by Julia Donner
“No, and we are all grateful. Many never came home.”
Howie whispered, “He wasn’t afraid, was he?”
“Certainly not. Your father chose his family.”
Waldo frowned. “Why has he never told us about Réveillez?”
“Your father would never whine about his losses. He behaves like the gentleman he is, and you will come to learn that there are many deemed as such, but few deserve the designation.”
Howie’s gamin features emphasized a deeply buried hurt when he stared at the floor and murmured, “Mother said Réveillez was all he cared about. Do you think that’s how he is?”
Feeling a bit trapped, she rushed to think of how to answer. She must have a care not to denigrate either parent. “Réveillez is important to this family. It’s not merely a pile of rocks. Its very name became a family motto. The castle came to us from a former Crusader knight who married the heiress and chatelaine.”
A blessed inspiration gave her the idea of how to avoid Howie’s difficult question. “Did you know that we are descendants of Highland warlords? Fighting is in our blood.”
Waldo inched closer, “Yours, too?”
“I am a McNab on my mother’s side, part of a local clan and on my father’s, the Grahams. When I went to my first grown-up party here, I wore my clan’s colors. I didn’t give a fig if it was against the law. I pinned the sash with my great, great grandmother’s brooch. Now then, do you wish to learn your history?” She waited for their nods. “Very well. Tomorrow we will take the dogcart downstream where there is a pool deep enough for a refreshing swim. Then we shall have a picnic luncheon and I shall tell you the stories. We shall do so every day the weather permits.”
When they looked at the floor, she demanded, “Come now. I thought you were eager to hear about your past.”
Howie nudged his brother with an elbow. “Tell her, Waldo.”
He muttered, “We don’t know how to swim.”
She made a disgusted noise. “Ridiculous. Then I shall teach you. Now go along with Hopton.”
She watched them glumly climb the stairs. By the time they reached the first floor landing, they were chatting with eager anticipation. She hoped Hugh didn’t come back to sons that she had let drown.
Chapter 9
Whenever the weather permitted, she drove Waldo and Howie in a dogcart to a swimming and history lesson. The dam she and Hugh had devised when they were children remained. Someone had fortified it with larger stones, deepening the pool they had created so long ago. The boys required only basic instruction before taking off on their own, fearless and wildly playful, which helped to drain their boundless energy.
Content to sit on a blanket spread on the grassy stream bank, she watched them play and frolic. The dog splashed with them, then sprawled on the turf, snuffling and rolling, before stretching out to sun and dry his black fur.
The kitchen prepared baskets of treats for the constant hunger of the youth. Sopping and laughing, they came out of the water to the blanket where they dropped down on the edge to keep her from getting wetter than she already was from an earlier lesson. This was her cue to fold back the cover cloth on the picnic basket and hand out treats to the famished boys. A meaty soup bone was included to keep the dog and his drool out of the way.
Sunlight glanced off the water. Birds restarted their songs now that the splashing had stopped. The scent of wild roses and crushed grass filled the air, an altogether splendid day.
Howie said around a mouthful of bread and jam, “Thank you for teaching me to swim. I had to learn sooner or later. Going to sea when I grow up.”
“To sea? Howie, you’ve already made the decision to join the Navy?”
While peering into the basket for another sandwich, he told her with a confidence and maturity far beyond his years, “Papa will arrange for it.”
“But Howard, you’re so young. I know you must take up a profession, but do you think you will always wish to be a seaman?”
He nodded and bit into the sandwich. “Papa said it is a sound decision.”
She kept a smile fixed on her lips while trying not to show her dismay. During the war, she’d seen war-battered ships limp into port, holes blasted in their sides, splintered masts, sails and rigging shredded. The wretched wounded were carried off, no dead bodies, since they were immediately buried out at sea. The great Nelson had to be preserved in brandy to be brought home for burial months after his death. Like the rest of the nation, she’d mourned for the great Naval hero, but she never forgot her impression of the horror of battles at sea, nor the memory of cabin and servant boys, not much older than Howie, striding down the gangplank, their small faces etched from experiences too violent to hide with their happiness to be home.
