Blue Bonnets

by Marie Laval

  But McNeil was in Alltacaillich, miles away from here.

  An unwelcome thought sprung into his mind. Perhaps McNeil had come looking for him because there’d been an accident at the fisheries, or trouble in the village, or again because Morag had taken a turn for the worse. Yet how would McNeil know where to find him?

  As he pushed his way through the dense crowd he caught another glimpse of the man. This time there was no doubt. It was indeed McNeil. He called out and waved, but McNeil didn’t hear and by the time he reached the doorway, he had left.

  He couldn’t have gone that far, Bruce thought as he swung open the door of the tavern to go after him. Cold, sharp air stung his face and burned his lungs. Only a misty, blurred crescent of moon and a couple of gas lights lit the night. He put the collar of his jacket up, pushed his hands into his pockets and left the hazy lights, the music and noise of the inn behind. A hundred feet away from the tavern, the streets were quiet and dark. Where had the man disappeared to?

  As he started down a cobbled lane leading to the harbour, instinct made him pat the side where he usually carried his pistol. Damn. He’d left it in his room at the inn. A noise behind him resounded in the empty lane. He froze and looked over his shoulder. A cat darted along the wall and melted into the shadows. He carried on along the quays, stepping over empty baskets and coiled ropes, and walking around piles of fishing nets.

  A dozen fishing boats, all empty, danced on the surf, their masts clanking in the breeze. The sea appeared black with only a few curls of silver where the moonlight touched its surface. Smells of seaweed and rotting fish filled the air, waves lapped at the jetty and the harbour wall.

  McNeil wasn’t here. Nobody was. He was wasting his time.

  Suddenly the hair at the back of his neck prickled. Sounds of rapid footfall behind him echoed in the silence. He spun round, just in time to see the huge shadow of a man lunge at him. A fist connected with his face, hard enough to slam his head back. Stunned, he fell to his knees with a grunt. Before he could scramble up to his feet, another man kicked him hard in the stomach.

  One of the men grabbed hold of his arms, twisted them behind his back while the other punched him again, knocking the air out of him. He groaned, tasted the metallic tang of blood. The man holding him let go suddenly and he slumped down, his face scrapping the slimy, wet cobbles.

  ‘He may be a devil with a claymore, but without it he fights like a sissy,’ his attacker sneered.

  Bruce caught his breath. He recognised that voice. It was the mail-guard.

  ‘Got your knife?’ the other asked in a harsh whisper. ‘Good. Finish him off while I go after the woman. She’s the one Morven wants. He wasn’t happy when you messed up at Sith Coille.’

  ‘We didn’t mess up,’ the guard retorted, indignant. ‘Everything was going to plan when he got in the way. Now I’ve lost my job, and if McGunn reports me for abducting the woman, I’ll probably hang. Anyhow, the woman’ll be easy to deal with once this bastard’s dead.’

  Bruce tensed up. A dark, hot knot of rage twisted and grew inside him. So it was true. The mail-guard worked for Morven. But what did Cameron’s factor want with Rose? Whatever it was, these two thugs wouldn’t get rid of him so easily, and they certainly wouldn’t touch a single of Rose’s hair, not as long as he had a breath of life inside him.

  With a mighty roar, he leapt to his feet, tackled the man closest to him and brought him down. He straddled him, punched him in the face. There was a sickening sound of bone crushing under his fist and the man stopped struggling.

  Bruce sprang up just in time to see the mail-guard pull a knife out of his pocket. The blade glinted in the pale moonlight. Hunching forward, he shifted on his feet, ready to pounce.

  Bruce didn’t give him time. He grabbed hold of his wrist, punched him hard in the stomach then kneed him in the groin before prising the knife out of his hand. It fell on the cobbles with a clinking sound. He then smashed his fist into the man’s face in a single, powerful blow.

  The guard stumbled, fell on his back with a loud thump and lay sprawled on the cobbles, grunting and spitting blood.

  ‘What do you want with Rose Saintclair?’ Bruce asked, pushed the tip of his boot onto his throat.

  ‘Don’t know what ye mean,’ the man wheezed.

  Bruce bent down and twisted his fist into the man’s collar. Lifting him up at arm’s length, he slammed him against the wall of a cottage. The moonlight was just bright enough for him to see his attacker’s features.

