Folly's Reward

by Jean R. Ewing

  Prudence looked up at him. He was too pale and struggling not to shiver, but he didn’t seem in any further need of help.

  “And if I thought for one moment that you might be taking advantage of me, sir,” she said. “I should wish that you had drowned.”

  Her answer was a charming smile. “Angel, you are too severe. For so would I.”

  Bobby let go of his hand and ran ahead toward a track that led up from the beach. A stout, respectable lady stood there shielding her eyes with one hand.

  “Look, Mrs. MacEwen!” Bobby cried. “We have found a man.”

  * * *

  Prudence changed her dress and vigorously sponged away the marks of salt water. The fabric was still wet from its contact with the man’s body. She wished she could as easily scrub away her uncomfortable feelings.

  How could a man in danger of dying of exposure offer all that absurd, meaningless gallantry? And to her, of all people!

  She glanced at herself in the mirror.

  Unlike her sisters, she wasn’t pretty. Everything about her was nondescript. Her coloring was altogether too washed out and pale, even her straw-blond hair—it had none of Bobby’s golden lights. She was a governess, for heaven’s sake! And she had problems of her own.

  Half an hour later, Prudence sat in the drawing room while Mr. and Mrs. MacEwen tried to decide what to do with the fellow who had been so inconsiderate as to wash himself up on their beach. Bobby had been sent to the nursery, where one of the maids was giving him a bath. The stranger had been allowed to sit in the kitchen, warm himself, and take some refreshment, while the cook hovered over him and no doubt happily returned his outlandish flirtation.

  “I cannot think that it is perfectly respectable to be found on a beach,” Mrs. MacEwen said, tapping her fingers on the arm of the sofa.

  “It’s a villainous, rascally way to be found, to be sure.” Mr. MacEwen examined his pipe and poked in the bowl with a wire.

  “I don’t like it, Mr. MacEwen. The man claims to be English, yet he comes from France, where that evil Napoleon was defeated just last year. Let us give the fellow a shilling and send him on his way.”

  “Yet his speech is very elegant.” Mr. MacEwen knocked the pipe against the edge of the grate.

  “Fancy words are all very well, but any jackanapes can learn to ape his betters. Look at his appearance! No gentleman ever wore such clothing. It is that of any rough sailor.”

  “It is most distressing, indeed.”

  “And he says he does not know who he is. How can anyone not know their own name?”

  “No one but a scoundrel, Mrs. MacEwen, no doubt at all.”

  “If the fellow ever had anything finer in his background, he has come down in the world.”

  “An excellent supposition, Mrs. MacEwen. Fled creditors, most like, or the law.”

  “Oh, good gracious! You do not think he is a criminal?” Mrs. MacEwen turned to Prudence. “How could you bring him here, Miss Drake? When you and Bobby are hiding at the risk of your very lives. That is enough, surely, without threatening all of us with a vagabond found on the beach.”

  “I had no wish to find him, Mrs. MacEwen,” Prudence said, coloring a little. “I am very sensible of your kindness in sheltering Bobby and me. Yet I believe this man has had a gentleman’s education.”

  “Has he, by God?” Mr. MacEwen began to fill his pipe with fresh tobacco. “How do you know?”

  “He talked about things.” Even to Prudence’s own ears, it sounded lame.

  “Then he is a gentleman who has disgraced himself and makes his own way. You mark my words! There is no more dangerous type. Forgotten his name, indeed! I never heard such fustian. Remembers it all too well and is afraid we’ll have heard ill of it, I’ll be bound. Let him have his meal and be gone from here!”

  “Yet he’s a likely-looking lad,” Mr. MacEwen said. “I have given him one of my shirts. You’ll have no objection to my giving the lad an old shirt, Mrs. MacEwen?”

  Prudence caught his merry eye and smiled back. Mr. MacEwen often teased his wife.

  Mrs. MacEwen frowned. “That is no more than Christian charity.”

  “Nor a bed in the stable for tonight? He isn’t strong enough yet, I’ll warrant, to be taking to the road. Besides, what if he was a peer’s son or an honorable man with a family, and we turned him out of doors on a cold night?”