She set down her sandwich. Not for Howie, please.
Tears pricked her eyes. Startled by the strength of her emotions, she blinked to stop the wetness from pooling. In the few days since arriving at Coldstream, Hugh’s sons had captured her heart. She knew, deep in her soul, that they would champion and care for her daughter as their father had done for her.
Comfort came from the knowledge that Hugh would insist that Howie finish his education before embarking on a life at sea. Perhaps by then Howie would change his mind, but in the little time that she had known him, Howie displayed remarkable determination once his mind was set on a goal. She must keep in mind that many men returned from the sea unhurt. And wealthy, but Howie showed no interest in riches at this age, other than enacting the game of locating a pirate chest.
A question from Waldo pulled her out of useless sentimentality. “You said that you and Father made this dam?”
Since she’d shifted on the blanket to hide her distress, she had to lean sideways to answer. “It took us nearly a month. It had been an excessively warm summer and your grandmother wasn’t keen on us going with only the footmen to Loch Tay for a swim.”
“Wouldn’t your governess go along? Or Father’s manservant?”
“I had no governess at that time, and your father only had a tutor. We had the occasional lessons from a dance instructor, and of course, your father had fencing lessons in addition to whatever he could learn from our gillie.”
Waldo hunted in the basket for a biscuit. Before biting into it, he asked, “How old is Mr. Gilchrist? He’s been Coldstream’s gille forever.”
She gave them a sly look and secretively whispered, “I don’t think he ages. He looked ancient when I was a girl. Best behave, me lads. What if he’s magical?”
Grinning, Howie asked, “Mr. Gilchrist taught Father?”
“As he now teaches both of you. And pay heed. You won’t learn the right way to brawl from any Southerner.”
Waldo reached for another biscuit. Even though lean to the point of thinness, he had his father’s appetite. “Gilchrist won’t go in the water. He says he’s gotten too old to demonstrate swimming.”
Howie whispered, “Mrs. Crawford said he was common.”
Emily twitched her nose. “You might want to keep in mind that the source of her spite comes from being spurned.”
The boys gaped at her, until Waldo said, “Gilchrist offered for Mrs. Crawford? You must be daft. They’re old. She has to be fifty, if she’s a day.”
Striving to keep the irony from her reply, she pointed out, “That’s considerably younger than Mr.Gilchrist. When you get older, you’ll learn that falling in love can happen at any age.”
Howie gave his too intent attention to the task of plucking a blade of grass, alerting her that he was about to pose an interesting question. “And that’s what happened with you and Father? He’s almost as old as Mr. Gilchrist.”
Emily pursed her lips to keep from laughing. “Uhm, not quite that old.”
Before she could inform them that their father was forty years younger than the gillie, they heard the rhythmic thuds of an approaching horse. Hugh appeared, riding an elegant hack with gleaming bay coat and cropped tail. He dismounted and tethered the horse to a st
out branch.
When the dog lunged up to greet him with slobbering canine enthusiasm, Hugh stopped him with a single word and the point of one finger. The dog dropped to the ground and stared up in adoration. Hugh murmured praise as he unbuttoned his long, split-backed riding coat. After removing it, he draped it over the saddle seat and released the dog to freedom with a wave of his hand.
He wore buckskins and a pristine cambric shirt with no neckwear. She hadn’t seen him so casually dressed since childhood. It looked odd, making her as uncomfortable as if he were nude. The plain shirt emphasized the broadness of his shoulders, narrowness of his waist and hips, and strong horseman’s thighs. She experienced an odd quiver when he sat beside her on the blanket.
An unexpected bout of nerves had her quickly warning, “Hugh, this blanket is more wet than dry.”
“I’ll survive.” He smiled at the welcoming chorus from his sons and answered their eager questions before asking one of his own. “Has she shown you the secret grotto?”
Waldo and Howie exchanged stares of wide-eyed surprise mixed with curiosity. They shook their heads in unison.
