God forgive me, she had mumbled almost unintelligibly.
“I was in pain,” Dory responded evasively. “People say strange things when they think they are about to die.”
God forgive me for the hurt I have caused, for the lies I have told…
“Sure they do,” Emmy said leaning forward propping her elbows on her knees. “Confession is good for the soul right?” Emmy waited for Dory to speak.
…for the bigamy I have committed.
“Don’t have anything to say?” she asked winding her hands on the towel but Dory remained silent. “No? Fine, let me start. Are you out of your friggin’ mind?!” Emmy hissed swatting at Dory around the head and shoulders with the towel.
Dory raised her arms to protect her face but offered no other defense allowing Emmy’s ire to vent while knowing that this would not be the best moment to chide Emmy for her foul language.
“What on earth were you thinking?”
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” was the meek reply.
“Like hell you don’t know what I’m talking about, Dorcas MacLean,” Emmy leaned in and snarled, “or should I say Heather MacLean?”
“I’m not...”Dory started but was halted by the look of warning of Emmy’s face.
“Do not lie to me,” she warned tightly. “You confessed to bigamy last night. Begged God’s forgiveness for it. Are you going to lie there now and tell me you aren’t Connor’s wife?”
“I am! But I’m not Heather!” she protested then caved into tears. “Oh, please don’t tell anyone!”
“Oh, I’m going to tell anyone.” Before Dory could draw a breath of relief, Emmy continued, “You are.”
“No!” Dory/Heather whispered in horror. “He’ll kill me!”
“Which one?” was Emmy’s sarcastic reply. “You married Connor then turned around and then pretended to be another person and committed bigamy with his own brother! I will ask again, what were you thinking? You had to know it would not end well.”
But I’m not pretending to be another person!” she claimed. “I am Dorcas! It is my name! My real name!”
Emmy paused at the ring of truth and frowned. “Now I’m confused.”
“My father brought me here to take Heather’s place,” the woman bawled. “Heather was ill and the doctor’s thought she might not make it through and the wedding had been planned for so long. Rather than risk losing the settlement the earl had paid my father by trying to negotiate a change in brides from my sister to me, he made me take her place. It was a huge settlement! He kept insisting on calling me Heather, saying no one not even our mother could tell us apart. I think in a moment of madness, he may have truly believed I was her,” Dory whispered.
“You expect me to buy that load of crap?” Emmy sneered. “I wasn’t me, it was my twin nonsense?”
“It is true! I swear!” Emmy snorted but Dory, Heather? grabbed her hand. “I swear to you on the soul of my mother and the lives of my wee babes that I am telling you the truth. I am not Heather.”
Emmy stared into her desperate blue eyes for a long moment. She was in earnest that much was true. Was it possible? Had her nutty dad thrown her to the wolves for money? And at eighteen, what could she have done to stop him? “Wait, but you are his wife?”
Dory nodded miserably. “What I told you before was the truth. I fell in love with Ian the moment I saw him,” Dory swallowed painfully and continued. “At first I thought he must be Connor, my betrothed, then Father led me to Connor and introduced him…not Ian… as the one I would marry. I was devastated,” she sobbed.
“Connor isn’t a bad guy, you know,” Emmy chided.
“He scared me at the time, sometimes he still does,” she admitted. “But he didn’t love me and before you say anything, he never would have. I knew it and, I think, he did, also. If it had been Ian, I knew I would have a chance at real happiness, but in less than two days of Connor’s company, I knew I couldn’t be happy with him.”
“Why not say something then? ‘Hey, wait, I’m not Heather!’ or just ‘I don’t want to marry you’?” Emmy sat on the bed next to Dory and shook her head in disgust at the whole idea of arranged marriages. Had any of them ever turned out well?
“I begged my father not to make me do it,” she confessed tearfully. “I told him I would tell the truth or run away rather than marry Connor. My father beat me and locked me in my room and set his valet to guard my door and I never had a chance to run. They watched me all the way through the ceremony. Father had threatened me against denying the vows during the ceremony. Then it was done. I was his wife.”
