The MacGregor's Lady

by Burrowes, Grace

  Ian turned a thoughtful expression on Spathfoy. “We forget that you are only half-English, Spathfoy, though it’s usually the louder half.”

  Spathfoy glared at Ian. “The more articulate half.”

  “Spathfoy is right,” Con said. “The wee lad was one of us, his mother too.”

  That Connor and Spathfoy would agree on anything was extraordinary.

  “There will be a marker,” Asher said. “A proper memorial in the family plot… and a service.” The last felt as important as the marker.

  “I’ll bring me pipes,” Con said. “The ladies will put on a spread, and we’ll tell the stories.”

  The decision was right. It felt right, and as Asher mentally tested around the edges of his various pains and regrets, he found his disclosure had not, in fact, made anything hurt worse. They’d drink and they’d dance, and if they drank enough, maybe even cry—and they’d do it together.

  But as for putting Hannah on that ship bound for Boston at dawn tomorrow, that was something Asher had to do alone.

  Twenty-one

  Hannah did not blame Asher for letting her sleep until the last possible moment. She did not blame him for being very much the earl as they left the inn in the predawn chill. She did not blame him for expecting her to take some sustenance with their tea tray.

  She drew the line at allowing him to join her in the boat that would row her out to the ship anchored in the middle of the harbor.

  “I have this planned,” she said. “It’s to be like a Viking burial. You watch my ship drift out to sea, and you’ll know I’ve gone. I’ll watch the land disappear…”

  And die, inside, where a woman loves, she’d die. She didn’t tell him that part. Didn’t have to.

  “Get in the boat, Hannah.”

  Glowering at him was purely in the interests of bravado. He’d used the same tone of voice in which he’d offered other commands: “Spread your knees, Hannah. Kiss me, Hannah. Hannah, don’t cry.”

  That last one had been honored more in the breach, so to speak. Hannah let him hand her into the boat, and moved over on the little bench amidships so he could sit beside her. Four stout, unsmiling fellows took the oars, and they shoved away from the pier.

  “The captain has some things for you, documents and whatnot. He’ll give them to you when you reach Boston. Your aunt sends her best wishes, and I had her wedding gift to you stowed on board with your effects. I will explain the situation to Enid when her husband brings her north later this summer.”

  He went on speaking, the burr ruthlessly suppressed so Hannah had to listen hard for it. She did not attend his words, specifically, but she listened for the music in his speech. The Highlander who crooned in Gaelic and told her he loved her.

  “You’re to eat, regularly, and not just hardtack. The provisions on this crossing are suitable for the royal barge, Hannah, and I expect you to enjoy them.”

  Enjoy? She turned her head to peer at him and saw he was in no better shape than she. His eyes were shadowed beneath and within, and for him, he looked pale. Hannah took his hand and brought it to her lips.

  “I will contrive, Balfour. You needn’t fret. I will eat. I will take air on the deck. I will bathe and dress and comb my hair. I will not plague your captain by falling into hysterics. I will be like those mountains of yours, dignified and serene.”

  Lies, but they seemed to ease some of the tension about his mouth. “See that you are. And I shall do likewise.”

  At least they agreed on what they wouldn’t be doing.

  The ship was before them all too soon, and again, the dear, dratted man would not make his good-byes, but must climb onto the deck immediately after Hannah’s own ascent, leading Hannah up onto the poop deck where the captain was cursing in Gaelic.

  She recognized the curses and had practiced them for later use.

  Asher commenced exhorting the captain, who was to control the very weather lest any harm come to Hannah. She let the sound wash over her, the sound of a man in love, doing what he could to keep her safe. The little maid stood some distance away, neat, round-eyed, and wise enough to wait until Asher was done blathering.

  And then, all too soon, Asher turned to Hannah, took her by the elbow, and led her to the railing.

  “I love you. I will always love you. Tend to your family in Boston, Hannah, but know that my heart goes with you.”

  “Not fair.” She swayed into his embrace, and it had nothing to do with the rise and fall of the waves. “You weren’t supposed to say it in English.”

