by Julia London
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
MARGOT’S HORSEMANSHIP HAD not miraculously improved overnight as Arran had futilely hoped. He began to feel a wee bit guilty about her bringing up the rear as she was, her hat having bounced off her head somewhere along the way.
He was also annoyed by the amount of bickering between his two best hunting guides. The brothers were perhaps the best stag stalkers in all of Scotland but could scarcely abide one another. Their discord went back many years and was centered, naturally, on a lass. Arran didn’t know what had happened, precisely, or when, but it had become part of the legend of the two men. Now they were known as hunters without parallel, and for their constant strife.
Arran circled his horse around and held it back so that he wouldn’t hear the sniping and could walk alongside Margot’s pony. His two hunting dogs trotted alongside them, their noses to the ground, their tails high.
Margot smiled cheerfully at him as he pulled in beside her, but her cheeks were stained with the exertion of the effort to hold her seat, and her breath was short.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with this pony today. I had a much easier time of it yesterday when I rode down to the cove.”
There was nothing wrong with the pony. The fault lay completely in the hands of the rider. “The road down to the cove is flat and the distance shorter,” he said. “We’re moving upglen to Lochbraden on no road at all. It’s a harder course.”
“Lochbraden! I thought perhaps we were riding all the way to England,” she said pertly.
He smiled. “We’ve no’ gone more than three miles, leannan. Another mile and we’ll come down to hunt. How is it that you’ve never learned to ride properly, then?”
She looked surprised. “But I am riding properly!”
Her fingers curled around the reins so tightly he wondered if she’d be able to straighten them. “It seems a wee struggle for you.”
Margot groaned. “It is more than a wee struggle,” she sheepishly admitted. “I was never taught to ride. My father was a very busy man, and my brothers’ education took precedence over mine.”
That didn’t surprise Arran. He supposed the same was true at Balhaire.
“Did your father teach you?” she asked curiously.
“My da was killed when I was a lad,” Arran said matter-of-factly. He’d been struck dead instantly when a yard aboard a ship broke free and hit him in the head.
“Oh, yes, of course,” Margot said, remembering that detail of his life. “You were fourteen years of age, were you not?”
“Twelve,” Arran said. “My ma dead no’ a year later.”
“I had forgotten how young you were,” she said. “I can’t imagine how you must have suffered those deaths.” She looked out over the landscape, her expression thoughtful. “You were raised by Jock’s parents, weren’t you?”
“Aye, Uncle Ivor and Aunt Lilleas raised me up to be laird of Balhaire, as was my birthright, alongside Jock and Griselda.”
“No wonder you and Jock are completely inseparable now,” she mused, and smiled wryly at him.
Arran smiled at that. “We’re no’ inseparable. You did no’ see him in our bed last night, did you?”
Margot snorted. “He would have been there had you allowed it. You may trust that is so.”
Arran laughed roundly at that. It wasn’t far from true—Jock was intensely loyal and protective of him.
“Your people do love you so, Arran. How I envy you that.”
“They are our people,” he corrected her. “And you were loved in England, as well.”
“Me?” She shook her head.
“Ach, I have it on excellent authority that you are well admired by the gentlemen, Margot. And that you’re particularly proficient at the gaming tables.”
She laughed. “I suppose I was admired by some. And I am more than proficient at the gaming tables. I am really rather good at it. I scarcely ever dance, so what else might I do?”
Arran chuckled. “In this, I believe you—you are indeed a bloody awful dancer.”
“Thank you!” she said with delight. “At last, someone has admitted what I know very well to be true. Someone is forever assuring me I am not as bad as I fear. Nevertheless, I accepted any invitation into society after I returned to England. I made the best of my situation, just as I’m certain you did here.”
Arran shrugged. She would never know that for days after she’d left, he’d stumbled about, his thoughts on her, on the things he’d regretted saying, on the things he wished he’d said. He’d felt almost drunk, so much regret and pain slushing around in him.
“You did,” she insisted lightly, taking his silence for argument. “You expanded your trade with France after all.”
“Aye, I did.”
“And you were surrounded by people every day. Your society was here, where you are. You didn’t have to seek it.”
“It was here for you, as well.”
“Perhaps,” she said. “But what I saw was an audience to a marriage I did not want and at which I was awful. Even now, it’s as if all the Mackenzies are witnessing the reconciliation of the laird and his wife.”
“Reconciliation is a very strong word,” he said. “I’ve no’ agreed that is what we are about.”
She blinked those wide green eyes at him. “Haven’t you?”
“No.”
She pondered that a moment as she studied him. “When will you agree that it is?”
“When I am confident you are being completely honest with me.”
Her smile faded. “Well...” She glanced away, and it seemed to him she was considering how best to respond. But if she meant to speak, he wouldn’t know—at that moment, Duncan called to Arran. The grouse had been found.
The party came to a halt on the hills above a tiny loch that drained into the sea. Arran dismounted and helped Margot down, and they walked to where Duncan and Hamish were squatting, looking down a long hill.