“And then they stopped guarding you thinking that you were out of choices,” Emmy concluded picturing how it all played out.
“When I was allowed to go to the countess’ chambers to prepare for my wedding night,” Dory explained, “I packed a small bag and ran away.”
“And left Connor to face his greatest humiliation on his own, in front of his father and yours, the Prince of Wales and a hundred other people, I suppose?” Emmy asked.
“Don’t look at me that way,” Dory begged. “What would you have done if your father tried to force you into marriage? I know you quite well at this point, Emmy; you would not have stood for it.”
“No, I wouldn’t have,” Emmy admitted, “but I would have found a way to cut it short before I was actually married.”
“It was never consummated!”
“And that makes it all better?” Emmy asked in disbelief. “The least you could have done was not come back. Why did you? For Ian? To rub Connor’s face in your deception?”
Dory tried to push herself up in defense but lay quickly back down with a cry of pain. Emmy tsked. “Don’t be a twit. Lay back down before you tear your stitches.”
“Please don’t think of me badly, Emmy. Please,” Dory begged tearfully. “You have become like a sister to me. You are so much like her. So much like Heather.” Dory gripped her hand and sobbed.
Emmy felt herself softening from her righteous anger as Dory carried on. What would she have done, indeed! No force on earth could make her do something she didn’t want to do, so how could she really blame Dory for that? She was a product of this age and her upbringing. But to come back!
As if reading her thoughts, Dory continued. “I never meant to come back. I was determined to find a place to live far from Duart and my father. I could not forgive him for what he had made me do. I did all right in the beginning. I even found a job waiting tables for a little while but was let go when I refused to entertain male customers. After that I ran out of what little monies I had quickly and soon was sleeping on the streets of Inverary or in barns along the road. So I went, walked, back to my father’s house. When I got there it was seven months later, Mother had perished from the influenza and Heather was near death. Father was ill as well having suffered a failure of his heart after I fled.” Dory cried genuinely now awash in grief and guilt over what she had lost. “I stayed there as long as I could then I had no choice, with no other family all my father’s property went to a distant heir or to my husband. I could have either returned in shame as his wife or come in mourning as his sister-in-law. God forgive me, I chose the latter and for that my soul shall truly burn in Hell.”
“I’m sure your soul will be just fine,” Emmy consoled and patted the woman’s hand.
But Dory shook her head in denial. “I arrived here in my father’s carriage while Connor was away…”
“Looking for you.”
Chapter 41
The clearing of a deep male throat gave both women a start and they turned to find Ian framed in the doorway. His eyes were nearly black with anger or pain, Emmy couldn’t be certain, but his body was tense. “I would like to talk to my…Dorcas, if you please, Emmy.”
“Ian…” both women started in unison, but Ian held up a hand.
“If you please.”
Emmy gave a jerky nod at his tight words and cast Dory an apologetic look as she slipped out the d
oor. It shut with a soft click that was almost worse than a slamming door. Cold rage or simple devastation? She didn’t know which and wondered if she should fear for Dory uncertain whether Ian’s rage might translate to violence in an era where a man still had the right to beat his wife. Besides she had just given birth and was in no condition for any major confrontation.
Worried, Emmy leaned back against the bedroom door wondering whether she should go back in and protect Dory or tell Connor everything. Well, Dory was right about one thing. Connor was going to kill her when he found out. Hopefully it would be a figurative slaying. Surely an explanation was necessary. He deserved to know but was it her place to break the news to him? Should she have him come to speak with Dory? Bring him to save Dory from Ian? That would not be how she wanted him to learn of Dory’s deception, but if Dory were in danger from Ian, she would need Connor’s help. She hope that he wouldn’t feel compelled to violence himself.
“What are you doing?”