  “If you lock the house up tight, there’d be no danger in letting him lodge in the stable, I suppose.”

  “And tomorrow he can do a little work for his supper. Maybe by then he’ll have recalled his name. If it’s a good one, there might be a reward in it.”

  “Very well, sir,” Mrs. MacEwen said, “but on your own head be it, if we’re all found murdered in our beds.”

  “What do you say, Miss Drake? You are very quiet. What shall we do about this flotsam or jetsam? Shall we shelter this foundling of yours from the sea?”

  Prudence smiled again at his kindly face, wreathed now in tobacco smoke.

  “As my father always said of you, Mr. MacEwen, he never had a friend less likely to follow anyone else’s counsel. You were kind enough to give shelter to Bobby and me, when I turned up like a beggar at the door. So I believe you have made up your mind to keep him, whatever I might say.”

  “And so he has, Prudence,” Mrs. MacEwen said, wagging her finger. “So he has. But what time have we for strangers when we have your problem on our hands? What about that, Mr. MacEwen? What if that black lord comes here after wee Bobby?”

  “Oh, that can’t happen,” Prudence said with a great deal more conviction than she felt. “How could Lord Belham possibly find us here?”

  Chapter 2

  “Devil take it, Roberts! What a damnable, bloody, God-forsaken country! How much longer, for pity’s sake?”

  The carriage moved like a March hare along the rutted track, now stopping, now leaping ahead with a jolt. The man inside leaned back against the squabs and continued to curse with considerable invention.

  “The last milestone indicated only three more miles, my lord,” his secretary replied.

  My lord hammered with his cane, and the carriage stopped.

  “Then I shall walk to Dunraven from here,” he said. “Another hour more or less will not make any damned difference to the life of a five-year-old boy. I will probably arrive before you, but if not, tell the countess she may expect me.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Roberts said.

  His lordship stepped from carriage.

  The peaks on each side of the road sparkled with whiteness. Above them the sky blazed a clear, bright blue. Under the sudden warmth of the sun, rivulets of water ran from beneath the snow, making little brown channels across the heather.

  The man ignored the mud beneath his boots and strode away up the road. The horses nickered after his retreating figure, then the coachman gave them the signal and the carriage lurched forward once again.

  The gates of Dunraven Castle were closed. He thundered for some time at the huge oak doors that blocked the entrance. Eventually a wizened head peered over the battlements, and a frail fist was shaken at him.

  “Get awa’ yon! Get awa’ frae the yetts! Vagabonds are nae welcome here!”

  “For God’s sake, man,” his lordship said with the icy certainty of rank and privilege. “I am the Marquess of Belham. The Dowager Countess of Dunraven is not only expecting me, she is also my aunt. The present Lord Dunraven, moreover, has just become my ward. If you do not open these gates, I shall burn them down.”

  The owner of the white hair peered down for a moment. The dark-visaged fellow below held a very business-like pistol in one hand. He produced a flask of powder from a pocket. Evidently he meant what he said.

  “Dinna fash yoursel’!” the retainer said. “I’m an auld body. Be patient.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Lord Belham faced Lady Dunraven.

  She seemed to be of a similar age to her servant at the gate, but there was no mistaking that she came from
a long line of blue blood. Dressed in black crepe, she sat on a chair that boasted the dimensions of a throne and glared up at her visitor with unrestrained animosity. Her lace cap crowned her head as brightly as the snows crowned the venerable peaks of Beinn Mhanach.

  “So, Marquess,” she said. “You have come to claim the child.”

  “May I sit, Countess?” Lord Belham asked. “I have traveled some distance.”

  “Ha! To think that when my husband’s sister married your father, it was seen to be a grand match! It is not my custom to have black rakes and villains sit at my fireside.”

  “Then I shall stand.”

  He strode over to the peat fire that smoldered sullenly in the hearth and held out his hands. Firelight glinted on a large gold signet ring on his finger. The tiny gleam of warmth was almost entirely swallowed up by the cavernous, feudal chimney and the vast reaches of the stone-vaulted ceiling.