“There, in the tall grass, laird,” Hamish said, pointing. “We’ll go round the far end—”
“The far end!” Duncan snapped. “Ye’ll as good as flush them out if you go round the far end.”
“Aye, so what would ye have us do, shoot from here, where we can scarcely sight the loch, much less the fowl? What bloody nonsense.”
“All right, that’s enough of it,” Arran said, vexed now. But the two brothers didn’t hear him—their bickering had reached a crisis, and they came to their feet, squaring off with each other and exciting the dogs, one of whom began to bark. Behind the two men, the grouse took wing, flying across the loch and deep into a ravine.
“For the love of Christ,” Arran said irritably.
“I’ve ’ad enough of ye and yer fool mouth, I ’ave,” said Duncan. “I ought to take yer bloody noggin off with me bare hands.”
“Do you think ye’re man enough for it, lad?” Hamish shot back, and shoved his brother in the chest.
“Stop this,” Arran said angrily. “You’re grown men!”
But the wound between Duncan and Hamish flared up like specter between them, and the two men were suddenly grabbing at each other, cursing in their native tongue—each trying to land a fist as the dogs barked wildly.
Arran reached for his gun.
“What are you doing?” Margot cried.
“I mean to shoot the both of them,” Arran growled. He meant to shoot above their heads, but he was sorely tempted to shoot them for being so bloody obstinate and losing an entire pack of grouse.
He brought the gun to his shoulder but was startled as Margot suddenly threw herself into the melee between the two men.
“Margot!” Arran shouted.
Hamish and Duncan suddenly stopped fighting. Because Margot stood between them, holding them each at arm’s length. They could
not swing a fist without striking her.
“What is the matter with you?” she demanded breathlessly. “You ought to be ashamed of such childish behavior!”
“It’s him, mu’um,” Duncan said just as breathlessly, and tried to reach around and over Margot for his brother. “He’s been a thorn in me side for all me life.”
“Your whole life!” Margot said incredulously as she pushed Duncan back a step. “I think that is not true or you wouldn’t continue to hunt with him,” she said, dropping her hands. “Now, what is this all about?”
“He knows what he did, aye?” Hamish said, glaring at Duncan. “He knows.”
“I didna do a bloody thing—” Duncan shouted and tried to lunge for Hamish again.
“Enough!” Margot shouted.
The two men—and Arran and the dogs for that matter—grew silent. Duncan and Hamish glowered at each other, but thank all that was holy, they were silent for once.
“It is inconceivable to me that two grown brothers could be at such odds with each other.”
Both men opened their mouths to speak at the same moment, but Margot threw up her hands. “I don’t want to know,” she said. “But I am asking you to think clearly about whatever it was that happened between you. Should it not be forgiven and forgotten? You, sir—who will be there to bury you when you die? An undertaker? Is that what you want?” she demanded of Hamish.
He looked sheepishly at the ground.
“And who, sir, will be there to care for you when you are old and ill?” she asked, swinging around to Duncan.
“Dunno,” Duncan muttered, refusing to look at Hamish.
“I think you do know. You really must consider what being brothers means. I can’t believe that two men would squander all familial ties and the rest of your lives over some old tiff. What does it matter, really, when compared to family? Is it really worth such acrimony?”
Arran was not only astonished by her acumen but also proud of it. He had never seen this side of her, had never imagined this side existed.
“I don’t expect you to resolve all your hard feelings overnight. But I want your solemn promise that you’ll at least try. Will you promise?”
The two men eyed each other. “Aye, milady,” muttered Hamish.
“Aye, milady,” Duncan echoed.
“Thank you.” She dusted her hands together. “Might we now hunt this grouse? The laird has said my supper will be wanting if we don’t.”
“You heard your lady, then,” Arran said.
The two men gathered up the dogs and their horses and set off to find the grouse. Arran watched them ride on, then looked down at Margot. “Fine work, Lady Mackenzie. You have tread where mere mortals have refused to go.”
She rolled her eyes. “The peace won’t last. But I should hope it will hold until they at least have bagged my supper.”
He laughed, drew her into his arms and kissed the top of her head.
He helped her onto her horse and they followed the brothers around the loch until they sighted the grouse again, as the birds were too fat and too heavy to fly far. As a result, the three men were able to snare a half dozen of them. When the dogs had brought the birds back to them, and Hamish had bagged them all, Arran sent the men and the dogs to Balhaire. “Lady Mackenzie and I will be along,” he said. And to Margot he said, “Come,” and took her hand, walking down the grassy slope, then pulling her down onto her belly in the grass with him.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I mean to make a hunter of you yet, aye? I’ll at least have you know how food is put on your table at Balhaire.” He put the gun up against her shoulder and showed her how to hold it. He instructed her how to sight the birds. He had no hope that she could bring down a grouse, but he wanted her at least to try.
“They’re wandering about,” she said as she peered through the sight.