Emmy shifted from foot to foot unsure what to say. She was glad he was there but…“Connor, we have a problem.”
“Is it Dory? Has something happened to her?” he paled as he asked the question. Strange but he come to like the woman over the past couple weeks.
“She’s physically fine, but she was just telling me something and Ian overheard.” Emmy’s brow wrinkled with worry that was easy for Connor to read.
“What was it?”
“I don’t think it is my place...”
Setting her aside, Connor rapped on the bedroom door, but receiving no answer cracked the door and looked in. Around him, Emmy could see Ian staring into the fireplace while Dory lay staring at his back with haunted eyes. When the woman saw Connor enter the room, she moaned pitifully.
“What has happened?” Connor asked when no one spoke.
Emmy went to Dory’s side. “What did he say?”
“He hasn’t said anything!” she said desperately. “I think he hates me.”
“Well, you better tell Connor now and have done with it so you can explain.”
“No!” Dory’s anxiety was clearly written on her face and the tension of her body.
Emmy tried not to feel too much pity for Dory. Reaping what was sown, she thought. Dory should never have waited ten years for the truth to be known. “Yes!” Emmy hissed back.
“What is it?” Connor demanded. “Ian?” His brother remained by the fire casting him only a hollow stare before directing his gaze to Dory, who shifted uncomfortably under the weight of their dual glares.
“Well, Connor,” Dory cleared her throat and glanced nervously at Emmy who waved her on in encouragement. “I know we have never been on the best of terms until just recently and perhaps what I am about to say will destroy any chance of that changing, but there is something that I think you should know. It has weighed on my mind for many years and perhaps been the reason that we have never gotten on well, though you are my brother-in-law, because I haven’t wanted to say anything so always remained aloof…”
“Dory, really,” Emmy rebuked softly.
“Very well then,” Dory sighed. “My lord, I think you should know that Heather is dead.”
Connor straightened away from the door and stared her Dory in surprise before turning to Ian for confirmation, but Ian was staring with equal surprise at his wife. Clearly he hadn’t heard the whole story.
“Way to cushion the blow, Dory,” Emmy said drily.
“How long?” Connor wondered hoarsely following a long silence.
“Almost ten years,” Dory admitted.
Connor’s mind raced. Ten years? “Then she died after she left here?”
Dory bit her lip and shook her head. “She did die shortly after the wedding, but she never left here, my lord, because she never came here.”
“But of course she did,” he rebutted. “The wedding…she was…” He trailed off and gaped at Dory as the reality of her confession set in. “It was ye, wasn’t it?” His voice was low and menacing, demanding the truth and Dory gave it to him with a jerky nod. “Ye deceived me all this time?”
“I did not want to, my lord,” she looked desperately to her husband and then to Emmy for help and finally feeling sorry for the timid woman in the face of Connor’s temper, Emmy stepped in.
“Dory is not entirely at fault here, Connor.” She paused briefly as his intense gaze swung to her but pressed on. “With Heather fallen ill and maybe dying, Dory’s father coerced her to pretend to be her sister. He made her falsely marry you in order to keep with marriage settlement you had already given him. She wanted to tell you, but he beat her until she agreed to do it and then ran away.” Emmy held up a conciliatory hand. “It was wrong, she has admitted it.”
“And ye believe all this?” his voice still quietly severe, controlled. “She could be working off yer sympathy and lying to ye to gain an ally.”
“I don’t think so, Connor.”
“I am not telling this falsely, my lord,” Dory chimed in. “I never meant to deceive you. It has weighed on me these many years and deprived me true happiness in my life.”
“And yet, ye did deceive me,” he ground out as he stood, his fists balled against his side. “And ye have committed bigamy with my own brother.”
Ian flinched. “Why, Dory?” Ian whispered his voice filled with pain and despair. “Why did you come back here knowing you were my brother’s wife and marry me?”