  “I love you. I will always love you. I’m letting you go because I love you, but this is not the end.”

  He had to say that too, of course, like telling a patient they’d feel only a little burn at the touch of the knife.

  “I love you, too.” And thank a perverse God, Hannah was beyond tears. “I will always love you.”

  There was nothing more to say. Nothing more to feel. She went up on her toes and kissed his cheek, which was for once cold from the sea breeze. And because the hardest words always fell to the woman, she said them. “Good-bye, Asher.”

  He held her impossibly tight, as if he’d hold her forever if he could just wrap her close enough in his arms, and then he stepped back. “Farewell.”

  Rather than watch him disappear over the rail, Hannah turned her back to stare at the sea and the ships bobbing and lifting on the water. She had no thoughts. She was one tired, bitter ache, where a woman in love had stood and was still trying to stand.

  “Yer ladyship?”

  The maid looked resolute, as if she’d borne one of Asher’s lectures too. The girl’s name was… Ceely, and in her green eyes, Hannah saw some Scottish determination. Probably even MacGregor determination, given the number of second and third cousins in Asher’s employ.

  “It’s Miss Cooper, Ceely. Shall we go below?”

  “My very thoughts, milady.” The girl marched across the deck, but Hannah didn’t make it that far. She stopped at the opposite rail and caught sight of the little boat with its four oarsmen, moving closer and closer to shore. Asher was on the bench in the middle, facing Hannah’s ship, bare-headed and immobile.

  She blew him a kiss. He returned the gesture, and then she couldn’t see him anymore for all the damned tears in her eyes.

  ***

  Ian was waiting when Asher walked up to the inn, sitting outside on a wicker chair facing the harbor, no baby in evidence, no tea and scones, not even a flask.

  “You do realize that’s your wife you just put on that ship?”

  Asher slid into the seat next to him, so he might torment himself with the sight of Hannah’s ship leaving port. “A consummated engagement is a handfast marriage under Scottish law. Of course I realize it. Hannah probably won’t until she reads the letter I gave the captain.”

  “You might have gone with her.”

  “We’ve had that discussion. I have no authority over her family, but I can at least give her the protection afforded the Countess of Balfour.”

  But what if she forgot to read the letter he’d given the captain, didn’t collect the money, the ring, the deed to Asher’s Boston house? Captain Mills would get them to her… eventually.

  Ian scraped his chair back. “Do the Americans recognize handfast marriages? Hannah’s not a Scottish citizen. One does wonder.”

  “You’re the bloody lawyer.”

  “There’s still time to catch the ship, Asher. The anchor hasn’t been drawn up, the sails aren’t lowered. The tide hasn’t yet turned.”

  The tide would turn in less than thirty minutes, and Mills was not one to miss the tide. “Fetch me a drink, why don’t you, Ian? Con promised.”

  Ian rose. “He promised we would not let you start drinking until you were under your own roof. Enjoy the sunrise.”

  So this wake was to be a solitary one, though Asher’s grief was sincere indeed. Sooner or later, when he’d shown the colors long enough as Earl of Balfour and laird of clan MacGregor, he’d travel to
Boston and attempt to argue his wife into returning to Scotland. She’d refuse, and because their situation was no kind of marriage for raising children, she’d eventually demand that he return to Scotland.

  “It is beautiful here.”

  An old voice, a very old voice. Asher resigned himself to exchanging civilities and then finding more solitude from which to watch his dreams sail away.

  The elderly woman perched three seats over, sitting so straight her back did not touch the chair. She stared out across the harbor like an eagle scanning its territory.

  “Good morning, madam, and yes, this is a lovely city.”

  His unlikely companion was very small, with snow-white hair in a tidy coronet, and clothing in the height of fashion. Her palette ran to magenta, blue, and green, like a peacock. She ought to have a lady’s maid fussing about at least, and several shawls. She took out a silver flask. “Today is a beautiful day, a wonderful day.”

  She offered him the flask. It wouldn’t be sociable to refuse. Out on the ship, activity on deck increased and men scrambled aloft.

  “My thanks.” He passed the flask back, the drink both appreciated and of excellent quality.