  Small, beady eyes deeply set under thick, dark eyebrows stared back at him.

  ‘Why did you lock her up in that house at Sith Coille? And why is Morven interested in her? Answer, damn it, or I’ll finish you and your friend right now.’

  His arm ached. His head ached, hell, his whole body ached. He wouldn’t be able to pin the man against the wall for much longer.

  The man’s eyes opened wider and stared at something beyond Bruce’s shoulder.

  Bruce glanced back and let out a curse.

  Two tall, dark figures stood behind him, both armed with clubs. They were upon him before he could step aside. Blows rained on his head and back, flashes of light exploded in front of his eyes. His last thought before he slipped into unconsciousness was that he could have sworn he’d heard these men’s voices before – in Inverness, the night he and McNeil were attacked on the docks.

  ‘I wonder where my Lieutenant is.’ Wallace scanned the room, empty now the ceilidh had ended. ‘Something’s not right. He bought us drinks then disappeared, but that was over an hour ago.’

  ‘He may have gone for a walk, or to meet someone.’ Rose frowned. Her cheeks burned and she added, ‘There is this red-haired serving girl he seems to like rather a lot…’

  ‘A girl? Somehow I don’t think he’d go dallying with a lass and leave you here with me,’ Wallace protested, an indignant look on his face. ‘No, something’s up and I…’

  ‘Good Heavens, Lord McGunn!’ The landlord’s voice resounded in the hallway, interrupting him. ‘Look at the state of you! Did you have an accident?’

  ‘He’s back.’ Wallace rose to his feet but Rose was faster.

  Pushing past him, she darted towards the hallway, so fast that she tripped on a mat and fell straight into McGunn’s arms.

  ‘Watch what you’re doing, woman!’ He winced in pain as he caught her. ‘I don’t need any more bruises.’

  She gasped as she took in the blood trickling from a cut to his forehead, the contusions on his cheekbone, and his swollen left eye.

  ‘By Old Ibrahim’s Beard, you’re hurt!’ She disentangled herself from his grasp but stomped on his foot as she moved aside.

  ‘Oops. S-sorry.’

  He scowled at her and hissed between clenched teeth.

  ‘Why is it that you happily trample all over me but never once stepped on Wallace’s feet when you two were twirling on the dance floor earlier?’

  ‘Whatever happened, Lieutenant?’ Wallace asked.

  ‘I was set upon by a gang at the harbour. My fault, entirely. I was careless, I didn’t even take my pistol. It could have been far worse had an old fisherman not come out of his cottage and raised the alarm.’

  ‘What were you doing there?’

  Wincing, McGunn walked across the lobby to lean against the counter. ‘I thought I saw one of my men in here and went looking for him. I didn’t find him, I must have been mistaken.’

  He paused. ‘Listen, Wallace, I need to speak to you, and make plans for tomorrow. Can you stay a while longer while I take Rose to her room and tidy myself up?’

  Wallace nodded. ‘Of course. I’m stopping at my uncle’s tonight. You remember him, don’t you? The man’s an owl, he never goes to bed before dawn. He won’t mind if I come back late.’

  He gestured towards the counter. ‘I’ll get us a couple of whiskies while I’m waiting.’

  ‘Good man.’

  McGunn asked the innkeeper for warm water and fresh towels to be brou
ght up to his room then turned to Rose.

  ‘Come with me,’ he ordered as he took hold of her elbow to march her up the stairs.

  Although she didn’t care for his tone or his iron grip on her arm, she didn’t protest. Somehow she knew it would be pointless.

  ‘Make sure you lock your room up tonight,’ he said when he opened her door, ‘and don’t open for anyone else but me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘The men who attacked me were after you. One of them is the mail-guard. He’s working for Morven.’

  ‘Are you sure? What would Morven want with me?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ McGunn said in a low voice. ‘But I intend to find out.’

  Chapter Nine

  Rose pulled the curtains half open onto the night so that she could see the sky from the bed. Even if the crescent of moon was thin, pale and blurred, and only a few stars pricked the sky’s velvety darkness, it was still better than being closed in. She set the oil lamp on the bedside table to adjust the light. The flame hissed and flickered in the yellow tinted globe, making huge shadows on the wall.