“I never wanted to come back. I never meant to,” she appealed for understanding. “But after Father died, I had nowhere else to go. I had no money. No home.”
“Aye, I heard that much of what you said,” he admitted. “But why not admit who you were? Why did you wed me?”
“When I arrived here and saw you again, I just could not do it. I had fallen in love with you when we first met and, on my arrival, I knew that I would encourage your affections and if possible I would wed with you. I chose to damn myself,” she sobbed again. “And I have damned you as well. That was why God took my other babes before they had a chance to live. I was being punished for my sins and surely, if Emmy had not been here, I would have lost the ones we have now. I am so sorry. I have been miserable for years for what I have done!”
“Miserable?” Connor cold voice lashed like a whip. “You have been miserable? Ye’ve lived in my house for ten year amid sin and lies! Aye, I can see how ye’ve suffered as ye’ve witnessed my humiliation for so long!” His voice rose to a roar.
“Connor!” Emmy tried to cut in but Connor silenced her with a slash of his hand.
“I have heard enough! Lies! Years of lies! I want ye gone, do you understand?” He jabbed a finger at Dory. “Gone!”
The door slammed behind him as he left in his rage leaving a cowering Dory sobbing in her bed. Emmy exchanged a long look with Ian. “That went pretty well, don’t you think? I’m glad he kinda lost it there at the end. He was just too quiet before that.”
“Are you jesting?” Dory gawked at Emmy in disbelief. “Emmy, he wants me to leave my home! He looked ready to do me physical harm!”
“Oh, that,” Emmy waved dismissively. “He didn’t mean all that. He was just mad. But mad is good. Am I right, Ian? It’s like you told me before. Always stoic, never really emotional? Anger he can work out. ”
Ian shrugged still staring down at the woman he had lived as husband and wife with for ten years. Her plea had touched his heart, but his brother had made a valid point. She had made the choice that had brought his brother the greatest misery. How could he forgive her for that? “You lied to me.” His voice was low and pained.
“My father forced me into it, Ian,” Dory reached out a pleading hand to her husband and stifled a sob when he ignored it and turned away. “I never wanted to marry Connor. I loved you the moment I met you. But he beat me, made me do it.”
“But you came back here and perpetuated a lie for ten years. You saw how it had affected Connor! Why had you never told him that Heather had died?” he questioned. “You could have at
least done that for him.”
“I don’t know,” she whimpered.
“Damn you for what you have done to us. For what you have made us.”
Emmy had been feeling awkward in the face of their marital argument and considered slipping out when a tingling of a thought caught her. “Let’s not go crazy here. I’m not a lawyer by any means, but I think your mutual souls are going to be just fine.”
“What do you mean?” Dory sniffed.
“I mean that I’m about ninety-nine percent certain that you are not a bigamist,” Emmy expounded.
“What?” the pair chorused in unison.
“Emmy, what are you getting at?” Ian asked.
Emmy’s mind raced. “I mean I don’t know how the law works here but… Let me ask you this, Dory, when you married Connor, what name did you use?”
“Heather’s,” Dory whispered.
“The priest said something like ‘do you Heather…”
“Aye,” Ian offered. “He said Emeline Heather Stuart. Why?”
“And Dory said?”
“I just said ‘Yes.”
“Right!” Emmy clapped her hands together. “And when you signed the marriage certificate, you signed it…how?”
Dory and Ian exchanged a long look that spoke of their decade together. A conversation without words in spite of the present state of affairs. “With Heather’s name just as Father forced me to,” she frowned. “I think he was quite mad, you know.”
“Well, I think he was quite committing fraud,” Emmy responded watching as Ian caught on to her line of thinking. “What is the legal age of consent here?”
“The legal age of consent?” Dory echoed in confusion.
“What age do you have to be to make your own decisions legally?” Emmy clarified.
“Twenty-one,” Ian said quietly. “And she was eighteen when they wed…or not even that, were you? Just short?”
A Laird for All Time Page 27