A wan smile came to his face. Something told her there was much more she was going to learn and Frederick worried over how she would respond.
“There be more, isna there?” she asked.
“Aye, lass,” John said. “Much more. Ye see Clair believed that since she was Mermadak’s first born child, that she should inherit. Believing that she could, since Mermadak made the public declaration that he was her father, she was determined to do whatever necessary to see that she did.”
“That’s why she poisoned me? Fer a pile of rubble and land?” Aggie asked.
“Aye, but what she didna understand or know, because Mermadak hadna told her, was that it mattered no’ that she was his child, there was no way she could ever inherit. The lands, the title of chief, they all pass through the McLaren bloodline. And yer da was no’ a McLaren.”
“Aye,” Aggie said. “I ken that. He took mum’s name after they married, believin’ I think, that ‘twould give him more credibility.”
“Clair did no’ ken that,” Frederick said.
It did make sense that she would believe she could inherit if Aggie died. “Does she understand it now?” Aggie asked.
All faces looked to Frederick. “Aye, John and Ian told her.”
“I should speak with her,” Aggie thought. “I doubt I’ll be able to get through to her. But, we were friends once, long ago. Mayhap I can appeal to her memory of that.”
Frederick swallowed hard. “I’m afraid ye can’t speak with Clair.”
Aggie’s heart felt tight with worry. “Please, tell me she did no’ find a way to escape? I canna live worryin’ she’ll do somethin’ as foolish again.”
Frederick gave Aggie a gentle hug. “Aggie, when John and Ian explained the way of it she didna believe them. But when she saw yer grandda’s will and the other evidence …” his voice trailed off.
“What, Frederick? What is it?”
“They found her this morn, in the room they’d been keepin’ her in. She hung herself, Aggie, with a bed sheet.”
Aggie’s hand flew to her lips to stifle the cry of shock. “Nay,” she said. She truly felt sorry for Clair. The woman had been lied to, deceived, lead to believe in things that could never happen. All because Mermadak McLaren was a heartless, cruel and evil man. “Poor, Clair,” she whispered.
John raised a brow. “Poor Clair?” he asked, dismayed with Aggie’s statement. “Need I remind ye that she almost killed ye?”
“John, if ye had known Clair when she was younger, ye never would have believed her capable of such a thing. We were friends, the three of us,” she said as she looked at Rose and smiled fondly at the memories.
“Aggie is right,” Rose said. She had been quietly listening, though she already knew the entire story. She was there to support Aggie, to be her friend. “Clair was no’ like this until mayhap six or seven years ago. I can only assume that is when she learned that Mermadak was her birth father.”
“Be that as it may,” John said, “she still tried to kill ye and me granddaughter. Fer that, I can no’ ever fergive.”
Aggie could well understand John’s hesitance. It was his job to protect his family and his clan. She decided she could not change his mind about Clair and would never try.
As she lay there thinking over all that had just been said, a thought suddenly occurred to her. “John, ye said ye showed Clair Hugh McLaren’s will. How on earth did ye come to have it?”
“Ian and Rose found it, Aggie,” Frederick said.
Aggie turned to face them. “Ye found it?”
“Aye,” Rose answered. “We were goin’ through the remains of the keep, like scavengers ye ken. It seems Mermadak had made a hidin’ place out of the mantle in his room.”
Aggie raised a curious brow. “The mantle?”
“Aye,” Ian said as he caressed Ada’s cheek with his index finger. “God’s teeth, is it me or is this the most beautiful babe ye’ve ever laid eyes on?”
Rose nudged Ian in his arm with her shoulder. “Aye, she is bonny.”
Aggie let loose with a frustrated sigh. “Please, tell me about the mantle.”
Ian finally tore his gaze away from the babe. “Somehow he managed to fashion a very large, deep drawer out of the mantle. Ye had to hit it just right to get it to open. The heat from the fire must have caused it to crack. But we found, among other things, Hugh McLaren’s will.”
“Why on earth would he fashion such a thing just to hide a will?” Aggie murmured her question.