  Silence settled like a shroud. Lord Belham stared up at the portrait over the fireplace. A young man smiled back above a small plaque, which identified him as Henry, fourth Earl of Dunraven.

  “Do you think I have regrets that you once held a different opinion of me?” he said at last. “Fortunately, we need not tolerate each other for very long. It was Henry’s dying wish that the care of his little son come to me.”

  “My son died too young,” Lady Dunraven snapped. “He did not mean it.”

  “Perhaps not. Nevertheless, Henry put his instructions for young Robert’s guardianship in writing with the full blessing of the law. We are both bound by it.”

  “How was my son to know that bad blood runs through your veins like the stink in the gutter of the wynd? I don’t doubt it was your infernal influence that undermined his health with drinking and bad women after his wife died—my only son! You led him to an early grave. Now, should anything happen to the child, you are heir to both lines, aren’t you?”

  Lord Belham turned from the fireplace. His mouth was set in something very close to a sneer.

  “And why, pray, should anything happen to Robert? The little Lord Dunraven isn’t sickly, is he?”

  “He enjoys very robust health. But the life of a five-year-old hangs by a slender enough thread.”

  “I suppose it does,” the marquess said dryly. “Might I see the child and judge for myself?”

  “He is not here.” It was said with considerable triumph.

  “But you had the boy brought here as soon as you knew your son was dying.”

  “So I did.”

  “Then where, pray, is Robert now?”

  The Dowager Countess stood up. She thrust out one scrawny hand and shook a finger in the marquess’s face.

  “Where you can’t get to him. Where he can grow up into his estates without hindrance. Where there is no profligate gambler and rake to threaten his health and his innocence. I have sent the child away.”

  “Oh, God!” Lord Belham said with obvious sarcasm. “Then how the hell am I supposed to get my hands on his inheritance?”

  “Not by doing harm to my little grandson, sir!”

  “Madam, whether I am the blackest villain in Britain or not, do you really think I plan to murder an infant, even if he is the fifth Lord Dunraven?”

  She pursed her lips. “Neglect would be enough. Neglect and a little carelessness. Then you might turn me out of here, sell Dunraven, and pay off your gaming debts and your mistress’s duns. Any small thing could snap the thread that holds life in little Bobby.”

  If Lord Belham was angry at such an outrageous suggestion, it didn’t show in his face. He paced for a moment as if considering his next course of action.

  “Very well,” he said at last. “You win. I have pressing affairs in London, and I don’t have time for this. Keep your grandson where you will, madam. I wash my hands of it.”

  He gave her a stiff bow and left the room.

  His carriage stood in the castle courtyard, the rampant eagles of Belham emblazoned on the door panel. Lord Belham stopped and looked at them for a moment, then he ran his fingers over the painting and smiled.

  “Wherever you go destruction flies with you,” he said under his breath to the bating eagles. “Unspeakable vice smolders in your fiery glance. So sweet Lady Dunraven is too smart to let you get your depraved and bloody claws into her little grandson. What a pity!”

  He grinned up at his coachman. “We are to turn around, George. To hell with the horses!”

  “But they’re being baited, my lord,” the coachman replied.

  Lord Belham laughed. “Since the shafts stand empty, so I see. But once my steeds from Hades have had their supper, we head back to England.”

  The coachman scratched his head and nodded. What was one more queer start from the marquess?

  Meanwhile his master walked into the stable. His secretary was overseeing the feeding and grooming of the team.

  Roberts raised his brows at the sight of Belham’s face. “Does Lady Dunraven not part willingly with her grandson, my lord?”

  The marquess’s voice was very soft. “We retreat, Roberts, defeated and without the child. She has sent him away. But leave a man here to ask about discreetly, will you? Have him pursue the runaway and report directly back to me. The boy must have had a nursemaid with him, or a governess, or tutor. He or she will have friends somewhere, connections. Scotland isn’t so big. I want little Lord Dunraven found. Is that clear?”