  Holding her father’s diary against her chest, she slid under the bedcovers, shivering as her bare feet made contact with the cold sheets. She gave the fluffy pillows a tap and sat back with the diary on her lap. Her fingers stroked the leather binding and traced the burn marks and charred edges caused by Cameron dropping it into the fireplace. Inside, the pages were yellowed and brittle. Soon it would fall apart, the ink would fade, and there would be nothing left of her father.

  No, that wasn’t true. She would always have the memories of his smile, of the intense blue of his eyes, of the warm, solid feel of his arms around her, and the deep rumbling of his voice. She closed her eyes and smiled. She would never forget his voice. She still heard it in dream sometimes. It always sounded so real it was as if he was right there, next to her, like the evening she was locked inside the abandoned cottage at Sith Coille, scared and cold before Lord McGunn arrived.

  The journal slipped from her fingers. She had forgotten all about that strange dream until then. Her father had pointed to the diary and urged her to find a medal. What medal? He did write about a medal in his journal, but it was Niall McRae’s medal… Never mind, she sighed, it had only been a dream.

  She opened the diary again and flicked through the pages until she found the first entry about her father’s encounter with Captain Niall McRae.

  ‘16th June 1815…’ she whispered. ‘Quatre-Bras.’

  ‘21:30. What a terrible mess today’s been, what a wasted opportunity! As the murky daylight gave way to a moonless night, putting an end to the fighting, we realised we’d lost every inch of ground we had managed to gain earlier today. So many dead and wounded and it was all for nothing! Now we have pitched our tents in the mud and struggled to light fires under the rain, it is time to tend to the wounded – ours and a few dozen English, Scots and Dutch we have brought from the battlefield to the hospital tent. We might have lost the battle today but we made a substantial number of prisoners, although what we’re supposed to do with them, I have no idea.

  All kinds of rumours are flying around the smoky camp fires tonight, rumours that make the men angry and bitter. The worse by far is that our enemies stripped our fallen cuirassier comrades naked and left them to rot in the mud, and now Wellington’s and Blücher’s troops are eating their dinners from their breastplates.

  Victory should have been ours – it was ours, if only for an hour or so, before the debacle, and now we’re all wondering what the hell went wrong. Why did it take so long for Ney to issue the orders to take Quatre-Bras, and why did d’Erlon’s First Corp spend the afternoon marching between Quatre-Bras and Ligny?’

  She carried on reading, her lips moving in a whisper.

  ‘22:30. Back from a tour of the camp. Ney just left with his aide-de-camps and I can hear Kellerman rant and rave in his tent nearby. He has good reason to, he only narrowly escaped death after Ney’s daring – some said suicidal – charge. When his horse was killed under him, he rode away standing on the stirrups of two of his cuirassiers.

  In the hospital tent the chaplain, who doesn’t speak a word of English, asked me to talk to a Scottish captain from the 92nd Highlanders regiment, a Lieutenant Niall McRae. Ever since he regained consciousness after the battle the man has been begging for a scribe to write his last will and testament. The chaplain says he won’t last the night. McRae is in terrible pain and yet he shows great courage. He is a brave devil, I’ll grant you that. I hope I’ll have his resilience when my time comes.

  Something strange happened when I first lay my eyes on him. I had the most peculiar feeling I knew him, yet I’m sure I’ve never seen the man. Even though he is lying down on a stretcher, I can see how strong and tall he is – a real force of nature. The man’s a fighter. The laudanum the surgeon gave him for the pain didn’t do much to knock him out. He won’t take anymore because he wants to keep a clear mind to dictate his letters before it’s too late.’

  A knock on the door broke the silence and made Rose jump.

  ‘Rose? Open up, it’s McGunn.’

  She drew in a sharp breath and put the diary on the bedcovers next to her.

  He knocked again. ‘I want to talk to you.’

  ‘Just a minute, I’m coming,’ she answered, jumping out of bed and frantically looking for her shawl.

  She gave up the search when he knocked a third time, a little harder. At this rate he would wake up every single patron in the inn. She unlocked the door and opened it just enough to peer through. He had changed into a fresh white shirt, washed the blood off his face and combed his hair back. His eye was still slightly swollen but the cuts and bruises didn’t look quite so bad now.