“There was more in the drawer than just the will,” Frederick interjected. “There were letters, many letters, and three journals.”
Aggie turned to face him. “Letters? Journals? I didna ken da to keep a journal.”
“The letters were yer mum’s, Aggie,” Frederick said as he left the bed and walked to a corner of the room. He returned a short time later. In his arms were the letters and the journals.
Aggie’s eyes grew wide with wonder as Frederick carefully placed the items on the bed beside her. He pulled a chair from the corner and sat down next to her.
“Aggie, these letters, they hold much information, as do the journals.” He took her hand in his. “The letters be verra auld. Some are from yer grandmother to yer mum. Some from cousins.”
Aggie heard the unsaid and. Bracing herself, she lifted a bundle of the letters and held them to her chest. “The others?” she asked.
Frederick took a long pause before answering. “Douglas Carruthers.”
Aggie had no earthly idea who Douglas Carruthers was, but from the long faces that stared back at her, they knew. “Who is he?”
“The chief of Clan Carruthers,” Frederick answered.
Aggie’s heart told her there was more to Douglas Carruthers than just being the chief of a clan.
“Aggie, he and yer mum,” Frederick paused before taking her hand in his. “They loved each other verra much.”
Aggie tilted her head and looked into her husband’s eyes. “She had a lover?” Though she was surprised, she could not say that she blamed Lila for taking a lover. After all, she had been married to a cold and distant man.
“Aye, lass.” Frederick gave her hand another squeeze. “’Twas a verra long time ago. Some twenty-five years.”
’Twasn’t just what he said, but how he had said it. Her stomach tightened and her palms grew clammy. She waited patiently for him to tell her the rest. When she saw he was struggling, she took a steadying breath. “Do no’ be afraid to tell me anythin’, Frederick.”
Frederick glanced at Ian and Rose, unable to get the words out. They were lodged quite uncomfortably in his throat.
“Is Douglas Carruthers me father?”
“Aye,” he whispered. “He is.”
Uncertainty and a hundred questions wrapped themselves around Aggie as she tried to take it all in, absorb this new knowledge and what exactly it might mean for her.
“I think,” Frederick said, his voice low and soothingly calm. “I think that be why yer da treated ye so poorly. He felt betrayed by yer mum and hated her for it. It all be laid out in his journal.” Frederick gave a nod toward the stack of journals on her lap. “He did no’ learn the truth until after yer mum was gone. He found the letters, ye see. Because he could no’ punish her…” his words fell away.
Aggie finished his line of thought for him. “He took his hatred of her out on me.”
Frederick gave a slight nod of his head. He looked so utterly sad for her that tears welled in her eyes.
“Have ye read these?” Aggie asked him.
“Aye, most of them, but no’ all.”
Aggie swallowed back the confusion and hurt she felt at the moment, her mind awash with too many questions.
“And the journals?” she asked.
“One be yer da’s, the other is Hugh’s,” Frederick said. “I’ve read them all.”
Aggie raised a brow. “The third journal?”
Frederick let out a large breath of air. “Well, Aggie, that be the
most intriguin’ thing out of all this.” He lifted the smallest journal, encased in black leather and bound with a black leather strap. Holding it up, his expression changed to one of concern. “This belonged to a man name Richard Hubert, of near Aberdeen. This journal is what yer da used for the past twenty years, to black mail several men.”
“Blackmail?” Aggie asked, her own curiosity rising.
“Aye. Aggie, in that drawer in the mantle, Ian and Rose found pouches, many pouches, all filled with groats.”
“How many groats?”
“A wee over ten thousand,” Frederick said.
Aggie’s eyes grew as wide as the loch outside the keep. “Ten thousand groats?” she exclaimed. It was an exorbitant amount of coin. She doubted the king himself had that much in gold and silver. Why had her father not spent the money on his people? Why had he made them suffer all these years? Aggie let loose with a disgusted sigh. And why had he left it behind? It made no sense. But then again, very little her father had done these past years made sense. Aggie realized that the man wasn’t just cruel, he was tetched. Hiding ten thousand groats, not spending any of it to help his people was all the proof required to reach that conclusion.