Hugh bumped her shoulder with his, a funning reprimand. “No fair, madam. You shall have to tell them and show them on the next outing. It’s downstream from here.”
“Did you swim in it?” Howie asked.
“No, it’s too shallow, but the water is so clear and still you can watch the fish. We enacted versions of the Lady of the Lake legend.”
Waldo gazed at her with hopeful eyes. “Yes, please, we’d love to see it.” Under his breath he muttered to Howie, “I get to be Arthur.”
Howie sneered. “Doesn’t matter a jot to me. I prefer the villain. They’re more interesting. Papa, how old were you when you built the dam?”
A smile quirked up one side of Hugh’s mouth when he glanced at Emily. She looked away when she realized he was amused by her flustered state. ”Well, Em? Were we nine or ten?”
“I was seven,” she corrected. “You were ten. Who added the larger rocks since then?”
Hugh crossed his booted ankles. “I did to create more depth.” He said to the boys, “Did you know that a battle was fought upstream? It’s been over a hundred years ago, but one can still find artifacts, especially after a heavy rainfall.”
Waldo and Howie locked gazes, mumbled excuses and leaped up, bare feet flying as they returned to the stream. Emily called a warning for them to beware of stepping on sharp objects, which was largely ignored.
Beside her, Hugh leaned back on his elbows, looking pleased to watch the activity in the stream. After a while, he said, “Thank you, Emily.”
Also watching, she murmured, “For what?”
“This is how they were…before. Happy, full of fun, not mischief, which reminds me. Why didn’t you tell me about the frog and talcum powder incidents?”
She gave her head a little shake. “You’ll get no tales from me, sir.”
His warm hand covered hers where it rested on the blanket. He softly said, “Still, I’m grateful.”
Billowing clouds muted the sunlight, creating slow moving shadows. They sat in companionable silence, content to allow the youngsters to expend their energies on a frenetic search of the shallows. Water coursed over the dam, a bubbling, gurgling music over the rocks. The stones they’d laid so long ago were sheathed in furry moss in comparison to the newer, clean-faced ones Hugh had placed to deepen the pool. The boys gradually made their search of the rippling stream, investigating with their toes, retrieving uninteresting items that they discarded with a fling downstream.
She wasn’t quite sure when she realized what was happening with their handclasp. He hadn’t released her. His thumb had been moving lightly over the back of her wrist, a thoughtless caress. At some point, she had unconsciously turned her hand so that their palms merged, gliding skin against skin, discovering textures in a slow dance of exploration, fingers threading, sliding. They stilled at the same time and carefully withdrew.
From the corner of her eye, she saw his narrowed gaze. She sensed that he was no longer concentrating on his sons and now focused on an intense inner inventory. Like her, he was unsettled by the recent physical exchange, one neither of them had expected. It had started as the touch of simple companionship, of quiet contentment, but gradually moved to leisurely foreplay.
Did he feel as she did, this charged, fretful yearning? Every stroke of his fingers had evoked a desire that had lain dormant the last months, waiting under the surface of her worries.
Restless and strangely anxious, she tried to make sense of the bewildering pull of something she’d never felt before. All the flirting and lovemaking of the past—she hadn’t lied to herself—she’d known with every encounter that it had been a substitution for love.
George and hers had been a true marriage, but it had been arranged and presented to her as something she must do. There had been no other choice for a girl in her position. Although they took pleasure in one another, there was never a sense of intimacy, certainly nothing like what she experienced moments ago with nothing more than a simple handclasp.
She tried to think back to how often she and Hugh had actually had physical contact, skin to skin. During church and carriage rides, when she’d snuggled against him for warmth, there had been layers of clothes. When they shook hands at weddings, funerals, parties, there had been gloves. No congratulatory kisses had been shared at their marriages. But today, Hugh’s light caresses had felt more erotic than some of the shocking acts her former partners had insisted she try. The sensation of Hugh’s flesh on hers left pin-prickles on her arms and a curious nervousness within. She became acutely aware of a compelling urge to roll across the blanket and sprawl over his chest, rub herself against the length of that lean body that constantly radiated tension.