  ‘What took you so long?’ he grumbled. ‘I thought we agreed you would read me your father’s diary.’

  ‘I didn’t think you would still want to, not after what happened.’

  He shrugged. ‘I told you, I’m fine. Aren’t you going to let me in?’

  She didn’t have much choice, so she opened the door. As soon as he walked in the room felt too small, hot and stuffy. Painfully aware of her state of undress, she glanced around and let out a small whimper as she spotted her freshly-washed stockings and drawers dangling from the back of a chair at the side of the fireplace.

  ‘Just let me tidy those away,’ she stammered as she rushed to the fireplace to pull her undergarments down and throw them in a heap on the floor.

  He looked at the bed, the covers down and the pillows still bearing the imprint of her body, then at the window and his face hardened.

  ‘Why the hell did you leave the curtains open? Anybody can see you from the square. I told you these men were after you.’

  ‘Oh… I didn’t think. You’re right, of course. It’s just that I have this… thing about dark, confined spaces, and I can’t breathe if I don’t see the sky, the stars, the moonlight.’

  He arched his eyebrow. ‘You’re afraid of the dark.’

  She grimaced and gave a brief nod.

  ‘You never complained when we were at Sith Coille.’

  ‘You were there, so I wasn’t afraid.’

  ‘Well, I’m here now too and I don’t want to risk anybody seeing you from the street and finding out which room you’re in.’

  He walked to the window and drew the green curtains with a sharp tug.

  ‘Sorry I’m so late, but the maid took her time bringing hot water and towels, and then I had to talk to Wallace.’

  ‘The maid?’ she said in a sour voice. ‘I hope her soft hands didn’t disappoint.’

  He frowned. ‘What are you talking about?’

  Embarrassed, she shook her head.

  ‘Nothing. Just forget it. What you do with chambermaids is none of my business. I shouldn’t have said anything.’

  He seemed to think for a moment, then he drew in a long breath.

  ‘I was only trying to sweet-talk the girl into telling me about her cousin�
�s whereabouts – the mail-coach driver. Poor Effie is most upset with him because he ran away to Inverness yesterday having taken her all her savings. No one in her family understands why he left his work for the Royal Mail. They all think he’s gone mad…Of course, I found out tonight at my own costs that if the driver ran away, the mail-guard is still around, and is in fact in league with Morven and they are trying to prevent you from reaching Westmore.’

  He pulled a chair and sat down near the fire, stretching his long legs in front of him.

  ‘Let’s get on with that diary, shall we?’

  She nodded, picked the diary up she’d left on the bed and sat opposite him to read the first entry once again, translating it into English as she went along. Every time she looked up, he was staring straight at her, sharp and intense, absorbing her every word.

  Her hand shook a little as she turned the page.

  ‘17th June. 3:30am

  Captain McRae died twenty minutes ago. I stayed with him until the end. It was odd that I should feel the man’s death so keenly. It wasn’t the first time I saw a man die from battle wounds – God knows I killed enough men myself – but there was something about him, something I can’t explain, a connection of some kind. I guess I’m just being fanciful. It’s probably because I’m so damned tired.

  The question is, what do I do now? I can’t go to my superiors since they wouldn’t give a damn about McRae’s last will and testament, and riding to the 92nd Highlanders camp is out of the question. So I guess I have to wait and keep the three letters I wrote on McRae’s behalf safe in my greatcoat bag until I can dispatch them to Scotland when the campaign is over. I don’t know what good it’ll do, though. I don’t share McRae’s faith in human nature. Pride and greed too often take precedence over justice and fairness. In the case of Niall McRae and his son, I fear this is exactly what will happen.

  As well as the letters, McRae also entrusted me with his personal effects. There isn’t much. A monogrammed silk handkerchief embroidered with heraldic griffins, a silver whisky flask, a pair of fine leather gloves and a particularly fascinating item I didn’t immediately recognise - one half of a gold medal, the Order of the Crescent, granted by Selim III, ruler of the Golden Porte, to British officers after the Anglo-Ottoman victory at the 1801 battle of Canope.