“Aye, ten thousand groats,” Frederick said with a smile. “Don’t ye see? We can use the funds to rebuild yer keep, the clan. We can start over, make the clan what it once was, a big, proud clan.”
“Nay! We will do no such thing!” Aggie argued.
Frederick looked at her as though she had just lost her mind. “What do ye mean we’ll no’ do any such thing?”
“That money was stolen from innocent people. I’ll not use ill-gotten gains to rebuild anythin’. We’ll find out who it belongs to and give it back.”
“But Aggie—” Frederick began to argue.
“Nay, I’ll no’ hear of it. Frederick, I could no’ sleep at night knowin’ we’d used dirty coin to rebuild our lives. ‘Twould be the same as if we stole it ourselves. Neither of us are thieves.”
Frederick smiled thoughtfully at his wife. “I admire yer honor lass, but I don’t think ye understand all of it. Yer da induced—”
“Blackmailed,” Aggie reminded him forcefully.
“Blackmailed,” Frederick stood corrected, “men who tried to sell Scotland to England.”
Her brow knitted into puzzlement. “What?”
Frederick grew quite excited as he explained it further. “Aye, men who were ne’er-do wells and traitors to the throne, to David. Somehow, this book fell into yer father’s hands and he used it to amass a fortune and keep the men quiet and slowly guided them back to the side that was right. He thwarted their further attempts to sell Scotland and the throne back to England. In time, he was even able to bring them back into Scotland’s folds.”
Aggie gave her head a good shake. “Are ye sayin’ that because Mermadak blackmailed these men, he thwarted a plot to overthrow the crown?”
Frederick gave a happy nod of his head. “Aye.”
“Me da—” she quickly corrected herself. “Mermadak did somethin’ good?”
Frederick laughed heartily and was soon joined by the others in the room, save for Aggie. “Well, I wouldna go so far as to say he intentionally did a good deed. That’d be a wee bit of a stretch. But in the end, it turned out for the good. So, we’d no’ be rebuildin’ the keep and clan with money stolen from decent people. We’d be rebuildin’ usin’ sassenach money.”
In her way of thinking, it didn’t matter where the money had come from. But Frederick looked so happy, so full of hope, that she didn’t think she could deny him his dream. She loved him too much to do that to him. There was probably nothing she could deny him, but most especially this.
There was no need for her to ask him if he was certain that this was what he wanted. His eyes twinkled, his expression was hopeful and determined. With Frederick as chief, Aggie was certain anything was possible.
“Fine,” she said with a roll of her eyes.
Frederick’s smile brightened as he took her hands in his. “Och, Aggie, ye’ve made me verra happy!” He placed a kiss on her forehead. “I promise ye, my queen, I’ll no’ let ye down.”
Aggie could only smile in return. There was no doubt in her mind that he would be nothing but successful in his pursuit to rebuild their clan.
“I love ye, Aggie Mackintosh,” he whispered in her ear.
“And I love ye, Frederick Mackintosh.”
Epilogue
AS THE WEEKS went by, their daughter thrived. With the love and attention bestowed upon her by her entire family, it would have been impossible for her not to.
Each morn, after Rebecca fed Ada, Frederick would lay the babe in her cradle, pull out a stack of the letters and read them to his wife. Aggie learned far more about her mother from these letters than she had in all the years the woman had lived.
Lila, they learned, had only married Mermadak at her father’s request. It was not a love match by any stretch of the imagination. But Lila had held out hope that someday they would, at the very least, learn to care for one another and become allies and friends. She had been sorely mistaken.
Mermadak had shown great promise back then, to be a good and just leader. It was, of course, all lies, but Lila didn’t know that until after they were married. Among other things, Mermadak was a liar, thief, and adulterer.
Lila had lost track of the number of women she had found him with, in their marital bed no less. After the fifth or sixth embarrassment of finding another woman with her legs wrapped around Mermadak, Lila left to spend time with family near Aberdeen. That was where she met and fell in love with Douglas Carruthers. Completely, totally in love with him. According to her journal, he was a kind, witty, strong and handsome man. She adored everything about him, but most importantly, he adored everything about Lila.