  “You are welcome.” She took a businesslike draught and tucked it away.

  “Are you recently arrived to Scotland?” Though what did he care if one old woman was enjoying her travels? What did he care about anything?

  “I arrived last night, and today I am to rejoin my granddaughter. She has been very foolish, very stubborn, but she is good-hearted. I have come to talk sense into her.”

  Would to God that—In an instant, the entire universe shifted. Hope erupted like a geyser while Asher took the chair beside the old woman. “Your granddaughter is Hannah Cooper. You came.”

  When she turned her head, it was exactly like a raptor deigning to peer at a scurrying mouse. “Of course I came. You are her Asher? One doesn’t ignore letters such as yours. Such detail, even to choosing my inn for me. You must take me to my Hannah immediately. She must not return to Boston when her fool of a stepfather wants to lock her away in one of those awful places. They have pleasant names, but what goes on there is enough to drive any woman to lunacy. Fetch her to me, this moment, please. I am old, and I do not hurry well.”

  Her accent held French and maybe… Mohawk?

  Asher shot to his feet. “I can’t take you to Hannah just yet, but by God, I can fetch Hannah to you.” He paused three paces from the door to the inn. “What of her mother and her brothers? Are they coming?”

  One nod. “As you suggested. Hannah’s mother announced that she was going to visit her sister in Baltimore, scooped up the boys, and her imbecile of a husband was relieved to see them off on a visit. They will arrive here next week.”

  Before she finished speaking, Asher had the door to the inn open, while out on the water, the first sail on Hannah’s ship had dropped and was flapping madly in a crisp morning breeze.

  ***

  “’Tis a gift from yer auntie.” Ceely pushed the package into Hannah hands. Without thought, Hannah’s fingers closed around the parcel. Up on deck, she heard the anchor chain wrapping, wrapping around the capstan as the anchor was drawn up, the sound like a tightening noose around Hannah’s heart.

  In minutes the ship would turn for the sea, and Hannah’s terrible choice would be fait accompli.

  What have I done?

  “Open yer package, mum.” Hannah was scaring her maid. Behind stolid Scottish sense, Ceely’s voice bore a hint of alarm.

  Pretty red ribbon came away easily, revealing a maple wood box with a carved figure of some sprig of foliage on the top. Hannah opened the box, and found in its velvet-lined contents an array of small bottles.

  She picked up a bottle at random. “Dr. Melvin Giles’s Root Juice and Tincture of Everlasting Health.” Dr. Giles shared the box with various remedies and elixirs, most of which, Hannah knew well, would put her to sleep.

  It was a solution, of sorts, to the problem of how to endure, how to become like the mountains—though there would be no dignity to it. Hannah took out one small bottle, opened the top, and sniffed. The cloying, seductive aroma of the poppy wafted forth, sickening, but tempting…

  “There’s a note, mum.” Ceely did not approve of this gift—this wedding gift that was in truth a parting gift. Censure was manifest in the extra-prim set of her mouth and the narrowing of green eyes.

  Hannah picked up the note: “Hannah, if you return to Boston without marrying your earl, you’ll need these far more than I ever did. Love, Enid Draper.”

  No tender sentiments from the new bride, no fond doting from a devoted step-auntie, only oblivion in a bottle. In twenty bottles. Hannah stared at the bottles lined up so neatly in the pretty box. They looked like dead fish, those bottles, salted and packed away for systematic consumption.

  This was her future, in one box. This was how the rest of her life would go, one year beside another, salted with regret and packed way with missing Asher MacGregor.

  Hannah slammed the lid of the box down. “It isn’t ever going to hurt less, is it?”

  Ceely took the box without being asked. “Milady?”

  “It’s going to hurt more and more, because leaving him is wrong. I should have trusted him to share my troubles and help me set matters to rights. I should not have abandoned him. I should not—good God, I should not—have left him behind.”

  “So what will ye do about it?”

  The anchor was up, the chain no longer rattling into place. Shouting from above signaled the loosing of the sails, and the ship was riding higher in the waves. “Take me to the captain. We cannot leave port.”

