her. They’d rung a death knell to any hopes Maddie might have. And if there were any chance of her forgetting the words, the wedding band he wore was a fresh reminder every day of where his heart lay. And yet, the way he’d rescued her tonight and danced with her, his touch unmistakably tender...
Maddie shook her head in the darkness. She mustn’t let her hopes rise, nor could she permit herself to give even a hint of her own feelings to Mr. Gallagher. She would on no account put him in an uncomfortable position. He’d been so kind to her already. She wouldn’t make him feel that she had misinterpreted his generosity.
Oh, dear Lord, she prayed, help me! Only the Lord could give her the grace to accept the inevitable.
* * *
That evening, after Reid had prepared for bed, he went to his bedside table. Since the fishing episode he had kissed his wife’s portrait as he’d done every night for the last decade, but it had felt hypocritical, as if for the first time in his life he had something to hide from her. He knew what an adulterer must feel who is trying to maintain an outwardly normal relation to his wife, but knows inwardly how false he is being.
He pulled down the covers and got into bed without glancing at his wife’s photograph. But he felt its presence there in the dark as if she were looking at him with pity in her eyes, able to see and read into his very soul.
Without meaning to, he fingered the wedding band on his finger, slipping it up and down past his knuckle. He’d worn it since making his vows to Octavia that long-ago day. To love, honor and cherish her. Her death had released him from those vows. But since he felt responsible for her death, he’d never felt released. He owed her his allegiance. It was the least he could do to make amends for having cut down her life prematurely.