“Have you one in your sight?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Aye, then, on the count of three, pull the trigger. One. Two—”
Margot fired before he said three. And with her eyes closed. The barrel of the gun bucked into her shoulder, and her shot was so wildly awful that he couldn’t help himself—he fell over onto his back and howled with laughter.
“That’s so unkind!” Margot cried, laughing, too.
“Diah, but that was the worst shot I’ve ever seen,” he said, convulsing with laughter.
“Because you’re a terrible teacher!” she said, shoving playfully against his shoulder.
Arran grabbed her and pulled her on top of him, rolling with her in the grass. “It’s impossible to teach a woman who closes her eyes when she shoots.”
“You made me anxious,” she said. She was smiling up at him, relaxed. Happy. “I could have done it without you!”
“I donna believe it,” he said, pressing his palm to the side of her face. “And you couldna have ridden your pony here without me,” he said, and took her head in his hands and kissed her.
He forgot Duncan and Hamish. He forgot the dogs. He forgot how much mistrust he harbored, and everything else in that tall grass. The only thing Arran was aware of was the feel of his wife against him, the soft press of her lips. He rolled them again, putting Margot on her back, and kissed her as a well of tender emotion rose up in him, pushing aside his doubts about her. He wanted this. He wanted his wife, this life. Was it insanity to think he might have it? Was it fantasy that filled his heart?
He lifted his head, removed a bit of weed from her cheek, kissed her forehead and bound to his feet, reaching down to help her up. She brushed off her skirts and fussed with her hair a moment, removing blades of grass, then slipped her hand into his. “Have I earned my supper?”
“Aye,” he said, squeezing her hand.
He helped Margot onto her horse, and they trailed behind his men and dogs. Their path took them down to a cliff that overlooked the sea.
“Where are your ships?” Margot asked, looking toward the cove.
“Moored.”
“When will you go to France again?” she asked.
Her tone was light. Too light. He glanced back over his shoulder. “Who has said I will sail to France?”
In her green eyes, he could all but see the rapid click of her thoughts. She was suddenly at a loss for words. She looked anxiously out to the sea again and said, “I’m certain you’ve said it.”
“I’m certain I’ve no’.”
“Then I must have supposed it. Mrs. Gowan said you’d given her china to sell—oh look, there’s Jock,” she said suddenly, pointing ahead.
Arran moved his attention from the sudden flush in Margot’s neck to where she pointed. Jock was galloping toward him.
“Jock?” Arran asked when his cousin reached him.
“You are wanted, laird.”
Arran studied Jock closely, but his cousin refused to say more. “Have the English gone?”
“Aye.”
Arran nodded. “I’ll be along shortly.”
Jock wheeled about and sent his horse in a gallop in the direction of the cove.
“I’ll see you to the bailey,” he said to Margot.
She said very little as they rode back, but her brow furrowed as if she were confused about something.
When they reached the bailey, he helped her down from the pony and gestured for one of the men to take it.
But before he could put himself on his horse again, she put her hand on his arm. “Where are you going?” Her gaze was filled with an anxiety that seemed misplaced.
“You heard Jock,” Arran said.
“But...where will you meet him?”
He tried to understand what concerned her, what she thought he might be about to do. “Why do you ask?”
Margot’s eyes seeme
d to seek something in him. He didn’t understand what it was she sought, what it was she needed from him. “When will you return?” she asked, her voice small, sounding, strangely, almost guilty.
He frowned down at her, trying to work out this sudden change in her at the same time he worried what Jock had to tell him or show him. “I donna know, Margot. An hour. Perhaps longer. But I must go.”
She drew a breath as if to ask more, but Arran didn’t want to hear more questions that would make his suspicions about her blossom any more than they’d already begun to do. So he suddenly reached for her, kissed her temple and said, “When I come back, you may ask what you want, aye? But now, I must go.”
He mounted his horse and rode away, leaving her and his growing suspicions in the bailey.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THIS WAS THE only chance she would have, Margot knew. She was beginning to feel things for Arran she’d never felt before, had never even believed were possible...so if she was going to eliminate all doubts, she had to take this opportunity.
She had to know what was locked in that cabinet.
Margot watched Arran until he’d left the bailey. Her confidence in her emerging beliefs about him had been tested by Jock’s arrival and her sense that this meeting was a serious matter. When he’d disappeared through the gates, she walked as casually as she might into the castle, smiling at Fergus, responding politely that, no, she did not require anything and, yes, she meant to retire to her rooms. She moved up the curving staircase as any lady might having just come back from a long ride, as if there were no urgency about her day.
She stuck her head into her sitting room—Nell was nowhere to be seen. For once, Margot was grateful for Nell’s penchant for wandering about and gossiping.
Margot slipped into her rooms and quietly shut the door behind her. She paused at the small dressing table and ran her hands over the various items until she found precisely what she was looking for—a hat pin. She stuck it into the fold of her skirt and went through a door to the master’s chambers.
There was no one about, and moreover, with Mrs. Abernathy away, it looked as if no one had come in since Margot had left the room this morning. The hearth was cold, the water at the basin unemptied from this morning’s toilette.