Douglas wanted to marry Lila, but she was, unfortunately still married to Mermadak. He refused to allow her the divorce she so desperately wanted, no matter how much she begged and pleaded with him.
Keenly aware of the lengths that Mermadak would go to get whatever he desired, Lila worried over the safety of Douglas. He was not yet the chief of his clan, but someday, he would be. And when she learned that she was carrying Douglas’ child, she made the most difficult decision of her life; she went back to Mermadak. In her mind and heart she knew it was the only way to keep Douglas and their babe safe. Mermadak was ruthless. It was fear that sent her back to him, nothing more.
Lila was able to pass the child off as Mermadak’s only because Aggie looked so very much like Lila. The resemblance, everyone would say, was uncanny. Mermadak, being the fool that he was, never questioned Lila when she told him the child was his. And when she gave birth, albeit a full six weeks early, to a babe that was so tiny and wee, well, no one questioned that either. They simply assumed Lila had delivered early.
But Douglas knew. He’d done the math and realized that Aggie was his. He begged, repeatedly in his letters, for Lila to leave Mermadak, but she refused. Her fear was far too great and Mermadak far too cruel.
So the years passed by but the love between Lila McLaren and Douglas Carruthers never faded, never wavered, although it eventually blossomed into a lifelong friendship. From a distance, Douglas learned and watched, via Lila’s letters, his daughter grow. From her first steps, her first words, to learning to write her own name at the age of four.
By the time Aggie was six, Douglas realized that Lila would never leave Mermadak. By this time, his father had passed away and Douglas was now the chief of Clan Carruthers. He needed an heir and wanted to share his life with the woman he loved. Lila was the woman, but unfortunately she could not leave Mermadak and take up the role of Douglas’ wife.
He married a fine woman when Aggie was ten. The woman, Eleanor, knew all about Lila, for Douglas was quite honest in that regard. She had written to Lila to let her know that if ever she or her daughter needed anything, they would always be welcomed in the Carruthers’ home. That bit of news surprised bo
th Aggie and Frederick. “I suppose she loved Douglas enough that she could overlook certain things,” Aggie said as Frederick placed that particular letter aside.
“And yer mum loved him enough to stay away and let him build a life with Eleanor,” Frederick said as he helped Aggie to her feet. They stood over the cradle and watched their wee daughter sleep.
After a time, Frederick, unable to resist holding his daughter, lifted her up and into his arms. “Ada Mackintosh,” he said as he kissed her cheek. “I hope that someday ye find a love as strong as what yer mum and I have, and what yer grandmother Lila and Douglas had.”
Aggie agreed, to a certain extent. “But I hope ye do no’ have to suffer as me mum did. And ye will be blessed at knowin’ what a good, kind man yer own da is. Ye’ll never have to doubt that.”
Frederick smiled thoughtfully at his wife. “Aggie, I’ve taken the liberty at doing somethin’, and I hope ye’ll no’ be angry with me.”
Aggie turned up to look at him. “What have ye done?”
“I’ve written to Douglas Carruthers.”
Aside from hiding under a blanket, there was nothing she could do to hide her surprise. “Why?”
“Mermadak McLaren may have been the man who raised ye, but he was no’ in any way, yer da. Douglas loved ye, Aggie. He still does. He says no’ a day goes by that he does no’ think of ye.”
“He says?” she asked with a raised brow.
“Aye, he’s written me back. He says had he known how ye suffered after yer mum passed, he would have come for ye at once. He hopes that ye’ll be able to fergive him.” Frederick laid the baby back in her cradle and took his wife in his arms.
“There be nothin’ to fergive him fer, Frederick. Will ye help me write him a letter sayin’ that?”
Frederick kissed the top of her head. “Well, I could, but mayhap ye’d like to tell him yerself.”
“I do no’ think I’m fit to travel yet, Frederick. Mayhap in a few months, or next year when Ada is stronger, we could go visit.”
Frederick's Queen: The Clan Graham Series Page 51