She blinked to restore and center her thoughts. But with Hugh, her friend and cousin?
They both flinched when a piercing, high-pitched shriek silenced the birds. Howie stood on the stream bank, pointing at the water. “Father, he hasn’t come up!”
Chapter10
Hugh was off the blanket and at the stream’s edge before Emily could gather her skirts and stand. His dive arrowed through the air and sliced into the pool. Horror clutched her heart to stillness. The pool was too shallow for diving unless he entered beyond the drop-off.
The dog whined from the bank as she waded into the water. She pulled Howie back before he could follow his father. His arms came around her waist in a desperate embrace. They stood in the water as he cried and babbled his brother’s name into her side.
She gripped his shoulder. “Howie, what happened?”
Howie started to speak but stopped when his father came up for air and went under the surface again. “We found a dirk. Just there, under the spill. Waldo dropped it and dove under to find it. The cascade must have carried him into the deeper part.”
In silence they watched where the pool’s surface rippled, the disturbance from Hugh’s underwater search. Ripples moved across the depths, showing where he kicked. The plunk and swish of boots breaking the surface and the rushing water spilling over the dam were the only sounds. The songbirds and dog had gone silent.
What had happened to Waldo? Would Hugh be able to see him in the troubled water? The constant downpour from the dam made for murky vision underneath. She remembered it well, the tangle of branches and limbs on the rocky bottom, her shift hem getting snagged. She’d been caught down there once and had endured some frantic moments working to tear the material free.
Sunshine’s bright reflections glanced off the turbulence. Emily clenched her teeth to hold back a sob rising in her throat. She had to stay calm for Howie, but this time, Hugh had been under the water for too long. What if whatever had snagged Waldo had also entangled Hugh? He still had his boots on, now full of water and weighing him down.
A sudden gush of water and loud gasp for air brought Hugh upwards into the sunlight. Waldo hung over his shoulder, limp and still. E
mily kept a tight grasp on Howie’s hand as she inched toward them, careful to search with her bared toes for the sharp decline. The mud had a tendency to collapse, slide out and dissolve into the deep.
Between gasps for air, Hugh said, “Emily, let go. Get yourself and Howie up on the bank.”
She hadn’t realized that both she and Howie were hanging on to his shirt as he slogged through the water. She pried Howie’s hand free and pulled him with her. She knelt on the blanket as Hugh lay his limp burden down. Waldo’s white lips and complexion looked deathlike. He held fast to a dirk in one fist.
Hugh rolled Waldo onto his stomach to straddle his back, while Emily lifted the boy’s arms out of the way. His skin, cold and lifeless as clay, sent a shiver of terror up her spine. As soon as Waldo was positioned, she pulled Howie onto her lap. She wrapped her arms around his narrow shoulders, as much for her comfort as for his. They watched Hugh’s fingers encase Waldo’s ribcage, squeeze and compress the lungs. Time was the enemy.
Howie began to cry in wracking sobs when the task went on and on, compress and release, compress and release. Droplets dripped from the hanging strands of Hugh’s hair. His concentration and rhythm never faltered.
Hugh sat back on his heels when Waldo coughed, choked and spat up water. Emily turned her face aside and bit into the base of her palm to smother an escaped sob of relief. When she turned back, Hugh was watching her. He wore a rueful smile and an expression she couldn’t decipher. His shoulders and arms shivered as panic’s rush subsided.
Wearing a weak grin, Waldo blinked up at his father. “Look, I didn’t let go. It’s for you.”
Hugh looked down at the dagger Waldo held and gathered up his son in a desperate embrace. Waldo dropped the knife and hugged his father’s neck. “Papa, I’m sorry, I made you ruin your boots.”
“I have more. I don’t have another you.” He kissed Waldo’s cheek. “Let’s get you home and in bed. Keep your arms around my neck and your legs around my waist while I get mounted.”