  But Captain Mills, stout Scottish veteran of the seas, was not about to delay his departure, miss the tide, and violate direct orders from the ship’s owner.

  ***

  The inn’s common was empty save for Ian, sitting at the bar, back to the door.

  “She’s here!”

  Ian’s head came up. “Who’s here? Hannah? I knew she’d come to her senses. You get down on your knees, man, and you promise to goddamn worship her, do you hear me? Augusta said a man on his knees is irresistible, and if Augusta—”

  “Not Hannah, ye bletherin’ fool. Her grandmother. Her gran came to talk sense into her, but my Hannah’s on the goddamn boat, and—” And he was desperate to get to her, but one man would never catch a clipper bent on leaving the harbor.

  The right words came to him, from nowhere, from everywhere, from every Scottish laird ever to call for his people.

  Asher planted his feet and bellowed, “To the MacGregor!”

  Ian took up the cry, doors banged upstairs, and in moments, Con, Gil, and Daniels came thundering down the stairs in various states of undress. Spathfoy brought up the rear in full riding attire.

  “I need to catch Hannah’s ship. Ye”—he speared Daniels with a look—“fetch the auld lady from outside, look after her. Tell her I’ll bring Hannah to her if I have to swim the bluidy ocean to do it.”

  The little ketch was tied up in the same place on the dock. Spathfoy stopped long enough to yank off his boots, while Con, Gil, and Ian each took an oar.

  “You man the tiller,” Ian barked. “And start yelling for your captain to drop anchor.”

  The anchor was up, the sails filled, and while his kinsman strained mightily at the oars, Asher started yelling as if his very heart depended on it.

  Because it did.

  ***

  “Now, madam, I have a ship to sail, and Lord Balfour will take it quite amiss if I neglect m’ duties for a case of female vapors. Sea travel can be quite pleasant. You must not fret.”

  Mills, a man of mature years, ruddy complexion, and solid build, exchanged a look with Ceely that said quite clearly: “Drag the daft woman below if you have to, but get her the hell off my deck.”

  Ceely took a step forward. “Listen to her ladyship, ye auld fool. She’s the MacGregor’s lady, and if she says to turn the ship around, ye mun listen.�
��

  “I am the MacGregor’s lady,” Hannah said, the notion infusing her with renewed determination. “You can catch the tide tomorrow or this evening. There will always be another tide.” But there would never be another man like Asher MacGregor, not for her. “Drop anchor, Captain, or you’ll find yourself relieved of your command.”

  He rolled his eyes, and Hannah knew the urge to strangle him. “Now you’re a pirate, too? And you?” Rheumy blue eyes flicked over Ceely. “A couple of wee Corsairs?” He turned from them, cupped his hands to his mouth, and shouted up to the rigging, “Make sail!”

  Hannah planted her fists on her hips and yelled more loudly, “By order of the MacGregor’s lady, drop anchor!”

  The ship was riding the waves, dipping and rising, even turning slightly on the strength of nothing more than the harbor current and morning breeze.

  “Captain?” The mate jogged up to his superior’s side. “A word with ye, sir?”

  “I’m not dropping the damned anchor!” Mills spun away, muttering about daft, bleating women while Hannah directed Ceely to find her knife so she could cut her skirts free and swim to shore.

  ***

  “Up you go.”

  “Make fast and come after me,” Asher said, leaping onto the rope ladder. “I may need ye to help me kidnap the countess.”

  The scene on the deck was one to confuse a besotted man on a good day, and this was not a good day. Hannah stood nose to nose with old Mills, the sailors agog from their various posts, while the maid, Cousin Ceely, repelled boarders with a ferocious scowl.

  “And furthermore, the MacGregor will not appreciate you arguing with me, Captain! I need a boat and somebody to row it, or I’ll row it myself, but let me off this ship this instant!”

  What? “Hannah.”

  She froze as if she’d taken an arrow in the back, then did an about-face and stood her ground, back to Mills. Her boots were beside her on the freshly scrubbed deck, and the sea breeze was making inroads on her tidy bun. The front of her skirt was slashed all to hell, and she wore no gloves.