  Roberts bowed his head. “Perfectly, my lord,” he said.

  * * *

  The next day brought a fine mist, which enveloped the MacEwens’ household in its soft embrace. Prudence sorted through the mending and the wash, and then went up to the nursery to find Bobby and give him his breakfast.

  The room had been bedroom, schoolroom, and playroom for all the MacEwens’ children. It was still filled with toys and books. A fire burned merrily in the grate, and a maid was polishing the brass around the fender.

  Bobby’s bedclothes were tumbled about, but he was not there. Prudence knew a moment of panic. Lord Belham had broken in during the night and spirited the child away!

  She dropped into one of the battered old chairs and caught her breath at her own absurdity.

  “Bobby is in the stables, ma’am,” the maid said, stopping her polishing and giving Prudence a merry smile. “He’s very taken with the drowned gentleman.”

  “The drowned gentleman? Oh, no! I mean, of course. Thank you.”

  Prudence hurried back down the stairs and out into the yard.

  She had hardly forgotten the man Bobby had found on the beach. In fact, she had dreamed about him. He had come swimming into her room in his sleek sealskin coat, sinuous, graceful, with the wild, thyme-laden, salt-rich scent of the Outer Isles about him. When the fur dropped away, he stood gloriously naked at the foot of her bed. He had held out a hand to her and laughed.

  She had woken, her heart beating too fast, to stare with consternation into the cold dark of her little room. Thank goodness the dream had been so vague and shadowed! What on earth would Papa have thought of his calm and capable daughter, if he knew that she had such dreams?

  The thick mist cloaked the buildings and wreathed silently around the chimneys. The peaks that rose behind the house had disappeared. Except for the steady murmur of the surf, sounding muffled and ghostly in the distance, a stranger would never have known that the MacEwens lived between the sea and the mountains.

  A bright light shone from the little harness room at one end of the old stable, a place with a stove and a bed. Prudence walked up to the door and looked in. Entirely absorbed, Bobby knelt by the stove. Since he had dressed himself, the buttons on his muslin suit were mismatched.

  The man from the beach squatted in his shirtsleeves beside the child. His dark head tilted as he listened.

  “This is the silkie. See here! He comes out of the sea and drops his fur coat. Then he looks like a man.”

  Bobby pushed a little scrap of fur up a slope he had created by wrinkling the edge of the rag
rug. A twig wrapped in the fur emerged to play the part of the naked man.

  “But his home is the sea?”

  “Yes, and he’s the strongest man there is, and he’s lord of the fishes and the whales and the seals.”

  “And do the ladies admire him for that?” the man from the beach asked quite seriously.

  “They fall in love with him because he’s comely,” Bobby said.

  “But can his lady never keep him by her side?”

  Bobby picked up the scrap of fur and threw it toward the stove.

  “Only if she can find his fur coat and burn it. Then he’s a man forever and she can marry him. But if she doesn’t do it right, he dies.”

  “Then it’s rather a risky venture to try to wed him, isn’t it?”

  “Well, she doesn’t always marry him,” Bobby said.

  “Ah. Do the lady and the silkie have children?”

  Bobby clutched at the little stick figure. His blond head bent so that his face was hidden.

  “If there’s a little boy like me, his father will come for him one day and take him, and teach him how to swim in the ocean. But till then the silkie’s swimming forever out in the cold sea between Mull and the Skerries. I wish he would come. I wish he would come soon.”

  Prudence could hardly hear the man’s reply, his voice was so gentle. “Perhaps the silkie has to swim out there in the wild Atlantic, for it’s his nature and he cannot help it. But it must be very hard for his little boy who is left behind.”

  “It is,” Bobby said. “Very hard.”

  “I should like to meet a silkie. Wouldn’t you?”

  Bobby looked up, eyes damp with unshed tears. “They never admit who they are,” he replied.

  The man said something in the child’s ear too quiet for her to hear. Bobby smiled, a sudden rush of faith lighting his face like a lamp.

  She felt like a brute to interrupt, but she must.

  “It’s time for your breakfast, Bobby,” Prudence said.